Don't blame Wikileaks!

... says Ron Paul. Wikileaks only disclosed to the public that the United States has a dysfunctional foreign policy:

State secrecy is anathema to a free society. Why exactly should Americans be prevented from knowing what their government is doing in their name? In a free society we are supposed to know the truth. In a society where truth becomes treason, however, we are in big trouble. The truth is that our foreign spying, meddling and outright military intervention in the post-World War 2 era has made us less secure, not more, and we have lost countless lives and spent trillions of dollars for our trouble. Too often it’s the official government lies that have given us endless and illegal wars resulting in hundreds of thousands of deaths and casualties...

The neoconservative ethos, steeped in the teachings of Leo Strauss, cannot abide an America where individuals simply pursue their happy, peaceful, prosperous lives. It cannot abide an America where society centers around family, religion or civic and social institutions rather than an all-powerful central state. There is always an enemy to slay, whether communist or terrorist. In the neoconservative vision, a constant state of alarm must be fostered among the people to keep them focused on something greater than themselves, namely their great protector – the state.

This my quarrel with Sean Hannity and Glenn Beck. Supporting war, any war does not protect our freedom. It does the opposite. George Washington, in his Farewell Address, suggested the only workable foreign policy for a free people: Friendship and trade with all, alliances with none.

I agree that we should not disclose secrets that would telegraph our plans to the enemy, or would endanger the lives or blow the cover of our CIA operatives, but from what I have heard so far, little or none of the Wikileaks disclosures falls in those categories. Washington has abused the classification system for generations to hide essential knowledge from the American people. As far as I am concerned, anything that helps the American people make more informed decisions; and especially that which wakes them up is a good thing.