If you really cant imagine, even as a thought experiment, a situation in which you would be forced to betray a confidence in order to do what is right, then you are not trying hard enough.
The fact that this case almost perfectly exemplifies the most extreme possible trope of this situation seems to highlight, if only to me, that the underlying instinct purveyed by both sides of the argument is still the desire to do the right thing.

Perhaps you can imagine such a game-changing situation but feel that this case did not quite meet that standard.
Or perhaps you really do feel that once declared, oaths of loyalty should only be broken on pain of death and that Manning should expect such a consequence in considering the decision to leak the information.

However, I have a very hard time imagining that there is anybody out there who really thinks that there are no circumstances imaginable in which it is incumbent upon a moral actor to do what is right if that means breaking contract.

A whistleblower says: “Here is a list of the crimes for which I give evidence, and the evidence is as follows.”

Not, “Here’s a cubic shitload of stuff, some of which may be criminal. Grab a shovel and take a look”.

If he came to me with a terabyte of classified diplomatic correspondence, 98 percent of which was not indicative of abuse and for which I was now going to bear custodial responsibility, I’d have slammed the door in his face too.

http://definitions.uslegal.com/p/protected-class/

“The first civil rights laws protected only race and color. As the principle of discrimination evolved over the years more laws were passed and more groups were added. Federal protected classes now include race, color, national origin, religion, sex (or gender), age (over 40), and disability. State law (HEPA) further protects ancestry, marital status, sexual orientation, as well as arrest and court record (in most cases).

Anti-discrimination laws only regard unequal or unfair treatment as unlawful discrimination when the victim is a member of a defined group known as a protected class.”

I wasn’t able to find a definition for “semi-protected class”. My guess is that it refers to the protection at the state (not federal) level mentioned above, and that this protection is wildly inconsistent among states.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_Form_312

Bradley Manning would have signed this or some very similar agreement to protect the information he was granted access to. Journalists obviously do not need to sign any such document (unless they’re embedded with military troops? Now I’m curious about those situations…) and their role, quite rightly, is to inform the public about any important information they recieve.

The fact that such a huge portion of our workforce faces Federal felony charges if they discuss their work with the press is the problem.  The specific criminal charges that prosecutors can choose from to punish “leakers” is a side issue: these days, *any* Federal prosecution effectively ruins your life.

Also, there is absolutely no evidence that what Manning did was irresponsible, compared, of course, to the people who were most embarrassed about what he exposed.

http://www.salon.com/2010/12/24/wikileaks_23/

If we concede that people with clearance leaking classified documents is not acceptable then classifying documents will become a very easy way for anyone in the government to escape any kind of accountability.  More secrecy –> less accountability.  More draconian punishments for whisteblowers –> more secrecy.

I don’t think this is consistent with the ideals of the USA.  Sounds more like Belarus or Myanmar. No offense to the people in either country, I have been given the impression that those governments are oppressive.

Manning is as screwed up as Tim McVeigh was.

Right, because leaking evidence of human rights abuses within the military is exactly the same as blowing up children.

(Since he was in the service at the time, he had in fact taken an oath to do so.  That most serving officers would (and do) fail to meet the same high standard doesn’t make his behaviour any less responsible.)

And your accusation is flat-out ridiculous.  McVeigh killed random strangers; Bradley didn’t.  Silly comparison.

What he did was the most responsible thing that can be possibly done… although the courage to do so in this situation is extremely rare.

The list of overreaching governmental mistakes is too long to begin to recount, but if we can’t rely on The New York Times to find out where the mistakes and official criminality lie any more, we will have to rely on whistleblowers like Manning, just as it took Daniel Ellsberg from the State Department, and Mark Felt from the FBI, to provide the necessary information in an earlier era.

And, really.. the gay community is a semi-protected class?  Even if it were (hah!), it has nothing to do with this situation.

I respect Manning’s INTENT, but unfortunately, what he did was totally irresponsible.

Also, the journalist publishing the information needs to get it from somewhere.  If they’re making communication with American journalists into an offense with a real risk of the death penalty then it significantly threatens the ability of journalists to bring abuses to light.

if this was a court case for a journalist being prosecuted for publishing the information provided by manning then id say journalism was at risk.