What, exactly, has wikileaks posted that Americans don't have a right to know? nt

[grahamhgreen]

[lunatica]

1. Nothing we don't have the right to know

[grahamhgreen]

13. My thoughts exactly. I doubt we'll get one good answer to this question,

which is really at the core of the debate, although I've yet to hear it be asked.

In a country ruled by the people it is critical that we have access to the information necessary to make informed decisions, particularly concerning these wars.

[H2O Man]

2. It's so secret

that we dare not say.

[Taverner]

3. Exactly

That's the succinct truth that I wish I had thought of

[truedelphi]

4. And then there is that long long list of victims

Of Wikileaks.

NOT!

[RandomThoughts]

5. If you know what they are doing.

You will realize they have no power, and only you thinking that was the spell over yourself.

Think about how you thought about a banker maybe 5 years ago. You probably thought they were competent, hard working, knowing how to get things done, and maybe even you thought them useful.

From that they had your protection, even if they hurt you or many people.


When you learn they first off aren't even doing it, but don't even know much, and their only real talent was to agree not to care if people get hurt, then you realize, maybe something should be done.


There only skill was being willing to keep a secret of them not really being in control even of themselves, since if you knew that, crap would hit the fan for them.



If people know what they been doing. You know the rest. From the lamp pole.

'dancing in the dark'


And that's why they can't tell you, because you been under their spell. And it is not just bankers.


Many can have better inspiration also, and have been getting the message out to billions that wont talk about it, or some that can't talk about it.





That is what they fear, and how people think they can't turn back from the dark path. Since once they start they can't see any way out. The truth of that is it is not how they would end, but after an end. Thats what they don't know.

And Bruce is fine, he is trying to let people know what is going on.

[grahamhgreen]

15. The sad fact of the matter is that many have been taken in by a concerted mefia

campaign to discredit Wikileaks, yet no one can answer this simple question.

Had we had wikileaks docs on banksters 10 years ago, we could have prevented the financial meltdown.

[Gregorian]

6. It's not like they revealed the identity of a covert CIA agent or anything.

Because if they had, Congress would hunt them down like they did with Rove and his friend Skippy. Or is it Scooter?

[Golden Raisin]

9. Bullseye!

[Foo Fighter]

10. Scooter was convicted on 4 of the 5 charges and was sentenced to 30 months

in prison. Dubya commuted the 30 month prison term, calling it "excessive" and thereby proving that the system works.

For them.

[noise]

7. The super patriots have contempt for the public

IMO that is the bottom line. They don't believe the public has a right to know about back room deals. The TSA scanners are a good example. The public has no right to question the use of these machines. Safety concerns? Too bad. Privacy concerns? You have no right to question the government! How dare you!

[TheMadMonk]

8. Good question. Though "What is it they have no right to know?" would be...

...a better way to phrase it.

The answer is very little.

However, "need to know" does count for something.


We had a similar but different kerfuffle over patient's medical records here in Australia a little while back. Theoretically and legally those records were the property of the patient. However, the physicians had a very good reason for wanting to keep the actual contents of those records secret. Not a particularly nice reason, but as far as they were concerned, a very, very good one. Over the years, the paper records accumulated a number of private notations placed there by nursing staff and doctors. And in the greater scheme of things matters would have been a lot better all around if certain "secrets" could have been kept.

PIA was the one that "broke the scandal".

Eventually some people through FOI and the courts got their hands on their original medical records, and after much fruitless perusal of the literature to discover the medical meaning of the acronym "PIA", someone thought to ask a retired nurse (or something like that). "PIA" turned out to mean Pain In Arse. Other such previously cryptic notations were discovered to be equally pithy evaluations of a patient's character or behaviour.

And in defence of the medicos, the notations served a useful purpose. It gave them warning of what to expect in repeat customers and (if they were smart) prompt modifiy THEIR behaviour as carers accordingly. Verbally we, all of us, issue similarly "succinct" warnings all the time. But since unvarnished opinions almost invarriably burn, we indulge in all sorts of polite social fictions and do our sniping behind each other's backs. The recorded word kind of tosses sand into the gears of society.

There was no pressing need for the patients to know of these "private opinions", the only true beneficiaries in the whole debacle were the lawyers.


All that said: There comes a time.

Nothing surprising, and there truly is nothing really surprising in these leaks, is not the same as nothing to see. Some of the leaked cables are documented confirmation of suspicions previously only supported by anecdote and third hand accounts. Earlier leaks of military material put the lie to the "official story".

And if you look at in a certain way the progression of these leaks makes a great deal of sense. Assange has offered the United States mulitple oportunities to modify its global behaviour with at least a modicum of grace. To acknowledge military errors, make restitution, and either get the fuck out, or seriously rethink strategies.

Unfortunately, allowing one all too simple stipulation. That if the goal is continuation of conflict, rather than its resolution, all the crap going on in the world that is "too stupid for words" suddenly becomes almost pure Machiavelli. And the sheer horiffic beauty of the whole fucking mess is that a situation like Abu Grahib can be engineered simply by not bringing the hammer down on "fuckups" BEFORE matters reached the level of "frat house behaviour".

How did Iraq go from pockets full of sweets to streets full of rubble in a matter of weeks? I'm certain, deliberately leaving amouries, national treasures and antiquities, nuclear reactors (and other sites), hospitals, utilities, in fact, pretty much every site of civic, national, military (WTF?) or ecconomic importance, entirely unguarded for a considerable period of time after the occupation of Bhagdad had absolutely nothing to do with it. No one could possibly have anticipated that insurgent forces would have taken the opportunity to arm themselves. That criminals would loot the nation of its treasures and history. That a looter would emerge for every exposed niche. That infrastructure wouldn't be destroyed by "freedom fighters".

Oh I said "pretty much every" didn't I? Funnily enough, the one little bit of Iraq that was very quickly secured and put under guard were the oil fields. Ostensibly to prevent a repeat of the firing of the oil fields that accompanied the Iraqi withdrawal from Kuwait.

Other documents strongly suggest that an intent existed to make this war pay, by getting that oil moving ASAP. Unfortunately for that idea, it turned out that Sadam had put very little effort into upgrading those fields. And I would have thought that anyone with half a brain would have anticipated this. Like why the fuck bother. The amount of oil he was allowed to legitmately produce under sanctions, ammounted to cracking a couple of valves. Even his black market sales were fuck all in the greater scheme of things.

[Mojeoux]

11. Kick and Rec nt.

[grahamhgreen]

12. Great post.

[treestar]

26. Is it really desirable to have one person like Julian able to

threaten countries like that? suppose it was a person who wanted things we found undesirable? Your image of him giving the US a chance to modify its behavior is a bit disturbing. Like he becomes world wide dictator in some way.

And it would be interesting if some of the leaks contain personal information like medical information, that some people who laud him as hero would scream bloody murder if the government leaked such information on them.

[grahamhgreen]

29. The US modifying it's behavior may be disturbing to you, but i find these leaks far more disturbing:

- The Obama administration worked with Republicans during his first few months in office to protect Bush administration officials facing a criminal investigation overseas for their involvement in establishing policies that some considered torture.

- Then-Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and his top commanders repeatedly, knowingly lied to the American public about rising sectarian violence in Iraq beginning in 2006

- U.S. authorities failed to investigate hundreds of reports of abuse, torture, rape and even murder by Iraqi police and soldiers whose conduct appears to be systematic and normally unpunished, according to the WikiLeaks Iraq documents dump.

- A U.S. Army helicopter allegedly gunned down two journalists in Baghdad in 2007.

- According to one tabulation, there have been 100,000 causalities, mostly civilian, in Iraq - greater than the numbers previously made public

- U.S. special-operations forces have targeted militants without trial in secret assassination missions, and many more Afghan civilians have been killed by accident than previously reported

[TheMadMonk]

35. Yes one person should be able to threaten a country like that.

Just to drop a few names: Jesus, Luther, Martin Luther King, Mahatma Ghandi.

If one person is good enough reason to go to war, then one person is good enough reason to pause and reevaluate.

Although perhaps I should have been clearer. Modify its clearly ILLEGAL behaviour. In an ideal world Kissinger, the Bush dynasty, Cheney, and a host of others would all become lifetime guests of the nation (or in several cases of the Globe). In a less perfect world I would settle for the simple excision of their legacy.


Apples and oranges. This is public knowledge kept hidden. The other would be private knowledge revealed. Huge difference.

It's a long established principle of law, that the concealment of a crime is a crime in and of itself AND that the piercing of that concealment is not in and of itself a crime. And although it is possible that bona fide crimes may be committed in the course of that piercing, the simple fact of such crimes does not ordinarily negate the value of evidence of other crimes revealed in the course of their execution. (Whooo convoluted or what?)

So for a concrete example: I "appropriate" a laptop computer I find in the course of my labours, cleaning up after commuters on an intercity rail service. I take it home and find a huge stash of kiddie porn. Suddenly I come over all responsible and decide to hand the computer into the cops. I'm still liable for the theft (unless I'm smart enough to drop it into a library return slot, perhaps set to bring up a suitably disturbing image when it is next turned on), but my crime has no bearing on any revelation of the unrelated crimes of the computer's owner.

Only law enforcement agencies, or those operating in a related capacity (because of their specific or assumed remit) are specifically proscribed from collecting evidence without due authority. And only evidence collected inappropriately by such agents (from the presidential protection detail all the way down to "Block Captains"), is subject to automatic exclusion.

In the middle lie you and I, individually injured and committing crimes to establish the provenance of the injury done us. Let's just hope we have a little Silkwood or Brokovich in us. Perhaps justified if we succeed. Doomed, if we fail.

[treestar]

41. Or Osama bin Laden

Or attention seekers like Julian.

Sorry it is pathetic the faith people have in this hacker/leaker.

Cynical as we may be about elected officials, at least we elected them. We didn't elect Julian for shit.

[lunatica]

14. Ignorance is bliss. Their bliss is from keeping us ignorant of the truth

[Bodhi BloodWave]

16. Thats easy, the classified and/or secret cables that does not involve crimes, corruption and such.

[grahamhgreen]

17. Could you site a particular incident?

[Bodhi BloodWave]

18. the vast majority of the already released cables.

the helicopter clip I consider valid for wiki to release since its a crime, the US pushing Spain on that trial thing I consider close enough to corruption to be valid, to name two releases i approve off.

The vast majority of the classified diplomatic cables I disapprove of being released since they don't deal with anything illegal and as such are not 'whistle-blowing' in my mind.

[grahamhgreen]

21. So, nothing specific. I would submit that we all have a right to know the content of

these cables, so that we can make an informed decision on these wars, which are opposed by the majority of Americans.

Although they do not necessarily involve whistle-blowing, they do show us a pattern and practice of deception.

Remember, it is they who are working for us, not the other way around. They do not have a right or obligation to lie, quite the contrary, they have the obligation to tell the truth. Failure to do so should result in their dismissal.

[Bodhi BloodWave]

24. the vast majority of the cables has nothing to do with the war tho

and transparency does not mean that you are entitled to know everything that everybody who works for the government knows.

And you are partly wrong, they have a obligation to do whats best for the country, and if that means saying one thing while being of the opinion of something else then that is just a part of what diplomacy is all about.

All governments needs to know about other diplomats and leaders in regards to behavior and mindset when it comes to making agreements and such, and if one of the diplomats have a number of negative traits then that would hurt relations between the two countries if said publically, the government still requires the info tho.

And the above info on the diplomat is of no relevance to the public overall

[stray cat]

19. Do you think wikileaks is anything more than an info dump - or is Assange censoring

Just like any wekileaks sites people can post anything they want whether true false or stupid and ignorant

[grahamhgreen]

20. Truthfully, had the government not overreacted, we would not know whether any of the info was

true or fabricated by hackers!

In retrospect, the best course of action may have been to deny it all. Their actions have proved their guilt.

But Wikilieaks has asserted that they have censored some of the documents, so I would assume that to be true since we have not had Wikileaks lie to us, as the government has; particularly in regards to these wars.

[Better Believe It]

30. Have you read any of the documents released by "wekileaks[sic] sites"?

I've only found one actual WikiLeaks sites.

Please post some links to other ones.

Thanks.

[rgbecker]

31. Try this:

http://mirror.wikileaks.info/

[Luminous Animal]

38. Mirror sites are merely images of the same site. Thus, one site.

[Karmadillo]

22. But hundreds of thousands have died because of Wikileaks.

Oh. Wait. That's because of the bipartisan death machine of the Empire. My bad. Let me try again: If Wikileaks isn't suppressed, the rapists win!

[DirkGently]

23. Wikileaks is exposing millions of Americans to the risk of death. Of blissful ignorance.

[treestar]

25. It's not a matter of a "right to know."

We allow ourselves not to know so that other countries don't find out. Really people learn the basics. Could we really do without that stuff? Should we have just let the KGB or whoever go through all of our files?

That's not information being kept from us, it's information we as a nation keep from others. Weird that it's so hard to understand.

[grahamhgreen]

28. You may allow yourself not to know, I choose to know. In a democracy,

we are the ones who need to police our own government. This is why we need access to this information. After all, it is OUR information.

Proof of these issues helps Americans make informed decisions:

- The Obama administration worked with Republicans during his first few months in office to protect Bush administration officials facing a criminal investigation overseas for their involvement in establishing policies that some considered torture.

- Then-Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and his top commanders repeatedly, knowingly lied to the American public about rising sectarian violence in Iraq beginning in 2006

- U.S. authorities failed to investigate hundreds of reports of abuse, torture, rape and even murder by Iraqi police and soldiers whose conduct appears to be systematic and normally unpunished, according to the WikiLeaks Iraq documents dump.

- A U.S. Army helicopter allegedly gunned down two journalists in Baghdad in 2007.

- According to one tabulation, there have been 100,000 causalities, mostly civilian, in Iraq - greater than the numbers previously made public

- U.S. special-operations forces have targeted militants without trial in secret assassination missions, and many more Afghan civilians have been killed by accident than previously reported




Meanwhile, rest assured if Wikileaks is releasing it, the real spy agencies of the world had the info prior to the leaks. Indeed, the chips in the intelligence computers made overseas may all have keyloggers built in for all we know.

One of the real issues here is that this proves that our intel security protocols are ineffective. The thought that the KGB would have to get it from Wikileaks is doubtful, in fact they may have been the ones who sent it in! It is highly unlikely that Wikileaks is telling any real intel outfits anything they did not know.

[treestar]

39. that is not the issue

It all comes down to some allegation that we can't have any classified documents as a nation. That's crazy.

We'd be exposed to every other country. Was it wrong to keep things secret so other countries don't know them? Why is that?

It has nothing to do with trying to keep things from us.

Are you saying we have no right to espionage, while other countries should have access to everything? If we all do, then so so all other countries?

I don't see why this is so hard to get.

[EFerrari]

33. You don't know who this should be kept from except, definitely us?

[treestar]

40. Spies from other countries

Duh.

You want the nuclear codes? Don't you have a right to that, too, then?

There's a common sense point here somewhere. It's not so much I don't want to know as that I can't do much with that information but evil people can.

[MattBaggins]

42. You really believe that don't you?

Propaganda: Lies that fool your friends but not your enemies.

All those scary folks you don't want finding out what our Government is doing, already know. Those secrets are meant to be kept from us. The foreign powers that be are fully aware of what's going on and being said behind their backs.

[PeaceNikki]

43. This ^

[kgnu_fan]

27. IF American public still want Democracy, we need to know what the government is doing in the dark

[Still a Democrat]

32. The names of Afghans who aided our war effort

The Taliban said they would search for those names and punish those that helped us. Amnesty International asked they be redacted.

Assange replied to the issue this way, "I'm very busy and have no time to deal with people who prefer to do nothing but cover their asses."

[bluestate10]

34. One can only hope the US got those people and their kin to safety. nt

[Luminous Animal]

37. Or while ushering them to safety they didn't get slaughtered by a U.S. drone. Ha!

[Luminous Animal]

36. Yes. He said that after asking AI for help. AI declined. Wikileaks also asked the U.S. govt for...

help. The U.S. govt. declined.

In the months since then, the U.S. govt. has admitted that there is no evidence that anyone was harmed due to the leaks.