Most significant attack on the freedom of the press since my case, Dan Ellsburg on Assange

[Beringia]

Link to tweet

[stopdiggin]

1. hope not

I think I would have to disagree. This case may have significance certainly .. but, I'm not sure if it represents the broadest attack on freedom of the press since Ellsberg. I keep remembering what Assange's actions really were .. and who partnered with him in those actions. Assange is accused (rightly or wrongly, as will be sorted out) as participating in (material aiding) hacks that penetrated and stoled information from both state and private parties. Does freedom of the press cover such actions? To go a step further does FOP cover ANY actions, or rationale, that results in the release of information? It's food for thought.

In my opinion .. what Assange has done here is substantively different than just publishing whistleblower information. And I think we ought to take a real look at the consequences of information piracy, and the right to privacy (at whatever level), before we start lauding this particular individual (and case) as a great freedom fighter.

[PSPS]

2. Sorry, no. A world of difference. Assange ain't no Bill Bradlee.

[moondust]

3. Maybe not, Dan.

2010
~
Moreover, although Ellsberg leaked with abandon, there were some lines that he declined to cross. Even today, he readily acknowledges that there are certain kinds of materials, "such as diplomatic negotiations, certain intelligence sources and methods, or various time-sensitive military-operational secrets, that warrant...strict secrecy." And the Times, for its part, made at least a limited effort to assure itself that the revelations in the Pentagon Papers would not (in themselves) jeopardize national security in any immediate way or put American or South Vietnamese lives directly at risk.
~
http://www.nationalaffairs.com/publications/detail/rethinking-the-pentagon-papers

I think Assange only had a layman's understanding of what he was releasing and he did so without any concern for "sources and methods" or the lives he might cost with his indiscriminate releases. I doubt he even knew or cared that there were lines that shouldn't be crossed.

Ellsberg, on the other hand, was a military analyst for the Rand Corporation so he knew about such things.

[Beringia]

4. Good points