Charlie Rose

Activebz  12/04/2010 09:23 AM Report

WikiLeaks gives people, the powerful and less powerful, the chance to see something about reality. It helps if we are going to be rational and pull any sense of human value forward into these truly perilous times.

For example, I invite people to look at the 'Collateral Murder' - Iraq video from the WikiLeaks material where Reuters photographers and children were killed or seriously wounded. Look at what the military said about the incident, look at the reactions of those with such superior fire power - like it is a video game. Did watching this change you, who have not been to this war, but who vote in anyway?

I did change me.

This is nothing new - people and children die in war. PR comes from the military. Very bad, threatening guys on the other side are real too. Yet, unless we look at the fuller picture of the ON THE GROUND reality, we just cannot understand the world or truly act (make policy) that is even our own interest or that of OUR children, never mind anyone elses. The tendency in humans for denial is strong and must be fought - especially now.

Some secrecy matters - it saves lifes, in protection of the sacred and ever more violated First Amendment, but to afflict the powerful who cavalierly abuse their power (with devastating or life degrading consequences) by making them look over their shoulder from time to time, is it any wonder that this phenomenon has some (qualified) support?

Daniel Ellesburg was disappointed that Nixon was elected AFTER the Pentagon Papers. Many people continue to sleep, and 'drink the cool-aid.' Is it forty percent of US citizens who vote? And looking at the state of US politics is seriously depressing for those interested in maintaining democracy and even civil society.

It is the job of journalists like Charlie Rose and others to, as Bill Moyers would say, 'educate themselves in public.' WikiLeaks helps there. Let's try to locate real risks, not just comfort ourselves in our - perhaps temporarily - 'safe' local environs.

salgadoce  12/01/2010 08:03 PM Report

Stengel mustn't be very sharp if what he got out of his Assange interview is that he is an anarchist, hell-bent on 'bringing down governments; that is such a naive, unsophisticated conclusion.

For a better picture, I recommend Andy Greenberg's interview transcript, which focuses on Assange's yet-to-be released material on the financial industry; much more insightful, much more productive.

http://blogs.forbes.com/andygreenberg/2010/11/29/an-interview-with-wikileaks-julian-assange/

Highlights:

What do you think WikiLeaks mean for business? How do businesses need to adjust to a world where WikiLeaks exists?

WikiLeaks means it’s easier to run a good business and harder to run a bad business, and all CEOs should be encouraged by this. I think about the case in China where milk powder companies started cutting the protein in milk powder with plastics. That happened at a number of separate manufacturers.

Let’s say you want to run a good company. It’s nice to have an ethical workplace. Your employees are much less likely to screw you over if they’re not screwing other people over.

Then one company starts cutting their milk powder with melamine, and becomes more profitable. You can follow suit, or slowly go bankrupt and the one that’s cutting its milk powder will take you over. That’s the worst of all possible outcomes.

The other possibility is that the first one to cut its milk powder is exposed. Then you don’t have to cut your milk powder. There’s a threat of regulation that produces self-regulation.

It just means that it’s easier for honest CEOs to run an honest business, if the dishonest businesses are more effected negatively by leaks than honest businesses. That’s the whole idea. In the struggle between open and honest companies and dishonest and closed companies, we’re creating a tremendous reputational tax on the unethical companies.

No one wants to have their own things leaked. It pains us when we have internal leaks. But across any given industry, it is both good for the whole industry to have those leaks and it’s especially good for the good players.

But aside from the market as a whole, how should companies change their behavior understanding that leaks will increase?

Do things to encourage leaks from dishonest competitors. Be as open and honest as possible. Treat your employees well.

I think it’s extremely positive. You end up with a situation where honest companies producing quality products are more competitive than dishonest companies producing bad products. And companies that treat their employees well do better than those that treat them badly.

Would you call yourself a free market proponent?

Absolutely. I have mixed attitudes towards capitalism, but I love markets. Having lived and worked in many countries, I can see the tremendous vibrancy in, say, the Malaysian telecom sector compared to U.S. sector. In the U.S. everything is vertically integrated and sewn up, so you don’t have a free market. In Malaysia, you have a broad spectrum of players, and you can see the benefits for all as a result.

How do your leaks fit into that?

To put it simply, in order for there to be a market, there has to be information. A perfect market requires perfect information.

There’s the famous lemon example in the used car market. It’s hard for buyers to tell lemons from good cars, and sellers can’t get a good price, even when they have a good car.

By making it easier to see where the problems are inside of companies, we identify the lemons. That means there’s a better market for good companies. For a market to be free, people have to know who they’re dealing with.

You’ve developed a reputation as anti-establishment and anti-institution.

Not at all. Creating a well-run establishment is a difficult thing to do, and I’ve been in countries where institutions are in a state of collapse, so I understand the difficulty of running a company. Institutions don’t come from nowhere.

It’s not correct to put me in any one philosophical or economic camp, because I’ve learned from many. But one is American libertarianism, market libertarianism. So as far as markets are concerned I’m a libertarian, but I have enough expertise in politics and history to understand that a free market ends up as monopoly unless you force them to be free.

WikiLeaks is designed to make capitalism more free and ethical.

robdverity  12/01/2010 04:24 PM Report

Right on REMant, you indeed have a way with words. The following from PBS Newshour suggests it's much ado about not much:

ZBIGNIEW BRZEZINSKI: "The real issue is, who is feeding Wikipedia on this issue -- Wiki -- Wiki -- WikiLeaks on this issue? They're getting a lot of information which seems trivial, inconsequential, but some of it seems surprisingly pointed.

JUDY WOODRUFF: Well, what are you referring to?

ZBIGNIEW BRZEZINSKI: Well, for example, there are references to a report by our officials that some Chinese leaders favor a reunified Korea under South Korea.

This is clearly designed to embarrass the Chinese and our relationship with them. The very pointed references to Arab leaders could have as their objective undermining their political credibility at home, because this kind of public identification of their hostility towards Iran could actually play against them at home.

JUDY WOODRUFF: And I want to ask you about that, because the impression is -- and I want to turn to Steve Hadley on this as well -- Saudi Arabia has not been public about its view, as -- and we heard the quote from King Abdullah, that the U.S. should go after or Israel should go after Iran and its nuclear weapons program.

So, what -- what effect could this have now that that's out there that it's confirmed?"

Tee hee! I hope it's the Mossad behind the links as part of their ongoing campaign to get the US to carry the water for them against their obsession against Iran. Since they pride themselves on being oh-so-clever; their sleeves abound with self-satisfied laughter no doubt. Chuckle, it would be diabolically devious.

REMant  12/01/2010 12:52 PM Report

You have two different things here: 1. the question of secrecy; and 2. the question of social control. In Assange's view, and I admit my own, the secrecy is there to support the social control. That's why we create so much classified material. Officials simply don't want to be interfered or argued with. It is absurd to ask why if the US is such a force for "good" it should come under attack for its methods. Ends do not justify means, even if it did make any sense to consider good without freedom. What discussions about these revelations themselves reveal is the degree to which "liberals" are in fact closet authoritarians. The first impulse whenever their "benevolence" is questioned is to call in the police. This is the kind of thing we complained about in Communist countries. It is analogous to Federalist and Anti-federalist views of the Constitution, and the Revolution. The same issues are involved in the regulation, or non-regulation more exactly, of the financial institutions. In the liberal mind, business also means "doing for ppl," and there's no problem until self-interest is such that it can't be ignored, or some curmudgeon has the temerity to point out that human activity must in the end produce something, or at least not destroy it. I have to quibble as well with the use of the word anarchist here. While it means the same as libertarian, (OED: belief in the abolition of government and the organization of society on a voluntary, cooperative basis,) it connotes running around throwing bombs, and its use denotes Mr Stengel believes in an authoritarian government, and such things as reason of state.