Jay Rosen of the New York University journalism school describes WikiLeaks as the first " stateless news agency ." The actions of WikiLeaks, he noted, show our news organizations how "statist they really are" and leakers going to WikiLeaks rather than the traditional media, shows how distrustful people are of the corporate media. This all shows that the "watchdog press has died" and WikiLeaks is filling the void.
The void will exist -- and be filled -- whether or not the Department of Justice prosecutes Julian Assange. The Economist writes : "With or without WikiLeaks, the technology exists to allow whistleblowers to leak data and documents while maintaining anonymity. With or without WikiLeaks, the personnel, technical know-how, and ideological will exists to enable anonymous leaking and to make this information available to the public. Jailing Thomas Edison in 1890 would not have darkened the night."
The traditional media is emulating WikiLeaks. Al Jazeera has created a "transparency unit" that launched in January 2011 and has published the Palestine Papers , which describe the Palestinian-Israeli peace process, based on leaked documents. The New York Times is now talking about creating its own version of WikiLeaks. Students at CUNY's Graduate School of Journalism designed LocaLeaks , allowing anonymous encrypted leaks to over 1,400 U.S. newspapers. Government employees and business insiders can now report illegal or unethical practices without being identified.
The journalism democracy door has been opened, power to report is being redistributed, government employees and corporate whistleblowers are being empowered and greater transparency is becoming a reality. The United States would be better off accepting these realities than prosecuting the news organization that showed the way. Prosecution will highlight the utter hypocrisy of the U.S. government, showing the world it does not mean what it says when it claims that freedom of the speech and press are cornerstones of democratic government.
Kevin Zeese is executive director of Voters For Peace , and serves on the steering committees of WikiLeaksIsDemocracy.org and the Bradley Manning Support Network .
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