You just said you would protect unspecific information with your life, seems like a fair question to me. Ultimately, I would assume like 99% of classified information the military has is pretty unremarkable and of little use to anyone outside the military. The American government is obsessed with secrecy for its own sake, they basically classify everything because they can. That doesnt seem normal for a country that likes to talk about how free it is.
How many Americans, Europeans or other non-Africans have been tried at the Hague period? Maybe some Serbs from the 90s? The US government just crapped on the ICC to protect Israel. Lets not pretend there is some kind of system of international justice that deals with Americans and their allies lol. Even if you went through 'proper channels,' no American is getting in front of the Hague, period. International law is only for those bound to it by force, not those protected by it.
Ok? I mean most people who could be called whistleblowers commit a crime or break some kind of NDA which could land them in legal jeopardy in the process, I don't think there is much debate about that. Civil disobedience is disobedience.
Whistleblowing does not require any of that. In the military, they have the Inspector General, and whistleblowing goes on every single day without retribution. The civilian side of the government has similar. I think you are assuming many things about the government culture that are inaccurate. If someone feels that they will face retribution, they can get a lawyer or seek other support, but simply leaking information is not the proper way to handle these matters.
There probably are many matters that can be handled that way, but there are certainly plenty where thinking the military or civilian government will police itself properly is foolish and naive, particularly when it comes to information they dont want in front of the public.
Your perception, but is that the reality? There are plenty examples of high officials being punished and held accountable. It’s not 100%, but nothing is 100%. The Wikileaks fiasco didn’t produce any indictments, so what did it really accomplish other than spill secrets? You are assuming that simply releasing secrets will result in an action desired by the releaser. I have never looked at the released documents but from what I understand, there was a lot more released than things that an objective party would consider incriminating.
Wikileaks isn't a law enforcement mechanism, that is a weird standard to hold them to. How many indictments has the Washington Post produced? If they reveal crimes or wrongdoings that aren't prosecuted or punished, that is an indictment of the systems that fail to do so, not Wikileaks. Yes, Wikileaks simply published raw information, you can debate whether that approach is less journalistic or not compared to more careful reporting based on the same leaked sources. Once information is free, people can do whatever they want with it, not always good. Its a doubled edged sword, but freedom of information seems better than excessive secrecy to protect the powerful.
I don't see how you could think that is what I meant. Obviously, I was asking how many indictments did the information released by Wikileaks lead to. I wasn't asking how many indictments that Wikileaks, the establishment, issued. Let's not get silly.
My point still stands in either case. If Wikileaks reveals crimes that aren't prosecuted, that's an indictment of the people that wont prosecute. Besides, its not as if the only thing of public interest is illegal activities. Most of the worst and evil things happening are stuff that is perfectly legal (or not explicitly illegal)!
You are contradictory. One the one hand, you are a strict disciplinarian who believes crimes must be punished. On the other hand, you think commiting crimes in order to obtain information is excusable. Two things can be wrong at the same time. Assange is not automatically innocent if in due course of committing espionage, he exposed other crime or wrongdoing. I don't disagree with you that crimes should be punished. What we disagree with is the method that Wikileaks obtained and released the information. You are also glancing over a very significant issue, which is that the data-dump revealed and disclosed a lot of information that wasn't related to crimes, but did harm to the USA. You can't praise the whistleblowing, yet excuse the malicious activity.
I'm a strict disciplinarian? That's news to me! I only said if the state doesn't prosecute a crime revealed by a whistleblower, that's an indictment of their process, not Wikileaks. That states are typically more zealous in prosecuting the leakers of information than things revealed by that information, simply illustrates their priorities, in this case, maintaining secrecy and control of information over justice or doing the right thing.
See, that's the issue. You presented yourself as uncompromising with respect to crime going unindicted. When you do that, it opens you up to criticism if you are aren't equally applying your standard. To me, it's not about letting people getting away with crimes, it's making sure that procedures are followed and information is protected as best as reasonably possible. Illegally conspiring to collect and dump out a haul of classified information in the public domain is not the legal or correct way to go after specific crimes. In fact, I think had the whistleblowers followed correct protocols, they may have achieved the result you think should have happened. By turning it into a circus and committing crimes themselves, they de-legitimised their efforts. Their story became bigger than the story they were trying to make. Even Wikileaks themselves suspended Assange for his actions.
I'm not a law and order person, I don't demand that people be prosecuted for petty crimes or that things that harm no one be made illegal. But yeah, I would like to see corporations, governments and the powerful held accountable when they do crimes and/or violate international law, the kind of things that are typically the domain of whistleblowers to expose. I don't think that makes me a hypocrite at all. I've contended all along that the law essentially protects the powerful and subjugates the not so powerful, and that intentionally breaking the law by leaking information can turn the tables. In some cases, its probably the only way to hold the powerful accountable, because they shape the laws and institutions to protect themselves and their secrets. If they dont prosecute those crimes, then their legitimacy is thrown into question, which is in of itself a useful public service.
unfortunately, the only way you would agree that some stuff should be classified would be to reveal that classified information to you.
Assange should be awarded some kind of medal. He got Gatorrick22 and wgbgator to both support him and agree with one another. Other than that he should maybe develop brake trouble on a mountain road on a dark rainy night.
Journalists and the alphabet agencies do this all the time... nothing new. The problem is is was illegal activity, and the Dems don't like getting caught with their hand in the cookie jar.
