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Pentagon Seeking Out Wikileaks Founder Julian Assange
clustro writes "The Pentagon is desperately seeking the 'cooperation' of Wikileaks founder Julian Assange, in order to stop him from releasing over 250,000 pages of confidential foreign policy documents. The documents were allegedly provided to Assange by Bradley Manning, the same solider who leaked a video showing a US Army helicopter killing unarmed civilians and international press correspondents."
Could you just provide us your GPS co-ordinates? Thanks!
Good luck finding "Julian" as if such a man would have parted ways with his real name. He is a master of 27 languages and knows the local customs as if he recited them as his daily prayers. This is a man who possesses a near chameleon like instinct and can instantly blend into the background anywhere. Only further surpassing his ability to sink into the inky blackness are the hundreds of contacts he has made from here to hoover damn. Hell, even the rocks and streams seem to offer the man comfort if so much as he breathes a heavy sigh.
I can only laugh when the Pentagon says they want to find "Julian." Just considering the sheer number of hells they'll need to climb down to find the darkest demon who might be able to guess what "Julian" had for lunch just makes me chuckle.
Either that or the Pentagon can just send him an email.
"You should always go to other people's funerals; otherwise, they won't come to yours." -- Yogi Berra
If the Pentagon couldn't prevent the leak of the documents, what makes them think they can track down Assange.
Hey, how's it going?
Good thing he's not a United States citizen then, or else he might be violating his social contract.
93rd rule of Slashdot: No matter how obvious my sarcasm is, my comment will be taken seriously by someone.
I might be defending the leaker, but in this case he leaked the videos under a false guise. The videos didn't show "murder". If they had, I would still be undecided. However, he found some videos which might prove his point, but in reality the guys they shot at had a rocket launcher. There will always be collateral damage in war, and that is all he showed us. He has indeed committed treason to the tenth degree.
You don't get to make that determination yourself
Why the hell not? What, can only "experts" determine that? Funny how the experts are always government paid.
If our elected representatives no longer represent us, do we still live in a Democracy?
Yup. Now he's an enemy combatant. Now about those GPS coordinates...
Women are like electronics: you don't know how damaged they are until you try to turn them on.
Julian Assange is painted as a real life Jason Bourne; not so much. I hope, if Julian has these papers, he can get them released. The world of secrets is so yesterday, and the Pentagon/NatSecure pretending this is a security issue would be a joke if they hadn't murdered so many people already. Does the Pentagon really think it is a secret that they are woefully foolish, bigoted, and misanthropic? Really, what else do these contain when `all the presidents men' are willing to roll over on active spies for vindictiveness.
Rock on Julian; forcing what these lunatics say and think into the public sphere is a service to all, and will help change the world for the better.
Yes, I believe they have the man responsible: Bradley Manning. I expect he is totally screwed for the rest of his life.
Are you trying to claim that the people he gave the information to, who NEVER ASKED HIM FOR IT, should also be screwed? If so, what if he happened to have emailed the info to you?
Sleep your way to a whiter smile...date a dentist!
Leaking a video and foreign policy documents does not constitute "treason."
In Soviet America, leaks plug you.
Why is Snark Required?
Are you trying to claim that the people he gave the information to, who NEVER ASKED HIM FOR IT, should also be screwed?
No, if you'll read my post, I didn't claim that, but...
If so, what if he happened to have emailed the info to you? ...
Oh, I don't knpw...let me think: I probably wouldn't post it to the internet and protect the identity of the person who emailed it to me at all costs.
This is amazing that this has taken Slashdot all day to report on the #1 story on most Tech sites and the #2-3 story on most non-tech sites. Is there a reason political stories are never posted by Soulskill on Slashdot? I'm looking over what he has posted and I can't find any. You would of had at least 1000 comments by now, but you are now posting this at 10 pm PST which means that not a lot of people are going to see this. If you want more info look at my signature, that was my 3rd attempt at getting this posted on Slashdot today. It includes 4-5 links unlike the lead.
An Education is the Font of All Liberty
You, sir, are a troll. If you had a clearance you'd know that the info is either banal or humiliating to the U.S.
in response to your sig: It's entirely possible that we live in a democracy. We just won't live in a republic. Democracies are a tyranny of the mob which is why the founders deliberately did not create one.
treason (plural treasons)
noun
Definition:
1. betrayal of country: a violation of the allegiance owed by somebody to his or her own country, e.g. by aiding an enemy.
2. treachery: betrayal or disloyalty
3. act of betrayal: an act of betrayal or disloyalty
Ever hear of the Pentagon Papers?
Classification is supposed to be used to protect the American people, not protect criminals in office, or protect certain classes' privileges, or protect certain corporations' contracts, or to DECEIVE the American public.
If you are privy to misuse of the law in such a way or of such abuses, it's the patriotic and moral thing to do to expose them.
We don't know (yet) what this information is, but breaking the law is sometimes justified if the law is unjust or is being used to protect uinjust actions.
The person taking such action, choosing to break a law they see as wrong faces the consequences knowingly. History will judge whether they were right or wrong.
And in general we should be uncomfortable with the idea of our government deciding that we don;t have a right to know what its doing - pretty much goes against the ideas behind the founding of this country and is abhorrent to anyone not having an authoritarian mindset.
Somehow I'm sure our country and citizens will manage to survive the release of this information that the government feels it must protect us from.
This space available.
Your own personal view on whether something should or shouldn't be classified is irrelevant. There are well-known and established processes that govern classification.
I don't know where you live, but I still live in a democracy. So while my opinion on what should/shouldn't be classified might not be the definitive one, an important one, or even a good one.. it's always a relevant one. You presumably live in a dictatorship, so I can see how you might have a different opinion on it. Of course, your opinion on everything is irrelevant, since you live in a dictatorship.
AccountKiller
No this is not true, and the attitude is deeply troubling. Because society is FREE and there are certain INALIENABLE RIGHTS. Please look up the meaning of inalienable if you don't understand it. Some of those are contained in the First Amendment: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."
I really hope this is a troll. If so, kudos - it is very well done.
If not, I weep that there are actually people who think this way. It is instructive to understand this kind of mindset. If the democratic will says it's ok, then it must be ok. Countless atrocities committed in the name of the majority have occurred on the basis of this mode of thinking. The Holocaust comes to mind.
I think I'm going to be sick.
Nope, that sounds more like the definition of spying. Giving the intelligence to the enemy, or to the general public doesn't matter. For all we know, he's been trading valuable information, and publishing embarrassing information. I don't honestly believe that, but I'm sure if he "cooperates", it will be used at his trial, assuming he gets one. Otherwise, we'll hear about a tragic boating accident in which he didn't make it. You have to watch the buildup of gas fumes in the engine compartment, a boat can just explode without any notice.
Serious? Seriousness is well above my pay grade.
All he is saying is that if you do release confidential data based on your personal determination that it is a moral thing to do, you should not be guaranteed to not suffer any consequences. What if the Pentagon is telling the truth and releasing these documents would cause "serious damage to national security" and people die as a result of your decision?
Negative moral value of force outweighs the positive value of good intentions.
Because we the people delegated those decisions to the government "experts". Ain't that a bitch?
Did you bother watching the video?! THe guy did NOT have a ROCKET LAUNCHER. It was a god damn camera with super long lens. (I am not trying to be funny, that's what really happened)
According to the Wikipedia (and consistent with the media reports):
Manning reportedly said that the diplomatic documents expose "almost criminal political back dealings" and that they explain "how the first world exploits the third, in detail"
Probably this is the same sort of thing that U.S. Marine Major General Smedley Darlington Butler recognized about the military and political black-ops in the early twentieth century. What's new is old.
It's also interesting that Bradley Manning wasn't given an award for pointing out corruption in government, seeing as how congress enacted whistle-blower protection for people who expose corruption in government.
Seems like the military wants to have it's cake and eat it too. Too bad for Manning and the military.
From the article:
Although it is likely that WikiLeaks has broken US laws in de-encrypting the video from Baghdad and publishing secret documents, the tone of an American official who spoke to the Daily Beast sounded more desperate than threatening. "We'd like to know where he is; we'd like his cooperation in this," the official said.
I'm certain that if they get their hands on Lassange, that they would quickly arrest him. There is nothing more threatening to government security than publicity about government corruption.
If in fact the Commander in Chief of the U.S. military (Barrik Obama) is indeed not Right Wing like so many Republicans claim (they say he is a "socialist" and a "liberal") then Obama would make sure that Bradley Manning is given a Presidential Pardon and that any embarrassing and illegal conduct conducted by the military and diplomatic core be brought out into the public (through his proclaimed government "transparency" initiative) and any unethical or illegal acts be punished accordingly.
Somehow I'm thinking that isn't going to happen, because Obama is just a different shade of neoconservative than his predecessor. My two cents anyway. Moderate with moderation!
Section 3. Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort. No Person shall be convicted of Treason unless on the Testimony of two Witnesses to the same overt Act, or on Confession in open Court. The Congress shall have power to declare the Punishment of Treason, but no Attainder of Treason shall work Corruption of Blood, or Forfeiture except during the Life of the Person attainted. Constitution > Webster
In the US, we have collectively decided, as a society, that some information should be kept secret, even from The People, and we have empowered and entrusted the government with the power to do so.
Really, did _you_ vote on it, will your vote be reaffirmed every generation or so to ensure its still what the people want ?
Perhaps you should have said, a previous generation let the powers that be keep secrets from everyone, and now we cant get them to give up their power.
A free and democratic society does not keep secrets. You mean something less than free and something less than democratic.
Also, the website in question is not a party to the agreements that make information "classified". They are, of course, not obliged to respect those agreements.
If we have a free press, then the information about government wrongdoing can, of course, be published without fear of reprisal. Why would you suggest anything less?
Why do you always reveal a pro-business, information can be criminalized bias in all your postings? What government projects do you work on?
The ability to wash gov issued news packets as objective reporting.
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
People leak to WikiLeaks because they believe (mostly accurately) that there will be no consequences (unless they stupidly out themselves, as Manning did). This creates an unhealthy environment for any kind of legitimately protected or sensitive information -- indeed, the rule of law -- in a democratic society.
Isn't that the exact point of wikileaks : to make it possible to leak information the world should be aware of , without risk for the whistleblowers. ... ) , but if they can be leaked , they will be leaked , and the chances are it's going to be leaked not to the general public , but to someone with less then good intentions.
You could say some information should be kept secret ( like military strategies , etc
At least , when it gets leaked to wikileaks , the whole world knows about it , and so the goverment has no choice but to change there plans , and making them more leak-proof , which means it also becomes more difficult for those with bad intentions to get the information.
Slipping shoelaces ?
This guy is more intelligent than most of the other replies have given him credit. If every ounce of military information were publicly available, we would not be able to have covert or clandestine military operations. Our enemies would know every move we make. Obviously, the "Collateral Murder" video wasn't some tactical plan, but my point is this: Someone, somewhere, has to make the decision about what should and should not be given out to the world. As the OP pointed out, anyone who decides to release that information must be prepared to suffer the consequences, good or bad. If Manning thought he could just get away with releasing the video and go on with his life, he was wrong.
So you would have made the same call? You saw the video I assume otherwise you wouldn't be talking about it. You saw how casually they were walking about considering a helicopter was circling above... Way to make hollow excuses for a lack of insight on the part of one soldier.
That depends on the information, not on opinion, not even yours...
You're kidding right? Explosions are flashy, they get a lot of attention and everybody sees it. The last thing that a group interested in keeping their activities under wraps would want is for everybody to start looking at them because a critic just turned into a fireball.
Poisonings, "muggings gone wrong", character assassinations, etc. are all much more subtle ways to go about silencing a nuisance. They want a resolution where they can, reasonably, act just as surprised as everyone else. I'd be much more suspicious if he died of a sudden heart attack, or was murdered by an apparent Islamic terrorist than if he went out in a blaze of improbability.
Try not to take me more seriously than I take myself.
The main issue is, there is indeed SOME need for SOME info to be classified, mainly for national security reason. Once that need is established, people start stretching it. Care to explain to me why/how that specific video should be kept classified/secret ?
Second, I'm starting to have doubts about how free and democratic some societies are. What's the yardstick ?
The Cloud - because you don't care if your apps and data are up in the air.
In the US, we have collectively decided, as a society, that some information should be kept secret, even from The People, and we have empowered and entrusted the government with the power to do so.
Yes. And Hitler was elected in democratic elections as well. (I know, I know, Godwin's Law) Just because we voted on it doesn't mean it's always the best case. We generally aren't informed on what exactly we're voting on. In this specific example, we're voting on who gets to keep things secret. Which means by definition we _can't_ know what exactly we're deciding. This is exactly _why_ we need people to leak things.
There's the famous saying about preferring that a thousand guilty men go free than one innocent man be punished for a crime he did not commit. I consider this to be quite similar. I'd rather have a thousand national secrets leaked than have that one thing covered up. Just because it's not the next Holocaust doesn't mean it isn't something that needs to be released. Not enough people leaked what was happening in Nazi Germany until it was too late, likely because they were afraid of the consequences. The more tools to lessen the consequences, the better.
You've got that backwards. Who watches the watchmen? I see what you did there.
You've played this little switch to make it look like WikiLeaks is the custodian, the watchman...but your own logic proves otherwise. You even say that this is Pentagon information, that some secrets should be kept secret and that by just living in the US, we've agreed to that contract.
Wrong, sir. Simply wrong. I'm going to bypass most of what you said because it's simple double-speak. You frame this in a way that is cowardly. Unarmed civilians, collateral murder...both within quotes as if to say that killing unarmed people is okay, that it is a justification. I'm not going to wade into the situation of the battle, but I posit to you that we can and should do better.
The government makes mistakes and we have seen too many times that it tries to cover them up rather than owning up to them. As a country we should strive for that higher ideal. Then perhaps the need for secrets, especially of a botched military operation where civilians died, doesn't need to become a state secret.
I don't generally post on Slashdot... but couldn't resist. Post them. Now. Please. No doubt it'll hurt US relations with who-knows-who... but the truth is always the best way to create the best change. One day, this man should be nominated, and win, a Nobel Peace Prize.
according to WikiLeaks' twitter feed: "Allegations in Wired that we have been sent 260,000 classified US embassy cables are, as far as we can tell, incorrect."
Would Wikileaks have a reason to lie and withhold these messages, if the US govt. has the capability to find out if Manning sent them to Wikileaks? Maybe he leaked them, but to someone else, and it was simply assumed to have been to Wikileaks?
Corruption is convincing someone that the selfless ideal is the same as their selfish ideal.
Obama himself has threatened to arrest the wikileaker: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fM59bbp0Wsw
I watched your video: Obama does NOT threaten to arrest the wikileaker in the video. If that isn't what you meant to imply you should make it more clear.
Just to be clear, I am an Obama supporter, but I also disagree with some of the things that he does. But let's have a debate that is focused on the facts and reasoned opinion, not innuendo.
Look where all this talking got us, baby.
When are people going to realize that the differences between Republicans and Democrats exist only in rhetoric?
When are people such as yourself going to realize that assuming that if neither party doesn't agree with a certain view, that doesn't mean they're "both the same". Have you REALLY not being paying that much attention?
If the rather large differences between the two parties aren't what you care about, fine. But don't ignore the differences just because you don't care about them.
AccountKiller
From TFA:
Manning, 22 [...] As an intelligence specialist in the US army, Manning
I fail to see how a 22 year old guy can be an "Intelligence specialist".
(and get off my lawn BTW).
http://michaelsmith.id.au
Direct Democracy is rule of mob. Saying plain ol' Democracy is a rule of mob is like saying a Parallelogram is a four sided figure with all equal sides. We live in a Representational Democracy, roughly speaking a Republic and Democracy where representatives are determined by the people.
I read TFA and all I got was this lousy cookie
He also signed an order for an extra-judicial killing of an American citizen, ignored when an American citizen was killed and is making the greatest changes to arresting, prosecuting and punishing government whistleblowers since the cold war. Obama has also kept the manhunting squads (warning PDF) created by Vice Pres Cheney running at full steam. These are the same sort of people who pulled off that assassination in Dubai, but will likely be far more competent.
An Education is the Font of All Liberty
dayalsoap, are you sure you provided the correct link? Because I just spent the time to watch it, and Obama doesn't make any such threats.
There should always be the right to disent. Even the right to disent from the right to disent (so long as they stay a tiny minority).
I read TFA and all I got was this lousy cookie
What the hell dream world do you live in?
"the Army had no reason whatever [mypetjawa.mu.nu] to believe that the "unarmed civilians" featured in "Collateral Murder" were "unarmed""
Common people carry guns in Iraq. Not just pistols either, but assault rifles. I've read in many places that AK-47s are common. Simply carrying one does not make one an "insurgent" http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2008/12/earlier-this-we/
"the fact that he skipped out on a planned appearance at a panel today in Las Vegas, NV"
WTF would that prove?
"In free and democratic societies, an individual deciding on his or her own to leak classified information is a subversion of that very democratic process. "
Where did you pull this line, Glenn Beck? The democratic process depends on an educated society and a free media so that citizens can make educated decisions. Despotic societies depend on secrets and uneducated citizens. Not to mention the people in charge of the video were not elected.
"if you do, this kind of decision is a moral/ethical one which must necessarily be tempered with consequences. I.e., if, in a free and democratic society, you really believe that a piece of classified information should be released, and you're going to unilaterally decide to do release it because of your own personal beliefs or convictions, you should be willing to pay your society's consequences for it."
If everyone thought the way you do, we'd still have slavery, women wouldn't be able to vote, and any killer with connections would walk free.
I saw the video and it is tragic and disturbing, but that is simply saying that war itself is tragic and disturbing, which is something people should realize without needing a video. Whether this particular soldier made the right call or not is meaningless because you cannot expect thousands of soldiers in thousands of situations like that to make the right call every time. Things like this are unavoidable, they have happened in every war so far and will continue to happen. Btw, if I was standing next to a guy with an RPG and US helicopters were circling above I wouldn't be casually walking about.
Negative moral value of force outweighs the positive value of good intentions.
I watched the whole video. It doesn't mention wikileaks, the wikileaks founder, or anything surrounding this case at all. The video is about an entirely different leak (of which almost no details are given), and Obama doesn't even threaten to arrest that guy.
AccountKiller
Well, he's screwed, unless his info shows major corruption. If his info is solid, his captors may be screwed.
I hope for intelligent responses to this post that actually acknowledge the need for some information to be protected, and for processes to protect that information, of which the government is the steward. Or, for any reasonable alternative other than any and all information should always be able to be indiscriminately leaked without fear of reprisal.
Well, I agree that some information needs to be protected.
In my opinion, most of the governments in the world use their control over information to the great detriment of their citizenry. They do this on purpose, with malice and forethought. I presume that most people who are in charge of making this happen rationalize it with thinking that they're somehow serving the greater good. In point of fact, they aren't. I can't state that emphatically enough. They are not serving any greater good, no matter what kind of excuses they think they have.
Information about the activities of our government that should be secret should basically only be information that would pretty directly result in someone getting killed if it was public knowledge. Strategic plans, detailed specifications for key military equipment, identities of spies, that sort of thing. Also, in some cases, I would also accept that diplomatic negotiations should be kept secret for some relatively short period of time in order to avoid jeopardizing said negotiations.
Too often used is the excuse that information should be kept secret because it would give our enemies ammunition to discredit us. If that's the case, the information discredits us whether or not its secret. All you are doing by keeping it secret is fostering a false sense of self-righteousness in the populace, one that is ultimately incredibly dangerous and inimical to democracy.
So far Wikileaks discretion and judgement in these matters has been impeccable. Sure, you might think the video depicting the helicopter shooting up civilians is biased for any number of reasons. But those reasons should be up for public debate, not hidden behind a decision to make some piece of information secret. Nobody would be able to argue that the army couldn't have known the civilians were unarmed if the video weren't out there to argue about.
Need a Python, C++, Unix, Linux develop
Circling above ? The chopper was a couple of *kilometres* away. They could probably barely even *hear* it.
You could say some information should be kept secret ( like military strategies , etc ... ) , but if they can be leaked , they will be leaked , and the chances are it's going to be leaked not to the general public , but to someone with less then good intentions.
That is also an interesting point. If it's on wikileaks, everybody knows its public knowledge and plans can be changed accordingly.
I still think that wikileaks has a bit of a duty to try to filter out stuff that's obviously going to get someone killed if it's publicly known.
Need a Python, C++, Unix, Linux develop
You do realize that confidential has no meaning for the regular civilian? It has nothing to du with democracy whatsoever. Yes the leaker did something illegal, but only because he is a soldier, for you and me, this is only some printed paper.
How do I uncompress my MD5 archive?
I looked at the link you posted. It did not show Obama threatening to arrest the wikileaker. In fact, it shows Obama signing a law that is meant to protect journalists' rights. Perhaps you meant another link that actually showed what you said it would.
But in this case, the wikileaker would be Manning, the guy who swore an oath to abide by the Constitution and follow orders. The video of the killings was edited to remove scenes where the gunship did not shoot at confirmed hostile forces that was actively shooting at US forces due to the risk of harming women and children. This edit was meant to portray the gunship crew in a bad light, not to tell the truth. Now it comes out that he's leaking over 200,000 highly confidential diplomatic conversations, whose release would jeopardize diplomatic relations with our friends and foes alike. Releasing these documents without permission is a crime. That's different than a journalist being forced to name his sources, it's about punishing a man who broke the law.
A NYC lawyer blogs. http://www.chuangblog.com/
Why else would Australian customs cancel his Julian's passport ?
http://www.smh.com.au/technology/technology-news/australian-wikileak-founders-passport-confiscated-20100516-v6dw.html
First Julian is not an citizen of the usa.
I just hope that the Judge/ Judges who handles this case asks themselves :
Why did you enter the legal profession?
Do you believe in the principle of a fair trial?
Do you believe in free speech?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lady_Justice
He is right on the money in saying that:
His comment is not a troll, and this level of moderation is clearly and abuse of the moderator system. Ironically, it seems to have been perpetrated by people who believe information should not be obstructed! Hey, assholes, if you really believe in it, how about you prove it by not shouting down or drowning out opposing viewpoints! If you modded this down, and you're reading this post, please comment in this thread to undo it. If isn't fair to mod him down just because you disagree with him.
That said, what does it say about the government of the US that they failed to release the Collateral Murder video on their own? How many other incidents like this have happened in Iraq that the government has covered up? Don't the people of the US have a need to know how their tax dollars are being spent? How would these videos hurt our military effort? Don't the people of Iraq know they've been given the shaft? And don't the other nations in the region assume the same anyway? Anyway, food for thought. It does bother me that he wasn't willing to come out in the first place, but I don't know all the details either.
Specifically, the new intelligence groups created by Bush/Chaney that were outside the regular chain of command should be investigated. If I remember correctly, these were in the Pentagon, and were staffed by neo-cons, and they reported primarily to Chaney.
All we know right now is that the name of an active serving CIA asset was revealed to the public, with the result of "adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort." Clearly treason. We also know that Scooter Libby was convicted of obstructing the investigation. So a crime was committed and a successful cover-up occurred. We cannot let this treasonous act go unpunished.
Well, my right wing Slashdot readers, how does it feel when the shoe is on the other foot? Ready to see high ranking members of the Bush team spend the rest of their lives in jail, or be lined up against a wall and shot? Personally, I would volunteer to fire one of the guns, but I guess I just am the kind of person who holds a grudge.
Why is Snark Required?
From the top of the WikiLeaks main page:
"# Fri, 11 Jun 2010 14:37:12 wikileaks: Super panel tonight in Vegas with Julian Assange, Valerie Plame & Scott Risen | IRE10 bit.ly/dwcjxI"
Wow, is it really that hard to find him? He tweets his location pretty regularly...
I hope he gets a gun and exercises his 2nd amendment right. If there was ever something I think it applied to, I would imagine this is it.
If the only way you can accept an assertion is by faith, then you are conceding that it can't be taken on its own merits
I am not a U.S citizen and have had problems with U.S foreign policy. For once I understand the U.S government to some degree.
In greater scheme of things sometimes even more sensitive information moves over diplomatic channels than over the spy network. One of the first things that spring to mind is diplomatic cables from Saudi Arabia. As a close U.S ally but with a government that the U.S can't really condone I guess some of those cables can be too candid for public consumption. Also many governments in the area can't work with the U.S if the U.S goverment is disclosing secrets as it would lead to embarrasment at home or worse. Compromised diplomatic cables would be an embarrasment to any country.
I like Wikileaks and it fills an important role in exposing the will of politicians to shroud the transparency of government. But to say that in a free and democratic society that secrets shouldn't exist... Is childishly naive.
This has nothing to do about any of those things. This has to do with Foreign Policy documents from the US State Department. If the US is engaging in illegal acts to further its FP missions than they should be immediately stopped. The military is a blunt instrument and the CIA death squads are not surgeons as evident by the 1000 or so dead civilians so far from US CIA drone strikes in Pakistan, Somalia and Yemen and should never be relied upon to bring forth results in FP. The vast majority of our attempts to shape policy in countries by use of lethal force, no matter how targeted have failed. One could note the vast amount of war crimes perpetuated by US backed insurgent groups in South America, Middle East and Southeast Asia for examples.
An Education is the Font of All Liberty
Much more interesting to me is what will happen with the dummy that leaked the info. Article 106 of the UCMJ defines this offense as punishable by death. This soldier knew with absolute certainty that he was committing a grave offense. A court martial is not handled like your everyday court case, no amount of money is going to save his skin.
Got Code?
Daniel Ellsburg, who released the Pentagon Papers while working for the Rand Corporation during the 1960's and 70's was on MSNBC today and implied that they may attempt to assassinate him with the same sort of shadowy CIA manhunting squad used against him by Nixon. In his words they were sent by Nixon to " permanently incapacitate him" in Washington DC during some political rally.
An Education is the Font of All Liberty
Treason is lying to the american public about WMDs. Perhaps you don't think the boss can commit treason. But the public is meant to be the boss - and they were lied too, and money was laundered, lives were lost and countless suffered.
Like all pain, suffering is a signal that something isn't right
How did Wikileaks know that the people killed by the helicopters in the video were "unarmed civilians"? Did the other "unarmed civilians" who were carrying AK47's tell them?
Concerning the Reuters journalists, if an AP or UPI reporter had been in Dresden during the WW2 British air raid and had died in the firestorm, would someone have filed charges against the bomber pilots? Or Churchill?
War is war. When you are in the wrong place at the wrong time, you die. It comes with the territory.
When did 'we' decide this? I don't remember 'us' being asked. Was this decision made in perpetuity or are 'we' agreeing to an extension of it every time a president is elected even if it is with less than 50% of the vote? Maybe soon 'we' will decide to ban private firearm ownership, get tattoos and implants and right-size our dissidents?
They whose government reduces their essential liberties for temporary security, receive neither liberty nor security.
Exactly and I do not think that most people here quite understand how much trouble this soldier is in. In reality this soldier may be facing a firing squad for releasing that video.
Got Code?
In the US, we have collectively decided, as a society, that some information should be kept secret, even from The People, and we have empowered and entrusted the government with the power to do so.
Really, did _you_ vote on it, will your vote be reaffirmed every generation or so to ensure its still what the people want ?
Perhaps you should have said, a previous generation let the powers that be keep secrets from everyone, and now we cant get them to give up their power.
This argument doesn't hold much water. Should every law in a democratic society be renewed every few years? I agree there may be an argument for more openness, but secrecy in some areas is and will always be important. Furthermore, as the first post in the thread stated, this leak is not being chosen democratically, either. Unilateral action by an individual or small group of individuals is not necessarily in there interest of the people. Also you claim "we cant get them to give up their power." Have you tried? When was the last time you wrote to your representatives urging them to press for legislation declassifying reams of diplomatic documents?
Aside from the fact that the Army had no reason whatever to believe that the "unarmed civilians" featured in "Collateral Murder" were "unarmed", and the fact that he skipped out on a planned appearance at a panel today in Las Vegas, NV...
Isn't it supposed to go the other way around? You shoot at people who you know are armed and actively dangerous. You often don't have perfect information in war and going on unfounded hunches and "innocent" assumptions can cost innocent lives.
In free and democratic societies, an individual deciding on his or her own to leak classified information is a subversion of that very democratic process. In the US, we have collectively decided, as a society, that some information should be kept secret, even from The People, and we have empowered and entrusted the government with the power to do so. When an individual, on his or her own, decides that some secret information should be leaked -- no matter the reason -- they subvert that process. It is nowhere near akin to leaking sensitive information from totalitarian or repressive regimes, or even from corporate entities. Some might assert that information is overclassified, or classified such as to hide wrongdoing or illegal or questionably behavior. Fine, but: 1. You don't get to make that determination yourself. However...
Correct, the people who may have "classified it such as to hide [possible] wrongdoing or illegal or questionably [sic] behavior" make that determination. You are simply saying that is how it is, but is is not ought. Is that how it ought to be?
2. ...if you do, this kind of decision is a moral/ethical one which must necessarily be tempered with consequences. I.e., if, in a free and democratic society, you really believe that a piece of classified information should be released, and you're going to unilaterally decide to do release it because of your own personal beliefs or convictions, you should be willing to pay your society's consequences for it.
People leak to WikiLeaks because they believe (mostly accurately) that there will be no consequences (unless they stupidly out themselves, as Manning did). This creates an unhealthy environment for any kind of legitimately protected or sensitive information -- indeed, the rule of law -- in a democratic society.
Your own personal view on whether something should or shouldn't be classified is irrelevant. There are well-known and established processes that govern classification.
Just about the only thing WikiLeaks believes should be protected from leaking is negative information about WikiLeaks itself.
Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?
I hope for intelligent responses to this post that actually acknowledge the need for some information to be protected, and for processes to protect that information, of which the government is the steward. Or, for any reasonable alternative other than any and all information should always be able to be indiscriminately leaked without fear of reprisal.
Clearly our nuclear launch codes should not be leaked. However, revealing truth about human rights abuses ultimately leads to our being a healthier nation. Imagine if the abuses at Abu Garib were classified and still continued to this day without the public knowing any better. Sure, revealing those abuses hurt our propaganda efforts in the Middle East somewhat, but I don't think an America that routinely abuses human rights is one worth living in or dying for.
Quis custodiet ipsos custodes? [Latin for: "Who watches the watchers?" or "Who polices the police?"]. Whistleblowers do. Watchdog journalists do. We the people in order to perfect a union do.
Big apple, new Yorik, undig it, something's unrotting in Edenmark.
we have collectively decided, as a society
We decided? My best interests? How do you know what my best interest is? How can you say what my best interest is?
Literalism isn't a form of humor, it's you being irritating.
"What if people die as a result" of leaking the confidential data? Many, many people *have* died due to our offensive military operations in that part of the world. I wager that obtaining the documents is an effort to examine the premises and policies surrounding those deaths, a la the Pentagon Papers. The claims of "serious damage to national security" have been seriously overblown in the past. Give the documents to someone trustworthy (outside the United States) to evaluate for their likelihood to "seriously damage" us.
Actually that would be an interesting experiment. Every law reviewed by the population every few years. This would give the population control, it would also limit the amount of laws that could be feasibly enacted ehich is something everyone should agree is a good thing. Every first world country is burying itself under the new laws it creates every year when we all have perfectly good laws already on the books to punish those same crimes.
Normal people worry me!
"In free and democratic societies, an individual deciding on his or her own to leak classified information is a subversion of that very democratic process. In the US, we have collectively decided, as a society, that some information should be kept secret, even from The People, and we have empowered and entrusted the government with the power to do so."
Nonsense. It is based on the circumstances at hand. It is not "always OK" or "never ok" to leak classified information.
Example: Nuclear weapon blueprints. Probably not a good idea to leak those. Probably also not good to leak troop movements or things like access codes to restricted areas.
However, illegal wiretapping, murder covered up by the army, Abu Ghraib abuse problems, etc. are all things that NEED to be leaked in order to ensure the democratic process continues to work. The people have decided that some information needs to be secret. The people need to make sure this power isn't abused... by any means necessary. Once we allow the government to subvert our freedom the entire point of this country is gone. If you don't want freedom then there's plenty of other places to go that don't have it. Feel free to move there any time. The USA was founded on the principle that freedom was more important than anything, even security.
-1 disagree is not a modifier for a reason. -1 troll, flaimbait, redundant, overrated are NOT acceptable substitutes.
It is difficult to take a stand on a morally divisive issue. The more people stand up the better. We would all be better off for it. In this case, it is hard to judge when you don't even have the information to make a stand; like when we don't have the documents to show what the government is doing. I sure hope the government doesn't use that "state secrets" excuse, like they did for Area 51 and other cases which seems to be a precedent. Part of me hope Julian will release the information, the other part of me feels that if I were in the same situation: what would I do. Would I want to risk the wrath of the world's most powerful nation militarily to help others to avoid the same fate, or would I release the document in the hopes that enough of us will take a stand before we all get blasted up by some sort of microwave weapon in a protest for free speech. Yeah, I know it sounds grim, but the tools are all there for the people in office, certain classes and corporations interests...
Society use your Sciences
I don't remember agreeing to no such social contract, nor that I have ever agreed to such. A free and democratic society wouldn't have need of secret documents.
"There is a way that seems right to a man, but its end is the way of death." Proverbs 16:25 (NKJV)
When did 'we' decide this?
You don't have clearance to know that.
Depending on what he leaked he may be considered a hero by civil libertarians if some of the allegations and rumors swirling about these cables are true. I know I consider him one, this is far less a grave offense against the law and liberty than Cheney's death squads or Bush's/Obama's/Congress's support of the Patriot Act. You seem almost gleeful he has less rights during a court martial, any reason for that?
An Education is the Font of All Liberty
how do you figure he might be violating his social contract?
An illegal law is null and void on its face.
First of all I would say that any sworn official of the government has a duty to uphold and defend the Constitution, and if that person is aware of laws that are being broken and nothing is being done, they absolutely must leak that information to the press.
Secondly, the Whistleblower Protection Act (1989) specifically prevents the punishment of individuals who leak information about a crime, fraud, abuse, or misconduct. So you're not even right that they should be punished.
There is *nothing* democratic about concealing the workings or inner details of our government. It is the very essence of anti-democratic behavior on the part of a government against its people. The fact that we were willing to hold our noses and allow this stench to grow during the cold war was bad enough, but there isn't even that justification anymore.
Is "seeking out" a nice way of saying that his photograph and last known locations were distributed to predator drone pilots at Ellis AFB?
. SLASHDOT: Home of the vicious nerd.
Oh hey, look, I was wondering when you're going to show up again. I'm not surprised it's on a topic that's dear to your heart. And you've even managed to not completely and cravenly defend an undefensible government action.
As for your question as to what is supposed to be classified: that's ultimately up to the will of the people, through the method of election of representatives who enact the will of the people. Or so it goes in theory. In practice, rules have to be bent, and will be bent - in both directions. The court of law is exactly the place where this is supposed to be, and will be, hashed out.
Those who can, do. Those who can't, sue.
First of all, I think that people do need a video to realize that war, and in particular the Iraq war, is tragic and disturbing. It's one thing to hear that lots of civilians are mistakenly killed in the course of our military occupations, it's another thing altogether to see some of the exact circumstances in which that occurs.
Do you recall the story that broke soon after the video, regarding a house that special forces stormed on bad intel, in which various people were killed, including two women that the soldiers apparently arranged deceptively so that they could claim in their report that they were previously killed in an "honor killing?" The incident that the commanding general of SOCOM had to fork over a wad of cash and apologize for? If there had been a video of that, with black-clad soldiers going "Oh shit! I think these people were just civilians!" and then digging out their rounds from the bodies, tying them up, artfully arranging them, and discussing their cover story, how do you think that would have gone over? Instead of everyone forgetting in a few weeks, we'd still be watching the congressional hearings on CSPAN.
Regarding the guncam video, do you find the destruction of the van, and the attack on the building with missiles while apparent bystanders walk by to be equally unavoidable as the deaths of the journalists? I am a little surprised that the video didn't at least make you wonder at all about the wisdom of the RoE they were operating under. You don't have to demonize the pilots and gunners personally to find fault in the incident. The military's reports found that the crewmen did make the right call in every case, and summarily declared all 20+ men killed in the various attacks "AIF" (Anti-Iraq Forces), so you can't write everything off as a tragic mistake; it was tragic official policy.
Even if all of these things are rendered "unavoidable" by our political need for near-airtight force protection (like the dozens of unarmed civilians killed at Afghan road checkpoints), many people are not aware that they occur. If everyone knew exactly what went on in Iraq and Afghanistan, they might not support the military missions there (or future hypothetical invasions) so much; war reporting certainly had that effect during Vietnam. If no one ever gets outraged, what motivation is there to avoid these entanglements, or even to try harder to avoid civilian casualties in the conflicts we are already fighting?
I can only imagine that all the random milita members on the streets with rifles and RPGs that day didn't realize that the helicopters ~1km away were or could be targeting them. I agree that the Reuters stringers took a foolish risk, and that the initial incident is not indefensible. Maybe "AIF" ambushes are always that ridiculously nonchalant. Everything that happens afterward, though...
Also keep in mind that the only reason anyone (any American) ever cared about this incident was that it was subsequently discovered that two of the "AIF" were Reuters stringers. Imagine how many incidents there must have been where people who didn't work for a major Western news organization were creatively classified as insurgents. I'm sure that some of them weren't pointing giant telephoto lenses at the Bradley convoy down the block, and would be harder to blame for their own demises.
That's the point. He is a soldier, one who you are supposed to be able to trust with this information.
His decision, right or wrong, to release this information will provoke a survival impulse from Uncle Sam.
Can we spend our time, money and energy on identifying our "enemies" that you speak of, and see how we can avoid having these "enemies" in the first place rather than having an elaborate system of creating "enemies" which has this nasty side effect of our government doing things behind our back? Please really, does this ever occur to anyone one here who says "our enemies"?
I am sincerely disgusted by the use of construct "our enemies" that doesn't address the root cause of why do we have these, or other "enemies" in the first place.
I know I am not going to make many "friends" with such blunt questions but that is me.
How about Bush, then? Outing an agent in cover for political reasons. Why isn't he being taken to task? Because that would embarrass the US. That's why they have all these confidential/classified documents: not because of safety of their people or their operations, but because they would be embarrassed if they got read.
"and people die as a result of your decision?"
How about the opposite: what if people die UNLESS you publish these documents and publishing them would save lives? That's not actually far-stretched, Pentagon and the US army is known for killing people, even completely unarmed civilians.
If you go the "what if" - route then you should consider several different outcomes and not only one.
Chaney played Dracula. I think you want Cheney, who has been accused of sucking blood.
Plame drove every morning to CIA headquarters at 1 I'm a Spook Drive. I'm sure it never crossed anyone's mind that she might once have been an agent.
We tried everything we could think of to protect you, babe, but your cover has been blown.
Their they're doing there hair.
Every 4 and 6 years I elect representatives that ideally can adjust policy to suit the desires of current generations.
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
A court martial is not handled like your everyday court case, no amount of money is going to save his skin.
SPC Bradley Manning[1] has done stomped on his dick with golf shoes with this event.Court_martial#In_the_United_States>
Much more interesting to me is what will happen with the dummy that leaked the info.
I would say the very best he can hope for is the rest of his life spent chopping wood with a dull axe, under the anxious and eager scrutiny of the trigger happy guards at Ft. Leavenworth.
I saw one of these work details in action while I was on guard duty during Basic Training at Ft. Leonard Wood, circa 1977.[Ft. Lost in the Woods, A.K.A. Little Korea(due to the harsh winters)]
More than likely, he'll spend a lengthy vacation at that infamous D.O.D. vacation hotspot, Gitmo. Surf's up, dude! He'll get to go waterboarding everyday...no matter how many times he confesses!
Article 106 of the UCMJ defines this offense as punishable by death.
As a nation, and a society here in the U.S.A., we've lost the spine to carry through with that nowdays.[2]
The government would have to provide more info than they want to; to sentence him to 'Death'.
[1]You would think that an Intelligence Analyst would be smarter than to let the leak lead back to him.
[2]Purely my observations from a limited perspective. I hope I'm wrong...
*Disclaimer:*
I'm not debating the 'right-ness', or the 'wrong-ness' of Bradley Manning's reasons or motives.
The truth of the matter is, he's FSCKED!. Literally, figuratively, and truly...fscked.
Down With Slashdot BETA!!! I've been around the corner and seen the oliphant; you can only abuse me from your perspecti
Yes, you do. Otherwise we wouldn't be having this conversation. Ultimately, it is you who determines your actions.
Either releasing a document is right or it isn't. If it's right, why suffer for doing the right thing if you can avoid it? And if it's not right, suffering a punishment for it doesn't make it any more right.
Oh, sure. But if I get my hands on classified material, and have the opportunity to publish it without getting found out, it's my personal view on whether that material should or shouldn't be classified that determines whether I will.
Forget magic. Any technology distinguishable from divine power is insufficiently advanced.
More people die each year from car accidents in the US then every terrorist act combined yet were not spending hundreds of billions of dollars coming up with scientific ways to prevent that, and it could be done easily. Instead we spend hundreds of billions of dollars coming up with scientific ways to better kill. People are already dying - release the documents.
*DrugCheese rants*
With the last decade of torture and other war crimes, I wouldn't trust the Pentagon further than I could throw it.
We are all God's parents.
Parent isn't a troll. You disagreeing with someone doesn't make them a troll.
We are all God's parents.
Many, many people *have* died due to our offensive military operations in that part of the world.
Yes, well that's what happens in wars ... people fucking die.
Not always the right people, but hell, when the guys with the AK47s are hiding in convoys of old women on donkeys, what exactly should they do ? Line them up and segregate the old women and terrorists into two orderly lines ?
Collateral damage is always unfortunate, but somehow implying that the US does it "deliberately" is nonsense. But, it's a part of war, always has been, get over yourself. I'm pretty sure a couple of residents of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were injured while you were dropping your A-bombs, but that never bothered you.
The only way releasing classified information on foreign policy gives aid and comfort to a nation's enemies is if it exposes some egregious wrongdoing on the part of the nation having its information leaked, in which case moral obligation to expose unlawful practices comes into play
I don't think that this is the case (not that I'm implying the U.S. military isn't innocent or anything). I think this is a case of some pissed-off loser wanting to exact some sort of revenge against his superiors for the slights he feels he's been given.
In either case, treason, as defined by the U.S. Constitution, does not apply here.
Aside from the fact that the Army had no reason whatever to believe that the "unarmed civilians" featured in "Collateral Murder" were "unarmed"
Geneva convention et al are quite clear in this regard. They are to be treated as unarmed civilians.
You appear to have attracted your desired 'intelligent responses' to your post, but they don't seem to back up your position.
97% of all politicians are scum sucking overlords.
All secrets deserve to be outed, especially the hidden aliens/ufo stuff, i dont care how many people/corporates will cry, stuff em, they are not above the common person.
Seriously, most secrets are known between all secret agencies and politicians, so they just live in a 'above the norm' world, while us common folk are like slaves that have no idea.
So screw em, burn their mansions down, make em run naked, sack em all, replace em with new brighter brains that are corrupt or working for the club of rome or collective 300.
Liberty freedom are no1, not dicks in suits.
When your choice of government is between Tweedledum and Tweedledee, in what way are you "deciding" to sanction their common policies, i.e. that "nobody watches the watchman"? You're only voting on the very few superficial differences between them.
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
The need for secrecy is usually a reaction to a security failure, not a preventative measure.
The best way to be secure is to have lots of friends and few enemies, trust is the most valuable weapon to achieve that, secrets detract from trust.
Re your secret nuke launch codes, there is a saying (from the *BSD folk), without physical security there is no security, if all that is needed to launch nukes is some secret sequence of numbers then thats a design failure right there.
Lock the fckn door to the room with the button in it maybe ???
What if the Pentagon is telling the truth and releasing these documents would cause "serious damage to national security" and people die as a result of your decision?
He will be eligible to work there?
I find it astonishing how willingly people will swallow bullshit handwaving out of the desire to avoid conscious guilt.
Let's get the facts straight: The civilians didn't have a rocket launcher. It has been shown that the initial reports were clearly fabricated lies. It shows us a policy of prioritizing military propaganda over professional thoroughness. As such, we have no reason at all to believe their other claims and can only draw conclusion from the raw material we have.
Lock the door to avoid using a secret?
With what sort of lock?
Nerd rage is the funniest rage.
Wrong. The people haven't delegated anything for a long time. The state of "democracy" in the US is a joke. We're given a choice between sock puppet A and sock puppet B, and the same person has their hands in both of them. Then once we have chosen which sock puppet is more entertaining, the actual business of governing is then further removed from actual choice because laws are written not by our "representatives" but by special interest groups and unelected bureaucrats. When was the last time congress declared war? Yet somehow we've been in a perpetual state of war for many decades now. Apparently those "experts" that we delegated authority too have further delegated their responsibilities to god knows who.
I think they should be. Perhaps if every law had a sunset clause, we'd have one concise set of laws that people could live with rather than a maze of laws so complex that it takes an expert to understand the rules he is bound to live by.
Only lives that are "on the line" should the information be leaked are those of the guilty parties.
Military has complete knowledge of the contents of those papers. They should, cause they wrote them.
Ergo, not a single troopers or civilians life (on any side of the conflict) should be lost due to the leaking of the information - as the military already knows how to prevent that.
Move the assets, change the codes and call-signs, plug the holes and reinforce the barriers.
And please don't start how that costs money, as that is the one thing military obviously has no problem with at the moment.
Only "lives on the line" IRL are the ones that military and intelligence heads will "silence" in order to cover their asses.
... that for all the shit that goes on in the world to be revealed to the world public that the mass majority of the shit is so totally uncalled for and only exist because of other shit being covered up and kept from other cover up efforts...
The shit needs to be coming out and we can start with Haliburtion blowing the deep water horizon oil rig in tneir pathetic little fucking oil war.
We did not need the oil brought up at this time, we have plenty (this is a fact) and the best holding tank is the earth.
It was tapped as a matter of securing right to the oil vein, which is large. It was tapped sooner than it was supposed to be.
The rig was supposed to be blown before it was tapped..... oops!
This fucking the world shit has to stop! Fuck the Pentagon we don't need it, they are one major supporter of cover ups.
Excuse me but I live here too and I'm tired of the fucking smell of covered up shit!
People, you need to start looking at the information that is available and god damn't start thinking it out!!!!
Try this on for starters. What the World Wants and ask your self why in hell is this not being done? Want to stop terrorist then remove their reasons for existing, instead war monger feed it...... What the fuck?
What lead up to 911? A Trillion dollar bet!!! justy follow the god damn money people. You can even see who the loosers were if you do that. Hint One company name starts with a "W" and another starts with an "E" and there were more too... follow the money god damn't and all the way to 9/11.
Maybe I'm wrong? Maybe I'm not but one thing is for certain, you are not going to know the truth if you don't use your brain and your common sense enough to realize there are coverups and far to many but more than enough to know you can figure things out for yourself. And the general media is not going to fucking spell it out for you. They are afraid of anthrax threats, just ask Ted Turner about that or look it up on the internet.
Not sure which asshole mod modded this redundant. This is an excellent post. Particularly "the information discredits us whether or not its secret."
If the information is embarrassing to the US, then perhaps we should stop doing things that embarrass us.
I used to be soldier in the US army as well. And frankly, I say fuck the US government. Somebody needs to take those assholes in DC down a peg.
Our life, liberty and livelihoods are on the line when the three-letter agencies and the White House go around the shadows skulking about looking for loopholes, creating them or running roughshod over the Constitution. When executive power is illegally used to justify futile efforts to demoralize terrorist networks or destabilize pesky anti-US regimes that than backfire and are used as the rallying cry to recruit ever more desperate and hateful individuals to proclaim that the US and its peoples are their blood enemies, we have more than an interest in the documentation of such activity we have the right to know.
An Education is the Font of All Liberty
And what if You were driving your daughters somewhere through your hometown and came upon what to you looked like an explosion with dying people crawling to safety?
To Americans it's the 'warzone' but to people that live there it is 'home'.
*DrugCheese rants*
With some creative interpretation it could be considered mutiny.
(a) Any person subject to this code (chapter) who--
(1) with intent to usurp or override lawful military authority, refuses, in concert with any other person, to obey orders or otherwise do his duty or creates any violence or disturbance is guilty of mutiny;
If you interpret general security rules like keeping confidential information secret as an order and overriding military authority (over the data) while the Wikileaks people count as "any other person" that could work. I don't know how strict courts martial are with wording like that but if they succeed capital punishment is possible.
Justice is the sheep getting arrested while an impartial judge declares the vote void.
As long as the gunner can reasonably misidentify that he's in the clear.
Justice is the sheep getting arrested while an impartial judge declares the vote void.
Republic and democracy are independent of each other, a republic can be a democracy as well (and so can a monarchy, the opposite of a republic).
Justice is the sheep getting arrested while an impartial judge declares the vote void.
coming to a theater near you. wait, it never stopped running.
Read radical news here
How to know you're doing real journalism: when the powers that be are this pissed off.
The shiny-assed poltroons of the New York Times and the Murdoch press can just fuck off. Really. Whining shits that people aren't giving them free money for rewritten press releases any more. Useless fucks.
Boycott the shitty, shitty press. Tell them why. Give money to Wikileaks.
http://rocknerd.co.uk
Many, many people *have* died due to our offensive military operations in that part of the world.
Yes, well that's what happens in wars ... people fucking die.
Not always the right people, but hell, when the guys with the AK47s are hiding in convoys of old women on donkeys, what exactly should they do ? Line them up and segregate the old women and terrorists into two orderly lines ?
I think he'd rather you GTFO of the war, actually.
They could ask him nicely, by not torturing him. Eg. by waterboarding. According to Pentagon it's just a "rough interrogation technique", isn't it?
it's so sad and frustrating that people can't see that simple fact, here in Mexico money was wasted to register every cell phone in order to combat "the mobs" less than a month after the registering was complete, the database is being sold on internet.
I certainly know that is way too easy to locate a cell phone having its number, it was easier to register everybody's data than actually look for the reported numbers, and of course thet didnt made illegal to hide the calling number, just as does nextel, the company that gives (unvoluntary?) service to most of the kidnappers
I'm positive, don't belive me look at my karma
In free and democratic societies, an individual deciding on his or her own to leak classified information is a subversion of that very democratic process. In the US, we have collectively decided, as a society, that some information should be kept secret, even from The People, and we have empowered and entrusted the government with the power to do so.
In a free and democratic society, citizens have responsibilities. Those responsibilities include refusing unlawful orders when they are in the military. If you obey an unlawful order, you may actually be committing a crime.
Your own personal view on whether something should or shouldn't be classified is irrelevant. There are well-known and established processes that govern classification.
Your personal view is very much relevant, because that's the ultimate arbiter for determining whether you should obey an order or not. That doesn't mean that merely believing that an order is unlawful necessarily gets you off the hook, but following orders (including classification) is not automatically legal or safe (let alone moral).
If you read Manning's side of the story, he believed he had been ordered to manipulate documents in a way that resulted in innocent people being thrown in prison. He also believed that the US was trying to conceal crimes. He may or may not have been right in his assessments, and that may or may not be sufficient as a defense, but it is certainly not as clearcut as you seem to think it is--in particular because we live in a "free and democratic society".
Or, for any reasonable alternative other than any and all information should always be able to be indiscriminately leaked without fear of reprisal.
Who, other than you, has said that "all information should always be able to be indiscriminately leaked without fear of reprisal"? How does what Manning did or what Wikileaks is doing possibly fall under such a heading? Manning and Wikileaks may or may not be right in what they are doing, but they are doing it out of conviction, they are not doing it "indiscriminately", and they are certainly not doing it "without fear of reprisals".
I hope for intelligent responses to this post that actually acknowledge the need for some information to be protected
Of course, some information needs to be protected. Your problem is that you argue as if (1) you can trust the government completely, and (2) being in the military absolves people from personal, moral, and legal responsibility. Both are clearly wrong. I mean, have you slept through the last decade of politics? Have you not read your history about war crimes trials?
It's people like you who are a threat to our free and democratic society. And your glib, straw-man dismissal of the risks and motivations of the people who leak documents makes you a rotten human being in my opinion.
After reading your post, I refreshed my memory by looking up an earlier leak, the Pentagon Papers. I believe that particular leak was completely justified because it proved that a succession of presidents had lied to the American people. The reason that the Pentagon and the diplomatic corps are worried about this current leak may just be that they have similar wrongdoing in them...because they acted improperly and illegally and do not want this known. Personally, if there's anything in them about "extraordinary rendition" or torture, I want that known, and it will NOT come out through proper channels. For such things, the system does not and cannot work.
So what should a moral citizen do? The answer is that he DOES make the determination himself that certain things are immoral to keep hidden. No man should ever place his conscience in another's keeping. The Nuremberg trials were all about that principle.
So, break the law if you feel it necessary. This is called "Civil Disobedience." And yes, sooner or later pay the price for it. My impression is that the founder of Wikileaks knows that he will pay the price eventually, but wants to have an effect on the world first. My feeling is that the price he will pay with is his life. Our governments are not above assassination, any more than they are above kidnapping or torture.
-Gareth
I think the issue is WTF the US Army is doing down there. Not how they fight the war but that there is a war in first place considering it's one that has been started on lies and done nothing but waste money and further destabilize the region.
Justice is the sheep getting arrested while an impartial judge declares the vote void.
How about the opposite: what if people die UNLESS you publish these documents and publishing them would save lives?
That's the point at which an individual has to decide if leaking the information is worth the price he will have to pay. Doing the right thing doesn't mean that bad things can't result for you personally.
"An unarmed man can only flee from evil, and evil is not overcome by fleeing from it." Col. Jeff Cooper
Oh, I don't knpw...let me think: I probably wouldn't post it to the internet and protect the identity of the person who emailed it to me at all costs.
Well, fortunately, other people actually have a sense of moral responsibility and weigh the facts before they make such decisions.
And because we live in a democracy and a free society, these people have fairly significant legal protections to do so, because people in free and democratic societies realize that governments are not inerrant and that their societies only remain free and democratic if citizens show moral responsibility, courage, and vigilance.
My security engineering textbook actually has a chapter on nuclear launch codes and how that system was designed. You could, in the absence of all other security mechanisms, simply brute force the codes, since they are of deliberately limited length; the military did some research and discovered that when people are under stress (which is likely if they are being asked to arm a nuclear weapon), they can only accurately enter a certain number of digits even if those digits are being read to them.
In my opinion, though, the most interested detail is the motivation for nuclear launch codes. As you pointed out, there should be (and there is) some physical security measure in place to ensure that some random guy does not launch a nuclear missile. The purpose of the arming codes is not to prevent Joe Schmoe from starting World War 3, but to prevent the soldiers themselves from doing so without authorization. Prior to the Kennedy administration, nuclear bombs were armed when they were deployed (dropped from an airplane), and the only measure in place to prevent a pilot from doing so without orders was a single soldier standing near the plane, who was supposed to shoot the pilot in such a situation -- but the commander might issue the order to strike without authorization.
As for the codes being leaked...that was considered as well. The codes change frequently, some change daily (i.e. the codes that the president carries -- there are other codes, like maintenance codes), so even a leak would have a low potential for causing a problem (a pair of rogue soldiers hell bent on launching a nuke would have to get the authorization codes on the same day they are leaked).
Really, people bring up nuclear secrets (and for some reason, launch codes) whenever they want you to abandon all logical thought and stop questioning the need for broad secrecy. A lot of things that people think are secret really are not secret, or are things that were once secret but are not anymore: it used to be the case that anything related to nuclear weapons, even chemical data about the fuel, was automatically classified, but that policy was relaxed somewhat. Sure, there are things that are secret and that are better kept secret, like the locations and planned movements of US military units in Iraq and Afghanistan, or the identities of spies in foreign countries, but there is a limit and things are supposed to be declassified after a certain amount of time, with certain rare exceptions.
Palm trees and 8
The only way releasing classified information on foreign policy gives aid and comfort to a nation's enemies is if it exposes some egregious wrongdoing on the part of the nation having its information leaked, in which case moral obligation to expose unlawful practices comes into play
Really? There are no other ways releasing documents could do that? It couldn't for example have details of spies within enemy groups, or details of surveillance techniques, or details about the resolution of spy satellites and their orbits. There are lots of very damaging things that could be here that have no moral problems associated with them at all.
>>>In free and democratic societies, an individual deciding on his or her own to leak classified information is a subversion of that very democratic process.
Bullshit. The democratic process doesn't work when the People don't know that their leaders are child murderers (see the leaked video). It's no different than BP's attempted coverup of their oil spill, in order to mislead investors . Let the light of liberty shine on the dark places our leaders attempt to hide from us.
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
Why do you think we are the most prosperous? Freedom isn't free, it is often enough paid for by another's slavery.
The United States has begun trading away 'actual rights' like the right not to be spied upon, murdered extrajudicially by your own country or prosecuted for leaking documents that reveal criminal activity for 'personal rights' like the right to shop at Walmart, the right to own 2 cars or watch the latest reality show. The Patriot Act sailed through both the congress and the media as if it were incontestable on any grounds but he last time they tried to propose an increase in regulation for Tobacco to fall under the FDA millions of people organized in protest. People would rather be free to smoke in an Orwellian nightmare than wake up in a country where they would be required to actually participate in the day to day protection of our civil liberties.
An Education is the Font of All Liberty
but hell, when the guys with the AK47s are hiding in convoys of old women on donkeys, what exactly should they do ?
You mean, the guys with the AK47s are hiding in convoys of old women on donkeys in their own country that USA invaded? ... probably with AK47 smuggled in the country after the war started, cause unlike Americans we are not gun nuts and we don't all carry a gun to work in civilized Europe.
Well, I guess they are pretty much correct. IF someone invaded my country I would also try to get back at them
In free and democratic societies, an individual deciding on his or her own to leak classified information is a subversion of that very democratic process. In the US, we have collectively decided, as a society, that some information should be kept secret, even from The People, and we have empowered and entrusted the government with the power to do so.
I kind of remember a free and democratic society that 70 years ago put Hitler in power and supported ethical and religious discrimination with awful results. But according to your line of thought, they where completely right, after all it was a democratic decision.
Fully and completely. I say it in every wikileaks article here or anywhere. I always draw responses of either "it already it" or "it's fine as it is" and that is bullshit. Wikileaks is one of the most important outlets the world has, to not do everything possible to keep it that way is sheer stupidity.
http://teasphere.wordpress.com - A little spot of tea
Yes, well that's what happens in wars ... people fucking die.
Yeah. During a state of war, ie a state of government sanctioned mass murder, people die. Is that supposed to be some sort of insight? I suppose it is for someone who comes up with the two worst cases of the employment of WMDs in modern history as some sort of guiding example.
Switch back to Slashdot's D1 system.
I might be defending the leaker, but in this case he leaked the videos under a false guise. The videos didn't show "murder". If they had, I would still be undecided. However, he found some videos which might prove his point, but in reality the guys they shot at had a rocket launcher.
[citation needed]
People leak to WikiLeaks because they believe (mostly accurately) that there will be no consequences
No, they leak to WikiLeaks because they believe (mostly accurately) that there will be consequences.
Whistle-blowers are not a protected class. If you work for an organization that is breaking the law (particularly if that organization is a government agency) and you blow the whistle on their illegal activities, you should fully expect to be fired. That's the reality of the situation.
And if by some miracle you're not fired, expect the whole affair to be whitewashed and swept under a rug, with no consequences to the people that broke the rules in the first place (it's incredible just how hard it can be to fire a bureaucrat).
By anonymously releasing the information, you can complain while still protecting yourself from recrimination, and simultaneously raise enough of a shit-storm to actually get something done about it for a change.
You seem to think WikiLeaks operates outside the fray of a "free and democratic society," but I contend it is actually a vital part of it.
Ever hear of the Pentagon Papers?
Probably not. The right-wing revisionism that ignores the crimes of Republicans and their lackeys may be more subtle outside of the Texas public education system, but it's still there. It won't be until the every generation alive during the Nixon years is long dead (if even then) before that mess will find it's place in our nation's history, uncolored by political agendas.
"the Army had no reason whatever [mypetjawa.mu.nu] to believe that the "unarmed civilians" featured in "Collateral Murder" were "unarmed" " Really? You think that killing anyone you can't prove summarily and immediately is unarmed is a reasonable engagement policy? This occurred in a city with an overwhelming ratio of noncombatants to combatants, not a well-defined battlefield or firefight over occupying some ground.
In free and democratic societies, an individual deciding on his or her own to leak classified information is a subversion of that very democratic process. In the US, we have collectively decided, as a society, that some information should be kept secret, even from The People, and we have empowered and entrusted the government with the power to do so.
For that quote alone your post deserves to be rated 5. If I could, you'd certainly get a +1 Insightful from me.
Afterall, why wouldn't you add a rocket launcher to a camera? You know you would if you could.
And the 8 million civilians killed in Vietnam alone were all legitimate targets because you liberate a country by doing a holocaust.
The US does not do introspection. They are right they must be because else they would be wrong and that does not fit with the American way of thinking.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
actually, every law should have a mandatory expiry date.
It's easier to say they're identical than to expend time thinking.
Hail Eris, full of mischief...
E pluribus sanguinem
Well did you? Or did you watch wikileaks carefully edited short version?
The US troops who were being shot at and who arrived on the scene moments after the Apache attack found AK's and RPG's and photographed them in situ.
And they shot the van because according to the rules of engagement giving aid to an insurgent made you a target. War isn't a video game, they didn't have a hit box pop up showing there were children in the van. It was a bad call but understandable in the context.
And yes comparing this to WWII is an insult because the allied powers in WWII did not give a shit about civilian casualties* and continued bombing cities knowing full well it had no significant impact on enemy morale. The Nazis were bad guys but the Soviets were worse and the Western allies handed all of Eastern Europe over to them.
* In fact they deliberately targeted the areas to which civilians were fleeing.
========
CINC, 4th Penguin Legion
With free and open government, there is nothing to leak. With dishonest, sneaky, and evil governments, there is much to leak. Whether a government is evil is not defined by the manner in which its leaders are chosen, and the US does not get a pass for evil behavior simply because people can vote.
What changed under Obama? Nothing Good
And Hitler was elected in democratic elections as well.
No, he wasn't, stop spreading that BS please. Hitler was appointed by Hindenburg, then engineered the Reichstag fire, then enacted draconian laws on grounds of security, used that to rig the next election, which still didn't bring him majority. He then forced Hindenburg out, forced the new Reichstag into giving him legislative powers, effectively suspended the constitution, and then proceeded on to murder his opposition in and outside of his party, and, finally, using the "emergency" legislative powers to declare himself a Furher. Or somesuch. But he was never elected at any point of his national political career by a majority.
All we know right now is that the name of an active serving CIA asset was revealed to the public, with the result of "adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort."
Specifically which enemy was "adhered" to or given "aid or comfort" in any way?
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
The problem is that when that process is used to hide crimes and events that have little to do with security and everything to do with preventing the embarrassment of the government, then the process has failed. And in the grand American tradition, it takes a hero to stand up for the principals of this nation over its laws. Today we would be a far worse nation without individuals standing against the tyranny of the establishment. Are we better off because people like Bob Woodward, Rosa Parks, Abraham Lincoln and Paul Revere decided that the laws of their time did not reflect the spirit of this great nation? I think so.
I may be a little bit old fashioned, but wasn't censorship by the military in times of war the norm not so long ago... everywhere in the world? I'm all for freedom of speech, and I support Wikileaks with a passion, but if some of those documents can potentially jeopardize operations who are currently in-progress (including military personnel), shouldn't the DoD at least have a chance to talk with journalists beforehand? You know, this kind of cooperation isn't new; it's always been that way. Remember: loose lips sink ships.
cpghost at Cordula's Web.
Well, explosions are flashy, but it's not totally uncommon. The bilge fan fails, and the rest is history.
Check this search.
This is what can happen (with pic).
That was just an example. There are plenty of ways a person can have an accident that never gets questioned after the initial investigation. Car accident, slip & fall, mugging, home invasion, or even "natural" causes as you mentioned. Boating accidents are an easy way to explain away whey no body was found, and little evidence left behind.
Serious? Seriousness is well above my pay grade.
Like many things we keep trying to wrap laws and rules around things, it's war your on the wining side or your dead. Even if your on the winning side you may be dead. I've watched that video from the footage it looked suspicious. From the audio it sounds like they thought they were the enemy thats enough. We don't fight wars anymore we fight pr campaigns. The sooner we realize that war is the last resort to inflict our will upon another sovereign nation the better.
No sir I dont like it.
Yeah right. Try the blue Kool Aid next.
What changed under Obama? Nothing Good
The United States is the world's oldest surviving federation. It is a constitutional republic and representative democracy,
I read TFA and all I got was this lousy cookie
It is either a Social Contract or Natural Rights, I for one would rather hammer out my own document that protects my rights based on my consent to be governed, even if such consent was presumed by birth than trust a bunch of philosopher-types and theologians to endlessly argue over what inalienable rights are.
An Education is the Font of All Liberty
Your opinion on what should and shouldn't be classified has no direct relevance to the situation, if this isn't want you want you should exercise your democratic rights by participating in the same democratic process that established the current classification processes.
Talk to your representatives about your opinion, become informed about local candidates so that you vote for the one that best represents you.
Outside these channels your opinion does not count in a representational democracy.
Because the Democratic half of the single party that runs the country ALSO lied, does not relive the Republican half of that same party from their lies.
And best evidence? Are you as stupid as our government thinks you are?
Well cited summary: http://www.georgewashington2.blogspot.com/2009/11/everyone-knew-that-iraq-didnt-have-wmds.html
What changed under Obama? Nothing Good
Indeed. 99% of politicians should leave office at the end of a rope. Only a very few are not pathological liars and/or sociopaths.
In free and democratic societies, an individual deciding on his or her own to leak classified information is a subversion of that very democratic process.
That's assuming we live in a free and democratic society. That's far from the case.
I.e., if, in a free and democratic society, you really believe that a piece of classified information should be released, and you're going to unilaterally decide to do release it because of your own personal beliefs or convictions, you should be willing to pay your society's consequences for it.
Why? If it turns out that the material was wrongly classified (remember, it's illegal to classify things merely because they're embarassing), shouldn't we be thankful?
There are well-known and established processes that govern classification.
When those processes have obviously failed, it's our duty to stand up and correct them.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
I would not put it past our Government or any other to have this guy killed. It's one thing to leak ACTA documents it's quite another to leak embassy communications. He's taken it a bit too far.
"In free and democratic societies, an individual deciding on his or her own to leak classified information is a subversion of that very democratic process. "
Well, it is, isn't it? At least it is when that information harms those we like to back up or typically agree with. When it harms those we dislike it is patriotic and brave...
People replying to my sig annoy me. That's why I change it all the time.
There's no reason to shoot yourself in the foot, though. If you can stop or expose an injustice perpetrated by the government and also avoid getting yourself smooshed by the same government, no reason not to.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
He did win a strong plurality, though, which in parliamentary systems is usually enough to get you elected Prime Minister (if there's no majority, but one party clearly has a strong plurality, they usually end up forming the government).
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
Why is it a unchallenged premise, that operatives simply must be dealing in information which will risk their lives? Whose social contract states that we all must subscribe to that ideology?
Leaking, if it does nothing else, demonstrates that the ability of any organisation to keep deadly secrets, secret, continues to diminish. I don't think I'd like to live in a society where leaks were harder to accomplish. I can't help thinking that institutionalised secrecy is a dead-end strategy, which could be (somewhat, if not completely) mitigated by just being better at what you do.
That said, I don't see how we get from here to there - if leaking those documents will endanger lives and do nothing to alter policy with regards the trade in secrets - then isn't wikileaks just using this as a shameless publicity stunt?
Interestingly enough, Jordan has a system where they are a monarchy and have representation both via appointment (their Senate is appointed by the king) and via election (their House of Representatives).
So barring the definitional requirement of "head of state not being a monarch", they do have the other defining characteristics of a republic.
When you have an Apache helicopter, everything looks like a rocket launcher.
Watching the full video myself, I'm left with the impression that the pilot and/or gunner failed to adequately assess the situation and jumped to conclusions as to the nature of the object being held. Getting into a "firing-style position" i.e. crouching behind a corner with a large rounded object pointed out at a helicopter is a good way to get that person antsy and trigger-happy.
I'm not condoning the event, I think that military should have a strict liability in civilian casualties. Namely, if a civilian dies as a result of your fire, then you're screwed, it doesn't matter what conditions surround the matter.
WARNING! This girl exceeds the MAXIMUM SAFE standards established by the FDA for BRATTINESS
Somehow I'm sure our country and citizens will manage to survive the release of this information that the government feels it must protect us from.
I rather like the quote (that I cannot attribute, if someone knows, it'd be awesome): "The fastest way to inform your enemy, is to inform your public." Or something to that effect.
WARNING! This girl exceeds the MAXIMUM SAFE standards established by the FDA for BRATTINESS
What if the Pentagon is telling the truth
BWAHAHAHahahaHHAHAhahahaha! The...bhahaha... the PENTAGON, telling...pfffrt... the TRUTH!?! HAhahahahAHAHAH! Oh, lawd!
Yeah, hey, remember them telling the truth about Pat Tillman? Or when they were telling the truth about Abu Grahib? Or that lil' blonde soldier they violently extracted from an Iraqi hospital? Oh yeah, they just can't help themselves at the pentagon: Everything they say is truthful!
You can't take the sky from me...
In free and democratic societies, an individual deciding on his or her own to leak classified information is a subversion of that very democratic process
Yes. And war is peace, slavery is freedom, and ignorance is strength.
Got any other claptrap you'd care to share?
Your opinion on what should and shouldn't be classified has no direct relevance to the situation, if this isn't want you want you should exercise your democratic rights by participating in the same democratic process that established the current classification processes.
This discussion we're having right now is a big part of that process. Speech is obviously a necessity in a democracy. This idea you have that democracy is sitting in isolation, calling up your representative and having a little chat with him/her is utterly ridiculous. Democracy happens by people forming opinions, and voting for people who hold those opinions. Peoples opinions are influenced by discussion. Giving your opinions to elected officials is part of the process, but it most certainly isn't the only part. Does this really have to be spelled out for you?
AccountKiller
I guess my argument is that with such an incredibly marked lack of transparency in governments the world over, I think the benefits of consequence free leaking outweighs the downside. I would rather trust the editors of wikileaks to decide what should and shouldn't be secret than my own government.
I think secrecy is more harmful to democracy than consequence free leaking is.
Perhaps its true that we've voted for it to be that way over time. But I don't think we can ever get to a place where we don't vote that way without having the leaks. Government control of so much information is really bad for our ability to reliably make decisions about what our government ought to be doing.
Need a Python, C++, Unix, Linux develop
In a free and democratic society, there is no classified information that's hidden from its citizens. The ruling populace require the access in order to make the decisions they are entitled and obliged to make.
Since the US is neither free nor a democracy, it relies in part on keeping information from their citizens. Partially because the citizens can't be trusted, but also because of the repercussions that would follow if certain things were disclosed to the voting public and its representatives.
The big problem I have with the secrecy laws as they are is that it's the horse controlling the hay feed. There's no independent body that goes through classified documents and says "hey, this is ass covering, and doesn't protect any citizens except the guilty ones".
If Wikileaks were to hand over the documents, congress would not disclose everything not found to be vital to protecting its citizens. It would not read them at all, but hand them over to the military, and at best ask them to go through them and please disclose what shouldn't have been classified. And we know how well that would go.
I think Wikileaks here has a patriotic obligation to go through the documents and disclose everything that can jeopardize the safety of our citizens if kept secret. Like disclosures of how far certain military commanders and diplomats can be trusted, before we put our lives in their hands.
My recommendation: For every document not obviously dangerous to disclose, send the military an encrypted e-mail asking for the rationale that this shouldn't be disclosed. If met with a canned response or gibberish, disclose. If the military can justify it through logic, don't.
Whether or not he deserves to be punished, I don't buy the idea that leaking classified data in a democracy is always bad. Many times data is classified, not to avoid disclosure of legitimate sensitive information, but often to prevent embarrassment or hide criminal actions. There is a need to protect certain information, but there is also the need for an informed citizenry. This is especially true in a democracy.
Xavier Rabourdin for president 2012
"Loyalties: The World"
Which means no one or just to himself.
When Fascism comes to America, it will call itself Anti-Fascism, and tell you to give up your guns.
Julian was/is suppose to be keynoting The Next HOPE conference in NYC... I wonder if this means that he will need to bow out. Maybe he can videoconference in? Can tor handle video streaming?
You see? You see? Your stupid minds! Stupid! Stupid!
Simplification of historic events leads to wrong conclusions. I recommend post http://yro.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1683756&cid=32549066 as a quick introduction, along with http://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/riseofhitler/elect.htm .
Please show us the evidence of the rocket launcher. There most definitely wasn't one in the video. AK-47s are legal for Iraqi civilians to have, and many civilians had to patrol their streets to stop the rampant looting the US forces let happen.
Well, secret documents aren't a natural right so it's a social contract, one which depends on my consent to be governed, a consent which cannot be freely given until at and past the age of reason.
"There is a way that seems right to a man, but its end is the way of death." Proverbs 16:25 (NKJV)
Uhhhh - I didn't see the same video you saw. I saw an Apache firing on a group of armed men, located in an area from which our ground troops took fire.
The thing that I find most interesting about this argument is that the predominant sides of the argument consist of the side that says, "These guys were irresponsible/criminal Rambo-types. They/we need to do better!" versus the side that says, "These were good soldiers doing the best they could in trying circumstances. Bad things happen in war."
Now, considering that the fighting in Iraq is an anti-insurgency campaign, and the U.S. military is supposed to be winning "hearts and minds," dead civilians, dead reporters, wounded/dead children foster hatred of the U.S. and undermine the mission. Therefore, the people defending those soldiers and saying that mistakes happen are essentially saying this:
"This war cannot be won."
1. You don't get to make that determination yourself. However...
I'd be willing to buy into this if our government (Congress) wasn't working overtime to hide every detail possible with respect what is really going on. Making information classified has been trivialized to the point of absurdity. It doesn't take much of an IQ to realize that this kind of BS breeds a lack of trust (and rightly so).
and then you'd be shot, and nobody would be surprised.
I agree, I had previously imagined a soldier seeing something disturbing and speaking out about it. But what I think I see in that story is more like a plain old spy.
If I see a rocket launcher, im gonna shoot the guy with it. Its called war, you dont call timeout and ask for everyone on the other team to raise their hands. Youve obviously never been to war. Until you have, keep it to yourself.
You are entitled to your own opinions, not your own facts.
black-clad soldiers going "Oh shit! I think these people were just civilians!" and then digging out their rounds from the bodies, tying them up, artfully arranging them, and discussing their cover story, how do you think that would have gone over? Instead of everyone forgetting in a few weeks, we'd still be watching the congressional hearings on CSPAN.
You're kidding yourself. The US is killing towel-heads. These people deserve to die. No one in the US really cares, as long as they can drive their SUVs, watch their wide-screen TVs and otherwise live comfortable bourgeois lives at other people's expense.
The Hacker Ethic, as maintained by the CCC.
Access to computers - and anything which might teach you something about the way the world really works - should be unlimited and total. Always yield to the Hands-On Imperative!
All information should be free.
Mistrust authority - promote decentralization.
Hackers should be judged by their acting, not bogus criteria such as degrees, age, race, or position.
You can create art and beauty on a computer.
Computers can change your life for the better.
Don't litter other people's data.
Make public data available, protect private data.
This brings to mind a classic quote from the 1980s BBC series 'Yes Minister': "The Government Official Secrets Act is not there to protect Government Secrets, but Government Officials"
Thanks. Background materials:
Myth: Democracy elected Hitler to power.
Fact: Hitler used backroom deals, not votes, to come to power.
http://www.huppi.com/kangaroo/L-hitlerdemo.htm
German presidential election, 1932
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_presidential_election,_1932
Now, if we could get THIS THREAD back ON TOPIC :)
The person who pulled that trigger KNEW (even if he later turned out wrong) that if he didn't pull the trigger, that the enemy might. It is a sorry state of affairs that this could happen, it could have been avoided, by the news crew telling the U.S. military that they were out there. They did NOT tell the U.S. that they would be in the area.
Its dangerous to be pimping a big old camera in iraq anyways, the iraquis love to film ied attacks on Americans. When I was in Iraq, wed get hit by IED's and its prob a good thing the only cameras we ever saw were in our vehicles. It kinda fucks you up when you find videos of YOUR vehicle being attacked and put on propoganda sites. Hint to Newscrews: Tell the exhausted, overworked, and probably not wanting to be there soldiers well tell them your there, it might prevent getting fucking shot.
Ill tell you another thing, the person who pulled the trigger has to live with that, Id bet hes not having an easy time of it. My heart goes out to the innocents who die, but I stand by my fellow soldiers.
You are entitled to your own opinions, not your own facts.
You don't get to make that determination yourself
Why the hell not? What, can only "experts" determine that? Funny how the experts are always government paid.
Ahhh, sheepdot. You realize, if this were a thread on global warming, you'd be -1 Troll instead of +5 Insightful right now (^_^)
Since when is 35% when the other party has 53% a "strong plurality?" Hitler was appointed Chancellor by President Hindenberg.
You would hide among women and children, with the hopes of using them for cover to kill Americans. You fucking coward. Youd risk the lives of innocent to kill someone.. to get revenge. your a fucking coward.. a piece of shit coward at that.
You are entitled to your own opinions, not your own facts.
really? no, they're looking to make him go away , by any means necessary and possible.
When an entire government wants your "cooperation" because you're doing something they really don't like, it can't be called "seeking your cooperation". They are, quite simply said, out to get you, and your "cooperation" will be under extreme duress. Hope he has a good hiding place. And simply being out out of country isn't going to cut it, they're not going to mind in the slightest tossing a hooded unconscious body into a black SUV at 2am in Switzerland.
And no surprise that the soldier got caught, after bragging about it. That has to be one of the stupidest moves a whistleblower can make, bragging to anybody. Real whisteblowers don't need to brag or get credit, they're satisfied that the whistle got blown and will remain where they are, quietly gathering more dirt. In that respect, it's a shame this guy ran his mouth. He could have shed sunlight on more dark corners if he'd have held his cover.
I work for the Department of Redundancy Department.
Yeah, sure, there are explosions on boats from time to time. People also get struck by lightning and attacked by sharks. It's actually quite rare, as evidenced by your own search results: the first page has minor stories in obscure publications from 4 and 5 years ago. Furthermore, most of them appear to have resulted in no fatalities, and many not even in serious injuries. It would most certainly get scrutinized if, out of nowhere, this guy went out in a Michael Bay explosion. Consider for a moment just how many boats are actually out there, not exploding or experiencing any kind of misadventure. It's a rarity.
In fact, it would be much less suspicious if his house burned down. That happens all the time, and often doesn't even make it into the local paper above page 5. To be honest though, I think they'd rather he just gave up the cause, faded from the public eye, and was forgotten; which basically leaves intimidation and bribery as the most likely options.
Try not to take me more seriously than I take myself.
You mean that the "befehl ist befehl" excuse was accepted by the Americans in the neurenberg trials and the other Nazis got away with it?
Why bother with websites when you have p2p? Protecting websites against a determined adversary is hard, as Pirate Bay shows us. Put it on a completely decentralized network with included search functions like eMule and Gnutella and noone, not even the US governmant, can stop it.
Suicidal Tendencies reference - a great song & band... Well done!
-- Measure Once, Cut Twice
Well, we all know in Europe you are very quick to call someone a coward when you have a gun in your hand and the other people doesn't. We do have a different word for that though, bullying.
Seems to me that their are as much risking the innocent lives of other people when they hide amongst them, as the Americans are when they shoot at them. It's their country, you have no business being there with your army, you are not welcome, and you don't have absolutely any moral authority telling people in their own country they cannot carry guns when you are waving them all around. Go fucking home and stop killing innocents for oil!
Seems the Sat. Morning cartoons are over and all the kiddos are out using their mod points.
When Fascism comes to America, it will call itself Anti-Fascism, and tell you to give up your guns.
It could also expose some egregious right doing intended to confound and defeat those enemies. It might expose the identity (or clues to the identity) of agents in the field. The contents of the messages will not protect him. But even if he beats the treason rap, he was brainwashed by the cult of the whistle-blower and is doomed. It's sad really.
They may try to get him on a treason charge, but if that fails, 30k+ counts of espionage, theft, misuse of a computer system, fraud, etc. will be enough to lock him in a deep hole until his bones decay to dust. If he is lucky he'll get solitary for life - a fate worse than death IMO - but that pales in comparison to life of a genuine traitor in the general population of a PMITA prison.
I whole heartedly agree that they don't have time to second guess.
However, the military should owe a strict liability for civil deaths that are caused. They already owe essentially a strict liability for the death of a soldier (owing to the mandatory life insurance, etc), but having a "life insurance policy" or such for civilian casualties is a good idea.
I am of the belief that soldiers can do their duty, and still face the reality in public of their accidents/misdeeds.
This particular apache attack as not a matter of national security, and the tapes should have been willingly handed over by the military to allow for some sort of oversight.
WARNING! This girl exceeds the MAXIMUM SAFE standards established by the FDA for BRATTINESS
Obviously the chopper wasn't in danger considering it just sat in the sky while the people walked around ignoring it you dumb ass. If they were going to shoot the chopper, they would have. They most likely thought the chopper was on their side. I take it you've been to "war." Go back, and get shot. Don't come back home, pig.
They should have admited this right away, Ill agree 100%. It seems that alot of people are jumping to the conclusion that it was the soldiers individual fault. Perhaps the situation the soldier was put in to is at fault here. There are so many things that we dont know, its impossible to lay blame.
I don't know how this situation would work, I do remember one of the drivers in my platoon taking out a cars side mirror on accident. The owner of the car got paid 200 dollars. I know there is som e sort of compensation for damage injury or death, is it the level that an soldier gets? I doubt it, but I believe they do receive something. (It may only happen in certain situations or whatever, Ive noticed the military isnt always forthcoming, or fair)
You are entitled to your own opinions, not your own facts.
Your right, the chopper wasn't in danger, the nearby supply convoy was the one in danger, the chopper was providing overwatch. Get you facts straight.
You are entitled to your own opinions, not your own facts.
Which other party had 53%? In the last elections before Hitler was appointed Chancellor, the Nazis got 33%, and the second-best showing (by the Social Democrats) was 20%. That's at least a reasonably strong plurality, which in most parliamentary systems would be enough to give the party that got 33% first crack at forming a government--- especially if, as in this election, there was no obvious coalition with more votes.
A particular problem was that the communists (KPD) weren't willing to join an anti-Nazi coalition of bourgeois parties. Of the groups vying to form a coalition government, the NSDAP-DNVP coalition had 41.6%. The pro-democracy "Weimar coalition" that had ruled for much of the 1920s (SDP, DDP, and Centre) got 33% between them. The non-Nazi right (if the DNVP had joined them instead of the Nazis) had about 12-13% between them, or about 25% if they got the Centre Party onboard too. To the extent that anybody could be said to have "won" the Nov. 1932 election, the NSDAP-DNVP coalition comes reasonably close.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
No mystery about it, the wealthy control government, and control who we the little people are allowed to vote for.
When this country was formed government was small enough that controlling didn't matter. Now that we have a federal government with a multi-trillion dollar yearly budget, there's trillions of reasons to control it.
Yes, but at the same time, it is probably a good thing that Julian is now an international celebrity. If he were to mysteriously disappear now, there would be an outcry, whereas before no one would have flinched. Even if wikileaks eventually goes down, 3 will pop up in its place. There are too many people who see the importance of it for it to die.
You presumably live in a dictatorship, so I can see how you might have a different opinion on it. Of course, your opinion on everything is irrelevant, since you live in a dictatorship.
Or he works in a dictatorship, like the rest of America.
My page.
I know there is som e sort of compensation for damage injury or death, is it the level that an soldier gets? I doubt it, but I believe they do receive something.
No, soldiers have a mandatory life insurance policy, which as of around 2001 was about $200,000-250,000. This was payable to the beneficiary under all conditions except suicide.
I do not really know any information about what compensations one is able to receive for injury or death at the hands of sanctioned military action.
WARNING! This girl exceeds the MAXIMUM SAFE standards established by the FDA for BRATTINESS
I vote in local primaries, just because the person I vote for doesn't get elected doesn't change that I am participating in a republic.
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
There are all kinds of things that happen, that rarely make the news.
I heard a house explosion. Like, it shook our building about 1/4 mile away, so we went looking for what caused it. that wasn't very hard. By the time we got outside, there was a column of smoke rising. When we got there, fire rescue was on the scene, and reporters were just starting to show up. I hung around long enough to get the whole story, and then left.
The story was... A little old lady lived with two room mates in an older house. Her husband had passed away a while before, but she still had two of his oxygen tanks stored in the laundry room. A fire started in the clothes dryer, and when the tanks reached burst pressure, they did. That's what we heard.
It made one of the local news web sites for a few hours. The other local stations didn't bother to run it.
Just because something happens doesn't mean it makes it to publication. Houses burn. Boats sink. People go missing. Unless there's something that catches the eye of the mass media (usually celebrity involvement), at most it'll be a blurb buried in a local publication. Blood and guts are sometimes good for the ratings, but that doesn't always do it.
I'm sure we all remember the accident in California where the girl took her dads car, went speeding down a highway at 90mph+, lost control and had a fatal accident. National news, etc, etc.
Around the same period, someone I knew was in a fatal accident. He was the passenger in a car that was doing 90mph+ on a highway, lost control, and both of them died. I eventually found out by word of mouth from one of his friends, but they didn't have the details. I finally found a two paragraph story buried on one local news site, which at least gave me a date and location. To anyone else, it was a non-story. If a local news crew happened on the scene first, and got pictures of the blood and guts, it would have probably been national news.
I like using a boating accident as an example. Well, it reminds me of MST3k quote "This was no boating accident". :) So a boating accident, house fire, random shooting, accidental prescription overdoes, or the victim just disappears, it really doesn't matter.
Serious? Seriousness is well above my pay grade.
Its called SGLI and its a maximum $400,000, depending on what the soldier pays in.
You are entitled to your own opinions, not your own facts.
Indeed. 99% of politicians should leave office at the end of a rope. Only a very few are not pathological liars and/or sociopaths.
I like to say that there are no honest car salesmen anymore: they went bankrupt a long time ago.
I think, the same is true for politicians: they either died or were elected out of office (in favor of a liar/sociopath) a long time ago.
And you know what? People want to be lied to. They don't want to hear the truth.
Windows 2000 - from the guys who brought us edlin
Not enough people leaked what was happening in Nazi Germany until it was too late, likely because they were afraid of the consequences. The more tools to lessen the consequences, the better.
That, and the fact that people did either not care or could just not imagine what happened in these "camps".
Photos and eye-witness reports had been smuggled out of Concentration-camps (the regime was, after all, corrupt from top to bottom, and I presume there was still a lot you could do in there, if you bribed the right people) and the western leaders were more or less fully informed after about 1944. They never even bothered to bomb the train-lines or other vital parts of the infrastructure.
Fast-forward to the 1990s: concentration camps resurface in Europe, again. This time, it's the Serbs. Europe takes notice, we have western film crews on site, there's video-footage in every household. They're just a couple of hundred kilometers away from the Austrian border.
Does anything happen?
Nope, it takes until the late 1990s before Europe takes on Serbia....
So, in historic review, the leaks from the 1940's are now barely footnotes in Wikipedia.
I fear the same will be true for Mr Manning's efforts, as heroic (and possibly self-destructive) his efforts are.
Of course, in the whole affaire, what I can't understand: how the hell could the officers in charge of him actually intrust him with so much access?
Not only did thsi kid siphon-off a giant amount of information - he even _had_ to brag about it to somebody he thought he could trust.
_That_ is the real scandal. If any serious efforts had been made to test his personality, I'm sure this would have come-up in no time.
Don't they have grown-ups for such positions?
Windows 2000 - from the guys who brought us edlin
After that the full video shows a few people fleeing into a nearby building which they declared abandoned, then launch 3 hellfires at it completely demolishing the place. Later it turns out there were two families living in that building - all murdered.
Read what I mean, not what I wrote.
The mafia can bring order and structure also..
are all okay if the state is doing it...
Producing a little chaos and discord among the diplomatic corps of many nations is only giving a little taste of what they do to us on an everyday basis
All these leaks might make a little more difficult to start a war on false pretenses.. And it could prevent corrupt financiers/future government employees from trashing the economy on every election cycle.
Todos mis movimientos están friamente calculados
I hope you're not a drone pilot :-)
Todos mis movimientos están friamente calculados
Especially if you consider your public your enemy.
This space available.
How about, In free and democratic societies, a corrupt individual or group who decide to classify information in order to cover their crimes is a subversion of that very democratic process.
From my observation, the latter occurs much more often than the former. Given government crimes of late, how does a free and democratic society overcome corruption when evidence of same is declared classified information?
Here's something to think about:
In short, those in power shouldn't do anything they might not want to later read about on the front page of the news. And, indeed, those who don't remember the past are condemned to repeat it - and it's hard to even remember the past if its classified.
I say release the emails and let the chips fall where they may.
Ask Me About... The 80's!
The point is, we are there on false pretenses doing evil. We need MORE Mannings and more people like the sociopaths on the chopper getting killed.
What changed under Obama? Nothing Good
To Julian Assange:
Never talk to police. Let a criminal lawyer or some competent authority do the talking for you.
Cheers,
Mahadiga
I'd like to buy homeland for our 10 million people. http://twitter.com/mahadiga
So what secrets do you think the State should be able to keep?
Never mind, it doesn't matter what you think because someone else will disagree with you and leak them anyway.
See, that's the problem. When everyone considers themselves the ultimate arbiter of what should be secret and not secret, there are no secrets. And only an idiot would say the Government should not have anything that is kept secret.
When Fascism comes to America, it will call itself Anti-Fascism, and tell you to give up your guns.
And only an idiot would say the Government should not have anything that is kept secret.
The government's authority comes from the consent of the people. Those people have every right to investigate every single aspect of that government. No secrets are allowed when abuse is suspected and needs to be uncovered and corrected. This whole "Big Brother is watching" thing can work both ways. That pleases me. Feel free to call me an idiot if that's the only way you can defend your point.
Todos mis movimientos están friamente calculados
I'm not Jewish or Arab or Muslim, I'm just an geek who likes to believe we will change the world via social networks of real people. But I am an Australian!
So when 9 people are shot I hit the social networks to see what is going down. And bingo on Facebook up comes "We are for Gaza".
I have never seen a site where people are being so manipulated. Not by people from Gaza but people from Mossad. Most likely the reason the site has no administrator is because it's run by Mossad. If only I was 'just paranoid'.
Facebook -- "We are for Gaza" -- after 7 days as an embedded ethnographer
1. Not one Israeli has entered and apologised for the horror acts of their government.
2. No normal Israeli could stay on the page as the hate projections are extreme, I believe those people to be Mossad agents making it impossible for rational Israelis to be involved.
3. If a topic is listed that is current and of interest 15 'I love Israel messages' will drive it off the front page of the site within 30 seconds.
4. While there is a party line taken by those in Gaza and it has a clear message, the only party line from the Israelis is "GOD GAVE US THIS LAND" which is clearly an insult to a thinking person.
They (the machine) can't answer questions like "don't you think after 50 years the international community should do a QA audit on your nuclear activities?
Based on... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7sfIh3poEDc
I bet if you looked at posts in this thread you would be able to pick out the stooges. "No we can't possibly have a world without secrets!" framed with "because the terrorists will end humanity".
The Israelis favourite framing is "blar blar blar and it's because Humas is Evil"
Here I'll pick out some of the framing for you...
blar blar blar "and Obama doesn't even threaten to arrest that guy." [Therefore Obama is weak we need a strong warlord]
blar blar blar "murdered by an [apparent] Islamic terrorist [how they frame it] than if he went out in a blaze of improbability [yes an improbable truth, thank god you see it bro!]
blar blar blar "Of course, your opinion on everything is irrelevant, [now the framing] since you live in a dictatorship. [Oh course there is no relationship between where someone lives and there ability to be rational]
You watch on every political discussion on the net there are people in those discussions that are there only to effect the framing of the discussion and when pressed they have nothing much to say as those answers are in the blue book of macros to prevent peace in the world.
Anyway keep up the good work you guys. They wouldn't need secrets if they weren't doing the wrong thing. Pure and simple.
So I should be able to see your tax returns eh? How about any sealed court records you may have.
The people do have a right to investigate every single aspect of the government. Using representatives they elect. Not by just deciding to release information.
But then you just stepped around my point and got all pissed about being called an idiot. You are saying that the government should have absolutely no secrets of any kind? Because unless you are saying that, then you are just wasting bandwidth.
When Fascism comes to America, it will call itself Anti-Fascism, and tell you to give up your guns.
But then you just stepped around my point and got all pissed about being called an idiot.
No, I merely see it as attempt to dismiss the thought without giving it any and that your assertion is the final authority. Basically a cop out..
If you want a specific, fine. Only military strategies and tactics during actual wartime should be kept secret. No closed door meetings on any domestic or economic issues. It shouldn't take an FOIA request to get answers. "No comment" is unacceptable.. Failure to comply will only produce more wikileaks sites.
Todos mis movimientos están friamente calculados
I don't know where you live, but I still live in a democracy.
I don't think that word means what you think it means.
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Hippie Logger Jock
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So ... your position boils down to: Having even more people die - only thing that distinguishes the second group from the former is you don't like them.
Hard to see a difference between you and what you rail on about, now isn't it?
Not a fair analogy? It wasn't an analogy, it was what happened. Just because you are in the area doesn't mean you have anything to do with what's going on. No matter what you think of any of the players in the current plot, this is fact: The military covered up these killings and labeled them all as enemy combatant kills.
*DrugCheese rants*
And Hitler was elected in democratic elections as well.
No, he wasn't, stop spreading that BS please. Hitler was appointed by Hindenburg, then engineered the Reichstag fire, then enacted draconian laws on grounds of security, used that to rig the next election, which still didn't bring him majority. He then forced Hindenburg out, forced the new Reichstag into giving him legislative powers, effectively suspended the constitution, and then proceeded on to murder his opposition in and outside of his party, and, finally, using the "emergency" legislative powers to declare himself a Furher. Or somesuch. But he was never elected at any point of his national political career by a majority.
No actually Hitler was elected by democratic elections. What he did was get initially elected to the German parliament and used the electoral system at the time to grant himself more and more powers. This was helped by infighting and political manoeuvring by his opponents which allowed him to set himself up for a "power grab", allowing himself to become Chancellor (essentially what would be the prime minister) and then eventually merge his job with the office of president. The conditions of post World War 1 German politics essentially set up the conditions for his rise. Hindenberg was a check to him initially but he was limited by constitutional role that he needed to perform to enable the proper formation of a government from the people who had been elected to parliament. See the Wikipedia article on Hitler; it's quite interesting.
Why didn't they get out? C'mon, people are responsible for their actions. If they're there, they must be guilty in some way. If a van stopped for the reporter, surely he was involved with the insurgents in some way.
So the US military doesn't know where the insurgents are, with dozens of eyes in the sky as well as people scouring all over the ground, satellite imaging, probably even using some humvee mounted triangulation to help pinpoint where the fire is coming from .... but the civilians are supposed to know what neighborhoods to stay out of?
And I don't know why the US doesn't just nuke the whole area and get this over with...
You are just plain ignorant.
*DrugCheese rants*
That's an awfully cavalier attitude to have when your own life isn't on the line.
If it does breach national security, as they claim it does, then it is exactly my life that is being put on the line being a member of this nation is it not?
I think it apt to use the overused quote: They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.
This is MY goverment. I am NOT the goverments CIVILIAN.
*DrugCheese rants*
"moments" == 10+ minutes???? Nah. And texans are armed civilians. Can the army just shoot into a crowd of texans walking the streets of houston???
and it will happen again, as far as i can see it is some kind of accidental collateral damage, which is inevitable in any war ... but to prevent this from becoming common, i think people like mister Wikileaks are doing a great job of kicking the conscience or at least the p.r. - nightmare back to the military of the 'civilized' (mind the ''-s) world. Can't break cake without baking eggs, there will always be innocent victims. Question is, how many victims would there be if some of the middle-east nations were allowed to go at it just like that? I'm not one for interfering with any culture, but when, for example, armageddon-man from Iran starts herding Uranium for peaceful purposes i'm a bit wary, and i'm happy the spacemarines (yes, thank god for cold fusion) are buffering between him and me. If this costs an innocent reporters life, that's a sad fact but i still want them to keep an eye on Mordor while i sleep. So, good thing we have wikileaks so the space-marines do not succumb to the teachings of the dark lord :p
As long as theres homo sapiens there will be war and it doesn't look like we'll be evolving anytime soon...next-gen is being held back everywhere, in the name of public safety...so, again, thank your gods for shit like wikileaks before i raise Orwell from the grave to haunt you all.
beware he who denies you access to information for in his mind, he already deems himself to be your master (SMAC-ish)
He was elected by a plurality, at least, with his party garnering (if I recall correctly) about 44% of the votes
Nope, he got 44% post-reichstag, with the new, dictatorial laws already in place. go look it up.
or, put it another way, your facts are off.
Hitler did not become a Chancellor by a proper constitutional process; he and his party never had support even close to the numbers needed. He got himself in power by back-room dealing, subverting the democratic process, not using it.
What he did then is to use the Reichstag fire to get emergency powers (again, distancing himself from the democratic principles of the constitution); to use the state apparatus to win a larger vote; and to use his private army to force the (new) parliament to let him dispense with what was left of the democratic institutions after the Enablement act.
Calling this a "democratic" process is okay if you accept that countries like Nicaragua, Cuba or Chile in the 70s were "democratic".
So, the idea that Hitler was "democratically" elected is not even close to the truth.
Also, I see some above question the role of the nazis in the engineering of the fire, but if one follows the proceedings of the trials, especially the mountain of evidence of the fire, it is quite obvious.
An informative article on the subject of the fire is available here. Unfortunately, my other sources are mostly on paper, and out of reach at the moment.
Actually, we live in a representative democracy. We choose the idiots that represent us. Whether they do what we want or not, is just part of the deal. You don't like them, either elect someone else next time or run for the position yourself.
"Be polite, be professional, but have a plan to kill everybody you meet." General James Mattis
"Only military strategies and tactics during actual wartime should be kept secret."
Ok...so now this little puke who is in the military and who already stole these documents disagrees and leaks military strategies and tactics to wikileaks, who then publishes it.
But that's OK, since wikileaks is a fine and outstanding idea and it's this guy's duty to leak information he feels is in violation of the law.
When Fascism comes to America, it will call itself Anti-Fascism, and tell you to give up your guns.
Unfortunately, when you sign up for the military, your decision on whether or not to release information because it "is the moral thing to do" does not apply.
From About.com:
"I, (NAME), do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; and that I will obey the orders of the President of the United States and the orders of the officers appointed over me, according to regulations and the Uniform Code of Military Justice. So help me God."
From Wikipedia:
Executive Order 13526 replaces earlier executive orders on the topic and lays out the system of classification, declassification, and handling of national security information generated by the U.S. government and its employees and contractors, as well as information received from other governments.
Since it is an Executive Order, that would make it the "orders of the President of the United States", which means you have violated the oath that you took.
The Uniform Code for Military Justice, TITLE 10, Subtitle A, PART II, CHAPTER 47, SUBCHAPTER X, 906a, Art. 106a. Espionage is pretty clear on the topic:
"(1) Any person subject to this chapter who, with intent or reason to believe that it is to be used to the injury of the United States or to the advantage of a foreign nation, communicates, delivers, or transmits, or attempts to communicate, deliver, or transmit, to any entity described in paragraph (2), either directly or indirectly, anything described in paragraph (3) shall be punished as a court-martial may direct, except that if the accused is found guilty of an offense that directly concerns
(A) nuclear weaponry, military spacecraft or satellites, early warning systems, or other means of defense or retaliation against large scale attack, (B) war plans, (C) communications intelligence or cryptographic information, or (D) any other major weapons system or major element of defense strategy, the accused shall be punished by death or such other punishment as a court-martial may direct."
So releasing confidential information on your personal determination while you are in the military is about the same as anyone just speeding through a red light with a cop watching and then telling the cop, that it was you moral determination...
See how that flies with the judge.
"Be polite, be professional, but have a plan to kill everybody you meet." General James Mattis
What I find amusing is that you assume some little 22-year-old kid is the least bit qualified to make such a decision.
Regards;
....They'd all be too busy watching American Idol.
Regards;
Call it collateral damage in the fight against corruption.. Perfectly acceptable using the same standards as the government does... Regardless what the law says, uncovering a corruption is a duty. Exactly the same as any citizen who witnesses a crime. He is expected to come forward. And please save the "through proper channels" crap... That will usually get the honest guy punished. Since the US entered these wars under false pretenses, I'm for whatever it takes to get them out now. Any and all moral high ground is long gone.
Todos mis movimientos están friamente calculados
-1, Flamebait? It's called *sarcasm*, people...
/me suggest the following scoring category: -2, sarcasm-impaired. :P
And you know what? People want to be lied to. They don't want to hear the truth
If only it were not true. I just saw an interview with Darren Brown, and he was saying how upset people get with him when he points out a charlatan psyhic. I mean, wtf?.
It seems that the bush administration correctly gauged that they could break the law, and with sufficient media manipulation, hard-core republicans would keep justice at bay. Those hard-core republicans have their head so suck up their ass, that they cannot even digest what happened. And, apparently, having a head suck there is a comfortable place, so long as you only watch Fox.
Like all pain, suffering is a signal that something isn't right
And you know what? People want to be lied to. They don't want to hear the truth
If only it were not true. I just saw an interview with Darren Brown, and he was saying how upset people get with him when he points out a charlatan psyhic. I mean, wtf?.
It's true in the sense that people want to hear "Good News".
Silly example: the infamous "Darling, does that dress make me look fat?"-question.
Few women want an honest answer to that question.
Same with questions about war, peace, financial situation, environment.
(Adding to that is the fact that the people in charge often have very little practical power to make short-time changes for the better - they can only create stop-gap solutions etc).
In the US, the "spin-it-positively" attitude is most obvious - that doesn't mean that we don't have it at all in Europe.
Just take at look at the fucked-up €-situation....
Windows 2000 - from the guys who brought us edlin
I ascribe to this principle as well but there's another side to the equation: don't do the crime if you can't do the time. In other words, I am all in favor of people leaking classified information but I am also in favor of them being prosecuted for doing so. Similarly, while I find torture abhorrent, if someone takes it upon themselves to torture another and should the data extracted be valuable (even preventing something terrible from happening), then the torturer should still be prosecuted for the crime.
In free and democratic societies, an individual deciding on his or her own to leak classified information is a subversion of that very democratic process.
That's assuming we live in a free and democratic society. That's far from the case.
While I agree with your underlying sentiment it's worth reflecting on the fact that you are able to type that sentence without fear of personal repercussions.
Read Pynchon.
And the 8 million civilians killed in Vietnam alone were all legitimate targets because you liberate a country by doing a holocaust.
I'd love to have confirmation of that 8 million figure. Wikipedia suggests that's an order of magnitude too high to be credible but admits the true civilian body count is unknown.
If the Vietnam civilian toll were in the millions then the US would have to face truly Godwinian comparisons. These were common in the activist culture of the 1960s-70s but it seems to have become unfashionable now.
But even if the US bombings only caused the deaths of several hundred thousand Vietnamese? That's still something I don't really hear much complaint over. Lots of talk about 'the troops' - and as conscripts they faced a horrible ethical choice between breaking the law of their country or serving in a bad war they were told was necessary (but obviously wasn't since the free world survived the Fall of Saigon) - but what about the deaths of foreign innocents? Shouldn't they count more than national troops in all our moral calculations, or how can we consider ourselves 'good guys'?
Yes, I do get frustrated when people complain the 'the troops came home from Vietnam and were told that the war they served in was neither honorable nor necessary. How dare mere civilians who've never faced bullets say such a horrible thing!'. Well, truth hurts maybe, but that's the case. Vietnam WAS a bad war and 'serving your country' isn't automatically a good thing if your country is acting dishonourably - is it?
You are not a brain: http://books.google.com/books?id=2oV61CeDx-YC
If you believe that yourself, a fellow soldier, American citizen, allied soldiers, allied citizen, or unallied citizen is in danger (In that order) of loosing life limb or eyesight, then deadly force is allowed.
Isn't there a bit of an ethical conflict with that order of priorities?
Ethically, it would seem that, in order to be and remain 'the good guys' in a conflict, a soldier's order of preservation of life should be almost the exact reverse:
* local civilians (foreign if you're the invading force, national if you're defending) - women and children first, then able adults
* allied citizens
* own citizens
* allied troops
* own country troops
* self
Sure, there's a total conflict between self-preservation and protection of others - but that goes with the territory, doesn't it? If you don't make it an ABSOLUTE priority to FIRST protect the people you're supposed to be serving and protecting (the civilians) - and theoretically in order not to be an illegal brute-force occupation you're there to serve and protect the Iraqis, not the Americans - then it seems like you're just a guy with a gun shooting people who aren't his mates. And that seems like the definition of 'aggressor' or nastier words.
Not getting at you personally, but if self-preservation over all while in a foreign country is US military doctrine then how exactly does it differ from any other country's military doctrine? And if the 'good guys'' military doctrine is indistinguishable from their enemies then why should we, as civilians, support 'our troops' over other troops? Just because they're 'ours'? But Nuremberg established that 'just following orders' is not an acceptable excuse for a soldier, so why should 'just supporting the troops' be an acceptable excuse for a civilian?
You are not a brain: http://books.google.com/books?id=2oV61CeDx-YC
You presumably live in a dictatorship, so I can see how you might have a different opinion on it. Of course, your opinion on everything is irrelevant, since you live in a dictatorship.
The reality is that so-called Western democracy is in fact criss-crossed by an alternate military-industrial hierarchy which is internally a dictatorship, or lots of little dictatorships. We call them 'CEOs' and 'generals' and they do answer to supposedly 'higher' authorities, but the power generally flows down these systems, not up, and they are each generally proud of 'not being a democracy'.
Theoretically the loop closes somewhere between the marketplace and polling booth - but since, due to commercial secrecy and classification laws, information about how each of these organisations function is not generally available to consumers and voters - and even many shareholders and legislators - I find it hard to see how we can say our society is really a democracy at its heart. It's really just a sort of quasi-democratic web of competing top-down tyrannies.
Which is somewhat better than one big united tyranny - but not by much, and not in the big matters where it really counts: strategic armaments and military policy. Those remain mostly self-governing closed shops. How exactly are you going to argue with the CEO of McDonnell-Douglas or the General in charge of the Single Integrated Operating Plan? Supposedly the Joint Chiefs report to the SecDef and President... but even they can only know what they're told, right?
If a Julian Assange stood for office and got voted in as President, promising to declassify everything... do you really think the powers that be would stand for that, even if 51% of the population voted in favour?
You are not a brain: http://books.google.com/books?id=2oV61CeDx-YC
Countless atrocities committed in the name of the majority have occurred on the basis of this mode of thinking. The Holocaust comes to mind.
To the contrary: while some anti-Jewish laws were enacted openly, I believe the Final Solution was decided by a very small minority in extremely secret closed meetings. It was certainly not openly discussed and voted on in public or there would not have been such shock and disbelief by the wider world when the camps were liberated after WW2.
So the Holocaust is actually a complete counter-example to your argument. If Wikileaks had existed then, and the secret planning documents had been widely distributed, it might well have been averted entirely.
You are not a brain: http://books.google.com/books?id=2oV61CeDx-YC
you can't write everything off as a tragic mistake; it was tragic official policy.
Best one-line summary of this entire issue. Thank you.
You are not a brain: http://books.google.com/books?id=2oV61CeDx-YC
f you don't make it an ABSOLUTE priority to FIRST protect the people you're supposed to be serving and protecting (the civilians)
You must have me mixed up with a police officer. The police use the "to serve and protect" line. I was not there to serve the local citizens, I was there to serve my country. There is a HUGE difference. I was not there to serve the iraqi people. Those rules outlined when I could make MY OWN determination that lethal force was necessary
then it seems like you're just a guy with a gun shooting people who aren't his mates. And that seems like the definition of 'aggressor' or nastier words.
I never fired my weapon once, I was there to remove roadside bombs. If you want to get into whether or not Americans should have ever gone to Iraq, I wont play that game. (Frankly I have my own doubts.. now) I was there to remove bombs, the same bombs that were being used against the civilians by opposing factions. SO before we try to turn this into a American bashing exercise, why dont you talk to someone in YOUR local military, Im sure they have pretty much the same rules. Trust me, they arnt there to serve and protect either.
You are entitled to your own opinions, not your own facts.
I often see fully grown-up men act like 5-year olds or even worse, and then again 12-year olds act completely rationally and responsibly. As such I'd say age does not correlate with rightness or wrongness of one's actions.
Don't let the door hit you on the way out!
Good thing he's not a United States citizen then, or else he might be violating his social contract.
Clause 5(c), going to the bathroom during a TV commercial is theft.
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- - You can't take something off the Internet! That's like trying to take pee out of a swimming pool.