Wikileaks

[tcaudilllg]

is reshaping the political map, nationally and internationally.

Clinton has announced she will not continue public service after leaving her Sec. State job. Ironically it seems to me that she's the perfect individual to repair relations with other countries in the wake of the Wikileaks revelations. Her frankness in discussing hers and others' self-interests reminds national groups of their common need for each other.

Ron Paul has come out in support of Wikileaks, a sign that the Tea Party coalition is breaking up in the face of a test between cultural purity and hypocrisy. TIME Magazine's positive report on the magazine is an indication that "intellectual middle America" (read, the ideological meeting of the minds between conservative and liberal reformers) approves of the disclosures and Wikileak's general mission/philosophy.

There is reason to believe that Assange will be able to amount the costliest criminal defense in history, probably dwarfing even O.J. Simpson. The government's case against him is very weak...; however because he is a foreign national it is probable there will be efforts to try him before a grand jury, so as to evade public sympathy. It would be a clear sign that the government is trying to hide something NOT in the national interest.

Wikileaks has announced that a hundred thousand computer enthusiasts around the world are on tap to release the cables should something happen to either Assange or it. Assange has managed to dent nationalism itself by mounting the first international crusade against corruption.

Eagerly awaiting the Bank of America docs.

[EyeSeeCold]

Huh? Aren't grand juries intended to assess if there is enough evidence to propose that someone is guilty?

[Capitalist Pig]

Ugh, enough about fucking Wikileaks. This shit is getting as trite as OJ.

[Creepy-bg]

Ugh, enough about fucking Wikileaks. This shit is getting as trite as OJ.

[xerx]

Eh, a lot of the leaked info was already pretty obvious. Berlusconi is a clown. US foreign policy is shaped by their economic interests. Governments in the Middle East are corrupt. The last one was definitely a shocker!!!

[tcaudilllg]

I've been thinking Assange is taking on too much of this on his own. He needs to respect that others have an interest in these leaks and he needs to let them defend THEIR OWN interests. Of course we know there will be no end to the academic and journalistic gambits to get hold of these papers... the cat is out of the bag and to advocate for the release of these documents is to become a left-wing hero, to be perfectly honest. Waiting for Assange to be arrested before advocating for his ambition -- waiting until it is clear nothing can be done to complain -- is not only the coward's way out... it's outright dishonest.

For that matter, I think after this the only thing the Left will tolerate as top-secret are time-sensitive military tactical docs. Because after seeing, it's plain that there is a lot of bad shit going on, stuff that if revealed would end up seeing a lot of the people involved go to jail. Assange has exposed not explicit corruption, but the immediately obvious conclusion that many things are top secret that shouldn't be top secret. The pressure to release every doc will never end, and will show its hand in full at the beginning of 2012, when an unstoppable Left wave sweeps the United States.

As it is, America is quickly sliding into a totally sociopathic society in the wake of this continued profound economic weakness. I know what's going on -- it's been discussed that productivity gains are being transmuted directly into equal profits for less labor. But I also know that surveys are being leveraged to determine finite market sizes, with a lot of resources being pushed -- and other tactics besides -- to control these markets that are growing at predictable rates. It so happens these can be predicted with dual-type theory (and political type theory, to an extent)... but careful pattern analysis can also be the base for these kinds of market studies. There is an oligarchic-style conspiracy to hold the unemployment rate at 10%.

[tcaudilllg]

Am I right in thinking that Assange is probably the kind of guy who would go to pretty much any lengths, no matter how negative, to bring truth to light?

[EyeSeeCold]

Are you proposing LII?

[silverchris9]

Okay, so I was indifferent about all this wikileaks shit, but now that there are people actually in jail over it, and Julian Assange is actually going to get charged with a crime (and Mike Huckabee, who I formerly had half a shred of respect for, is effectively saying that Bradley Manning should be tarred, feathered, lynched and hung from the nearest poplar tree), I'm interested in it now. Someone please make the argument for me: why should Julian Assange go to jail? 'Cause from my perspective, it just looks like the government lies, and this website posts things that bring the lies and shady stuff to light. I don't see how that is a crime much less an immoral act. And the fact that somehow people have constructed a narrative wherein he lacks the moral high ground doesn't make sense to me, but hey, I figure anything can be done with the right rhetoric. So yeah, make the argument.

[tcaudilllg]

OK Assange is a hacker. Hacking is a kind of programming, which is NiTe exerted: a bunch of little arithmetic operations used to direct and decide from among possible outcomes for whatever purpose. (the IM type usually defines the programmer's specialty in that respect... for example an SEI-ILI might like programming games, or art tools) Assange could be an LII... because they say he's one of the most skilled hackers in the world and to have that kinda skill -- hell, to even choose hacking as your specialty --, you've got to do a lot of experimenting testing random propositions as to how the system you're trying to hack into is rigged. LII-ILI is pretty much THE internet security type -- you can just imagine how useful Ti is for purposes of categorizing the millions of viruses, trojans and what have you out there. In my estimation conservative and liberal LII-ILIs play games of cat and mouse, the liberal being the one likely to try breaking into the system, and the conservative being the one to protect it.

I've not honestly taken a lot of time to read up on Assange's writings, so I'm really sure what type he is. But LII is a possibility. ILI EM I'm sure of. 100%. You can EM type (or 16-subtype or whatever descriptive system you prefer) just by classifying what a person does in terms of two elements. The more you understand what a person is good at, the easier it is to perform an accurate diagnosis. Assange is a programmer, hence he's an ILI EM. ILI EM people have NeTi (speculation and evidence, respectively) in their mystery block (the EM equivalent to the id block): they see truth as something mysterious and elusive. A million speculations, hardly a shred of evidence. When they think they can get it, they usually go for it. They think it's important, but too complicated to infer. Assange is so interested in these cables because for him they are a light into something that he otherwise can't see into. Most people are able to infer based on probability what our government is doing behind the scenes... it seems like he can't, and so he needs a compensation.

In essence he's just a very insecure person.

I'm very concerned about the long term fallout of his endeavor. The State Dept doesn't keep big secrets and it's very unlikely that the DoD has any information that we honest to god do not need getting out for sake of our physical survival. There is no contact with aliens. Iraq and Afghanistan are already out. But I think what Assange means to do, particularly now that he has all the secrets, is to create a world where there are fewer secrets. We're losing the war in Afghanistan because of these secrets. Secrets undermine us, and that's why Assange wants us to stop using them.

It seems like a perfect world scenario but a world with fewer government secrets will not be, just a more trusting and effective one in which radical forces are easier, not harder to fight. For the record, the 9/11 commission concluded among its findings that government was too secretive and so should use fewer classified (or "controlled") documents. The reason it hasn't has little to do with national security and a lot to do with covering the tracks of diplomats (and their personal convenience). Diplomats are often political appointees... senators, governors, and think-tank heads who want an opportunity to burnish their credentials for future races.

The good news is there is an excellent chance that Bush's cronies will be caught doing something, meaning some of them might go to jail. (actually scratch that, Obama will just pardon them).

Now about Assange's dramatic streak, that's NiFe exerted... ethical aspiration and whatnot. It's basically the same thing that drives "open" software and media, like the General Public License, Linux, file sharing, and of course Wikileaks. Programmers believe in "dramatic enterprise"... getting paid to do something that makes the world demonstrably more even, just, transparent, open... whatever.

I do get the impression that the world is more emotionally open, and maybe more sympathetic, on the whole, since the leaks began appearing. I'm very concerned though, that at the rate Assange is dribbling them out he could end up weakening Obama. That would definitely not be in his interest or the world's. What would it mean for yet another cascade of 50 cables to be coming out on Election Day 2012? It could become Obama's version of Jimmy Carter's OPEC embargo.

[tcaudilllg]

Here's info on that whole thing about the cables and the reactions to them:

Wikileaks: new diplomatic cables 'contain UFO details', says Julian Assange - Telegraph

[tcaudilllg]

OK now he's saying Obama should resign if he knew about the UN spy order. That's going too far. (although I can't imagine that he would do such a thing).

But there's that NeTi mystery block working overtime again. LOL... uncovering one "conspiracy" just leads to a bigger one.

But honestly I don't like the triangulating that goes on in Obama's WH. He needs to clean it.

And he also needs to get the party's approval before making domestic policy decisions.

[olduser]

I think everyone is missing the boat in the wikileaks discussion. Mostly because the discussion is about wikileaks the organization, and Julian Assange. I like the documents themselves because it gives some view in the political process, and how nations operate. It is very curious to me that we send diplomats to China and look at the sort of science they are doing, etc. Also, the information is interesting and we have only seen ~1000 cables thus far meaning there are 249,000 to go which could yield us or help us see historical events in a different perspective. The cables are not really a complete information source, they are only the vantage point of select individuals.

[tcaudilllg]

Well with this latest release of a breakdown of U.S. vital interests, I think the U.S.' days of dominance are numbered.

I think it's relatively obvious to the decent people of the world what Obama needs to do next. Hopefully, it's obvious for him as well.

But you can't really dispute at this point that the emperor wears no clothes.

[tcaudilllg]

What are the chances the US is gonna try to apprehend not only the Wikileaks people, but also the TIME Mag editors and others who are going over the docs?

Michael Hayden wrote an article today that was very sharply critical of them, apparently trying to build support for some sorta move against that process.

That's the thing about it... the government is overreacting in a situation in which lots of people are involved. I mean PayPal, MasterCard, Visa... 4chan hit them ALL today.

How far is the government going to go, is the big question; and what will it mean to U.S. culture if it goes too far?

I think the problem is Obama's people. He's got the wrong people, who are giving him awful advice, and he needs to get a better brain trust immediately.

[Creepy-]

U.S. Celebrates Wikileaks Arrest By Announcing Press Freedom Day
the irony

adding:
"Even in authoritarian countries information networks are helping people discover new facts and making governments more accountable"
-- US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, January 21, 2010






lol

[Creepy-]

Pied Piper this time:

Things anyone can do to support private communication in general and Wikileaks in particular:

- set up a Tor relay (server) on your computer to donate bandwidth. Tor is an anonymity network that is used by Wikileaks as well. It's basically a network of proxies - these are the servers that can access outside sites. Anyone can connect to it - some privacy setups use it, I think that some FireFox add-ons, too, but I don't trust them so never used - but the less servers run out there (exit points), slower it moves, so harder for people to transmit information. More servers possibly add an additional layer of security, by obfuscating connections into complexity. These are instructions for the Windows users: https://www.torproject.org/docs/tor-doc-relay.html.en. (Linux/BSD/other Unix check your documentation)

- this is not some big deal but who wants to possess and optionally share/spread "teh real shit" Assange's insurance file can do it. It may be called "insurance.aes256" or "Insurance Assange Style.aes256" or making part of a torrent download/directory called "Wikileaks-Afghan_War_Diary_2004-2010-AllFormats" (the file in it is "insurance.aes256", too). Likely a 7zip archive encrypted through OpenSSL with an unbreakable algorithm named in its extension (assuming, again, that its password is long enough). To make sure that you get the correct file, its SHA1 hashsum is: cce54d3a8af370213d23fcbfe8cddc8619a0734c (source). This is the checksum of the fully downloaded file, not the torrent, neither checked while the file is downloading! (eg. run on most Linux distros: sha1sum /path/to/insurance.aes256 after the download is complete; for Windows there are different programs). Additionally, this is the exact file size can be verified: 1,491,834,576 Bytes, in case that you suspect that the file can be a fake made by discovering a hash collision.

--
PP

[tcaudilllg]

There's a dark curtain falling over the United States. We do not know that Wikileaks will not eventually be charged as some kind of new "cyber espionage" law, which our feckless courts will probably uphold. Associating themselves with Wikileaks in any way is dangerous for American citizens.

But godspeed in your bid to bring down this evil giant. You have my gratitude, if not my material support. It'll take time to make it safe to support Wikileaks in the future... a long, uphill battle awaits but victory is inevitable.

Really what I see the threat as here is that someone is trying to change the rules of the game mid-play. (that someone being the U.S. government). Politically, this is Cheney, Hayden and Co. (the neocons) insisting that leaking U.S. non-technical/time sensitive secrets is harmful. Then you have the conservative traditionalists and reformers howling that this hurts us, along with actually some of the people on the traditionalist Left who are just seeing this as an attack on America (not that most of those people care for foreign interests anyhow). The traditionalist Left will come around, but it'll take some time. In the meantime, the conservatives are using this transient majority to drive home their assault on Wikileaks.

But it's too late, because you cannot escape the conclusion that the rules of the game have been changed mid-stream: SCOTUS ruled that leak publication by the press was protected by the 1st amendment, and now they want to prosecute Wikileaks because it's not "mainstream" press? And the mere obviousness that the politicians are doing this not to punish anyone for hurting the U.S. (which has not happened)? The very principle of mid-game rule changes is itself very frightening, because we've seen a very dark side of America -- a side which declares itself an enemy of the world's forward progress. There is something very, very wrong with America, such that it is becoming increasingly dangerous to both its citizens and foreigners. Because when people do things that they have a genuinely good reason to believe are in accordance with the law, then they are not to be tried as criminals. To assert an interpretation of the law for purposes of trying someone may be tolerable in such cases where tyranny is concerned -- or fraud -- but when it concerns the press, or science... it's intolerable.

[Creepy-]

Avaaz.org - Wikileaks: Stop the crackdown

[Simon Ssmall]

Online petitions, serious bussiness

[leckysupport]

Eh, a lot of the leaked info was already pretty obvious. Berlusconi is a clown. US foreign policy is shaped by their economic interests. Governments in the Middle East are corrupt. The last one was definitely a shocker!!!

It's stuff a lot of people already guessed, but I see it as confirmation.

[force my hand]

U.S. Celebrates Wikileaks Arrest By Announcing Press Freedom Day
the irony

I was expecting a link to The Onion.

War is peace, etc.?

[xerx]

It's stuff a lot of people already guessed, but I see it as confirmation.

I hope that the lives saved by the absense of future wars balances out the lives of dead informants, plus the coming increase in government secrecy and bald-faced dictatorship. (Not being sarcastic here, I sincerely hope it was worth it and that the confirmation will lead people to make active changes).

http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/201...nt-informants/

[Rick]

It would be great to see traditional governments, which have always operated through secrecy and suppression of information, be superseded by a more horizontal and transparent managerial structure where all information is accessible to everyone. With the Internet this is now theoretically possible for the first time, and maybe Wikileaks will be a catalyst towards a restructuring of politics and government. I am skeptical, but the prospect is still exciting.

[Creepy-]

It would be great to see traditional governments, which have always operated through secrecy and suppression of information, be superseded by a more horizontal and transparent managerial structure where all information is accessible to everyone. With the Internet this is now theoretically possible for the first time, and maybe Wikileaks will be a catalyst towards a restructuring of politics and government. I am skeptical, but the prospect is still exciting.

I'm very optimistic about the success of the movement actually (and yes, I think that the Internet is the most powerful medium involved), with a little difference: history repeats. I don't think this is the first time this happens and the evolution comes only in superficial terms (technology, different methods), but the status-quo is just a cyclic array. Access to a large variety of resources always triggered such de-centralization, to higher or lower levels, but also in different ecosystems - locally and globally.

Trade and variety means also information, how I'd describe the period we just got/get out from - and IMO this was always the case. But mark my words, because most of us will likely be alive that time: in 20-30 years we'll experience a similar unrest as the one around the world wars, this type of decentralization and free thought will create ideological - and harmless, at first - nuclei, but they will create the necessity of "putting order into chaos", the seed of the future adherents, revolutions and wars (hopefully not violent anymore).

This period is very similar to the anarchist movement of the second half of the 19th century. I don't believe in the master ring and I believe that Sauron never sleeps, authoritarianism is part of our nature, too, and it has its role. What may change is the understanding of the whole process, that things don't just "evolve" in one direction, but that it's an eternal cycle - at least I don't any have evidence that it will ever end. I have my doubts, though, that the importance of this fact will ever be acknowledged by everyone, I'm not the first neither the last to observe these things along the time. So just saying .
When you look back into history, submerging into a real story with a happy-ending, just to wake up and recall what happened next - not happy at all, from the same perspective. I'm not pessimistic, actually, in the end our beloved children and grand-children will struggle to bring authoritarianism back, can we do something about it? It's us, humans.

Every phase will eventually reach a peak of abuse (in its respective sense), boldness, imprudence and decadence - it's only a matter of time. I find that it is truth in the words "That is born will die".
---

Watch the following conference of Moxie Marlinspike, it's very interesting - makes you understand what's actually going on. I agree 99% with what he says, but, like IMO your case, I disagree with the idea of "evolution", that this subversive method for controlling information is "new" because of the Internet. Anyway, enjoy. (the guy is kinda harassed by the Government (US) because he's a "hacker" (evil, Satan) and a fighter for freedom and privacy)


--
Pied Piper

[Capitalist Pig]

Abolish the state, and none of this would ever become an issue.

[Not A Communist Shill]

But then more things would be concealed, and more people would be murdered in their beds.

[Rick]

...

Thanks and well-said. You're definitely right about history repeating itself. In the past the tools of information exchange were less effective than the Internet, but so were the tools of control and organization of society. One might as easily argue that we are moving towards an age of unprecedented totalitarianism thanks to increasingly efficient means of control. Perhaps both are true, as you suggest.

My reason for skepticism is that the Earth's finite resources place limits on the degree of complexity that can be achieved. We are probably quite close to those limits already, meaning that further evolution wil be towards less complexity rather than more. I don't see how complexity can be increased while energy inputs decrease (this was discussed in other threads on Peak Oil, etc.). What would be optimal would be to decrease complexity (economic, organizational, transportational, etc.) while retaining sophistication of means of communication (i.e. Internet), but whether this is possible remains to be seen.

[Rick]

Abolish the state, and none of this would ever become an issue.

Proposed: a new Constitution

1. No states are to exist on the territory defined by the former state.
2. Attempts to create states within this territory are to be considered unlawful.
3. Those who attempt to create states will be punished by the State Abolishment Committee ("SAC"), which is to consist of a legislative branch and a putative branch.
a. The duty of the legislative branch of the SAC is to determine what consitutes an attempt to establish a state.
b. The duty of the putative branch of the SAC is to punish offenders identified by the legislative branch in the manner determined by the legislative branch.
c. Members of the legislative and putative branches of the SAC are to be selected in the following manner...

[tcaudilllg]

Proposed: a new Constitution

1. No states are to exist on the territory defined by the former state.
2. Attempts to create states within this territory are to be considered unlawful.
3. Those who attempt to create states will be punished by the State Abolishment Committee ("SAC"), which is to consist of a legislative branch and a putative branch.
a. The duty of the legislative branch of the SAC is to determine what consitutes an attempt to establish a state.
b. The duty of the putative branch of the SAC is to punish offenders identified by the legislative branch in the manner determined by the legislative branch.
c. Members of the legislative and putative branches of the SAC are to be selected in the following manner...

Rick I like that! An anti-LSI government...

Hey wait a second! How is this any different from what we've got?