Wednesday, July 28, 2010

WikiLeaks: Time to Celebrate, Time to Mourn

It's time to celebrate.

It's a big win for Internet-based, indie media that WikiLeaks.org posted its "Afghan War Diary," based on 90,000 leaked US military records detailing a failing war in which US and allied forces have repeatedly killed innocent civilians. This on-the-ground material is vaster than the Daniel Ellsberg-leaked Pentagon Papers during the Vietnam War and was much faster in reaching the public.

Throughout this decade of war, Ellsberg has been an evangelist beseeching government employees to engage in leaking and "unauthorized truth telling." His prayers have now been partially answered - with Assange boasting that the 2004-2009 Afghan war logs constitute "the most comprehensive description of a war to have ever been published during the course of a war."

If Ellsberg is the most important whistleblower in US history, Internet activist Assange is probably the most important aider and abetter of whistleblowers - using technology that Ellsberg couldn't have imagined as he labored over his now ancient Xerox machine.

Nearly 40 years after the Pentagon Papers were leaked by Democratic military analyst Ellsberg, a Democratic White House seems bent on public deception and cheerleading on behalf of an immoral war that can't be won.