WIKILEAKS, IRAQ AND THE PRICE OF TRUTH

Wikileaks founder Julian Assange: prepared to wear a target to reveal the terrible truth.

The bile is piling up again.

The Pentagon/government has had enough of Wikileaks and its founder Julian Assange and they're firing every weapon in their propaganda arsenal.

I'd like to make just a few points on Wikileaks massive disgorging of approximately 400,000 government documents yesterday.


THE FALLOUT

As you probably know, the documents showed that civilian casualties in the Iraq invasion have been under-quoted by our government, that Abu Ghraib was an ongoing torture house, that the Iraqis who'd teamed up with us killed their own citizens while we looked the other way, etc etc etbloodycetra.

Firstly, it's worth noting the differences in how the media around the world reported this. I stress HOW as much as WHAT.

Overseas, the focus was generally on the war crimes and U.S. lies, and the stories reflected disgust. Here, in the mainstream mass media, nearly everything I read was padded much softer. And there was more focus on -- and TV head shaking over (Diane Sawyer, what a little actress!) -- Wikileaks and Assange.


THE RESPONSE

And so the smear and spin began here. Assange may be charged with rape in Sweden, the media told us. There's infighting and resignations at Wikileaks, the media reported. This latest exposing of documents puts out troops at risk, our officials were quoted as saying in nearly every initial article.

Okay, to answer those statements:

1/ If Assange is a rapist, lock him up. But that has nothing to do with the documents. He didn't forge them. They are real.

2/ Who cares?

3/ Aren't we intelligent enough to be told HOW this will endanger the troops (even without going into grand detail)? I truly suspect this argument is just a ruse. Clearly there is a lot of information that we, as citizens, SHOULD know and aren't told. If we WERE told, the population would see that the troops really do need to be made safe by bringing them home. But the government/corporations don't want that: It would be bad for business.


WHICH IS THE REAL CRIME?

Now, should Wikileaks be stealing government documents. Well, by the law of the land, no. But should our government be breaking international laws? Should it be keeping secrets about illegal activities? (Nixon got booted for a lot less than this!) In short, should it be doing all the things that the documents reveal?

No!

So, once again I say, not all rules are good rules. Not all laws are good laws. Wikileaks broke a law to reveal a much bigger evil.

We as a people in a purported democracy have a right to know A LOT MORE than our government tells us. And being treated like children who just aren't sophisticated enough to deal with it all is getting old. And it is elitism at its worst!

Our government needs to operate more openly. That doesn't include divulging tactics in legitimate, DEFENSIVE wars. But just about everything else.

Our media need to be taken back by the people. The fat cats who've stolen the airwaves and gobbled up the papers shape the perception we get of the world. THIS IS ONE OF THE TRUE PROBLEMS OF LIVING IN THE U.S. It's like living in a box with one selective hole punched in it that we can look out of.

We all must insist that the United Nations be restructured so that the U.S. doesn't have so much clout, and that THE U.N. be the judge of initiating military actions around the world and NOT America!

I also believe that if the U.S. engages in military invasions which are not supported by the U.N., then it is incumbent upon our military personnel to say "We won't go," en masse, and for the civilian population to support them completely.


CONCLUSION

Remember...

The people who run this country -- and much of the world -- the economic and political elites (and these two spheres overlap, of course), in tandem with our media and the PR industry, have a vested interest in keeping things as they are. They are not about to change a system that benefits them, and they are not about to talk the truth about it.

Bottom line: Our government's culpability justifies what Wikileaks has done.

It is the shame of our political and economic system that we have to steal the truth to get it.

Take care,
Adrian Zupp

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