The opposite of open and transparent

This New Yorker article contains a double of paragraphs that sounds somewhat absurdist:

FISA proceedings, decisions, and legal rationales are typically secret. America’s surveillance programs are secret, as are the court proceedings that enable them and the legal rationales that justify them; informed dissents, like those by Levison or Senator Ron Wyden, must be kept secret. The reasons for all this secrecy are also secret.

... According to the [FISA] court’s rules of procedure, a party may be held in contempt for defying its orders. The secret court may consider many punishments—secret fines for each day of noncompliance, or even secret jail time for executives. The idea behind civil contempt is that “you hold the key to your own cell.” If you comply, the punishment stops. But hold out long enough and your contempt may be criminal, and your compliance will not end the jail sentence or displace the fine.

The closing of Lavabite, the email service which Edward Snowden used, it seems may result in criminal charges being filed against its former owner for failing to cooperate with an undisclosable order of this secret court. How confident is the chief justice of this secret court that they're able to provide adequate oversight of US government agencies? According to an interview with the Washington Post:

The chief judge of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court said the court lacks the tools to independently verify how often the government’s surveillance breaks the court’s rules that aim to protect Americans’ privacy. Without taking drastic steps, it also cannot check the veracity of the government’s assertions that the violations its staff members report are unintentional mistakes. “The FISC is forced to rely upon the accuracy of the information that is provided to the Court,” its chief, U.S. District Judge Reggie B. Walton, said in a written statement to The Washington Post. “The FISC does not have the capacity to investigate issues of noncompliance, and in that respect the FISC is in the same position as any other court when it comes to enforcing [government] compliance with its orders.”

If only this were a parody. (On a related note, civil forfeiture laws in play also seem to parody justice. That article's byline: "Under civil forfeiture, Americans who haven’t been charged with wrongdoing can be stripped of their cash, cars, and even homes. Is that all we’re losing?")