Comments on: Controlled Unclassified Info May Be Classified, US-Czech Doc Says

By: iklan baris gratis

iklan baris gratis — Sun, 19 Jul 2009 10:35:14 +0000

Thanks Nemo, I think that’s a reasonable explanation of what was intended.

By: Nemo

Nemo — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 00:29:36 +0000

It could very well be boilerplate – a lot of governments that have less institutional transparency than the U.S. have in the past been – and one presumes, still are – appalled at the apparent power (or danger, depending on ones view) of the FOIA. Perhaps it’s just a way of appeasing less enlightened countries’ concerns?

It’s perhaps worth noting that the 2003 US-UK missile defense MOU predates the actual implementation – but not the passing – of the UK’s FOI law, which didn’t really go into effect until 2005, and was still a hotly-debated (and much-misunderstood and -maligned) bit of legislation in ‘03. Only now are politicians there starting to realize it isn’t the appalling travesty everyone used to think it was (if only because so few people make use of it, alas.)

Purely as an aside, I suspect the ability to classify previously-unclassified foreign material has interesting implications for the fun and exciting field of “derivative classification”…

By: Steven Aftergood

Steven Aftergood — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 23:38:05 +0000

Thanks Nemo, I think that’s a reasonable explanation of what was intended. I would note, however, that foreign government information is already exempt from disclosure under FOIA. (It is also eligible for classification under the terms of the executive order.) It therefore seems surprising to me — and an unfortunate precedent — that the agreement invokes classification of unclassified information (CUI) as a option for evading FOIA. On the other hand, I recently learned (from Alasdair Roberts) that nearly-identical language regarding classification of CUI previously appeared in the 2003 US-UK memorandum of agreement on missile defense. It may even be considered boilerplate.

By: Nemo

Nemo — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 23:01:07 +0000

Trying to play devil’s advocate for a minute, it seems to me that the article can be read as only applying to information regarding the Czech-US missile deal. I don’t know anything about the Czech Republic’s FOIA laws, if any, but I’d suspect that that clause is in there as a way for the U.S. to exempt from release information the Czechs don’t (necessarily) want made public about the program. I do not believe that the U.S. has any sort of reciprocal classification arrangement with the Czech Republic itself – with NATO, yes, but that isn’t really applicable here – so this is, at a guess, a way to appease Prague that their secrets aren’t going to *automatically* become fair game for all their neighbors, just because the U.S. doesn’t formally, legally, recognize their classification markings…

By: Theron

Theron — Mon, 14 Jul 2008 23:08:11 +0000

Say what?

Read Orwell’s “Politics and the English Language.”

Reflect also upon this comment:

“A people that grows accustomed to sloppy writing is a people in process of losing grip on its empire and itself. And this looseness and blowsiness is not anything as simple and scandalous as abrupt and disordered syntax. It concerns the relation of expression to meaning. ” Ezra Pound

No matter how one looks at the language and the logic expressed therein, the langauge of the power elite confuses and detaches expression from meaning. It hides and distorts any semblance of reality.

No wonder the current administration attacks science, deletes evidence and fears modern art.