Julian Assange: Traitor?

This comes from a conversation I had with a few friends at a new year's get-together. The topic of WikiLeaks somehow came up, so I briefly mentioned how it's good that WikiLeaks is doing what it has done so far, and that because someone within the military leaked the documents (and WikiLeaks just published the already-leaked documents), if it wasn't WikiLeaks, it could have just as easily been a different organization.
They disagreed, saying that though the documents this time around may not have been harmful, that could easily happen with the next round of publication of leaked cables. They also said that for that, Julian Assange should be tried for treason (if such dangerous cables do get leaked).
And you know what? I agree with them on that last point. Although most documents are likely to be relatively innocuous, there are likely to be some cables that do truly threaten our national security, and those should not be published (and if they are, then certainly Assange should at least be tried). (Then again, as Assange is not a US citizen, I'm not sure how that would even work, but that's another story for another day.)
But WikiLeaks will never publish any truly sensitive documents. Why? Two key facts that most major news media leave out are that, for one, of the roughly two million documents WikiLeaks has in its possession, it has only published two thousand, or 0.1%, and all of these published documents have been published by other major news outlets as well (some before WikiLeaks, in fact). The other key fact is that every single document that WikiLeaks publishes is done with the approval of the government (and this includes edits like redactions), so no matter how strongly some members of the government may condemn WikiLeaks and Julian Assange, someone group of people in the government is approving all this (probably in the executive branch/bureaucracy, which explains why the legislators are the ones getting most worked-up), and WikiLeaks will never publish any truly sensitive documents (provided they continue to abide by these procedures).

Wikileaks: American Entertainment Better than the TSA

There's a new article (Brett Michael Dykes, The Lookout) about a leaked document posted on Wikileaks reporting that American TV shows and movies have been very effective at painting a positive portrait of the US in the eyes of Saudis (ever since American channels there have started showing actual American TV and movies and not just US-sanctioned propaganda). Of all the quotes in the article, this one stood out the most:

[...] even in the remote, highly conservative regions of Saudi Arabia where anti-Western thought typically proliferates. The cable quotes him saying that out in the Saudi hinterlands, "you no longer see Bedouins, but kids in western dress." [...]

I feel like this is along the lines of winning the people's "hearts and minds". The reason why this works is because as opposed to state-sponsored propaganda (which is pretty obvious when shown), this more subtly shows what's so great about the US.
Finally, I think this report is a great send-up of all the politicians who are equating Wikileaks with terrorism. Quite the contrary: while a lot of what it shows is what we've done wrong (and of course these politicians will hypocritically call for press freedom in other countries yet repress it here), it also shows a lot of what we've done right. Why not publicize that more? (I think it's because people will start demanding the incriminating information as well; really, politicians just call for press freedom when it suits them. So, what else do you have to hide, Senator Lieberman? After all, you do want to criminally prosecute them, don't you?)
Oh, and the title? It just goes to show that this entertainment is far better at converting potential terrorists into people positively curious about America than the TSA is at stopping terrorism.

Lage Raho Wikileaks!

In the last couple days, there have probably been more news stories about the leaked government documents put on Wikileaks than there are actual leaked documents on Wikileaks. TechDirt has a funny (sadly, it's true) article about how the State Department supposedly wants the leaked documents back. Evidently, it somehow thinks that digital goods are simply analogue goods on computers that can be "reclaimed". Unfortunately, it doesn't realize that online, once it's out there, it can never be put back; this is also true of businesses and trade secrets, and businesses know this, so I'm not sure why the Department of State has become the Department of State of Denial.
To show them just how ridiculous and tone-deaf their demands are, I propose a nonviolent protest along the lines of the movie Lage Raho Munna Bhai (which I watched over the summer and whose plot synopsis, especially the part about sending roses, you can read in Wikipedia here). A commenter on TechDirt suggested, just for fun, compressing the documents into a ZIP file and emailing the compressed file to a State Department email address (which, obviously, cannot and does not do what the State Department wants done). This seems a little boring, so I'd like to take this a step further.
If you want to do this through email, do the ZIP file idea, but change the permissions on all the files, while adding an additional fake "document" that is actually a Rickroll video. If you are really savvy (and if this is possible), try to rig the properties of the ZIP file so that when opened, the ZIP file automatically opens the Rickroll video (and the other documents are inaccessible).
If you, like me, want to do this in the style of the movie, print out some of the leaked documents and put them in an envelope or box. Include in this box a "Get Well Soon" card (with a polite message about, as Munna Bhai says, their "disease of dishonesty") and a bouquet of flowers.
This is just nonviolent protest against stupidity in the State Department, and as far as I know, this isn't breaking any laws. (Please don't be stupid and include viruses in the emails. That would be illegal.) How does it all sound?