here's more evidence of our descent into empire than perhaps you had previously;


“Democracy dies in darkness.” That’s an old saying that The Washington Post recycled as its motto at the dawn of the Trump era.
Truth is, the journalists at the Post don’t know the half of it; nor do they bother to report on the genuine secrecy and increasing lack of transparency in the Department of Defense. Nothing against the Post - neither do any of the other mainstream media outlets.
But it’s true: Right under most Americans’ noses, the military has become more opaque over the last several years. Now, few outlets cover foreign policy with any particular gusto - after all, there’s so much to say about Stormy Daniels or the Brett Kavanaugh drama. But this trend should concern all citizens.
Thing is, what the U.S. military is up to on any given day is done in your name. If civilians are killed, locals alienated or civil liberties restricted, then the global populace, including concerned U.S. citizens, aren’t going to fix blame solely on the armed forces … they’re going to blame you! If for no other reason than this, citizens of an - ostensible - democracy ought to be paying attention. The military is a fierce, potentially brutal instrument, and anyone who cares about liberty ought to watch it closely.
Only that’s getting harder and harder to do in today’s political climate. On one issue after another the U.S. military has recently intensified its secrecy, has classified previously open information and has suppressed any remaining sense of transparency. Don’t just take my word for it: This week a relatively mainstream congressional Democrat, Adam Smith - a ranking member on the House Armed Services Committee—wrote at length on this very topic.
Make no mistake, these trends are long-standing and gradual. So, what follows is not some vacuous liberal attack on President Trump, who remains, for legal purposes, and so long as I remain in uniform, my commander in chief. Still, the time is long past when someone needs to scream from the proverbial mountaintop about America’s expanding empire of secrecy....https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2018-11-04/army-major-exposes-us-militarys-empire-secrecy