WikiLeaks about to hit the fan

But attorneys for the three argued that the release would violate their First Amendment rights.

The disclosure of hundreds of thousands of classified US documents through WikiLeaks has claimed its first scalp within the Obama administration with the reported resignation of PJ Crowley, the official spokesman at the state department.

CNN is reporting that Crowley is abruptly stepping down as the public face of US foreign policy because of his remarks to an MIT seminar last week about the treatment of the suspected source of the WikiLeaks documents, Bradley Manning, in a military jail.

Crowley said: "What is being done to Bradley Manning is ridiculous and counterproductive and stupid on the part of the department of defence."

The remarks forced Obama to address the issue of Manning's regime in the brig at Quantico marine base in Virginia for the first time. The president sought to defend the treatment, which includes Manning being held in solitary confinement in his cell for 23 hours a day and being stripped naked at night. More

Interesting.

I suspect the judge/government haven't thought this all the way through. This could bite the government on the butt. If nothing is private - then nothing is private - including government information exchange.

stupid is as stupid does

The Twitter Order does not seek to control or direct the content of petitioners’ speech or association. Rather, it is a routine compelled disclosure of non-content information which petitioners voluntarily provided to Twitter pursuant to Twitter’s Privacy Policy. Additionally, the Court’s §2703(d) analysis assured that the Twitter Order is reasonable in scope, and the government has a legitimate interest in the disclosures sought.

"Nothing is private" sounds more like the motto of Wikileaks.

The judge's conclusion is restricted to information sought in a government investigation. "Nothing is private" sounds more like the motto of Wikileaks.

The Twitter Order does not seek to control or direct the content of petitioners’ speech or association. Rather, it is a routine compelled disclosure of non-content information which petitioners voluntarily provided to Twitter pursuant to Twitter’s Privacy Policy. Additionally, the Court’s §2703(d) analysis assured that the Twitter Order is reasonable in scope, and the government has a legitimate interest in the disclosures sought.

AlterNet / By Medea Benjamin and Charles Davis

Bradley Manning Humiliated and Abused: Why Is Exposing a War Crime More Dangerous Than Committing One?
Bradley Manning leaked cables showing officials covering up U.S. tax dollars funding child rape in Afghanistan, illegal bombings in Yemen and more -- and he's the one in jail?
March 7, 2011 |


NOTE: On March 20 CODEPINK and others will be traveling to the Quantico Marine Base to rally in support of Bradley Manning. You can sign the CODEPINK petition here asking President Obama to pardon Bradley Manning.

Bradley Manning is accused of humiliating the political establishment by revealing the complicity of top U.S. officials in carrying out and covering up war crimes. In return for his act of conscience, the U.S. government is holding him in abusive solitary confinement, humiliating him and trying to keep him behind bars for life.

The lesson is clear, and soldiers take note: You're better off committing a war crime than exposing one.

An Army intelligence officer stationed in Kuwait, the 23-year-old Manning - outraged at what he saw - allegedly leaked tens of thousands of State Department cables to the whistle-blowing website WikiLeaks. These cables show U.S. officials covering up everything from U.S. tax dollars funding child rape in Afghanistan to illegal, unauthorized bombings in Yemen. Manning is also accused of leaking video evidence of U.S. pilots gunning down more than a dozen Iraqis in Baghdad, including two journalists for Reuters, and then killing a father of two who stopped to help them. The father's two young children were also severely wounded.

"Well, it's their fault for bringing kids into a battle," a not-terribly-remorseful U.S. pilot can be heard remarking in the July 2007 "Collateral Murder" video.

None of the soldiers who carried out that war crime have been punished, nor have any of the high-ranking officials who authorized it. Indeed, committing war crimes is more likely to get a solider a medal than a prison term. And authorizing them? Well, that'll get you a book deal and a six-digit speaking fee. Just ask George W. Bush. Or Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld or Condoleezza Rice. Or the inexplicably "respectable" Colin Powell.

In fact, the record indicates Manning would be far better off today - possibly on the lecture circuit rather than in solitary confinement - if he'd killed those men in Baghdad himself.

Hyperbole? Consider what happened to the U.S. soldiers who, over a period of hours - not minutes - went house to house in the Iraqi town of Haditha and executed 24 men, women and children in retaliation for a roadside bombing.

"I watched them shoot my grandfather, first in the chest and then in the head," said one of the two surviving eyewitnesses to the massacre, nine-year-old Eman Waleed. "Then they killed my granny." Almost five years later, not one of the men involved in the incident is behind bars. And despite an Army investigation revealing that statements made by the chain of command "suggest that Iraqi civilian lives are not as important as U.S. lives," with the murder of brown-skinned innocents considered "just the cost of doing business," none of their superiors are behind bars either.

Now consider the treatment of Bradley Manning. On March 1, the military charged Manning with 22 additional offenses - on top of the original charges of improperly leaking classified information, disobeying an order and general misconduct. One of the new charges, "aiding the enemy," is punishable by death. That means Manning faces the prospect of being executed or spending his life in prison for exposing the ugly truth about the U.S. empire.

Meanwhile, the Obama administration has decided to make Manning's pre-trial existence as torturous as possible, holding him in solitary confinement 23 hours a day since his arrest 10 months ago - treatment that the group Psychologists for Social Responsibility notes is, "at the very least, a form of cruel, unusual and inhumane treatment in violation of U.S. law."

wandeljw wrote:

The judge's conclusion is restricted to information sought in a government investigation. "Nothing is private" sounds more like the motto of Wikileaks.

what it is, is real life NOW

Judge Theresa Buchanan wrote:

The Twitter Order does not seek to control or direct the content of petitioners’ speech or association. Rather, it is a routine compelled disclosure of non-content information which petitioners voluntarily provided to Twitter pursuant to Twitter’s Privacy Policy. Additionally, the Court’s §2703(d) analysis assured that the Twitter Order is reasonable in scope, and the government has a legitimate interest in the disclosures sought.

and the public has a legitimate interest in what their governments are doing


tit for tat



This isn't going to stop here.



If any government employee/politician thinks things are going to go backward in terms of information sharing , they're truly burying their heads in the sand.

Obama is a criminal, and he belongs in a prison in Geneva for human rights violations.

Quote:

"Well, it's their fault for bringing kids into a battle," a not-terribly-remorseful U.S. pilot can be heard remarking...

Sorry, ehBeth, I didn't intend to stir you up.