I haven't seen the Valerie Plame litmus test applied to this case.

If you were outraged at Plame being outed as a CIA agent, shouldn't you be outraged at Wikileaks?

Likewise - if you thought the Plame outing was no big deal, shouldn't this be no big deal as well?

Havent read the documents myself but were individual spies, aides, consulate members, or any non politically appointed boot lickers named?

From the headlines, there isn't much real news in there. I mean, Saudis fund terrorists. Did anyone miss that one? The government meddled with climate science. Did anyone think not, while stocking up on incandescent bulbs?

This is much ado about nothing. The scandal is the ineptitude of the military in allowing such widespread access to this stuff. State ends up with some egg on its face, and the caravan moves on.

I'm still in favor of Assange drinking a thorium coctail, or stopping a bullet, just on general principles.

Assange is just a run of the mill anti-American fuckwad. He's convinced himself that all the lies the left tells about an "Imperial America" are true, and he's going to bring the empire down.

Call him Don Quixote, ignore him, and laugh when he falls off his horse. He's not worth killing.

@Kevin - Plame was outed by her husband much earlier than by Armitage. And her husband did it because the CIA didn't take his James Bond fantasy seriously.

> he's ended the era of innocent optimism
> about the Web.

Too pompous by an order of magnitude.

> The irony is that WikiLeaks' use
> of technology to post confidential U.S.
> government documents will certainly
> result in a less free flow
> of information.

There's an infantile attraction to false irony at work here. (Remember Obi-wan Kenobi's inexplicable, stupid suicide? It's like that.) It's madness. It suggests that we can never demand simple integrity from our public servants, that we must always psych them out through uncounted iterations of murky motive and forgivable selfishness.

I don't see why. If everything we might do to discipline or even assess the performance of these servants merely encourages misconduct, then how can we move forward?

Fuckit. Fire them all.

If all it takes is one Julian Assange to disrupt the shatter these enterprises, they weren't worth defending anyway.

I can't believe that Amy (and others, e.g. the WSJ) are being so goofy and technocratic about this.

Let me be clear about this:

I too want to "hobble" the United States government.

You should as well.

Likewise - if you thought the Plame outing was no big deal, shouldn't this be no big deal as well?

Umm, anyone who drives up to the employee gate at Langely isn't exactly a "secret" agent.

It's odd that if somebody tries to download a pirate version of a CD, the internet police are all over that person and will be sued, yet Hill and Barr just stand by. Maybe they also want it divulged?

It's odd that Assange never tried to hobble the North Korean or Pakistani government.

These leaks have done more to embarrass then to jeopardize America. If they've embarrassed our government and its officials - good.

I do think in the short term there may be some reluctance with information sharing but as Crid noted above, fire them all. That otta re-institute friendly cooperation.

I think Assage is a jerk, but what's done is done and I can't help but sit back and watch with amusement. Our world leaders are a bunch of petty, vindictive, adolescent, armatures. That to me is the most frightening thing of all.

I thought this piece by Jack Schafer on Wikileaks was a good one. Restoring our distrust of government institutions: href="http://www.slate.com/id/2276312/"

Assange seems to be a self-aggrandizing jerk with a serious anti-American and anti-authoritarian streak. That doesn't mean that these releases don't serve the useful purposes of encouraging a healthy skepticism of our and other governments.

> but some secrets are damaging to our interests

You can say THAT again.

I think Assange seems himself as some kind of righteous revolutionary... and like a lot of them, he is really and authoritarian meglomaniac. And I have noted as biff did, that he isn't trying to do this to anyone who might actively seek to end him, like China or NK or Myanmar. He is certainly much to comfortable to be a real revolutionary or someone fighting for freedom fo some people.

In the end, he should watch out. Some of the people he has embarassed would have no compunction about testing his weapons' stopping power. And it isn't us, it doesn't have to be.

> I think Assange seems himself as some
> kind of righteous revolutionary...

And we care about this man's interior life because... ??

I don't understand why people want to make this about Assange. He's an ass? Well, OK.

Sulzbergers tend to be fuckwits. Hearst was a shitheel. The Binghams and the Grahams and every publishing family you could name has had serious problems.

What exactly is the point?

"And we care about this man's interior life because... ??"
In terms of understanding what he will do, and why. Also to explain to people what that means. From this guy you have to take away the romanticism of the Just Whistleblower... because a lot of people see him in such a way. Including the dupes that feed him this stuff. As far as clearing them out, you don't fire them, you prosecute them. Firing is letting them off too easy.

Naw, we need to encourage this sort of thing. Whatever "romance" you find here is very much in your own eye....

Assmange claims to be anti-war, yet with his release of commentary from multiple Arab nations, he's made another mid-east war with Iran a near certainty.

his particular method of information release (dump it all and fuck the consequences) has already led to thousands of deaths - by his own admission. Sometimes secrets are kept until a safe way to divulge the truth can be found.

Eventually, someone's going to die as a result of his document dumps, and their family will hunt him down and end him. Whether this is what he wants or not is irrelevant. At some point, he'll gore the wrong ox, and that's all for him.

He is, more than anything, a preening narcissist.

Well, Meeeeeee-YOWWWW!

He's always spoken highly of YOUR work....

Naw, we need to encourage this sort of thing. Whatever "romance" you find here is very much in your own eye...
You mean like releasing your digitized health data and airport scanner images stored on gov. computers?

"You mean like releasing your digitized health data and airport scanner images stored on gov. computers?"

How is this comparable? Personal information of private citizens vs. diplomats and leaders entrusted (and hired by the populous) with negotiating and managing foreign policies and wars on our behalf?

Surely, you are joking. I don't know how a polyp up my neighbors ass holds the same standard of privacy as Hillary checking up on the emotional well being of crazy pants down in Argentina. It's silly, petty, shit being released. If these elected officials look like complete morons...so be it. They were hired to do better than this and we have a vested interest in knowing about it.

Surely, you are joking.
I'm not joking, and don't call me shirley. Say julian gets mad at you for something, or wants to get back at the government. The TSA is a gov. agency. You think he would be so moral as to care about you, or your records if they were in a database? Surely, you trust too much.

> You mean like releasing your digitized
> health data and airport scanner images
> stored on gov. computers?

Why not? Is government SUPPOSED to have that information? Did I authorize them to have my health records, or a photographic rendering of my thundering, masculine build?

Seriously, this is news to me, that they have that stuff. Like, wow. Whole lotta shit goes down while you're busy earning a living, y'know? CAN'T TURN YOUR BACK ON THOSE MOTHERS FOR EVEN A MOMENT.

Crid, is it your position that anything that can be discovered, by whatever means, should be revealed to the world? And for once, skip the snark and just tell us what you think. I'm having a hard time wading through your prose on this.

Keep in mind that this leak wasn't the result of some sophisticated hacking program. It was accessed and compiled by Pfc Manning, using his legitimate authorizations. Basically the whole diplomatic security apparatus was compromised by a single untrained 23 year old private who had some grudge against the army due to his sexual orientation.

So Wikileaks leaking isn't necessarily going to cause a break down in internal communication within the US government. All they have to do is introduce a few basic safeguards. The truly embarrassing aspect of this whole episode is how vulnerable this information was. State is apparently notorious for being too nonchalant about intelligence, and now their laziness has bitten them.

I think that the best strategy w/ Assange is probably to give him enough rope to hang himself.

i'm with Crid.

> I'm having a hard time wading
> through your prose

Reread. Amy will let you leave her blog up on your screen as long as you want.

> is it your position that anything
> that can be discovered, by whatever
> means, should be revealed

Seriously, reread. Did I ever say that?

I think when you're working for American taxpayers, keeping secrets for your the benefit of your own careerist, vainglorious impulses cannot be excused, and a price should be paid. Geez, I just don't want to say it all again. Speak up about what confuses you, OK?

"Say julian gets mad at you for something, or wants to get back at the government. The TSA is a gov. agency. You think he would be so moral as to care about you, or your records if they were in a database?"

Ever heard about HIPAA? A TSA agent should never be able to access that information due to the fact that most health care companies and business insurers are held to a hire standard for security (encryption, etc) then the government. But the government is a covered entity under this ACT. It's unlikely that a simple TSA agent would have access to this information.

Our health care records are under better protection then what is being leaked by Assange . Pretty pathetic, all things considered.

Anyone else still think the Government the solution to our problems?

What I love about this whole thing is that Julian Assange frosts his hair. He's like the maniacal villain from the Ice Capades.

And the guy who leaked the information was upset that his drag queen boyfriend dumped him so he complained to a guy named La-Mo, who then ratted him out.

They're like a bunch of characters in a Mike Myers film.

Ever heard about HIPAA? A TSA agent should never be able to access that information due to the fact that most health care companies and business insurers are held to a hire standard for security (encryption, etc) then the government. But the government is a covered entity under this ACT. It's unlikely that a simple TSA agent would have access to this information.

Sure, Feebie. Ever wonder how all these "secret" documents got out? You think it was just one private they are blaming?

> He's like the maniacal villain from
> the Ice Capades.

I am so going to steal that line.