Friendly Fire from the Forest

Speaking to the Jackson Free Press by cell phone from an undisclosed location in a Mississippi national forest, Hinds County supervisor and Mississippi National Guard veteran Charles Barbour took a break from military training to spew friendly fire at Jackson media outlets.

“There are some things you don’t need to know. … Part of my job was assembling nuclear weapons. I know a little something about secrecy. We’re not telling y’all,” he said.

Barbour was responding to criticism of the supervisors for allowing Hinds County Emergency Management Director Larry Fisher to withhold portions of the county’s emergency plan from the public. The county’s emergency plan includes a public section, with information about where to get water, food or shelter after a disaster and a “classified material” section that details the location of “nuclear decontamination equipment.”

“The media has made it very clear they’re not taking sides between the U.S. military and the terrorists,” Barbour said. “If you’re not on my side, I ain’t telling you anything. If you don’t want America to win this war, if you’re a quote-unquote objective observer, that’s fine, just don’t ask the U.S. military where our secret hiding places are. … Hinds County does everything it can to keep the public informed with the information they need to survive in the event of an emergency. They don’t need to know certain things that can put them in harm’s way.”

Brent Cox, ACLU public education coordinator, said: “The government is obligated to explain why, within the law, a portion of public record has been redacted. … We’re going to find out exactly why (the supervisors) are witholding this information and wheteher it’s within the law to do so.”