The level of trust is extraordinarily low and the level of suspicion extraordinarily high, and with good reason and on both sides. The press has hunkered down for very good reason, because it's being treated like a mushroom.

One of the principal factors fueling the proliferation of the abuse of secrecy and sensitive but unclassifieds is the administration's adherence to the unitary executive principal. This administration more than any of its predecessors believes that it is its responsibility to collect power onto itself in the executive office when it comes to the conduct of war, foreign policy, the management of agencies and departments, regulations, etc.

I don't think the question is if should we have a shield law. I think the question is what kind of shield law we should have. Yes, I'd like to see a federal shield law, but if and only if it provides genuine safeguards and doesn't green-light prosecutors and judges and litigants from going after the press and getting things to which they should not be entitled. It's not a simple kind of litmus test.

Every effort is made to control information. Secrecy is just one of the toggles on their control board. The mindset is in place, and they've done a lot of hiring over eight years, not just political appointees. And they've done a lot of firing or driving people out who might have countermanded or resisted. So, institutionally, it's not going to be simply a matter of flipping the switch to undo it. You're going have to bring in people dedicated to transparency, and you have to demonstrate that there are rewards for candor.

There's no faster way or surer way to consolidate power and disenfranchise critics than to operate in secret. So this plays squarely into the promotion of the unitary executive. That's one factor.

These human experiments have gone largely unchallenged and unquestioned by Congress, the medical profession, and the scientific community at large.

...In the vast majority of drug experiments, it is not uncommon for none or one or two of hundreds of patients to benefit from the drug.