Pentagon Employees With Top-Secret Security Clearance Owe Millions In Unpaid Taxes

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19. "Top Secret" and "Secret" clearances are handled out to almost anyone.

To get such a Clearance all you have to be is, after a quick check, not a KNOWN member of a subversive group (KKK or the Communist Party). They MAY do a Credit Check, but bad credit rarely indicates a bad security risk (If you can NOT pay your bills, but you admit so and do not pay your bills, where is the potential for blackmail or bribery?).

A Criminal history would make someone ineligible for Secret Clearance, writing a bad check and NOT honoring that check could be grounds NOT to get a Secret Clearance. On the other hand, Not paying a debt is not criminal, thus no criminal liability possible. Such a not payment of a debt may lead to someone being sued but what harm can it do to the holder of the clearance? Unless he or she is actually trying to pay the debt and does not have the money to do so EXCEPT with money from Espionage. such bad debt does not indicate a tendency to do espionage (In most cases the situation is NOT debts, but people buying items and living beyond their means for they could do so based on the brides they took)

Security is watching for someone who MAY be blackmailed (Thus homosexual activity was grounds for denial of s Security clearance for decades, through that is not the case in the last 20 years) OR someone can be easily bribed (For example, someone actually TRYING to pay a debt as oppose to someone who is NOT trying and cares less if the creditor sues them or not, through it is more like buying a new Cadillac every year instead of every five years for other people of his or her pay grade).

Secret and Top Secret Clearances generally has to do with access to codes, radios, advance technical manuals, personnel records etc. It rarely involved anything that is really secret, but things that could help someone learn how US units move, operate, what is the standard procedures in certain situations etc. Classification above "Top Secret" is itself Classified often on a need to know basis, this involved how bases are set up, secret bases, for example underground submarine bases, access to codes that are used to transmit messages about company level, etc. Operation of advance computers and equipment is also subject to higher levels of Security then "Top Secret".

Just a comment that "Secret" and "Top Secret" Clearances are NOT that much of a Security Clearance. They are the first steps in the Security clearance system, but very low level of clearance. Many people in the Military have "Secret" and "Top Secret" Clearances (I even had one, learned about it when it was withdrawn in the 1990ws during the last scare of to many people with "Secret" Security Clearances). It is the higher level of Security we need to worry about, the people with security clearances higher then "Top Secret", those are the people who have the information our enemies want, not how to operate radios and codes in a combat unit at company level. This is the level where the CIA spy for the Russians, Ames operated at. This is the level the FBI agent who spied for the Russians operated at. i.e. well ABOVE "Secret" and "Top Secret" Clearance levels. Ames was caught by the FBI doing a check on his spending and determining he was spending more then his income permitted. The FBI Spy, Robert Hanssen was only caught by the FBI paying a Russian Agent $7 million Dollars for the Russian folder on the spy.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Hanssen

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aldrich_Ames

Just a comment that "Secret" and "Top Secret" Clearances are NOT that high a clearance AND that being in debt does NOT make someone subject to Blackmail or bribery (The Russians prefer bribery, you get someone who WANTS to spy for you, as opposed to someone you are forcing to spy for you). Thus you look at how someone is living, is he or she living within their means? If yes rarely a spy problem, if no, why? Living below one's income indicates bad choices (gambling, drugs use etc) but living ABOVE your income brings with it HOW and that is generally because of bribes.