My fellow Americans,
A lot has been made over the release of classified, sensitive, and secret diplomatic information by the WikiLeaks website, with considerable attention given to some of the characterizations of foreign leaders.
News outlets pounced on such purile and lurid passages as calling Italy's Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi "feckless, vain and ineffective as a leader", and with a penchant for throwing "wild parties." Or those painting French President Nicolas Sarkozy as having a "thin-skinned and authoritarian personal style" with a bit of an inferiority complex. Now, many Americans probably agree with this and don't understand the uproar over this leak. After all, none of this is actually top-secret information. We all know that Berlusconi is a drooling old whoremonger and that Sarkozy is a petulant hobbit.
The naive among us would look upon something like this as simply transparency, and the right of the people to be informed about what their government is doing. But that's not true. Much like the process of making sausage, there are things in government and diplomacy that the people are better off not knowing. And your average orthogonian doesn't really want to know what happens behind the scenes. He's happy just knowing that the government is taking action to keep him secure, healthy, and free. The less he knows about the specifics, the better.
But that isn't the point. The content is incidental to the act. It doesn't matter that most of these comminications are mundane reports about unimportant incidents in insignificant countries. What is pertinent is that the publication of these documents is a serious and major breach in the integrity of our protected communications and a blow to our national security.
So these leaks, while cloaked in the guise of transparency, are really just the attempt of Franklins looking to take a potshot at the power structure. I know, because I had a similar experience. In June, 1971 the leading voice of the subversives and agitators, the New York Times, started publishing excerpts from the classified "Pentagon Papers" which detailed the top-secret American strategy, analysis, plans, and intentions for political and military operations in Vietnam. It didn't matter that this information was compiled during my predecessor's administration. The important thing was that this was secret government communications and it was now in the hands of the liberal press. It was a leak, and that level of aggression simply can not be allowed to stand unanswered. As president, it was my duty to respond.
When I faced this matter I chose Liddy for the job. He was a nasty and vicious bastard, and wanted nothing more than the chance to go Cambodian on some pointy-headed East Coast liberal like Ellsberg. I wanted the sweet revenge of destroying his reputation, livelihood, and personal life, while I think Liddy had something a bit more immediately physical in mind. In any case, a slipup during the infiltration of Ellberg's psychiatrist's office quashed the plans.
But at least I had the minerals to take action.
Now it's Obama's turn. He needs to find some psychotic beast willing to risk everything to get to this character and run a spike up his ass. At this point it's about principle. And that is more precious than any memo describing the Iranians as selfish, uncooperative misanthropes.
Nixon is: Vengeful
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