Vanir Ausf B

"Well, they're informants so, if they get killed, they've got it coming to them. They deserve it." LInk

If she actually has one you've made a horrible mistake.

My point regarding the title was simply that HBGary does not represent the United States or US cyber security. There actually is a National Cyber Security Division of the Department of Homeland Security. Regarding Assange... he is your bastard, not mine. I do agree with costard that killing him would solve nothing. It would only make him a martyr, a status he is entirely undeserving of. Better to shine light on his own nasty secrets.

Linky Regardless of questions on what he deserves or doesn't deserve, Julian Assange is a twat of the first order. BTW, the thread title is misleading. HBGary is a private company, not the US Government.

You'd have to be pretty naive to think that was anything other than a montage of the dumbest answers since no one got a single answer correct. "How many sides does a triangle have?' Pfff. I would have answered every question correctly, and I'm American.

I don't see any country scoring perfectly in that survey. Therefore yes, any country.

Indeed. You could make the same video on the streets of any country in the world.

I agree the story is BS. The song was actually "Overcome" by Creed.

Back to hammering? Most of what has been said of this event so far has been for the purpose of hammering the other side.

Why Gifford? One thing about her that may make her unique from his perspective is that he had interacted with her in person. She visited a college he was attending at the time and held a Q&A session that he attended. According to people who were there he asked her a nonsensical question that she answered in a way that he didn't like.

What does that have to do with the Giffords shooting? Make a separate Decline and Fall of the United States thread, or somefink.

Without any evidence that this guy was inspired by Sarah Palin what you are saying is purely speculative. So if there is no evidence that he was inspired by Sarah Palin, then what is your motivation for speculating that it "could well be" connected to her? As I said before, this says more about your own political views than it does about this incident, or Sarah Palin for that matter. Not that I'm aware of. Almost anything could incite violence in someone, somewhere. You can't threaten to kill someone, however.

QFT When I see people trying to tie this loser's actions to Sarah Palin or the Republicans or the Democrats I see someone reading into it what they want to see. That sheds more light on their own political beliefs than it does on this event.

Unless you're Amazon, and therefore immune to DoS attacks. But I agree they got what they deserve for doing business with Wikileaks in the first place.

I really need to find a synonym for "action".

If no action had been taken to put an end to it when it was discovered what had taken place you may have had a point. But action was taken so you don't. The US Ambassador took no action to suppress revelation of what happened, despite urging from the Afghan minister to do so. And disciplinary action against DynCorp employees was taken.

Oh I think there is quite a lot of concern about the individuals there. The 2200+ coalition soldiers that have died there weren't all suicides. It's true that the Taliban doesn't pose an existential threat to the United States, but when my brother's unit rotates into Afghanistan next year they probably will pose an existential threat to him. Would they know if someone had? If a local decides not to approach a NATO patrol about the IED he knows is planted near by because he's doesn't think the US will keep it a secret, we would never know. It's not something that can be easily quantified. As for feeling threatened by my own government, the good thing about living in a democratic system is that we can always vote the bums out. If that is not a sufficient check on their power then you're going to need a violent revolution.

Whether or not communications between nations should be completely open is an interesting issue. I'll concede that there is probably a stronger case to be made in favor of it than for all internal government communications to be public. There is an obvious downside: Diplomats would be less honest with each other, and certainly less forthcoming. This could cause problems in the same way that if you knew that every conversation you had would be printed in the local newspaper the next day your relationship with your wife/girlfriend may become strained. The issue is less debatable with regard to internal communications, IMO. If the US Ambassador to Russia knows that everything he sends to the State Department will be known to the Russians, how likely is it that he's going to give the kind of honest assessment found in the leaked cables? It's hard for me to imagine Russia described as a mafia state and Putin as an alpha dog in a world devoid of government secrets. The State Department did not support or conceal what DynCorp did. Even if they had, would that have justified making public the details of unrelated NATO military operations and the names of Afghan informants? I don't think so. I am far worse that you would ever suspect. But seriously, I did say "maybe". The way I look at it is that if someone willingly and knowingly takes action that aids one side or the other in an armed conflict, whether or not they actually support the goals of that side is academic. The results are the same either way.

Fascinating. So if you would prefer that my government and your government not even communicate with each other, I presume you would prefer they not do a lot of other very basic things that all government do. Given that you also view our governments as the greatest threat to our liberty, is it fair to say that you would be in favor our governments ceasing to exist? It's true that there is probably nothing any government does that would not be in the interest of someone, some where, at some time, to know. I do not see that as a compelling argument in favor of abolishing all secrets. I could use any number of relevant examples to illustrate why, but let's look at NATO military operations in Afghanistan. In who's interest is it for everything the military does in Afghanistan, and how they do it, to be made public, including the identities of Afghans cooperating with NATO forces? The most obvious and immediate beneficiaries would be the Taliban. Is this desirable? Well, it is if you are the Taliban, or if you are supportive of the Taliban. From the perspective of the United States or any other allied nation involved in Afghanistan it would be self-defeating. Maybe it just comes down to what side you're on.

Not at all. I don't know if Germany would have turned out differently. It seems to me the problem wasn't so much that people didn't know what was going on, but that most of them supported it, or at least did not oppose it. It's irrelevant anyway. Like you, I recognize that we don't live in a utopian world where complete transparency is practical. We all live in societies with laws, governed by institutions that enforce those laws. Most of us accept these restrictions on our personal freedom as preferable to anarchy. But we don't want to live in North Korea either, so we don't maximize one way or the other. We draw the line somewhere in between and then debate about whether it should be adjusted a little this way or that. I disagree with the terrorist Bruce Schneier that WikiLeaks has pushed the line more towards individual liberty. I think the long term effect will be more the opposite. That's not to say there is nothing in all the material Wikileaks has put out that should be in the public domain. There is some here and there, and if Assange had used a scalpel to carefully separate out those few gold nuggets and concentrate the public perception on them he may have done some real good. But he's used a shotgun instead, and anything worthwhile has been buried under mountains of information that was legitimately not public. Everything Wikileaks has published was categorized at a level that made it available to a fairly large number of people. Wikileaks themselves puts that number at around 3 million. I have a hard time believing that number will go anywhere but down in reaction to these leaks. Does anyone seriously think the US military will react to having details of their operations and names of their contacts exposed by publishing this information themselves in the future? The days when an Army private could read correspondence between US embassies and the State Department are over. I would like for the terrorist Bruce Schneier to explain how that has increased my personal freedom, or anyone else's for that matter. So when I crack a smile at seeing Assange's dirty laundry flapping at the top of a flagpole it's not because I'm in favor of the details of criminal investigations being leaked to the public. It's because I appreciate the irony of it in this particular case. And because I feel no sympathy for the man.

I learned to do this in school, not from watching television.

So to maximize liberty government should have no secrets at all. Everything the government says and does should be known by everyone the world over. At least that seems to be the logic presented here. Assuming, of course, that maximum liberty is the goal. He does not state that explicitly. If that is not the goal then that would that mean there is a place for state secrets, something Assange does not seem to believe in.

I would rather have the media free to tell lies than appoint the government as the final arbiter of truth. Besides, the article you just quoted seems to suggest this thread is much ado about nothing. FOX News caters to a particular audience. It does not create that audience.

I can't help but appreciate the irony of Assange pilloried by a leaked report.

Giving material aid of any kind to al-Qaeda is quite illegal under US Federal law. People who do so are not only investigated but prosecuted.