naturalplastic wrote:
If it were 1944, and I, an American, knew when and where the DDay landing was going to happen, and I gave that info to Nazi Germany, so they could counter the DDay Invasion and win... that would mean that I was guilty of something akin to treason. Would it not?
In order for your analogy to work, you'd have to be a non-US citizen of a third party country, as Assange is not a US citizen and thus cannot commit treason against us.
naturalplastic wrote:
Thats the issue. He took state secrets and made them public. Regardless of his motive (good or bad). Though Assange wasnt working for a specific enemy state like your stereotypical spy, he did broadcast state secrets to the world. Justified, or not.
That's not illegal though, I could publish top secret documents tomorrow and the government couldn't do anything about it, what they're going after him for is making a circuitous claim that he helped Manning steal the files or crack the encryption, which from what I've seen is not a particularly strong case. It's basically revenge and a warning to others at this point, we're trying to send a message to other would be leakers and their publishers that we'll make their lives a living hell if they do something like this.
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