In the 209-page legal brief made public on Thursday, lawyers for Manning questioned the testimony of military officials at her trial, arguing that their claims of harm were “speculative” and “provided no indication” of actual harm, which they said had a “highly prejudicial” effect on the trial.
We have collectively shared documents with more than two dozen media outlets, and teams of journalists in numerous countries have thus worked with and reported on Snowden documents ... This partnership approach has greatly expedited the reporting, and also ensured that stories that most affect specific countries are reported by the journalists who best understand those countries.
From the article: Katrin Axelsson and Lisa Longstaff of Women Against Rape wrote: “The allegations against [Assange] are a smokescreen behind which a number of governments are trying to clamp down on WikiLeaks for having audaciously revealed to the public their secret planning of wars and occupations with their attendant rape, murder and destruction… The authorities care so little about violence against women that they manipulate rape allegations at will. [Assange] has made it clear he is available for questioning by the Swedish authorities, in Britain or via Skype. Why are they refusing this essential step in their investigation? What are they afraid of?”
Hedges: And it comes down to something as visceral as being a father. I have four children. So I may fail. But I at least want my children to look back and say they tried. We are squandering the future of the succeeding generations, and we have a moral imperative of revolt.
Hedges: Just as infected as the prisons and the courts are poor neighborhoods, which abound with snitches, many of them low-level drug dealers allowed to sell on the streets in exchange for information. And from there our culture of snitches spirals upward into the headquarters of the National Security Agency, Homeland Security and the FBI.
Manning: After 9/11, a dedicated office of lawyers specializing in novel applications of law for national security issues, the National Security Division (NSD), was created and now, with a small caseload and an enormous amount of resources, this division of the Department of Justice has been waging a quiet war against the media, their sources and the right to free speech and a free press, using the growing national security and surveillance apparatus to prosecute various cases and, occasionally, target the media.
The military whistleblower’s 2010 Wikileaks dump included information that could have saved the 11 BP workers who died that spring in the Gulf of Mexico oil rig disaster. By Greg Palast GregPalast.com truthdig.com April 19, 2015 The author under arrest in Azerbaijan in December 2010. (Palast Investigative Fund) Five years ago Monday, 11 More
Greenwald: The attack of the NYT editors on King for that speech is strikingly familiar, because it’s completely identical to how anti-war advocates in the U.S. are maligned today. It begins by lecturing King that his condemnation of U.S. militarism is far too simplistic: “the moral issues in Vietnam are less clear cut than he suggests.” It accuses him of “slandering” the U.S. by comparing it to evil regimes. And it warns him that anti-war activism could destroy the civil rights movement, because he is guilty of overstating American culpability and downplaying those of its enemies
So, as Collateral Murder turns five, rather than looking at the video as a curiosity from a bygone conflict, we should watch it again and consider how the film continues to speak to us about the state of contemporary geo-politics, journalism and whistleblowing. By Christian Christensen Common Dreams April 4, 2015 A still image from "Collateral Murder." More
Whistleblowing was the buzzword of 2013 and 2014. Snowden and Assange are the big names splashed around headlines, but they’re not the only ones going to great lengths to preserve the Fourth Estate and, in doing so, saving democracy. By Frederick Reese MintPressNews.com December 22, 2014 Barrett Brown Photo: Nikki Loehr Occasionally, there are situations More
Across the globe, a new historical conjuncture is emerging in which the attacks on higher education as a democratic institution and on dissident public voices in general - whether journalists, whistleblowers or academics - are intensifying with sobering consequences. The attempts to punish prominent academics such as Ward Churchill, Steven Salaita and others are matched by an equally vicious assault on whistleblowers such as Chelsea Manning, Jeremy Hammond and Edward Snowden, and journalists such as James Risen.
Degrade and destroy? The west should try to disrupt the canny militants into self-destruction, because bombs will only backfire Chelsea E Manning in Fort Leavenworth The Guardian 16 September 2014 If properly contained, Isis will not be able to sustain itself on rapid growth alone, and will begin to fracture internally. Photograph: via AP The More
