Wikileak’s Main Aim Is To Reveal Hypocrisy

December 7, 2010

Julian Assange Becomes the US's Public Enemy No. 1

The man who had sent a shockwave through global politics since the publication of the American embassy cables two weekends ago had become a hunted man.

He has also become the Americans' latest public enemy, after having challenged the world's most powerful nation and made its secrets public for all to see.

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Revealed: Assange ‘rape’ accuser linked to notorious CIA operative

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U.S. to Host World Press Freedom Day in 2011

Press Statement

Philip J. Crowley Assistant Secretary, Bureau of Public Affairs Washington, DC December 7, 2010

The United States is pleased to announce that it will host UNESCO’s World Press Freedom Day event in 2011, from May 1 – May 3 in Washington, D.C. UNESCO is the only UN agency with the mandate to promote freedom of expression and its corollary, freedom of the press.

The theme for next year’s commemoration will be 21st Century Media: New Frontiers, New Barriers. The United States places technology and innovation at the forefront of its diplomatic and development efforts. New media has empowered citizens around the world to report on their circumstances, express opinions on world events, and exchange information in environments sometimes hostile to such exercises of individuals’ right to freedom of expression. At the same time, we are concerned about the determination of some governments to censor and silence individuals, and to restrict the free flow of information. We mark events such as World Press Freedom Day in the context of our enduring commitment to support and expand press freedom and the free flow of information in this digital age.

Wikileak's Main Aim Is To Reveal Hypocrisy- done.

Posted by b on December 7, 2010 at 20:37 UTC | Permalink

Comments

Are my eyes deceiving me?
Holy shit you’re back! b is back!! Fuck yes!
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Why Julian Assange (and Wikileaks) are so dangerous. In Assange’s own words – – –
Sun 31 Dec 2006 : The non linear effects of leaks on unjust systems of governance
…different structures of power are differentially affected by leaks (the defection of the inner to the outer) [and] its motivations may become clearer.
The more secretive or unjust an organization is, the more leaks induce fear and paranoia in its leadership and planning coterie. This must result in minimization of efficient internal communications mechanisms (an increase in cognitive “secrecy tax”) and consequent system-wide cognitive decline resulting in decreased ability to hold onto power as the environment demands adaption. Hence in a world where leaking is easy, secretive or unjust systems are nonlinearly hit relative to open, just systems. Since unjust systems, by their nature induce opponents, and in many places barely have the upper hand, mass leaking leaves them exquisitely vulnerable to those who seek to replace them with more open forms of governance. http://iq.org/conspiracies.pdf

Posted by: Anthony | Dec 7 2010 22:34 utc | 1

As supplement to the above linked doc in comment #1, I will link the best third-party analysis of Assange’s strategy that I have seen.

Posted by: Cloud | Dec 8 2010 3:07 utc | 2

It’s just showbiz yall! Or all done w/a house of mirrors…

Posted by: Uncle $cam | Dec 8 2010 7:19 utc | 3

Anyway, the Show must go on…

Posted by: Uncle $cam | Dec 8 2010 7:26 utc | 4

Wikileak’s Main Aim Is To Reveal Hypocrisy- done.
Is it? My jury is still out. Not on Assange, (thats a whole other story) but on wikileaks in particular as a meta-narrative. I’ve watched this politics game far to long to have come to that conclusive conclusion so quickly; I’m quite surprised that you have B…

Posted by: Uncle $cam | Dec 8 2010 12:47 utc | 5

Hello b et. al,
Happy days indeed. My heart warms to see this watering hole back up and, it looks like from Uncle’s third comment, vibrant already. I understand your caution (cynicism?) Uncle but it caught me by surprise as Wikileak seems to me to be one of the few sources of honest, with honest intent, news sources around. I hope your caution is unfounded.
Anyway, I look forward to the first rate discussions of this and hopefully other subjects as b gets things rolling and rollicking again.
Thank you b.

Posted by: juannie | Dec 8 2010 13:05 utc | 6

Oow, nice; this watering hole opens up for a drink – and uncle $cam was generous to invite us at Le Speakeasy…
Anyway, by coincidence, over at http://www.tinyrevolution.com/mt/archives/003412.html Jonathan Schwarz comes out of hibernation / out of his Fortress of Solitude with a post along the same lines as yours, with some funky quotes form Obama and the Madam (Clinton).
The hypocrisie reveals the nakedness and more importantly, the emptiness of the emperor to paraphrase Eco in Libération. The reactions from the lackeys of empire would be hilarious if they weren’t so stupid. I’m not sure the future will bring good things, though.

Posted by: philippe | Dec 8 2010 14:50 utc | 7

B-
Thank you!
The re-opening of MoA must be one of the signs of the apocalypse?
The world certainly is interesting enough at the moment… I’m sure many of us would benefit from drinking a pint glass full of sanity served up here.
I’m waiting on the financial leaks…
Peace
DaveS

Posted by: DaveS | Dec 8 2010 15:06 utc | 8

Well, what a happy surprise to see b again, and hat tip to Uncle Scam for alerting at Speakeasy. I’ll have a glass of Chardonnay, next one is on me.
I don’t quite know what to make of the Wikileaks saga for the moment. I believe WL is exactly what it says it is, that Assange is sincere and coherent. There is no underground plot, conspiracy or manipulation. No hidden actors (the CIA, the Mossad, G. Soros, green reptiles, etc. etc.) played, or play, any role. Sometimes what you see is what you get.
Until the war logs the mainstream – gvmt., media, corps – managed to ignore WL. As well as Cryptome and no doubt others. WL did publish some interesting things, but there wasn’t much uptake, and it was confined to that weird and scuzzy circle of hell – the intertubes.
The war logs themselves didn’t even create much of a ruckus, it was all very much bizness as usual, oh this information has come to light, let’s publish a tad about it. (Of course the material is highly important yet requires analysis by historians and other experts.) No doubt this was very much a wait-and-see strategy, in line with previous policy. I think had there not been more forthcoming, of threats of more, WL might have continued as before. Maybe not. Who knows. The thing is, many ppl, gvmts., official bodies (e.g. U.N), accept the occupations in Iraq and Afgh. and don’t really want to hear about it. War means war crimes, oppression means bombings, murders, rapes, and now destruction of houses, etc. – look the other way. Another explanation is that it simply takes time (and now a lot of phone calls!) for a reaction to kick in and bite, sluggish and uncoordinated as it is, so it is perhaps an accident that the sometimes gossipy and image-damaging content of the diplo logs – I’m referring to what came out for the larger public in Der Spiegel, the Guardian, etc. so far – provoked outrage. I have also read several times that the threat to publish, in the New Year, information about a major US bank, was a spur for counter-attack.

Posted by: Noirette | Dec 8 2010 16:09 utc | 9

continued..
Now the cat is out of the bag.
It was inevitable at some point the grip of MSM be broken by the internet. Remember the hopes in the beginning, that citizen-journalists, and associations with platforms, and even ‘new leaders’ would gather some new powers, rise up, change things, etc.? That didn’t happen, and many thoughtful, informed, brilliant, etc. ppl just gave up. So it took hackers and leaks, exposure of what exists rather than creating novelty. It is understandable. I get it. The wider implications, long term?

Posted by: Noirette | Dec 8 2010 16:11 utc | 10

glenn greenwald on democracynow tuesday:

whatever you think of WikiLeaks, they’ve never been charged with a crime, let alone indicted or convicted. And yet, look at what has happened to them. They’ve been essentially removed from the internet, not just through a denial of service attacks that are very sophisticated, but through political pressure applied to numerous countries. Their funds have been frozen, including funds donated by people around the world for his — for Julian Assange’s defense fund and for WikiLeaks’s defense fund. They’ve had their access to all kinds of accounts cut off. Leading politicians and media figures have called for their assassination, their murder, to be labeled a terrorist organization. What’s really going on here is a war over control of the internet and whether or not the internet can actually serve what a lot of people hoped its ultimate purpose was, which was to allow citizens to band together and democratize the checks on the world’s most powerful factions. That’s what this really is about.

a perfect time for moa to rise from the ashes

Posted by: b real | Dec 8 2010 16:19 utc | 11

When you are most needed you return with flags flying to give renewed courage to us all. Cead mile failte romhat.

Posted by: eas | Dec 8 2010 18:23 utc | 12

Notice that the US government, despite making claims that leaking secret war documents would put our soldiers in Afghanistan and Iraq in harm’s way, didn’t threaten to prosecute, much less assassinate, Julian Assange for this. But when he leaked documents which exposed the incompetencies and the outright lies committed by our high-ranking diplomats, top officials in all three branches of our government came forward, demanding that Mr. Assange be tried as an enemy combatant who’s a clear and present danger to our national security. This goes to show that our top government officials believe that it’s far more important to protect the reputations of our diplomats than it is to protect the lives of our soldiers. To them, our imperial diplomats are to be protected at all cost, while our soldiers are nothing but lowlife pawns in the game of empire building. And what’s particularly ironic about this is that our mainstream media would rather defended government oppression than protect freedom of the press.
Also notice that the US government and many of its allies are hell bent on prosecuting Julian Assange for espionage and other crimes against the American Empire, but they aren’t hell bent on doing the same to the deep pockets behind WikiLeaks. I suppose that this is just another example where our guardians and protectors of the Empire are willing to sacrifice the peons in order to save the bigwigs at the top.
real b, I too can’t think of a better time than now for the Moon to make a comeback. I wouldn’t feel this way had the Empire not declared an all-out war on WikiLeaks — the most important weapon we have in our fight save freedom of the press!

Posted by: Cynthia | Dec 8 2010 18:23 utc | 13

Noirette,
If you haven’t already read the entire Forbes interview with Assange, I recommend you do so. That interview is most revealing and very reassuring that no matter what may happen to Assange, WikiLeaks has gone global and will now be very difficult to stop.
Assange makes clear that he is not, as some would have us believe, anti-business. The purpose of WikiLeaks is to expose criminality and corruption in high places and thereby force integrity and ethics in the way big business deal with big government. It’s really quite simple: those government-backed corporations that engage in corrupt and illegal activities will now have reason to fear full exposure of their dirty deeds. Their veil of secrecy that has hidden and protected them from being exposed is now in the process of being torn down. So IMO, the citizens of the world owe the WikiLeaks people our unwavering support and enduring gratitude.
http://blogs.forbes.com/andygreenberg/2010/11/29/wikileaks-julian-assange-wants-to-spill-your-corporate-secrets/

Posted by: Cynthia | Dec 8 2010 18:41 utc | 14

I for one never took MoA off the top of my blogroll. Always was the best commentary and format on the internet, bar none. Besides, I’m a way too weary of all the trains to nowhere, hobo camps, and mental Hoovervilles. Also, willing to share my last pint of Mad Dog with the home crowd.

Posted by: anna missed | Dec 8 2010 19:06 utc | 15

Hiya’ll! Big howdy to B
Well thank xist or whatever fer that! I’ve been getting in all sorts of trouble all over the net since this place closed. Except fer the Speakeasy where I can retreat when it gets too much of course, but there are sooo many unreconstructed loonies, dingbats and numbskulls on the other blogs that are open, it is impossible to have a real dialogue . .
Anyway this isn’t all about me, I wanted to mull over one of the things that has been festering or is it fermenting in the consciousness over the past couple of days.
It seems likely that Holder & oblamblam are going to front for a prosecution of Assange under some derivative of the espionage act. If I could be bothered I would enter into a rave about how much hubris does it require for a state to prosecute a citizen of another state, living in a third nation, for treason but we all know that however much imperial arrogance is required , the amerikan empire has more.
No I was prompted by an article in my local fishwrap this morning which was reprinted from the Independent (after 2008 both rags have been picked up by a former Russian oligarch living in exile in London. As well as being even more neo-liberal than b4 both have a strong zionist bent they didn’t used to).
Anyway this article reckons that:

Informal discussions have already been held between American and Swedish officials about the possibility of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange eventually being delivered into United States custody, according to diplomatic sources.
Assange, 39, was in a British jail last night awaiting extradition to Sweden, where he is wanted over allegations that he sexually assaulted two women. The Australian was refused bail at City of Westminster magistrates’ court on the grounds there was a risk he would abscond, despite a number of prominent public figures offering sureties.
His arrest was described by the US Defence Secretary, Robert Gates, as “good news”. The US Justice Department is considering charging Assange with espionage offences after his website released classified US diplomatic files.

Remember as B has pointed out, it is the major fishwraps which have selected these cables for publication and run them first yet no one is talking about charging them.
I won’t beat about the bush it seems pretty obvious to me that we are about to have an amerikan court imposed division thrust upon information dissemination, not just within amerika, but right across the planet.
Certain reliable and trusted organs ie those which toe the line and reprint the lies they are told will be designated ‘media outlets’ and given protection under the amerikan first amendment. Anyone else will be living in a grey area scared that if they write the wrong thing they can be grabbed from wherever in the world they live and tossed in an amerikan prison for the rest of their life.
Can’t happen? Watch it happen. Wikileaks had to use the mediia because there was no way that they could muster the resources to sort and compile that information into something that meant anything to the average peep. However since the fuss over the first release when assholes were claiming afghani give-ups were gonna be killed (that there hasn’t been a single recorded case of that is irrelevant apparently), the major outlets (yes including the guardian) have been bending over backwards to select data that reinforces the imperial backstory whilst blackening Assange & Wikileaks in the eyes of the citizenry.
WL has been on the back foot because the issue of Bradley Manning weighs heavily. Survivor guilt I believe the psychs call it. They haven’t made a lot of smart moves and then when amerika decided the issue was big enough to burn a couple of undercover agentess’ who had been encouraged to get close to Assange, it became just a matter of time.
The thing is we can be all fatalistic and say Julian fucked up and cry in our beers, but it will be all of us who then have to live in a world where the only information is their information.
And for what it is worth Julian is still a hero in my book. He wasn’t as unprincipled as them and certainly didn’t have the same resources, but that doesn’t make him a fool or a traitor or any of the other imprecations that are gonna be tossed by peeps who should know better.
Unless we can make it plain that doing over Assange is overkill, everyone will regret missing the opportunity.
The media outlets especially. Because if this gets up they are going to be living on a knife’s edge, whereby their status can be revoked simply by a a HateWeek as they did with WikiLeaks. When that happens all their colleagues will be so craven that they jump to the front of the line in bringing their colleagues down lest the same fate befall them. We know this because we know our history, just as Orwell wrote his novels based on what had learned.
I am already sensing some doubt from some commentators on this very issue, prosecuting Assange is a bridge too far for some. And I don’t mean Kevin Rudd whose comments need to be regarded as the usual pol doubletalk, but within the few media commentators who still think for themselves, there is great hesitance about this. I don’t need to paint a picture of how bad things will get if this comes to pass. At least I hope I don’t. This is exactly what we have always suspected could happen but dismissed as being paranoic.
Just as we dismissed the regular attempts by state agencies to steal our civil rights before 911. 911 allowed that we can’t allow the Wikileaks fit-up to enable the next step into horror.

Posted by: Debs is dead | Dec 8 2010 20:52 utc | 16

it sure is nice to see the regulars around and it makes me damn happy that b found some time to write (no matter how briefly).
I too have been struck at the panic and heavy handedness of this latest response. Part of me wants to believe it is the folks with money who really don’t want their laundry aired in public. when it was just soldiers gunning down civilians..we could live with that. then it came out that their were some diplomatic moments of frankness which are probably a bit embarrassing but not really harmful. when word came out about the hard disk from a major bank that wikileaks has…then the shit hit the fan.
there is a full court press going on by our betters. I really don’t know what most US people think about this as I am overseas and my job really discourages discussion of this sort of thing. I do see that Euronews had a poll today whether Assange’s arrest was politically motivated and about 90% said yes. for what my fellow americans think I look to Joe Bageant who is not impressed as you will see when you read AMERICA: Y UR PEEPS B SO DUM?

Posted by: dan of steele | Dec 8 2010 21:59 utc | 17

It’s worth pointing out, as Cloud does above, that JA has carefully thought out his goals and methods. His goal is to hinder organizations that act against the common good, the method is by revealing secrets. The organizations clamp down on security and stop communicating within themselves and as a result become less effective.
My brief research tells me he has expertise in computer network and security issues, and he has posted extensively on security expert lists since at least the mid-1990s. He is 37 now, so he would have been about 23 at that time. He is a young man who clearly grew up in the era of cyberpunk, cypherpunk and recent decades of oppressive war by western powers.

A cypherpunk is an activist advocating widespread use of strong cryptography as a route to social and political change.

Here’s an interesting Assange quote making the rounds, not sure when it’s from.
“A man in chains knows he should have acted sooner for his ability to influence the actions of the state is near its end. To deal with powerful conspiratorial actions we must think ahead and attack the process that leads to them since the actions themselves can not be dealt with.”
This is one of the most interesting battles to occur in public in a very long time. Julian Assange may have come up with a unique way to bring honor to his name.

Posted by: jonku | Dec 8 2010 22:17 utc | 18

Hallelujah, praise the internet lord, miracles do happen. Thanx B for the early x-mas prezzi.
Talking about hypocrisy:

…But White House spokesman Robert Gibbs condemned the release, warning that publishing the documents would jeopardize “our diplomats, intelligence professionals and people around the world who come to the United States for assistance in promoting democracy and open government…”

Couldn’t get better satire on the comedy channel.

Posted by: Juan Moment | Dec 8 2010 22:19 utc | 19

I cannot help but conclude the the one of the very real consequences of Assange’s postings..will be fought over the controll of the freedoms these very wires allow us all..and in empire and others attempts to restrict,censure and controll them…dare to struggle dare to win

Posted by: noiseannoys | Dec 9 2010 0:48 utc | 20

Sorry to play the worrywart, but late last week I decided to download the archive of the cablegate postings to date, each day. The site was updating all releases thus far each day, linked to the bottom of this page .
The last one to be uploaded was dated the 4th of december and I downloaded it on the 6th (the difference is most likely the fact that I live a few hundred kilometers west of the international dateline combined with the possibility it was uploaded to Wiki leaks late in the evening. That can make a 14 or 15 hour delay between upload and download appear to be 48 hours).
THe 6th (NZ time) was the day before Assange handed himself in. In all likelihood that day was spent on a deal of issues more important than getting the latest archive up.
However it is now 3 days since I downloaded that volume and 5 days later than the date on the last archive.
This concerns me greatly, not because I think WL are being slack, or cowardly but because it may demonstrate that the incarceration of Assange has exposed a hole in the wikileaks operation.
One that now allows the corporate media to have complete control over what is leaked when.
I hope this is just a temporary hiccup, because the alternative is that the forces of darkness have scored a victory much too easily.
I also hope I am wrong and have been looking in the wrong places. The guardian claimed to have new releases in both their 8/12/2010 and their 9/12/2010 editions (NB here where I live date DDMMYYYY).
I have just checked the latest Guardian stories on cables about africa (Primarily eritrea & nigeria) and although the Guardian appears to have stopped reprinting the cables in full, I have been unable to find any of the strings they quote in their stories in the last archive available titled “cablegate-201012041409.7z” .
Has anyone else had better luck?
Hopefully I am looking in the wrong places. If not we are about to be overwhelmed with even more embassy tittle tattle about african states and the other targets of the empire’s rampant greed.

Posted by: Debs is dead | Dec 9 2010 2:12 utc | 21

Thanks b, for opening MoA at this critical moment. I think it’s important to defend Assange and support Wikileaks as best we can. Only a small sample of the files has been released and just look at the over-reaction of the US administration! The reaction has brought out extremist views in the ranks of US officials. There’s talk of using the Espionage Act, whose history goes back to the potent suppression of political activists during the First World War; and whenever that rusty old warhorse is trotted out, you know that some really serious political repression is being pondered.

Posted by: Copeland | Dec 9 2010 2:32 utc | 22

I’ll have a Glenfiddich, please…no ice. Thank you, kind sir!

Posted by: Dr. Wellington Yueh | Dec 9 2010 3:21 utc | 23

Anonymous hackers hit Visa Mastercard in WikiLeaks revenge
Again, I’ll save my judgment, on who may or may not being responsible for this regardless of headlines…

Posted by: Uncle $cam | Dec 9 2010 4:16 utc | 24

Sorry, just found this too…
Operation Payback cripples MasterCard site in revenge for WikiLeaks ban
I’m just reiterating, examine these things from a parallax view.As often is the case, the truth is dynamic.

Posted by: Uncle $cam | Dec 9 2010 4:33 utc | 25

@debs (9:12:18 PM),
At time of writing, I see the link ‘Click here to download full site in single archive’ pointing to a 201012082231.7z.torrent file (haven’t checked what’s inside, yet)

Posted by: philippe | Dec 9 2010 4:34 utc | 26

Thanks Philippe. It was as I suspected it may be. Late last week after the amazon/DDOS thing a number of different WL mirrors were created. I had been using the one located at http://wikileaks.ch which was the fastest for me to get around. Apparently it hasn’t been updated. Neither has the one which was set up to work around the problem of lack of root server translation & referral, which was listed as the IP address http://88.80.13.160, rather than a text address.
They were the first two sites I have been going to, but after I saw your post I thought I may as well run through the complete list of mirrors and the 4th url took me on to a site that has had a new archive every day from the 28/11/10 ton 08/12/10.
It matters to me because the few media outlets remaining in this country have been very selective about the cables involving here they publish. There has only been one of any real significance, the report of an amerikan pro-consul on a tour of North Eastern Afghanistan. He wrote:

Province faces a different set of security challenges. As
the head of the UNAMA office for the region tells it, even
though Baghlan generally flies under the national radar, it
actually deserves to be labeled “the wild, wild west.”
xxxxxxxxxxxx, behind-the-scenes
contests for power (including on the part of the provincial
chief of police); the influence of local strongmen and former
mujahedeen (particularly in northern Baghlan); unchecked
poppy cultivation in Andarab district; underlying
Tajik-Pashtun tensions; and criminality all combine to
undermine stability. Direct insurgent activity appears
limited, but criminal elements have fashioned links to the
Taliban. Locals have also made themselves available to
execute for-hire insurgent missions. The Hungarian PRT does
little to address any of these problems. They are not
permitted to fire their weapons except in self-defense, do
little more than patrol the main roads and undertake no
counter-narcotics activities. When two Hungarian de-miners
were killed doing their work, Budapest stopped sending mine
clearers to the PRT. When the security situation in
northeastern Bamyan Province was threatened by Baghlan-based
malefactors, it was the New Zealanders who had to cross into
Baghlan to address the problem. The PRT sees itself as
focused on humanitarian assistance and small-scale
development work. Again xxxxxxxxxxxx,
his nation’s troops are looking to do their short stints in
Afghanistan and get back home unscathed.

None of NZ’s media outlets picked up on it for several days although they had been contacted, given a copy of the link and asked why a mere mention of this country got banners in every other instance but the news that NZ PRT appeared to be exceeding it’s mandate and policing areas outside it’s jurisdiction copped no mention.
So the cable appeared on a few blogs although it seemed that most peeps preferred talking about what they saw to be the flaws in Assange’s character.
Then after the head of the military released a press statement which was just more of the usual propaganda, then the mainstream media ran the story as a “aren’t our troops wonderful” thing.
The kiwi attitude here can’t properly be explained in a couple of lines. I may post in it some other time when I have time. A rough n ready sketch I see it as a “Lets have our cake and eat it too” kind of a thing whereby NZ’s no longer independent foreign policy is kept quiet in the hope that other people will believe nothing has changed, thereby keeping up the bullshit facade of clean green for tourists, meanwhile crawling into bed with empire in the mistaken hope a few crumbs may fall off the table.
Things haven’t gotten too bad here yet (or rather most of the things happening elsewhere happened here back in the 80’s), so many believe everywhere else is like that too.
Big digression -sorry my point is that smaller nations like NZ need to have citizens getting across the cables early b4 the media puts together their perverse take.
For me the issue should be who are these people selling out their nation by discussing confidential business with foreign agents? Officials from everywhere, especially england, seem talk to amerikan embassy officials about stuff that they shouldn’t and if the law were properly applied, they should all be up on treason charges.

Posted by: Debs is dead | Dec 9 2010 5:44 utc | 27

wow.
just when i keep kicking myself for falling off at le speakeasy (we who were the flame for a wee bit)
i see this.
at a local blog i feed i wrote this:

As pundits and politicians stupidly call for the execution of Julian Assange for treason (stupid because he’s an Australian citizen) I watch the spectacle and am confounded how once again an opportunity to truly see how this country is being run is lost on the dumbfounded public.
There should be absolutely no more illusions about the complicity of the Obama administration in perpetuating the policies of Bush. Obama and his lackeys have proven eager to go to bat by covering up crimes and coercing other nations from bringing criminals like Dick Cheney to justice (because our country refuses to). Obama too easily bows to the same corporate task masters running the war machine and sucking the public trough dry, and his inability to frame the issues we face in a way that might further a more progressive agenda, at this point, appears like an almost willful ineptitude.
Our political system is so corrupt, partisan, and dysfunctional that an aging Lawrence Eagleburger (Secretary of State under Pappy Bush) felt compelled to appear on Olberman of all places in order to plead for the obstructionist GOP to understand the dire need to pass the new START treaty, which they oppose for no good reason other than torpedoing Obama and ultimately the entire country.
And another former high-level Republican appointee, Paul Craig Roberts, continues his brave observations after being ostracized from the inner circles of corporate media for opposing the Iraq invasion and subsequent occupation. His take on the wikileaks spectacle is, as usual, quite insightful.
It really is too bad the lesson we all should be getting from the latest wikileaks data dump—that even the most mundane workings of government is being reflexively kept secret from us—is getting buried in the noise.
Instead we’ll be treated to increasingly rabid calls for someone to pay for compromising our NATIONAL SECURITY, and executing Bradley Manning for treason will become a drumbeat on Fox News. As for the courageous Aussie standing up against the psychotic imperialism of America, we’ll get the sex treatment, and pundits will be talking about his penis, broken condoms, and a man’s capability to control his ejaculate.
Speaking of treason, if our laws are intended to be enforced equitably in this country, and it turns out a majority of Americans can be stirred into a frenzy of support for the execution of Bradley Manning, then to be fair we should also consider the execution of congresswoman Jane Harman for treason, because technically that’s what she did as supposedly evidenced by a conversation caught on a NSA wiretap.
Unfortunately we are not a nation where blind justice presides. Instead there is a growing fascist cyst growing on the skin of this country, and its pores are filled with secrecy and repression. Otherwise the extent of a truly frightening bipartisan attack on our constitutionally protected rights as citizens might percolate among the populace, and if we fully realized how far we’ve already gone toward a dark, authoritarian future that would make Orwell blush, then maybe we wouldn’t allow the kabuki theatre of national politics to distract us from the behind the scenes consensus of the wealthy few against the impoverished masses.
If that ever happened—if the masses could be roused from their slumber—then domestically the police state is in place and ready to go, wherever needed. The TSA controversy is just a normalizing piece of corporate media-hyped propaganda to incrementally move us toward acceptance of our new position as cattle for the ruling class.
This level of pessimism is getting more and more difficult to dismiss. It’s no longer just fringe-thinking, conspiracy-prone paranoids that see where continued passivity in the face of our fascist slide will take us.
The question, as always, is what can we do about it?

for what it’s worth.

Posted by: lizard | Dec 9 2010 6:06 utc | 28

The more i read of this the stickier it gets…but,with that comes the clarity of the growing deperation of empire to darken any light.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2010/dec/08/julian-assange-extradition-attempt?CMP=twt_fd
a quote from above link
“Amid suggestions that the US is examining ways to take legal action against Assange, one of his lawyers, Mark Stephens, repeated his claims that Sweden’s actions were politically motivated, perhaps as a stalling tactic while the Americans bring a charge: “If there are talks between Sweden and the US for his rendition, we have every reason to be concerned.”
I post this qoute from Shelly, again..
Rise like lions after slumber
In unvanquishable number,
Shake your chains to earth like dew
Which in sleep had fallen on you-
Ye are many-they are few…

Posted by: noiseannoys | Dec 9 2010 6:19 utc | 29

Sifting through the signal to noise ratio, at this point is useless, except for the expected and truly brilliant psyop. One can never be certain of anything with these dark lords…
However, the one tangible thing one can look to is what Debs has shared above… as an anchor, boundry-marker for the present/immediate future.. More will be revealed. Thanks Did…

Posted by: Uncle $cam | Dec 9 2010 6:56 utc | 30

Attention b real, et,al…
WikiLeaks cables: Shell’s grip on Nigerian state revealed

US embassy cables reveal top executive’s claims that company ‘knows everything’ about key decisions in government ministries

Posted by: Uncle $cam | Dec 9 2010 8:52 utc | 31

I am so glad that you are back B. Welcome back my friend. Welcome back. I am getting goose bumps as I type this.

Posted by: ndahi | Dec 9 2010 9:50 utc | 32

I predict many more G5’s, G6’s, G7’s, G8’s, G9’s & GT10’s along with occasional G20’s and lots more big sports festivals, and other heads of government meetings.
I suppose they do do some work at these tings, n receive their fresh orders, amend old ones etc, but mostly they are a great way of shifting interest away from a story that looks like it may cause all sorts of trouble by running for 8 days. I forget the exact details but any story that stays on front pages for more than 7 days, is a story that is likely to cause real head-aches and can easily slip outa the control of the spinners.
I know how insane that sounds but one thing the WikiLeaks cables have demonstrated beyond a shadow of a doubt is that a great many people do spend a lot of time and energy, ensuring a co-ordinated approach to spinning the news to the angle that best advantages empire.
This is particularly true in relation to amerika recapturing its original ME colony, Iran. Diplomats from most embassies in Iran are instructed on how amerika wants them to behave (remember amerika doesn’t have a Tehran embassy so they are keen to ensure everyone else toes the line. US officials tried to organise a boycott of Ahmadinejad’s inauguration but failed because too many countries are keen to not totally burn the bridges. The walkout by the whitefella western countries as Ahmadinejad hit the stage at the UN general assembly was the result of orders from amerika. The brits did something wrong – apparently the englandish ambassador to the UN missed his cue and was most cowering & apologetic.
Of course being english the mess up could have been deliberate cause they (the english) were flat out putting together a deal for BP or some such.
We can’t tell that but the cables do tell us that amerika instructs diplomats from other nations on what to do vis a vis Iran.

Posted by: Debs is dead | Dec 9 2010 9:56 utc | 33

that last post is but a fragment of something that almost made sense, but due to my lack of MoA prctise got lost in the ether. Sorry bout that gang

Posted by: Debs is dead | Dec 9 2010 9:59 utc | 34

And so it begins…
Hacker war begins
Visa is Down
As a commenter elsewhere pointed out, “these attacks will only serve to further the case for severe net regulation{retaliation}. Aggressive interference with the corporate tyrannies that run most of the developed world will just be branded “internet terrorism” and work to their advantage.”
indeed, the war in cyberspace is officially on, in ernest …
if MOA is to remain open and an island of intellectual thought, as it once was, we need b to declare his intentions, (is this temporary or contingent on something or other) and given the answer, that we brace ourselves for the coming Tsunami. I’d also, highly suggest 1)that we mirror the MOA website, use la speak as a reserve, AND that MOA’s become familiar w/IRC Chat clients.
I see the storm clouds gathering, is it the fascist boot upon us?; we might not make it past this one…
@Anthony and cloud, just wanted to acknowledge and thank you guys for your input, especially the pdf in comment #1.

Posted by: Uncle $cam | Dec 9 2010 12:38 utc | 35

Cynthia, I read that interview (Forbes), as well as several others, plus videos, which is one of the reasons I consider WL and Assange to be exactly what they say they are. The other is that Assange’s general ideology (as I see it) is remarkably coherent and quite well worked out, and I am familiar with it, as I know somef 25-30 geeks.
Assange’s stance on the free market, very strongly for, his vacant dismissal of 9/11 ‘conspiracy theories’ – he used a term like ‘tiresome‘ (I’m too lazy to look it up) are all right in line with an acceptable, and well argued, position both for very conventional, traditional views, and against hypocrisy, with the latter being the more vital spike. One can’t show up hypocrisy if one denies, attacks, or contests, the founding principles that are being subverted, denied, lied about.
Your post makes the same point I did in a different way. Lets have a drink!
Debs said: Unless we can make it plain that doing over Assange is overkill, everyone will regret missing the opportunity.
Right on.

Posted by: Noirette | Dec 9 2010 12:49 utc | 36

Just dropping by to join the reunion. Since I agree that more documentation is, in the long run, always better than less, I welcome Assange’s actions. That there may well be other interested parties “helping him” is not unexpected. It would certainly be great to have multiple credible rivals to Assange and co. in “liberating” secret documents whose secrecy serves only to conceal misdeeds and
perfidy. I doubt that the number of secret documents non lying in this category is very substantial.

Posted by: Hannah K. O’Luthon | Dec 9 2010 13:41 utc | 37

ahhhhhh!!!!
OMG

Posted by: annie | Dec 9 2010 14:18 utc | 38

mirror mirror on the wall
http://wikileaks.ch/mirrors.html

Posted by: noiseannoys | Dec 9 2010 14:18 utc | 39

I guess this is the reunion thread so I’ll say again: Missed you b.
2,255,888 visitors since 2004. Wow.

Posted by: beq | Dec 9 2010 18:05 utc | 40

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