2011-06-06 WikiLeaks Notes: Latest News on the #Cablegate Releases & #WikiLeaks

Mentor and friend Greg Mitchell at TheNation.com is on vacation. While he is away, I am pinch-hitting and blogging WikiLeaks updates here. All the times are EST. You can contact me at kgosztola@hotmail.com with any news tips. Twitter username is @kgosztola. Also, if you are looking for something good to listen to, I encourage you to check out the catalog of podcasts posted here at WL Central from the "This Week in WikiLeaks" show I produce every week.

11:10 PM Big ruling for Pharma whistleblowers: Court rules under the False Claims Act "a drug or device maker remains liable...even when a pharmacy or hospital was unaware that a kickback was made to a doctor to induce the sale of a product for which reimbursement was sought from Medicare and Medicaid." This has the potential to alter outcome of a number of whistleblower lawsuits.

11:00 PM Over 4,100 citizens sign petition urging the Department of Justice to drop its case against NSA whistleblower Thomas Drake

10:50 PM Historical WikiLeaks: Documents showing British government fears that French would launch "back door attack" being made available. The government files are from the Stuart period and include secret reports of espionage and treason.

8:00 PM Nice build out on the Honduras coup on El Faro made possible by US State Embassy cables.

6:10 PM This article from The Guardian began to circulate hours ago: estimated that 25% of hackers "may have been recruited by the federal authorities to be their eyes and ears"

6:05 PM Proof that many who have been granted the privilege of writing op-eds in the US media think WikiLeaks just gossip: Anything — anything! — that crosses the Internet might eventually make it into the public realm. That was proved once again when Wikileaks published thousands of supposedly secret diplomatic cables. Spy groups, rogue regimes, criminals and other outfits dedicate vast efforts trying to hack the most-secure computer systems of the military, government and business.

4:45 PM Department of Justice missed deadline for "legal guidance" (jargon for restrictions) on attorneys accessing Gitmo detainee assessment reports released by WikiLeaks. Now, they have been awarded an extension and have until June 10 to present such "guidance."

4:35 PM David Remes, who leads human rights law firm Appeal for Justice, demands attorneys be able to use and access WikiLeaks documents for cases. He rejects the extension being awarded to the Department of Justice saying DOJ has no incentive to finalize guidance if it continues receive extensions.

3:45PM Bradley Manning street art in New York City

2:31 PM David Sirota for Salon has a post on the US intimidating and targeting a corporate whistleblower on behalf of Cisco against ex-Cisco executive Peter Alfred-Adekeye. The chilling story deserves to be considered in the context of the wider war on whistleblowing being waged by the Obama Administration. But, this one stands out because it quite clearly shows government stepping in, as Sirota notes, to defend business.

2:05 PM Jennifer 8 Lee, believed to have played a role in the spread of the "Collateral Murder" video is here to moderate a panel session at #pdf11 on "Media Revolutions." (Of course, she's had some tension and fallout when it comes to WikiLeaks and has distanced herself.)

1:55 PM Esquire has posted an exit interview with Bill Keller, who is leaving his postion as executive editor of the New York Times.

11:22 PM Nice update to add here as I am tweeting from #pdf11. Few good references to WikiLeaks so far during the opening session of the conference.

Op-ed by Aniebo Nwamu from Nigeria on keeping governments open. He writes, "Sinners whose sins have been exposed have been the only ones attacking Julian Assange, WikiLeaks' founder, and his brand of new journalism. When leaders preach transparency and accountability, I wonder the difference between what they mean and the good job WikiLeaks was doing before it was stopped."

7:20 PM US thought Pakistan crossed the line in its pursuit of Baloch and Sindhi political activists in the war on terror, according to the diplomatic cables.

6:55 PM Cables reveal more details on a dispute between Canada and the United States over Devils Lake in North Dakota. The dispute is called a "prime example of failed diplomacy" and centered around the fact that the lake has no "natural outlet" and state officials would like to be able to provide North Dakotans relief by sending water into Manitoba's watershed via the Red River. From the CBC.

6:10 PM Adrian Lamo, the hacker who turned in Bradley Manning to US government authorities, finally faces the sort of scrutiny that journalists have been applying to Assange. No interview has deconstructed what Lamo thinks like this before.

Last night, @exiledsurfer posted a two-part interview with Lamo, the hacker who turned in Bradley Manning to US government authorities. Here's the videos of the interview with a bit of a background on why @exiledsurfer decided to interview Lamo.