Good on You, WikiLeaks

Looks like the U.S. Government wants to get WikiLeaks added to the list of terrorists. I think they need to look along different avenues of solving the problem.

Because wikileaks is simply reporting fact and was not directly or indirectly implicit in the removal of these docs from government custody, they should be protected by the constitution under freedom of the press. If these documents were being released by the New York Times, you can bet your ass that’s what would happen.

Also, the public attention that they are driving is an act of civil disobedience that is designed to improve our government by exposing flaws, correcting behavior, and increasing security and should be openly supported. It is part of what our founding fathers stood for and encouraged.

It is the responsibility of the government itself to maintain its own secrets and prevent the initial theft, and those thieves should be dually prosecuted under the law. But… Further recipients of those stolen secrets, which are now basically public domain, hold no culpability in the theft, regardless of what is done with them.

Based on this, if you were to prosecute wikileaks, then where do you stop? If I visit the websitE and look at the docs, then I now have a caches copy on my computer and am now in possession of stolen secrets. Am I now liable as well?

I don’t think so.

Good on you, wikileaks. George Washington would be proud.