Should wikileaks stop releasing documents? Should the US have the power to tell them to stop?

[Phil]

Cowards, all. Quit doing shit that you have to cover up, that won't survive under public scrutiny, and you won't have to worry about Mr. Assange or his organization.

[Lori]

*applaud*

[Michele]

remember "transparency" in government?

[Kevin]

i see more businesses are bailing on wikileaks. trying to distance themselves from them

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/wiki...

[Lori]

Hmmm, well if this is true then I've changed my mind and wikileaks crossed the line for me re: national security http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-ca...

[Ken]

Lori wrote: "Hmmm, well if this is true then I've changed my mind and wikileaks crossed the line for me re: national security http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-ca..."

Though I don’t see any significant threat to the nation by releasing this information, I likewise don’t see it as vital information whose revelation will enlighten Americans about any particular policy or initiative. For that reason there is no positive benefit to outweigh the negative potential that would tilt the balance in justification of its release.

While I continue to believe WikiLeaks has great potential value, when it simply increases the difficulty of diplomacy as the recent leaks did, or does a release with no discernible purpose as seems to be the case with this one, it appears to be a less than judicious use of its capability, a capability that should be reserved for more important matters.

It’s clear that Assange has real enemies, and all sorts of entities wishing him ill. But he should do his best to avoid allowing paranoia to get the best of him (though his paranoia is to some extent justified) by striking out with little apparent motivation but spite.

[Kevin]

VISA and mastercard have now also bailed and Assange has now been arrested. this is really unraveling. i know he has threatened to release the most revealing secrets yet if he is arrested so we'll see how this goes and also i know that there are more than 500 mirror sites set up by sympathizers around the world to thwart a site take down. to be honest, i am sort of glad it is being taken apart

[Jim]

I was reading an article on this yesterday, and one of the biggest problems seems to be that there are 800,000+ people who has access to, and can classify documents as Top Secret . There are so many things classified that have no bearing on National Security, and so many people have access that those that do really aren't all that secure. Basically the system is broken and needs to be fixed, and Wikileaks may have supplied the impetus to get this system more manageable.

[Phil]

Good. It's about time.

[Michele]

just heard on the news that wikileaks was warned by the US government that what wikileaks planned to do was against the law and then specified which law. so,they knew ahead of time they were breaking the law, chose to do so. Now they must face the consequences.

[Lori]

I'm of mixed feelings, in many ways I think wikileaks was doing us a service.

[Ken]

Michele wrote: "just heard on the news that wikileaks was warned by the US government that what wikileaks planned to do was against the law and then specified which law. so,they knew ahead of time they were breaki..."

The United States can certainly warn, and even cite the Espionage Act while doing so, but there’s still little basis for believing the Espionage Act can be applied to WkiLeaks for a host of reasons already discussed here.

Though the latest releases were in my opinion ill-advised, the legal maneuvering originating in Sweden, which has nothing overtly to do with the WikiLeak releases at all, strikes me as a fairly odoriferous set-up behind the scenes, and for that reasons is terribly chilling.

[Ken]

Bail was denied on the grounds there was a risk Assange would fail to surrender, which strikes me as conspicuously odd given that Assange presented himself voluntarily to British authorities. Though the details of the charges and the charges themselves are murky, from what Swedish authorities have described, having sex without a condom is the basis for a molestation charge. Whether that justifies taking the unprecedented step of seeking and subsequently obtaining an Interpol warrant (normally reserved for genocidal heads of states or government functionaries) and subsequently for denying bail is highly debatable, and together evokes all sorts of authoritarian creepiness to me.

Many, myself included, would gladly prosecute Assange in the court of public opinion for any unhelpful, or pointlessly damaging releases he made, and hence his reputation and his credibility would suffer when WikiLeaks was ill-advisedly used. But this eerie, heavy-handed retribution strikes me as far more troubling than the ramifications of any leak to date.

[Kevin]

this would have made a great spy movie if it were not real

[Ken]

It’ll be a movie, and probably several. For now I’ve got Peter Sarsgaard penciled in to portray Assange.

[Lori]

Ha! I was just thinking the same thing!

[Kevin]

i want peter sellers as assange. that way it won't seem so spooky with real danger and secrets and all

[Lori]

It'll be very spooky since he's dead!

Wait. Isn't he?

[Kevin]

well, i guess that's that then

[janine]

is it too late to introduce him to a zombie virus?

[Kevin]

i guess we can get a cryo walt disney head to be in it too then

[Michele]

I have a hard time imagining Sweden as a repressive,oppressive government. I'd like to know more about what the "rape" charges involve on an official basis...from a member of the Swedish government or head of their police.

[Lori]

Sweden is extremely liberal about sex (except they don't have any common law marriage) but this has to do with consensual sex. Supposedly the agreement was that he would wear a condom, but either it broke or he didn't, so she asked him to stop and he didn't. This is an interesting take on assault vs. rape http://jezebel.com/5708456/some-thoug...

[Lobstergirl, el principe]

Reuters says that there are three levels of rape in Swedish law, and the one Assange is being accused of is the 3rd one (least severe). They say "Conviction carries a maximum four year jail sentence and a minimum of less than two years, depending upon the circumstances." Jezebel says the punishment is a $700 fine. (Which is it??) One report says Assange had sex with two women who were starstruck by his celebrity and sought him out. With the second woman, he had sex once with a condom, and the second time without, and she now wants him to be tested for HIV. With one of the women, according to Jezebel, the condom broke mid-sex and she wanted him to stop but he allegedly didn't.

[Michele]

I taught my son that no means no. it does not mean maybe and it does not matter when the woman says no. he should just stop because if he does not it is wrong. If she is playing a game with him then by respecting her no he refuses to play her game. No means no even after penetration.

[Lori]

Huh, Operation Paybacks is getting pay back. Govt is shutting them down. I like this last sentence of the article:

The attempted punishment is also likely to produce a nasty PR backlash. Hacking Wikileaks' enemies might be cathartic, but it also reinforces the notion that there's something illicit about Wikileaks — and about the practice of publishing information the government would prefer, usually for its own selfish reasons, to keep secret.

Noose closes around pro-wikileaks vigilante. http://gawker.com/5709789/noose-close...

Fascinating, just fascinating.

[Michele]

anarchy in action.

[Lobstergirl, el principe]

Former Bush administration official Jack Goldsmith (Office of Legal Counsel) today said he agrees "with those who think Assange is being unduly vilified" and, further, is unable to see how WikiLeaks' conduct can be distinguished from either that of The New York Times (both in this leak and past ones), as well as "Bob Woodward, [who], with the obvious assistance of many top Obama administration officials, disclosed many details about top secret programs, code names, documents, meetings, and the like." He adds, with great understatement: "the U.S. government reaction to WikiLeaks is more than a little awkward for the State Department’s Internet Freedom initiative."

(via Glenn Greenwald, Salon)