Wikileaks – A New Media Pirate?

Wikileaks created a global precedent, who’s positive and negative effects have yet to be realized and analyzed. Think what can happen when the secrets of world diplomacy are exposed. Who wins and who loses?

The Media Pirate?

I’ll start with something simple. Wikileaks is a project which can basically be defined as a media pirate. Essentially, information which they have no right to is acquired illegally and then distributed. As the world just learned, Wikileaks procured secret internal documents (cables) which were the property of the U.S. State Department and uploaded them for the public to read.

The Media pirate come out to defend public interest and, in general, is supported by the concept of rights inspired by the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution which protects the freedom of religion, speech and the press. Of course, such constitutional principles and practices exist in many other countries worldwide.

However Wikileaks is not a media and does not employee any real journalists. The theft of information, illegal posting of classified or proprietary information on a website with no stable presence or tradition in any country in the world is not journalism. This is the opposite of journalism! That’s why it is very important to ask ourselves the question:

Does Wikileaks protect the public interest?

The organization could possibly justify convincingly the leakage and dissemination of classified information through its website to the media regarding the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Why?

First, nobody likes war, even those who lead them. Secondly, even in times of war, people have rights! Therefore when the military uses the imbalance of civilian-military relations, which is natural during the war, to violate human rights and they are exposed, this is good for democracy and the rule of law. In this case, the answer to the question, “was it helpful to oust classified information on Wikileaks concerning the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan?” is more like “Yes!”

Privacy and privileged communications against the public interest!

The latest situation of the disclosure of internal communications between the diplomatic services of the U.S. State Department is far different from the leaks related to Iraqi and Afghani wars. Whatever diplomats of a country discuss in their internal correspondence is a matter of national security for that country. The right to a closed correspondence of any institution such as a foreign ministry (in this case the State Department) is essential and in the national interest of any country. This is just one of the things that made publishing stolen inside information so egregious.

Any “public interest” disclosure that violates the right of an individual or a legitimate entity to conduct secure and private correspondence cannot be supported! Catering to this type of public interest we must be especially sensitive, we being the people of Eastern Europe, at the very least because some of us have “lost” part of our lives in a system in which “public interest” was taken hostage by the constitutions of our countries.

International gloating?

Support for Wikileaks in connection with the completely illegal and improper disclosure of diplomatic correspondence, I think is absurd. It is another example of poorly defined and confused anti-Americanism. You do not have to like America. However, what has happened needs to be placed on a rational plane because what has happened with the diplomatic correspondence of the United States today has set a precedent and tomorrow can more easily become a practice that affects every country in the world.

The publication of private foreign documents, such as diplomatic correspondence which are not of a matter which relates to democracy, human rights or other high political value does not benefit the public interest. On the contrary, it is a criminal act.

What is clear from the leak of Wikileaks?

Normally the U.S. and especially the State Department are nervous of “leakages” of information. It is normal for other countries such as Israel, China, Great Britain to also be upset by what has happened as well. Countries with stable democracies, free media, and which have a balance of powers along with strong societies will learn from this Wikileaks incident and will use this difficult situation to find new ways to impede the dissemination of sensitive information if for no other reason than to keep diplomatic relationships in good standing.

Nation-states and individual societies should now be aware that international security and global stability may, at any time, be endangered by private interests. It is necessary, now more than ever, to achieve lasting and effective balance between individual national interests and the greater global society which in many ways is its own multinational character.

Is Wikileaks acting on behalf of any strong private interests, or just the particular interest of its founder to earn money from publishing classified information, I do not know. I only know it is bad for a major country and a member of the Security Council of the United Nations, like France, to become a sanctuary for Wikileaks.

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The Guy Who Makes Money From Rejecting Capitalism

“Capitalism is a legal system that allows this greed to take place”, this was an understanding of the Capitalism the popular film director Michael Moore shared with viewers of the Larry King’s show. I must say that this is the most inadequate and stupid definition about the Capitalism I’ve ever heard. I regret that the world’s most influential media CNN, gave tribune to such an ignorant person who’s currently fighting against the values of the modern western societies.

The Larry King’s interview with Michael Moore and the things the film director said made me to make my first post here since February. I had a lot of things to say within these months about worlds affairs that I dislike. One of them was the course of the president’s Obama administration to abandon the missile shield and to engage in security cooperation with Russia. I believe that this was a huge mistake that made the whole Europe more insecure. But the charismatic U.S. president Mr. Obama has a very specific views about a number of issues including the reforms in the US healthcare system and unfortunately about the international affairs.

It was strange how he provided legitimacy for Muammar Gaddafi and other leaders of regimes recognized as terrorist when he went to speak in front of UN body this week. If the UN is becoming a place to provide legitimacy for extremists regimes, then it is loosing its credibility as a world’s most important international decision-making body! If the UN goes this way, the next step would be to invite Osama Bin Laden to have a keynote.

I wouldn’t write above things if wasn’t provoked by the things Michael Moore said in his interview with CNN. I was pretty much focused on capitalism (my dot-com business) within the last 10 months, not on fighting for democracy. Unfortunately when you see how the most popular flagman of the extreme socialist propaganda in the U.S. is fighting the Capitalism, there isn’t much to do, you should respond the way you can.

The worst Mr. Moore does is to explore the disappointment of millions of “Main street” Americans from the Wall Street. The Wall Street’s failure is definitely a lesson to learn, but not an occasion to be used as starting point to fight the Capitalism. Financial markets are essential part of the capitalism and the American economic system, but they aren’t the core of this system. So the downfall of the stock market isn’t a good reason to change the economic system.

20 years after the fall of Communism

Thanks to the course of the Ronald Reagan’s administration today we mark 20 years of free world. For the last 20 years we have experienced an era of an economic development without precedent in the world’s history. The Asian societies became richer, and there are signs that African countries will change a lot and will achieve growth within the next decade.

In an international system without a block of communist states and with a very few communist enclaves left we saw prosperity – in Asia, in Eastern Europe, in South America and even in Africa. There are only a few regimes – North Korea, Belarus, and Cuba – left to inspire Michael Moore?

They spent our money?

Mr. Moore said in Larry King live that the U.S. government are spending “our money”. I really refuse to be polite at this point. There is no such thing like “our money” jackass. There are “My money”, “You money”, but not “our”. You can talk like that in a soviet-type economy. If you don’t like your own system, your own country, then go to Belarus and make movies about “our money”. Of course you wouldn’t because not one will allow you to make money there.

Michael Moore, the money-maker who stands against the capitalism said at the end of its interview with Larry King that he has a Chrysler minivan, he doesn’t have any savings account is Swiss banks and he has a bout. An he appealed for a “new economic order that is fair for all people”.

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