Often an event or ` Black Swan ' will occur that will disrupt the status quo and can as a consequence reveal many truths about ones true nature and/or intentions. Wiki-leaks has certainly done this in a big way. How are western democracies any different from Communist China if they hunt down and lock up Julian Assange?

I don't see what Wiki-leaks has done and hopefully continue to do, as any different from what a good investigative journalist would do. Oh wait! One difference. Steroids. This is a huge leak on steroids. (Man that must be painful.) It illustrates the challenges we face as the internet evolves and grows. It raises questions about freedoms and the strength of those freedoms when put under stress that we are now having to face, though they are certainly not new.

The French aristocrat Alexis De Tocqueville wrote presciently of the logical conclusions to where Democracy was heading back in 1840. What seemed then like outrageous speculations about the duel nature of democracy are now coming true. It's illustrated by not just how difficult it is to travel freely around the world but the reactions of democracy's when challenged on truths.  One has only to read De Tocqueville and compare his musings on the consequences of disent within Democracy with for instance, what happened to Joe Wilson and his outed CIA operative wife, Valerie Plame. He was dead on the money on how a democracy can attack itself from within and it's passive/aggressive tendencies almost 170 years ago.

Our modern democracies are built on a bed-stone of perceived tolerances, but we're all a bit iffy about having too many Muslims or Mainland Chinese about or tolerating some of the more radical elements of different immigrant cultures. Yeah I'm looking at you France, Switzerland, America. Don't get me wrong. I totally fall into that category. It's an academic argument I have in my head on a pretty much weekly basis. How do we cope with a stone age religion in our midst that's growing more prevalent and influential and has a strongly held and unashamed desire to take over the world and run it in it's barbaric and ancient ways? And then apart from Christianity we have the Muslims with similar motivations.

Wiki-Leaks has bought to light behind the door comments of diplomats and public servants that the majority of people didn't know about but at the very least, probably suspected.  Russia in bed with it's Mafia? Nothing new there. Pakistan is schizophrenic with borderline personality disorder issues and lots of nuclear missiles? Pffft!  Prince Andrew is a pompous dick? Durrrr.

President Obama was partially elected on cries for transparency of Government but when faced with true transparency reacts like a naughty child who's been told to go their room. Poorly. Modern democracies need to display a strength of character and self awareness that can tolerate dissent without curtailing the very liberties and laws on which they're built. What's the point of trying to convince countries without it that democracy is a strong, reliable system of government if they continue to nobble and curtail it whenever it's threatened? We need to lead by example and we're failing ourselves and the wider world if continue on this path unchecked.

Goodness! That was a long rant. Don't worry. Stupidity will return here sooner than a worried look appearing on the face of fat kid lost in a lion safari park.