The American Enterprise Institute has been hemming and hawing over the important policy question, “Why won’t Julian Assange just die already?” Julian Assange, as you might recall, is the jerk from Wikileaks who tricked possibly hundreds of Americans into caring about the war in Afghanistan for maybe thirty seconds. Can’t you just let America watch its vampire sitcoms in peace, Mr. Julian Assange? No? Okay no problem we will just Predator Drone you, then.
It’s true! According to zany AEI shill and WaPo Op-Ed Word Processor Marc A. Thiessen, The United States should use its plentiful “military assets” to find Assange so that it can roast his feet with hot coals and then tickle him with thumbscrews. Just kidding, that is so old-fashioned. This is the twenty-first century — we should probably just kill Julian Assange with flying robots.
There is also strong grassroots support for just cold tactical nukin’ Afghanistan, because Julian Assange can’t put the troops in harms way if the troops are already dead! But does Marc A. Thiessen advocate for nuking our troops in Afghanistan and Julian Assange just to be safe, or does he hate America and love our enemies?
Eh, let’s just compromise and make Wikileaks against the law and then send Julian Assange to Gitmo forever:
[T]he Left wants to keep WikiLeaks open and shut down Guantanamo Bay. We should do precisely the opposite: Shut down WikiLeaks to stop them from providing more classified information to the enemy and keep Guantanamo open to stop the terrorists held there from killing more innocent people.
It must be nice to look at the world through poop-colored glasses. No fuzzy gray areas, just poop, you know? [The American Enterprise Institute]
{ 42 comments }
“Just poop.” Mr Waggaman, you have finally outdone Mr Newell’s “missle krusher dongle.”
Just make him listen to Susan Collins talk for a long time.
Be sure to clean up the blood that drips from his ears, though, or it’ll be a one-way ticket to The Hague for you.
“we should probably just kill Julian Assange with flying robots”
In about ten years this will not be a punchline but a simple statement of fact.
If you’re shit, all you see is shit.
What does the A. stand for in Marc A. Thiessen? I’m going to go ahead and imagine it’s short of Amber.
What does the A. stand for in Marc A. Thiessen? I’m going to go ahead and imagine it’s short for Amber.
err, short FOR Amber…
mornings
There’s nothing conservatives hate more than selective leaking of possibly damaging information.
[re=632577]megs[/re]: short FOR Amber…
Haha wow, I sure made a mess.
Once they repeal DADT, they won’t be able to keep the US military out of Sweden.
Somewhere Satan is pitchforking Robert Novakula and laughing at the irony.
“The Left” = Anything these far right, goosestepping cornholios don’t agree with. Which is, in actuality, “the Majority”.
I agree: nothing is more harmful to the American body politic than actually knowing what the fuck is going on with their government.
(P.S. Wikileaks is a scam anyway: after all, if they’re all into “truth” and “disclosure” why haven’t they posted copies of Obama’s Kenyan birth certificate? Huh? Huh? Answer me. Why?)
It’s unfortunate that Julian Assange is such a prick, you know how the worst possible spokesman for death with dignity would be Kevorkian?
[re=632580]Mr Blifil[/re]: “There’s nothing conservatives hate more than selective leaking.” Full stop.
Except for Vitty-Bitty. He likes it when Mommy has to clean a lil oopsie.
“This is the twenty-first century, we should probably just kill Julian Assange with flying robots.”
Unclear what you are getting at here.
Johnny Sokko’s Flying Robot had finger missiles, a back missile, a bazooka cannon, eye beams, the ramming center V on his chest, a flame thrower, the burning cross technique, electrocution wires, and assorted power punches.
At least 5 of these would seem like a disproportionate use of power and technically “uncool,” Geneva-convetion-wise.
This guy revealed what is being done in our name, with our money?
KILL HIM!!!
[re=632583]megs[/re]: Ha Ha. I thought there was an echo.
[re=632593]freakishlystrong[/re]: Also, gravity is a leftist conspiracy.
Send her to Afghanistan and/or hand her over to the Taliban?
Honestly, this would be much more interesting news of Mark Thessien had encountered a problem that he thought couldn’t be solved by torturing someone to death in Gitmo. The man is seriously as inhmanly repellant a person as Dick Cheney, and at least Cheney (now) has the excuse of lacking an actual functioning human heart, his heart having submitted its resignation, in protest, years ago.
Seriously, torture is a seriously bad thing and we shouldn’t do it, but Mark Thessien makes a very convincing argument that we should maybe make an exception specifically in his case.
Good point, Tao. Julian Assange would look good in an Ed Hardy Polo Bikini.
[re=632625]tao[/re]:
HEENNNGGGHHHH!
[re=632595]Serolf Divad[/re]: I thought Wikileaks was a do it yourself plumbing site.
Put plutonium in his cigars to make his beard fall out.
Taliban has stationery, is the thing that surprised me in all those linkies.
This is great:
“The Taliban officer claimed that the group’s English-language media department continues to actively examine the WikiLeaks material and intends to draw up lists of collaborators in each province, to add to the hit lists of local insurgent commanders.”
Their “English-language media department”? WTF? Is that adjunct to their “corporate strategy and channel-driven synergies group?
Oh yeah, lets also realize, that until Wikileaks posted these names, the Taliban had no idea who was working with the Americans, and, in fact, was just sitting around NOT killing people because they had no idea who the traitors were. In fact, I heard they were bored.
$14 for the Ed Hardy t-shirt, but only $4 more you get the whole bikini? Can you say “christmas shopping already done?” Then say it, brother, say it.
snark off
In 2003, [re=632588]Robert Novak(ula)[/re]: outed Valerie Plame as a CIA operative. Novak’s info likely came from our favorite prince of darkness, Dick Cheney. The outing was purely political, and folks working in the Company, as the CIA is sometimes lovingly known, have stated that Plame’s outing likely led a number of off-shore people getting at best arrested, but more likely tortured and killed. Libtards generally were not heavy with the hoorays on the Novak/Cheney outing of Valerie Plame.
WikiLeak’s leaking of thousands of old after action reports and stale order of battle poop is haled by some, as a proper outing of government shenanigans. I haven’t read all 76,000 or whatever snippets, but clearly there have for me been zero Pentagon Paper moments. Am I missing something here? If so, will someone please share that “we absolutely had to know this item” from the WikiLeaks documents.
The Pentagon Papers release of classified information did shine a light on the fact that LBJ’s administration was clearly lying to both Congress and the American people. From those who have been digging and digging through all those fucking WikiLeaks papers I’m not aware of anything that was turned-up that is much beyond battle voyeurism that provides a quote to support a premise that war is nasty shit. Well, I’m sorry but no shit on that conclusion. Unless you are a total pacifist, which is wonderful but likely not practical in today’s world, what does/do those WikiLeaks have to do with supporting an argument that the US stay in or get the fuck out of Afghanistan?
What some of the leaked WikiLeaks’ documents do contain, as admitted by WikiLeaks themselves, is information that the Taliban could glean to identify individuals who have assisted US and allied forces. More than likely those the Taliban identifies as collaborators, or those the Taliban even thinks maybe were helpful, will die incredibly horrible deaths. And for what please tell me, for what fucking purpose beyond Julian Assange’s fucking ego, those people so identified will have died?
In the interest of personal honesty, I have to admit that in Vietnam my gig included working closely with indigenous informants. In Vietnam, like Afghanistan the warriors and political cadre on the other side did not necessarily wear uniforms, and moved from “civilian” to fighter and back very frequently. For these reasons I take a very dim view of assholes like Novack/Cheney and Julian Assange who knowingly, and when you get past the verbal smoke screen for very personal and not global reasons, feel justified in setting up people for a visit to the great beyond that will assuredly pass through an unholy house of horror.
[re=632595]Serolf Divad[/re]: Not quite sure where you were going with your first sentence. When the government is being a sneaky lying dog I’m right there with putting a spotlight on that kinda behavior. But, but does the government really need to share everything with everyone? Perhaps not. Should the military post on the web all the plans and details for the security systems that surround where nuclear weapons are stored? Uh, probably not. Should generals be required to post on Facebook where they will be attacking tomorrow? Uh, the troopies probably would not support that. Should the Secret Service post all their Presidential security measures to make it easier for assassins? Uh, again maybe not. Perhaps that even in an open democracy there are a few somethings that are best kept under wraps and only shared on a need-to-know basis.
snark on/
[re=632625]tao[/re]: But where are the WaPo-branded fursuits?
[re=632761]weejee[/re]: A few things
Yes, they were both political, but there’s a pretty big gap in terms of motive. Valerie Plame was outed rather obviously in retaliation for the fact that her husband called the Bush Administration out on basing their argument on starting a brand new war on blatant lies that they knew were lies when they made them. Even if you’re an idiot and thing that wasn’t illegal, it’s pretty obivous that it was it was a shitty thing to do, and that this compounds the shittiness of starting a war on false pretenses. By contrast, even if Assange is an asshole about it, and even if it didn’t reveal any “oh shit major news” information, the mission of Wikileaks is largely to push back against a rather odious amount of government secrecy- secrecy that, lest we forget, allowed them to design and implement an official secret torture program for years, one which tortured a number of people to death, even before rumors of its existance started to circulate. Yes, the shitty outcomes are comparable, but unless we’re to believe that Assange was angry at some Afghan informants for some previous slight, there’s an enormous gap in motive there, even if Assange’s ego is a factor, which it certainly is.
Second, well, I’m willing to dispute how non-notable the leaks actually are. I’m reasonably politically aware, particularly on the subject of our terrible wars and if you told me that there was some evidence of Pakistani intelligence was providing material assistance to the Taliban, while we were fighting them, and while we were giving Pakistan military aid, it would have been a surprise to me, even knowing that Pakistan has, at times, been a fairly reluctant partner. I suspect most of the war-supporting public would have been even more surprised, and I do attribute some of this to the fact that much of the American media does quietly sit on many of the more damning stories that come through the wire. “War is ugly and civilians get killed” isn’t news, sure. But “we’re giving military aid to a country that’s also helping the guys trying to kill our forces” kinda is, to most people.
Third, feel free to correct me on this one, but I don’t recall many people, much less opinion columnists for major papers or sitting Congresspeople, openly calling for Karl Rove or Dick Cheney should be extrajudicially assassinated by predator drones or executed for treason. Hell, Bush thought it was “excessive” for Scooter Libby to serve a single moment in prison. I think it’s fair to say that we’re not really seeing an equivalent reaction, here.
I do think it was shitty of Assange not to redact sensitive names, don’t get me wrong. I do also think that, however the amount of secrecy in our government now, is, much as it was during parts of the Cold War, rather dangerous both to our democracy and to the American people at large. If the government can decide to secretly torture people unaccountably, what can’t it do? What can we do to prevent another Tuskeegee, for instance?
Does that mean we should reveal everything about our battle plans, etc? No, of course not. But the best solution to both the “transparency” and “responsibility” issues is for the government to be more forthcoming about these things, while also being waaaay more ingenuous about when something constitutes an actual sensitive state secret that would actually threaten national security to reveal, versus something that is merely embarrassing to the government or opens government officials to criminal or civil liability. Some of us honestly believed that Barry O. would try to fix that bit somewhat, and are sorely disappointed that he decided not to after all. And in the absence of any independent, internal movement from the government, all we really have is Wikileaks, sad to say.
Hahahaha, there are so many things wrong with the “nuking” argument that I don’t even know where to begin, except to say that it’s obvious certain individuals have already had their brains irradiated.
Also, earlier points re: redactions are completely valid. These documents would have had just as much impact if names of informants / their locations were removed, and there’s really little reason to not do so. Just because WikiLeaks knows it might get “blood on its hands” and is at peace with that doesn’t excuse sloppily and negligently exposing individuals to harm.
[re=632691]CaptainDog[/re]: “…English-language media department …” Something from Dilbert, no doubt. Do they also have 401k, medical, dental, etc?
see Hodgeman on this.
[re=632761]weejee[/re]: [re=632800]mumblyjoe[/re]:
/Snark off
:
Weejee:
Brother, This time I have to disagree with you, and go with Mumblyjoe, at least in part.
As I think you and I both know, one of the reasons “The Late Unpleasantness in Southeast Asia” started in the first place (under Eisenhower and then Kennedy); picked up speed (under Johnson); and lasted as long as it did (under Nixon) was that “The American People” really didn’t know what was going on — or weren’t force to pay attention to what was going on.
Absent the disclosure of information that results in a real risk to our military and/or legitimate military objectives, or our allies, etc., I go for disclosure under circumstances such as these, e.g., another foreign adventure started for ambiguous/poorly articulated reasons; that has been mis-managed throughout; and as to which there is no viable exist strategy.
Here, despite the “spin” that the Pentagon, White House and The Right are attempting, there has been no showing that any of the information leaked has resulted in any increased risk to anyone. The recent statements of Admiral Mullen and Secretary Gates made this clear. [In contrast, the disclosure about Plame placed at risk any foreign national with whom she may have had contact.]
Yes, those who are “assisting” us in Afghanistan are at risk. But that’s the nature of guerrilla warfare. And I refuse to accept that, in a close/tribal society such as Afghanistan, The Locals don’t know who is helping whom.
Also, I would be willing to be that a lot of “Our Friends” are double agents (if not triple or more). Your “indigenous informants” in RSVN?: You mean, the Hồi Chánh Viên or the Chieu Hoi? I’m personally convinced that most of those Little Yellow Bastards were working for Uncle Ho, and getting paid by both sides. (When, of course, the ARVN officers actually paid “their” troops.)
To close on a personal note: The first time I got to D.C. on a case after The Wall went up, I left the Marriott on the Hill early to go running down the Mall. I was wearing a Walkman, and the sun was coming up. I got to the Memorial at about dawn, right when the sun was coming up. I was going run past the names, and then circle back to the hotel. No point wasting a lot of time on bad memories — and I still hate that stupid statute they added as a sop to the Hawks.
I kept running for about the first 10 steps. Then I started walking. Then I stopped. And threw up — decorously, into the bushes.
Ah, the memories. Good times. Good times.
After that, I walked back to the hotel.
As the JDL like to say: Never Again. Not if I have anything to do with it.
I think it’s a God-damn Fucking Criminal Outrage that Draft-Dodging MotherFuckers like Cheney and Bush put our people in harm’s way, based on lies and a fundamentally ignorant world view that has No Chance In Hell of being successful.
But if you have a different view, so be it. Unlike said above-referenced Draft-Dodging MotherFuckers, you earned the right to talk.
/Snark on
Personally, I would have shot most of those “Kit Carson Scouts.” Accidentally, of course. After calling in some Arty first, I mean.
[Sorry for the length of this: It was tough getting to work this morning. Santa Monica Blvd. in West Hollywood was closed due to "Congested Buttsex" on all lanes.
PLEASE bring back Prop 8!!!!!]
[re=632578]megs[/re]: I believe it is A for Adolf.
Dear [re=632800]mumblyjoe[/re] I agree with your first point that there was a difference in terms of motive, and would also agree with you that Cheney et al using Plame’s outing (in essence firing her, cause she could no longer work as she had) trumps Assange’s ego. That said, where in WikiLeaks papers is anything about secret torturing? They do show that before McCrystal there the amount of collateral damage, e.g, dead babies, was way too high. However, one thing Barry’s boy may have got right was changing the rules of engagement that has dramatically reduced that problem. Stuff about Dubbya folks turning people over to significant others for interrogation, to provide implausible denial regards the “T” word, has been argued in the press for years. Mumblyjoe, or any other Wonketteer, please point me at anything in the WeakyLeaks that points at US applied or sanctioned torture not previously waterboarded to death by the media.
Regards the Pakis providing assistance to the Taliban, that is something too that has been kicked around for years, particularly the ISI – their army’s intelligence service. Google “pakistan intelligence taliban” and you get ~2.8 million hits most of which go back years and years. This was an item that really caught my eye, given my checkered past in Vietnam, but all that I have seen is whining about Paki aid from middle – upper management Afghani bureaucrats who are not exactly disinterested third parties. Those folks pissing on Pakis is as about as surprising as Sarah Palin getting smacked around on Wonkette. In the past year or so, it seems to me that the Hillz has made some serious inroads in getting the Pakis to be less cooperative with the Taliban. A number of recent articles have addressed how the Pakis play the Taliban really rather than aid them (yes, sorry it is a Newsweak linky clicky, but even those sorry bastards are on top of it). Since Pakistan borders both India and Iran, it is not completely surprising that some Pakis would not be warm to the idea of a strong and healthy Afghanistan. Playing the Taliban does help destabilize that country, even if it doesn’t help what Barry is trying to do. There’s a lot of pushing going back and forth on that, but I do think the Pakis are being more cooperative regards the Taliban under Barry’s watch than they ever were with Dubyah. Again, I don’t see anything in the WeakyLeaks that is worth people getting whacked by the Taliban.
On your third point we are absolutely 100% on the same page there. 100%, those assholes need a serious thrashing, metaphorically speaking, as do those who publish them – WaPO included.
[re=632860]Neilist[/re]: Hồi Chánh Viên or the Chieu Hoi Oh fer two on those brother. And I agree with you that both were about as useful as tits on a boar pig.
And I refuse to accept that, in a close/tribal society such as Afghanistan, The Locals don’t know who is helping whom. Even though the Nam have different mores than Afghanistan does today, and like the USA the rural mores do perhaps conflict with the urbans, in Vietnam it took patience, time, more patience, not those are not necessarily All-American traits. Oh, and leverage – leverage is good.
I kept running for about the first 10 steps. Then I started walking. Then I stopped. And threw up — decorously, into the bushes. Back in the mid 90s, my wife and I took our youngest twin boys on a for them first ever trip back east. We basically hinged the trip around the Ms and caught games at Yankee Stadium, Camden Yard, and Fenway Park. Figuring for 15 year-old twins some baseball might offset all the fucking terrazzo. Between the Baltimore and Boston we stopped in DC, and one of the stops was the Wall. The twins got first startled and the downright scared – Dad was on his knees and sobbing like a baby. Good times, yeah, good times.
Apologies to all for starting these tl;dr posts.
Or as Liz Cheney pointed out on Faux Noise Sunday “Give him to ME!!!”
[re=632888]weejee[/re]: My point about the torture thing was that it was a symptom of broader goverment opacity, as were many of the more heinous things the US did, both abroad, and to its own people, during the Cold War. Yes, it eventually got out, and we eventually stopped it, (although, as far as we know, etc.) but only well after the damage had already been done. And arguably, this had a mite to do with the fact that nobody really thought there was anything wrong with keeping this massive, secret program to torture people a secret, and when anyone tried to bring some of this stuff to light, GWB just shouted STATE SECRETS until they went away. And at least a couple of those things haven’t really changed all that much, even if now we’re assassinating (not that that’s an appropriate word for how Predator drones work) people not-so-secretly secretly, instead of torturing them.
But, in that sense in particular, this was more about activism than about anything peculiar to Afghanistan, admittedly. So, somewhat mixed feelings about that, particularly with the theoretical price tag attached. Theoretical, incidentally, because for all the hand-wringing, we haven’t actually had any confirmed reports of this actually happening yet. Maybe we’ll even see a wikileak about it, but I suspect the DoD is liable to trumpet that particular information from the highest rooftops.
But the thing about that pricetag is that it cuts both ways- the ISI still dicking around with the Taliban in the 2000′s, and us blaming some shitty friendly fire kills on the Taliban instead, also have some pretty direct clear human costs attached with them as well- it perturbs me to no end that the people doing the most public hand-wringing about the safety of Afghan informants right now are also the most likely to dismiss the actual subject matter of the more discouraging reports as incoquential.
Plus, even if it was old news, it clearly was salient enough to enough of the public to inform people’s opinion of the conflict rather markedly, which suggests that it wasn’t really exactly old news to a lot of the people who heard it.
But I thought they LOOOOVED Wikileaks back when they could use Assange’s reposting of douchebaggy emails from climate scientists to “prove” that global warming wasn’t happening?
OH WINGNUTS YOU ARE SO FICKLE
AYN RAND IS DISAPPOINT
[re=632860]Neilist[/re]: I am with you on this, N. “Sunlight is the best disinfectant.” I wish I could take credit for that, but that guy Brandeis beat me to it. Any truth-telling that accelerates the end of a stupid war or wars is jake, j-a-k-e, with me.
O/T, but not really, eight of my fellow and fellowess high-school alumni were murdered in the WTC/911 attack, and I want the Cordoba center there at “Ground Zero” tomorrow, or sooner, even though I’m neither a native nor adopted New Yawkah. You can’t ever grow inter-faith tolerance too fast for me.
WikiLeaks has done a good job.
Doomed AfPak Quagmire has been highlighted by Brzezinsky:
http://afpakwar.com/blog/archives/2797
Al Qaeda is connected to kashmir as well:
http://www.currentintelligence.net/agenda/2010/7/5/al-qaeda-in-kashmir.html
More on Kashmir Quagmire:
http://www.kashmirlibrary.org
-akhila raman
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