Candid And Unfettered Advice

I often hear, in reference to the refusal of the White House to allow information about its advisors and its decision-making process to come to light, that "for the President to perform his constitutional duties, it is imperative that he receive candid and unfettered advice," to quote White House Counsel Fred Fielding, and that the prospect of having to testify under oath about that advice could have a chilling effect and make such advisors "reluctant to communicate openly and honestly." This rationale has been repeated so many times that reporters seem to gloss right over it on auto-pilot, like it's just some boilerplate they have to include next to station identification and the weather.

What kind of advice is the president getting that the American people need to remain ignorant of it? If there are people advising the president who are afraid of having their ideas attributed to them, I've got news for you, those people should not be influencing policy. Are there any secret signatures on the Declaration of Independence? Are there any articles of the Constitution whose validity is dependent on their authorship? Why should we, as Americans, be so respectful of the desire for privacy of those who are guiding our ship of state? It's our country, "We the people" isn't just a cute phrase, it's a guiding principle, that this representative democracy, this republic, derives its power from the people, through the people, and for the people.

I know I'm getting carried away here, but this is pretty outrageous stuff. Should we allow ourselves to be ruled by those who lack the courage of their convictions? Given that this nation was created and birthed by men and women who were willing to die, to be tortured, to give up all they had in the world for the ideas of freedom and justice for all, does it not follow that the maintenance and furtherance of the grand ideals that underpin the United States of America should be undertaken by people of similar strength of character? That the governance of this nation should be an enterprise to which one would be proud to have one's name attached?

I recognize that a good decision-maker, especially one responsible for so much, needs to have access to all available options, and sometimes must make difficult and perhaps Machiavellian choices about things. And if we're talking about information that must be kept secret to ensure the security of the country, then telling it on the mountain is not appropriate. But when we're talking about internal politics, about the basic nuts and bolts administration of national policy, such a deference to secrecy is not right, and it's certainly not our way of doing things. We the people believe in open and honest government, and those qualities are not fueled by shadows, smoke, and mirrors. If the Congress is asking the president a question, then the people represented by the Congress (that's us! you and me!) are asking the president a question, and if he is indeed upholding the ideals that he most solemnly swore to uphold, then he cannot but answer truthfully. That is a basic fact of our system of government. To do any less is un-American, and must be dealt with harshly and with all available haste.