The term "responsible disclosure" may no longer have any meaning.
"Irresponsible disclosure" for the short term may be equivalent to "responsible disclosure" for the long term.
There must be some pretty dark stuff yet to be disclosed, and/or some pretty overt threats for those relatively fearless journalists to close ranks. The "Assange example" may have done its job perfectly.
Not just Assange, basically everyone involved except maybe Poitras took a hit. Appelbaum was driven out of his work with Tor (and from public life) after a smear campaign, Greenwald had to shift to alt media, and Snowden had to flee the country. Other journalists and editors “moved on” from their work with the papers.
Snowden did ask them not to get into any direct military secrets that were in the leaks, so that could explain some of the restraint.
His politics have been remarkably consistent over time. He’s always been a slightly left-leaning, anti-war civil libertarian who is deeply suspicious of government, particularly the US government. He’s been posting lately about how Trump has been starting or expanding unjust wars and cracking down on press freedom. That’s hardly a “right-wing fringe” slant.
Since 2016, he's appeared repeatedly in conservative outlets (including pushing conspiracy theories about Ukraine), gotten fired for uncritically pushing unsubstantiated claims from the Trump campaign as journalism, hosted a video podcast giving a voice to folks like RFK Jr.
Other than speaking up against the surveillance state, he's been solidly aligned with conservative viewpoints.
RFK was also a lifelong Democrat. Not that long ago anti-war, pro free speech, anti 'big brother', anti illegal-immigration, anti political violence, anti mega-corp (especially big pharma), and other such stuff was all part of a very typical liberal 'resume.' Now it's more or less the exact opposite on many of these points.
It's not people's views that are really changing, but those of the parties. A complete liberal from not that long ago would now be deemed a conservative by the DNC. I think that's a problem for the DNC that needs to be tackled, because it's self defeating.
2028, after this presidency, should be an overwhelmingly massive landslide the likes of Reagan-Mondale. But it's going to be a coin flip, and this sort of otherizing is precisely why.
>A complete liberal from not that long ago would now be deemed a conservative by the DNC.
You say this like it isn't inherent to the nature of liberalism versus conservatism. A liberal of a prior generation is almost always conservative compared to liberals of the current generation. It just feels different this time because you're actually witnessing it change in real time rather than learning about it from history.
But in this case we're rather going in quite the opposite direction! For instance broad opposition to free speech has no place in any sort of formulation of liberalism, and so you find yourself in a scenario where a certain brand of liberal today would hold values deemed quite conservative, even by the standards of the past.
But this is also not particularly unprecedented. In the early 20th century the Republican and Democrat parties largely swapped roles. There was no formal agreement or acknowledgement of such. It happened quite organically, spurred along by decades of relatively significant events. I think we're seeing the outlines of such happening again, in much the same way.
When one debates aforementioned 'certain brand' types today, it often feels like a blast to the past. They share many of the characteristics of the die hard conservatives of times past - self assuredness bordering on divine authority, seemingly blissful ignorance of their numerous self-declared 'enemies', that trademark rabid intolerance, and more. The main thing that's changed is the dogma of choice.
First, the conversation was about the DNC, so what centrist Dems think is more important than "Progressives, radlibs, and the ultra-left". But beyond that, what specific policies are you talking about? Because without naming specific parts of the DNC platform, what you're saying sounds completely indistinguishable from "my niece corrected my pronoun usage and that made me angry".
I think a practical issue you have to deal with on this sort of topic is what is done versus what is said. Illegal immigration is a great example. There's no part of any official DNC that overtly supports illegal immigration, yet policies and behaviors show an intent to enable and facilitate exactly that.
On the speech issue, here [1] is a rather great bit on DNC efforts to censor speech by the WSWS/World Socialist Web Site. The article mentions the ongoing obsession with censoring "disinformation" when disinformation itself is often little more than truths that counter the official lies of the day.
BLKNSLVR · · focus · HN ↗
"Irresponsible disclosure" for the short term may be equivalent to "responsible disclosure" for the long term.
There must be some pretty dark stuff yet to be disclosed, and/or some pretty overt threats for those relatively fearless journalists to close ranks. The "Assange example" may have done its job perfectly.
iamnothere · · focus · HN ↗
Snowden did ask them not to get into any direct military secrets that were in the leaks, so that could explain some of the restraint.
Arainach · · focus · HN ↗
Greenwald didn't "have" to do anything. His politics took a sharp turn towards the right-wing fringe and he lost his original audience.
iamnothere · · focus · HN ↗
Arainach · · focus · HN ↗
Other than speaking up against the surveillance state, he's been solidly aligned with conservative viewpoints.
somenameforme · · focus · HN ↗
It's not people's views that are really changing, but those of the parties. A complete liberal from not that long ago would now be deemed a conservative by the DNC. I think that's a problem for the DNC that needs to be tackled, because it's self defeating.
2028, after this presidency, should be an overwhelmingly massive landslide the likes of Reagan-Mondale. But it's going to be a coin flip, and this sort of otherizing is precisely why.
slg · · focus · HN ↗
You say this like it isn't inherent to the nature of liberalism versus conservatism. A liberal of a prior generation is almost always conservative compared to liberals of the current generation. It just feels different this time because you're actually witnessing it change in real time rather than learning about it from history.
somenameforme · · focus · HN ↗
But this is also not particularly unprecedented. In the early 20th century the Republican and Democrat parties largely swapped roles. There was no formal agreement or acknowledgement of such. It happened quite organically, spurred along by decades of relatively significant events. I think we're seeing the outlines of such happening again, in much the same way.
When one debates aforementioned 'certain brand' types today, it often feels like a blast to the past. They share many of the characteristics of the die hard conservatives of times past - self assuredness bordering on divine authority, seemingly blissful ignorance of their numerous self-declared 'enemies', that trademark rabid intolerance, and more. The main thing that's changed is the dogma of choice.
mitxela · · focus · HN ↗
iamnothere · · focus · HN ↗
Centrist Dems are more supportive, as are the (sizable) segment of socialists who understand history
Left libertarians are broadly supportive of free speech
slg · · focus · HN ↗
somenameforme · · focus · HN ↗
On the speech issue, here [1] is a rather great bit on DNC efforts to censor speech by the WSWS/World Socialist Web Site. The article mentions the ongoing obsession with censoring "disinformation" when disinformation itself is often little more than truths that counter the official lies of the day.
[1] - <a href="https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2019/11/09/pers-n09.html" rel="nofollow">https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2019/11/09/pers-n09.html