So you would have supported Twitter blocking all mentions of the Panama papers until this conviction last month? Or would Twitter judge ahead of time that a crime has occurred and thus permit the hacked materials to be released?
> In those instances, it is up to the whistleblower and journalists initially before eventually the court decides.
But only journalists of a certain political bent? You seem to be advocating adding Twitter, FB, and other for-profit corporations into the conversation here.
> Assange is the one who is not on the same moral footing as those two.
Assange was the journalist who published Manning's releases. This seems incoherent to me.
> Trump's taxes likely did reveal numerous potential crimes.
The NYPost article revealed the crime of crack possession. It was not so long ago that the FBI did a sting operation to get the same sort of footage they used to convict my city's (DC) mayor. And the FBI clearly thought they had some information about a crime, which is presumably why they were subpoenaed.
Obviously, that's a stupid argument - but that's the point. You are just going to set up arbitrary thresholds for what is a crime and what isn't post-facto to justify blocking what you don't want and allowing what you want.
Yes, here is the first google result.[1]
>Who decides whether a crime has occurred?
This is complicated and why there is a preference for whistleblowing to occur through official channels rather than through journalists. However sometimes there is a level of corruption that can't be dealt with any other way besides going public with it. In those instances, it is up to the whistleblower and journalists initially before eventually the court decides. Snowden was good in this regarding by trying to limit what was leaked. Manning did a poor job here.
>I would say that Snowden exposed a crime (perjury) by James Clapper. Manning (IMO) exposed war crimes.
No disagreement here. Snowden and Manning fit a clear definition of whistleblowers. Assange is the one who is not on the same moral footing as those two.
>Similarly, I think that it was in the interest of the public to report when it was discovered that Trump only paid $750 in taxes (despite not committing a technical crime!) or that Hillary Clinton received some debate questions in advance (again, not a crime!).
Trump's taxes likely did reveal numerous potential crimes. He reported different numbers to the government and lenders which would likely indicate he committed fraud.[2] He both employed his daughter and paid her as an external consultant which isn't allowed[3]. He regularly claimed things as business expenses in questionable ways.[4] I'm sure there are many others too, those were just the first three I remembered.
[1] - https://www.icij.org/investigations/panama-papers/first-us-t...
[2] - https://www.propublica.org/article/trump-inc-podcast-never-b...
[3] - https://www.cnn.com/2020/09/28/politics/ivanka-trump-donald-...
[4] - https://theintercept.com/2020/09/28/donald-trump-taxes/