through h4x0r3d's eyes

#Obama echoes Richard Nixon on #WikiLeaks prisoner - #FreeBradley #FreeManning

The first time President Obama was publicly asked about Bradley Manning, the soldier accused of disclosing government secrets to WikiLeaks, his answer was reminiscent of George W. Bush.

The second time - when he declared Manning guilty without a trial - it was more like Richard Nixon.

Manning, a 23-year-old Army private, is charged with divulging hundreds of thousands of classified documents, including war logs from Afghanistan and Iraq and State Department diplomatic cables.

Until his transfer in late April to a military prison at Fort Leavenworth, Kan., Manning had been held for nine months at the Marine brig in Quantico, Va. Here is how attorney David Coombs, the only person allowed unmonitored visits, described his confinement there:

Held in an isolation cell for 23 hours a day; stripped of his clothing every night, purportedly for his own protection, and given a coarse smock to wear; required to stand naked at some roll calls; prohibited from sleeping between 5 a.m. and 8 p.m. and required to respond to guards’ queries every five minutes; also awakened and required to respond at night whenever guards couldn’t see his face.

The issue landed in Obama’s lap via P.J. Crowley, the State Department’s chief media spokesman and the only member of the administration known to have protested Manning’s treatment.

Answering a question at an MIT student seminar in March, Crowley called the conditions of Manning’s confinement “ridiculous and counterproductive and stupid.”

Asked about Crowley’s comments at a news conference the next day, Obama said the Pentagon had assured him that its procedures for Manning “are appropriate and are meeting our basic standards,” and that “some of this has to do with Pfc. Manning’s safety.”

Two days later, the State Department announced Crowley’s “resignation,” government-speak for signing a farewell note while being pushed out the window.

What was especially noteworthy about Obama’s comments was his reliance on the Pentagon’s assessment of its own conduct.

It called to mind Bush’s assertions that waterboarding suspected terrorists was legal because his handpicked lawyers had told him so. Or his acceptance of promises from countries like Morocco and Egypt that suspects delivered to them for interrogation after overseas abductions - the practice known as “extraordinary rendition” - would be treated humanely.

Obama’s assurances, at any rate, didn’t satisfy a group of Manning’s supporters, who burst into a protest song April 21 during the president’s $35,800-a-head fundraiser in San Francisco.

Later, one of the protesters asked Obama about Manning. According to a transcript of a cell phone recording, the president first replied that military secrecy laws apply to everyone.

“If I was to release stuff, information that I’m not authorized to release, I’m breaking the law,” Obama said. “We don’t individually make our own decisions about how the laws operate. …

“He (Manning) broke the law.”

The questioner then brought up Daniel Ellsberg, who leaked the Pentagon Papers study of the Vietnam War. That was different, Obama replied, because “what Ellsberg released wasn’t classified in the same way.”

There were at least three things wrong with Obama’s statements, in ascending order of importance:

— The president has the power to declassify any document and wouldn’t be “breaking the law” by releasing it.

— The Pentagon Papers were classified top secret, a more restrictive level than any of the material Manning is accused of leaking.

— Manning is still awaiting trial and is legally presumed innocent.

It’s the first time a U.S. president has made such a public comment since 1971, when Nixon declared that cult leader Charles Manson, then on trial, “was guilty, directly or indirectly, of eight murders.”

Manson was tried and convicted by a civilian jury. Manning will go before a panel of military officers ultimately responsible to the president.

Obama’s comments also raise the question of whether he looks at all criminal cases through the same lens or uses different standards depending on whether the government is alleged to be the victim or the victimizer.

This is, after all, the president who has declared that America needs to look forward, not backward, when asked about investigating former Bush administration officials for allegedly approving torture.

Obama, to be sure, has forbidden waterboarding and renounced torture. His administration also has prosecuted soldiers for killing civilians.

But while promising never to hide government wrongdoing with claims of secrecy, Obama has invoked the state-secrets defense in seeking dismissal of lawsuits challenging the Bush administration’s clandestine wiretapping and rendition programs - suits that alleged crimes by government officials.

His administration is prosecuting another media leak case, against former National Security Agency official Thomas Drake - whose supporters, like Manning’s, describe him as a courageous whistle-blower - with Espionage Act charges that carry up to 35 years in prison. One charge against Manning, aiding the enemy, is punishable by death, although prosecutors say they will not seek the death penalty.

It might be time to add Obama to the long line of presidents who considered crimes against “Them” - suspected lawbreakers, both foreign and domestic - less serious than crimes against “Us.”

Bob Egelko covers the courts for The Chronicle. E-mail him at begelko@sfchronicle.com.

This article appeared on page F - 3 of the San Francisco Chronicle