I was in the Australian Army and we were taught very explicitly what the differences between lawful and unlawful orders were with plenty of real examples in history (e.g., not under any circumstances to attack a noncombatant).
I remember reading a story about an Australian F-18 pilots under direction from US HQ who refused to attack a designated targets in IRAQ plenty of times because they weren't convinced that the targets were military. see link: http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/03/13/1078594618101.html
Compare that behaviour to collateral murder and you see the point that blind obedience is not a good thing.
Manning apparently tried to point out that he was being given unlawful orders by his superiors and he was put down and regarded insubordinate. Mass releasing documents was supposedly not his first course of action, rather it may have been a last resort.
To equate good/bad purely with the law is too simplistic. Sure legally he could be found to be a traitor, but this would be a case were the law conflicts with a more sophisticated ethical understanding in which he is not a traitor, rather an agent attempting to right a greater injustice than the injustice of releasing information classified secret (by an authority acting unlawfully itself) to the public. This would be the principle of greater harm.
I don't agree, I think that this site goes to great pains to carefully point out cases where the govt appears to grossly abuse its power, especially when tackling threats to its hegemony. In that sense, this site is providing evidence that can assist in making a conclusion.
To a rational person then, the conclusion is that the govt is at times the secretive miscreant that you describe. That it also often does many good things does not excuse the bad.
We know that the US govt has engaged in kidnapping and torture of innocent people, that has been confirmed. George Bush recently had to cancel a visit to Switzerland because of the threat of arrest for crimes against humanity (think about that for minute). With these things in mind, how is a mistrust of a govt capable of such actions to be considered paranoia? I think it is irrational to not be mistrustful.
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I remember reading a story about an Australian F-18 pilots under direction from US HQ who refused to attack a designated targets in IRAQ plenty of times because they weren't convinced that the targets were military. see link: http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/03/13/1078594618101.html
Compare that behaviour to collateral murder and you see the point that blind obedience is not a good thing.
Manning apparently tried to point out that he was being given unlawful orders by his superiors and he was put down and regarded insubordinate. Mass releasing documents was supposedly not his first course of action, rather it may have been a last resort.
To equate good/bad purely with the law is too simplistic. Sure legally he could be found to be a traitor, but this would be a case were the law conflicts with a more sophisticated ethical understanding in which he is not a traitor, rather an agent attempting to right a greater injustice than the injustice of releasing information classified secret (by an authority acting unlawfully itself) to the public. This would be the principle of greater harm.
Re:
To a rational person then, the conclusion is that the govt is at times the secretive miscreant that you describe. That it also often does many good things does not excuse the bad.
We know that the US govt has engaged in kidnapping and torture of innocent people, that has been confirmed. George Bush recently had to cancel a visit to Switzerland because of the threat of arrest for crimes against humanity (think about that for minute). With these things in mind, how is a mistrust of a govt capable of such actions to be considered paranoia? I think it is irrational to not be mistrustful.
Techdirt has not posted any stories submitted by FSM.
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