Hiding Behind a Wall of Secrecy

[seemslikeadream]

By LINDA SEEBACH
Nov 8, 2004, 06:23

A coalition of journalism groups is very concerned that the bill establishing a national intelligence director will emerge from a conference committee with provisions that would make it harder to expose government misconduct as well as making the nation safer.
Given the tendency of officials to try to restrict public access to information that makes them look bad, the former outcome is unfortunately more likely than the latter.

The National Conference of Editorial Writers, to which I belong, has an informal committee that recommends whether the organization should take a position on public issues. Last week, committee members were asked about a proposed letter from the Coalition of Journalists for Open Government (www.cjog.net) to members of the conference committee currently trying to reconcile the House and Senate versions of the intelligence-reorganization bill.

"You might ask," wrote Pete Weitzel for the coalition, "why the bill is so far along and we're just waving the flag." He goes on to say that the language of the bill doesn't overtly talk about secrecy provisions, but, combined with parts of the Homeland Security Act, it would allow the intelligence director "to dramatically expand the use of gag measures like polygraph tests, pre-publication review, mandatory logging of journalist contacts and non-disclosure agreements."

more
http://www.capitolhillblue.com/artman/publish/article_5666.shtml

[NVMojo]

1. the media lapdogs won't have a problem with this ...

they will let the Bush admin do the work for them by press releases. We will lose true journalism in America completely.

[mhr]

2. What's New - More Of The Same From The Bush Administration

The Broader American Public Could Care Less - More Red-State Ignorance Is Bliss Idiocy.

[cubsfan forever]

3. Same stuff, different day n/t

Professor 2