"The job of the media is not to protect power from embarrassment"
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"The job of the media is not to protect power from embarrassment"
With all the cluck-clucking on this side of the Atlantic, it's not shocking that the best, full-throated defense of the new Wikileaks release comes from the UK:
The job of the media is not to protect power from embarrassment. If American spies are breaking United Nations rules by seeking the DNA biometrics of the UN director general, he is entitled to hear of it. British voters should know what Afghan leaders thought of British troops. American (and British) taxpayers might question, too, how most of the billions of dollars going in aid to Afghanistan simply exits the country at Kabul airport.
The Guardian's Simon Jenkins adds:
Clearly, it is for governments, not journalists, to protect public secrets. Were there some overriding national jeopardy in revealing them, greater restraint might be in order. There is no such overriding jeopardy, except from the policies themselves as revealed. Where it is doing the right thing, a great power should be robust against embarrassment.
Seriously. To those who say there was no good reason to publish this information, I would argue there was no compelling reason not to. The elites and the powerful have been lying to the American people and to the world about too many things for too long, and we've all seen how they've screwed things up -- so the more light we shiine on their activities the better, right?. Unless you think that Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, and Co. are doing such a whiz-bang job that we uninformed and unimportant peons should just blindly let them take care of our business. If that's your opinion, then, yeah, I could see why you'd be troubled by the Wikileaks release. And also if that's your opinion, I'd love to hear from you.
Comments (48)
Unfortunately, Will, people live by the ignorance is bliss philosophy in this country. Just like they elect politicians who insist that America is the greatest country ever just because people believe it instead of electing the politicians who want to make this country better. Global-warming deniers fall into this category as well, along with the Texas school board fiasco. Loud words have trumped action in our political landscape and the middle-class and lower-classes are paying the price.— HandNik
Interesting that you brought up global warming. Why is it that the New York Times argues for releasing the wikileaks information about which diplomats think which countries' leaders are jagoffs, but the NYT also argued against releasing the "ClimateGate" transcripts which were in their possession. Why the double standard?— Mr. Smith- First things first. How exactly did Wikileaks come into possession of this latest information? It seems that coming across this information is not as difficult as it should be.
In the rush to merge the information held by the various intelligence agencies to form the Department of Homeland Security after 9/11, millions of diplomatic and military personnel were given access to the U.S. government intranet that houses all of this type of secret information.
An increasing number of US embassies were plugged into Siprnet in the last decade, so that military and diplomatic information can be shared. In 2002, 125 embassies were on Siprnet; by 2005, there were 180.
...a diplomatic dispatch marked Sipdis is automatically downloaded on to its embassy's classified website. From there it can be accessed not only by anyone in the state department, but also by anyone in the US military who has a computer connected to Siprnet. Millions of US soldiers and officials have "secret" security clearance.— Bush Destroyed America 
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The Obama administration will soon be taking control of this domain.— jmc- An amzingly brilliant question asked by Mr. Smith. Why?— phillyjeffsr
Mr. Smith-the answer is selective outrage. Remember that these people,including our intrepid blogger,believe the USA is the root of global evil. Anything that can be done to support that theory is fair game. Nevermind that security sources will be exposed and possibly killed for being so.In the libs world, equality of outcome is paramount. If the US can become more equal to other countries by bringing us down, so be it. They see it as unfair that we lead the world. Damn the consequences, our sources put at risk, especially if republicans can be embarrassed. This action by this soldier is treason.— georgel- Comment removed.
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I agree. Maybe we can finally find those WMD's that I'm hearing so much about...or find those guy's we are fighting over there so we don't have to fight them over here stuff!!- Well you have some explaining to do then Little Willy! Since when have you done anything that was critical or embarrassing to a single Democrat? Specter doesn't count. You have been nothing but a sycophant supporting the left's policies. And this is a disaster. How is any leader supposed to make judgements unless he understands what is really going on in various countries. This is nothing more than a hardcore leftist's attempt to cripple the US. And the Obama administration by its silence demonstrates it wants us to look bad.— Dutch-wayne
- fortunateson: This is what I was referring to-"Federal authorities have shut down more than 70 websites in one the broadest actions yet against companies the government suspects of selling counterfeit or pirated products... some domain names had been seized without giving their owners a chance to make a case that their operations are legitimate.".— jmc
- If PFC Manning is not tried and executed for treason, why have the penalty. Did he do it because he thought he was being patriotic? Is he an idiot? Or does he just hate this country. What is the difference between flying planes into buildings and releasing info like this in the name of doing "What I belive is the right thing to do".— abnrgr
- While we are at it...I'm still skeptical of that whole magic bullet theory...watergate...iran contra and the real reason why we engaged in Gulf War 1...and don't get me started on the Lusitania and Pearl Harbor!
- Will, while you preach for not protecting power from embarrasment, would you also advocate for the publication of all emails ever written or received on Daily News and Inquirer email servers? After all, these newspapers are "powerful" entities in the Delaware Valley that impact our society. Shouldn't there be transparency in how the news is shaped by the agenda of the "elite" editorial board and the "journalists" themselves? Where is your call for publication of all these internal communications? You wouldn't want to protect your elites from embarrassment would you?— Mr. Smith
Apparently Obama 'prefers to look to the east and doesnt care about Europe', Ok fair enough how about he gets some of his middle eastern allies to take over in Afganistan from the Brits.— PAEnglish- The job of the media is not to protect power from embarrassment...... Anybody else see the irony of Bunch posting that?.— PAEnglish
- PAEnglish...Do not look to Bunch for logic. He is an intellectual of such high magnitude that he thinks on a level that transends logic. We are not worthy.— abnrgr
- abnrgr... You mean he's a liberal therefore puffed up with his own self importance, and beleives anybody who dares disagree with him is doing so out of nothing more than ingnorance.— PAEnglish
- We're Americans, by definition, all that we do is right and just.— gee1971
- What a hoot. The same idiots who blather about putting our troops in danger don't seem to have a problem with the apparent beginnings of groundwork-laying for another war - this time to help our Saudi sugar daddies and our great "ally" Israel. Yeah, keep believing that the US soldiers who dies in Iraq actually died for something, which they did not. Maybe that helps you sleep better at nite as you "pray" for our soldiers. Maybe you ought to see that they die for something worthwhile. Thanks, Wiki, for doing the work our news media is too afraid, and too bought-off to do.— CiceroSpuriousDeodatus
- I would hope this PFC Manning is in the brig awaiting court marshall and execution for treason and it is beyond me why this founder of wikileaks has not been neutralized (taken out) as of yet.— phillysgone
I am troubled by these leaks because we have too many people in harms way around the world.— Les Ismore- PAEnglish...You are much more eloquent than I.— abnrgr
- @abnrgr, it is hard to fathom that someone with the rank of PFC could have had access to all of this info. Most if not all enlisted personal in the intelligence field with this rank have only a 'Secret' clearance. There have to be more people involved here.— junethe4th
- So, it is OK to release all info held by the gove because we have a right to know. Does this mean that the press no longer has the right to withold info such as source material? We do have a right to know.— abnrgr
- CiceroSpuriousDeodatus... "Thanks, Wiki, for doing the work our news media is too afraid, and too bought-off to do." N.Y.Times article last month regarding the founder of WikiLeaks... "But now, WikiLeaks has been met with new doubts. Amnesty International and Reporters Without Borders have joined the Pentagon in criticizing the organization for risking people’s lives by publishing war logs identifying Afghans working for the Americans or acting as informers." Once again CiceroSpuriousDeodatus, you show what a bitter, waste of a human being that you are!— Catch22
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- Junethe 4th. I am not aware of any rank restriction to clearance access. A PFC certainly isn't involved in the decision making process but he may have some clerical or technical expertiese that allows access. I believe the sharing of information by all divisions of the govt after 911 is partly to blame. I'd just like to know what happened to fire walls and need to know.— abnrgr
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- Billreilley...The problem with the background check is it is tracing your past and dosen't really have insight to someones thinking. This PFC turd probably had the required clearances and seemed like an upstanding citizen to the FBI when they interviewed his neighbors, teachers or employer. I had a SP4 that worked for me that had much more than a TS clearance that was the embodiment of a 60's hippie, thought Jane Fonda was a patriot and always smelled of pot. So much for a BI.— abnrgr
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- He'll be guest hosting for Olbermann by this time next year.— Mr. Smith
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- RDuke...Thats funny.— abnrgr
- Quick, when was the last time Will wrote anything critical of Obama, unless it was for not being liberal enough?— pj katauskas
- Mr. Smith, you make too much sense, as usual. And Les, couldn't agree more with your 1144.— pj katauskas
- @billreilly, I know about the FBI background investigations. A thorough investion takes months. There are levels to clearances. Access to this type of info would probably require a clearance above 'top secret' (and if were in the filed, you know about this). As I said I believe there are more people involved.— junethe4th
- First, Will -- the leak of these documents will endanger American and ally lives -- as Rep Peter King put it in on the Today show, hostile foreign governments will be going LINE BY LINE through these leaks looking for who had what information and what possible source it could have come from. That might lead to a spate of executions of people friendly to our cause in hostile countries (hello, Iran). Handnik, your phrase "global warming deniers" is ignorant. It's similar to saying that people who are pro-life are trying to control women's bodies -- you are being too obtuse to understand the nuances of the issues. There is a LARGE group of people who DO NOT BELIEVE that it has been scientifically proven that Man has the ability to make an enormous impact one way or another on the planet's overall warming and cooling trends. They also believe that it is ABSOLUTE NONSENSE to penalize American businesses and taxpayers to fund ridiculous programs on things that haven't been sufficiently proven. Global Warming has been labeled as the root cause of: California fires, earthquakes, hurricanes, blizzards, political unrest, ice ages, stink bugs, and Al Gore's inability to tell the truth among other things.— IggleFan68
- pj -- I'm am right there with you. Les, surprisingly we agree on your 11:44 post, and Mr. Smith asks some AWESOME questions... Ahahahahahaha!! BTW -- I seem to recall tons of outrage when Valerie Plame's name was leaked and reported through the media. Is it what Mr. Smith calls selective outrage? BTW, can you believe they are making a movie out of that? And shockingly the NYT's gave it a glowing review...— IggleFan68
- I'd say this classifies as embarrassing. An SEIU affiliate recently dropped health care coverage for children, citing Obamacare regs as being partially responsible for the cost increases. “In addition, new federal health-care reform legislation requires plans with dependent coverage to expand that coverage up to age 26,” Behroozi wrote in a letter to members Oct. 22. “Our limited resources are already stretched as far as possible, and meeting this new requirement would be financially impossible.” http://blogs.wsj.com/metropolis/2010/11/20/union-drops-health-coverage-for-workers-children/
— RG - So Wikileaks exposes leaders around the world to be thugs and criminals. It is time to turn off the American money gravy train and make more daisy cutters.
- I think we can all agree on more daisy cutters! That should unite us all.— Mr. Smith
So far I have not seen anything published in the Wikeleaks state-department stuff that I did not already know or suspect--"the president of Iran is crazy," what a surprise!
“So far I have not seen anything published in the Wikeleaks state-department stuff that I did not already know or suspect--"the president of Iran is crazy," what a surprise!” Exactly, Archimedes! The MSM seems to be in love with Julian Assange, eh? There have been many people who have come out with some very embarrassing things about western governments, yet they receive no coverage at all. Why Wikileaks? Let’s see, The Pentagon Papers, Watergate and Wikileaks. Did I miss one? I smell ghost, or whatever you call them.— Hamlet
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