Information Lockdown

by BRUCE SHAPIRO

Viewers of the old spy spoof Get Smart will remember the Cone of Silence--that giant plastic hair-salon dryer that descended over Maxwell Smart and Control when they held a sensitive conversation. Today, a Cone of Silence has descended over all of Washington: From four-star generals to lowly webmasters, the town is in information lockdown. Never in the nation's history has the flow of information from government to press and public been shut off so comprehensively and quickly as in the weeks following September 11. Much of the shutdown seems to have little to do with preventing future terrorism and everything to do with the Administration's laying down a new across-the-board standard for centralized control of the public's right to know.

The most alarming evidence of the new climate emanates from the Justice Department. Investigators still hold in custody 150 of the 800 people rounded up in the aftermath of the attacks. (One detainee died in custody in New Jersey.) No charges have been filed, no hearings convened. The names of nearly all those still held remain classified, as do the reasons for their incarceration. Lawyers for some of the hundreds cleared and released have told reporters of questionable treatment of their clients--food withheld, attorneys blocked from access. Of the 150 who remain detained, only four presumed Al Qaeda suspects have been publicly named. FBI agents frustrated at the lack of progress in their interrogations of those four now mutter in the Washington Post about using sodium pentothal, or turning the suspects over to a country where beatings or other torture is used. The government's stranglehold on information about other arrests makes it impossible to know just how far agents have already gone down that road, or whether the dragnet was mainly a public-relations exercise.

Just as damaging as these detentions is an October 12 memo from Attorney General John Ashcroft reversing longstanding Freedom of Information Act policies. In 1993 then-Attorney General Janet Reno directed agencies to disclose any government information upon request unless it was "reasonably foreseeable that disclosure would be harmful." Ashcroft reverses this presumption, instead calling on agencies to withhold information whenever the law permits: "You can be assured that the Department of Justice will defend your decisions," he writes. Ashcroft is in effect creating a "born secret" standard; in the words of the Federation of American Scientists, the order "appears to exploit the current circumstances" to turn FOIA into an Official Secrets Act.

One after another, federal agencies are removing public data from their websites or restricting access to their public reading rooms. Caution is understandable, but OMB Watch and Investigative Reporters and Editors have both documented egregious examples that seem at best tangentially related to terrorism and more likely designed as butt-coverage for mid-level bureaucrats. The Energy Department has removed information from its web-posted Occurrence Reporting Program, which provides news of events that could adversely affect public health or worker safety. The EPA removed information from its site about the dangers of chemical accidents and how to prevent them, information the FBI says carries no threat of terrorism. More relevant than Al Qaeda, it appears, was hard lobbying by the chemical industry, which found the site an annoyance. The FAA pulled the plug on long-available lists of its security sanctions against airports around the country--depriving reporters of their only tool for evaluating the agency's considerable failures to enforce its own public safety findings. At the Pentagon, news has been reduced to a trickle far more constricted than anything during Kosovo, which in turn was more restrictive than during the Gulf War. So comprehensive is the shutdown that on October 13, presidents of twenty major journalists' organizations declared in a joint statement that "these restrictions pose dangers to American democracy and prevent American citizens from obtaining the information they need."

In the short run, the Cone of Silence did most damage at the Centers for Disease Control. Could the two (at this writing) Washington, DC, postal workers who died of inhalation anthrax have been protected by earlier treatment? Did any of the CDC's doctors or scientists recommend a course of antibiotics for postal workers along the trajectory of anthrax-laden letters? Who knows? With the CDC's staff muzzled, the public and postal workers alike were left with politicians as the conduits for contradictory and inadequate information about the risk.

The uncertain dimensions of the Al Qaeda threat make equally uncertain which information the government publishes might contribute to another attack and what to do about it. But it should be noted that the World Trade Center and Pentagon attacks apparently involved data no more confidential than an airline schedule. The Administration's response has been to treat all information and press access as suspect--an approach that will subvert public confidence and undercut legitimate media scrutiny more than it will damage Al Qaeda. During Vietnam, the famous credibility gap resided at the Pentagon, with briefings and Congressional testimony at odds with battlefield evidence. Just weeks into this war, the Bush Administration is risking a new credibility gap roughly the size of the District of Columbia.

thenation.com

-- (fucking@Nazi.bastards), October 30, 2001

Answers

New York Press

Le Maitre Taki

Heroes & Villains

This is for any firefighter, police officer, rescue worker or relative of a victim–in fact anyone who knows the difference between right and wrong: The next time you see an Oliver Stone movie advertised, do not give a penny of your hard-earned money. Boycott the theater, and boycott any film company that finances this pig’s unwatchable garbage.

The paronomastic Stone publicly called Sept. 11 a revolt, as revolting a remark as I can think of. I had the bad luck to meet and dine with Stone a couple of times around 10 or 15 years ago. He craves publicity and attention, ergo his conspiracy theories and unbridled hate for Uncle Sam. Knock the old boy, invent all sort of lies, and the media and Hollywood are sure to notice. This is the Oliver Stone creed. I hope to relieve myself on his grave.

Mind you, the only positive thing to emerge from the Sept. 11 rubble is that Hollywood suddenly has taken cops, firefighters and the military to heart. Just think about it. It took the murder of thousands of innocent people for those craven vulgarians in Hollywood to come to their senses, and then only because they fear the reaction of the people. Since the 1960s, it’s been trendy to make the U.S. government, the CIA, the FBI and the military the heavy. Patriotism was depicted by Hollywood as an emotion felt by crypto-Nazis, racists, homophobes and squares. Let’s see. When was the last time a Hollywood film did not portray the military as bloodthirsty rednecks? When was the last time a movie showed a priest as kind and altruistic, rather than a child-molesting bigot? When was the last time Hollywood showed cops for what they really are, good men out to serve and protect the public?

Last week, while flicking the channels, I came upon a movie that showed four young men sitting around a room. A large American flag was on the wall. Before I heard a word they were saying I told the mother of my children that they were skinhead Nazis out to murder black people. You’ll have to take my word for it, but this is exactly what they turned out to be. The flag on the wall gave the plot away. Since the 60s the flag has been a symbol to denigrate (it was used as a bedspread, tablecloth, even as underwear). I know, I know, this is what freedom of speech is all about, and I would go along with it, as long as we had real freedom of speech. But the only ones free to insult, denigrate and malign have been those insulting the flag, the military and the church.

Let me give you a perfect example of a double standard. Hollywood has avoided making films that deal with communist totalitarianism, while movies about Nazi Germany and the Holocaust are produced with regularity. Are Stalin’s victims not victims enough for a film? True, Nazi Germany was our enemy, while the Soviets were our allies, but the evil empire lasted 70 years and the Cold War began in 1946, whereas the Nazis were only 12 years in power. The Soviet Union murdered millions, as have the Chinese communists, but Hollywood has not dared make a film like Burnt by the Sun, the extraordinary work by Nikita Mikhalkov on what Stalinism was all about. It was dedicated to "all those who have been burnt by the sun of revolution."

Hollywood’s left-liberal culture has always been infected by Popular Frontism and anti-anti-communism. It was this kind of culture that made possible the constant attacks on the U.S. government and the military. Scummy so-called trendies like Robert Redford reveled in their anti-American messages, completely ignoring the fact that millions upon millions fled their native lands in unofficial global plebiscites against Marxist socialism. But since Sept. 11, Hollywood has changed its tune. In fact some of the most powerful figures of La-la-land are discussing with the White House how they can help spread the message abroad and at home about the war on terrorism. The only thing that comes to mind is that it’s about time. These creeps have not suddenly seen the light. It’s more the other way ’round. They know that making anti-American films will not wash, at least not inside these United States. So now, all of a sudden, we’re all patriots.

I write following the funeral of Christian Reganhard, on Friday, Oct. 26. I met him in judo class, as wonderful and polite a young man as you’ll ever hope to run across. He was 28 years old, as tough as he was gentle, and left the Marine Corps in order to join the FDNY only last January. Assigned to Ladder 131 in Brooklyn, he died the way he lived, heroically, while trying to save others. He was the son of a New York police detective. He was the prototype Hollywood villain. Patriotic, respectful of the flag, a gentleman, a churchgoer, he had all the attributes the freaks and conmen of Hollywood detested.

The booing of the Clintons in Madison Square Garden was well-deserved. A pig like Harvey Weinstein and the grotesque Clintons can try to benefit from the tragedy, but the firefighters did not fall for it. After all, they embody what the Clintons, Weinstein and the rest of the rabble have always hated and looked down upon. The vast right-wing conspiracy lives.

-- -- (fucking@Commie.bastards), October 30, 2001.

HUUUH???? Does this have something to do with the subject of my thread?

LOL!! Typical asshole Repug, when confronted with the disgusting truth about the consequences of your actions, you change the subject with an attack against a totally unrelated subject!

I will thank you to start your own threads from now on asshole, and stay with my subject or stay the fuck out!

-- fuck off (you worthless repug @ piece. of shit), October 30, 2001.

in-fighting, yup' just what we need!!

I must really be getting old, i can remember a time ,when folk's respected 1 another.

but like the bible say's ''in the last day's=pride will rule''

then the fall.

-- al-d. (dogs@zianet.com), October 30, 2001.

FCB, good post.

-- (roland@hatemail.com), October 31, 2001.