WikiLeaks: The Inside Story

Watch live streaming video from columbiajournalism at livestream.com

Watch Editors Bill Keller, of The New York Times, and The Guardian’s Alan Rusbridger discuss their interactions with WikiLeak’s Julian Assange and the decision to publish the secret diplomatic cables he uncovered. Jack Goldsmith, a Harvard Law School professor and former assistant attorney general, joined this conversation moderated by Emily Bell, director of the Tow Center for Digital Journalism at Columbia Journalism School.

Journalism School Dean Nicholas Lemann kicked off this highly anticipated event held at 7 p.m. on the Columbia University campus.

Jullian Assange WikiLeaks Founder Assails Fox News, Huckabee and Palin

After listening to this interview of Jullian Assange, I encourage American's to review the Wednesday, December 8, 2010 posting below, "Bad Citizenship May Be A Crime."

Jullian Assange makes very strong points about the inappropriate, if not criminal conduct that has taken place by members of Fox News and some of our own elected government representatives. Their conduct needs to address and it is time for the American people to call them onto the carpet. We need to do our own thinking America and stop listening to irresponsible politicians and shock jocks who fancy themselves journalists.

Importantly, there is an issue related to the treatement of PFC Bradley Manning, cooking the facts and the absence of due process that has taken place on his behalf. Americans have reason to start demanding accountability from members of our own governmental.

The exclusive MSNBC December 22, 2010 of interview oJullian Assange can be seen at the URL that follows here: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/12/22/julian-assange-msnbc-fox_n_800471.html

BAD CITIZENSHIP MAY BE A CRIME

BAD CITIZENSHIP MAY BE A CRIME


By RANDELL A. MONACO, Esq.
December 8, 2010

Does restricting access to the Internet infringe upon freedoms of speech? Certainly not in the eyes of United States Senator Joe Lieberman, chair of the Homeland Security Committee, who has now taken credit for getting Amazon.com to kick Wikileaks off its servers. Amazon continues to deny that their decision had anything to do with Lieberman despite that he has warned other tech firms not to host the site either.

Joe Lieberman suggested on Fox News today that the four media outlets that have publicized the Wikileaks cables should be investigated. "To me, the New York Times has committed at least an act of bad citizenship," Lieberman said. "Whether they've committed a crime, I think that bears very intensive inquiry by the Justice Department.”

Has access to the internet become a basic human right? Certainly not in the United States where access seemingly belongs to PayPal, eBay and Amazon to plunder the nickels and pennies that still trickle down to the shrinking middle class. Does anyone think that Lieberman might now be indebted to these companies for their cooperation?

Does restricting access to the Internet infringe upon our fundamental constitutional rights to freedoms of speech and press? The legal analysis of this question requires a “strict scrutiny” test which simply stated requires a judicial determination of whether there is any other possible less restrictive way to avoid the harm threatened. Off the top of my head, it seems obvious that competent security of State Department Cables would be a much less restrictive manner presuming that diplomatic inconvenience is actually a threatened “harm” which outweighs the rights guaranteed Americans. This analysis seems to close the circle bringing us back to the issue of competence.

Apparently Joe Lieberman a former state attorney general, has little regard for our freedom of the press stating to Fox News that, “I think that bears a very intensive inquiry by the Justice Department” referring to whether the New York Times had committed a crime by publishing the diplomatic cables. How is the “publishing” by Wikileaks or the republishing by the New York Times different? The fact is that neither of them stole or conspired to steal the diplomatic cables that were downloaded by U.S. Army PFC Bradley Manning while serving abroad who then brought them home to Boston and, while on leave, sent them off to WikiLeaks.

Despite the absence of discussion, you might be interested to know that PFC Manning has not been formally charged, but is in custody. This raises the issue of why? If there is a genuine threat of “harm” and not mere diplomatic embarrassment or inconvenience then why hasn’t he been charged with treason? My guess is that the facts may still be cooking and that PFC Manning might be needed to testify should the Justice Department come up with a recipe to charge Julian Assange.

Julian Assange, I believe has, the same fundamental right that supposedly we each have which is to publish statements others make if they are true and accurate. He has a right to speak and the question that factually continues to elude discussion is, how does an Australian citizen publishing diplomatic cables from a foreign country commit an act of treason or some other crime? Without a discussion of jurisdiction, a “crime” of any sort requires the unity of a mental state and, as in this case, an act, presumably publishing.

I personally find these suggestions coming from a U.S. Senator UN-AMERICAN! After all these are the fundamental freedoms that our ancestors left their homes, fought and shed their blood to win for us. America, it appears Joe Lieberman and other senior government officials have deemed inconvenience, embarrassment and concealing truth more important.
Again, to my way of thinking, there is something seriously wrong when in this “digital age of enlightenment” one person like Joe Lieberman can cut our people off from global consciousness? The term for this, had Lieberman properly sought a Judicial Order to enlist the cooperation of PayPal, Amazon and eBay, is prior restraint. Knowingly, Joe Lieberman has violated the rights of every American with his admitted end run on our judicial processes by either, intimidating, bullying or bartering with PayPal, Amazon and eBay and intimidating other American tech companies not to host WikiLeaks.

In the end these unjust restrictive efforts and attempts to censor internet content, I expect, will strengthen the resolve of those who seek to and have a voice and disobey Joe Lieberman?
Last week, The New York Times and four other news organizations began carrying articles based on an archive of a quarter-million confidential State Department cables obtained by WikiLeaks making them available to their readers. Does America think that is a crime? I’m betting no!

In this holiday season, I urge American’s to show eBay, PayPal and Amazon that there is no place for their services here in the United States.

Journalistic Transparency, a Mandate for Hope of Global Democracy

By RANDELL A. MONACO, Esq.
December 4, 2010

How much influence has Corporate America had on the recent efforts and mobilization of the international community and the U.S. Justice Department to censor WikiLeaks who has become an important international transparency organization?

Media freedom watchdog Reporters Without Borders on Saturday condemned the personal attacks on Assange and "the blocking, cyber-attacks and political pressure" in what it called the first "attempt at the international community level to censor a website dedicated to the principle of transparency."

The question being begged is to what extent have the recent intervention efforts been stepped up out of concern of exposed wrong doing and the promised WikiLeaks release of information come Monday about conduct on Wall Street and in the U.S. Banks? It seems more than coincidence that the intervention of US Senator Joseph Lieberman resulted in the decisions of Dynamic Network Services Inc., PayPal and Amazon Inc..

On December 2, 2010 American owned EveryDNS dropped WikiLeaks from its entries, citing DDoS attacks that "threatened the stability of its infrastructure". The validity of that concern should be questioned. The site's 'info' DNS lookup remained operational at alternative addresses for direct access respectively to the Wikileaks and Cablegate websites.

In step with Dynamic Network Services Inc., Amazon Inc. severed its ties with WikiLeaks, to which it was providing infrastructure services. As reported by Dylan Welch of theAge.com.au this followed the intervention of an aide on behalf of US Senator Joseph Lieberman.

Then, on December 4, 2010 PayPal, the payment processor owned by eBay, permanently cut access to WikiLeaks.org. In a blog posting PayPal claimed that WikiLeaks violated its "Acceptable Use Policy".

There seem plenty of reasons to question PayPal’s claims and Amazon’s denial of acting under political pressure following the intervention of Senator Lieberman’s aide. Senator Lieberman, who later praised Amazon's decision and called for other companies to follow suit, has also proposed new legislation to amend the Espionage Act to include the “publication” of “human intelligence” targeting similar cases — Securing Human Intelligence and Enforcing Lawful Dissemination Act, also known as the SHIELD Act .

Without discussion or public statement of review of obvious constitutional concerns related to the freedoms of speech and press, corporate America and the international community have acted to censor what should have been recognized as a public service to our Nation. The vulnerability and release of this information has exposed the real concern, NOT the publication which was after the fact.

Also, access to WikiLeaks has been blocked in the United States Library of Congress. Importantly, on December 3, 2010, the White House Office of Management and Budget dispatched a memo forbidding all unauthorized federal government employees and contractors from accessing classified documents publicly available on WikiLeaks and other websites. Presumably this would include off hours access from personal non-public computers.

Is seems that what is being focused on is the embarrassing wrong doing possibly by, and between, both Wall Street and government officials. This is speculation but this sequence of events is beginning to look and walk like a duck!
The temporary shutdown of WikiLeaks seems an end to an extraordinary week for Mr. Assange, a 39-year-old Australian, and possibly a warm up of things to come in the week ahead for Wall Street and others yet to be named.

A call to action for the boycott of Amazon, PayPal and eBay this Christmas Season would be a worthy stand for Global Democracy.