Gutknecht E-Line

I received a note today from Congressman Gil Gutnecht's office:

Each week, I send my constituents a personal e-mail called the E-Line. It features breaking news from Washington on gas prices, taxes, Iraq and other issues; links to informative articles and websites; and a message board for you to tell me what you think.

Click here to view last week's E-Line and sign up for future editions. Should you ever wish to stop receiving the E-Line, the option to discontinue this e-mail is always provided.

I took the opportunity to thank him for the note, reinforcing my call for this government to share all information with its citizens:

Dear Mr. Gutknecht:

Thank you for the sending me the e-line invitation; I'll be sure to sign up. In the words of that great Republican President Abraham Lincoln, "democracy is the government of the people, by the people, for the people." I strongly believe that such a democracy is only possible if the electorate is well-informed of the activities of its government. This is why I worry so much about reports that our government has taken a number of actions on behalf of our country, in the name of our country, but without the informed consent of the people of our country. I'm thinking in particular of the policy of "extraordinary rendition," reported "black sites" operated by the CIA, the data mining of our citizen's phone calls by the NSA, and other anti-terrorist activies apparently practiced by various branches of our government. Whether or not such activities are appropriate for our country to engage is almost beside the point; I'm perhaps more concerned that we the people are excluded by our government from participating in the policy debate by the pervasive secrecy of our executive branch. Frankly, I don't agree that it's in our country's best interests to keep policies secret from our citizenry. I believe that pertinent details of such policies should probably be kept secret, but not the policies themselves. Such secrecy may represent a government for the people, but it can be neither of the people nor by the people, and the phrase "police state" comes to mind. What do you think?

Yours sincerely,
[Qimugtua]
Rochester, MN 55904