Leaked Documents

Well, pretty much every story I am finding today in the news revolves around the leaked documents from WikiLeaks. I'm not sure what to think about this. While I would like to know what the government is doing, I also want certain types of information out of the hands of some people.

We elect people to decide what information it is we need to know. We can't just have panic over every little thing. We also cannot drown ourselves in these details without ample context of the circumstance regarding the documentation.

In this case, I'm not sure there is much of a shock here. Apparently, it's confirmed that Iran is a stick in everyone's spine, even those in the Middle East.

But the seismic document spill by WikiLeaks showed one area of profound agreement -- that Iran is viewed in the Middle East as the region's No. 1 troublemaker.

Gulf nation leaders were known to dislike the Iranian regime and its nuclear program but rarely made those sentiments known publicly. The leaked cables and communications, though, show those officials talking about Iran with a degree of disdain and worry more commonly found among the Israelis.

According to the documents, Saudi King Abdullah frequently urged the United States to destroy Iran's nuclear facilities, to "cut off the head of the snake." According to the Guardian, he warned that Iran's program could trigger a nuclear arms race in the region.

King Hamad bin Isa al-Khalifa of Bahrain and Jordanian lawmaker Zeid Rifai separately expressed similar concerns. Rifai told a U.S. official to "bomb Iran, or live with an Iranian bomb," warning that sanctions would not matter, according to the Guardian. Abu Dhabi crown prince Sheikh Mohammad bin Zayed fretted that Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad "is going to take us to war."

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Rep. Pete Hoekstra, R-Mich., ranking Republican on the House intelligence committee, called the leak a "colossal failure" with respect to the intelligence community.

"This database should never have been created. Hundreds of thousands of people should not have been provided access to it. This is a colossal failure by our intel community, by our Department of Defense to keep classified information secret," he said on ABC.

Thoughts? The young man that has been said to leak these documents...hero or criminal? What should happen to him?