“We’ve seen the current president bringing five prosecutions so far… against people for whistleblowing, for leaks of classified information,” said Daniel Ellsberg, famous for his 1971 leak of the “Pentagon Papers,” which helped turn the tide of public opinion against the Vietnam War.

“All previous presidents put together brought three prosecutions… We see a campaign here against whistleblowing that is highly unprecedented in legal terms.”

The White House declined to answer questions about its policy towards those who leak government secrets.

The five prosecutions include the case of US soldier Bradley Manning, who is accused of having handed hundreds of thousands of classified military and diplomatic documents to WikiLeaks.

Manning, 23, was arrested in June while deployed to Iraq, amid suspicions he was responsible for passing a trove of secret US government documents to the whistle-blowing website, many of which were then published around the world.

Earlier this month, the military unveiled 22 additional charges against Manning including “aiding the enemy,” which carries a potential death sentence, though the army said it would not seek capital punishment.

US investigators have failed so far to establish a direct link between the Manning and the website, which began publishing the documents last year.

Rights groups have criticized the conditions of Manning’s detention at a Marine base in Quantico, Virginia.

And earlier this month State Department spokesman PJ Crowley was forced to resign after publicly criticizing the “ridiculous, counterproductive and stupid” way in which he is being treated.

Another accused leaker facing possible prison time is Jeffrey Sterling, a former CIA operative accused of passing US secrets to the New York Times.

And Thomas Drake is said to have revealed the existence of the George W. Bush administration’s warrantless wiretapping program. His trial is set to begin in Baltimore next month.

Despite the barrage of prosecutions, experts say the government will have a heavy burden in proving its case under a 1917 espionage law.

“One of the statutes says that you have to give this information… ‘with the intent or reason to believe that this information is to be used to the injury of the US’,” said Andrew Contiguglia, an expert on constitutional law.

“In the situation that you have here, there are former CIA operatives, military operatives, taking the information and giving it off to press people, not spies,” he said.

“What makes us think that when we give information to the press, that info is going to be used to the injury of the US?”

He goes on to argue that the leaks are part of the American system.

“It’s important that in order to strenghten our democracy, we have to keep our government honest, and the only way to keep our government honest is to give access to that information,” he said.

Dan Marcus, a law professor at the American University in Washington, says it’s possible to read too much into the administration’s probes.

“All presidents and all national security branch officials worry about unauthorized leaks,” he said.

“There’s always been a great concern in the governments about leaks of damaging national security information, and I don’t think that’s changed dramatically from one administration to another.”

He added that there is a bit of a double standard at play.

“There is a certain amount of hypocrisy,” Marcus said.

“There are good reasons for the government trying to keep certain information secret (but) government officials often leak some information when they believe it is in the interest of the government to do so.”

What happened to the comments on this site?

There were some great discussions. Are they lost now?

Los Angeles–anyone? Anyone want to help get something together here? Is L.A. listening?

Levin is head of the ‘Arms Committe’ alongw with McCain
poc above -hl

United States Senate Armed Services Committee
Room SR-228, Russell Senate Office Building
Washington, DC 20510-6050
202-224-3871 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting 202-224-3871 end_of_the_skype_highlighting

FULL COMMITTEE MEMBERS

DEMOCRATS

Carl Levin (Michigan)
Chairman

Joseph I. Lieberman (Connecticut)
Jack Reed (Rhode Island)
Daniel K. Akaka (Hawaii)
Ben Nelson (Nebraska)
Jim Webb (Virginia)
Claire McCaskill (Missouri)
Mark Udall (Colorado)
Kay R. Hagan (North Carolina)
Mark Begich (Alaska)
Joe Manchin III (West Virginia)
Jeanne Shaheen (New Hampshire)
Kirsten E. Gillibrand (New York)
Richard Blumenthal (Connecticut)

REPUBLICANS

John McCain (Arizona)
Ranking Member

James M. Inhofe (Oklahoma)
Jeff Sessions (Alabama)
Saxby Chambliss (Georgia)
Roger F. Wicker (Mississippi)
Scott P. Brown (Massachusetts)
Rob Portman (Ohio)
Kelly Ayotte (New Hampshire)
Susan M. Collins (Maine)
Lindsey Graham (South Carolina)
John Cornyn (Texas)
David Vitter (Louisiana)

‘A Pentagon spokesman has said the conditions of Manning’s confinement comply with U.S. laws, and suggested that officials are concerned that Manning might try to hurt himself.’

It all sounds legal and above board, but ask yourselves this question; Why would Bradley Manning try to hurt himself?

He is a brave man, a moral man… He did the only thing a brave, moral man could do in his situation. Most military people close their eyes and say; “That’s war.” When they know it’s nothing of the kind.

Please read this true account of other brave servicemen first… URL follows.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/My_Lai_Massacre

WARNING… THIS PAGE SHOWS AN ACTUAL WAR CRIME.

Bradley did what those 3 servicemen did in Vietnam when they saw their own soldiers herding women and children into a ditch. They knew what they were seeing was a nazi style atrocity. They reported it to the military. The military didn’t like their men slaughtering unarmed civilians, they didn’t want to make it public either. The News media did that, when those 3 brave men made their evidence and statements available.

The American military needs to decide what kind of men they want in their ranks. Torturers, morons, rapists, baby killers… or people like the 3 Vietnam servicemen. Honorable men who did not close their eyes to cold blooded murder. Loyalty and patriotism has it’s limits.

Or maybe not… We will see.

‘s spokesman quits over comments

Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton’s chief spokesman resigned Sunday, three days after he publicly criticized the treatment in confinement of WikiLeaks suspect Army Pfc. Bradley Manning as “counterproductive and stupid.”

In a prepared statement, P.J. Crowley said his remarks about Manning’s treatment, made at an appearance Thursday in Cambridge, Mass., were meant to highlight the effect of actions by U.S. security agencies “on our global standing and leadership.”

Lawyers for Manning, who is charged with unauthorized sharing of classified information, allege that he has been mistreated, including being forced to sleep naked, while in confinement at a Marine Corps base in Quantico, Va.

A Pentagon spokesman has said the conditions of Manning’s confinement comply with U.S. laws, and suggested that officials are concerned that Manning might try to hurt himself.

We now have countries, including my own, sucked into yet another shooting war. They say it’s to protect the innocents on the ground… a ‘No Fly Zone’ no less, but isn’t that how all wars start. The Vietnam disaster started with CIA goons paying locals for communist heads. So many dollars for a sack full of gory heads. The local thugs got rich removing heads from none communist rivals they owed money to. In the mean time, real communist forces were planning a massive attack in the North.

Who are the people we call innocents on the ground? Does anybody know, does anybody care?

As far as I can see, these so called innocents are shooting guns and firing shells too. Where did they get their weapons? What is their agenda? To many questions, to few answers.

Of course there’ll be more war crimes and those crimes will be hushed up by both sides. The people who uncover said war crimes will be called nasty names, will be attacked by the right wing media, will be stripped of their clothing, will be stripped of their rights, will be thrown into solitary confinement to ponder their fate.

Bradley Manning is not the first brave man to see the brutality of war, the futility of war, and he’ll not be the last.

Bradley: “Do we learn nothing from history?”

War Monger: “What history?”

On March 8, 2007, two days after the verdict in the Libby trial, Congressman Henry Waxman, chair of the U.S. House Committee on Government Reform, announced that his committee would ask Plame to testify on March 16, in an effort by his committee to look into “whether White House officials followed appropriate procedures for safeguarding Plame’s identity.”[54][55]

On March 16, 2007, at these hearings about the disclosure, Waxman read a statement about Plame’s CIA career that had been cleared by CIA director Gen. Michael V. Hayden and the CIA, stating that she was undercover and that her employment status with the CIA was classified information prohibited from disclosure under Executive Order 12958.

Subsequent reports in various news accounts focused on the following parts of her testimony:

* “My name and identity were carelessly and recklessly abused by senior government officials in the White House and state department”; this abuse occurred for “purely political reasons.”[56]
* After her identity was exposed by officials in the Bush administration, she had to leave the CIA: “I could no longer perform the work for which I had been highly trained.”[57]
* She did not select her husband for a CIA fact-finding trip to Niger, but an officer senior to her selected him and told her to ask her husband if he would consider it: “I did not recommend him. I did not suggest him. There was no nepotism involved. I did not have the authority….”[57]

The sheer hypocrisy of the United States is just jaw dropping – can only talk the talk – incapable of walking the walk when it comes to freedom, liberty and just treatment for all.
I thought one of the by-products of the “liberation” of Iraq by the U.S and its allies was to put an end to exactly this kind of despicable treatment of an individual by its Government.