Big Brother Joins The Fourth Estate

I asked this question a couple of days ago, but based on this story about the CIA's denial of requests under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), I must ask it again; what country am I living in?

I'm concerned by this in particular:

In its lawsuit, the archive said the CIA had rejected immediate waivers for 42 FOIA requests over the last year, demanding in many cases to know how its requests were related to current events. The delayed FOIA requests dealt with issues such as U.S. assistance to Afghan rebels after the 1976 Soviet invasion.

The CIA told the archive that it would not waive search and duplication fees because many of the requests would not interest the general public.

Thomas Blanton, the archive's executive director, said the response was illegal and potentially dangerous for the entire FOIA process.

"This means they get to decide what's news," Blanton said.

Yep.

Let’s see...illegal NSA spying, altering of records at the National Archives, and now the CIA gets to play Woodward and Bernstein.

Of course, we can ALWAYS find out which celebrity is getting married, divorced, pregnant, or posing on behalf of one worthy cause or another. Meanwhile, it gets harder and harder to find out information like this (from this link):

"According to the U.S. Treasury Department, America's first 42 Presidents, from George Washington (1789) to Bill Clinton (2000), borrowed a combined total of $1.01 trillion from foreign governments and financial institutions. From 2000 to 2006, the Bush White House has borrowed $1.05 trillion alone. Yes, that means we have borrowed in the last 5 years what we had previously borrowed in the first 211 years of our country."

A legacy of unmatched secrecy AND debt to go with it; whatever comes after us one day will think us mad for allowing this to go on.