US diplomatic cables released

[Alyeska]

Wikileaks isn't even a fucking American organization. They are not beholden by US law. You can punish the people to steal the information and leak it. But Wikileaks is like a news organization. Their hands are not dirty on receiving this information any more than the New York Times is for releasing information from an informant.

[weemadando]

It's interesting how American law works. It seems that in the UK and Australia, what wikileaks is doing isn't illegal as the onus and duty of care responsibilities lie with the party who is holding the classified material. Once it's out, then the distribution and dissemination is not an offence.

[Alyeska]

That of course isn't stopping ass clowns in either government from trying to make life miserable for Assange. And of course people in my government are downright dickish over the whole affair.

[Thanas]

So the US government is letting the corporations do the work for it by essentially killing the site through other means (that and the hacker attacks). Free speech? Foreign institution? We do not care, might makes right.

[Broomstick]

So, according to the article, the US is considering accessing diplomatic cables as criminal activities, so it's probably not covered by free speech. Would accessing them be illegal? I mean, trey are technically covered by diplomatic immunity, due to their being in the diplomatic bag, so would accessing them be illegal?

It's interesting how American law works. It seems that in the UK and Australia, what wikileaks is doing isn't illegal as the onus and duty of care responsibilities lie with the party who is holding the classified material. Once it's out, then the distribution and dissemination is not an offence.

The Pentagon Papers set a precedent back in 1971 that publishing classified information is not inherently illegal - it is illegal to steal such documents, illegal to hand such documents over to others, but not for those others to publish them. The Pentagon Papers weren't just confidential, they were genuinely "top secret". The US government's attempt to stop publication was thrown out by the Supreme Court.

In other words Weemadando - the US law is the same as UK and Australia in this regard. That is why the government is applying pressure to shut WikiLeaks down rather than a direct injunction, because a direct injunction would most likely be denied based on the Pentagon Papers precedent.

No, Nightstalker, this doesn't involve "diplomatic immunity".

So the US government is letting the corporations do the work for it by essentially killing the site through other means (that and the hacker attacks). Free speech? Foreign institution? We do not care, might makes right.

Of course, Thanas - the US government is required to respect free speech and free press. Private corporations, however, are NOT. It is entirely legal for private entities to refuse to publish such things even while it is entirely illegal for the government to officially censor such documents.

If WikiLeaks wants to stay on the internet it needs to find a non-US server and service that neither the US government can touch nor is part of a US corporation that can shut it down. Either that, or a US provider that isn't afraid to stand up to the US government's pressure... uh, good luck with that. I mean, there probably are people willing to try it, but succeeding is another matter.

[Thanas]

No, Broomstick, the DOS attacks have been ongoing against private sites, which is why they switched to commercial in the first place.

[Thanas]

BTW, these are the most sickening parts of the releases so far:

(1) the U.S. military formally adopted a policy of turning a blind eye to systematic, pervasive torture and other abuses by Iraqi forces;

(2) the State Department threatened Germany not to criminally investigate the CIA's kidnapping of one of its citizens who turned out to be completely innocent;

(3) the State Department under Bush and Obama applied continuous pressure on the Spanish Government to suppress investigations of the CIA's torture of its citizens and the 2003 killing of a Spanish photojournalist when the U.S. military fired on the Palestine Hotel in Baghdad (see The Philadelphia Inquirer's Will Bunch today about this: "The day Barack Obama Lied to me");

(4) the British Government privately promised to shield Bush officials from embarrassment as part of its Iraq War "investigation";

(5) there were at least 15,000 people killed in Iraq that were previously uncounted;

(6) "American leaders lied, knowingly, to the American public, to American troops, and to the world" about the Iraq war as it was prosecuted, a conclusion the Post's own former Baghdad Bureau Chief wrote was proven by the WikiLeaks documents;

(7) the U.S.'s own Ambassador concluded that the July, 2009 removal of the Honduran President was illegal -- a coup -- but the State Department did not want to conclude that and thus ignored it until it was too late to matter;

(8) U.S. and British officials colluded to allow the U.S. to keep cluster bombs on British soil even though Britain had signed the treaty banning such weapons, and,

(9) Hillary Clinton's State Department ordered diplomats to collect passwords, emails, and biometric data on U.N. and other foreign officials, almost certainly in violation of the Vienna Treaty of 1961.

Glenn Greenwald also has a worthy read on the moral relativism employed by wikileaks critics here on Liebermann, on Joe Klein here and general stuff here.

[Stark]

Those articles are pretty hilarious; the same people paranoid about black helicopters and UN mind-control rays from space are totally okay with state-sanctioned identity theft and blackmail. Revealing it is even treason!

[Broomstick]

No, Broomstick, the DOS attacks have been ongoing against private sites, which is why they switched to commercial in the first place.

Thanas, a company like Amazon or PayPal is not bound by the first amendment in the US, either. Only the government is. Only since 1925 has the free speech/free press guarantees been held to apply to government levels below Federal (see Gitlow vs. New York) If Amazon and Paypal aren't government owned they don't have to obey the First Amendment free speech and free press clauses, which was what I meant.

In addition, a commercial website can be wholly privately owned, whether it's commercial or not doesn't indicate it's ownership status. In either case, it doesn't matter. First amendment doesn't apply outside of government. Amazon is under absolutely no obligation to continue hosting a customer that is bad for their business, unless they signed a contract to do so. Even then, under some circumstances they still might be able to get out of it legally.

Perhaps there was some confusion over terms? If someone at WikiLeaks thought that because Amazon was a commercial site it was bound by the First Amendment they were sorely mistaken. Dropping WikiLeaks was perfectly legal. Whether dropping WikiLeaks was moral or ethical is a different question, but surely no one expects a business to continue to host a customer if by doing so they encounter so much opposition they essentially can no longer do business with anyone else? Again, it may not be moral or ethical, but it is a very pragmatic decision.

That's why I said that if WikiLeaks wants to stay on line they'll need to find a host outside the US, and one that can resist US government pressure.

[Thanas]

No, I said the DOS attacks were ongoing - so Wikileaks has been targeted right from the start by hackers, which means that we do not know if all attacks are made by corporations. Wikileaks switched to swiss sites, but these were attacked as well. Seems you and I are talking past each other.

[Drone]

If this site isn't a US based one run by US citizens, how exactly would it be protected under free speech anyways? As far as I know the constitution is for US citizens, not a guide on how to deal with foreign ones.

[Phantasee]

I thought the US Bill of Rights applied to everyone on US soil, not just citizens?

[Metahive]

As far as I know the constitution is for US citizens, not a guide on how to deal with foreign ones.

I have heard this reasoning several times now and I'm curious, wouldn't that mean that any tourist coming to the US would have no protection under the law and could be abused at will?

FYI, it's spelled out in the 14th amendment, any person within the jurisdiction of the US can't be denied equal protection under the law.

[Drone]

As far as I know the constitution is for US citizens, not a guide on how to deal with foreign ones.

I have heard this reasoning several times now and I'm curious, wouldn't that mean that any tourist coming to the US would have no protection under the law and could be abused at will?

FYI, it's spelled out in the 14th amendment, any person within the jurisdiction of the US can't be denied equal protection under the law.

Apologies, I meant on foreign soil. I thought by saying that if the servers aren't US based I was making that distinction already.

[Metahive]

That depends on what treaties the US has signed with the nation in question and in regards to such situations overall, but you best ask one of the legal experts here about that.
I was responding primarily to the "constitutional protection only for citizens" meme that is just wrong.

[Thanas]

Apologies, I meant on foreign soil. I thought by saying that if the servers aren't US based I was making that distinction already.

If the servers are not US-based the USA has no legal right to interfere except in the most strenous of circumstances.

[Drone]

Apologies, I meant on foreign soil. I thought by saying that if the servers aren't US based I was making that distinction already.

If the servers are not US-based the USA has no legal right to interfere except in the most strenous of circumstances.

True, but this is one of those things that every government does and no one says a word about. If it were the Russians, Chinese, Israelis, French, Germans etc... the general concensus would likely be something to the effect of "Who gives a fuck?"

[Stark]

You say that based on what?

[Drone]

You say that based on what?

Based on the fact that there's been threads to that effect when the Russians were accused of assassinating someone and when the Chinese were accused of hacking, and the general response to the worm in Iran's nuclear site.

[Stark]

The response to the attack on Iran is just a tiny bit coloured by the fact that the thread is full of US cheerleaders who would be hysterical with fear if the same thing happened to the US.

[Broomstick]

No, I said the DOS attacks were ongoing - so Wikileaks has been targeted right from the start by hackers, which means that we do not know if all attacks are made by corporations. Wikileaks switched to swiss sites, but these were attacked as well. Seems you and I are talking past each other.

Probably.

It wouldn't surprise me if it was a combination of government and non-government DoS hacks - he has pissed off a lot of people, after all.

[Thanas]

Apologies, I meant on foreign soil. I thought by saying that if the servers aren't US based I was making that distinction already.

If the servers are not US-based the USA has no legal right to interfere except in the most strenous of circumstances.

True, but this is one of those things that every government does and no one says a word about. If it were the Russians, Chinese, Israelis, French, Germans etc... the general concensus would likely be something to the effect of "Who gives a fuck?"

In US Media. Trust me, the global media has quite a different take, even on Stux.Net.

[Thanas]

Another article from the National Journal: Link.

[Coyote]

My only real beef with WikiLeaks is that they are totally an anti-US organization. I want to hear about what is going on in the high-up places of folks like Pakistan, Iran, the conflict escalation decisions in the DPRK, Russia, Burma... Syria's WMD plans would be nice, what about Turkey's latest rounds of political maneuvering?

I also wish they'd go after what I see are the REAL culprits-- banks and other finance institutions that are the movers and shakers of our current economic problems.

Like I've mentioned in other places, with all that's going on in the world today, the fact that Hillary Clinton might have been overheard calling the Vice-Premier of Dagestan a bozo is kinda lame as a "news" item.

But so far, WikiLeaks is coming across as just another "anti-America axe-grinding organization". Sure, they've exposed the torture and such in the past, which is fine. That deserved to be confronted. But now they're ignoring real problems to continue to focus, tunnel-like, on the US.

[Thanas]

My only real beef with WikiLeaks is that they are totally an anti-US organization. I want to hear about what is going on in the high-up places of folks like Pakistan, Iran, the conflict escalation decisions in the DPRK, Russia, Burma... Syria's WMD plans would be nice, what about Turkey's latest rounds of political maneuvering?

They published some stuff about that as well, but the majority of leaks they get seem to come from the USA and coalition forces. They had some pretty damaging german stuff up there for a while as well.

I also wish they'd go after what I see are the REAL culprits-- banks and other finance institutions that are the movers and shakers of our current economic problems.

They have announced plans to do that in a month or so, once they gathered the documents for release.

But so far, WikiLeaks is coming across as just another "anti-America axe-grinding organization". Sure, they've exposed the torture and such in the past, which is fine. That deserved to be confronted. But now they're ignoring real problems to continue to focus, tunnel-like, on the US.

I think we got to new stuff like the "look the other way on war crimes" order of the USA in Iraq as well as the pressure regarding torture suspects in Spain and Germany. This is far from over in that category and I do think these are real problems.