More Loud Noises On Wikileaks

It's depressing to see Republicans like New York's Peter King, constantly calling this administration corrupt and the most secretive in history and worse than Bush and Obama probably stomps kittens in his spare time on Sundays and everything, turn around and say that Wikileaks is tantamount to treason.

The ranking Republican on the House Homeland Security Committee has called for the prosecution of the source of the Wikileaks controversy, saying that the leak amounts to a treasonous act and has put the lives of Americans at risk.

Rep. Peter King (R-N.Y.) told Don Imus on “Imus in the Morning” that the recent leak of more than 93,000 sensitive documents on the site Wikileaks.org was “disgraceful.”

“It violates espionage laws. I consider it treason,” said King. “The fact is, whatever happened here and whoever gave them that information is guilty, to me, of the most detestable, contemptible crime, and we have to take it seriously.

“We're not going to allow it to happen again. And this guy, whoever he is, a staff sergeant or whoever it is, but whoever they find out did it has to prosecuted and punished to the fullest extent of the law. I mean, it's not funny business. This is for real.”

Keep in mind this blustering twit would presumably be getting the gavel for the House Homeland Security Committee if the Republicans take back the House this fall, and if you think King's investigations would stop at just the military and that he wouldn't go after Wikileaks itself and President Obama to boot, you're crazier than he is.  For King and the Republicans this is all about Obama and will be until we get a new President.

Look, if our media isn't going to keep the US Government honest, outfits like Wikileaks will have to as Double G points out.

Whatever else is true, WikiLeaks has yet again proven itself to be one of the most valuable and important organizations in the world.  Just as was true for the video of the Apache helicopter attack in Baghdad, there is no valid justification for having kept most of these documents a secret.  But that's what our National Security State does reflexively:  it hides itself behind an essentially absolute wall of secrecy to ensure that the citizenry remains largely ignorant of what it is really doing.  WikiLeaks is one of the few entities successfully blowing holes in at least parts of that wall, enabling modest glimpses into what The Washington Post spent last week describing as Top Secret America.  The war on WikiLeaks -- which was already in full swing, including, strangely, from some who claim a commitment to transparency -- will only intensify now.  Anyone who believes that the Government abuses its secrecy powers in order to keep the citizenry in the dark and manipulate public opinion -- and who, at this point, doesn't believe that? -- should be squarely on the side of the greater transparency which Wikileaks and its sources, sometimes single-handedly, are providing.

Since most of our watchdog press is asleep anyway, it's good to see someone doing the job.