Am I alone in thinking wikileaks is a GOOD thing?

[Barb]

The Fourth Estate has become the Fifth Column, nobody's watch-dogging our government.... This makes them not only careless but also more corrupt. Wikileaks is providing a valuable service that the US Press abandoned. I have donated and I urge everyone else to do so.

Cuss and discuss.....

The only usefulness I comprehend is that these leaks will force a new and improved system of security and confidentiality by our government. We have to stay one step ahead of those that would trespass and report to the world, the actions of our classified government, for better or for worse. Let our actions stand alone and speak for themselves.

oKAYYYY, if our ACTIONS are classified, how do our ACTIONS speak for themselves?

The results, maybe you mean the results. But do you, in your life, believe that the ends justify any means? Do you go back to the results of bad acts on other people and pretend that THEIR actions produced their results, knowing full well that it was YOUR actions that laid them low and that stepping on their backs did not get you where you are? Of course you wouldn't do such a thing. It would be reprehensible. It would have repercussions. Someone who knew the truth would want to get back at you, wouldn't they? Would you then call them terrorists?

Its not rocket science, it ISN'T. The WHOLE FUCKING WORLD knows what we do except US. The government isn't trying to hide the truth from the WORLD, it only attempts to hide it from US. And we're complicit in our own ignorance, because we'd rather hear a pleasing bed time story than the plain fucking truth.
THAT is what is dishonest, THAT is what is unpatriotic, and THAT is what is truly and deeply disturbing about our nation.

 

[Synthaholic]

I find what they do really damaging. If the information is legitimate it should be released to the proper Authority, and investigated. There is no excuse for releasing Classified Information.

I'm just starting to read this thread so I apologize if someone has mentioned it, but NONE of these documents were Classified or Top Secret. There were Secret, and NOFORN, meaning 'no foreign' eyes can see them.

SECRET is a classification.

. . . and?

It's low level. If the State Dept. wanted their cables to have a higher security level, they would have done so.

 

[Barb]

How are they traitors? Julian isn't American, what loyalty does he have to this nation?

Also:

http://www.usmessageboard.com/polit...be-overstating-the-danger-from-wikileaks.html

Of course they're overstating it. Hell, they've got our "professional journalist's" balls as earrings (even the benwahs), why not try for prosecution under treason to try to silence any other meaningful dissent?

Dissemination of classified state secrets is not mere "dissent." It is a criminal act.

In thirty years, when he guilty are dead, it won't be. Is justice delayed justice denied?

 

[Intense]

I'm just starting to read this thread so I apologize if someone has mentioned it, but NONE of these documents were Classified or Top Secret. There were Secret, and NOFORN, meaning 'no foreign' eyes can see them.

SECRET is a classification.

. . . and?

It's low level. If the State Dept. wanted their cables to have a higher security level, they would have done so.

You think so? I'm still trying to understand what Union they have sworn allegiance to. I'm thinking it is definitely not the USA. I think they should compete under their own flag in the Olympics.

 

[Liability]

I heard Andrea Mitchell say that the reason it is so "difficult" for the Administration to go after Wikileaks is because [I have to paraphase it from memory]: 'then they'd have to also prosecute all the news media who re-published what wikileaks disclosed, and that nobody expects that,' or words along those lines.

Let me just call bullshit on that piss-poor "excuse.".

Prosecute the private for his alleged behavior. Prosecute Wikileaks for its unquestionable behavior (and that includes prosecuting the idiot in charge of Wikileaks and anybody in the corporate chain of command with any culpability for making that document dump happen right on down to the asshole employee who just pressed a button to "submit" the stolen material to the world). And then, when it comes to scum like The New York Slimes, make the obvious choice: "Since the dissemination had already occurred, further prosecution of news media would be pointless and thus, in the use of prosecutorial discretion, the Administartion, the DoJ and the Attorney General have determined that prosectuion of news outlets (other than Wikileaks) will not be undertaken."

If this Administration, DoJ and AG Holder do NOT go after the wikileak fuckers, then this Administration is guilty of malfeasance.

What happens when the private sends the information directly to a US media outlet instead?

(A) that's a contrary to fact hypothetical. He didn't. He sent it to the fuckers at wikileaks.

(B) in your alternative universe scenario, the private still gets prosecuted and the recipient who then disseminates it also gets prosecuted -- if the world was run by sane people. Do I give a rat's ass that this might mean (for example) that the fucking NY Slimes might get criminally prosecuted? Nope. I'm fine with that. I'm all for the 1st Amendment. But, being all for the 1st Amendment does NOT entail authority for the notion that a newspaper is immune to being prosecuted for violating a law prohibiting dissemination of classified material.

 

[CrusaderFrank]

I cant wait for Wikileaks to dump the Secret service protocols and practices for guarding POTUS, or for launching an armed Minuteman, that'll be fun...and it's our right to know too, amiright?

 

[Synthaholic]

SECRET is a classification.

. . . and?

It's low level. If the State Dept. wanted their cables to have a higher security level, they would have done so.

You think so? I'm still trying to understand what Union they have sworn allegiance to. I'm thinking it is definitely not the USA. I think they should compete under their own flag in the Olympics.

Oh, don't misunderstand. Manning should be prosecuted to the full extent of the law. As should his superiors.

In fact, that will be interesting: will anyone else be held responsible, or will this be another Abu Ghraib?

 

[Synthaholic]

I cant wait for Wikileaks to dump the Secret service protocols and practices for guarding POTUS, or for launching an armed Minuteman, that'll be fun...and it's our right to know too, amiright?

That info most likely has a Classified designation.

Do you understand the difference?

 

[Liability]

Of course they're overstating it. Hell, they've got our "professional journalist's" balls as earrings (even the benwahs), why not try for prosecution under treason to try to silence any other meaningful dissent?

Dissemination of classified state secrets is not mere "dissent." It is a criminal act.

In thirty years, when he guilty are dead, it won't be. Is justice delayed justice denied?

Thankfully, your non-responsive "answer" is pointless. For this isn't thirty years from now. This is "now." It is the present. The criminal act just happened.

Justice delayed is often justice denied, but that question has zero applicability to the matter at hand.

 

[8537]

I heard Andrea Mitchell say that the reason it is so "difficult" for the Administration to go after Wikileaks is because [I have to paraphase it from memory]: 'then they'd have to also prosecute all the news media who re-published what wikileaks disclosed, and that nobody expects that,' or words along those lines.

Let me just call bullshit on that piss-poor "excuse.".

Prosecute the private for his alleged behavior. Prosecute Wikileaks for its unquestionable behavior (and that includes prosecuting the idiot in charge of Wikileaks and anybody in the corporate chain of command with any culpability for making that document dump happen right on down to the asshole employee who just pressed a button to "submit" the stolen material to the world). And then, when it comes to scum like The New York Slimes, make the obvious choice: "Since the dissemination had already occurred, further prosecution of news media would be pointless and thus, in the use of prosecutorial discretion, the Administartion, the DoJ and the Attorney General have determined that prosectuion of news outlets (other than Wikileaks) will not be undertaken."

If this Administration, DoJ and AG Holder do NOT go after the wikileak fuckers, then this Administration is guilty of malfeasance.

What happens when the private sends the information directly to a US media outlet instead?

(A) that's a contrary to fact hypothetical. He didn't. He sent it to the fuckers at wikileaks.

Of course it is - but if/when Wikileaks is shut down people will simply find a different venue for publishing the information. That venue has been domestic media in the past.

(B) in your alternative universe scenario, the private still gets prosecuted and the recipient who then disseminates it also gets prosecuted -- if the world was run by sane people.

So do the media outlets that re-disseminate the information get prosecuted? or is only the media outlet that first received the information prevented from sharing it?

 

[Barb]

Dissemination of classified state secrets is not mere "dissent." It is a criminal act.

In thirty years, when he guilty are dead, it won't be. Is justice delayed justice denied?

Thankfully, your non-responsive "answer" is pointless. For this isn't thirty years from now. This is "now." It is the present. The criminal act just happened.

Justice delayed is often justice denied, but that question has zero applicability to the matter at hand.

If the US government is so all fired embarrassed by this, as by any other thing they want to keep under wraps until the actors are dead, there's a crime somewhere.

 

[Liability]

What happens when the private sends the information directly to a US media outlet instead?

(A) that's a contrary to fact hypothetical. He didn't. He sent it to the fuckers at wikileaks.

Of course it is - but if/when Wikileaks is shut down people will simply find a different venue for publishing the information. That venue has been domestic media in the past.

"People" who find a different "venue" to break the law get prosecuted as should which "venue" elects to join in the effort to break that law. Media is not immune from the obligation to comply with the law. I did not elect anybody at The New York Times to determine for America which classifed material "really shouldn't be kept secret." Nobody elected anybody at the Times to make those decisions. In fact, the law says that nobody outside of the intelligence and military folks and the governmental officials who issue the various "classifications" is permitted to make those decisions. That's kind of the point of why it is prohibited to disseminate the stuff. The decision, the only valid lawful decision, has already BEEN made.

(B) in your alternative universe scenario, the private still gets prosecuted and the recipient who then disseminates it also gets prosecuted -- if the world was run by sane people.

So do the media outlets that re-disseminate the information get prosecuted? or is only the media outlet that first received the information prevented from sharing it?

If the private had given the material to the fucking New York Slimes instead of Wikileaks and The Slimes had been the one to do the document dump, then yes, The Slimes gets prosecuted in the rational world and if The Boston Globe then re-disseminates the already leaked material, it makes little sense to bother going after them. The horse has already left the barn.

 

[Synthaholic]

It was childishly easy, according to the published chatlog of a conversation Manning had with a fellow-hacker. "I would come in with music on a CD-RW labelled with something like 'Lady Gaga' … erase the music … then write a compressed split file. No one suspected a thing ... listened and lip-synched to Lady Gaga's Telephone while exfiltrating possibly the largest data spillage in American history." He said that he "had unprecedented access to classified networks 14 hours a day 7 days a week for 8+ months".

Manning told his correspondent Adrian Lamo, who subsequently denounced him to the authorities: "Hillary Clinton and several thousand diplomats around the world are going to have a heart attack when they wake up one morning and find an entire repository of classified foreign policy is available, in searchable format, to the public ... Everywhere there's a US post, there's a diplomatic scandal that will be revealed. Worldwide anarchy in CSV format ... It's beautiful, and horrifying."

He added: "Information should be free. It belongs in the public domain."

Manning, according to the chatlogs, says he uploaded the copies to WikiLeaks, the "freedom of information activists" as he called them, led by Australian former hacker Julian Assange.​

link

 

[Liability]

In thirty years, when he guilty are dead, it won't be. Is justice delayed justice denied?

Thankfully, your non-responsive "answer" is pointless. For this isn't thirty years from now. This is "now." It is the present. The criminal act just happened.

Justice delayed is often justice denied, but that question has zero applicability to the matter at hand.

If the US government is so all fired embarrassed by this, as by any other thing they want to keep under wraps until the actors are dead, there's a crime somewhere.

If there's a point in your musings, it is not evident.

What the released State Department Cables said is maybe evidence of improper US international behavior. (Holy shit! We use diplomats to SPY on other nations? Who knew?) Or maybe it's just embarrassing. Either way, so what? The crime is in the receipt and dissemination of stolen governmental secret documents.

 

[Barb]

Thankfully, your non-responsive "answer" is pointless. For this isn't thirty years from now. This is "now." It is the present. The criminal act just happened.

Justice delayed is often justice denied, but that question has zero applicability to the matter at hand.

If the US government is so all fired embarrassed by this, as by any other thing they want to keep under wraps until the actors are dead, there's a crime somewhere.

If there's a point in your musings, it is not evident.

What the released State Department Cables said is maybe evidence of improper US international behavior. (Holy shit! We use diplomats to SPY on other nations? Who knew?) Or maybe it's just embarrassing. Either way, so what? The crime is in the receipt and dissemination of stolen governmental secret documents.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kKJhKHrTvmw"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kKJhKHrTvmw[/ame]

 

[8537]

If the private had given the material to the fucking New York Slimes instead of Wikileaks and The Slimes had been the one to do the document dump, then yes, The Slimes gets prosecuted in the rational world and if The Boston Globe then re-disseminates the already leaked material, it makes little sense to bother going after them. The horse has already left the barn.

I disagree here - if you believe the Times should be prosecuted for disseminating, the most effective way to prevent that dissemination would be to fully prosecute both the firm that disseminated the information the first time AND any one who repeats it. That would be an important step towards preventing the information from being disseminated via the media.

Otherwise, we'll just get some two-bit, fly-by-night media presence releasing the info and every media outlet using the "it's already out there" excuse.

 

[Liability]

If the private had given the material to the fucking New York Slimes instead of Wikileaks and The Slimes had been the one to do the document dump, then yes, The Slimes gets prosecuted in the rational world and if The Boston Globe then re-disseminates the already leaked material, it makes little sense to bother going after them. The horse has already left the barn.

I disagree here - if you believe the Times should be prosecuted for disseminating, the most effective way to prevent that dissemination would be to fully prosecute both the firm that disseminated the information the first time AND any one who repeats it. That would be an important step towards preventing the information from being disseminated via the media.

Otherwise, we'll just get some two-bit, fly-by-night media presence releasing the info and every media outlet using the "it's already out there" excuse.

IF Wikileaks does a document dump and every so-called "legitimate" news media outlet then RE-disseminates the dumped material, it is borderline absurd to "try" every media outlet in the USA.

But it sure as HELL makes good sense to try the guy who gave the stolen material to Wikileaks in the first place and it sure as HELL makes good sense to fully prosecute Wikieleaks and all those scumbags AT Wikileaks who acted in that criminal fashion.

But if your argument is that the next layer of dissemination should also get prosecuted (meaning, go after the fucking NY Slimes and the Washington Compost, etc., as well) then, fine.

In principle, I have nothing against that.

But so far, the ONLY one this dumbass Administration seems to be going after is the private who stole the material and gave it to Wikileaks. The Administration is thus acting in such a pussy timid fashion, they are effectively enabling more of this crap.

 

[Liability]

If the US government is so all fired embarrassed by this, as by any other thing they want to keep under wraps until the actors are dead, there's a crime somewhere.

If there's a point in your musings, it is not evident.

What the released State Department Cables said is maybe evidence of improper US international behavior. (Holy shit! We use diplomats to SPY on other nations? Who knew?) Or maybe it's just embarrassing. Either way, so what? The crime is in the receipt and dissemination of stolen governmental secret documents.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kKJhKHrTvmw"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kKJhKHrTvmw[/ame]

You may be babbling and incoherent, but at least you remain pointless, Babz.

 

[Trajan]

I am no fan of obama, I don't blame him for this and I think its screwed up this happened on his watch, he got sideswiped. Its also embarrassing for us all.

That being said, nor do I wish us to look foolish inept and conversations better left secret need to be left secret.

Putting out dirty laundry, that provide road marks to negotiation points for one thing, relations amongst folks that already suspect they hold each other in contempt, and the fact that some of this will effect the way we interact with one another. A lot was made of bushs stepping on Europe etc. well, remarks I have head that are in wiki are not flattering to our allies to say the least and not flattering to us....spying on foreign leaders and plenipotentiary's...really?

Will it have long term damage?Ii don't know, maybe not , a lot of this is a given, buts its always better left unsaid, like the digs you want to take at seldom seen family members at holiday dinners .

In addition how much is lost when our people don't feel safe using 'cable' traffic to make observations to one another on issues and personalities that may help us craft negotiation points etc.?

As far as lives? we don't know and never will I don't think.You can play suppsoe though, suppose a name of one of the opposition leader(s) in contact with us, unknown to Iranian intelligence comes out? What do you think his/her life is worth?

I will say that in all likely hood the leaks of the wire taps and swift prgm. probably did, or certainly will if it has not already.

So basically anything that our government has done wrong in secret is not fair game since it makes us look bad? If we didn't want to be in such situations, perhaps our government shouldn't be doing these things in the first place?

The problem I find is we likely don't even know half of what our own government is doing when it comes to foreign policy. What happens is the American voters cannot make as informed decisions as possible because of this. We only find out when screwups happen it seems long after anyone who is involved is dead.

hello?

Dude….you have completely tacked, you asked and made comment on what lives may or not have been lost and a reference to punishing the publisher of the info., then you cherry picked one fairly innocuous sentence out of the answer I crafted for you in that context and ran totally in the other direction.

You are also introducing a strawman, nowhere in that answer to you did I say that they or anyone should be excused for what they had done “wrong”. In fact can you tell me what I said they did wrong? Other than this getting out making them look foolish which is hardly their doing?


If you wanted to post a screed on transparency and collective gov. guilt then why didn’t you just do that…

 

[Trajan]

In thirty years, when he guilty are dead, it won't be. Is justice delayed justice denied?

Thankfully, your non-responsive "answer" is pointless. For this isn't thirty years from now. This is "now." It is the present. The criminal act just happened.

Justice delayed is often justice denied, but that question has zero applicability to the matter at hand.

If the US government is so all fired embarrassed by this, as by any other thing they want to keep under wraps until the actors are dead, there's a crime somewhere.

why? how does that follow?