You said, "it's a little late to worry". That seems to me to mean you don't think there's anything that should be done. OK. What should be done at this point?
They've already issued a D Notice in the UK (essentially 'please do not publish them'). A concern is how this will extend attempts to control the internet, as even if governments ban the publication of the leaks they can still be distributed via P2P and darknets. That's the kind of thing that gets idiot politicians into a lather - we had a MP discuss a bill forcing ISP's to make sure anything anyone tried accessing that contained over 18 content, then they needed to make sure the viewer was over 18 by way of example.
What exactly can be done? The leaks are out. And unless the CIA have built a time machine the leaks are staying out, anything else is simply a display of reality-impairment and ignorance that we're no longer living in the 1960's.
I don't like the fact that Assange has released the information he has released. But, I disagree that he should be prosecuted for releasing that information. If anyone should be prosecuted it should be the people within the US government and military that are responsible for giving that information out.
I was leaving that mostly up to you to answer. It's kind of a litmus test, don't you know? But, seriously, about this stuff first since it's the fire that's being dealt with. Then about how to prevent it from happening again, assuming you do, indeed, think there are things that should be kept secret at all, that is.
You can't prevent it from happening again - if people are dealing with sensitive information then there are those who will, for various reasons both fair and foul, who will release it. As for keeping things secret, for a time maybe - but since the taxpayers dime is paying for all this stuff, the taxpayers are entitled to have it made available to them at some point. If you want to keep your actions hidden forever, then either you're either a little shit or haven't got the courage to stand by your convictions. Neither of which should be near the levers of power.
I'm not sure that there is anything you can do about the stuff that's already out. As for the future, I guess not giving twenty year old Privates access to classified material would be a start.
I'd argue that if they're giving twenty year old privates access to something, it probably didn't deserve to be labeled classified in the first place.
Who, me? Never. The point was what Assange could be charged with. Anything that destabilizes the world's governments concerns me. I want to be wiped out by an asteroid, not nuked.
Now apply that standard to what's in the documents we're talking about here. Sure, some of it probably should've been released already. I'll grant that. But there's also stuff that has no business being out yet and that's what I'm spun up about. That stuff is endangering lives and hurting countries. The people that release that kind of information deserve to be punished. Right? Right? You're right in that it's inevitable that leaks are going to happen. But our response is not to shrug and say, "Oh, well, there's nothing we can do about it." We can punish the people who leak that type of information (after proper judicial procedure, of course.) Hopefully, we can discourage it from happening again while we sort out the processes involved in classifying the "cover my butt" stuff that doesn't need to be treated that way. By the way, diplomatic secrets - their opinions of other countries, et. al. Yeah. That kind of stuff is an important national secret also. Just IMO.
Oh, well. Let's just give up. That's a really good answer. As for the other, tighter access controls would probably be a good idea. As well as a smaller need to have so many things classified in the first place. I am a proponent of smaller government. But we are talking about the current situation and not an ideal, though.
How about the people that actually are doing so on a daily basis, not just exercising a basic right? Oh, right, we elected them, so they can't be punished. Instead, we cover up or simply ignore their crimes. Wrong. There is no evidence that Wikileaks has ever endangered anyone, except in the public perception. The Pentagon did an investigation found after the Afghan War Logs leak that not a single Afghani had to be protected as a result. Yes. Just in your opinion.
I think the best thing to do about Assange is just let him keep releasing the stuff he has and doing nothing else...after all he's a egomaniac and anarchist who wants to see more violence and deaths as a result of his actions...and doing nothing pretty much defeats his purpose for releasing them to begin with.
Well, it's obvious that I'm doing no good here. Whatever the reason, my points aren't making it and I'm certainly not buying the counters. Have a good night.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-11882092 The reason governments want what they do kept secret is because it shows who they really are and how they really operate, its nothing to do with 'keeping people out of danger'
You're right. Quitters never win. So here's what we do... 1. We send Predator drones after Assange and anyone else connected to Wikileaks. 2. We then invade any country that has a Wikileaks mirror server within it's boarders in order to destroy all the data on them. 3. We nationalize any newspaper that even hinted about the leaks. 4. We blockade any country who's media reported on the leaks until they punish those newspapers to our satisfaction. 5. We DARE any other fool to pull that crap again. Howzat?
That may be true - but it's ALSO going to put people in danger. You just don't care because it serves your hoped for political ends. Those evil diplomats in Canada certainly seem to think so: http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news...ade-the-world-more-repressive/article1818157/
Let alone the indirect price of this - The military leaks happened because of an openness initiative in the Pentagon, spearheaded by Petreaus, where the US would share intel with it's allies and ensure it was properly disseminated. That's done with now. And if you think this is going to lead to more openness from the world community, you are out of your mind. This stuff is going to be locked down tighter than ever before, specifically because of this kind of embarrassment. And it's going to spill out into every corner of the US government community - and in quite a few other countries as well. Of course, Rick is pro all this. It makes the Great Satan have a more difficult time operating, and that's all good to him. Even worse, people won't be able to TRUST the US any more, because some sanctimonious prick might get them killed for trying to get someone to do the right thing, such as help oppose the killings in Indonesia. As the evil Canadian diplomat pointed out:
I know you're not this obtuse but, if it makes you happy, I can't respond with anything approaching civility to how stupid that was. I'll just stop with calling it stupid.
Ya think? Okay then... Build a time machine and stop Al Gore from inventing the Interwebs? How would you propose to getting the cat back into the bag?
I have never once said we could get this particular cat back in the bag. There is a middle ground between the do-nothing and the sci-fi extremes, you know? I have said that we could do everything in our power to discourage the like from happening again - including punishing those who've committed the crime this time. Due process and all, but there's definitely been a crime committed. The leaker, most likely a military member, is going to face military justice. At the same time, we also review the whole system of classifying documents to make sure we're not just putting stuff under lock and key to protect someone's ego or some other such fluff argument. Maybe getting our elected officials back to doing real work and having their committees actually performing real oversight work as intended? There are five workdays in a week for most people (but not Congress, IIRC), why shouldn't they be working instead of just politicking? Cut down on the massive amount of classified documents and you cut down on the amount of management said documents take. Cut down the management and the fewer immature 20-year olds you need to handle the systems. The classification problem is systemic and it's got to be addressed from the roots up. But that's not an argument for chucking the systems that are currently in place midstream. We've got to start upstream and work our way down in an orderly fashion. The two are completely separate processes but those who are rejoicing in politicians getting "theirs" are so caught up in it that they can't see the real potential for damage. And, yes, I've read the stories that claim no real damage has been done yet. And, yes, I've seen the claims about how small the amount of information has actually been released. This all may be way overblown by both sides (protecting their POVs) and the media (for ratings) and Wikileaks (in their attempts to attract more donations?) but the potential is obvioiusly there and we've just been lucky so far.
If you say so, Sport. I already suggested that there was stuff we could do to help keep it from happening in the future.
