Julian Assange-
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Daniel Ellsberg - Wikipedia
'What' doesn't matter because you have to get past the "How" first.
This is just a watered down version of the same strawman argument.
Johnson's administration had "systematically lied, not only to the public but also to Congress." The Pentagon Papers revealed that the U.S. had secretly enlarged the scope of its actions in the Vietnam War with coastal raids on North Vietnam and Marine Corps attacks—none of which were reported in the mainstream media.
The Pentagon Papers revealed that officials, while publicly supporting the Vietnam War, personally doubted its justification and deceived the public.
Nixon and the Pentagon Papers | Miller Center
The leak of the "Pentagon Papers" study of the Vietnam war became a turning point in the history of Richard Nixon’s presidency and a crucial catalyst in his downfall
The What cancels the How sometimes.
UUUUhhhhhh...... NO.
That's what we have courts for. The court (the How) decides if the Top Secret (the What) documents contain evidence of a crime that needs to be made public and legally scrutinized.
We can't have a bunch of Chelsea Mannings (visualize the picture) running around and deciding for themselves that they have uncovered some horrific crime and splashing Top Secret documents all over the place.
That's just the way it works. You may think differently on how it 'should' work, but so did Chelsea Manning and that's why Manning went to jail. There is a 'Right' (not Rite) way to do it. The court of law and the court of public opinion do not always agree.
I didn't want you to get all worked up over the usage of 'Right' and have the Nun show up.
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it's funny to me that you chose Chelsea Manning as an example since they went to jail, served their time, and is now a free citizen.
can't have a bunch of them running around now
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Read about the Pentagon Papers and the Supreme Court decision re Daniel Ellsberg. Your ignorance is showing. Read about how the Pentagon Papers affected Richard Nixon. The links are the above. Read them.
I had a personal interest in the Vietnam war during those years. I remember there was an actual left wing in the Democratic Party.
The what was a lie and the how was decided by the courts. That's the way it worked.
When did spelling get anyone all worked up?
dramamine
Well-known member
12.1 The Media as a Political Institution: Why Does It Matter? - Introduction to Political Science | OpenStax
The importance of a free press can be boiled down to a sentence from esteemed University of Illinois at Chicago lecturer Doris Graber’s seminal work Mas...
openstax.org
12.1 The Media as a Political Institution: Why Does It Matter? - Introduction to Political Science | OpenStax
The importance of a free press can be boiled down to a sentence from esteemed University of Illinois at Chicago lecturer Doris Graber’s seminal work Mas...
The Fourth Estate and Freedom of the Press
The importance of a free press can be boiled down to a sentence from esteemed University of Illinois at Chicago lecturer Doris Graber’s seminal work Mass Media and American Politics: “The mass media . . . serve as powerful guardians of political norms because the American people believe that a free press should keep them informed about the wrongdoings of government.”3 Another common way of defining the media’s role is to say that it acts as the fourth estate, or the unofficial fourth branch of government that checks the others. The term fourth estate is credited to Scottish writer Thomas Carlyle, who wrote, “Burke said there were Three Estates in Parliament; but, in the Reporter’s Gallery yonder, there sat a Fourth Estate more important far than they all.”4 In other words, people look to the media—the fourth estate—to keep the government in check. The role of the media must be protected if it is to carry out that task.Throughout US history, the media has fulfilled this role as intended. In the late 1960s, Rand Corporation analyst Daniel Ellsberg provided classified documents to the New York Times and the Washington Post proving that the government was concealing protracted military involvement in the Vietnam War. The New York Times withstood government pressure and a Supreme Court case to go on to publish a series of articles now known as the Pentagon Papers, which revealed the extent to which the American public had been lied to about the country’s progress in that war. The Watergate scandal is perhaps the most famous example of press freedom and the role of the press as watchdog (another term for the fourth estate). In this instance, a government informant known as Deep Throat fed Washington Post reporters Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein confidential information about then president Richard Nixon’s corrupt campaign practices. An ensuing series of investigative pieces by the two journalists revealed multiple abuses of power in Nixon’s reelection campaign, and their reporting ultimately led to the indictment of multiple presidential aides and the eventual resignation of the president himself.
Don't be foolish enough to think that anyone is guaranteeing you that it will work all the time, just how it is supposed to work. Politics and corruption is a dirty business.
Two posts nagging about a couple of typos, I wasn't sure how far it was going to go. I had friends who went to catholic schools and told me about the nuns. It was easy to see later in life, any time I saw meticulously perfect penmanship I knew it was the work of the nuns.
moose eater
Well-known member
Had proper chain of command been the only path to reporting war crimes and corruption in government, the My Lai massacre, the Gulf of Tonkin lies, and the crimes committed by Tiger Force in the Central Highlands, or Reagan's illegal (guns for drugs) war in Central America and trading missiles with Iran would likely have never been heard/read about and the history might've been changed forever for the worse for many people.
The 4th Estate is an integral player in any country that even remotely pretends to be 'free' (whatever that means anymore).
When government commits crimes, and ours (the US) commits them regularly, it is the duty of the Press to expose them. And lying about the available gunship video in the Iraq killings, as well as the outrageous behavior of the US troops on the ground when others (civilians) attempted to lend aid to the wounded and dead, such as the gunship lighting up a van full of (mostly) kids, as well as the grunt on the ground flipping the wounded guy off who was lying prone on the ground when he stretched out his hand for help, were DEFINITELY war crimes.
If this is what Assange and Manning revealed, and it is, at least in part, then pin a medal on them, and incarcerate those who think and act as though they deserved prosecution. Those people are our -real- threat, both as a Country and as a world.
The 4th Estate is an integral player in any country that even remotely pretends to be 'free' (whatever that means anymore).
When government commits crimes, and ours (the US) commits them regularly, it is the duty of the Press to expose them. And lying about the available gunship video in the Iraq killings, as well as the outrageous behavior of the US troops on the ground when others (civilians) attempted to lend aid to the wounded and dead, such as the gunship lighting up a van full of (mostly) kids, as well as the grunt on the ground flipping the wounded guy off who was lying prone on the ground when he stretched out his hand for help, were DEFINITELY war crimes.
If this is what Assange and Manning revealed, and it is, at least in part, then pin a medal on them, and incarcerate those who think and act as though they deserved prosecution. Those people are our -real- threat, both as a Country and as a world.
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Have you ever been wrong, @Zeez?
Don't be foolish enough to serve me a word salad about politics and corruption being a dirty business.
dramamine
Well-known member
Yes, and especially whilst arguing against our only (Constitutionally-protected) safeguard against such. I know I keep repeating this, but the watchdog function of journalism has been effectively memory-holed here in the United States. What a trip to see folks, ostensibly on the political left, arguing for their own right to be uninformed of governmental malfeasance. Isn't that right-wing stuff?
Buzz, First of all You are the one posting over and over that I made typos, so it looks more like you are the one claiming to be right.
Second of all, Many people are closed minded here. Nobody is ever going to convince anybody that they are wrong. The proof is that it is very rare that you ever read someone acknowledging that they are wrong. The best anyone can do is get someone to acknowledge that there is another side of something that they do not see and probably don't agree with.
Thirdly, When you got on your high horse to reprimand me about my spelling, I did politely acknowledge that I made a couple of typos wrongly. But then you had to pursue me with another post to try and drive the point home a second time. My response, besides the angry nun with the ruler who you were impersonating, was to point out to you that you could easily look back and find lots of typos by everyone. You didn't bother harassing them but you do seem to be trolling me trying to make yourself appear to be right.
The only reason I engaged in this conversation was because AOH was correct and that he was getting pushed. I know he can take care of himself, but I agreed with what he was saying. Most people with good critical thinking skills would also agree. There are no sweeping generalizations that apply to everything and that is why we have courts, but it all starts with the law. Screwing off with Secret documents and publishing them is against the law.
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read your first quote, then try to reconcile what you said there with the second quote. you said "are not to be punished." that pretty much opens up the field to anything. prove me wrong- what ARE your "limits" ??? i'm retired, i'll wait...
moose eater
Well-known member
Is the U.S. government designating too many documents as 'classified'?
Historian Matthew Connelly says one reason we see mishandling of classified documents is that far too many records are being classified.
alaskapublic.org
As Political Science Professor R.L. Smith taught at University of Alaska-Fairbanks, in his many poli sci classes, there's all sorts of stuff that gets classified that has often times already been published and seen by many, often times simply because someone with the authority to classify documents thought it might impact the view of the country as seen by others, whether foreign or domestic.
That was over 40 years ago, and Mr. Smith had worked extensively on Capitol Hill in D.C.
So, it's been a long time now that rather petty documents are sometimes classified, simply because it makes someone worry that it might slightly stain the imaginary and now-betrayed white cowboy hats, or perhaps spill some metaphorical ketchup on the ol' red, white and blue, which, ironically, those who engage in criminal or suspect actions from their government thrones have, they, themselves, badly soiled with their corrupt or criminal shenanigans at the State Dept and Oval Office, etc..
Remember that when you travel abroad and the locals sneer at you (or worse). Your government, in their psychotic levels of nationalism, lack of real genuine wisdom, toxic view of the country and world, and relative ignorance has been making a shady or often outright negative name for its citizens for many years, and their answer is to cover it up and prosecute those who tell the truth about it, rather than to simply cease engaging in deplorable activities.
Bless Assange and every person who believes and acts in a way that emphasizes that a transparent, legitimate, well-boundaried government is a better government.
I'm betting Al Capone wished he could have 'classified' the shit he was involved in too.
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This is as good a place as any, to point out that I have often found quite a difference in perspective between those of us who went through the draft a few rounds and those who were fortunate enough not to have.
I have posted a series of classes a while back on the Espionage Act, and how it has been used ...
Bottom line is that a double standard is employed on behalf of the country.
I do not think it is at all admirable, nor do I think it will change.
Assange will never be returned to his home country , would imagine most here understand that was
merely a device the state uses.
I have admiration for the likes of the individuals who took the material, as well as Reality Winner,
etc. These people knew when they took the material, that they would pay dearly for doing so.
The state has learned all too well what it can do. Who pays for that, why in this case it shall
be Assange. He will die a miserable death in the care of those who know all too well
how to deny any small comfort or hope.
We live in a system that was gamed long before we ever arrived. Grew up watching WWII
movies that described and showed a fictional situation in which a noble press was there
to fight for that which is right, and once in a while the little guy even wins.
That was not a reality then, nor is it now.
I will repost the classes on the Espionage Act in the near future.
I have posted a series of classes a while back on the Espionage Act, and how it has been used ...
Bottom line is that a double standard is employed on behalf of the country.
I do not think it is at all admirable, nor do I think it will change.
Assange will never be returned to his home country , would imagine most here understand that was
merely a device the state uses.
I have admiration for the likes of the individuals who took the material, as well as Reality Winner,
etc. These people knew when they took the material, that they would pay dearly for doing so.
The state has learned all too well what it can do. Who pays for that, why in this case it shall
be Assange. He will die a miserable death in the care of those who know all too well
how to deny any small comfort or hope.
We live in a system that was gamed long before we ever arrived. Grew up watching WWII
movies that described and showed a fictional situation in which a noble press was there
to fight for that which is right, and once in a while the little guy even wins.
That was not a reality then, nor is it now.
I will repost the classes on the Espionage Act in the near future.
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