I don’t know much about anything specific to the case. I think targeted disclosures concerning particular issues can sometimes be justified. I think large scale disclosures of just every damn thing are probably irresponsible–but, I think, it’s becoming inevitable that these kinds of events are going to be par for the course and it may even be that we’re heading for an era in which it is impossible to keep secrets.
Which leads to another interesting question: Can a good political/international system stand in an environment where it’s impossible to keep secrets?
It is probably bad…although it might be very useful for some people to know these secrets.
And, yes, a working system could exist, even in a totally open society.
Supposing we still have the privacy of our thoughts, we can keep secrets by telling them to no one. So you’d still have a role for negotiators.
Supposing even our thoughts are no longer private, we’d still have a society and civilization. It would differ in a lot of ways, but it could still work. We’d just have no betrayals, no conspiracies, no frauds and hoaxes, no scams. There would be little role for deal-makers: both parties in a trade would know, up front, what they are willing to pay/receive for the goods in question. (I also suspect people would learn to be very, very callous. At first, everyone would feel everyone else’s pain. But we’d soon learn to ignore it.)
Private individuals and groups of private individuals have a right to privacy; the government does not. Unless keeping these diplomatic documents a secret makes the government a better slave to the people, there is no justification for keeping them a secret.
I wouldn’t go this far, outing CIA operatives is just bad all around. But I agree with this in principle. What your government is doing ‘should’ be known so you can decide if you approve and vote accordingly, and informed electorate is essential.
Governments need privacy, at very least in terms of military secrets. It would be very poor strategy to publish the location of all the SSBNs at all times.
But, moreover, since diplomacy is often a process of give-and-take, governments need to keep their “bottom line” secret. It would be very bad if we were to publish, openly, exactly what actions on the part of ISIS would drive us out of Iraq entirely, or exactly what actions on the part of Egypt would cause us to withdraw our ambassador.
I would agree that government needs privacy, some of the time. In May 1944, it would have been a bad idea to publicize the exact time and location of the Normany landings.
But once we accept the notion that the government can legally keep some things secret, there’s a temptation for government to keep more and more things secret, and do so for reasons that are less and less legitimate. After all, some government documents expose corruption. Some are embarrassing to the government as a whole. Some are embarrassing to individual politicians or powerful bureaucrats. Some make the government look wasteful and incompetent. So it’s no surprise that the number of secret documents has grown ridiculously large, while the government goes all out to prosecute whistle-blowers, even when they are supposedly protected by law.
We need to know the kinds of things the government keeps secret.
For example, if there are unmarked police cars, it’s sufficient to know that there are unmarked police cars; we wouldnt’ need to know exactly which cars they are (which would defeat the purpose). But it would be bad for there to be a secret policy of unmarked police cars.
Anyone who says the government should have no secrets would have to say that unmarked police cars shouldn’t be tolerated. Likewise, undercover police operations would be illegal. Have fun in your totally transparent state!
Even with my simple statement above, there’s a big gray area. For example, if we disclose all the ways that we look for terrorists, that really helps the terrorists. On the other hand, if the government has carte blanche when looking for terrorists, that’s a recipe for abuse. Finding the sane middle ground isn’t easy.
All that the leaks show is that, if someone strenuously disbelieves in the cause, secrets may get out. And in the modern era, they will get out widely.
If everyone is in line with the cause, who has access to the information, the information would still not get out.
But that’s only talking about modern nations. For other nations, it’s going to be easier to keep a secret when you are a bad person who is doing bad things, because you have the willingness to ruthlessly protect your secrets. And that person will want the secrets of modern nations, because he can use those secrets to help him plan horrible acts.
To be sure, we need checks and balances on the government, but let’s not toss the baby with the bathwater.
The law only protects whistle-blowers who work within the system. If you take all of the evidence to an Inspector-General or Auditor or your Supervisor’s Supervisor.
If you take it to the New York Times, the law won’t protect you. You’re doing it wrong.
(Another dumb thing Snowden, specifically, did, was to dump the whole volume of his evidence where it would be made public, rather than carefully selected subsets of the evidence. The tiniest fraction of what he exposed would have served the purpose, without being nearly as harmful.)
there is no justification for HAVING any CIA operatives. we need to stay out of other country’s biz. no country is ever going to attack any country that has nuke missile subs, and no military or spy outfit can do a damned thing about any truly dangerous splinter groups (obviously, 911 is proof). What the CIA HAS done is tee off several billion people at the US (quite justifiably teed off0.
Except when that mail contains war plans against the gentleman in question, he’s a damned fool if he doesn’t take such precautions.
The CIA is far from perfect…but we’re a damn sight better off with it than without it. Lacking the CIA, Soviet nuclear missiles would have been sited in Cuba without any possible U.S. response.
Oh sure, the increasing tensions are Assange’s fault. It couldn’t possibly have anything to do with the fact that Saudi Arabia has been bombing Yemen for the past three months, it has to be those damn whistleblowers.
People support leaks of foreign governments messages. They are much less understanding about leaks of their own governments secrets, unless those relate to domestic policy/ burning issues.
And this is why I think Obama is a traitor for the TPP, negotiating in secret. They say it’s so everyone will bring everything to the table. But if that’s not stuff their people would want them to bring to the table, it shouldn’t be brought. The whole thing should be open minus maybe actual state secrets. But, instead it’s closed doors.
I’m really hoping it will be used in the elections. Any Democrat can accuse a Republican of supporting Obama making secret pacts with the rulers of other countries and giving him more power.
Yeah, I don’t read Arabic. Any smoking guns? Privately expressed sympathy for the 9/11 terrorists? Memos about “Once we finally destroy Israel and kill all the Jews…”? The Saudi leaders calling Obama a kaffir? Respected western women referred to as whores?
From what I have seen, most of them seem to be straight forward message that any embassy would write… there are god knows how many Bills of Lading for purchases made for instance. I also read a thank you note to some London socialite for hosting some function or the other.