Anyone who favors self-government should support the efforts by WikiLeaks to expose official lies. Their latest release of hundreds of thousands of State Department diplomatic cables will hopefully undermine the piety and pretentiousness of U.S. foreign policy for years.
The Obama administration is rolling out the same old “people will die!” hobgoblin in response to the latest disclosures. But as Nancy Yousef notes today in an article distributed by McClatchy newspapers, “Despite similar warnings before the previous two releases of classified U.S. intelligence reports by the website, U.S. officials concede that they have no evidence to date that the documents led to anyone’s death.”
WikiLeaks provides a great litmus test for American politics. The vast majority of congressmen who rush forward to denounce WikiLeaks’ disclosures have themselves done little or nothing to expose or challenge the official lies that have long permeated U.S. foreign and military policy.
It would be wrong to assume that WikiLeaks is disclosing the whole truth and nothing but the truth about U.S. government policy. The leaks routinely show facts and policies that profoundly contradict official pronouncements. But simply because a government document is classified as “top secret” doesn’t mean that it is not full of crap.
This riff by Arthur Silber deftly captures the higher philosophical issues involved in this latest WikiLeaks controversy.
It’s up and running:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/the-us-embassy-cables
An Ambassador called another Ambassador a poop head, lots of people will die, Iran is building nukes, Israel is grateful to America, but there’s nothing to see here folks. Just keep walking, please.
The Guardian is providing only the date, time, sender and tags for each cable with no body text. Massive redaction. You can text to some of the files here:
http://cablegate.wikileaks.org/
It is being reported that Wikileaks is experiencing denial of service attacks.
I can’t imagine anyone risking their freedom to leak the tripe that is being reported so far, so there’s probably at least some juicy stuff among these cables somewhere.
I’m assuming it will get juicier.
Anything that makes the US State Department squeal like a stuck pig has to be good.
What about the often-trotted-out line by the neocons and neolibs in regards to our gargantuan surveillance state, ‘if you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear’.
I will send $1000 to the first reporter to ask Madame Secretary that very question.
Dang! I wish I could get into her press conferences, then.
Except that folks with subversive tendencies are only allowed to reads the Leaks, not talk to the pooh-bahs.
“The Obama administration is rolling out the same old
Did you ever see the N Y Times analysis of the Beirut barracks debacle — I think it was published in December ’83? I recall reading that Sunday’s paper — I was fascinated by the horrendous errors and idiotic policy that preceded the demolition of that barracks.
And maybe not much has changed…
BOYCOTT AMAZON.COM FOR HANUKKAH. Don’t be a Likudnik just because you’re Jewish! Yesterday after a call from war-monger Senator Liebermann, Amazon canceled Wikileaks access to its servers. Amazon has joined our jailers in censorship. Don’t buy from Amazon, and let them know why. Here’s Amazon’s “Investor Relations” contact: ir@amazon.com.