Sheldon Richman: Why WikiLeaks leaks matter

  Why should anyone care about the secret diplomatic cables WikiLeaks has disclosed? So what if State Department bureaucrats say unflattering things about other world “leaders?” Some people may be asking those questions in response to WikiLeaks’s latest disclosures. Okay, they say, leaks about atrocities on the battlefield (such as the first WikiLeaks disclosure, the “Collateral Murder” video) tell us something we should know about — the gross misconduct by U.S. military forces, condoned by the command all the way up to the president of the United States.

  But diplomatic cables? Who cares?

  We all should care. The documents serve as a timely reminder that the people who collectively call themselves “the government” are professional liars. Lying is what they are paid to do. They lie to their foreign counterparts, but mainly they lie to us. The biggest lie of all is that they do it in the American people’s interest.