Let's see how brilliant you are. Not very as you plainly claim facts not in evidence.
The state does a poor job of upholding law.
Also, the notion that the federal government doesn't violate the Bill of Rights is ... incredible. This is blatantly untrue.
Where in anything I wrote did you get the notion (clear lack of reading comprehension on your part) that I believe the government is God who commits no wrong. I definitely fear the power of the Federal government is too large. The government has violated the law of the country many times. So what, that's not what we are discussing here.
As for the "target list" against Afghans, Pakistanis, and others who have assisted the US military: What do you expect would happen if you were to help an unwelcome foreign army invade and occupy your home country? They shouldn't be surprised to find targets on their backs.
Again, you show complete disregard for the facts. The list in question is not human assets, but physical assets. Embassys, bases, Federal buildings in the US. Real locations and the security status of each one. With the release of this list, all lines were crossed. If you leak information and it tweaks the government, so be it. When you endanger human beings, there is no justification.
These measures do not provide security and are nothing more than theatrics to condition people to obey the state--while Michael Chertoff and friends make a profit off the machines, of course.
Beyond that, though, let me clarify what your main point is: You're arguing that the state can read my e-mails. It can track my bank accounts. It can finger-**** my wife in the airport.
Whether or not it provides security or not is not for me to say. The Constitution does not allow profiling which is why the searches are random. Until the Supreme court allows profiling, this is the way we do things. And of course, nobody gets finger-******.
But if we lowly citizens turn the tables, if we reveal the truth about the state--that it literally tortured men to death at Abu Ghraib after coving them in human feces and electrocuting their testicles, that it stole trillions from taxpayers to give it to incompetent banksters, that it gunned down a rescue vehicle then humiliated the corpses by running over them with a tank and snickering about it--then we are the criminals? Telling the truth is a crime?
All of those truths came out without Wiki leaks so have still not provided any justification for what Assange did. In fact, if you spend the time to look carefully, the US Government announced the investigation at Abu Ghraib before it was ever published in the media. No lowly US citizens did anything to bring this about. The US had a commission investigate the activities, published a report and charges people with crimes. I never maintain that the US Government never did anything wrong at anytime in US history. None of these arguments you have laid out support the release of diplomatic cables.
See how Bradley Manning is already losing his mind due to extreme solitary confinement and sensory deprivation in a tiny cell, without even a pillow or sheets to sleep on.
That would be his problem. He download the files and gave them to someone to publish. He knew it was illegal and he is paying the price. The thing that separates the Mannings and the Assanges of the world is that they do things they know to be illegal and they expect no consequences. The real heros of the world are willing to suffer the consequences personally in order to achieve a greater good. The difference between a hero and a Narcissist.
