[helthanatos]

Does it matter who it's controlled by as long as it does some good? As far as citizens are concerned, it should be / is treason to keep these secrets. People say Snowden is terrible for doing what he did and he is hiding in Russia. They are wrong for thinking their thoughts about how "unAmerican" he is. WikiLeaks could start releasing nonsense, but when they do that, their purpose is at an end.

[geofft]

Yes. If it does biased good, it may not be doing good at all. For instance, there are claims that Wikileaks had the opportunity to leak RNC emails, and decided not to. It is certainly one thing to say that the DNC and RNC don't get to have privacy (I'm not sure I'd agree, but I can see the argument). It is another thing entirely to say that one of these groups doesn't get privacy and the other one does. Both of them make sausage. Both of them are American political parties. It's unpleasant, there's undoubtedly rampant corruption in both, and people are sending internal emails without an eye to the fact that the general public might read and misinterpret them. But if only one group becomes the target of Wikileaks, the general public will get upset at them and not the other.

If Wikileaks is controlled by some entity with an agenda, it is very easy to attack and embarrass and cause political problems for other groups, opposed to that agenda, and refuse to attack groups aligned with that agenda. No lies are required. They can release selective truth, and generate public outrage directed in a particular way, thereby clearing the path for whatever groups they like. Those groups would probably generate as much outrage if they were the target of Wikileaks, and we have no way to verify what Wikileaks themselves might be hiding.

It's sort of a Richelieu "Give me six lines written by the hand of the most honest man and I would find something in them to have him hanged" situation: they're hanging only the honest men they dislike.

(Also I'm sort of weirded out by your phrasing "They are wrong for thinking their thoughts" - I'm guessing you meant just "They are wrong to think" or something?)