I have to admit feeling a bit hypocritical for reading these documents even though I wouldn't have published them myself but I take comfort in the words of a relative when I discussed the matter "you're overestimating your relevance". Perhaps it's the same mentality we use when we download movies we could easily obtain for $15.

It seems that Wikileaks has gone a bit far, with the potential for major damages to U.S. foreign policy in the future, and it certainly isn't fair that the secrets of only one country get exposed when other countries probably engage in the same practices.

One aspect of the leak which appears to not have been picked up on is the consequences it might have for inter-agency information sharing in the U.S.. I believe it was the Guardian which noted that these files were part of a program were information deemed safe for sharing with other agencies was digitized and shared, which allowed Bradley Manning to get a hold of them. Now that the agencies sharing the information have been burned once, I wonder if they will be reluctant to participate in programs like this in the future.

...but you say that as if it's a bad thing.

I do not believe that any government, organization, or person deserves trust that is not earned.

If that trust is grounded upon deception, be it pragmatic or malevolent, then there is no law of the universe that requires that trust be preserved. If disclosure of true intent destroys a relationship, then so be it - it was a sham and therefore doomed.

Blake, are yoyu joking? Wikileaks "breezily sidesteps"?

The Bush Administration breezily sidesteps international and domestic law, and the progressive elimination of torture in the Western world over a period of hundreds of years. Bush breezily sidesteps the question of legal justification for torture by reference to the thin sophistries of morally bankrupt lawyers like John Yoo. The Obama administration breezily sidesteps closing Gitmo, prosecuting Bush, Cheyney and others, and now, it appears, is actively continuing illegal detentions.

In the face of such barbarism, your misguided concern is that American diplomats might not be candid? The candor of our morally bankrupt foreign policy apparatus is the least of America's problems.

Would any of these have been held back from a FOIA request 10, 20, 30 years from now? I guess the passage of time makes the who's screwing who of it all less embarassing or less a matter of 'national security'?

That the US (DOS in particular) is unable to secure their own traffic/documents is really the issue here, not that wikileaks actually printed them.

I believe that Blake has a strong argument. While we can cheer for full disclosure, the unnecessary complications to our foreign policy caused by this leak will have a long series of consequences, not only for the United States. For example, in the Middle East alone Wikileaks has managed to clutter a very dangerous situation. By recklessly exposing the candid nature of international correspondence, some of our foreign policy positions will have been set back by years, if not decades. Russia? Forget it. Iran? Now cornered by its Sunni neighbors and more dangerous.

I'm one of the people, been around for a while, and have observed that we are routinely katalog firm lied to by our government about a vast array of subjects that affect our lives. Simply put, the government has long ago lost its credibility. These people stamp things "secret" to cover their blunders, lies and mendacity. The really funny part is that there are so many "secret" documents, that a vast army of people, including many contractors, need to access them --assuring a continued flow of leaks.