40 posts and only, what, three Bush-bashing jokes?
Looks like the standards are going down on the Dope.
ETA: Bravo, KneadToKnow!
I can’t be everywhere at once.
I used to have TS-SCI codeword clearance.
It’s not nearly as interesting as the movies would have you believe. In fact, it’s not nearly as interesting as the end of the credits of those movies - you know, the bit where they tell you about APSCA and “not based on real events”.
Actually, Top Secret is the highest clearance. It is by definition information that would cause exceptionally grave harm to the security of the US if released. There are additional controls on classified information, like SCI or special access programs, but that doesn’t mean those are “higher” than top secret. In fact, it is entirely possible to have codeword programs that are merely classified Secret, or whatever.
In terms of executive branch procedures, the idea that the President isn’t allowed to have access to some classified information is ridiculous on its face. The President is the ultimate authority on matters of classification. There’s numerous executive orders going back many decades on this. Declassification authority rests with whomever originally classified a program or their superiors who gave them permission to do so, which ultimately leads to the President being the ultimate authority to reclassify or declassify information as he sees fit.
On a constitutional basis, I think it’s an absurdity to think that there’s anyone in the executive branch who can disobey a legal command by the President. The first line of Article II of the Constitution reads “The executive power is vested in the President of the United States,” or something very close to that. What is the constitutional basis for some legitimate power within the executive branch not being able to be exercised, either directly or indirectly, by the one person which is invested with that power? It makes no sense that there are well-established and perfectly legal executive powers that cannot be exercised by the chief executive.
The President can see any damn thing he demands. But the odds are that he doesn’t need to know the name of a particular intelligence source or how some algorithm works.
And the idea that there are secrets (like antigravity machines or time machines) that are too dangerous for the President to know about: I’d say the exact opposite. If there is futuristic technology out there, it is dangerous NOT to have the President know about it. I’ll bet my bottom dollar that any government schmuck who knows of any technology or phenomenon that has the potential to turn our world upside down is going to be damn sure that he’s not the last one holding the bag in the case that something goes awfully wrong.
Let me add one other point: there are various types of government information which are controlled by law, not executive decision. For example, the Privacy Act limits how agencies can distribute information to other agencies. If the President makes a request to see some document on John Doe held in the bowels of some agency, and he has no good reason to see it, on the basis of law he may be denied the ability to see it.
But the matter of national security information is, with only a couple of exceptions, governed by executive orders, not law. So again, we’re getting into the absurdity of “can the President draft an executive order that he cannot break?” in the same vein of wondering whether God can make a taco so spicy that he can’t eat it.
I thought it was MSG or something like that.
In the interests of accuracy, I should point out that the lark’s vomit is for the ‘extra crispy’ recipe only.
Also, avoid the KFC ‘Spring Surprise’ special.
Keep readin’. 
It’s been a long week… :smack: Boy am I glad it’s Friday.
The names of some of the men trapped alive in capsized ships at Pearl Harbor are almost certainly known. They tapped them out in Morse code. The names have never been released and most likely will never be. Just to avoid further hurt to the families.
Do enquiring minds do want to know: Who put the bop in the bop-she-bop-she-bop? What was thrown off the Tallahatchee Bridge? What happened the night the lights went out in Georgia?
Also, what’s the square root of -1. One last matter – if Tom Cruise fell alone in the woods & made a sound, would anybody care?
I don’t understand your scenario here.
If a mathematician discovered such a process, he/she would write an article about it and have it published in a mathematical journal. The first the CIA would hear about it is when one of their mathematicians got their copy of the published journal in the mail and read the article. At that point, it’s a little late to declare it top-secret!
Note: the stealth technology that is used in the most advanced warplanes was invented by a Russian mathematician, during the cold war. He (and soviet censors, too, apparently) didn’t see it having a practical application, so he published it in a Soviet mathematical journal. A few years later, people from Lockheed read a translation of it, and realized that they did have the computer technology to make a practical plane using this. And they successfully developed stealth planes.
Of course, they didn’t explain this, or the fact that it came from Russian mathematical research. So the mathematician never knew what was being done with his theory. Until years later, when he emigrated to the US, and Lockheed invited him to their plant, and showed him what they were doing with his theory. (I don’t think they ever paid him any money, though.)
At least it took 13 messages before someone came in and crapped in the thread with a cheap shot at the President.