The Wikileaks Question

[JackRiddler]

.

Why do people have trouble understanding nathan28?

You may not like the tone (which you could tone down slightly nathan when you notice that people don't get your jokes) but it's almost always well-argued and clear as a bell what he means.

It's the New York style, perhaps.

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[Project Willow]

Looks Like Assange's MC'd mom has got in on the action, so now we know once and for all that this is really just a limited hang-out controlled opposition effort. That's why people are calling for Assange's assassination, including likely presidential candidates.

is that sarcasm?

Nathan's broad brush is smacking everyone across the face, and no, it doesn't read as a joke to me. I might have missed a few posts but I actually see a lot of questioning and I-don't-knows rather than jumping to conclusions and damn anyone to hell for posting something in order to learn more about it because one doesn't know anything about the author (Emory.)

As for the subject at hand, after reading Twyla's post I take my eyeroll back.

[barracuda]

...Twyla's post...

Yep.

US State Department has banned all employees from using WikiLeaks

[justdrew]

Looks Like Assange's MC'd mom has got in on the action, so now we know once and for all that this is really just a limited hang-out controlled opposition effort. That's why people are calling for Assange's assassination, including likely presidential candidates.

is that sarcasm?

Nathan's broad brush is smacking everyone across the face, and no, it doesn't read as a joke to me. I might have missed a few posts but I actually see a lot of questioning and I-don't-knows rather than jumping to conclusions and damn anyone to hell for posting something in order to learn more about it because one doesn't know anything about the author (Emory.)

As for the subject at hand, after reading Twyla's post I take my eyeroll back.

I'm going to assume it's sarcasm as I understand the term
Meaning he thinks:
it is NOT "a limited hang-out controlled opposition effort."

[MacCruiskeen]

nathan28 knows.

[MacCruiskeen]

It couldn't be a lily, or a daffy daffadilly

[justdrew]

Note this guy must have been operating a botnet, so there's nothing "good guy" about this jester...

anti-WikiLeaks hacker raided by the cops
01 December, 2010

A self-styled 'hacktivist for good' who claimed to have carried out the denial of service attacks which took down WikiLeaks over the weekend has been raided by police.

A posting on The Jester's Blog says:

"So much for being quiet around here. The fire is starting to stir. As many of you already are aware my door was kicked in and all of my equipment was seized. The weird thing is it was the local sheriff's office not the government. Hmmm.

"In the mean time, my email and WordPress accounts are probably jeopardized so I decided to launch on my own server since nothing can be trusted at this time. I still have copies of all utilities, code, and web backups.

"I will keep everyone posted as things start to unfold. I am not sure what's going to happen, no charges have been filed as of yet. Thanks for all your support!"

It's not clear whether the raid was part of an ongoing action on the part of local law enforcement or was prompted by the DoS attack on whistle-blowing outfit WikiLeaks. Either way, the fact that WikiLeaks was unavailable for several hours on Sunday and again on Tuesday is of little consequence as the dossier of 250,000 or more secret Government wires had already been distributed to newspapers all over the world.

The Jester, who has previously attacked militant jihadist web sites, is now trying to raise the $10,000 in lawyer's fees he reckons he'll need to get out of this particular pickle.

---

SEPERATE SOURCE ON THE JESTER'S ATTACK

[Pele'sDaughter]

WikiStink
by Susan Abulhawa at dissidentvoice.org

Over a quarter of a million diplomatic cables, marked – “secret” , “confidential”, or “unclassified” – to and from the US State Department have been “leaked” to the public, presumably by a whistleblower. On the surface, it seems like the sort of thing that restores power to the people. It arms us all with knowledge and reminds those in power that they must answer to the public.

Then you pause to think. And that’s when the holes in this narrative become obvious.
Although WikiLeaks claims to provide a counter balance to the decades of disinformation served up in heaps by the “old media”, it chose to allow the vetting of these documents by these same outlets. Other highly respected media outlets, like al Jazeera and various independent media, were excluded. I find that odd, for starters.

If we take a look at the content of the cables themselves, the most remarkable thing to come out of these secret and confidential memos is what they do not contain. Granted, only 290 have actually been released so far. But it seems far from a coincidence that nearly every cable to and from Arab states released thus far has to do with villainizing Iran and mum’s the word on most major diplomatic hooplas of the past few years.

Take for example the bombshell briefing by a senior military officers to Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Admiral Michael Mullen earlier in the year. The team was dispatched by Commander General David Petraeus to brief the Pentagon on intelligence that Israeli intransigence in the peace process was jeopardizing American troops in Iraq and Afghanistan and that America was perceived as weak, ineffectual, and unable to stand up to Israel.

Such political commentary from the highest echelons of the military was unprecedented and when news of this briefing broke, you can bet there was a significant diplomatic flurry. Yet a simple search of Petraeus’ name in the cablegate database on the Guardian website only turns up cables indicating that Arab countries were eager for an attack on Iran, which coincidentally happens to bolster Israel’s drumming for more war.

You can’t even find Vice President Joe Biden’s name in the keyword search even though Israel’s announcement of the construction of more illegal Jewish-only settlements in East Jerusalem on the eve of Biden’s visit to Tel Aviv amounted to an epic public spanking of Obama. Subsequent statements from the White House were as harsh as America ever dares to be with Israel, although they did not approach Obama’s reported ire over the matter. Thus far, there is not a single cable on the matter.

If you search cables originating in Dubai, all you’ll find are those denouncing and accusing Iran in titles like “Arab states scorn ‘evil’ Iran”, “AbuDhabi favors action to prevent nuclear Iran”, or “Emiratis fret over Iranian meddling”. This is quite amazing considering that the biggest diplomatic crisis this year occurred after a senior Hamas leader was assassinated in Dubai. The evidence and the world’s collective finger pointed at the Mossad and several diplomatic fallouts ensued when it was confirmed that Israel had forged foreign passports of the hitmen. And yet, there is not a word about this in any of the cables released so far. Instead, everything referencing the UAE or originating from Dubai only discusses “evil Iran”, much like the cables referencing Gen. Petraeus.

The list goes on. For all of Israel’s well known subterfuge (to put it mildly) – their espionage against the US; their persistent requests for money, weapons, special favors, and political cover; their well documented crimes against Palestinians; their mafia tactics of assassinating leaders, intellectuals, and scientists across the globe; and their US-based powerful lobby, AIPAC, which was the center of an FBI investigation that found their senior officers passing sensitive and classified US intelligence to Israel – there is nothing referencing any of this in the memos to and from the US State Department in the cables thus far released.

Something else to note.

Someone with access to hundreds of thousands of classified communications and with the ability to move them without detection must have exceptionally high security clearance. He or she must be on the far upper end of the ladder. Why would individuals like that risk their careers, possibly their lives, just to embarrass the US, presumably their own country?

Whistleblowers tend to be people who obey the call of their conscience and moral codes to expose crimes and injustices committed. But there is nothing of the sort in this “leak”. Even more absurd is the notion that Manning, a soldier, leaked all these documents while in custody and under surveillance.

Finally, does anyone find it odd that while most world leaders are quietly bracing themselves for embarrassment and diplomatic repercussions, Benjamin Netanyahu is confidently speaking and gloating about how Saudia Arabia has urged attacking Iran? I sure do.

There are still thousands more cables to be reviewed and redacted by the good old boy network of ‘old media’ and I hope that the cables they release in the coming days and months will prove my suspicions moot. I’m willing to keep an open mind until we’ve seen the full leak. In the meantime, what we know so far does not add up and frankly smells rotten.

http://poorrichards-blog.blogspot.com/2 ... stink.html

[barracuda]

Over a quarter of a million diplomatic cables, marked – “secret” , “confidential”, or “unclassified” – to and from the US State Department have been “leaked” to the public, presumably by a whistleblower. On the surface, it seems like the sort of thing that restores power to the people. It arms us all with knowledge and reminds those in power that they must answer to the public.

Er, I thought it was like three hundred so far.

Although WikiLeaks claims to provide a counter balance to the decades of disinformation served up in heaps by the “old media”, it chose to allow the vetting of these documents by these same outlets. Other highly respected media outlets, like al Jazeera and various independent media, were excluded. I find that odd, for starters.

What? I thought Al Jazeera was itself an op of the Mightly Wurlitzer.

The list goes on. For all of Israel’s well known subterfuge (to put it mildly) – their espionage against the US; their persistent requests for money, weapons, special favors, and political cover; their well documented crimes against Palestinians; their mafia tactics of assassinating leaders, intellectuals, and scientists across the globe; and their US-based powerful lobby, AIPAC, which was the center of an FBI investigation that found their senior officers passing sensitive and classified US intelligence to Israel – there is nothing referencing any of this in the memos to and from the US State Department in the cables thus far released.

In other words, the cables haven't yet addressed my pet news stories, thus WikiLeaks is Israel.

Someone with access to hundreds of thousands of classified communications and with the ability to move them without detection must have exceptionally high security clearance. He or she must be on the far upper end of the ladder. Why would individuals like that risk their careers, possibly their lives, just to embarrass the US, presumably their own country?

No, the security clearances required to access virtually all the documents is relatively low, the highest being merely "secret". At least half of the two-hundred thousand documents are unclassified.

Whistleblowers tend to be people who obey the call of their conscience and moral codes to expose crimes and injustices committed. But there is nothing of the sort in this “leak”. Even more absurd is the notion that Manning, a soldier, leaked all these documents while in custody and under surveillance.

Do we know with any certainty that Manning is the source here? Or when the cables were aquired by WikiLeaks?

I’m willing to keep an open mind until we’ve seen the full leak.

Good advice.

[undead]

TEH WIKILEEKS IZ TEH JOOZ!

Seriously, though, does it really matter if Wikileaks is limited hangout / disinfo? It matters to the military, clearly, but does it matter to normal people? Is it going to stop them from doing whatever the fuck they want? No. Is it providing new information to help understand what is happening to us? Not really, if you have been paying attention. Even if Wikileaks is completely honest and well intentioned as an organization, at least some of their whistleblowers are bound to be disinfo.


“Shut Off the Raging Dialogue of the Story of the Week”
July 8, 2010 at 4:11 pm
By Al Giordano

Late last month, Egyptian authentic journalist Noha Atef and I led a workshop at Tufts University’s Fletcher Summer Institute for the Advanced Study of Nonviolent Conflict near Boston for seventy community organizers and civil resistance leaders from 41 countries. This video shows the first hour of that ninety-minute session. We were invited by our friends at the International Center on Nonviolent Conflict to host the plenary session.

Careful readers of The Field will have heard some – but not all – of the points we made on journalism as civil resistance. We talked from our own experience at the School of Authentic Journalism and as journalists and communicators. It probably wasn’t a “normal” session for such an esteemed academic institution: I did part of my talk in darkness after shutting off the lights in the hall, and later led participants outdoors through what I called a “discipline building exercise” into the preferable set and setting of a perfect New England summer day, where everyone who had something to say had a chance to say it. My intervention was essentially designed to kill the Power Point method of education-as-spectator-sport and unleash more of the innate imagination in each individual so that we could think and speak creatively together.

Noha Atef is, simply, a force of nature. Even if you only have time to watch her part of the presentation, do that: You really want to meet the 25-year-old soft-spoken warrior who through persistent journalism, a lot of guts, and a significant sense of humor, tore down the curtain on torture by Egyptian police and hear about how she did it. The presentation she gave at Tufts was an encore of one she gave last February in Mérida, Yucatán at the Narco News J-School, but we didn't videotape that one at her request. In Boston - in what was her US premier - she was ready to bring her story to a global audience.

You’ll also get a taste, from this hour, of what the School of Authentic Journalism is like and of how we do things, in case you’re thinking of applying to the 2011 session or know someone who should.

At the six-day session we met organizers who are from or work in Argentina, Armenia, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Belgium, Bulgaria, Burma, Camaroon, Canada, China, Colombia, Egypt, England, Ethiopia, Georgia, Germany, Guinea, India, Kenya, Mexico, Morroco, Nepal, Nicaragua, Nigeria, Pakistan, Palestine, the Philippines, Poland, Russia, South Africa, South Korea, Sweden, Thailand, Turkey, the US, Vietnam, the West Bank, West Papua-Indonesia, Yemen and Zimbabwe.

We broke bread and conversed late into the nights with each other, and also with veteran social fighters like Mary Elizabeth King and Jim Lawson. We found some excellent recruits for the School of Authentic Journalism from the continents of the earth and made some new friendships, which are sure to last.

The point of it all was that nonviolent struggle is not a question about whether one considers oneself a pacifist or not (I certainly don’t, and regardless, the group was a serious enough collection of free thinkers and doers that we didn’t waste our time having that stupid “debate” that some “activists” like to have on a perpetual hamster wheel in which nothing ever gets resolved except to displace the real work of organizing) but that nonviolent resistance is really about how we, as aspiring change agents, learn to plan and act strategically.

I wouldn’t quite call it a “science,” although it does resemble certain laws of physics. It is more of an art, even a martial art, in which every circumstance in every struggle is unique but also shares common dynamics with all struggles. And so it is very helpful to listen to the experiences of others in lands we’ve never visited. We see our own struggles in theirs, and solutions for how to win ours in the strategies and tactics developed locally by each one.

And, of course, the matter of media is now central to all struggles. Our workshop began with a premise:

“A movement that makes its own media has considerable advantages and better chances of success than those that must depend on commercial media to tell their story and define their narrative.”

And that’s the story Noha and I tell in this video. If you spend the hour to watch it and don’t find it worthwhile, I’ll personally give you your money back... Oh. Wait. It’s free!

http://narcosphere.narconews.com/thefie ... story-week

[DrVolin]

I keep coming back in my mind to the volume of stuff wikileaks puts out. Not a few documents about 250 thousand things, but 250 thousand documents about one thing. I once read an excellent analysis of Barbarossa that showed quite clearly that the surprise was not due to German operational security, but rather to the paralyzing volume of signals of the attack that the Soviet Leadership had to contend with.

[seemslikeadream]

If Assange is taken back to Sweden, will he remain there to fight the sex case or will they send him to the U.S.?

[justdrew]

If Assange is taken back to Sweden, will he remain there to fight the sex case or will they send him to the U.S.?

how do you fight, "I changed my mind" ?

Sweden does have an extradition treaty with the US, but no charges have yet been brought by the US.

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I've looked into it a bit more and it's not at all clear where all wikileaks is hosted. There's so many stories flying around about where they are and what services who offers that it's not at all clear.

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I strongly suspect they have a underground braintrust that has never come to light

[seemslikeadream]

Warrant blunder thwarts arrest of WikiLeaks' Assange

LONDON - WikiLeaks chief Julian Assange has evaded arrest in Britain because Swedish authorities made a mistake when filling in his arrest warrant, The Times newspaper reported Thursday.

The paper said that British police knew where the Internet whistle-blower was — believed to be a location in southeast England — but could not act on the information as the European arrest warrant was incorrectly filled out.

Swedish authorities issued the warrant — in connection with alleged sex offences — on November 19, a day before Interpol placed him on their wanted list.

However, a police source told the paper the warrant was unenforceable.

"It is not a properly certified warrant so we can?t act on it," the source said.

Assange's British-based lawyer Mark Stephens said the authorities knew his whereabouts.

"The police know how to get hold of him, as does the Swedish prosecutor. Yet no one seems concerned to tell us what is going on," he said.

Assange has not been seen since his WikiLeaks website began the release over 250,000 official U.S. documents on Sunday.

[wintler2]

I strongly suspect they have a underground braintrust that has never come to light

Wikileaks donationsare auspiced by the wau holland foundation and must have links to the Chaos Computer Club.


Twyla, that zunguzungu piece is revelatory, thanks much, have to quote another bit..

Which is why the point is not that particular leaks are specifically effective.

Wikileaks does not leak something like the “Collateral Murder” video as a way of putting an end to that particular military tactic; that would be to target a specific leg of the hydra even as it grows two more.

Instead, the idea is that increasing the porousness of the conspiracy’s information system will impede its functioning, that the conspiracy will turn against itself in self-defense, clamping down on its own information flows in ways that will then impede its own cognitive function.

You destroy the conspiracy, in other words, by making it so paranoid of itself that it can no longer conspire