Kept under wraps

For decades, advocates of open government have been trying to get Washington to detail the amount of money the American taxpayers pony up to fund the nation’s intelligence agencies.

They had limited success when former CIA Director George Tenet in 1997 and 1998 released his annual budgets — $26.6 billion and $26.7 billion, respectively.

Otherwise, such spending has remained classified.

Last Friday, though, President Bush signed a bill implementing the recommendations of the 9/11 commission. Among the provisions in the legislation: the declassification of the nation’s intelligence budget.

This has nothing to do with revealing the details of specific programs or the means and methods of America’s clandestine operatives. It simply demands that the overall figure for intelligence spending be a matter of public record.

But even this minor step has friends of government secrecy all aflutter.

Though Mr. Bush signed the measure, the White House issued a statement arguing that disclosure “would provide no meaningful information to the general American public, but would provide significant intelligence to America’s adversaries and could cause damage to the national security interests of the United States.”

And within a day of the provision becoming law, the U.S. House passed a defense bill that includes an amendment overturning the 9/11 commission’s recommendation.

“Publicizing a budget sounds pretty benign until you realize the bad guys are looking at what goes into our intelligence,” said Rep. Darrell Issa, the California Republican who sponsored the House amendment, which was adopted with no opposition.

This is silly. The notion that al-Qaida — or some other organization or nation at odds with the United States — will gain an upper hand based on a single budget number shouldn’t survive serious scrutiny. Details of the defense budget are public record, and that hasn’t hindered our ability to defend ourselves.

Besides, the law Mr. Bush signed includes a provision that allows the president to waive the disclosure provision if he can convince Congress that revealing the budget figure would harm national security.

“The taxpayers deserve to know what they’re spending for intelligence,” said Lee Hamilton, the former congressman who was vice chairman of the 9/11 commission. In addition, Mr. Hamilton told The New York Times, this small movement toward openness might encourage Congress to more aggressively exercise oversight of such spending.

When the Senate considers the House version of the defense bill, its first order of business should be to strip Rep. Issa’s amendment.