The whistleblower website WikiLeaks.org (which I must confess I hadn't heard of until a few months ago when they were featured on Democracy Now!) has reportedly been given a ton of classified diplomatic cables and its founder is being searched for by the Pentagon to plead cooperation:
American officials are searching for Julian Assange, the founder of WikiLeaks in an attempt to pressure him not to publish thousands of confidential and potentially hugely embarrassing diplomatic cables that offer unfiltered assessments of Middle East governments and leaders.
Although it is likely that WikiLeaks has broken US laws in de-encrypting the video from Baghdad and publishing secret documents, the tone of an American official who spoke to the Daily Beast sounded more desperate than threatening. "We'd like to know where he is; we'd like his cooperation in this," the official said.
It is, in any case, not clear what legalhttp://feeds.bignewsnetwork.com/?sid=646591 measures US officials could use to stop publication of the cables. Assange has created an elaborate web of protection – with servers in several countries, notably Sweden, which has strong laws protecting whisteblowers.I am kind of torn on how I feel about this. I certainly think our government keeps many things from us that we should know. Not in some elaborate conspiracy or anything, just I believe they are over sensitive about information I feel like us as citizens have a right to see. This could create a huge problem for the over sensitized climate of diplomatic relations, so I can't really say how I feel about the release until I see what is in the documents. As a footnote, the soldier who leaked the information has been arrested and is being prosecuted.
