Um, I Think It's Time for a Thread on WikiLeaks

kevin, answer the question: which information is off-limits?

off limits to whom? to belabor the point: v v little information is of limits to the US press, if any at all.

i meant, you are finding hawkish forces wanting to destroy assange, and dovish ppl saying, well know let's not be hasty.

if the objects of a dump were the institutions of the safety net i'd assume the parties would be reversed, all i'm saying. i'd assume anyone motivated to make such a dump TO wikileaks would have a right-wing agenda.

didn't realize this was about "what's legal"

give a shit

xp

off-limits ethically ffs

history mayne, it actually IS non controversial in the US, or at least was until all this. as to how my argument was specious, well, I dunno

what you haven't offered and appear unwilling to offer is a way to reconcile a free press with yr vague assertion that some stuff just shouldn't ever be made public ever (by said press). even a sketch would be handy, for real. because otherwise you're faced with the impossible task of imagining kinds of info that may not even exist yet. its a legislative nightmare.

didn't realize this was about "what's legal"

give a shit

xp

off-limits ethically ffs

― rip whiney g weingarten 03/11 never forget (history mayne), Tuesday, December 7, 2010 3:41 PM (7 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

are you fucking kidding me

of course we're talking legally, and have been. when did you move the goal posts

are

think i said earlier that what is going on is a redefinition of 'the public interest'; theoretically it's limitless, i guess

personally i don't think that releasing state dept memos about diplomacy with the baltic states vis a vis their policy towards russia is cleanly defensible on public interest grounds, unless you believe there's wrongdoing

wonder where the pro-WL crew draw the line is all

xp

why the fuck would i care about the legality of it you mook?

http://www.state.gov/r/pa/prs/ps/2010/12/152465.htm

had this debate today on my FB page, mostly with a former boss/retired journalist. he just basically believed that somebody should do something to curb wikileaks, and i had to keep asking him, who should do what, and how are you going to do it so that you don't also end up indicting the NYT, the BBC, whoever the hell else? he has some idea that WL should be held "liable" if their disclosures lead to anything bad happening to anyone anywhere, which needless to say would be a hugely dangerous precedent. but i was surprised that a guy who worked in newspapers for 40-some years was saying this. i've been less surprised by not at all heartened by the number of my mostly-liberal friends who have no idea what the pentagon papers case actually established as u.s. law on all this stuff. there are a lot of people who just assume that what WL is doing is illegal. which of course makes it that much easier for somebody like lieberman to actually try to make it illegal.

but not at all heartened, i mean...

ha, check the facebook page for that event linked at the bottom
xposts

oh a v for vendetta face guy commented, you don't say

lmao

HM--the reason the legality of it all is pretty important (over here, at least), is because Lieberman et al are trying to make it illegal. which, as tipsy points out, sets a dangerous precedent.

so you may not care about it, but as an American concerned about my civil rights, I do. and srsly dude, why is yr default "unpleasant and insulting"? nagl

freedom isn't free

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/dec/07/wikileaks-saudi-arab-invasion-lebanon

so you may not care about it, but as an American concerned about my civil rights, I do. and srsly dude, why is yr default "unpleasant and insulting"? nagl

gbx OTM (even tho I'm much less sympathetic to WL as an institution than he is) - dial it back hm.

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20101202184039AAFQSfV

fwiw, I'm still wary of WL as an institution that just indiscriminately publishes anything it gets; I'm not sure I'm that comfortable with the "lights on all the time" cryptomish philosophy that underpins it. otoh, I can't fathom a way to meaningfully distinguish it from journalism. I'm sorta left going "that's kinda how it is now" and have to hope that the assanges of the world are ethical actors, and that legally-bound gatekeepers don't go ham and start spilling everything they know all the time. I'm ambivalent about the former, and optimistic about the latter---the people we trust with sensitive information have always had the opportunity to violate that trust, and I'm not sure that the existence of wikileaks will do much to provoke a meaningful change in how seriously these gatekeepers take their positions.

I'm still wary of WL as an institution that just indiscriminately publishes anything it gets; I'm not sure I'm that comfortable with the "lights on all the time" cryptomish philosophy that underpins it.

Except none of this is the case. They've gone to the US gov't and a bunch of huge international media companies first, then when they put up the original documents they keep the redactions NYT, Guardian, etc. have made. The misinformation surrounding this is pretty thick. For instance, a lot of people think they've leaked all 250,000 docs.

Looks like 4chan is on the offensive for wikileaks

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2010/12/4chan-rushes-to-wikileaks-defense-forces-swiss-banking-site-offline.ars?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=rss

now i have no idea what side im on

lol jk fuck the feds :D

haha yeah well being pro free speech means being associated with some strange bedfellows. like I think Ron Paul called assange a hero you know?

Yeah but wasn't that for "Sex By Surprise"?

pretty fucked up that Twitter is blocking a Wikileaks hashtag.

IS ILXOR NEXT!?!?

He surrendered to police in London and was arrested. Bail was refused over fears that he might flee, and also due to some fear that he was at risk from "unstable persons."

http://bunchgrasser.files.wordpress.com/2008/11/sarah-palin.jpg

pretty fucked up that Twitter is blocking a Wikileaks hashtag.

wait what

pretty fucked up that Twitter is blocking a Wikileaks hashtag.

Wait - this is not good.

They're not - because Wikileaks is also @wikileaks it can't be a trending topic.

yeah they adressed that. "cablegate" was trending earlier.

lol, U.S. announces press freedom day:

http://gizmodo.com/5708380/

thru the looking glass

http://i.imgur.com/5kYP1.jpg

because Wikileaks is also @wikileaks it can't be a trending topic.

Ahh. I dont use Twitter so I dunno how that stuff works.

^O_O

xp

OK, guilty lols at that image.

OK LULZ

h/t dom (rip)

it's kevin i was mostly aiming my bile at; gbx had the sack to, you know, mount arguments so caught it, i guess

anyway, i just think beefing with assange over all of this is wildly and weirdly misplaced. sure he's a self-absorbed d-bag and possible rapist who no doubt loves the prospect of being an hero to millions of...whoever, but it doesn't change the fact that we are watching, in real-time, the lengths some of our elected officials will go to to excoriate and gag what basically counts, under law, as "journalism"

that he chose the wrong battle is starting to become irrelevant at this point---that there's a "battle" at all is what should really be of concern

― kanellos (gbx), Monday, 6 December 2010 23:13 (2 days ago)

agree with most of this...the rape stuff is probably contrived....read yr blogs if cynicism fails

these arguments about whether wl are doing 'journalism' and if so how successfully, seem completely obscure....perhaps cuz i have little regard for the woodward/bernstein mythos but who gives a shit...at least some of this recent stuff is a lot more than any news org have done by themselves lately

right now i think u have to set any misgivings about assange and wikileaks' tactics to one side and condemn the transparency circling of the wagons by powers-that-be

transparencyt

greenwald is so on top of this stuff, he's putting most the media to shame: http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2010/12/07/wikileaks/index.html

one key point is just the reminder that WikiLeaks worked with newspapers to select and redact the cables. the idea that they just indiscriminately dumped stuff is just not true. and it makes it seem even more ridiculous to go after them rather than after the media outlets that actually reported the stuff before WL even released it.

otm

New media has empowered citizens around the world to report on their circumstances, express opinions on world events, and exchange information in environments sometimes hostile to such exercises of individuals’ right to freedom of expression. At the same time, we are concerned about the determination of some governments to censor and silence individuals, and to restrict the free flow of information

Dunno how the BoPA flack managed to type that up w/o either cracking up lauging or crying his poor little eyes out.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doublethink

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superior_Orders

so they got some gontser macher lawyer bro gonna tear it up on assange's behalf at the extradition hearing

i don't see how it's gonna work tho

p sure rape is a crime

OH SNAP

not accused of rape, accused of "sex by surprise"

geoff robertson qc out of retirement for the big one

Just FYI, "sex by surprise" is not a legal term at all but Swedish slang for rape.

So "he's not accused of rape, he's accused of ::slang for rape::" is not really a convincing defense.