Explain to us how the law separates the two.

How come no one from the NYT has been arrested for treason? Hmm...

In what way is selling a secret to another nation similar to publishing info about that secret to the American public?

Do you really consider that those who call us enemy, are not consumers of our news media?

What were you, about 10?

15, actually, and already rabidly reading anything political I could get my hands on.

There were two older women sitting in front of me, and I saw one turn to the other and say, "Oh, yes, he's much better looking than Norman Mailer."

Heh. The alarming part there is those two voted. Ponder that for a moment.

So...the NYT publishing the Pentagon Papers and information on the NSA terrorist eavesdropping program is now the same thing as traitors selling secrets to the Cubans?

Explain to us how the law seperates the two. Be sure to use examples. Get the point, now?

but then again please tell me,
is separation of Church and state in this part or maybe the right to murder your extra children?

Why don't you try answering the question once in a while instead of using your inability to make a funny, but once again the feeble emotional attacks of humorless monkey worshipers....

But you was on the right track...Like this...

It could be that I'm just not as smart as you guys and can't understand ancient English.....

Exactly,It's not just because your not as smart as us it's because its not in the Constitution unless your as smart as us, you know prepared for life with a pure liberal education, other wise it will seem to you to be a lie, you have not had the proper training to understand that it's the truth even though you can't see it, trust me it's there, you just don't understand.

It could be that I'm just not as smart as you guys and can't understand ancient English.....

Most of us here struggle to understand GAEnglish, a dialect with which we're not familiar.

It could be that I'm just not as smart as you guys...

That would be an accurate assessment...

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

Don't see were it say you can aid the enemy in a time of war by giving away top secret information, but seeing you donnkalopes can't understand the first 16 words, hell, who cares what you think.

but then again please tell me,
is separation of Church and state in this part or maybe the right to murder your extra children?

It could be that I'm just not as smart as you guys and can't understand ancient English.....

Um, the Pentagon Papers were more than "a few years ago"

For you, perhaps. Me, I lived through it

What were you, about 10?

FWIW, I went to Ellsberg's press conference in Cambridge that he held on the release of the papers. It was in a hotel just off the Square (I think it's now a Harvard living complex). There were two older women sitting in front of me, and I saw one turn to the other and say, "Oh, yes, he's much better looking than Norman Mailer."

Please point out the relevant text of the Constitution that allows the government to classify data.

Thank you.

Eric, it really comes down to this. Why have a freedom of the press?

So, do you realy propose to hold the Meyers' to a different standard than the press? Aren't the press just citizens? (What are blogs, after all?)

Let's try this, it'll be fun...

What I want them to do is sell everything they can find out about the government, to the Cubans, period. Then the experts can look at it and determine the constitutionality of their actions after the fact.

Explain to me in a legal sense how the wto cases are different, or could be made so.

Ummm, yeah. Why wait for the legislative or judicial branches to exercise their constitutional powers of checks and balances after examining the facts when we can have the editors of the NYT weigh in on the legality of government operations based solely on their political agenda?

When Jefferson said this at his second inauguration:
"No experiment can be more interesting than that we are now trying, and which we trust will end in establishing the fact, that man may be governed by reason and truth. Our first object should therefore be, to leave open to him all avenues of the truth," I don't think he meant to add the caveat "except when the government is doing secret-type stuff involving the spying on American citizens"

Then the experts can look at it and determine the constitutionality. If something is truly vital to our national security, then no one in the government should feel a need to leak it to the Times. Every time the Times publishes something like this, its because someone leaked it to them. Why do you suppose they did that?

There are a large number of reasons, but I suppose one of the best answers I can give is to ask you to investigate the case of Kendall and Gwendolyn Myers, who were recruited from American academia by Fidel Castro's intelligence service, and sold secrets to them for years.

I'm willing to bet they thought theirs a moral decision, too. Are we to trust their judgements?

As to "breaking the law to protect it" argument, I would say yes, it is valid. The Constitution is the supreme law of the land, and all other US laws that are in conflict with it must give way. If it takes a bunch of screaming lefties breaking national secrets laws to point out when the Constitution has been urinated on by the Government, so be it.

Um, the Pentagon Papers were more than "a few years ago"

For you, perhaps. Me, I lived through it.

and the avenues for disseminating information have greatly expanded during that time

...which makes the idea that the Times is still pushing this envelope all the more interesting, and frankly, alarming. It wuld be a much easier sell, convincing us that some sort of principle were being invoked here, were there more than just one publication with a well known political leaning, were involved.

You also seem to be proceeding from the assumption that the revealing the Pentagon Papers was the wrong thing to do, if I read you correctly.

Correct.

Even assuming the violations of the constitution, (A questionable point of itself) two points make such release problematic.

One, the idea I and John have already spoken to... that we seem bent on relying on the New York Times to make constitutional calls. On what basis of law, or reason do we allow such things to occur?

And secondly, the law had to be broken on several levels to make that publication happen. The argument was made that the justification for such publication was the law of the land was being broken. Do we really propose to protect the law by breaking it?