Bag's Rants

National Security. The age old cry of the oppressor.

National Security. The age old cry of the oppressor. - Jean Luc Picard, Star Trek TNG. Well nearly, he actually said 'Internal Security...' but close enough.

Lord Carlile, A Lib Dem, has said that he believes Police needs 90 days to interrogate terrorist suspects. He even said he knew of two or three cases. Read the article here.

Now I don't know about you but I would have though that if there were examples then they could have been quoted in justification. They were not and the excuse seems to be, yet again, National Security.

Now what I find confusing is that we in the UK certainly overclassify everything. A really interesting example is the Dunblane shooting. Why is that? Reason is supposed to be it is upsetting for the victims families but surely seeing things around their own houses would do that. Conclusions are it is embarrassing to the current Government somehow. Mmmm. So what? There are probably thousands of this type of suppression. Each one more related to cover up than National Security in my opinion. Call me paranoid but when things are leaked they are usually lifting the lid on something political rather than National Security. Our Government sees protecting itself as a National Security issue. Also, when things are leaked the full wrath of our Government comes down on the conscienceous objector who leaked rather than the culprits protected by the cover up.

This should be ridiculous in what is supposedly a free society. There is no reason why all the documentation created by the people who are supposed to work for us should not be made available on the web. We have the Technology. Clearly security and certain working practices at AWE and MI5, for example, should be covered under National Security but why should they not be obligated to publish financial details and reports not related to current issues publicly?

Our government has a vested interest in covering things with National Security. It is a way to control us and manipulate us. It all then comes down to trust and fear. We don't trust them, and have not for a while, and it looks like the fear is wearing off.

Time for another announcement of a terrorist atrocity narrowly averted by our security services then, with the fear restored, a request for 90 days with justification undefined due to National Security might be better received.

posted by Bag @ 8:15 pm