White House demands total secrecy for US spy budget

[leftchick]

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&ncid=1504&e=4&u=/afp/20041020/pl_afp/us_spy_secrecy_041020071330


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"Disclosing to the nation's enemy, especially during wartime, the amounts requested by the president, and provided by the Congress, for the conduct of the nation's intelligence activities would harm the national security," national security adviser Condoleezza Rice (news - web sites) and White House budget director Joshua Bolten wrote in a letter Tuesday to chief House-Senate negotiators.


Analysts said the White House demand had dampened the hopes of those who have waged a persistent fight for greater transparency in the US intelligence community.


The White House request came after the Senate and House of Representatives came up earlier this month with vastly different versions of a bill aimed at reorganizing the Central Intelligence Agency (news - web sites) and other parts of the intelligence community in order to make them more efficient.


The Senate bill calls, among other things, for doing away with a decades-old practice of keeping secret the amount of money the US government spends annually on spy operations abroad. It stops short, however, of disclosing specifics.

[izzie]

1. Bad news

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[gavodotcom]

2. Isn't this against the 9/11 Commission's findings?

I thought that intelligence spending was supposed to be subject to oversight--within reason, of course--to ensure to the public that the spooks were spending the money on the right priorities.

I could be completely wrong on my source, I've spent so much time reading, I'm sure there could be a mix-up.

If I'm right, though, wouldn't it be a fairly stupid position to take by the administration leading into the election?

[shraby]

3. Has the administration taken

any positions that were NOT stupid?

[gavodotcom]

4. lol, yeah, but this is taking it to the extreme.

That's an incredibly tough sell with two weeks left to go. They'll get creamed on this if the association's repeatedly made. They must have a lot of faith in the media. People *heart* the 9/11 Commission, even though I know the administration's position against it.

[ogradda]

5. well lets see $$ knowledge is dangerous

releasing the name of an actual SPY is ok tho:eyes: