What applies to banks can also apply to government

El Borak made some good points about how far the system can and must go to present a good face to the public to keep public confidence in the banking system high:

That might seem a little hyperbolic, but I assure you it's not, because Ms. Lea doubtless speaks for many in positions of authority who would criticize telling the truth about our modern banking system, if their doing so would not simply draw more attention to the problem. But even then, they see the wrong problem: they see confidence as a cause, rather than an effect, of a functioning banking system.

The cause-effect difference is obvious if one puts it in a little different perspective. Let's say that you discover that your friend's husband is cheating on her with his secretary. Because she is ignorant, your friend has complete confidence in her marriage. Telling your friend the truth will likely wreck her marriage - her confidence in it will be destroyed. To not tell your friend the truth means that she will be deceived and betrayed, not only by her husband but her friend, until that day that she pays him a surprise visit at the office and learns the truth for herself. You will not have saved your friend's marriage by withholding the truth from her, nor will you likely be able to save your friendship if she discovers your duplicity*. While in ignorance, your friend may have confidence in her marriage, and it may even have the appearance of being functional (this is the government's attitude: it is better for you to live happily in ignorance) but it is a sham that will - must - someday fail.

All of this applies one way or another to the legal system, if not the entire government, as well. If the public genuinely started to realize how deep the chasm between their perception of how the system works and how it really is, the system would quickly begin to crumble. For a lot of people on the right, the case of Mike Nifong was a rude awakening into how much of the criticism about the system from the black community is actually valid. It forced them to face up to the fact that prosecutors can and will do some wild stuff that makes police brutality look reasonable.

The majority of the confidence that people have in the legal system comes mainly from ignorance. The more that people find out about how non-deterministic the law is, how many loopholes there are that corrupt cops and prosecutors can slide through to avoid accountability, and how few protections defendants actually have, the less confidence they tend to have. The myth of the "overly protected" criminal is starting to unravel because no reasonably informed person can argue that "criminals have too many rights" when in fact, the accused has very few today that aren't whittled away by exceptions in the law and procedures.

More and more cases of the police violently disturbing innocent people on faulty, incompetent drug raids is being release. More cases of prosecutorial misconduct are being aired. All the while, the system is not reforming itself. Unlike the banks, one day the legal system will face a day of reckoning, but will be completely blindsided by it,