The Bradley Manning Show Trial

[804brown]

On the First Day of the Manning Trial

 

[wkmac]

On the First Day of the Manning Trial

Bradley Manning is being tried for doing what Obama promised he would do.

Transparency.

In order to hide the truth from the American people, anyone who dares speak out to tell the truth must be crushed in order to drive fear into those who might get the same idea of playing the role of truth teller. Obama promised open gov't and to protect whistleblowers yet reality under Obama like so much else has been in an opposite direction. Glenn Greenwald said it best not long along in a piece in The Guardian, republished on AlterNet.

Manning is a Hero!

 

[Upsmule]

Take your lumps traitor.

 

[brett636]

If I'm not mistaken some of the information he released jeopardized the safety of some of his fellow service members as well as other foreign government workers. For that alone he deserves to be locked up and the key thrown away.

 

[Upsmule]

If I'm not mistaken some of the information he released jeopardized the safety of some of his fellow service members as well as other foreign government workers. For that alone he deserves to be locked up and the key thrown away.

​Your not mistaken. And your absolutely right.

 

[Upsmule]

Love love love the comments after this one....I know, I would wound't I

Supporting a Traitor: Hollywood Releases ‘I Am Bradley Manning’ Video | NewsBusters

 

[BrownArmy]

The Obama administration is off the top rope on leakers (are you guys siding with Obama on this one? ).

I heard a woman on a call-in radio show and her comment got me thinking.

Her basic point was that after the Nuremberg trials, Americans at the time comforted themselves with the (false) assertion that, 'of course, we would never let that happen..' , i.e. get railroaded by an out-of-control government into allowing/participating in unthinkable acts of total insanity.

Yet, here we are - the Holocaust might not be the best comparison to what's been happening in the 'war' on 'terror', but hopefully you get the drift.

By legal standards Manning is 100% in the wrong, in terms of the military, or national security, or bla-ba-di-bla-blah.

But, what if he's a real Patriot here?

Think about it for a second: the same governmental secrecy that you decry in other contexts, you support in your willingness to buy the government line and send Manning to the gallows.

It's a pickle, no doubt.

 

[wkmac]

Of all the charges against Bradley Manning, the most pernicious — and revealing — is “aiding the enemy.”
A blogger at The New Yorker, Amy Davidson, raised a pair of big questions that now loom over the courtroom at Fort Meade and over the entire country:

* “Would it aid the enemy, for example, to expose war crimes committed by American forces or lies told by the American government?”
* “In that case, who is aiding the enemy — the whistleblower or the perpetrators themselves?”
​

When the deceptive operation of the warfare state can’t stand the light of day, truth-tellers are a constant hazard. And culpability must stay turned on its head.


That’s why accountability was upside-down when the U.S. Army prosecutor laid out the government’s case against Bradley Manning in an opening statement: “This is a case about a soldier who systematically harvested hundreds of thousands of classified documents and dumped them onto the Internet, into the hands of the enemy — material he knew, based on his training, would put the lives of fellow soldiers at risk.”


If so, those fellow soldiers have all been notably lucky; the Pentagon has admitted that none died as a result of Manning’s leaks in 2010. But many of his fellow soldiers lost their limbs or their lives in U.S. warfare made possible by the kind of lies that the U.S. government is now prosecuting Bradley Manning for exposing.


In the real world, as Glenn Greenwald has pointed out, prosecution for leaks is extremely slanted. “Let’s apply the government’s theory in the Manning case to one of the most revered journalists in Washington: Bob Woodward, who has become one of America’s richest reporters, if not the richest, by obtaining and publishing classified information far more sensitive than anything WikiLeaks has ever published,” Greenwald wrote in January.


He noted that “one of Woodward’s most enthusiastic readers was Osama bin Laden,” as a 2011 video from al-Qaeda made clear. And Greenwald added that “the same Bob Woodward book [Obama’s Wars] that Osama bin Laden obviously read and urged everyone else to read disclosed numerous vital national security secrets far more sensitive than anything Bradley Manning is accused of leaking. Doesn’t that necessarily mean that top-level government officials who served as Woodward’s sources, and the author himself, aided and abetted al-Qaida?”


But the prosecution of Manning is about carefully limiting the information that reaches the governed. Officials who run U.S. foreign policy choose exactly what classified info to dole out to the public. They leak like self-serving sieves to mainline journalists such as Woodward, who has divulged plenty of “Top Secret” information — a category of classification higher than anything Bradley Manning is accused of leaking.


While pick-and-choose secrecy is serving Washington’s top war-makers, the treatment of U.S. citizens is akin to the classic description of how to propagate mushrooms: keeping them in the dark and feeding them bull*.

Who was Really "Aiding the Enemy?"

 

[brett636]

I guess for those who would hold this traitor up as some sort of patriot and or hero don't really care that he put other American's lives at risk because of his actions. As long as it wasn't your brother/sister/son/daughter etc. who could have been killed because of his leaking information then its all ok?

 

[wkmac]

I guess for those who would hold this traitor up as some sort of patriot and or hero don't really care that he put other American's lives at risk because of his actions. As long as it wasn't your brother/sister/son/daughter etc. who could have been killed because of his leaking information then its all ok?

Why don't you take that same position and apply that to those who take us to war under false claims and terms in the first place and understand that as a greater treason?

 

[brett636]

Why don't you take that same position and apply that to those who take us to war under false claims and terms in the first place and understand that as a greater treason?

Why can't you stay on topic and tell me why its ok for Bradley Manning to diliberatly take it upon himself to jeopardize the safety and well being of his fellow service members all because he can't shake the sand out of his ?

 

[wkmac]

Why can't you stay on topic and tell me why its ok for Bradley Manning to diliberatly take it upon himself to jeopardize the safety and well being of his fellow service members all because he can't shake the sand out of his ?

OK, on the same grounds of putting our troops in danger, why are you not calling for Bob Woodward's head or better yet, the heads of the inside Washington sources who "purposely" leaking him even more secretive information? But those leaks were from within the power structure for political purposes, most likely from either the Pentagon or intelligence sources and yet you seem so fixated on Bradley Manning.

What about Leon Panetta who reports are circulating that he as CIA director leaked classified information to the makers of the Zero Dark Thirty film so where is the outrage? There is none because that film allows you to glory in all that is America at it's best, killing people because we sure as hell don't make or produce anything else of value anymore. Thank you democrats/republicans/liberals/conservatives equally for that fact.

And to my earlier point, yes, we were lied into a war in which our young men and women lost their lives, suffered horrible injuries and the mental scares are now rearing their ugly heads. If our cause was so damn noble and righteous, why are these brave men and women having such nightmares? To the point that suicide seems the only answer to stop them? Manning's disclosures if anything exposed the truth of the meat grinder these good folks were thrown into but sadly you've yet to wrap your head around the truth that War itself is welfare for the rich and evil! It's been the largest means of wealth redistribution and yet it is you who support it. So much for calling them democrats bad names eh?

As for the alleged "harm" to lives that Manning is suppose to have wrought, this suggests you just submit to an appeal to authority and blanket accept the claims as proven without any question when in fact this is in process as we speak. It's called a trial. BTW: Do you think the gov't is lying about Benghazi? So why now are they telling the truth with Manning? But the prosecution has one advantage in that in this trial, they do not have to prove that Manning's actions caused harm but only that Manning believed they would cause harm. So in the end we may not know of any actual harms that did take place but only that Manning believed them to be and that is still problematic to the actual effects on the ground. But then if you can't prove an actual harm in the first place, thought crimes can serve your purpose.

Manning exposed actions that are war crimes and thus showed the efforts to hide them. Some give the argument that in doing what he did, he was in fact following the law. But more important to me is the simple fact that person(s) in the employ of the State will and do lie in order to hide the facts that other self interests are being served other than what the public is told. That is a fact Jack!

And on that fact, with the gov't on the sly searching everyone's phone, email and internet records proves the paranoia of the State and it's the liar who tends to be the most paranoid because he/she has the most to hide and it's called the truth and whoever exposes it also exposes the liar. Therefore using the means of fear in suppressing truth tellers becomes a primacy action. So until the State and it's hooligans, uniformed or not show me reason why they are not lying, I see no reason to believe or trust them.

Manning did break his contractual agreement to remain silent on some level and he will have to pay for that and more than likely he will as he's plead guilty to some of the charges. No beef from me on that. I don't see Manning walking out a free man after this trial on the basis of contractual breech but in the fact that he threw mud in the face of the American Empire so to speak, I LOVE IT AND WANT SOME MORE OF IT! Whistleblowers are speaking out and thus the reason the Obama administration has gone into overdrive combatting it. Go read about former FBI translator Sibel Edmonds or former Dept. of Homeland Security employee Julia Davis and her husband BJ who exposed the open doors at our biggest border crossing. If you dare you'll begin to see an obvious pattern.

The information Manning had access too was also accessible to well over a million other people in gov't as well. I saw one figure that said the number of people with access to this information would make up the population of South Dakota and I think the other state was Delaware so with that many eyes with access, just how super secret was this information in the first place? A recent piece in the Guardian suggested much of this information may well have already been outed (those inside the beltway anonymous sources again) and that Manning also believed much of it was in the public domain already. The trial may prove this so and it bares watching for.

But with all those eyes, you don't think people in those positions didn't talk or also wrongly releases information or release for political objectives within Washington itself? The State as well as the Security State has become massively too big. It needs to be knocked down in size by a long way (if me I'd eliminate the CIA and NSA completely) and if it takes more Manning's to do so, then I welcome their courage and convictions. This gov't is not what it started out as so IMO it is they who have already been the ones to commit treason from original intent so to speak and therefore.............. Unlike you Brett, I really do want a lot less gov't and have never shied from saying so either.

If there really was truth and justice in our world, instead of the Manning trial, we'd be talking about the War Crimes trial of both the Bush and the Obama administration that might well cause a cascade effect to re-examine the Clinton, Bush 1, Reagan and even the Carter Presidency if not further back. Sad to say I won't be around in the years ahead when America as we know it will be a mere memory but like the brutality of Rome, I hope the historians of that time will also expose what we were as well. Future societies will rightly question why we fought the Soviets and the Nazis in the 20th century unless it was to just eliminate the competition.

And again, unlike you Brett, I don't play the false choices of the partisan politics bullschitt game. Poison is Poison!

 

[Upsmule]

People need to stop bitching and moaning about what should have happened or what shouldn't have happened.....start acknowledging what our brave men and women HAVE ACCOMPLISHED REGARDLESS OF THE NAY SAYERS AND PARTISAN BUSH HATERS. It all certainly wasn't for naught.....

On the anniversary of the start of the Iraq War, the United State Central Command in Tampa, Fla., listed these accomplishments of Operation Iraqi Freedom (search):
Operation Iraqi Freedom Coalition Forces have successfully liberated 25 million Iraqis from the brutal dictatorship of Saddam Hussein.
These highlights provide information regarding the accomplishments of the Coalition throughout the past year.
The OIF Coalition is comprised of 34 countries, including 11 NATO countries, and they have provided over 22,000 troops to support the efforts in Iraq. There are two multi-national divisions in Iraq: one led by the United Kingdom in central-south Iraq, and one led by Poland in south Iraq.
The international community has pledged at least $32 billion to improve schools, health care, roads, water and electricity supplies, agriculture and other essential services.
The World Bank, International Monetary Fund, the European Union, and 38 countries have pledged to extend loans and grants to Iraq. Other nations are contributing humanitarian assistance, extending export credits and reducing Iraqi debt.
The UN Security Council on Oct. 16, 2003, unanimously approved Resolution 1511 that calls on member states to support the work of the multinational force in Iraq.
Security:
America's armed forces are taking the offensive against remnants of Saddam Hussein's regime and foreign terrorists, leading more than 1,600 patrols a day and conducting an average of 180 raids a week.
45 of the 55 most wanted Hussein regime members have been captured or killed, including the brutal dictator himself, whose capture sent a powerful message to the Iraqi people that the tyranny of the past will never return. The capture of Saddam Hussein provided a boost to intelligence throughout western Iraq.
The quality of intelligence is cascading as a result of the Saddam capture: the intelligence is of higher quality and allows a higher level of captures. Saddam's capture is allowing the Coalition to apprehend more mid-level financiers and organizers.
More than 230,000 Iraqis now provide security for their fellow citizens, and Iraqi security forces now account for the majority of all forces in Iraq. These forces include Iraqi Police, Iraqi Civil Defense Corps, Iraqi Border Police, Iraqi Facility Protection Service and the New Iraqi Army.
Law/Governance:
Since July, the 25-person Iraqi Governing Council has had the authority to: name interim Ministers; exercise government oversight; prepare policy initiatives on Iraq’s national security, including reform of the armed forces, police and courts; lead development of a constitution; and approve Iraq's national budget. 24 Iraqi Cabinet Members also contribute to the business of the government.
First time in 13 years, an ambassador to the US was appointed to restore diplomatic relations.
90 percent of Iraq’s districts have municipal/government councils with more than 19 million Iraqis engaging in local political discourse.
Ministry of Justice has established a Council of Judges to oversee the judiciary and prosecutors. Also, defendants are now provided lawyers.
Public Health:
240 hospitals and most of Iraq’s 1200 clinics have reopened. 70 private hospitals are operating.
800 tons of high protein biscuits have been delivered to 15 Governorates for malnourished children and pregnant/nursing mothers.
1.09 million humanitarian daily rations have been distributed to date.
22 million children and 700,000 women have been inoculated against diseases since the war; 90 percent of all Iraqi children now receive routine vaccinations.
Pharmaceuticals distribution improved from 0 to 12,000 tons today, more than $210 million approved for the Iraqi Ministry of Heath for pharmaceutical supplies and equipment, basic health care services, medical equipment and power generators for hospitals.
Schools:
Nearly all schools are open and 5.1 million students are attending class.
25 Fulbright Scholarships awarded for the first time in 14 years; Fulbright Office added 2 new programs for Iraqis.
Over 13,500 school buildings in Iraq; $4.4 million spent to complete 2,299 school renovations; UNICEF and other NGOs are rehabilitating 105 schools; 183K desks, 57K chairs, 61K chalkboards and 25K metal cabinets have been distributed.
33,000 teachers and 3,000 supervisors trained in instructional practices and classroom management strategies.
Commerce and Trade:
Iraqis use a single, unified currency for the first time in 15 years; 4.6 trillion new Iraqi dinars in circulation.
Iraq Stock Exchange will open in April; Iraq Central Bank is fully independent and has been opened since Sept 03.
83 percent of all pre-war bank branches are open.
Umm Qasr Port turned over to Iraqi control in Jan 04.
393,950 jobs have been generated.
Estimated crude oil export revenues exceed $3.3 billion for Iraqi reconstruction.
Telephone service continues to expand with 95% of service outside Baghdad.
More than 170 newspaper are published in Iraq
Power:
4400 megawatts per day is the current seven-day average, this is up from 300 megawatts per day in 2003.
USAID will spend more than $250 million infrastructure repair funds on power rehabilitation and an additional $75 million allocated to power reconstruction.
Water:
Coalition programs have cleared over 16,500 km of irrigation canals, helping over 10,000 farms.
Water storage in most Iraqi reservoirs is approaching historic averages.
Rehabilitated water treatment plants will treat nearly 800 million liters/day, benefiting 3.5 million people.
90 percent of Iraqis will have potable water by Apr 05.
Quality of Life:
Religious rites are being re-established for all sects.
New Ministry of Housing and Construction has started 1,008 new homes and is working with the UN to start 7 housing projects with 3,528 units.
Military Supplies Used:
Item Quantity Dollar Value
MREs 42.1 mil meals $285.0 mil
Bottled water 120 mil bottles $31.0 mil
Cots 342,000 $18.2 mil
Lumber 17.25 mil board-feet $6.9 mil
Plywood 750,000 sheets $10.9 mil
Combat Boots 673,000 pair $48.7 mil
Body Armor 191,000 vests $105.0 mil
Body Armor 361,000 plates $180.5 mil


Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,114684,00.html#ixzz2VZNwd2ox

 

[wkmac]

Matt Taibbi on Bradley Manning and the Media selling ChumpBait

 

[Upsmule]

Matt Taibbi on Bradley Manning and the Media selling ChumpBait

Rolling stone. Seriously....and that is a less biased source than Fox News. Got it.

 

[wkmac]

Rolling stone. Seriously....and that is a less biased source than Fox News. Got it.

So which point or points that were made in the article did you object to the most?

 

[roadrunner2012]

So which point or points that were made in the article did you object to the most?

Reading is egalitarian, muleboy doesn't play that game.

 

[wkmac]

Reading is egalitarian, muleboy doesn't play that game.

In your case when it comes to videos, I guess you aren't egalitarian?

Pot meet Kettle!

 

[804brown]

USA = Unforgiving, Spiteful, Angry

 

[804brown]

Manning Chose Documents for Release as Selectively as Snowden