@JPB,
JPB wrote:There are supposed to be tensions between the media and the government. That's why we have a guaranteed free press!
You’re absolutely right.
It is rare that complex and important questions can be answered as easily as checking a table in The Book of Solutions, and finding the precisely appropriate cell to use.
What is interesting, at least to me, in terms of this topic is that while I've seen (both in this forum and out in the real world) the argument that
all government information needs to open to the world (with regretful acceptance of unfortunate "collateral damage"), I've not seen the reciprocal, that
all government information needs to be kept secret and secure.
Other than the forays into conspiracy theories, the feckless nature of the Australian government and the peculiarities of Swedish sex law, (all extremely interesting subjects to themselves) the degree to which government information should be made known, not whether or not is should be made known at all, has been at the center of the debate.
I'm not sure how anyone has come to the conclusion that either there are no existing mechanisms to learn what our governments are doing or that none of them work, but this is a mistaken premise.
Any of us can provide a long list of the government secrets that have been made known to the public before anything like WikiLeaks entered the fray.
In reviewing what WikiLeaks has unearthed, how much of it has really pulled back the curtain of secrecy? What do you know now that you didn't know before the WikiLeaks release, and if the information has confirmed what you previously only suspected how will this certainty cause you to think and act in ways you didn't when you only suspected the truth?
Of what you may have learned, how much of it do you think could have, and should have been revealed by pre-WikiLeaks sources of information? If any, why do you think these sources failed?
It seems to me that many of the supporters of Assange and WikiLeaks are more enthralled by the notion of government transparency than confident in their ability to provide it.
One or two supporters have taken the full plunge and agreed that no information should be kept secret and if there is "collateral damage," so be it. I can't agree with that, but it’s an honest expression of their belief and, more importantly, it honestly acknowledges WikiLeaks for what it is.
Other supporters will agree that "Yes, some government secrets are necessary, but greater transparency is what is important."
I believe that once you accept that some government secrets are necessary you can't support the indiscriminate dumping of all information that is the WikiLeaks model.
Assange has attempted to sidestep the issue by providing direct links to major news outlets. In effect he is leaving the task of screening and editing this information to the NY Times, Der Spiegel et al. but the fact remain is that the information has been dumped. It's out there. It may be more difficult to comb it for goodies if one doesn't rely on the major news outlets as a filter, but it can be done, and the people who are willing to put the time and effort into doing so are probably looking for the things the NYT and Der Spiegel have decided to "responsibly" withhold from the public.
BTW-It seems to me that by taking this approach, Assange has seriously undermined any defense that he was acting as a journalist when he dumped the information.
There are complaints about the mainstream media's seeming insistence on inserting entertainment into the news, and to some extent they are valid, but the simple truth is that the consumers of news want entertainment as well. We can debate which came first the chicken or the egg, but the fact remains that people want more than just the facts.
We are drawn to stories with people in them.
A volcano erupts on a desert island and while volcanologists are having an absolute field day, the public takes a look at the fiery pictures, yawns and moves on. A volcano erupts in a populated area and there is 24-7 coverage by all news outlets, with millions glued to their TVs.
Look at how many people have been at the center of this story, and not because of secrets revealed about them.
There should be an on-going tension between "public officials' desire to protect official secrets and the news media's determination to expose the inner workings of government" because both sides have valid point of views and often honorable intentions. I simply don't believe that we are being failed by the mechanisms in place designed to expose government secrets, and I do not want to see this tension disappear because one side has overwhelmed the other.
Governments will not allow WikiLeaks to eliminate the tension by overwhelming their ability to keep secrets. To restore that balance they will make it that much tougher for our usual sources of information to operate. Believing that WikiLeaks has ushered us into a new world without government secrets and that the outcome of full transparency is inevitable are living in a fantasy world.
