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Comment by eropple | Hacker News Reader

> There is a strong moral argument to be made that the government has no rights to secrets kept from its citizenry.

Such arguments don't hold water when the process of classification is determined by a fairly elected representative of that citizenry.

Americans could elect somebody who promised to ditch classification altogether, but they wouldn't, because reality is not so clear.

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Mob rule doesn't determine morality or even the best way of doing things. Moreover, this is assuming that we are given access to vote for actual candidates with varying positions instead of weeding out ones that don't toe the line.

Democracy being the least worst option doesn't absolve it from criticism.

Fair elections require informed voters, though. If government commits human rights violations on their behalf without telling them, I don't think that's particularly informed.

Yes, they could still vote to abolish state secrets altogether. But I think knowledge about how secrecy is abused is also very much relevant to an informed vote on such a matter.

How would you elect someone to get that done when every issue is tied to a hundred other issues in the same candidate and basically none of them will have any meaningful progress made during their term?

Specific opinions cannot be expressed by electing a "representative".

> How would you elect someone to get that done when every issue is tied to a hundred other issues in the same candidate and basically none of them will have any meaningful progress made during their term?

Elect an idiot like Trump who leaks secrets to foreign governments at the drop of a hat?

You cannot give consent if you are not informed about that to which you are consenting.

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