Wikileaks founder Julian Assange remains in jail in London without bail while the British decide whether to send him to Sweden to face an investigation on sex charges.
While he is resting, it’s a good time to review the situation.
Assange is the guy who dumped a quarter-million U.S. State Department cables on the Internet, infuriating Sec. of State Hillary Clinton and diplomats all over the world. The cables were all classified confidential or higher. Sec. Clinton accused Assange of attacking the U.S. — and the rest of the world. He is, several said, a terrorist.
As more and more thoughtful people have read more and more of the cables, Assange is still being called names, but U.S. diplomacy is looking good. Those frequency critical of the U.S. are saying the cables prove that our diplomats say that same things in their confidential (!) cables as they do at Rotary club lunches.
The U.S., the cables prove, really does believe in human rights, in democracy, in free speech. What was first seen as a damaging blow is turning out to be a public relations bonanza.
So does this mean no more secret diplomacy? Nope. It will always be necessary for diplomats to make candid assessments of the governments to which they are assigned and to send those assessments back to Foggy Bottom, hoping they will remain confidential. A much more secure system will be constructed to make this possible.
But how about the new criticisms? America doesn’t really believe in freedom of speech or transparent government, critics — particularly Russian critics — are saying. If they did, they wouldn’t be asking for Assange’s head. To say that America has been attacked and the Assange is a terrorist just because some official documents have been made public seems to make a mockery of the First Amendment.
Point made.
The reaction of Sec. Clinton and the Iola Register, among others, was over the top.
Assange isn’t a terrorist. He may not have committed any crime more serious than a voyeur does when peering through a bedroom window. What he did is more akin to filching diaries, copying them and sticking them on the Internet, than it is to espionage. He is, at the least, a rude evesdropper who certainly deserves no respect but may not deserve incarceration.
As I observed in my first burst of outrage, Assange got access to a government website that was accessible to some two million U.S. service, state department, intelligence agency and other government personnel. Access was given to him by a government employee who will pay dearly, as he should, for doing so. But it was ridiculous for the government to believe that information available to so many people could be kept confidential. And once it did become public, it was fair game.
Our official reaction should be to punish the guy who leaked to Wikileak — and then plug the holes.
Emerson Lynn, jr.
