[ExI] Manning and Assange

[Keith Henson]

On Wed, Aug 22, 2012 at 5:00 AM,  "spike" <spike66 at att.net> wrote:

>>... On Behalf Of Kelly Anderson
>
>>...Army Pfc. Bradley Manning swore an oath to protect his countries
> secrets, then violated that oath. That's a little stronger expectation of
> loyalty than "some"...
>
> JA!

It's not that clear cut.  The oath (undertaking) for military service
requires you to obey *lawful* orders.  If a military superior ordered
you to keep quiet about a murder is that a lawful order?  Was the
Baghdad airstrike (known as "Collateral Murder") in that class?

It's worth reviewing http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Calley

And perhaps the Pentagon Papers.  "A 1996 article in The New York
Times said that the Pentagon Papers "demonstrated, among other things,
that the Johnson  Administration had systematically lied, not only to
the public but also to Congress, about a subject of transcendent
national interest and significance".[2] The report was declassified
and publicly released in June 2011"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bradley_Manning#Impact_and_reception

It's not at all obvious that the leaked material actually hurt US long
term interests.  Most of it showed we had sensible people in overseas
locations who were telling the truth about the local situation,
corruption and all.  Keeping that from becoming general knowledge
maintains the status quo with the thugs running some of those
countries.  That may be in the short term interest of the US elites
who have profitable dealings with the thugs, but is it in the long
term interest of of the US?

>> ...he has ruined at least one life so far, that of Army Pfc. Bradley
> Manning...  -Kelly
> _______________________________________________
>
> NEIN!
>
> It was Army Pfc Bradley Manning who ruined the life of Army Pfc. Bradley
> Manning.  He screwed up, he paid the price, and will continue to pay.  That
> being said, he didn't actually spill classified information, for if it is
> classified, it wouldn't have been on any network which had a USB port.  He
> spilled a ton of sensitive information for sure.
>
> I recognize that Julian has done a mixture of harm and benefit, good call on
> that.

It depends on how you feel about transparency.   Unfortunately,
governmental transparency has not done well in recent times.  I guess
you can count on politicians to do the opposite of what they say.

> If he is a difficult sort, all the usual comments about him,
> megalomaniac, etc, I don't care about that either way.

There is a documentary about the 6 months when Conan O'Brian could not
work on TV and did a 30 city road show.

The producer of the documentary commented that the documentary was
really about addiction: Conan's addiction to attention.

He is, of course, damned good at what he does and deserves the
attention.  But the point here is that virtually everything that
humans do is because they are seeking attention or the integral of
attentions, status.  If attention motivates Julian Assange, what do
you expect?  Is that different in any way from what motivates
President Obama?  If so, how?

> He was never a buddy
> of mine.  But Private Manning deserves the punishment: the military is a
> special case.

People, including me, have contributed $650,000 to Manning's defense fund.

In his defense, I would quote recent US political statements about
transparency.  It could be argued that he was carrying out the
politically stated intent for better transparency.

I have mixed feelings about transparency.  It clearly would not work
to be open about the deliberations on killing people and who the
lawyers are who make the decisions (in the president's name) about who
will die this week in drone strikes.  The lawyers would live in
constant fear of their lives.

However, that process has almost eliminated the former prime objection
to propulsion lasers.  If governments (particularly the US) already
have the ability and consider it normal to extra judicially kill
people anywhere, then GW propulsion lasers don't introduce anything
new.

Keith

> spike