TUCKER CARLSON: Transparency restores faith in institutions and restores confidence in American democracy. It’s what we need.
This is the 21st Century. When you open the door for the public to inspect the workings of public institutions such as the press, Congress and the judiciary, our democracy becomes more responsive. When we allow the public to evaluate the performance of public institutions, it has the power to transform our democracy.
People of good faith have done a lot of things for us, and the least we can do in return is to be transparent about our activities, particularly to the public. Transparency helps build confidence and it helps people trust that public institutions are operating in the public interest. Transparency strengthens democratic institutions.
So I’m delighted that the government has decided to take this step forward on the Freedom of Information Act. The American public deserves to know what we do with taxpayers’ money.
But before all that, there was a very simple issue to be resolved: Who is accountable for providing the information that the public needs to trust it’s government is working for the people?
What do we think about transparency in general? I think it’s a good thing and I think we should encourage people to put that in their personal lives.
I think transparency in business can help drive better business. But I think at a time when our democracy is under great threat, particularly from a foreign state, we need to be careful about whether we are promoting transparency in our own government.
The government has given back what is probably a very useful tool that it had when it came into the public spotlight. It’s been operating behind the scenes for decades. It was part of what is called the “federalist system,” which was designed as a checks and balances system for the federal government under its states.
But the federal government has used the Freedom of Information Act to do things that are beyond its powers. And we’ve seen what can happen in terms of information about the workings of the federal government.
Last year, our government published a secret national security report about Russia. It said that our government had evidence that the Russian government was interfering with our elections. It said that the Russians were undermining the institutions of our democracy.
