Posted on 12/04/2010 7:07:52 AM PST by 2ndDivisionVet
Rep. Ron Paul (R-Texas) is defending WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange's release of thousands of classified diplomatic cables.
In an interview with Fox Business Thursday, Paul went against the opinions of many of his Republican colleagues, asserting that Assange should be given the same protections as the media.
"In a free society we're supposed to know the truth," Paul said. "In a society where truth becomes treason, then we're in big trouble. And now, people who are revealing the truth are getting into trouble for it."
“This whole notion that Assange, who's an Australian, that we want to prosecute him for treason. I mean, aren't they jumping to a wild conclusion?” he added. “This is media, isn't it? I mean, why don't we prosecute The New York Times or anybody that releases this?"
Earlier this week, Attorney General Eric Holder said that the Justice Department is investigating Assange's case to determine whether he can be charged with a crime for leaking the secret documents.
Arkansas Goveror Mike Huckabee went so far as to say Tuesday that Assange should be tried for treason and face the death penalty if proven guilty.
Most U.S. politicians claim that the leaked cables will damage relations with U.S. allies.
We need to go after the corrupt US government and Banksters that Julian Assange has done us the favor of exposing. I totally agree with Ron Paul.
All of the information Assange leaked out on his website just verifies what we all suspected anyway. Who was shocked to find out that NK sold nuclear material to Iran? Nobody thats who. Who didn’t know the Saudi’s wanted an attack on Iran? And On and on and on.
Message to Huckabuck: Assanage is not a US citizen he can’t be tried for treason.
You folks better be a lot more worried about the shadow government and the unelected beauracrcy that are currently taking our freedoms and installing a marxist regime right under our noses than one international information broker who is publishing the truth on his website.
Wake up before its too late.
Whose invasion plans were published? What has been published is stuff like how we used your tax dollars to pay off third world dicatators to sign up to global warming.
You're right, he's what, Australian? Why should we expect any non-American to be bound by American laws outside America? I've got no particular beef with Assange, other than he is playing a dangerous game releasing information that may endanger our people. If I were in his shoes I think discretion and common decency would lead me to not release that information.
Now, who-ever it is that released the information to him, they ought to be hung. Literally and publicly.
Step A - get the actual leaker for treason.
Step B - Roll some heads of those above him, all the way to Zer0.
That will not go over well here!
The painful truth is that it is probably best it happened this way. The US had a huge whole in its security that without a doubt had been compromised by foreign governments. This info was in the hands of our enemies - it just was not known.
As you say, the people who should be charged with treason are the individuals who provided the data and especially those responsible for designing the security of the system.
However, I don’t expect many people here agree with us.
Heck... exposing the TRUTH about the Saudi funding of Al qaeda might actually IMPROVE our national security.
He is certifiable.
In a competitive world where you are a democracy and there are facts that your government leaders are stumblebums, does not your survival require knowing those facst so that the People who control the government can take corrective action.
We are not talking about publishing the security codes for the communications for our troops in Afghanastan. We are talking about information like the decision to resolve the palestinian question BEFORE we deal with the Iran nuke problem. like the former is going to happen in God's lifetime.
In the end, all we’re witnessing is the deconstruction of the Western Democracies...which by their very virtue of the deficits required to run them, are becoming as much of an anachronism to the world as the European Monarchs were 100 years ago.
And you'd support Obama's administration being able to decide who should be assassinated as a threat to national security?
I suppose you'd be saying that anybody that exposes a government operation of killing people for political reasons (masked in the needs of national security) should be shot too, if they decide that it's in the best interest of the government for people not to find out about it.
He is a jackass.
But I do think the correct order would be 1. Determine whether classified information was accessed illegally, 2. Determine whether it was communicated illegally, 3. Gather evidence, 4. Find those who are most likely behind it, 5. Accuse, 6. Try, 7. If guilty, punish, if not guilty, release.
The Internet is not a license to break national law.
How about a Chess game where you have a Grand Master making all the moves on one side and you have the combined talents of 300,000,000 free citizens analyzing his moves and making suggestions as to the countermoves on the other side.
The strength of our Democracy is not our ability to execute things in secret but rather our ability to count on a free citizenry individual and collectively to stand up to the plate and do the right things on their own account with their own situational awareness. Free information is the strength of a democratic society, not its weakness.
Again, let me say, there is information that is genuinely classified because harm to the government will result. And then there is all the stuff that is marked classified because it is administratively convenient to do so, but which actually is not.
It seems impossible to make a rational argument against an irrational position. Without principles to govern society and common sense born of bad experience paul’s logic is almost unassailable isn’t it? Doesn’t free speech mean that anyone has the right to say anything they want to say? Shouldn’t you or anyone else be free to just simply speak their mind at any time on any subject? Try this at work with your boss, with a client, at home with your wife or with the 300 pound gorilla a the local bar and grill... let me know how that works out for you. Consequences for word and deed have bearing on the limit of free speech.
Do you suppose he could leak out a bunch of emails from bank execs joking about their plans to steal money from everyone they could...and their political pets would do nothing?
People who don’t already realize that has happened already never will. You do make a good point. The big uproar on this guy revved up when he started talking about mega banks.
Step one should be, determine which information was, in fact, classified. Information is not classified because some classification bureaucrat marked it classified (yes that administrative step is important, but not a final determination), but whether its release will potentially damage national security.
The fundamental problem in prosecution, in many of these cases, is the necessary step of demonstrating that harm to national security could follow the release of the information.
It seems likely that most of America’s secrets have already been stolen by other powers and super-powers, so it’s a real pity that the door will be bolted before the world can get a similar degree of insight into the workings of nations that may use this information against the west with no risk of their own secrets being revealed.
In other words, I keen to eventually see a whole lot of Chinese, Russian and middle-eastern communiqué.
1) Manning - firing squad.
2) Assange- 20 yrs for espionage
3) tighten up and lock down the access to information
We need adult patriots back in charge of our national security. This whole problem can be solved if we have the spine to act.
Free speech is one matter, but it ends when that speech puts human lives in jeopary.
Assange, the creeps who supplies him with the data, and everyone working for WikiLeaks should be jailed. It is their intent to destroy the United States.
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