Ok, why don't you publish the contents of all of your text messages, emails, and recordings of all the phone calls you've ever made and put a video camera in your bedroom streaming 24/7?
Because my text messages asking my girlfriend to pick up some food on her way back is of no interest to the public.
If, however, I am suspected of committing a crime, the police expects the whole untempered truth and anything else can be considered as obstruction of justice. If I can be held to this standard, so does our public servants in the government.
The government, however, has the power to hide stuff from the public. Leakers and whistleblowers are the only thing that can hold them accountable.
Because they (or myself - or yourself) are not empowered to systematically commit crimes by their/our citizens - who pay for the privilege of that through taxation.
So - you are saying that governments should not be accountable and transparent in their operations? Transparency within the limits of safety (intelligence gathering/criminal investigation (while it is underway - once it hits the courts and convictions are made, should be transparent) - yet - what happens when those who have the power are abusing it and committing criminal acts?
Yeah - give me the leakers, give me the dissidents - because you end-up with an out-of-control fascist police-state otherwise.
>what happens when those who have the power are abusing it and committing criminal acts?
I never saw anything on Wikileaks I thought needed to be leaked.
>Because they (or myself - or yourself) are not empowered to systematically commit crimes by their/our citizens - who pay for the privilege of that through taxation.
You have power over, say, your children, spouse, parents, maybe you manage folks? Do they have a right to dump all your information to each other?
>Yeah - give me the leakers, give me the dissidents - because you end-up with an out-of-control fascist police-state otherwise.
This is exactly the kind of teenage rebel logic I'm talking about. Snowden exposed an actual significant abuse of power issue. Assange didn't, as far as I know with the things I've seen and remember. People who want to blindly rebel but have nothing but vague charges and cannot point to real issues supporting anything anti-government.
Adults need to focus on understanding the real problems of government and providing real feedback on logically sound arguments. Not ambiguous "down with the man" rhetoric. You live in a world that needs government to function and governments need to keep secrets.
