Nobody asked but …
As long as government functionaries have complete discretion over secrecy, why would even a babe in arms or uneducated wretch be so foolish as to give them trust? I was graciously informed by my freshman composition professor that any occurrence of journalism which might coincide with truth and/or fact was the sheerest sort of accident. When I was a callow youth, just starting out in the business world, a slightly older and more experienced wit (I wish I could remember who) told me that all reports in workaday forms are “organized lying.” That observation left a deep furrow in my outlook. Then I learned from Twain that there are lies, damned lies, and statistics. My education was gaining fullness when I encountered the axiom that no man will intentionally fashion the club (a dossier of truths) with which he is to be beaten to death. This was tied up with a bow when I worked for a particularly treacherous politico, when after acquiring several stripes on my ass over a passage of time, I decided the shortest path to truth was to believe exactly the opposite of anything he said. The foregoing lessons that I share with you free of charge, vastly less expensive than the actual learning, now guide me through my golden years. The things that you’re liable to hear from someone else’s bible, they ain’t necessarily so.
Kilgore
