CDR: Re: New penalties to silence whistle blowers

[Bill Stewart]

At 04:43 PM 10/13/00 -0400, George at orwellian.org wrote:
>http://foxnews.com/national/101300/leaks.sml
>
>Congress Increases Penalty for Classified Leaks
>
>Friday, October 13, 2000
>
>An intelligence bill passed by Congress could stifle the ability of 
>whistle-blowers and the media to get information to the public by 
>expanding criminal penalties for government employees leaking secrets.
>[snip]

David Lesher forwarded the following to Cyberia-L

SECRECY NEWS
from the FAS Project on Government Secrecy
October 13, 2000

**      CONGRESS ADOPTS OFFICIAL SECRETS ACT

CONGRESS ADOPTS OFFICIAL SECRETS ACT

Congress yesterday approved the Intelligence Authorization Act for
FY 2001, including a provision that criminalizes the disclosure
of any information that the executive branch says is properly
classified.

It is a breathtaking removal of checks and balances on the
executive branch, and an undeserved endorsement of the highly
arbitrary national security classification system.  It is part
of the worst intelligence bill ever legislated, adopted by one
of the worst congresses in the country's history.

"This provision marks the first time that Congress has placed
the full force of criminal law behind the executive branch's
classification system," said Rep. Nancy Pelosi on the House
floor yesterday.

"This ... will create, make no mistake about it, with not one
day of hearings, without one moment of public debate, without
one witness, an official secrets act," said Rep. Bob Barr. "For
those who do not know what an official secrets act is, it is
something that we have never had in this country. It has been
broached many times, particularly in the Cold War era. But our
regard for constitutional civil liberties, our regard for the
first amendment ... has in every case in which an effort has been
made to enact an official secrets act beaten back those efforts."

Until now.  Yesterday's House floor debate on the Intelligence
Authorization Act is posted here:

 http://www.fas.org/irp/congress/2000_cr/h101200.html

_________________
Steven Aftergood
Project on Government Secrecy
Federation of American Scientists
http://www.fas.org/sgp/index.html
Email:  saftergood at igc.org
------ End of forwarded message -------


				Thanks! 
					Bill
Bill Stewart, bill.stewart at pobox.com
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