It's the ultimate Denial Of Service attack: 1) Co-locate stuff that the FBI doesn't like with the server that you want to DOS 2) Report your server to the FBI 3) Sit back and let the FBI do the rest.
Of course there is another interesting variation that's been seen in some related attacks.
1. Identify server used as LulzSec / Anonymous communications hub, tool distribution server. 2. Obtain warrant and confiscate server for forensic examination. 3. Identify users of server, peeling as many layers from onion as needed. 4. Issue arrest warrants for DDoS / network cracking activity. 5. ?? 6. Prison!!
I was just going to say.... "so we actually have no idea about any of this, right?"
I'm sure most people are clueless. I suppose they could be doing it for the "lulz".... but that really isn't their style.
FTA -
A government official who declined to be named said earlier in the day that the F.B.I. was actively investigating the Lulz Security group and any affiliated hackers. The official said the F.B.I. had teamed up with other agencies in this effort, including the Central Intelligence Agency and cybercrime bureaus in Europe.
How can you prove who you are when you're anonymous? Well, I guess there's always a public key. Use a public key, you dorks.
It won't work. How many times have we been told there are no members? That nobody can really speak for them? That any random group of people on a given day can take action without everyone else knowing or being involved?
What they think is a clever tactic for shielding them from individual guilt also makes it practically impossible to deny anything effectively, or believably.
Yes, do. I think the next one will be: We totally didn't do that (now that we see there really could be consequences brought by intelligence agencies that we told to F off).
Bin Laden lasted 10 years because his messenger drove about 90 miles before putting the battery in the cell phone to make a call so the signal wouldn't be traced back to him. Since I doubt most of them would get off the sofa to change the TV channel, I give any particular member of "LulzSec" and "Anonymous" somewhere between 10 hours and 10 months if the security services are truly interested*.
The onion peeling and "lulz" are just beginning.
*So, exactly which DDoS / hack came from where on which day? Which data was stolen from there? Hmmm?
After actual EMP bombs go off, the cities will be untouched, along with all the canned and packaged foods, but electronics not based on vacuum tubes (or specially shielded systems such as mil-spec) and electrical systems will be burnt out inside the rage of each bomb. The only stored information that will be accessible for trivial problems like repairing the electronics and electrical systems will be on "chunks of dead trees". It might be handy to have those chucks around.
Given who's running the government, I'm pretty sure it's about getting people who send movies and music to other people. I'm also pretty sure if somebody really tries to use the Internet to take down America, the government will miss that because it doesn't involve an mp3 file.
I'm reasonably certain that the Department of Defense don't give a hoot about mp3 files, unless they are a clever exploit to take control of a machine for remote exploitation. They do care about critical infrastructure being crippled. I'd don't think mp3s are involved in critical infrastructure, although they seem to play an important role in lurid fantasies.
If you think this story is anything like "Wikileaks", either forward or backwards, I don't think you understood it at all.
Is leaving critical infrastructure open to crippling attacks by cyberpunks just for "lulz" a good idea? I wouldn't think so.
Since practically all of the internet infrastructure is operated and maintained by various businesses, doesn't it make sense to involve them in security discussions and planning?
So, since Bush waged two wars without a declaration of war, nor repelling an invasion, therefore President Bush has committed at least two illegal acts?
No, he hasn't. President Bush obtained authorizations for use of military force from Congress for the war against Al Qaeda (War on Terror), and against Saddam's Iraq. Legally they are equivalent to declarations of war.
The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court of Review has made public its decision, reached last August, that the federal government has the power to wiretap international phone calls and intercept e-mail messages without a specific court order, even when Americans' private communications may be involved. The case arose from a challenge to this power brought by a telecommunications company whose identity has not been disclosed. The company had refused to turn over its relevant records, claiming that the president lacked constitutional authority to obtain them without a court order.
The "FISA court" issued a secret ruling that Congress acted within its authority when it passed the Protect America Act, which gave the executive branch broad power to eavesdrop on international communications. That ruling, it is now being reported, was upheld upon appellate review.
It is good criminal practice, to stay on "annoyance level". If you exceed that, law enforcement comes after you. If you exceed that enough, the people that come after you actually know what they are doing, are well funded and very, very persistent. If these clowns really manage to break into or do several damage to the federal reserve, they will end up in federal prison for a few decades. May take months or years to get them, but they will get caught.
In fiscal year 2010, the FBI requested almost $50,000,000 in new resources for internet crimes. Any bets they get more than that in new resources this year?
Perhaps the US shouldn't be doing things that it has to keep so secret. That's just a consequence of empire-building. Preach one value to the masses, do something else in practice.
Is it the duty of the United States government to serve the interests of the United States, as opposed to say, Iran? Is it the duty of the United States government to care for and protect its people, as opposed to say, the people of Venezuela? If so, then it must differentiate between different sets of interests, American, and those of others.
If American citizens have been taken prisoner unlawfully by pirates, the United States government could try to negotiate with the pirates. If the pirates want $1,000,000, but the US is willing to pay $20,000,000, should the government go in and up front announce the maximum amount they are willing to pay instead of try to pay the least amount? Wouldn't that be a fundamentally stupid bargaining tactic? But to do that, they would need to keep secrets from the pirates. Well, not just pirates, they would need to keep it secret from the media, since there are many media outlets that would gladly publish it, and force the US to pay $20,000,000 instead of $1,000,000. So, do you think the US should keep the maximum bid a secret and serve American interests, or announce it and server pirate interests by undermining the government's own negotiating position?
Let's say negotiations with the pirates are going badly, they heard in media that the government is willing to pay $20,000,000 but they got greedy and now think they can get $50,000,000. The US Government isn't willing to pay that much, decides to use a commando raid to rescue the hostages while stalling in negotiations. Military actions are generally at least twice as effective over short periods of time when the attacking force attains surprise. Even if the pirates think it is possible, they don't really know if, when, how, who, or where they will come from. Should the US Government announce to the pirates that it has given up negotiations, and that it is going to use military force to free its citizens? If not, that would mean keeping a secret from the pirates - do you oppose that? Of course, it will also have to keep the rescue plan secret from the media as well or it will be published, the pirates will see it, and will be prepared to defeat it. Should the government tell the next of kin that it is going to try a military rescue? They might tell the media, or their kin being held by the pirates, and either the media or the prisoners might tell the pirates. So, it looks like we can't tell the pirates, the media, or the next of kin. What about other people in the United States? Same problem.
As part of the planning for the rescue mission, it appears that it would be really helpful to refuel some aircraft in a country near where the pirates are holding the American captives. This third country has a government that is friendly to the United States, but much of the population is hostile as they are being influenced by religious extremists from outside their country. The government of this third country agrees to the refueling operation at one of their island military bases, but demand that it be kept secret to avoid agitating their citizens. Since it helps the mission of recovering Americans help hostage, shouldn't the US make use of the island for refueling? What about the request to keep it secret? Should the US stir up problems in the country by making it known, despite the request of the government? If the use of the island is revealed, it could hurt diplomatic relations, and perhaps even generate civil unrest, getting people killed. Shouldn't this be kept a secret? From the pirates? From the media?
During the flight to the pirate locations, and on the ground, US forces will be using radios for command and control, and various flight operations. Should the US inform the pirates about the radio frequencies it uses? What about the media, who might listen in? Suppose a
It seems people like to consider "Anonymous" to be like "the cloud". The cloud is everywhere and nowhere, boxes and fuzzy lines on a chart. It is a mystery what goes there. "Anonymous" is everyone and no one, no leaders, no members. But at the end of the day, "the cloud" ultimately resolves into individual servers with an IP address, and "Anonymous" resolves into individual people with a computer and an IP address who did or didn't do something as part of the group on any given day. DDOS once, and you were in on that attack, forever, even if it is only once. Now that "Anonymous" is attacking government institutions on a regular basis, I think life will be much more exciting for them, especially since they seem to be showing poor taste in targets.
The interesting thing is, due to the nature of their collective, they can really only admit to attacks, but can't effectively deny them. I wonder how many purely criminal organizations or foreign intelligence agencies are having their members participate as cover?
The director general of the BBC admitted Thursday that his organisation had been guilty of a "massive bias to the left" but said "a completely different generation" of journalists now works at the broadcaster. Mark Thompson told the right-of-centre Spectator magazine that there was an institutional bias when he joined the organisation, reinforcing the findings of a 2007 internal report which concluded that greater efforts were required to avoid liberal bias.
"In the BBC I joined 30 years ago, there was, in much of current affairs, in terms of people's personal politics, which were quite vocal, a massive bias to the left," Thompson said.
Terrorists and foreign intelligence services will also be doing this to use against the United States and its allies, not just journalists. Wikileaks has provided the raw material for data mining to find things the US doesn't even realize about itself, or its allies. There is no surprise that Bradley Manning has been charged with aiding the enemy.
Since I can anticipate the follow ups: No, Wikileaks didn't do an adequate job of scrubbing the documents of names at various points which is why they are useful to the Taliban and other groups building death lists. Yes, I have seen reports of people being killed due to Wikileaks publishing their name, you just have to dig a lot to find them. For some reason it doesn't seem to be a popular news item. Go figure. Oversight of US diplomacy, military, and intelligence activity is the role of the Congress elected by voters.
Even if nobody was killed, Wikileaks has resulted in a significant disruption to US diplomacy and antiterrorism efforts. (You pull out informants due to their cover being blown and you lose valuable intelligence.)
WASHINGTON — Americans overwhelmingly think that WikiLeaks is doing more harm than good by releasing classified U.S. diplomatic cables, and they want to see the people behind it prosecuted, according to a new McClatchy-Marist Poll.
"Clearly people are very unhappy with it," said Lee Miringoff, the director of the Marist Institute for Public Opinion at Marist College in Poughkeepsie, N.Y., which conducted the national poll.
The survey found that 70 percent of Americans think the leaks are doing more harm than good and want those who publish the secrets to be prosecuted.
What would happen if there were, just for arguments sake, dissident Americans........ Pause..
For the sake of argument? You don't think there are people engaged in dissent? Really? Well, there are dissenters of many flavors, from the fringe to more main stream.
And guess what? They have the same option as everybody else - they go into the voting booth and vote for the party of their choice, just like the rest of America. If they don't like the local laws, they can try to change them or move. (Massachusetts has state run health care, California is engaging in an interesting physics experiment - can financial implosions lead to the formation of a black hole, Texas is generating a disproportionate share of jobs, for a few possible destinations. Every state has its unique charms.)
In the meantime, they publish magazine articles, books and web sites,radio, as well as make use of other media.
If they engage in terrorism that kills people, they get hunted down like dogs, until they get friends.
Really, is this news to you? You probably should have paused earlier.
False. After his capture Revere told the British that the country was raised against them. Not one word about taking away the colonist's guns.
And while it is true that "you can't take their guns" is a reasonable inference from "they are ready and waiting for you", it is also a reasonable inference that "you can't take their trousers" or "you can't quarter soldiers in their homes", but for some reason you don't mention either of those, nor the dozens of other things you could reasonably infer from what Revere reported telling them, which was not "you can't take their guns" but "the country is raised against you."
If you've watched the movie Braveheart, you would know that the English had previous experience with opponents without trousers. The lack of trousers, while offense to the eye at times, does nothing to prevent infantry action and close combat. Weapons are the thing, specifically, guns. An armed and ready population is a very different thing than a lone family asleep in their beds as far as the prospects for retaining their arms - a very real concern.
Between 1768-1777, the British policy was to disarm the American colonists by whatever means possible, from entrapment, false promises of safekeeping, banning imports, seizure, and eventually shooting persons bearing arms.
By 1774, the British had embargoed shipments of arms to America, and the Americans responded by arming themselves and forming independent militia companies.
On the night of 18 April 1775, General Gage, Governor of Massachusetts, dispatched several hundred soldiers of the Boston garrison under the command of Major Pitcairn to seize the arms and munitions stored by the illegal colonial militias in Concord.
When Pitcairn encountered the Minutemen on the Lexington common blocking his way, he demanded that they throw down their arms and disperse. Although willing to disperse, the Minutemen were not willing to surrender their arms. The rest is history.
Three days after the British retreat from Concord, General Gage refused to allow Bostonians to leave the city without depositing their arms and ammunition with a Selectman at Faneuil Hall, to be returned at a suitable time after their return. When the citizens of Boston foolishly complied, Gage seized the arms and refused to permit their owners to leave the city. ("Declaration of the Causes and Necessity of Taking up Arms," July 6, 1775.)
Nobody had to say a word about taking the colonist's guns - it was British policy. How else do you think they were dealing with the rebellion?
Surely the reasonable inference isn't: the British will crush the rebellion and take away arms, everywhere but here?
He is not charged with Treason either. Why not? Could it be that the 'worst leaker in US military history' didnt leak anything all that important? Could it be that the state department over-classifies most of its material for political reasons?
No, it's because Treason is a crime specifically defined in the US Constitution. Manning's circumstances don't meet the Constitutional test for treason.
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.
As far as I recall or know, only one person has been charged with treason since WW2.
An American al Qaeda propagandist was indicted Wednesday on treason charges, the first person charged with the offense during the United States' war on terrorism, officials said.
Adam Yahiye Gadahn, who has appeared in five al Qaeda videos, is also charged with offering material support for terrorism, U.S. Deputy Attorney General Paul McNulty said.
But think about it, he is charged with aiding the enemy. That is treason by any common understanding of the word, and would constitutie treason in most countries, it just does not meet the US Constitutional meaning.
The State Department has been relocating diplomats and warning activists and sources around the world after Wikileaks outed them. This has been very disruptive.
Worrying that legal euthanasia may lead to trouble with insurance companies is only a problem in the very few, terribly uncivilized, western countries that do not have universal medical care paid for by taxes.
Yes, we keep hearing reports of how those government run plans turn out.
My health-care prejudices crumbled not in the classroom but on the way to one. On a subzero Winnipeg morning in 1997, I cut across the hospital emergency room to shave a few minutes off my frigid commute. Swinging open the door, I stepped into a nightmare: the ER overflowed with elderly people on stretchers, waiting for admission. Some, it turned out, had waited five days. The air stank with sweat and urine. Right then, I began to reconsider everything that I thought I knew about Canadian health care. I soon discovered that the problems went well beyond overcrowded ERs. Patients had to wait for practically any diagnostic test or procedure, such as the man with persistent pain from a hernia operation whom we referred to a pain clinic—with a three-year wait list; or the woman needing a sleep study to diagnose what seemed like sleep apnea, who faced a two-year delay; or the woman with breast cancer who needed to wait four months for radiation therapy, when the standard of care was four weeks. . ..
Nor were the problems I identified unique to Canada—they characterized all government-run health-care systems. Consider the recent British controversy over a cancer patient who tried to get an appointment with a specialist, only to have it canceled—48 times. More than 1 million Britons must wait for some type of care, with 200,000 in line for longer than six months. A while back, I toured a public hospital in Washington, D.C., with Tim Evans, a senior fellow at the Centre for the New Europe. The hospital was dark and dingy, but Evans observed that it was cleaner than anything in his native England. In France, the supply of doctors is so limited that during an August 2003 heat wave—when many doctors were on vacation and hospitals were stretched beyond capacity—15,000 elderly citizens died. Across Europe, state-of-the-art drugs aren’t available. And so on....
In The Business of Health, Robert Ohsfeldt and John Schneider factor out intentional and unintentional injuries from life-expectancy statistics and find that Americans who don’t die in car crashes or homicides outlive people in any other Western country.
And if we measure a health-care system by how well it serves its sick citizens, American medicine excels. Five-year cancer survival rates bear this out. For leukemia, the American survival rate is almost 50 percent; the European rate is just 35 percent. Esophageal carcinoma: 12 percent in the United States, 6 percent in Europe. The survival rate for prostate cancer is 81.2 percent here, yet 61.7 percent in France and down to 44.3 percent in England—a striking variation.
Also note that the United States actually has tax payer funded medical care, Medicare, for example. Medicare refuses more treatment than private insurers:
Slashdot Mirror
It's the ultimate Denial Of Service attack:
1) Co-locate stuff that the FBI doesn't like with the server that you want to DOS
2) Report your server to the FBI
3) Sit back and let the FBI do the rest.
Of course there is another interesting variation that's been seen in some related attacks.
1. Identify server used as LulzSec / Anonymous communications hub, tool distribution server.
2. Obtain warrant and confiscate server for forensic examination.
3. Identify users of server, peeling as many layers from onion as needed.
4. Issue arrest warrants for DDoS / network cracking activity.
5. ??
6. Prison!!
I was just going to say.... "so we actually have no idea about any of this, right?"
I'm sure most people are clueless. I suppose they could be doing it for the "lulz".... but that really isn't their style.
FTA -
Mod up.
Taking the entire cabinet is the sign of fools and novices.
Or someone concerned about the chain of custody for evidence.
Related herds, same bull.
Judge: "You are sentenced to 1337 years."
Lawyer for the defense: "But your honor, my client pleaded "w00t".
... wait... we're all still here! Which poor bastard did they take down?"
The first of many, I expect.
How can you prove who you are when you're anonymous? Well, I guess there's always a public key.
Use a public key, you dorks.
It won't work. How many times have we been told there are no members? That nobody can really speak for them? That any random group of people on a given day can take action without everyone else knowing or being involved?
What they think is a clever tactic for shielding them from individual guilt also makes it practically impossible to deny anything effectively, or believably.
Yes, do. I think the next one will be: We totally didn't do that (now that we see there really could be consequences brought by intelligence agencies that we told to F off).
Bin Laden lasted 10 years because his messenger drove about 90 miles before putting the battery in the cell phone to make a call so the signal wouldn't be traced back to him. Since I doubt most of them would get off the sofa to change the TV channel, I give any particular member of "LulzSec" and "Anonymous" somewhere between 10 hours and 10 months if the security services are truly interested*.
The onion peeling and "lulz" are just beginning.
*So, exactly which DDoS / hack came from where on which day? Which data was stolen from there? Hmmm?
After actual EMP bombs go off, the cities will be untouched, along with all the canned and packaged foods, but electronics not based on vacuum tubes (or specially shielded systems such as mil-spec) and electrical systems will be burnt out inside the rage of each bomb. The only stored information that will be accessible for trivial problems like repairing the electronics and electrical systems will be on "chunks of dead trees". It might be handy to have those chucks around.
Given who's running the government, I'm pretty sure it's about getting people who send movies and music to other people. I'm also pretty sure if somebody really tries to use the Internet to take down America, the government will miss that because it doesn't involve an mp3 file.
I'm reasonably certain that the Department of Defense don't give a hoot about mp3 files, unless they are a clever exploit to take control of a machine for remote exploitation. They do care about critical infrastructure being crippled. I'd don't think mp3s are involved in critical infrastructure, although they seem to play an important role in lurid fantasies.
If you think this story is anything like "Wikileaks", either forward or backwards, I don't think you understood it at all.
Is leaving critical infrastructure open to crippling attacks by cyberpunks just for "lulz" a good idea? I wouldn't think so.
Since practically all of the internet infrastructure is operated and maintained by various businesses, doesn't it make sense to involve them in security discussions and planning?
So, since Bush waged two wars without a declaration of war, nor repelling an invasion, therefore President Bush has committed at least two illegal acts?
No, he hasn't. President Bush obtained authorizations for use of military force from Congress for the war against Al Qaeda (War on Terror), and against Saddam's Iraq. Legally they are equivalent to declarations of war.
Intelligence Court Upholds Government's Warrantless Surveillance Intercept Power
It is good criminal practice, to stay on "annoyance level". If you exceed that, law enforcement comes after you. If you exceed that enough, the people that come after you actually know what they are doing, are well funded and very, very persistent. If these clowns really manage to break into or do several damage to the federal reserve, they will end up in federal prison for a few decades. May take months or years to get them, but they will get caught.
In fiscal year 2010, the FBI requested almost $50,000,000 in new resources for internet crimes. Any bets they get more than that in new resources this year?
Perhaps the US shouldn't be doing things that it has to keep so secret. That's just a consequence of empire-building. Preach one value to the masses, do something else in practice.
Is it the duty of the United States government to serve the interests of the United States, as opposed to say, Iran? Is it the duty of the United States government to care for and protect its people, as opposed to say, the people of Venezuela? If so, then it must differentiate between different sets of interests, American, and those of others.
If American citizens have been taken prisoner unlawfully by pirates, the United States government could try to negotiate with the pirates. If the pirates want $1,000,000, but the US is willing to pay $20,000,000, should the government go in and up front announce the maximum amount they are willing to pay instead of try to pay the least amount? Wouldn't that be a fundamentally stupid bargaining tactic? But to do that, they would need to keep secrets from the pirates. Well, not just pirates, they would need to keep it secret from the media, since there are many media outlets that would gladly publish it, and force the US to pay $20,000,000 instead of $1,000,000. So, do you think the US should keep the maximum bid a secret and serve American interests, or announce it and server pirate interests by undermining the government's own negotiating position?
Let's say negotiations with the pirates are going badly, they heard in media that the government is willing to pay $20,000,000 but they got greedy and now think they can get $50,000,000. The US Government isn't willing to pay that much, decides to use a commando raid to rescue the hostages while stalling in negotiations. Military actions are generally at least twice as effective over short periods of time when the attacking force attains surprise. Even if the pirates think it is possible, they don't really know if, when, how, who, or where they will come from. Should the US Government announce to the pirates that it has given up negotiations, and that it is going to use military force to free its citizens? If not, that would mean keeping a secret from the pirates - do you oppose that? Of course, it will also have to keep the rescue plan secret from the media as well or it will be published, the pirates will see it, and will be prepared to defeat it. Should the government tell the next of kin that it is going to try a military rescue? They might tell the media, or their kin being held by the pirates, and either the media or the prisoners might tell the pirates. So, it looks like we can't tell the pirates, the media, or the next of kin. What about other people in the United States? Same problem.
As part of the planning for the rescue mission, it appears that it would be really helpful to refuel some aircraft in a country near where the pirates are holding the American captives. This third country has a government that is friendly to the United States, but much of the population is hostile as they are being influenced by religious extremists from outside their country. The government of this third country agrees to the refueling operation at one of their island military bases, but demand that it be kept secret to avoid agitating their citizens. Since it helps the mission of recovering Americans help hostage, shouldn't the US make use of the island for refueling? What about the request to keep it secret? Should the US stir up problems in the country by making it known, despite the request of the government? If the use of the island is revealed, it could hurt diplomatic relations, and perhaps even generate civil unrest, getting people killed. Shouldn't this be kept a secret? From the pirates? From the media?
During the flight to the pirate locations, and on the ground, US forces will be using radios for command and control, and various flight operations. Should the US inform the pirates about the radio frequencies it uses? What about the media, who might listen in? Suppose a
It seems people like to consider "Anonymous" to be like "the cloud". The cloud is everywhere and nowhere, boxes and fuzzy lines on a chart. It is a mystery what goes there. "Anonymous" is everyone and no one, no leaders, no members. But at the end of the day, "the cloud" ultimately resolves into individual servers with an IP address, and "Anonymous" resolves into individual people with a computer and an IP address who did or didn't do something as part of the group on any given day. DDOS once, and you were in on that attack, forever, even if it is only once. Now that "Anonymous" is attacking government institutions on a regular basis, I think life will be much more exciting for them, especially since they seem to be showing poor taste in targets.
The interesting thing is, due to the nature of their collective, they can really only admit to attacks, but can't effectively deny them. I wonder how many purely criminal organizations or foreign intelligence agencies are having their members participate as cover?
BBC is the closest as it comes to doing that. Perhaps I'm giving them too much credit however.
Although it is a venerable institution, the BBC has struggled with bias over the years.
BBC had "massive bias to left:" director general
The Columbian drug cartels have been doing this sort of thing for years.
Terrorists and foreign intelligence services will also be doing this to use against the United States and its allies, not just journalists. Wikileaks has provided the raw material for data mining to find things the US doesn't even realize about itself, or its allies. There is no surprise that Bradley Manning has been charged with aiding the enemy.
The fallout continues, hopefully it won't be literally.
Al-Qaeda Already Using Wikileaks Material Against Us
Taliban Study WikiLeaks to Hunt Informants
Wikileaks: US will have to reshuffle diplomats following revelations
'They're informants... if they get killed, they deserve it': New book reveals shocking disregard of Julian Assange towards Afghans named in WikiLeaks cables
Since I can anticipate the follow ups:
No, Wikileaks didn't do an adequate job of scrubbing the documents of names at various points which is why they are useful to the Taliban and other groups building death lists.
Yes, I have seen reports of people being killed due to Wikileaks publishing their name, you just have to dig a lot to find them. For some reason it doesn't seem to be a popular news item. Go figure.
Oversight of US diplomacy, military, and intelligence activity is the role of the Congress elected by voters.
Even if nobody was killed, Wikileaks has resulted in a significant disruption to US diplomacy and antiterrorism efforts. (You pull out informants due to their cover being blown and you lose valuable intelligence.)
Poll finds that more Americans oppose WikiLeaks
What would happen if there were, just for arguments sake, dissident Americans........ Pause..
For the sake of argument? You don't think there are people engaged in dissent? Really? Well, there are dissenters of many flavors, from the fringe to more main stream.
And guess what? They have the same option as everybody else - they go into the voting booth and vote for the party of their choice, just like the rest of America. If they don't like the local laws, they can try to change them or move. (Massachusetts has state run health care, California is engaging in an interesting physics experiment - can financial implosions lead to the formation of a black hole, Texas is generating a disproportionate share of jobs, for a few possible destinations. Every state has its unique charms.)
In the meantime, they publish magazine articles, books and web sites, radio, as well as make use of other media.
If they engage in terrorism that kills people, they get hunted down like dogs, until they get friends.
Really, is this news to you? You probably should have paused earlier.
False. After his capture Revere told the British that the country was raised against them. Not one word about taking away the colonist's guns.
And while it is true that "you can't take their guns" is a reasonable inference from "they are ready and waiting for you", it is also a reasonable inference that "you can't take their trousers" or "you can't quarter soldiers in their homes", but for some reason you don't mention either of those, nor the dozens of other things you could reasonably infer from what Revere reported telling them, which was not "you can't take their guns" but "the country is raised against you."
If you've watched the movie Braveheart, you would know that the English had previous experience with opponents without trousers. The lack of trousers, while offense to the eye at times, does nothing to prevent infantry action and close combat. Weapons are the thing, specifically, guns. An armed and ready population is a very different thing than a lone family asleep in their beds as far as the prospects for retaining their arms - a very real concern.
Gun Control: A Historical Perspective, Part 1
Nobody had to say a word about taking the colonist's guns - it was British policy. How else do you think they were dealing with the rebellion?
Surely the reasonable inference isn't: the British will crush the rebellion and take away arms, everywhere but here?
You would take a retarded quitter over a right-center business friendly genius?
Even though President Obama did resign from the Senate before his term was up, I think calling him a retarded quitter is a bit harsh.
Anyway, the other fellow was for Palin, not President Obama.
He is not charged with Treason either. Why not? Could it be that the 'worst leaker in US military history' didnt leak anything all that important? Could it be that the state department over-classifies most of its material for political reasons?
No, it's because Treason is a crime specifically defined in the US Constitution. Manning's circumstances don't meet the Constitutional test for treason.
As far as I recall or know, only one person has been charged with treason since WW2.
$1 million for arrest of American al Qaeda charged with treason
But think about it, he is charged with aiding the enemy. That is treason by any common understanding of the word, and would constitutie treason in most countries, it just does not meet the US Constitutional meaning.
The State Department has been relocating diplomats and warning activists and sources around the world after Wikileaks outed them. This has been very disruptive.
WikiLeaks sparks worldwide diplomatic crisis
WikiLeaks cables prompt US to move diplomatic sources
Wikileaks: US will have to reshuffle diplomats following revelations
You might want to go back and look at some of those issues in your post using different sources, you're heading in the wrong direction in many cases.
Worrying that legal euthanasia may lead to trouble with insurance companies is only a problem in the very few, terribly uncivilized, western countries that do not have universal medical care paid for by taxes.
Yes, we keep hearing reports of how those government run plans turn out.
British healthcare in crisis despite massive investment
Cruel and neglectful' care of one million NHS patients exposed
Hospitals must make deep cuts to survive
For $41-billion, Canadians deserve a straight answer
The Ugly Truth About Canadian Health Care
Also note that the United States actually has tax payer funded medical care, Medicare, for example. Medicare refuses more treatment than private insurers: