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On July 17th, 2009, the U.S. Ambassador to Tunisia, along with his wife, had dinner with Mohammad Sakher El Materi and his wife Nesrine Ben Ali El Materi, the son-in-law and daughter of President Zine El Abindine Ben Ali. In what read like a transcript for MTV Cribs, he reported that the fully staffed house was recently renovated (despite the fact that they were also currently building a palatial compound) and included an infinity pool, ancient artifacts everywhere, Roman columns, frescoes and even a real lion’s head from which water poured into the pool. Take that Jackie and David Siegel! He even had a large pet tiger named “Pasha” that consumed four chickens a day. The ambassador goes on to add: “The opulence with which El Materi and Nesrine live and their behavior make clear why they and other members of the Ben Ali’s family are disliked and even hated by some Tunisians. The excesses of the Ben Ali family are growing.” 

For over two decades, the people of Tunisia had suspected that their president had his hands deep in the country’s coffers, they just didn’t have the proof. Until, of course, a little known website, with information obtained by an army intelligence analyst, blew the whistle on the entire kleptocracy of the El Materi regime. Tunisians finally had the proof they needed. Within weeks of Wikileaks releasing the thousands of diplomatic cables, protests erupted on the streets and toppled the regime. The Arab Spring was born.  

Yesterday marked the first day of the summer-long trial of that same army intelligence analyst, Pfc. Bradley Manning. Manning has been imprisoned for three years, tortured, and at one point was held in solitary confinement for 10 months because of those leaks. He faces life in prison if convicted. Yet, somehow, the war criminals who perpetrated the acts exposed in those documents are not held accountable or prosecuted.

Besides the thousands of documents that brought light to the true number and causes of civilian deaths in Iraq, human rights abuses by private contractors like DynCorp and Blackwater, diplomatic cables, and the extent of bribery and spying that takes place by U.S. government officials, Manning also leaked the infamous collateral murder video

Earlier this year, Manning stated that he released the documents because “I began to become depressed at the situation that we found ourselves increasingly mired in…we became obsessed with capturing and killing human targets on lists, on being suspicious of and avoiding cooperation with our host-nation partners…I believed that if the general public, especially the American public, had access to the information…this could spark a domestic debate on the role military and our foreign policy in general.”

The leaks did not threaten U.S. security as the prosecution is claiming. It did, however, embarrass the U.S. government and expose the hypocrisy behind the “spreading democracy” taglines. The ongoing killing and torturing of innocent civilians by U.S. forces, and the occupation of foreign lands, is far more threatening to U.S. security then the leaked documents could ever be.

The Obama administration is prosecuting him under the World War I – era Espionage Act, and must prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that Manning had reason to believe the files could be used to harm the U.S. or aid a foreign power. Manning’s statements on and off the record are hardly words of a man who thought his actions were aiding the enemy. Former Secretary of Defense Robert Gates also challenged those claims: “Is this embarrassing? Yes. Is it awkward? Yes. Consequences for U.S. foreign policy? I think fairly modest.” Gates was forced to resign shortly after those statements.

For those too young to remember, or not interested enough to care, in 1971, Daniel Ellsberg leaked The Pentagon Papers, which revealed that the U.S. was lying to the American people about the war in Vietnam and helped turn public opinion against the conflict. He faced a possible sentence of 115 years if found guilty of the 12 felony counts against him, but the trial was dismissed because of governmental misconducts against him. It also factored into the impeachment proceedings against Nixon, who eventually resigned.

The trial of Bradley Manning is like the Martha Stewart trial, one big show. It is to set a precedent for would-be whistleblowers or sources to the press, “snitches get stitches,” – or, more specifically, jail time. The Obama administration has prosecuted more journalists under the Espionage Act then all other administrations before him COMBINED. So much for transparency. 

But here’s a final thought: There are close to a million people who have top-secret clearance. How serious and criminal is that information if so many people have access to it?  

Danielle DeAbreu

Danielle DeAbreu is a student at William Paterson University studying Broadcast Journalism with a minor in Political Science. Follow me on Twitter @DaniDeAbreu13