What the Hell, Barry?

Did your people really just try to classify a copyright trade agreement as "national security secrets"?

The U.S. government has denied a freedom of information act request for several Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement documents, invoking a clause that says that the documents are protected as national security secrets. The provision applies in cases where there could be "damage to the national security and the original classification authority is able to identify or describe the damage." The content of the documents has been reported here and here.

I could maybe see the U.K. slapping a D-Notice on something like this—-though good luck getting anybody to pay attention to it--but there are quite literally no grounds for this here. ACTA is a power grab by the powerful, little else, and I'd gotten the impression that that's what Dems were supposed to be against these days.

(Though, admittedly, the Dems have ever been in the IP makers' pockets. Side effect of the whole hollywood thing.)

Anyway, free the damned things up, Barry, or give us a DAMNED good reason for why you aren't.