I'm honestly of two minds about this outfit; the maverick in me somewhat admires their no-holds-barred crusade for total disclosure. My prudent side, however, is disgusted by the irresponsibility of dumping mass documents which may jeopardize national security and individual safety.
Early on, their mission to expose cover-ups by the U.S. government of potential war crimes (the killing in Iraq of two Reuters reporters by U.S. forces) was admirable, in my opinion. But their recent reveal of hundreds of thousands of diplomatic cables struck me as purely gratuitous. When one adds to that the fact that their skeleton crew can't vet more than the tiniest fraction of these transmissions, their enterprise more and more seems risky and potentially hazardous for those whose secret communiques are being exposed. I fear that, barring some successful attempt to shut them down, they won't cease their operation till someone gets killed.
Regarding the Wikileaks founder, Julian Assange, there have been a lot of attempts to villainize him as an attention-seeker (and worse). I'm not sure that that's the case -- the below (quite lengthy) New Yorker profile from June of this year describes him as possessed of a dark and pessimistic idealism with regard to total freedom of information...I don't know if they plumbed his depths fully enough to unveil all of his motivations, but it's a fascinating read.
Thoughts?
http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2010/06/07/100607fa_fact_khatchadourian
Early on, their mission to expose cover-ups by the U.S. government of potential war crimes (the killing in Iraq of two Reuters reporters by U.S. forces) was admirable, in my opinion. But their recent reveal of hundreds of thousands of diplomatic cables struck me as purely gratuitous. When one adds to that the fact that their skeleton crew can't vet more than the tiniest fraction of these transmissions, their enterprise more and more seems risky and potentially hazardous for those whose secret communiques are being exposed. I fear that, barring some successful attempt to shut them down, they won't cease their operation till someone gets killed.
Regarding the Wikileaks founder, Julian Assange, there have been a lot of attempts to villainize him as an attention-seeker (and worse). I'm not sure that that's the case -- the below (quite lengthy) New Yorker profile from June of this year describes him as possessed of a dark and pessimistic idealism with regard to total freedom of information...I don't know if they plumbed his depths fully enough to unveil all of his motivations, but it's a fascinating read.
Thoughts?
http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2010/06/07/100607fa_fact_khatchadourian
