Senator Arlen Specter (R-PA) last week reintroduced three bills that he said were needed to limit presidential power and to restore the proper constitutional balance among the three branches of government. The first bill (S.875) would instruct courts not to rely on a presidential signing statement when interpreting the meaning of any statute. (Similar legislation […]
While official secrecy is a serious impediment to democratic vitality, the continuing decline of news gathering, reporting and editorial capacity could be a potential catastrophe. It is still unclear whether new and nascent forms of information sharing can provide a satisfactory substitute. The Knight Commission on the Information Needs of Communities in a Democracy is […]
At the direction of Congress, the Congressional Research Service does not make its products directly available to the public. Recent CRS reports obtained by Secrecy News include the following (all pdf). “Legal Analysis of Religious Exemptions for Photo Identification Requirements,” April 13, 2009. “Federal Advisory Committees: An Overview,” April 16, 2009. “Piracy Off the Horn […]
Pakistan’s nuclear weapons are “widely dispersed” says Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. Does that include the large weapons storage complex at Sargodha? Click for image. . By Hans M. Kristensen Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has expressed concern over the safety of Pakistan’s nuclear weapons in the light of increasing violence in the country. The […]
By Hans M. Kristensen Russia’s Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs, Sergey Ryabkov, gave a lengthy reaction to the FAS/NRDC report From Counterforce to Minimal Deterrence during a press conference Wednesday. The transcript from the press conference shows that in response to a question that the “report [is] suggesting a possible retargeting of US missile from […]
Following an August 28, 2008 explosion at the Bayer CropScience facility in Institute, West Virginia, Bayer used official secrecy restrictions to limit public awareness of the accident and to impede investigators from the U.S. Chemical Safety Board, a congressional review found. “Bayer engaged in a campaign of secrecy by withholding critical information from local, county, […]
The Senate Intelligence Committee released a newly declassified account of the opinions issued by the Justice Department Office of Legal Counsel concerning CIA’s interrogation and detention program during the Bush Administration. The document is neutral, dispassionate, and maybe a little dull, particularly when compared with the gruesomely detailed contents of some of the OLC opinions […]
Updated below By all authoritative accounts, Rep. Jane Harman (D-CA) did not interfere in the investigation of two former pro-Israel lobbyists who were suspected of unlawfully receiving and transmitting classified information. She did not seek to win favorable treatment for them from the Justice Department. They did not receive any such treatment. And she did […]
“The value and the major limitations” of a recently released CIA documentary collection on Col. Ryszard Kuklinkski, the Polish official who provided a vast quantity of political and military intelligence to the CIA in the 1970s and early 1980s, are assessed by Mark Kramer of Harvard University in a new publication of the Cold War […]
The disclosure of four Bush-era Office of Legal Counsel opinions on interrogation and torture is likely to have significant political and perhaps legal consequences. But their release is also a landmark in national security classification policy. These OLC memos, released by the Justice Department yesterday, were among the most urgently sought and the most fiercely […]
Former Justice Department attorney Thomas Tamm, who was one of the early sources for the December 2005 New York Times story on warrantless government surveillance and who is under threat of prosecution for having revealed classified information without authorization, yesterday received the Ridenhour Prize for Truth-Telling. The Ridenhour Prizes, named for the late Ron Ridenhour […]
Noteworthy new reports from the Congressional Research Service, obtained by Secrecy News, include the following (all pdf). “The National Intelligence Council: Issues and Options for Congress,” April 10, 2009. “Pakistan’s Capital Crisis: Implications for U.S. Policy,” updated March 6, 2009. “Direct Overt U.S. Aid and Military Reimbursements to Pakistan, FY2002-FY2009,” updated April 15, 2009. “China-U.S. […]