Secrecy Quotes - page 7
In our system, grand juries take every charge, every lie, and they try to sort the truth from the lies, and then they move forward into the system. And that's how the system ought to work. We should respect the secrecy of the grand jury so they can sort through what's true and what's not. And someone is leaking, and if they are leaking from the grand jury investigation, then that's a violation of the law.
Paul Begala
Yet high over the city our line of yellow windows must have contributed their share of human secrecy to the casual watcher in the darkening streets, and I was him too, looking up and wondering. I was within and without, simultaneously enchanted and repelled by the inexhaustible variety of life.
F. Scott Fitzgerald
Francis Bacon, in his New Atlantis, could charge his elite scientists in Salomon's House with practicing self-censorship to avoid publicizing dangerous knowledge. Here is how the Father of Salomon's House describes their practice: "We have consultations, which of the inventions and experiences which we have discovered shall be published, and which not: and take all a oath of secrecy for the concealing of those which we think fit to keep secret: though some of those we do reveal sometime to the State, and some not.” Bacon, the first prophet of the new relation between science and society and of the "conquest of nature for the relief of man's estate,” knew better than we that knowledge is dangerous, that publication is a public and politically relevant act, and that self-censorship on the part of scientists is necessary and desirable. The passage is also remarkable for its wonderful ambiguity regarding whether scientists or the State has ultimate authority over dangerous knowledge.
Leon Kass
A democracy works best when the people have all the information that the security of the Nation permits. No one should be able to pull curtains of secrecy around decisions which can be revealed without injury to the public interest. At the same time, the welfare of the Nation or the rights of individuals may require that some documents not be made available.
Lyndon B. Johnson
I am wedded to India because I owe my all to her. I believe absolutely that she has a mission for the world. She is not to copy Europe blindly, India's acceptance of the doctrine of the sword will be the hour of my trial. I hope I shall not be found wanting. My religion has no geographical limits. If I have a living faith in it, it will transcend my love for India herself. My life is dedicated to service of India through the religion of nonviolence which I believed to be the root of Hinduism.
Meanwhile I urge those who distrust me, not to disturb the even working of the struggle that has just commenced, by inciting to violence in the belief that I want violence I detest secrecy as a sin. Let them give nonviolence non co-operation a trial and they will find that I had no mental reservation whatsoever.
Mahatma Gandhi
Our own political life is predicated on openness. We do not believe any group of men adequate enough or wise enough to operate without scrutiny or without criticism. We know that the only way to avoid error is to detect it, that the only way to detect it is to be free to enquire. We know that the wages of secrecy are corruption. We know that in secrecy error, undetected, will flourish and subvert.
Robert Oppenheimer
He's obviously violated the laws of America, for which he's responsible, but I think the invasion of human rights and American privacy has gone too far ... I think that the secrecy that has been surrounding this invasion of privacy has been excessive, so I think that the bringing of it to the public notice has probably been, in the long term, beneficial.
Edward Snowden
Achieving a democratic and equitable international order requires overcoming formidable obstacles, including the wrong priorities by governments and international organizations, bias in favour of civil and political rights over economic, social and cultural rights, the prevailing demophobia in many countries, where governments refuse to listen to their citizens and ban referenda, the curses of positivism, selectivity and double-standards, the tendency to go for short-term solutions instead of addressing root causes, the continued existence of secrecy jurisdictions, the impunity of transnational corporations and other private sector actors, and, of course, institutional inertia.
Alfred de Zayas
The human race, to which so many of my readers belong, has been playing at children's games from the beginning, and will probably do it till the end, which is a nuisance for the few people who grow up. And one of the games to which it is most attached is called "Keep to-morrow dark,” and which is also named (by the rustics in Shropshire, I have no doubt) "Cheat the Prophet.” The players listen very carefully and respectfully to all that the clever men have to say about what is to happen in the next generation. The players then wait until all the clever men are dead, and bury them nicely. They then go and do something else. That is all. For a race of simple tastes, however, it is great fun.
For human beings, being children, have the childish wilfulness and the childish secrecy. And they never have from the beginning of the world done what the wise men have seen to be inevitable.
G. K. Chesterton
Indeed, the secrecy of the program indicates an understanding that the regular military culture and mores would not support these activities and neither would the American public or the world community. Another implicit acknowledgement of violations of accepted standards of behavior is the process of farming out prisoners to countries less averse to torture and giving assignments to private contractors.
President Bush set the tone for our attitude for suspects in his State of the Union address. He noted that more than 3,000 "suspected terrorists" had been arrested in many countries and then he added, "and many others have met a different fate. Let's put it this way: they are no longer a problem to the United States and our allies."
George Bush promised to change the tone in Washington. And indeed he did.
Al Gore
Naval forces are able, without resorting to diplomatic channels, to establish offshore anywhere in the world, air fields completely equipped with machine shops, ammunition dumps, tank farms, warehouses, together with quarters and all types of accommodations for personnel. Such task forces are virtually as complete as any air base ever established. They constitute the only air bases that can be made available near enemy territory without assault and conquest; and furthermore, they are mobile offensive bases, that can be employed with the unique attributes of secrecy and surprise - which attributes contribute equally to their defensive as well as offensive effectiveness.
Chester W. Nimitz
He exclaimed, "I wouldn't have stood for it for one bloody moment!!" I said, "And that's why they never told you. You've just answered your own question." He asked, "Well, what do you mean?" I said, "Because if you had known, and this would have been your response, you would have ended up like Jack Kennedy or like Lord Mountbatten, blown up by an alleged IRA bomb that was actually set by this rogue group. And you would have ended up like Marilyn Monroe and Mary Meyer and all these other people, who were killed for not going along with the secrecy You would have ended up like all the rest of them." Then I added, "And like, unfortunately, some of my group - like former CIA Director, Bill Colby" He just looked at me. He then muttered something to effect of, "Those bastards!".
Steven M. Greer
An Ashram has in it disciples and initiates at all points of evolutionary development, and of all grades and degrees; these all work together in perfect unison, and yet - within their differentiated ranks, for each degree stands alone, yet united with all the others - with their own established rapport, their coded telepathic interplay, and a shared occult secrecy and silence, which guard the secrets and knowledges of one grade from another and from the unready.
Alice Bailey
The real purpose of state secrecy is to enable governments to establish their own self-interested and often mendacious version of the truth by the careful selection of "facts” to be passed on to the public. They feel enraged by any revelation of what they really know, or by any alternative source of information. Such threats to their control of the news agenda must be suppressed where possible and, where not, those responsible must be pursued and punished.
Revealing important information about the Yemen war – in which at least 70,000 people have been killed – is the reason why the US government is persecuting both Assange and Zikry.
Julian Assange
...All my flaws and quirks and neuroses, they fit just as well as the scarring that comes from racism or masculinity, and I don't want to have to cut that off. People confuse privacy and secrecy way too much. I'm not saying it's confessional, but it gives more texture to your work if you can figure out how not to close off those rooms.
Terrance Hayes
I want to talk about our common responsibilities in the face of a common danger. The events of recent weeks may have helped to illuminate that challenge for some; but the dimensions of its threat have loomed large on the horizon for many years. Whatever our hopes may be for the future - for reducing this threat or living with it - there is no escaping either the gravity or the totality of its challenge to our survival and to our security - a challenge that confronts us in unaccustomed ways in every sphere of human activity.
This deadly challenge imposes upon our society two requirements of direct concern both to the press and to the President - two requirements that may seem almost contradictory in tone, but which must be reconciled and fulfilled if we are to meet this national peril. I refer, first, to the need for a far greater public information; and, second, to the need for far greater official secrecy.
John F. Kennedy
