A new “secrecy report card” by OpenTheGovernment.org finds that by almost every measure, government secrecy is rising. Some of the report’s indicators:
– “The government spent $195 maintaining the secrets already on the books for every one dollar the government spent declassifying documents, a 5 percent increase in one year.”
– “18 percent of the requested Department of Defense (DOD) acquisition funding is for classified, or ‘black,’ programs. Classified acquisition funding has more than doubled in real terms since FY 1995.”
– “Federal surveillance activity under the jurisdiction of the secretive Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court has risen for the 9th consecutive year — more than double the amount in 2000.”
The report credited Congress with attempting to increase government transparency, while at the same time Bush has tried to block such measures.
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