More Secrecy Bullshit

There exist, apparently, buildings you are prohibited from photographing.

The list itself, knowledge of which is a necessary precondition to following the (bullshit) law, is also secret.

We are not making this up.

The bottom line is that McCammon was caught in a classic logical trap. If he had only known the building was off-limits to photographers, he would have avoided it. But he was not allowed to know that fact. “Reasonable, law-abiding people tend to avoid these types of things when it can be helped,” McCammon wrote. “Thus, my request for a list of locations within Arlington County that are unmarked, but at which photography is either prohibited or discouraged according to some (public or private) policy. Of course, such a list does not exist. Catch-22.”

The only antidote to this security mania is sunshine. Only when more and more Americans do as McCammon has done and take the time and effort to chronicle these excesses and insist on answers from authorities will we stand a chance of restoring balance and sanity to the blend of liberty and security that we are madly remixing in these confused times.

Look, people: any time there are secret laws, or secret evidence, or secret trials, you’re fucked. The whole idea of any of those things is blatantly anti-American, anti-freedom, and anti-democracy. Governments MUST exist in an inspect-able, transparent state.

(Via BB.)

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