Wikileaks and Democracy In Zimbabwe

OCatenac writes "The Atlantic has an interesting story on the collateral damage of exposing diplomatic communications in Zimbabwe. From the article: 'The reaction in Zimbabwe was swift. Zimbabwe's Mugabe-appointed attorney general announced he was investigating the Prime Minister on treason charges based exclusively on the contents of the leaked cable. While it's unlikely Tsvangirai could be convicted on the contents of the cable alone, the political damage has already been done. The cable provides Mugabe the opportunity to portray Tsvangirai as an agent of foreign governments working against the people of Zimbabwe. Furthermore, it could provide Mugabe with the pretense to abandon the coalition government that allowed Tsvangirai to become prime minister in 2009.' Undoubtedly there are lots of things that our governments hide from us which should not be hidden but it's a shame that no one from Wikileaks could be troubled to consider the potential repercussions of this particular exposure."

Comments

Re:Ellsberg actually redacted diplomatic cables

[twoallbeefpatties]

While Ellsberg supports Assange and what they are trying to do, in actuality he redacted many names and even entire sections of diplomatic reports that assessed the allies of the US who were secretly supporting the Vietnam war, like Poland.

Assange (or whoever at his organization) also redacts names from the majority of Wikileaks releases, generally except where the names are of public figures.

The question is, is it worth it? To see how the bankers and the financiers and the heads of state control the world and the wealth in the world? Will it REALLY help democracy and display capitalism's flaws? Haven't we known that since Marx?

This is the most cynical, hopeless thing I have ever heard. It's essentially an admittance of defeat. You're saying, we may as well let the government and the corporations operate in secret, because we know that exposing their crimes won't do any good anyway. And the sad thing is, you might be right.

Re:Mugabe

[Mashiki]

Guess you missed most of the world shifting to democracy. Shifting to democracy wasn't love, hugs, and cookies. It was violent, unbelievably so. France slaughtered royalty and politicians alike. In the UK they were drawing magistrates in the streets. The US not only fought the British, but threw them out. India's shift was very violent as well, so was pakistan's. Israel's was the same. Oh lets not forget Argentina either.

People can be ready and want democracy. The shift to give people rights beyond what the government(royalty, or dictatorships), was violent everywhere. So yes, you can bring democracy by force. In fact, most of the democratic world was brought into existence by force. It's the erosion of democracy that's silent.