There's a "total meltdown" in America's intelligence services -- and the Bush administration's penchant for secrecy is one of the major reasons why, current and former top U.S. spooks charged Tuesday. George W. Bush's White House has pushed like few . . . . There's a "total meltdown" in America's intelligence services -- and the Bush administration's penchant for secrecy is one of the major reasons why, current and former top U.S. spooks charged Tuesday. George W. Bush's White House has pushed like few before it to put government information out of the public's grasp. Moves to classify documents are up 400 percent from a decade ago, to more than 23 million such actions in 2002, according to the Information Security Oversight Office, a division of the National Archives. But despite their cloak-and-dagger reputation, several of the country's leading spies, past and present, aren't happy about the rush to make things secret. To counter far-reaching, stealthy terrorist cabals, the country needs more openness, not less, they said Wednesday at Geo-Intel 2003, a first-of-its-kind conference here on the use of satellites in war, intelligence and homeland security. "Our secrecy system is all about protecting secrecy officers, and has nothing to do with protecting secrets. It's a self-licking ice-cream cone," said Rich Haver, until recently Donald Rumsfeld's special assistant for intelligence, now with Northrop Grumman. "We're compartmentalizing the shit out of things. It's causing a total meltdown of our intelligence processes." The link for this article located at Wired is no longer available. . Ex-intelligence officials and operatives from the U.S. disclose significant problems within the intelligence community linked to the opaque strategies of the Bush administration.. Intelligence Failures, Government Openness, CIA Operations, Information Classification. . Anthony Pell
President Bush has signed an executive order that explicitly gives the government the power to classify information about critical infrastructures such as the Internet. Bush late Tuesday changed the definition of what the government may classify as confidential, secret and . . . . President Bush has signed an executive order that explicitly gives the government the power to classify information about critical infrastructures such as the Internet. Bush late Tuesday changed the definition of what the government may classify as confidential, secret and top-secret to include details about "infrastructures" and weapons of mass destruction. The new executive order also makes clear that information related to "defense against transnational terrorism" is classifiable. In his executive order, which replaces a 1995 directive signed by President Bill Clinton, Bush said that information that already had been declassified and released to the public could be reclassified by a federal agency. Clinton's order said that "information may not be reclassified after it has been declassified and released to the public." The link for this article located at news.com is no longer available. . President Bush has signed an executive order that explicitly gives the government the power to class. president, signed, executive, order, explicitly, gives, government, power, class. . Anthony Pell
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