This Albuquerque Tribune editorial minces no words in its criticism of the Department of Energy’s polygraph screening program. Excerpt:
“Deception” is a nasty, nine-letter word that preoccupies U.S. counterintelligence agents. Appropriately, they worry about the potential for moles and leaks of nuclear weapons secrets from the nation’s classified bulwarks, including Sandia and Los Alamos national laboratories in New Mexico.
Unfortunately, the word also is at the heart of the Department of Energy’s misguided efforts to use polygraph examinations as a routine tool for plugging theoretical holes in the nation’s nuclear secrets dike.
The evidence suggests that the lie detector screening cure – intended to expose spies and lies – is worse than the affliction. In fact, it’s the big lie.