Bradley Manning, the US Army private( as low as you can go) , is sitting in the brig at Quantico, VA., waiting. For what, he's not quite sure. The military has not quite figured out what he should be charged with for his transferring message files to WikiLeaks for publication and dissemination.
NPR broadcast an interview with Daniel Ellsberg, the whistle blower of the Pentagon Papers in 1971/72. He went to trial and all charges were dismissed because of government misconduct(Justice Dept., etc. etc. White House, Executive branch...).
He was chastising the New York Times writer/editor Bill Keller for his apparent defense of the NYT and their lack of concern for Manning's failed attempt to contact the NYT staff with his information. He compared it to Ellsberg's case, which Ellsberg said was hardly representative of a good faith effort of the Times to assist a whistle blower. Ellsberg was at no time assisted by the paper or its staff of journalists and reporters. He was on his own, despite the obvious benefits reaped by the Times when they printed the secret documents and their contents.
Ellsberg related that the documents, from 1945 to 1968, contained nothing(0) that government legal staff could find that compromised the security of the United States. It seems hardly likely, that a low level Army private could reveal any damaging information in his role as a screener of diplomatic mail. Perhaps embarassing, but hardly dangerously revealing.
Ellsberg also raked Bill Keller over the coals for his arrogance, which comes shining through most of his editorial writing. Perhaps Mr. Keller needs a long vacation
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