08.21.13
A triumph for the Evil Empire
Bradley Manning gets 35 years. Next up, Julian Assange, unless he wants to stay in the embassy of Ecuador in London for the rest of his life. If Manning can be put away for life, so can Julian Assange and, inevitably, Edward Snowden.
In the big story few Americans will recall who turned Manning in but today he figures large again in summaries of the case.
The fellow was Adrian Lamo, a feckless convicted hacker and apparent pathological liar, once a low-level but constant publicity hound at Wired and other on-line magazines. One way of looking at it is to observe Manning couldn’t have had worse luck when he sought out Lamo on-line and chose to speak with him. Many would have told him, outright, run away.
But Manning is an historical figure.
Lamo is not. Rather, he’s an always present human carbuncle, someone whose publicity and achievement as an informant turning Manning’s chats and e-mail over to the FBI and Wired (also not spotless in the affair), exists only due to the frailty of the person who confided in him.