Achieving information control is the fundamental first step of any authoritarian regime. In the absence of informed dissent, the taxpayer-funded noise machine lets leaders do what they want while most of us are so confused about the actual facts that we are incapable of articulating any policy demands at all.
As we become less capable of confronting the world in a coherent way, we are increasingly dependent on politicians to tell us what to think. Even though their "information" may conflict with realities that slap us in the face every day, the cognitive dissonance causes paralysis.
The fundamental crisis facing our government is that most of its actions are so highly classified even other officials can't and don't know what's going on. How can they plan complex operations? How can they coordinate policy? The Iraq debacle makes it obvious that they cannot.
If a government can't even trust its own employees, we must assume that it's up to some seriously twisted shit.
Forget about media bias for a moment and consider the impact of secrecy on our society. True information is the blood of democracy. We need the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help us God. Without it our political discourse is starved of air. We become captive to "experts," pundits and smooth talkers, insiders who can claim privileged access and special information. We are no longer participant citizens but subjects.
