The Guardian has been (together with the Scotsman by the way) a source of inspiration over the last decade or more.
To see them intimidated like this by thugs that could have walked right out of something by Bulgakov or even Kafka is a sobering prospect.
It translates into: the free press is now classed an enemy of the state and equates to terrorism.
I've lived in Poland before the iron curtain came down, in the years when Jaruzelski ruled the country and when Solidarnosc was just beginning to form, the free press was classed an enemy of the state there as well. Mere posession of an illegal book or paper could get you into a lot of trouble.
The state sanctioned media were extremely circumspect in their reporting of what was going on in Gdansk and Gdynia but word trickled out and slowly Polish people everywhere started to see light at the end of the tunnel.
Reagan, the Afghan war and Gorbachev all played a part in the fall of the Soviet Union. But Poland and especially Solidarity, Wałęsa and Popiełuszko deserve a good chunk of the credit too.
A not so visible part of all of this is that the free press in Poland (called the samizdat) spread not only books but also 10's of thousands of copies of the underground newspaper Solidarnosc, many of which were read by multiple people, passed from hand to hand to trusted friends. These were the only counterweight to state media (newspaper, radio, television) and the contrast between the two was stark.
I wonder if the Solidarity movement would have gotten off the ground as well as it did and whether Poland would have made the early move to freedom without such a free press (and in some cases it wasn't even a press but simply hand-copying or re-typing!).
It is the only historical change that I have had the privilege of observing at very close quarters, so my experience is limited. But a free press to me is a must have, it is as important as having a system of government, and to have a free press we must have journalists and newspapers that are free to operate.
Otherwise one of these days we'll have to resort to underground presses like in the days of communism in Poland, press freedom is very important no matter who governs you, and government officials intimidating the press is a very bad sign.
In David Hoffman's excellent book "The Dead Hand: Reagan, Gorbachev and the Untold Story of the Cold War Arms Race" he describes how Reagan and John Paul II came up with a plan that saw the smuggling of large quantities of office equipment (photocopies, faxes etc.) into Poland.
Yeah right, we British might well need the skills of such immigrants to survive freely. Shame we dont have much of a tradition of immigrants from France...
Hmmmm.... The British (Or US) Resistance, any one? Really annoy our right wings by taking inspiration from the "evil surrender monkey" French? Or too ironic?
What you mean competing political organizations that where as concerned with internal politics and doing over the opposition as fighting the germans.
The representation of the Resistance vs the Communist Resistance in 'Allo 'Allo! is not that far from the fact and internal infighting between royalist and communist is also a theme in Captain Corelli's Mandolin.
Shouldn't we be doing more to discuss the nature of classified material that was exposed by the press, rather than just whether the "free press" is a good thing? Isn't there a continuum between reporting on e.g. D-Day invasion plans two days before and a judge who accepted cash to issue an injunction to stop vote counting in a contested election? And wouldn't the press be guilty of treason for the former, but fourth-branch status for the latter?
Why shouldn't we know about our own governments spying on us? Why shouldn't we be informed about how our government is governing?
The US Constitution, at least, was written in remembrance of the privations of an occupying army. The country was founded on the belief that the people are sovereign. If the people are to be sovereign, then they need to know what the government is doing. This is why we have freedom of the press, etc., and why this right is more important than any short-term goal.
The governments of the US and UK are acting like occupying armies. They disregard the rule of law, act arbitrarily, arrogantly, and without accountability. Fixing this is more important than any marginal security the NSA's secrecy provides. It's probably worth more than everything the NSA provides altogether.
It's been said here on HN, that if the anti-surveillance crowd were really serious, and constituted a good chunk of the voting public, then they would get organized like: Pro-Lifers, the Pro-Choice, Pro Gun, Civil Rights, etc. But it sounds like you are saying that your adversaries are agencies who by definition must act in secret, and there is no amount of political advocacy that can engage them on their level. It's only through some type of hacker-war, which you analogize to the revolution, that your concerns can be addressed?
I wasn't advocating a revolution, I think we can fix this inside the system we have. But I think that because we do have the means to allow us to fix it, like freedom of the press.
This episode bothers me in a different way than most violations of basic human rights. Because the violation is around privacy/secrecy, the violating entities have to attack the very means we have set up to correct violations. It's like a virus that attacks the immune system, something to be taken more seriously than the actual damage done, because it destroys the ecosystem's ability to correct other violations.
In any case, I was simply encouraging you to actually say something, rather than just say what sorts of things we should say, and then demonstrating what I meant.
I don't see any progress toward fixing this from within the system. Snowden and WikiLeaks are more analogous to an exiled resistance group than to people trying to work within the system. MLK stayed right here and got arrested and murdered.
Surveillance won't be a major political issue unless it tangibly affects a lot of people in a negative way. That's just not happening now. Most people don't care. But there are other things they do care about because they feel the effects.
I have no problem with allowances given to intelligence agencies at a time of war, however I do not recall that the UK or USA have declared war on anyone, let alone anyone whom the information pertains too.
Following the admission of the CIA and MI5 involvement in the 1953 military coup in Iran, and this has already been known/suspected but the war really wasn't on terrorism.
In the past the definition of public interest was much clearer because nationality was such a defining factor in how you would be treated. A friendly German in Britain during the war was still locked up even if they were no threat. Civilians were killed because they lived in a particular country rather than the ideology they supported. Identity is much more globalized and more diverse than in the past, and it is unreasonable to tie people down to a single national interest. The press need to consider what is in the public interest for the whole world.
I understand where you're coming from, but I just don't see how a more globally integrated society can be used as an argument to exempt members of the press, who are physically located in a nation, from being subject to the laws of that nation. We still manage to have international trade despite the fact that each nation has their own laws regarding money and trade, so a news organization (or reporter), like a business (or individual), can relocate itself to a country more favorable to its agenda.
There is a big difference between being concerned, advocating for, and helping those in other nations, yet still being a citizen of your nation, and imagining yourself as a global citizen who is above the laws of any one nation.
Agree 100%. Ironically terrorists give exactly the same "public interest" defense for their actions; appealing to a higher power than national interest. Personally I like the approach that Google adopts of having an overriding ethos, but also respecting local laws. The risk is that government will not be able to tell the difference between a noble ethos and a perverted terrorist one. I don't know what the solution to that is. Ignoring human rights is not the solution.
Yes. We absolutely should. But I personally think the actions by the state (completely ignoring due process and right to trial prior to the acquisition and destruction of a private entity's property) are even more treasonous.
At least these times are useful to find out which publications have the interests of the public at heart. I will cancel my subscription of the (shockingly silent) Economist and get a Guardian subscription instead.
Back in the day, I used the cablegate affair to gauge the "balls" of all the publications that were involved in the coordinated release. It might interest some of you that only El País had no "we're sorry but we have to do this because we are journalists" article in it.
To see them intimidated like this by thugs that could have walked right out of something by Bulgakov or even Kafka is a sobering prospect.
It translates into: the free press is now classed an enemy of the state and equates to terrorism.
I've lived in Poland before the iron curtain came down, in the years when Jaruzelski ruled the country and when Solidarnosc was just beginning to form, the free press was classed an enemy of the state there as well. Mere posession of an illegal book or paper could get you into a lot of trouble.
The state sanctioned media were extremely circumspect in their reporting of what was going on in Gdansk and Gdynia but word trickled out and slowly Polish people everywhere started to see light at the end of the tunnel.
Reagan, the Afghan war and Gorbachev all played a part in the fall of the Soviet Union. But Poland and especially Solidarity, Wałęsa and Popiełuszko deserve a good chunk of the credit too.
A not so visible part of all of this is that the free press in Poland (called the samizdat) spread not only books but also 10's of thousands of copies of the underground newspaper Solidarnosc, many of which were read by multiple people, passed from hand to hand to trusted friends. These were the only counterweight to state media (newspaper, radio, television) and the contrast between the two was stark.
I wonder if the Solidarity movement would have gotten off the ground as well as it did and whether Poland would have made the early move to freedom without such a free press (and in some cases it wasn't even a press but simply hand-copying or re-typing!).
It is the only historical change that I have had the privilege of observing at very close quarters, so my experience is limited. But a free press to me is a must have, it is as important as having a system of government, and to have a free press we must have journalists and newspapers that are free to operate.
Otherwise one of these days we'll have to resort to underground presses like in the days of communism in Poland, press freedom is very important no matter who governs you, and government officials intimidating the press is a very bad sign.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samizdat
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solidarity_%28Polish_trade_unio...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jerzy_Popie%C5%82uszko