@8pm every night.
I am breaking with my usual informationthread b/c I don't think people are up to speed with the "Manning issue" and it's COINTELPRO-type operation in regards to Lamo/Poulsen.
Seems to be a fair amount of known propaganda being thrown around about Bradley Manning. Not only in the media, but on this site. So, I will start tonight by providing some sort of context. when you click on the link for the Greenwald article, listen to the very long audio interview he does with Lamo.
On June 18, Glenn Greenwald starting doin' some of that lamestream journalistic stuff that the media seems to claim they do:
At the time when Lamo was conspiring with federal agents to induce Manning into making incriminating statements, Poulsen, by his own account, was aware that this was taking place, but there's no indication he participated in any way with Lamo. What is true, though, is that Lamo gave Wired the full, unedited version of his chat logs with Manning, but Wired published only extremely edited samplings of it. This is what Poulsen told me when I asked if Lamo gave him all of the chat logs:
He did, but I don't think we'll be publishing more any time soon. The remainder is either Manning discussing personal matters that aren't clearly related to his arrest, or apparently sensitive government information that I'm not throwing up without vetting first.
This part of Wired's conduct deserves a lot more attention. First, in his interview with me, Lamo claimed that all sorts of things took place in the discussion between him and Manning that are (a) extremely relevant to what happened, (b) have nothing to do with Manning's personal issues or sensitive national security secrets, and yet (c) are nowhere to be found in the chat logs published by Wired. That means either that Lamo is lying about what was said or Wired is concealing highly relevant aspects of their discussions. Included among that is Manning's explanation about how he found Lamo and why he contacted him, Manning's alleged claim that his "intention was to cripple the United States' foreign relations for the foreseeable future," and discussions they had about the capacity in which they were speaking.
Second, one can't help but note the irony that two hackers-turned-journalists -- Poulsen and Lamo -- are now the self-anointed guardians of America's national security, the former concealing secrets he learned as a journalist on vague national security grounds and the latter turning informant by invoking the most extreme, right-wing platitudes about "traitors" and "spies" and decrees that his actions were necessary to "save American lives."
Third, Wired should either publish all of the chat logs, or be far more diligent about withholding only those parts which truly pertain only to Manning's private and personal matters and/or which would reveal national security secrets. Or they should have a respected third party review the parts they have concealed to determine if there is any justification for that. At least if one believes Lamo's claims, there are clearly relevant parts of those chats which Wired continues to conceal.
Now, some people on this site are also using the same right-wing talking points about Manning. And one user has been using the Wired article while using those right-wing talking points. I suggest you head on over to the link I provided and not only read the entire thing, but listen to the interview with Lamo.
Again, Glenn Greenwald makes the damned point:
Still, in light of the magnitude of this story on several levels and his long relationship with Lamo, Kevin Poulsen should not be single-handedly deciding what the public is and isn't permitted to know about the Lamo-Manning interaction.
In case anyone had any doubts about Manning's actions:
Lamo: what's your endgame plan, then?. . .
Manning: well, it was forwarded to [WikiLeaks] - and god knows what happens now - hopefully worldwide discussion, debates, and reforms - if not, than [sic] we're doomed - as a species - i will officially give up on the society we have if nothing happens - the reaction to the video gave me immense hope; CNN's iReport was overwhelmed; Twitter exploded - people who saw, knew there was something wrong . . . - i want people to see the truth... regardless of who they are... because without information, you cannot make informed decisions as a public.
Manning: i mean what if i were someone more malicious- i could've sold to russia or china, and made bank?
Lamo: why didn’t you?
Manning: because it's public data
Lamo: i mean, the cables
Manning: it belongs in the public domain information should be free it belongs in the public domain - because another state would just take advantage of the information... try and get some edge - if its out in the open... it should be a public good.
Daniel Ellsberg also read the texts:
I am very appreciative of Bradley Manning, the suspect in this. Who has not been proven to be the source yet, by the Army. If the Pentagon's and Army's suspicions are correct, then I admmire what he did. And I feel great affinity for him. Because he did say, allegedly, to the person who turned him in, Adrian Lamo, in a chat log that he was prepared, that he was ready to go to prison for life! Or even 'be executed', he said, in order to share this information with the American people who he thought needed to have it. And that's the statement, I'd said, I've waited, in a way, for 40 years to hear someone make.
Story from 2002 about the Lamo/Poulsen friendship:
To publicize his work, he's often tapped ex-hacker-turned-journalist Kevin Poulsen as his go-between: Poulsen contacts the hacked company, alerts it to the break-in, offers Lamo's cooperation, then reports the hack on the SecurityFocus Online Web site, where he's a news editor.
So, once again, Poulsen has been friends with Lamo for many years. They got together the day before the second interview Lamo had with the Feds. Plus, as more and more of the texts come out, Wired is looking worse and worse. Listen to the interview with Lamos. Another post by Greenwald from Aug. 2nd:
Uber is the Executive Director of a highly secretive group called Project Vigilant, which, as Greenberg writes, "monitors the traffic of 12 regional Internet service providers" and "hands much of that information to federal agencies." More on that in a minute. Uber revealed yesterday that Lamo, the hacker who turned in Manning to the federal government for allegedly confessing to being the WikiLeaks leaker, was a "volunteer analyst" for Project Vigilant; that it was Uber who directed Lamo to federal authorities to inform on Manning by using his contacts to put Lamo in touch with the "highest level people in the government" at "three letter agencies"; and, according to a Wired report this morning, it was Uber who strongly pressured Lamo to inform by telling him (falsely) that he'd likely be arrested if he failed to turn over to federal agents everything he received from Manning.
So, while Lamo has repeatedly denied (including in his interview with me) that he ever worked with federal authorities, it turns out that he was a "volunteer analyst" for an entity which collects private Internet data in order to process it and turn it over to the Federal Government. That makes the whole Manning case all the more strange: Manning not only abruptly contacted a disreputable hacker out of the blue and confessed to major crimes over the Interent, but the hacker he arbitrarily chose just happened to be an "analyst" for a group that monitors on a massive scale the private Internet activities of American citizens in order to inform on them to U.S. law enforcement agencies (on a side note, if you want to judge what Adrian Lamo is, watch him in this amazing BBC video; I've never seen someone behave quite like him on television before).
Just stop! Watch the video.
no really. Watch it.
It seems everyone in our government is on the same page
Julian Assange like a hi-tech terrorist, says Joe Biden
"If he conspired to get these classified documents with a member of the US military that is fundamentally different than if someone drops on your lap ... you are a press person, here is classified material."
Asked if he saw Assange as closer to a hi-tech terrorist than the whistleblower who released the Pentagon papers in the 1970s, which disclosed the lie on which US involvement in Vietnam was based, Biden replied: "I would argue it is closer to being a hi-tech terrorist than the Pentagon papers. But, look, this guy has done things that have damaged and put in jeopardy the lives and occupations of people in other parts of the world.
"He's made it more difficult for us to conduct our business with our allies and our friends. For example, in my meetings – you know I meet with most of these world leaders – there is a desire now to meet with me alone, rather than have staff in the room. It makes things more cumbersome – so it has done damage."
The interview, though broadcast yesterday, was conducted on Friday. In an interview the previous day, he had been more neutral about WikiLeaks, saying: "I don't think there's any substantive damage."
Assange and Manning are done. The government has decided it is so........
I am not going to post anything else tonight. I think the Greenwald article and interview with Lamo is more important at this point than any new info on the cables.