Note that he didn't just lift a video and send it to Wikileaks. He also stole and released 260,000 classified US State Department diplomatic cables."
I've got mixed feelings about this. On the one hand, they were classified cables. On the other hand, he single-handedly created a diplomatic nightmare for Hildebeast and hundreds of Obama donors who got cushy ambassador jobs for donating to his campaign.
That latter part has to be worth at least something in the case for leniency.
Too much stuff is classified.
The burden of proof should be on the government to *PROVE* that every single document, image or video should be classified. And at that for no longer than ten years or so. It should be *VERY* hard to classify anything, Make a legal presumption of declassification unless it can be proven, beyond a shadow of a doubt that the item in question would lead to the death of U.S. military personnel or citizens or the quantifiable damaging of American interests.
Sunlight is the best disinfectant. I’m sorry some journalists were ‘embedded’ with some bad guys, happens, here’s the video, kiddies, mamas don’t let your babies grow up to be jihadies. It’s not like it’s going to change the way our enemies feel about us, is it? Sure it might traumatize some latte drinking liberals, BFD.
I’d even say that an honest appraisal of the ‘Pentagon Papers’ would show that having those out there was better, in the long run, for our Republic. It showed the incompetence and delusion of the Kennedy and Johnson administrations and I, personally, think that every POTUS and their staff should have, hanging over their heads, the fact that eventually everything they have written, said, and done will become public record; they are are our paid staff, after all. We citizens are members of a free republic, we have the right to know what those we select to lead us are doing and have done; yes we should prosecute those who give information actually useful to our adversaries, but the burden of proof should be high and heavy to show that the information in question provided tangible and concrete aid to our enemies and is not merely embarrassing information that someone would rather have not see light of day.
We need to seriously limit how much can even *BE* classified and for how long. It would be better for nothing to be classified than for everything the government wanted classified to be forever perfectly hidden.