The fiasco of waiting for the anticipated forced nudification of the American government and military by one citizen against the best interests of the 300,000,000+ strong collective is just too much to bear.
What is the point of any ally sharing with the US when their input might as well be published in a newspaper.
What is the point of any citizen going undercover for their country if their country can’t guarantee their cover.
How can the US play any diplomatic role when there is simply no privacy in their negotiations.
This situation is simply unacceptable.
There must be some provision in the US Constitution that would allow for Assange’s arrest and prevention of the publication.
Given what’s apparently about to be revealed, you may as well ask what the point of being a US ally is full stop. Ally with the US and have them support a Kurdish insurgency in your back yard!
I can’t wait to find out what the US has been doing behind the UK’s back. The UK government is so worried about what’s to be revealed it’s attempted to “voluntarily” censor all reporting of the leak in the British press with Defence Advisory Notices. :rolleyes:
I just read through the NYT summary of the cables. Its…pretty boring stuff. Most of them are non-classified, and I don’t think I’ve seen anything that wasn’t reported, at least in general terms, prior to the leaks. I hardly think its worth throwing out the First Amendment over.
I’m going to need the OP to demonstrate why Julian Assange is under US jurisdiction, and how the OP intends to keep information off the entire global internet. Is OP going to hack the planet? When does the US invasion of Sweden start?
Quite frankly I’m upset by reports that it might give Obama a hard time, but the idea is sound, and if reports of leaks in the pipe from other countries such as Russia and China are true, this could be a very good thing over all.
The world could use a little light shined on what hides in the shadows.
For a second there I thought you were talking about Valerie Plame. But that kind of principled standing would be too much, eh?
On a second thought maybe this would show how, for example, British MI6 hired a Taliban poser. Oh, we had no idea they would do that in the puzzle of war justification :rolleyes:
The only thing worse than uninformed citizen is the one who refuses to be informed.
The US is in no position to do anything about Assange. Far from it. They wouldn’t dare touch him now.
I’m looking forward to reading the juicy bits at least though I’d be surprised if it showed me anything I didn’t already suspect.
Diplomats are spooks? unflattering assessments of foreign leaders? say it ain’t so!
a State Department official states in a classified cable that Netanyahu informed the United States of Iran’s nuclear advancement in November 2009, but that the prime minister’s estimate was likely unfounded and intended to pressure Washington into action against the Islamic Republic
Where’s the whistle-blowing? If it’s about exposing government corruption and abuses of power, I’m all for it. If we Americans demand complete transparency in non-classified matters, we should get it through legislation. This is just bullshit and achieves nothing. In fact, it’s worse. It will achieve lousing up work that needs to get done and smear some good people along the way.
If you are comfortable with one individual being able to affect US foreign policy against the wishes of elected and appointed government officials, then all the more power to the adversaries of the US government elected to represent the people of the United States.
Perhaps I was a bit naive to not have recognized the international scope of this crisis, and thus the powerlessness of the US government in this regard, but I don’t believe that the impotence of any nation to protect secrets serves the best interests of the international community as a whole.
It is not inconceivable that Julian Assange may have more negative impact on the world than Osama bin Laden.
One little fallout for example may mean the end of the latest Start treaty.
While I acknowledge that there are some things that need to be kept secret for the security of the nation, I would prefer that those things are such that anyone who views them is of the opinion, without a doubt, that it must be kept secret or the nation could be irreparably harmed. You know, like undercover agents. They’re leak-proof because everyone with clearance agrees that they shouldn’t be leaked.
Anything beyond that, I say bring it on. Obama ran on transparency of government; it’s time to nut up or shut up. Like someone said in the GD thread, don’t suck cocks if you don’t want to be called a cocksucker.
Mitch “Droopy” McConnell is the end of the latest START treaty. This guy has nothing to do with it. That, and the audacity of the electorate putting a negro in the White House.
-Joe
This is how I feel, too. If something that my country is doing or wants to do can’t stand up to the scrutiny of the people who are being asked (or forced, depending on your perspective) to pay for it, then it prolly shouldn’t be done.
I have no problem with punishing any employee who steals data from their employer*. Conversely, I have no problem with Assange publishing the contents as they have been described. I’m with Bosstone on the secrecy/transparency balance. I guess you can subtract me from the “300,000,000+” who think this isn’t in our best interests.
With obvious whistle-blowing exceptions, where the employer is breaking the law, etc.
No, but the fact that they felt the need to do that, and the fact that they could do that, shows that something is flawed.
Why did this employee, who presumably had a clean enough slate to be granted a high security clearance, feel the need to A, leak classified info, and B, leak it to Assange?
Was he paid? I don’t actually know if Wikileaks pays bounties on information. I’d be surprised if they did, though.
Did he believe this information needed to be made public? Maybe it’s not one guy’s decision to make, but again, if you want to keep bad behavior from getting out then the best method is to not engage in the bad behavior at all.
If he did believe the information needed to be made public, was there any way to address that within our own system? Was the only way he could make the information public to give it to someone outside the US system?
I want my government honest, dammit. I want my government to understand that in the Information Age, they either need to be really goddamn sure something deserves to be private, or else they need to understand that what they do may be made public and therefore act accordingly. You can’t cheat an honest man.