The Wikileaks war continues.
“What our government is trying to do to WikiLeaks now is lawless in stunning ways.”–Dan Gilmore in a Salon.com column, “Defend Wikileaks or lose free speech.”
Gilmore continued:
Media organizations with even half a clue need to recognize what is at stake at this point. It’s more than immediate self-interest, namely their own ability to do their jobs. It’s about the much more important result if they can’t. If journalism can routinely be shut down the way the government wants to do this time, we’ll have thrown out free speech in this lawless frenzy.
“The first serious infowar is now engaged,” EFF co-founder John Perry Barlow tweeted on Friday. “The field of battle is WikiLeaks. You are the troops.” That’s the lede from a blog post by Audrey Watters (An/Archivista) looking at the lessons of the government’s efforts to shut down Wikileaks. She argues that the ideal of a free and open Internet is hampered by three key points of control which are vulnerable to political pressure. The post was reprinted by ReadWriteWeb.com, which has been following the Wikileaks developments.
“Live with the WikiLeakable world or shut down the net. It’s your choice.” John Naughton in The Guardian. Naughton writes: “The most obvious lesson is that it represents the first really sustained confrontation between the established order and the culture of the internet. There have been skirmishes before, but this is the real thing.”
Michael Brenner in the Huffington Post: WikiLeaks: The Three Faces of Uncle Sam.
And from Australia: Assange ‘not responsible for security breaches’ says Kevin Rudd.
Legal liability lies with US rather than WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange , says Australia’s foreign minister Kevin Rudd.
And from Gizmodo: “Wikileaks’ Julian Assange is arrested on suspicion of rape; today U.S. State Department drops this gem: “The United States is pleased to announce that it will host UNESCO’s World Press Freedom Day event in 2011 in Washington, D.C.” Oh my.”
Oh, my, indeed!
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No comments by 12 noon, amazing, as important as this is. It could be any one of us actually.
John Perry Barlow poet and lyricist he wrote “Throwing Stones” lyrics here:
http://www.dead.net/song/throwing-stones
Study and learn. He is an American hero, simple as that.
Like jonthebru, I’m surprised at the lack of comments singing Julian Assange’s praises. Time Magazine, Internet rumor has it, is considering him as its “Man of the Year.” He certainly deserves the distinction. Moreover, he would be a worthy successor to Liu Xiaoabo. Global peace, when it comes, will be preceded by greater understanding among nations of their shared and conflicting interests. Assange and the WikiLeaks team have given us a clearer idea of the world as it is. Mahalo plenty, Julian Assange!
I think this is a major battle line. Glenn Greenwald has been VERY GOOD on reducing this to its most basic outlines, particularly on Democracy Now:
http://www.democracynow.org/2010/12/3/is_wikileaks_julian_assange_a_hero
Essentially, Greenwald goes after those who want to focus on the risks created by the WikiLeaks. He agrees that Wikileaks was careless in not redacting some names in the earlier dumps. But they have learned in the course of doing this and have actually been very conservative with the release of the State Department cables. They have turned the raw documents over to the major news outlets, like the NYT. The Times and others have run whichever documents they planned on publishing by US intelligence services, asking the USG to point out any information which should be withheld because it would put someone at risk. Only after the documents have been vetted in this way, does Wikileaks release the documents on their own website.
Greenwald gets impatient with those who raise the prospect of theoretical harm as a result of the leaks. He says it is those who are trying to shut down Wikileaks that are committing widespread ACTAUL damage to human beings, including the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Iraqis and tens of thousands of Afghanis. In wars that cannot be “won” and which have been based on lies. If the US commercial media are not clamoring for the arrest and trial of government officials in both the Bush and Obama administrations, but what measure of proportionality are they calling for the arrest of Assange?
Whatever risks Wikileaks has unleashed for individuals (I am tempted to suggest this folks are “collateral damage” on a MUCH smaller scale), the world’s most powerful elites are angry at them and out to destroy Assange exactly because he has been effective at undermining support for these wars and EMBARRASSING the rulers of the World!
I can hear the strumming of the ballad, “Which Side are you On?” I know which side I am on.
BTW_ Because the Wikileak documents are available on the commercial media outlets, I would recommend people wanting to reduce risks to their own careers use those sites to peruse and download the documents.
Here is the Die Spiegel repository:
http://www.spiegel.de/international/topic/wikileaks_diplomatic_cables/
New stuff comes out every day. The revelations about US efforts to undermine the Copenhagen Climate summit are among the latest releases. Each day documents coming out proving the argument that in too many ways, Obama is just a continuation of the Bush administration.
Have at it!
Very scary times when we start talking about careers being threatened.
Suppose I read a cable and then I tell what I read to a friend and that friend tells it to another friend while we are all at a picnic in the park — if a government agent overheard this discussion, would they need to call in a bus to to pick us all up and haul us all off to a secret camp?
Should governments be allowed to have secrets? Should every word of communication be open to public scrutiny?
I cannot answer these questions simply. The world is not black and white. Nonetheless, the contents of the leaks suggest that perhaps we need to know more about what our government is up to.
Close down the CIA tomorrow? 9/11 would become a common event.
That being said, thank you for providing excellent links and starting an important discussion, Ian. When it comes to government secrecy, we need to know where the line needs to be drawn to fit the modern era. And we need to handle the fact that the line will need to be moved when new patterns and facts emerge.
There never will be an everlasting Bible that tells us how to handle government secrecy, but there can be a smart approach vs. a fatal, torturing approach.
all secrets have a half life and governments need to plan accordingly. the danger is when a government thinks that all secrets have to live forever or that everything is secret. Secrets don’t work that way and governments get into trouble trying to make them into something they can’t be.
The retaliatory reaction by the power hungry is more revealing than the actual document release. PayPal accepted the state dept’s misguided interpretation of law and pulled the plug on money exchanging hands thru paypal. So now they can follow through and make sure no money will be exchanged/paid to any journalist doing their job at a news organization such as Civil Beat, that would dare to inquire why more money and power is absolute. I will never know because I no donate $20 to find out.
Dean Little