Roachboy, honestly, from you I expect better.
Look, I represent people in legal disputes. Part of what we do is figure out strategies for how best to present our case. That takes a lot of brainstorming. Some of it is with clients (subject to attorney-client privilege) and some of it is with fellow attorneys and experts (subject to work product privilege). When we have these discussions, they range from mad-scientist-like creative ravings to workmanlike plotting -- but if they weren't protected by nondisclosure privilege we couldn't have honest discussions.
It's been awhile since I had a case against the federal govt, but a while ago I was involved in litigation against a federal agency, and they have something called the "deliberative process" privilege -- brainstorming isn't discoverable in lawsuits. It can be infuriating (esp if you think, as I did, that the "brainstorming" wasn't done in good faith but rather with the specific intent of fucking over my client), but I understand why the privilege exists. You can't have good decisionmaking if every crazy thing someone thinks can end up on the public record because then people won't speak their minds.
So I have some sympathy with the idea that not everything should be public, because I understand precisely the need to foster open discussion in certain areas by promising confidentiality. And I think you do, too, roachboy. And I'm well aware of the systemic abuse that this invites, particularly among ass-covering bureaucrats.
But there are remedies for the abuses. It's not Julian Assange's job to make those decisions. He has neither the training nor the disposition to address abuses intelligently. Neither do I (well, I might have the disposition but I don't have the training or, for that matter, the inclination). As I have said before, I'm very much the libertarian but I'm very far from being an anarchist -- and what Assange is doing is anarchic -- no one appointed or elected him to be the decisionmaker about what should and shouldnt be public. I'm very suspicous of self-appointed guardians of the public good. Hell, I'm suspicious of
anyone who considers him/herself a guardian of the public good, but at least when such a person is elected or appointed there is a way to get rid of them. The self-appointed guardians answer to no one.
As for the newspapers who publish this stuff - they should consider their own ethics. Trafficking in stolen information is sordid business. I am not in favor of prosecuting media for publicizing things (unless they themselves participate in the theft, which is exceedingly rare), but they do need to act responsibly. And one thing they can do is turn in their source if they know the source acted criminally - they can even do it anonymously!
