What’s the difference between a treasonous leaker and a courageous whistleblower?

This is one of many provocative questions arising from the saga over the alleged unlawful disclosure of classified information by 21-year old Air National Guardsman Jack Teixeira. The accused is said to have purloined and distributed a trove of Pentagon documents via the social media platform Discord, touching on topics from the Russo-Ukrainian War, to China’s malign efforts, to U.S. spying on allies Israel and South Korea — an effort that we wholeheartedly condemn. Over months, those documents made their way out to other platforms. So the national security and intelligence apparatus sprung into action, oddly working hand-in-hand with corporate media – the very journalists who used to celebrate leakers who exposed inconvenient truths from security agencies the media was adversarial towards – quickly identifying and apprehending the alleged leaker.

Teixeira has been described as Christian, pro-gun, and anti-war. He’s reportedly been recorded making anti-Semitic and racist remarks and was a participant in a group chat of other young, like-minded gamers. In other words, he and his ilk are the archetype of the primary threat the government tells us exists in America – the insurrectionist crowd. Now, all that’s been reported about the leaker and the leak may be true. But because of how we’ve seen national security weaponized in recent years, and given peculiar aspects of this story and the perfect narrative around it, it merits scrutiny. Here are some salient questions. 

First, how did Teixeira obtain these documents? Some reports suggest that despite his top secret security clearance and sensitive compartmented information access, it’s most unlikely he would’ve been able to grab materials taken from briefings prepared for the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and other senior defense officials. Are the systems and processes for protecting these materials so leaky that this lowly airman could somehow locate, access, and walk away with them? If not, did someone above Teixeira’s rank help him? 

This brings us to motive. Is it logical to believe that, as the media suggests, Teixeira was posting these documents just to impress his friends – knowing he might be throwing his life away? If he was sophisticated enough to collect these documents, and disseminate them as he did, wouldn’t you think he’d have a more substantive motive? Because the documents cover such a grab bag of issues, the answer seems murky. We might intuit that the leaks aimed to expose the Biden administration’s dishonesty.  

The documents show it’s going a lot more poorly than about the Russo-Ukrainian war.portrayed, despite our extensive support. The documents also show that America’s exposure is greater than had been suggested. We are deeply embedded in the war effort – one that we now know President Volodymr Zelenskyy would consider hugely escalating by striking inside Russia – which could draw the U.S. into more direct and dangerous confrontation. As invested as the Biden administration is in this dangerous conflict, documents show it is spying heavily on Ukraine’s leaders, suggesting it doesn’t trust them. 

So did the leak aim to make the case we ought to get out of the war — or rather that we need to urgently surge resources towards it to turn things around? Or just that we are being had? Making things more complicated is that there are also the unrelated documents concerning China, Israel, and South Korea. So again, what was the logic to the leaks? 

Is it possible Teixeira was a patsy for someone or a group with myriad motives? Another aspect of the leak getting short shrift is the question of why the government withheld these truths, particularly about the state of the war? 

Our leaders routinely over-classifies and then hides behind state secrets to stonewall when misconduct, incompetence and/or failure is apparent. That the focus of the authorities and media was on getting the leaker, rather than addressing the leaks, speaks volumes here. 

And another question: Once the feds targeted the leaker, how did they find him so quickly? We still don’t know who the Dobbs leaker was, or who planted the January 6 pipe bombs, or who propagated myriad illegal leaks during the Trump years. Yet the authorities found this leaker within days. Was he that careless? Or are our authorities willfully blind? And what about the role of the media? Does it regularly work with the FBI to track down leakers? Should it be thought of as a Deep State organ? 

Would it concern you to know that authorities are now talking about engaging in more pervasive social media surveillance thanks to the leak? Is that just exploitation of the situation, or does it tell us any more about the nature of this saga and how it’s been portrayed? To return to my original question, about what the difference is between a leaker and a whistleblower. Increasingly the answer would seem to be — politics.

A leaker is an enemy of those in power who puts forth information that undermines its favorite narratives. A whistleblower is an ally of it who defends its prerogative and its power. Hence the difference in media treatment between Jack Teixeira and Alexander Vindman. Though again, this is no defense of Teixeira and his acts. I abhor criminality and believe it should be punished to the fullest extent regardless if it exposes things the public has a right to know, that it’s imperative that it know. 

I also abhor a government that deceives, and often hides behind classification to protect its own interests while claiming it’s protecting ours – and a corporate media that colludes with, rather than confronts it.