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Comment by ck2 | Hacker News Reader

How the heck can a democratic state government have secret documents from its own people?

And, for that matter, why should a government agency be protected by "attorney client privilege"? If an employee of the NYPD were to retain an attorney with his own money, then their communications should be privileged. But if a government agency that's funded by taxpayers does something it might need a lawyer to protect it from, it should be public knowledge.

Not every thing an elected official does becomes a public document. Democracy does not mean that every little thing is subjected to a public vote.

We're not talking about a "little thing" here. We're talking about a document that defines the official policies of the NYPD being kept secret.

Doesn't have to be a vote but there has to be an accounting.

We're talking about sunshine vs stasi mentality.

It's like having secret laws we can't know about but are subject to penalty, democracy is not supposed to work like that.

For secrecy and privacy of course. Do you want to hold the list of undercover operatives in hostile countries? How about making public a list of people who have received social protection? I don't know about the system in USA but how would you like if a report of your earnings could be requested from the IRS?

Two different things. You are an individual and have privacy. The state cannot make private, secret laws. The IRS cannot have unlisted regulations that you have to obey without knowing what they are.

Top secret legal interpretations that nullify other laws still on the books are the new black.

Although I agree that in this case, the NYPD is wrong, I think that governments can keep certain things secret for the good of their people.

But then you cannot call such a government a democracy.

People making and enforcing laws do not get to arbitrarily decide to make something secret because they say so since they are the ones who made the laws in the first place. That's not democracy.

There is a reason we call the USA a representative democracy, instead of a direct democracy. The government can keep secrets from the general public, because the public elects individuals to make decisions on their behalf, and these individuals to have access. There are plenty of concerns over how well our representatives do represent our own interests, but in concept there is no reason that the fact that our represantatives know more then us invalidates anything.

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