Our Increasingly Secret Government

Barack Obama consistently talks about how McCain and Palin will bring more of the same to Washington. When it comes to government secrecy, he is absolutely correct (among many other reasons). It was found yesterday that Governor Palin had over 1100 emails hidden from the people of Alaska while charging the state for her family's travel to and fro the capitol and their home in Wasilla, despite being paid $125,000 a year for her position. Basically, the self-labeled reformer is full of it and clearly has something to hide from her state and as a VP nominee, every single American in the other forty-nine states as well. So if you are a fan of secrecy, then she is an excellent choice to help McCain with more of this:

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.

McCain has become more secretive with the press now that the Bushie lobbyists are on his team. Palin has the secrecy thing down and now I realize that the Republicans are right, she is clearly experienced....at being a corrupt Republican. As far as governing goes she is horrendous but to McCain and the Republican leadership, campaigning for power is the only thing that matters, not the quality government that the American people deserve.

EmailGate?

It takes an army these days to keep track of all the scandals emanating from the White House. Prosecutor-gate, GSA-gate, NSA-gate, illegal war-gate and so much more continuously makes the news because of the corrupt Bush Administration. Well now there is yet another potential abuse of power perpetrated by George's merry men.

From The LA Times:

Waxman told the Los Angeles Times in a statement that a separate "e-mail system for high-ranking White House officials would raise serious questions about violations of the Presidential Records Act," which requires the preservation and ultimate disclosure of e-mails about official government business.

Waxman's initial request to the RNC seeks e-mails relating to the presentation of campaign polling and strategy information to Cabinet agency appointees. He is also expected to ask for e-mails relating to Abramoff's activities, which Waxman is also investigating.

The Senate and House Judiciary Committees are also expected to formally request e-mail records from the RNC that relate to last year's firing of eight U.S. attorneys.

The private e-mail system came to light in the U.S. attorney controversy because one of Rove's deputies used an RNC-maintained e-mail domain — gwb43.com — to communicate with the Justice Department about replacing one of those prosecutors.

So from the prosecutor purge debacle this new potential scandal is coming to light. Using back-channel emails in this manner may violate the Presidential Records Act because of the White House's desire for ultimate secrecy. That hush-hush attitude has gotten the Administration in hot water already and this can just add more fuel to the fire.

Republicans are visibly worried over this latest request for information by Congressman Waxman because of the damning material that may be in those emails. Using the government for political maneuvering in this manner is a serious no-no and it doesn't seem that the White House really cared to follow those rules. Republican officials say that they created the email system to avoid troubles that arose in the Clinton years, but as the Republican and former Asst. Press Secretary Adam Levine said: "the road to hell is paved with good intentions."