President. for over a year I have served as the Chairman of the Commission on Protecting and Reducing Government Secrecy. Among the Commissions concerns is the often corrupting nature of secrets. Undocumented allegations. sweeping generalizations. personal biases. and outright lies can all be wrapped in the protective cloak of secrecy and receive a level of credibility that they would quickly lose if their documentation and sources were subject to public scrutiny. In addition to the problem of formal classification. the Commission has witnessed examples of instances in which unclassified information gathered from open sources is given greater weight by restricting the distribution of such information to those who hold security clearances. We were recently witness to an example of this phenomenon.
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Undocumented