Ellsberg could never have gotten the Pentagon Papers published had he not first done something far larger, if he had not changed his life — the way he lived it and what he did with it.
At Assange’s extradition hearing in London, Ellsberg fought against the way WikiLeaks’ publication of papers from Manning, similarly to the Pentagon Papers, had became demonized and then criminalized.
When the author blew the whistle on the C.I.A.’s torture program in 2007, Daniel Ellsberg called to congratulate him and say he had friends at his side. Years later, at a red-carpet event in Hollywood, the “most dangerous man in…
No matter how much the defenders of the militaristic status quo have tried to relegate the Pentagon Papers whistleblower to the past, he has insisted on being present, writes Norman Solomon.
If Julian Assange is extradited he will face prosecution under a severe espionage law with roots in the British Official Secrets Act that is part of a history of repression of press freedom, reports Joe Lauria.
You can see the twinkle of this looming conflict in the eyes of Western imperialists as far back as a 1902 interview with Winston Churchill that was published a year after the U.K. leader’s death.
The term “Fourth Estate” had taken on the dust of a neglected antique before the release of the Pentagon Papers. Afterwards it seemed possible to think again of the press as the independent pole of power required by a working democracy.