I have no problem with wikileaks. The problem people have is that they do not want a world where our top secret government dealings are made public (for security/diplomatic reasons). I agree with this. However, I believe that if someone is risking death by committing treason to reveal information to the people of the world, then there should be a way for them to reveal that information. Treason should not be impossible to commit, because there are times when the government is heading down a horrible path, and getting the truth out is more important than loyalty. It is the responsibility of our government to prevent its own officials from committing treason. It does so with the threat of death. The worse a path a government is heading down, the more those officials may be willing to risk death and get the truth out there. Also, the treason we’re talking about here is not the passing of information to an enemy government, but to all the people of the world. As such, it is generally more altruistic.

Theoretically, if there were a government official leaking documents to some press other than wikileaks, I would consider it the role of the press to report those documents to the public. The role of the press is to value truth and public awareness. This role is crucial in a democratic system. There are times when the truth would better have been kept secret, but we create bigger problems by creating a system where the truth cannot get out. Blame for treason lies on the leaker; wikileaks is fulfilling the role of the press. Much of our current media is not so admirally neutral, nor values the truth as purely as wikileaks seems to. I wonder whether if information had been leaked to some press within the U.S., if that press could or would have successfully distributed the information to the world, against the will of our government. As such, our press may not adequately be fulfilling the role we need it to fill within the system as a whole, making something like wikileaks necessary and indispensible.

Treason can betray the best interests of our country, but sometimes there are truths that are more important than treason. Imagine if it had been leaked in 2001 that Iraq did not have WMDs, that they had little-nothing to do with 9/11, and that these revelations had swayed the American people not to invade Iraq. Think about Guantanamo, and how important it is know the truth about it. Think of all the corruption within U.S. government and corporations (hypothetically, I don’t know much, but certainly looking at our Chicago politics…), and how important it is that the truth comes out. If the recent leak was by someone who sees us heading to war with Iran, and wants to avoid it, then that’s not so bad in my book.  

Josh, in response to what you wrote (b/c I dunno how to post this as a note), I think your argument is against the morality of the leak, and against the ideology of transparency being good in and of itself. I do not think you have made an argument that wikileaks should censor itself. The difference is that I believe it is good for part of the overall system to believe in transparency. I think it is great for the press to believe in transparency and truth. I do not believe the government should seek transparency in all things, or that the leak was necessarily the right thing to do. But I whole heartedly support the role of wikileaks, which did not obtain the information itself, and only serves as a conduit for others who believe their information needs to be shown to the world.

I suppose I do believe this is the right direction for the world, and that the media as is is not unbiased/good enough, so my beliefs likely influence this all.