For WikiLeaks and Julian Assange:<\/p>\n
\u2022When are you going to focus your relentless and often valuable energies on other governments, especially the ones that are even more noted for secrecy than the United States government, not to mention more repressive. Could you kindly find someone to liberate internal documents from, say, the Chinese government?<\/p>\n
\u2022You\u2019re more secretive than the people you target, by far. When will you be more open about your own workings. And are you ready for the day when someone leaks your own internal records, beyond the relatively tame exposing (which you did post, to your credit) of some donor information?<\/p>\n
\u2022What kind(s) of deals are you making with news organizations, anyway? CNN said it refused the latest documents because it wouldn\u2019t sign a confidentiality agreement. Then we learned that the Guardian shared the trove with the New York Times. Did the Guardian have a different agreement with you than the one CNN rejected?<\/p>\n
\u2022Some government is going to play you \u2014 and by extension the rest of us \u2014 for suckers, if this hasn\u2019t already happened, by arranging a strategic leak of disinformation. How are you preparing for that?<\/p>\n
For the U.S. government:<\/p>\n
\u2022Why did some 3 million people have access to much if not most of the diplomatic trove? That\u2019s hardly keeping things confidential.<\/p>\n
\u2022(Update) Do you really believe WikiLeaks is better at ferreting out information than the secret services of semi-hostile powers such as Russia, Iran and China? Do you suppose they\u2019ve long since had access to this stuff?<\/p>\n
\u2022Is stamping \u201cSecret\u201d on everything that moves helpful or detrimental to our national security?<\/p>\n
\u2022When it comes to invading other people\u2019s lives, with increasingly oppressive security and surveillance, your mantra is \u201cYou have nothing to fear if you have nothing to hide.\u201d Will you give that a little more thought in the future?
For journalists who get the documents directly from WikiLeaks:<\/p>\n
\u2022You are treating WikiLeaks as much as a partner as a source, no matter how much you might deny this. How comfortable are you in this bargain?<\/p>\n
\u2022Why does it take WikiLeaks to get the information you agree is so worthy of public exposure? Why aren\u2019t you doing your own jobs better in the first place?<\/p>\n
\u2022Why aren\u2019t you stressing, in your voluminous coverage, that these cables are not the final word on what has happened. They are often pure gossip. Do you have an obligation to provide more context for the material you\u2019re publishing and discussing?<\/p>\n
(Update) For Sarah Palin, who (or, perhaps, a staffer) tweeted today: \u201cInexplicable: I recently won in court to stop my book \u201cAmerica by Heart\u201d from being leaked,but US Govt can\u2019t stop Wikileaks\u2019 treasonous act?\u201d:<\/p>\n
\u2022Treason is an act against one\u2019s own country. Are you aware that WikiLeaks is not based in the United States, and that Assange is not a U.S. citizen?<\/p>\n
\u2022Are you saying you could have stopped Web and newspaper reports from other countries with U.S. court order? Can you find even one lawyer who agrees?<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
I\u2019m particularly struck by the questions to Assange.\u00a0 I\u2019m as much an enemy as any decent citizen should be to the closed door and increasingly authoritarian way in which our Ruling Classes lord it over us.\u00a0 That said, it\u2019s easy to be courageous in exposing the (relatively) free states.\u00a0 Julian Assange owes *everything* to the technological society with free exchange of information upon which he is focusing all his attacks.\u00a0 The real measure of the man\u2019s mettle will be when he uses his tech savvy to expose the vast caches of information in Russia, China, North Korea, and anywhere in the dozens of repressive regimes of the Islamosphere.<\/p>\n
Still, I\u2019m largely lovin\u2019 watching the roaches scurry from the light here in the free world.\u00a0 To paraphrase Uncle Billy, \u201cNot *every* heel is in Iran or North Korea.\u201d<\/p>\n