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tv   Democracy Now  LINKTV  July 31, 2013 3:00pm-4:01pm PDT

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[captioning made possible by democracy now!] >> from pacifica, this is democracy now! had exposed war crimes, revolution, and induced democratic reform. he is the quintessential whistleblower. >> in the u.s. request exclusive, and julian assange response to the verdict of bradley manning, acquitted of aiding the enemy but found guilty of violating the
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espionage act and other charges. he now faces up to 136 years in prison. julian assange will join us from the ecuadorian embassy in london where he has been living for more than a year. then we go to fort meade, maryland, where the sentencing hearing begins today. o'brien,peak to alexa who has been reporting from their everyday. >> we are not talking about the trial, as important as it is. we are talking about setting legal precedent for national security and whistleblowers, and beyond that, people using the internet, communicating in legally-protected speech. >> all that and more coming up. welcome to democracy now!, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman. for brentcing hearing
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a man and begins today following his acquittal on the most serious charge he faced, aiding the enemy, but conviction and 20 accounts. on tuesday, manning was found guilty of violating the espionage act and other charges for leaking documents to wikileaks. he avoids an automatic life sentence but still faces a maximum 136 years in prison on the remaining counts. the sentencing phase is expected to last more than one week with more than 20 witnesses expected to appear. we will have more on the verdict with julian assange after the headlines. the senate judiciary committee holding its first hearing today of edwardrations snowden. top officials are expected to testify. the journalist who published the bulk of his revelations, glenn greenwald, was due to testify by video to a separate hearing in
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the house, but the panel was canceled after president obama scheduled a meeting with house democrats. wyden said that the nsa had committed more violations on spying than the government had disclosed. the senator said that his concerns came on top of a recent admission from national intelligence director james clapper over violations of court orders. >> they did say there were violations of those court orders with respect to the phone records. that is on record. those violations are more serious than stated. >> he has been unable to explain his concerns in detail because surveillance operations are classified. on friday, james clapper sent a letter describing a number of problems --
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clapper has previously apologize for falsely telling wyden in march the nsa does not would and we collect data on americans. agencies saidnce they would cause a fire more information about nsa surveillance operations, including the order disclosed by edward snowden that ordered verizon to hand over phone records. last week's defeat of a measure to block the bulk collection of data on all phone calls placed in the united states. a federal appeals court has ruled law enforcement agencies can obtain location data on u.s. cell phone users without a warrant. the court of appeals for the fifth circuit upheld the practice of seizing location data from phone call from major telecoms. when jordy ok the practice on the grounds application did is a
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business record and therefore not protected by the fourth amendment right to privacy. a report last year found that a fraction of police departments to admitted to tracking cell phones routinely obtained warrants. tracking is said to be so commonplace, cellular providers charging police to obtain it. an attorney called the ruling a big deal and a big blow to american privacy rights. president obama is calling on republicans to accept a grand bargain aimed at reviving economic opportunities for the middle-class. speaking in tennessee, he offered to cut the corporate tax in exchange for new jobs. >> here is the bottom line. if folks in washington where they want a grand bargain, how about a grand bargain for middle-class tribes? how about a grand bargain for
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middle-class jobs? i am willing to work with republicans of reforming our corporate tax code as long as we use the money from transitioning to a simpler tax system for a significant investment in creating middle-class jobs. ofthe comments come as part a new effort billed as an effort to take on widening u.s. inequality. in an interview, mr. obama said -- the first full session of renewed middle east peace talks was held in washington, d.c. israeli and palestinian negotiators agreed to meet within two weeks. secretary of state john kerry said the parties have agreed to address the core issue behind the israel-palestine conflict. agreed herees have
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today that all of the final status issues, all of the core issues, and all other issues, are all on the table for negotiation. and they are on the table with one simple goal. a view to ending the conflict, and in the claims. our objective will be to achieve a final status agreement over the course of the next nine months. a viable two-stage solution is the only way this conflict can and and there is not much time to achieve its and there is no other are cordish. >> as the talks were held, a new report came out saying the israeli settlement population in the west bank has grown more than twice as fast as israel proper in the last few years. a peace activist said the israeli government has continued to encourage migrations to the
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settlement. >> growth in the settlement is much higher than in israel. we are talking about a 5% growth in the population each year, much higher than the less than 2% inside israel proper. this shows the israeli government is encouraging people to move into the west bank despite perhaps what some would say our intentions for a two- stage solution. >> do not been nations says that mounting violence have prevented the delivery of goods to 600,000 people. u.n. aid had only reached 2.4 million out of 3 million syrians in need. >> more areas are becoming inaccessible due to increased fighting. the plan is to reach 3 million in july but the upsurge of violence across many areas in damascus and the proliferation
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of checkpoints on the roads around major cities are affecting the basic food dispatching. we are hoping to dispatch food for 2.4 million people short of the july gold. askedsident obama has republican senators lindsey graham and john mccain to travel to egypt to hold talks. the announcement follows meetings between the european union policy chief and the ousted egyptian president. it was morsi's first outside contact since removed from office later in the month. meter in the day, ashden with the vice-president mohamed elbaradei. >> while i recognize it is challenging, it is important to begin now.
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>> to end polarization, and that is what we're trying to do. that is why the european union is here, to help. we are having all sorts of conversations with everybody. i am still optimistic. once we lower the temperature, contain the violence taking place, then there will be room disbandaceful way to demonstrations in different parts of the country and then go into syria. >> you can go to democracynow.org to see an interview with sharif abdel kouddous in cairo. morgan agreed to the penalty without admitting to government allegations it manipulated utilities to raise the price of electricity. it is the largest settlement in
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the federal energy regulatory commission's history. j.p. morgan is facing a more expensive government penalty for its role in pushing toxic mortgage-backed securities. the firm is currently under investigation from eight different federal regulators. mit has released a report on its handling of aaron swartz, the internet activist who committed suicide. he took his own life weeks before he was to go on trial for using the mit network to download millions of articles from jstor. concludes the school remained neutral in the prosecution but adds it failed to dually take into account the water background of information policy against which the prosecution played out and the mighty people have been passionate leaders.
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friends and colleagues have denounced the report as a whitewash. wilker spoker -- to democracy now! on tuesday. to investigate the case. it decided that it was neutral throughout and the president said that their actions were reasonable and appropriate. in fact, they were working with the prosecution and stonewalling the defense. this is really just a whitewash and it's disappointing, and frankly, makes me furious. filedon's attorneys have a motion saying that they were denied exculpatory evidence. student new lost his life after being handcuffed in a cell for four days without food
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or water. daniel john had been arrested at a celebration for marijuana culture. he was due to be released, but the dea and his agents forgot about him after placing him in a holding cell. he said he could see -- here's staffers outside of his cell, but no one answered his pleas for help. he drank his own urine in a bid to survive. none of the agents involved will face charges. six activists with a group codepink were arrested inside the senate are building on tuesday for protests calling for the closure of guantanamo bay. three demonstrators are on their long-term hunger strike in solidarity with guantanamo prisoners. those are some of the headlines. this is democracy now!, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. welcome to our listeners and viewers around the country and
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world. sheikh.meen the sentencing for branding manning begins today. -- bradley manning begins today. military judge denise lind found manning not guilty on the most serious charge of aiding the enemy, which carries a potential life sentence without parole. reporters in the courtroom said that manning showed no emotion as he heard the verdict. the sentencing phase of his trial is expected to last more than one week with more than 20 witnesses said to appear. manning faces a maximum of 136 years in prison. >> the manning family expressed thanks to the civilian lawyer, david coombs, who has been working on the case for three years. saidnamed aunt of manning
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-- the director of the aclu's speech and privacy technology project responded by saying -- meanwhile, house intelligence committee chair mike rogers and democratic ranking member dutch brokers parker issued a joint statement that justice had been certification. served. adding -- today we spend the hour on the manning verdict and its implications. we begin with julian assange, the founder of wikileaks. according to numerous press
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reports, the conviction makes it increasingly likely the u.s. will prosecute assange as a co- conspirator. prosecutors portrayed him as an information anarchist encouraging manning to leaked hundreds of thousands of documents. ulian assange is with us via video stream from the ecuadorian embassy in london. as he wasfugee there wanted for sex charges in sweden. the british garment promises to arrest him if he steps foot on british soil. this is his first interview with a u.s. tv show since the verdict. what is your response to the verdict? >> thank you. first of all, i must correct you. i have been given political asylum in the embassy in relation to the case in progress
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in the united states. it is a common media myth about my asylum here being in relation to sweden. it is not. reaction to the verdict yesterday, well, first of all, one of surprise in relation to the timing. this is a case that has been going on for three years, two months, 18 months of interlocutory motion, 30,000 pages of evidence that the judge was required to read, but she has made her decision on 21 separate counts over the weekend. we said at the beginning of the process, this is a show trial. this is not a trial were any justice can come about because
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of the framing of what was possible through debate. the bradley for manning teamed to say that he was well-intentioned, motive was taken out of the case. the prosecution has not alleged that a single person came to harm as at an result of his actions, not a single person. in fact, no evidence was presented that anyone was, indeed, harmed. the defense is not allowed to argue that means these charges should be thrown out. so what we are left with is 20 convictions of bradley manning, five of those for espionage. this is a case where everyone agreed that bradley manning provided the media information about war crimes and politics, some of which was published by the media.
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there is no allegation that he worked with a foreign power, that he accepted any personal benefits for the disclosure that he engaged in. and yet, we see him being convicted for five charges of espionage. it cannot possibly be the case that a journalistic source who is not communicating with a foreign power, simply working for the american public, can be convicted of five counts of espionage. merely ofabuse, not the human rights of brenda manning, but an abuse of the english language, and clearly, congress shall not bar freedom of the press or right to speech. that is clearly been subjugated here. >> julian assange, yesterday you said the aiding the enemy charge for which manning was
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acquitted was an upsurge, and it was put forward as a red herring. could you explain what you mean by that? has made its statement today. we have bradley manning, right now, despite being acquitted of that effectively being a traitor, aiding the enemy, he was acquitted of that, but he faces 136 years in prison, which is more than a life sentence. this aiding the enemy charge, but has attracted a lot of people's attention, because it has a possible life sentence, really, was part of the extent of over-charging in the case. at the very minimum, perhaps bradley manning could have been charged with mishandling classified in relation.
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of course, i think he should be acquitted of such a charge because under the first amendment and other obligations we have, he should be free to break one obligation to fulfill another, the higher obligation showing crimes. where we have the pain the enemy to urge the soaking up public attention and the public saying, the justice system is just. charge outhis is one of 21 different offenses. he is still up for 136 years. he received no financial payments. tried on five counts of espionage. that is absurd. >> we have to go to break.
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we are speaking to julian assange in the ecuadorian embassy in london. julian assange is the founder and editor in chief of wikileaks. back in a moment.
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♪ [music break] >> this is democracy now!, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman. this is the day after the ruling unbred the manning was given. 136 years in prison. the sentencing phase of the trial began today at 9:30 eastern time at fort meade. just after the manning verdict was announced, an associated press reporter asked gen this tacky to comment on the verdict. reaction to the manning trial? >> the verdict came out just
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before i stepped out here. i would refer you to the department of defense. no further comment from here. >> for the entire trial, this building said it would not comment because it was a pending case. now that it is over, you say you're still not going to comment? >> that is correct. i would refer you to the department of defense. they have been the point agency. >> these were state department cables. they were your property. >> we do not have any further comment. i know the verdict just came out. >> does that mean you are working on a comment? are you gratified? >> if we have anything more to say, i promise everybody in this room that you will have it. >> i am a little surprise that you do not have a comment considering the amount of energy and time this building expanded
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at assisting the prosecution. >> that is the associate press reporter matt lee questioning jen psaki. conversationur with joe in assange. your take on the government's lack of response, and your own impression of the case? >> it is interesting to see the state department doing that. they have made many comments about this over the past three years. secretary clinton, for example, -- another upsurge piecer rhetoric -- that this was an attack by the entire international community. investigationis against our organization is the largest or -- investigation and
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prosecution against a publisher in the united states history, arguably, anywhere in the world. it involves over a dozen different government departments. doj manages the documents related to the broader prosecution against wikileaks and myself, not just the manning year just toion a maintain the computer system that manages the prosecution documents. so i assume those statements from the state department are a mechanism to reduce the perception of their involvement, which has been extensive over the past three years. to comments turn made by the executive director of the freedom of the press foundation regarding your likely prosecution on the consequences of manning's verdict. although he agreed that the
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verdict brings the government closer to prosecuting you, he charging the publisher would put everyone at risk because they regularly publish national security information. your response? >> we have been saying this for three years now. it is nice to see -- finally, in the past three months, the mainstream press in the last few weeks, mcclatchy, the new york times, washington post have been more problematic -- but have woken up to the reality of what this means for all national security, reporters, and more broadly, for publishers. the approach here has been to smash the insider and the
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outsider. there was only one name on the table for the insider, bradley manning. one organization as the publisher, an outside force, wikileaks, most prominently represented by me. in order to regain its sense of authority, the united states ratherent has tried to, conspicuously, smashed bradley manning and wikileaks organization. at least it has not succeeded with the wikileaks organization, it will not succeed. it is bringing great discredit on itself. its desire for the perception of a party is such that it is willing to be seen as an immoral after that preaches the rule of law, that engages in torture
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against its youngest and brightest. in the case of bradley manning, formerly found against the united states, that the u.s. had engaged in cruel and abusive treatment, cruel and inhumane treatment of bradley manning. aboutlso want to ask you edward snowden, who remains at the moscow airport, where you are deeply involved with helping to try to find a place of asylum. interiorer sent to the minister last week, the u.s. assured that snowden would not be executed or tortured if sent back to the united states. --der wrote
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can you tell us what you understand to be the latest situation for snowden, and what your involvement with him is? why he is so significant to you, what his actions have been? snowden's freedom is an important symbol. bradley manning's incarceration is also an important symbol. bradley manning is now a martyr. he did not choose to be. it is not a proper way for activist to be paid, to choose to be martyrs, but this young man, in the case of manning allegedly, and with snowden, clearly, have risked their freedom, their lives.
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that makes them heroes. bradley manning had been put into a position, quite unjustly, where he faces 136 years. that brings disrepute on to the died states government and the justice system. edwards noted has seen what happened to bradley manning. the ecuadorian government, in their testifying of me, looked at manning. the u.s. guarantee of no torture means nothing. we all know the u.s. government anply redefines torture as abusive treatment of prisoners. stress provisions, extreme diet, extreme heat, cold, deprivation of basic things needed for living, like a glass of water, or the company of others.
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they simply redefined as not being tortured. it is words, and it means nothing in this case. in relation to the death and there are some more freedoms, but we would not want edward snowden to be in a jack ruby-type situation, which is a possibility. if he ended up in the net state's prison system, given the level of vitriol that exists against him by the administration, he would not be safe from police, from prison guards, he would not be safe from other prisoners. that he would not received a fair trial. similarly, the charges against him are political.
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only allegations on the table at the moment is that he acted for political purpose to educate a -- all of us. it is incorrect that extraditions should take place for political purpose. he has been exercising his political opinion, but we have seen an amazing statement by the white house in relation to edward snowden's meeting with human rights watch in new york, that that should not have happened. fors a propaganda platform edward snowden. it is incredible to see jay carney announcing edward snowden speaking to human rights groups -- denouncing edwards noted speaking to human rights groups. he cannot receive a fair trial in the u.s. on that basis he has
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applied for asylum in a number of different countries. i believe russia will afford him asylum in this case, at least on a temporary or interim basis. problem -- last week, there was news breaking that russia had granted temporary asylum, but now they say he has never been given the papers, so he cannot leave the airport lounge. >> this is just the media. there is a lot of demand for information, so people just invented or amplify some particular rumor. >> quickly, before we conclude, the u.s. government now classified as 92 million documents a year. this is an unprecedented number. over 4 million cleared for security clearance.
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can you explain the significance of this for whistleblowers, and what the manning verdict says to future potential whistleblowers? >> the verdict is an attempt to crush whistleblowers. it will not. the problems that exist in the security state in the west and a few other states, as bad as they have ever been, rapid the accelerating. we now have a state within a state. they have 5 million people with security clearances, more than 1 million with top-secret security. the majority of those 1 million work for booz allen hamilton and out of the inspector general's eye. asymmetry ofing an information between different groups of people.
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that is leading to extensive power inequality with the essence of the state intelligence community lifting off from the rest of the population, going its own way. wheree a situation now young people, like edward snowden, who have been exposed to the internet, who have seen the world, who have perspective, who have seen that our work, the work of bradley manning and others, they do not like that, they do not accept that. they did not accept that international violations -- international norms can be violated. we even saw michael hayden big knowledge that in an interview in australia recently. in order to function, the national security agency, cia,
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and so on, has to recruit people between the ages of 20 and 30. if they are technical, exposed to the internet, they have a certain view of what is just. they find in their jobs, the agency their work for do not behave in a legal, ethical, or moral manner. the writing is on the mall for these agencies. >> i want to quickly ask one more time, what does the verdict in the bradley manning case, facing 136 years in prison, what does that mean for you and wikileaks? you came up repeatedly in the trial. we know of a grand jury investigation of you in wikileaks in virginia. do you know if there is a sealed indictment for you, and what does this mean for your chance of getting out? withsed on conversations the doj, between the u.s. lawyers and the doj
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spokesperson, we know a lot. d.a.,cbride, the virginia probable than not, there is indictment, the result of their behavior. as this proceeds related to the manning case, we will continue to fight that. we now have a lot of people in this coalition. the bradley manning coalition has been great. michael ratner, who has been on your own program. that team understand what is going on, they have been deployed, to a degree, to defend mr. snowden in public. presumably, when the time comes, we will also defend ourselves. i am confident the u.s. will not
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succeed in extraditing me because i have asylum at this embassy. in relation to the broader attack on our staff, that is still very much a fight, but we will not go down easy. >> we have some breaking news which says the obama administration will make public a previously classified order that directed verizon communications to turn over a vast number of american phone records. the formerly secret order will be unveiled before a senate judiciary hearing due to begin in 20 minutes. theorder was issued by foreign intelligence surveillance court to a subsidiary of verizon in april. your response to that? edward snowden already made the order public. this is absurd. ofs is like our release
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guantanamo bay documents. they have already been made public. now the administration is going to waive some magical pixie dust to remove the contaminant of it formally being classified by the administration. here we have an example of no disclosure before the public until there is unauthorized disclosure. if i am incorrect -- >> it is. it is the document. >> there is some magical process going on here where there are documents.nholy with clearance have placed done something, pixie dust on them. we have got to remove this religious national security
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extremism. it is a new religion in the united states and other countries. it is an absurd, ridiculous. >> angelina assange, thank you for being with us. founder -- julian assange, thank you for being with us. founder and editor in chief of wikileaks. this is democracy now!, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. for more, go to our website, democracynow.org. ton we come back, we will go fort meade where the sentencing trial will begin today. we will speak to one of the few independent reporters to have spent every day in the court room or the media center. we will be joined by alexa o'brien as soon as we come back.
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>> this is democracy now!, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. we continue to discuss the verdict of private bradley manning. the military judge found him not guilty of aiding the enemy, the most serious charge he faced for him near over documents to wikileaks, but faces a maximum of 136 years in prison. meade,o to fort maryland, where alexa o'brien is with us from her car outside of the court room. she has been at the trial daily
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since it began, the first to make transcripts of the proceedings publicly available. she is sitting in her car because that is the only access we have. internet access is difficult inside the courtroom even though they are at fort meade, were the court-martial takes place, the headquarters of the national security agency. thanks for being with us, our first time speaking to you since the verdict. brenda manning, acquitted of aiding the enemy but found guilty -- bradley manning, acquitted of aiding the enemy but found guilty on a number of other charges. can you talk about their significance, what was your reaction? >> i was not surprised. we can talk about -- a lot of the press has become interested in this case because of the aiding the enemy church, which is a threat to national security reporting and to whistleblowers.
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manning would have faced life in prison without parole. being convicted of six of espionage charges is legally interesting in terms of the difference of time, but in terms of his own fate, not much of a difference. we would also look at the way in which the u.s. government [inaudible] a clipre going to go to as we reconnect with alexa o'brien. it has been very difficult for journalists to communicate in the court room for the months they have been covering the trial. not able to get internet access, could not even tweet unless they agree to go outside, take their phone, go outside, miss some of the trial. that is often the case in court rooms around the country, but we're talking about in the media center next to the court room. as we reconnect, we wanted to go
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to an interesting debate that occurred last night between glenn greenwald, who debated the cnn legal analyst jeffrey tooman, about the verdict. manning made the decision to disclose this. the people who wrote those cables have devoted their lives to trying to make the world a better place, particularly foreign service officers. maybe you disagree about that, but i admire the foreign service a great deal. i trust their judgment about what is secret a lot more than i do bradley manning. >> you can make that argument. people in the 1960's said that daniel ellsberg was a traitor. who was he to decide what should be linked to the u.s. government -- u.s. public? he exposed systematic lies on the part of the u.s. government.
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in the bush years, people said who ever told about the secret prisons are that the u.s. was fine without warrants, what right did they have to expose secrets? this is how investigative journalism works. people with a conscious come forward when they find out about things that their government is doing that is wrong and they disclose it to the world. if you think that is criminal, you are calling for the end of the death -- investigative journalism. >> i appreciate your education to me of what journalism is, but releasing 700,000 cables is not the same as the work of dana john woodward. >> how about daniel ellsberg? >> he also wrote the pentagon papers, he disclosed what he wrote, which is different than bradley manning exposing
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hundreds of thousands of cables that he did not read, much less right. -- write. we have o'brien, reconnected with you in the parking lot of fort meade. your response to that, and again, go through the significance of these charges, acquitted of aiding the enemy but convicted on a number of espionage charges. >> my response to that exchange is coming in the age of information, this is complete proportional. [inaudible]tness large datasets can glean information that you cannot find -- and you can have gleaned
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from two or three documents. in terms of the esplanade charges, they are threatening national security reporting as aiding the enemy, charges against manning. the press has not been here to cover the trial, so they forgot about those espionage charges. i am not sure if you can hear me. >> yes, go ahead. >> one of the other things, she found manning guilty of stealing five databases. what is controversial about this set of charges is she allow the prosecution to change the charge sheet after the closing of evidence. the defense has sought to dismiss the charges, saying the government had not presented any evidence related to the theft of data, merely presented evidence as to the fact of information.
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there is a distinction between databases and the information contained there within. the judge said that there was no difference and this allowed the prosecution to change their charge sheet. the defense filed another motion, and you can expect to see that in the appeals process. and then we had a computer fraud charge. , he did nots violate any technical breach to get the information. what seems to be happening here is judge lind is coming down hard on the idea that if it is we haveed and he leaks to remember, this trial has been about probable harm. there has been no actual harm. now we're in the sentencing
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phase and manning faces 136 years, we can talk about the lack of actual damage from these leaks. that is what we're doing today. >> we want to play a clip of a response to the verdict from michael ratner, one of the lawyers for julian assange. we were doing a live broadcast yesterday as the verdict came down and he described how the military judge, colonel denise lind, has now just got promoted. >> the judge, interestingly enough, has been given an appointment to the next highest military court, the appeals court, which i find extraordinary. in the middle of a trial of the most important whistleblower in the united states history, that the judge presiding over it be given a higher position. it brings us right back to daniel ellsberg. during his trial for espionage,
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which eventually collapsed under the government to caner become hypocrisy, the trial judge in that case was offered to be the head of the fbi. bencht out onto a park and said, while the trial is going on, how would you like to be the head of the fbi? talk about influencing a judge by the executive. you saw it in the ellsberg case, and now you see it in the other crucial whistleblower, the same thing happening, the judge being offered a higher position. i find it remarkable that they would mess around and make it look like that judge may not have complete fairness. >> that was michael ratner responding to the manning verdict. theas acquitted of aiding enemy but convicted on 20 and other espionage and other charges, faces 136 years in prison.
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that sentencing hearing begins today. alexa o'brien, if you could talk about what this sentencing hearing is about. it is different than a civilian court. new evidence can be presented here. >> that is right. since the court ruled that lack of damage evidence was not relevant at trial, essentially, we enter the sentencing phase with these two concepts, whether or not there was damage from these releases and what his motive was. but we will see happen is the government will bring out 13 witnesses in closed sessions or with classified stipulation, so under black redaction, talk about the damage from these leaks. in the pretrial record, in public reporting, we know, for example, the brigadier-general, who was the head of the defense intelligence agency's
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information review task force, determined that there were no sources or methods in the afghan war logs -- war diaries, or the iraq war logs. robert gates wrote a letter to senator levin in 2010 telling him as much. that letter is part of the court record. we also know the department of state has another classified damage assessment. what is interesting, from the pretrial record of three state department witnesses, and public witnesses, is that kennedy was responsible for testify to congress in december 2010 and early 2011, and two congressional officials told congressional aides to tell reuters that the state department was -- and the impact of the revelation was embarrassing but not damaging. and then there was another classified testament from the
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national counter intelligence executive, part of the office of national intelligence headed by clapper. this is a mitigation team set up in every federal agency, headed by a newly established national security staff insider threat eric holder atand the department of justice. this was recently reported, these insider threat groups within the government. it will be an interesting time. the question remains, how much of this is part of the trial, the heart of the trial to try to knock down this 136 years. >> one of the charges for which bradley manning was found guilty was wanted publication. explain the significance of this with respect to military law,
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and with regard to wikileaks? publication, manning was found guilty of. he faces two years maximum for it. this particular offense has there been used in a military court martial, not tied to any existing federal violation or punitive article under the code of military justice. what is interesting, whatever witnesses testified for aiding the enemy also testified for wonton publication. case wasnment's essentially that wikileaks was not a legitimate journalistic organization. that was one of their theory that cropped this up. the other was, the evidence by receipt of the enemy of the intelligence could be used to show that his leaks were wonton. this is meant to prescribe
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disclosures of large data sets made available by the internet, very cheap for people to publish right now, and while manning does not have to be the proximate publisher, it is certainly a prohibition against anyone in the military or national security arena who wants to publish something on the internet that will make the government angry. conclude, could you explain how much you know about how much press and under what condition the sentencing hearing will be covered starting today? have the press pool we had here yesterday. it was a media circus here yesterday. we have are stalwarts here, reuters, a couple of other mainstream american news organizations. the conditions will probably be the same. arbitrary to change every day.
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the internet probably will not be working. >> alexa o'brien, a final question, what were you most surprised by in this verdict? you have been there every day since the trial began. >> to tell you the truth, i was not surprised. i had expected she would come down on the s.b. not charges. what shocked me was how much press showed up for the day the essentially went down on manning. >> thank you for your time, all its o'brien. we will continue to cover the sentencing phase. -- thank you for your time, alexa o'brien. that doesn't for our show. you can read the transcripts, and watch, listen to the broadcast, as well as our special broadcast is still there when the verdict broke.
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