You’ve got right wing conspiracy theories, left wing conspiracy theories, leaders of other countries wigging out, and lots of fascinating revelations as the media pours through the documents. TPM has a ticker up and some of the headlines are astounding.
I started to discuss it this morning, when TPM listed its top five revelations, but that may be out of date. And we already have a conspiracy theory advocate in that thread making the same accusation being made by the President of Iran – that it was a deliberate dump of phony information.
Palin is slamming Obama over the leak and suggests that the government should treat Wikileaks like a terror threat. Germany is pissed. The Saudi King called for tracking chips to be placed in released Gitmo prisoners. China called North Korea a “spoiled child” and wants to discuss reunification. The Italian Prime Minister holds wild (but “dignified”) parties. Everybody and his grandmother wants to bomb Iran. Ghadaffi likes blonds.
And they’re still not through all the documents.
Meanwhile, Wikileaks’ Julian Assange is promising to release documents on “an American bank” which he compares to the Enron emails.
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November 29, 2010 at 4:32 pm
Anonymous
The only thing keeping Julian Assange from being an American hero is… American citizenship.
November 29, 2010 at 5:56 pm
Sally
I only wish certain info had been leaked years ago, which may have derailed the big sell for war in Iraq and Afghanistan. Or, if I may dream big, a major exposé of various (and nefarious) shenanigans carried out by our so-called global leaders for decades, which have resulted in the loss of trust, goodwill and respect for the US, and have caused the hardship, misery and injustice for many, including we the people. I was naive as a teenager, when I saw the Pentagon Papers, plus the Watergate drama unfold…. believing the fallout of those events would usher in a new era of “no more dirty tricks” etc. After Iran/Contra, I never would have guessed how quickly people seem to forget. *Sigh* I guess I’m preaching to the choir again.
November 29, 2010 at 6:32 pm
anon
Brian Williams on NBC News tonight said most people disapprove of the leaks…i wonder if any proof is behind that statement, or just wishful thinking on Williams’s part…well it could be true but don’t just say it is…
November 29, 2010 at 7:24 pm
Eric Kirk
Honestly, I have mixed feelings about it. Yes, it reveals a lot we have the right to know about government. But diplomacy could be a very problematic if officials in other countries are afraid to say anything in confidence. The Middle Eastern leaders who slammed Iran could wind up dead. And North Korea may dig in their heals and not even listen to China at this point.
November 29, 2010 at 8:23 pm
ED Denson
Eric, I don’t think its a case of saying things in confidence so much as reporting back what amounts to gossip. I am also a bit surprised by the idea that the state department would order its diplomats to be spies – we never liked it when the Russians did that. Of all the revelations, that is the disturbing for it shows a deep seated corruption – a corruption which extends to both parties as Rice and Clinton’s regimes ordered the spying.
But, diplomatic chatter is chatter. Next time he’s releasing what a bank had to say and there I look for evidence of a crime.
November 29, 2010 at 8:31 pm
Sally
Eric, I agree about having mixed feelings… But wouldn’t it be nice if diplomacy was just that: an honest dialogue, instead of a bunch of cloak and dagger? If “diplomacy” has historically been usurped by corporations (specifically, oil companies, in the oil-rich regions; fruit companies in the “banana republics” (read: “Bitter Fruit” if you have not already) When does it all end? Where does it stop? Do we make Iran the bad guy, or North Korea? I agree, the rhetoric from both nations is very “out there” but during my lifetime, our own “regime” has not been very credible either. I am only a couple of years older than you. I grew up as an optimist, a liberal, etc…. and as many times as my hopes (which used to spring eternal ) have been dashed, I still keep trying to believe and hope that things will get better. ♥
November 30, 2010 at 7:56 am
Eric Kirk
I was watching Lawrence O’Donnell last night and one of the issues raised by one of his guests is whether it’s a mistake to have so many “top secret” documents, suggesting that maybe they should distinguish between the intragovernment access to gossipy blog items and cables with actual substance.
And you’re right Ed. Pushing diplomats to spy is probably the most controversial of the statements.
Probably what should not have been released however is Middle East officials making comments about Iran or Gitmo detainees which may make them targets of violence, either organized or random.
Meanwhile, it does look like authorities want to find a way to prosecute the Australian Wikileaks founder.
http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/news/2010/11/ecuador_offers_a_home_for_founder_of_wikileaks.php?ref=fpb
November 30, 2010 at 8:45 am
Joe Blow
This conversation reminds me of the lame arguments used to justify why to NOT teach high school students about sex education. Too much information in their feeble, immature minds will cause them to WANT sex.
Maybe you should pay attention to this guy’s statements and wake up to what’s really going on in this country: Noam Chomsky: #WikiLeaks Cables Reveal “Profound hatred for #democracy by US political leadership” Watch: http://ow.ly/3hydl
November 30, 2010 at 9:06 am
Eric Kirk
Chomsky can always be counted on for the melodramatic.
November 30, 2010 at 9:19 am
Anonymous
chomsky speaks the truth. that is why we are a republic, not a democracy.
diplomats have been always been spies.
November 30, 2010 at 10:22 am
Joe Blow
Typical non-comment from you. You must be one hell of a lawyer. All you do with all your worthless political evaluations is muddy the water. Which tells me you know exactly what you’re doing – part and party to the ongoing betrayal, looting and war to completely enslave the working poor. Once people realize the truth and stop believing in worthless liars and their complicit enablers (people like you) preaching hope and change, you’ll think “melodramatic.”
November 30, 2010 at 10:46 am
Joe Blow
While you blather on, ridicule, (essentially devalue) and try to justify blowing smoke there are substantive issues confronting everyone. Chew on this quote: The WikiLeaks disclosure has revealed not only numerous government secrets, but also the driving mentality of major factions in our political and media class. Simply put, there are few countries in the world with citizenries and especially media outlets more devoted to serving, protecting and venerating government authorities than the U.S. Indeed, I don’t quite recall any entity producing as much bipartisan contempt across the American political spectrum as WikiLeaks has … Those who demand that the U.S. Government take people’s lives with no oversight or due process as though they’re advocating changes in tax policy or mid-level personnel moves — eradicate him!, they bellow from their seats in the Colosseum — are just morally deranged barbarians. There’s just no other accurate way to put it. These are usually the same people, of course, who brand themselves “pro-life” and Crusaders for the Sanctity of Human Life and/or who deride Islamic extremists for their disregard for human life. And the fact that this mindset is so widespread and mainstream is quite a reflection of how degraded America’s political culture is. When WikiLeaks critics devote a fraction of their rage to this form of mainstream American thinking — which, unlike anything WikiLeaks has done, has actually resulted in piles upon piles of corpses — then their anti-WikiLeaks protestations should be taken more seriously, but not until then.
Could this article be talking about people like you? The central goal of WikiLeaks is to prevent the world’s most powerful factions — including the sprawling, imperial U.S. Government — from continuing to operate in the dark and without restraints. Most of the institutions which are supposed to perform that function — beginning with the U.S. Congress and the American media — not only fail to do so, but are active participants in maintaining the veil of secrecy. WikiLeaks, whatever its flaws, is one of the very few entities shining a vitally needed light on all of this. It’s hardly surprising, then, that those factions — and their hordes of spokespeople, followers and enablers — see WikiLeaks as a force for evil. That’s evidence of how much good they are doing. Here’s the link to the complete article. By the way, nothing personal. Just an melodramatic observation.
November 30, 2010 at 10:50 am
tra
Vent that spleen! Vent it good!
November 30, 2010 at 11:10 am
Erasmus
I listened to enough of Amy Goodman’s interview with Noam Chomsky to understand what he means by the contempt for democracy evinced by our political leadership, and I stopped listening when he launched into yet another diatribe against Israel and a defense of the Hamas-Palestinian view of the Mideast. Sorry, but Professor Emeritus Chomsky did not convince this listener. Apparently, the fact that Arab public opinion sees Israel and the USA as the chief enemies of peace in their region outweighs the fact that most Arab leaders fear Iran and especially a nuclear-armed Iran. Huh? Why should the constant scapegoating of Israel in the Arab press, and the anti-Semitic views embedded in the Koran, be a factor in our foreign policy? I see no logic in Chomsky’s viewpoint. Frankly, I care very little what public opinion polls in the Mideast say. To say that Obama and Co. have a “contempt for democracy” because they don’t hew to the line of “Arab public opinion” seems nonsensical to me. — Chomsky has the right to (seemingly) prefer Hamas to the Israeli government. I doubt that he would prefer to live under a regime guided by the Hamas Charter (with its invocations of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion). I doubt that he will move to another country (having amassed great wealth in this one). It does disturb me that his political opinions are taken seriously by even a sliver of our population. He used to be published regularly by the New York Review of Books. These days, that august journal doesn’t even bother to review his screeds. Why should they? All he says is: we are evil, our enemies are just “misunderstood.” Let him continue to befriend Hugo Chavez. Let him write more introductions to Holocaust-deniers’ books. Let him forget his ghastly misreading of the Cambodian genocide (he doubted it, described it as just Western propaganda, until even he had to face reality). Let him continue to take money from the Pentagon and keep saying (with a straight face!) that he is only “technically” an employee of the DoD (they use his linguistic research in their code-making). — Let young idealistic suckers keep buying his books and swallowing his one-sided perspective, for he has some very large homes to maintain.
November 30, 2010 at 11:33 am
Wishing and Hoping
Secret Alliances are what got the world into World War One.
This Wikileaks leak pretty well blows Secret Anything out of the water, doesn’t it?
Doesn’t that mean the end of World Wars?
November 30, 2010 at 11:42 am
tra
From TPM:
Justin Elliot of Salon reports that former CIA General Counsel Jeffrey Smith’s suggestion that the Administration prosecute Wikileaks founder Julian Assange under the 1917 Espionage Act could have a host of problems both for the specific prosecution and the media as a whole.
“While there have been many successful prosecutions of leakers under this law, there have been extremely few prosecutions of those on the receiving end of leaks. ”
“Many have argued that the law is unconstitutional, and, if it was actually applied broadly, would lead to the prosecution of journalists and newspapers that routinely obtain and publish classified national defense information. ”
Elliot also notes that the law only refers to physical papers, so there’s no clarity on whether it would apply to digital leaks — and that, in order to prosecute Assange, he’d either have to be captured on U.S. soil or extradited from abroad.
http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/live/wikileaks_wire/wikileaks_wire.html?ref=fpb
November 30, 2010 at 12:01 pm
Eric Kirk
In theory an American citizen could be charged with treason for receiving classified material which has not yet been published, but I believe there has to be some effort on the part of the individual in soliciting or trying to get them. If they weren’t involved in the initial illegality, then they are free to receive the documents and publish them. There was a case in the 1970s which established this when personal records of a Senator, I think Moynihan, were stolen and delivered to a newspaper.
But since Assange isn’t an American citizen, he can’t be charged with treason in any case so they’re scrambling for something in anti-espionage laws. But again, I think it would have to involve some affirmative act on his part, not just receiving the documents.
Re Chomsky – I like some of his stuff, but he doesn’t always tell “the truth.” Certainly he didn’t back in the 1970s when he dismissed the Cambodian killing fields as fabrication. 3 million dead and he didn’t want to talk about it.
November 30, 2010 at 12:03 pm
Eric Kirk
Erasmus – I came across an article this morning which claims that the Wikileaks release pretty much debunks the theory of the “Israel lobby” behind the potential attacks on Iraq, as the pressure is apparently coming from other neighbors.
This isn’t the one, but it’s along the same lines.
http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Editorials/Article.aspx?id=197319
I will be interested to see whether leftists so ready to pounce on anything Israel says about Iran will condemn what these other countries are saying as well. Or are they exempt?
November 30, 2010 at 12:19 pm
tra
I assume you mean the potential attacks on Iran .
November 30, 2010 at 12:30 pm
Erasmus
Leftists of the Chomsky persuasion will continue to put forth the idea that the “Arab street” represents the true voice of that region and that the regimes quoted in Wikileaks are puppets of Western interests. That is a position defensible on an intellectual level, but absurdly impracticable — even when we look to the past. (There was a great deal of opposition to the Shah of Iran, but should we have abetted his overthrow? Which groups should we have supported? Would Iran be significantly different now if we had? The answers are unknowable, and I am far from assuming that we would be liked any better had we opposed the Shah. Our alliance with Israel would keep us out of Iranian good graces.)
November 30, 2010 at 12:39 pm
Eric Kirk
Well, we would have been hated a little less had we not sheltered the Shah who ran some of the same torture chambers the Khomeini regime took over. Of course if we hadn’t overthrown Mohammad Mosaddegh back in 1953, not only would we be less unpopular, but Iran might still be a parliamentary democracy today.
Still, I’m sure the puppet argument will be made, and since we are the puppet of Israel, by implication those Arab countries are puppets of Israel.
tra – right, Iran, although a certain anti-Semite who used to post here argues that we invaded Iraq at the behest of Israel too.
November 30, 2010 at 1:18 pm
Erasmus
True enough — but the British role in overthrowing Mossadegh was equal to our own, and no regime can be replaced for decades without the support of very powerful indigenous interests (though of course a country’s self-esteem is bolstered by blaming outsiders for their ills). Mossadegh was not the pristine democrat of current mythology, by the way. The reasons for Iran’s present theocracy involve much more than an event 57 years ago (though, once again, the fixation on that coup is understandable).
November 30, 2010 at 2:12 pm
Eric Kirk
Not the pristine democrat, but the last democratically elected leader. We (and the British) didn’t just overthrow the individual, but the system.
November 30, 2010 at 2:18 pm
Joe Blow
Criminals are criminals and that includes all the so-called Mom and Pop SoHum pot growers. Israel has over 60 years of history that speaks for what it is. Noam Chomsky is an anti-Semite? I suppose if I was a pot-grower and seller I’d have some credibility when I say they’re criminals pure and simple.
November 30, 2010 at 2:36 pm
tra
Pretzels? Pretzels anyone?
November 30, 2010 at 2:52 pm
Eric Kirk
Israel is a mom and pop pot grower?
November 30, 2010 at 3:39 pm
Joe Blow
Hey Eric! How is it you make a living as a lawyer when you don’t the difference between the subject and the object? I see your question tells me you didn’t bother to read what Chomsky said or your just being your normal frivolous self again.
If Noam Chomsky can’t talk about the realities of Israel’s criminal conduct without being vilified, who can? Jew worshipers and brainwashed born-again believers?
November 30, 2010 at 3:54 pm
Joe Blow
WikiLeaks’ harsh lesson on imperial hubris
Something from Israel by Johnathan Cook, a British journalist based in Nazareth, Israel. He says, from Nazareth, the capital of the Palestinian minority in Israel, things look very different. There are striking, and disturbing, similarities between the experiences of Palestinians inside Israel and those inside the West Bank and Gaza. All have faced Zionism’s appetite for territory and domination, as well as repeated attempts at ethnic cleansing. These unifying themes suggest that the conflict is less about the specific circumstances thrown up by the 1967 war and more about the central tenets of Zionism as expressed in the war of 1948 that founded Israel and the war of 1967 that breathed new life into its settler colonial agenda.
November 30, 2010 at 4:38 pm
Erasmus
The war of 1948 did not found Israel — the UN resolution of the previous year did. The “Palestinians” rejected the offer of statehood and, along with allies from the rest of the Arab world, invaded the nascent country in an attempt to strangle it at its birth. They failed, as they also failed (in a different sense of the word) to create a Palestinian state between 1948 and 1967, when no Israeli occupation would have prevented statehood. Why did they not create their own state? Perhaps the real ethnic cleansers are the Arabs, who refuse to countenance a non-Arab state in their midst. (The Kurds have been victims of this mentality for many,many years.) Creating a state on the territory left after the 6-day war would have implicitly accepted the division of territory at that moment. Maps in Palestinian textbooks have long shown a world without Israel. Who are the authentic ethnic cleansers? And where is all this land that Israel supposedly controls? Looked at a map lately? There are counties in CA not much smaller than Israel. — I’m disappointed that no one challenged me when I wrote that Chomsky worked fpr the Pentagon throughout his academic career. Either that fact is common knowledge or it is so preposterous-sounding that it’s not worth debating. Well, Chomsky himself admits it. On page 184 of “Propaganda and the Public Mind”, he says: “When you’re working for the Pentagon, as I was, in fact, there were no constraints.” On the following page, David Barsamian follows up this matter and asks whether Chomsky meant what he said “literally or figuratively.” Chomsky says: “I meant that I was working for the Pentagon in a bookkeeping sense. I was working in a laboratory that happened to be 100 per cent funded by the three armed services.” He then goes on to say that someone in the music dept. at MIT is funded by the Pentagon because a music dept. would not exist if other depts. did not get Pentagon money, leaving a surplus to spend on music. What convenient logic! He never addresses the crucial question: why did the Pentagon find your work worth funding (unlike the music dept). — Calling Chomsky a hypocrite is too easy.
November 30, 2010 at 6:53 pm
anon
Chomsky rules
shut-up Chomsky haters
my mom when to Country Day School with him
and pushed him off a sand hill
when he was nine
(so there!)
November 30, 2010 at 6:55 pm
Joe Blow
Zionist Jews have in the past 60 plus years demonstrated their total state of delegitimization. In other words, they have no more legitimate right to that land or statehood recognition than a monkey. Taking that land by force with support from the U.S. shall prove, in the end, to be meaningless. Inherent right to sovereignty is not determined by authoritarian rule any more than by subservient recognition. A simple truth most Americans are incapable of understanding. A pot calling the kettle black is irrelevant. Chomsky speaks the truth.
December 1, 2010 at 8:13 am
Erasmus
I’ll pass over the racist undertones of the statement above and merely say that Israel has as much right to exist as the USA or Syria. In fact — much more of a right, given the Bible’s account of the Jews’ existence in that region for millennia. I would like to read of a Palestinian people whose history reaches back to pre-Christian days. Moreover, Jordan is a country larger than Israel.Its population is majority-Palestinian. Why pretend that a Palestinian state does not already exist? For a very good reason: the Jews have no right to a state in the Mideast, so all the land belongs to Arabs. It’s not so much ethnic cleansing as it’s ethnic hegemony. — As for those who continue to swear by Chomsky: your heroes may work for the Pentagon. Mine don’t.
December 1, 2010 at 10:30 am
Joe Blow
Racist undertones? It’s okay to demonstrate racist bigotry when talking about the Palestinians, but Lord God Forbid anyone should talk about the Zionist Jew’s accepted and documented history. Chomsky can and does speak for himself. He certainly doesn’t need me. When you can’t refute what he says then you do what everyone in your position does – attack the messenger. That says more about you than Chomsky or me.
As far as Zionist Jew’s “rights” to legitimately claim nation status, that is already decided. They had 63 years to prove that claim and they failed. What happens to them is a forgone conclusion and no amount of American belief-support can change that. Live by the sword, die by the sword.
December 1, 2010 at 10:58 am
Joe Blow
These same arguments can be made about Israel. Just replace the U.S. reference and replace it with Israel. Then talk to me about who is the real criminal.
December 1, 2010 at 12:17 pm
Erasmus
I admire the patience of Eric V. Kirk in putting up with the ignorance and venom encountered on his blog. Attack the messenger? Anyone who does work for the Pentagon deemed worthy of payment is more than a “messenger.” He’s a collaborator. And his message is taken seriously by few people. (Just look at the magazines that publish him regularly and the ones that refuse to touch him.) — 63 years to prove a “claim” to nation status? After the UN created their state? They don’t exist? What kind of nonsense is this? Why do we have a right to exist (remember the Native Americans?) and they don’t? == All I can say is: thank God they have the bomb. Human stupidity (as Einstein said) is infinite.
December 1, 2010 at 5:43 pm
anon
Wiki-leaks…wow…i hope Assange doesn’t go down, and if he does that someone replaces him…somehow…
but i don’t like getting my “secrets” just though the censored filters of the New York Times or NBC news–are there lefty blogs or etc that are reading those million pages or do i have to weigh through them myself? (not a chance)…
what are the REAL highlights?
(Alex Cockburn? AVA?)
December 1, 2010 at 6:23 pm
tra
For the most part, I think the release of this kind of information is helpful. The expectation that all these diplomatic machinations would remain secret encourages a culture of deception and perhaps a sense of impunity among those participating in various foreign policy schemes. In general, it is better that our foreign relations be conducted in a more above-board fashion, with all participants understanding that their actions will eventually become public knowledge.
December 2, 2010 at 8:15 am
anon
most of the documents have yet to be read—there may be much more uncovered.
So far though, I have not heard of any “top secret” documents being released. I believe the documents are either “secret” or “classified”.
Does anyone know exactly what a “cable” is. I’m wondering whether an old name is being used for new technology. Were these docs hacked in some way or actually physically stolen?
It is unclear to me at this point whether this “shit storm” will clear anything up or just add to the over all state of unrest the world is in.
250,000 documents amount to a windfall for the 24hr news cycle though.
December 2, 2010 at 9:25 am
tra
“I’m wondering whether an old name is being used for new technology.”
Yes. These are not some kind of antiquated telegraph messages, they’re basically an official e-mail.
“Were these docs hacked in some way or actually physically stolen?”
There may have been more than one source, but the one we know about is Bradley Manning, a fairly low-level soldier who had access to a database of thousands of these “cables,” as it turns out that many thousands of U.S. personnel around the world did. Which raises the question of whether anyone should be surprised that they were eventually leaked.
Anyway, Manning apparently physically “stole” them by burning a CD of the info (while sitting at his desk pretending he was listening to an audio CD, lip synching along with the imaginary music as the data was downloaded to the CD). Then he just took the CD, put it in a CD case, and took it with him.
So he didn’t have to “hack” anything, he had access already. He did have to physically steal the data, and then he had to pass it along to Wikileaks (I’m not sure how the mechanics of that worked). He’s likely to spend decades in a military stockade as a result of his actions.
December 2, 2010 at 9:42 am
tra
Though, as Eric noted on another thread, some politicians and pundits are calling for Manning to be tried for treason and executed. But from what I’ve read, that ooutcome is pretty unlikely, given the very high threshold for finding someone guilt of treason.
December 2, 2010 at 10:07 am
Joe Blow
“High threshold”? Where is there any threshold when all President Obama has to do is accuse an any American citizen and on the basis of his personal accusation order his or her summary execution. In any civilized country ruled by law, that’s murder. You think maybe if they waterboard Manning a couple of hundred times they can get a confession to justify killing him? If anyone needs to be tried for treason it’s these politicians.
December 2, 2010 at 10:51 am
tra
I was talking about the unlikelihood of Manning, the original leaker, actually being tried for Treason, as defined in the Constitution.
Of course you’re right that there is another approach the administration could take, the extrajudicial route of secret detention, torture, etc. But I’d be quite surprised if Manning was suddenly disappeared and shipped to Gitmo or some black ops secret prison. I just don’t think that’s going to happen in this case, in part because Manning a member of the military and his case is being handled through the military justice system.
Julian Assange of Wikileaks is another matter entirely. He’s not a U.S. citizen, and of course not a member of the U.S. military. So the extrajudicial kidnapping, detention, torture and/or murder route seems more likely in that case.
For now, my guess is that the administration will hold off a bit on the hopes that Assange ends up getting picked up and extradicted back to Sweden on the sexual assault charges. I think the powers-that-be would prefer to see him discredited as a sex criminal rather than give him martyr status by disappearing and/or assasinating him.
Though I doubt that the discrediting-with-sex-charges gambit is going to work out in the end. Though I know very little about the allegations in Sweden, like (I think) most people, I suspect that whole thing is just a classic set-up, and is intended to get him in custody, distract from the leaks themselves, and undermine the credibility of Wikileaks in general.