Jacob Sullum on Obama's Cloak of Invisibility
When he was running for president, Barack Obama criticized George W. Bush's expansive vision of executive power, saying, "I reject the view that the president may do whatever he deems necessary to protect national security." The day after taking office in 2009, Obama declared that "my Administration is committed to creating an unprecedented level of openness in Government." Those two positions went together, observes Jacob Sullum, because secrecy requires power and power thrives in secrecy. Unfortunately, Obama himself has been demonstrating that very phenomenon for the last four years.
