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Wikileaks Now Hosted By the Swedish Pirate Party
oskii writes "During his visit to the the Swedish capital Stockholm, Wikileaks spokesman Julian Assange has struck a deal with the local Pirate Party. The party, which participates in the national elections next month, will host several new Wikileaks servers to protect freedom of press and help the whistleblower site to carry out its operation."
Now fucking us out of due process to combat copyright violations is a "matter of global security."
Their heart's in the right place, but could they possibly have a worse strategic approach?
While it's a nice publicity stunt for the Pirate Party (with the Swedish elections coming up in little more than a month), WikiLeaks may also gain from it. Swedish politicians may well be pressured by the US government, or by others depending on what WikiLeaks publishes in the future, to close down those servers like they did with The Pirate Bay. But now that they are hosted by the Pirate Party that would be seen as a direct attack on a political opponent, with the obvious effects on public opinion. That will likely make them think twice before ordering a shutdown, which probably wasn't the case with The Pirate Bay.
And yes, government representatives giving direct orders to police and prosecutors is illegal in Sweden. But in practice it happens all the time due to widespread patronage and cronyism and few legal checks against it.
Looks like the RIAA finally got that army of copyright enforcers they've been looking for.
...but he also needs to be held accountable if things go wrong.
No. Not more so than any other organisation. And any legal attack would have to go through the Swedish legal system. There is no "international law", there are just treaties that countries implement in their own legislation.
I feel so bad for Bradley Manning, the 22 year old that is taking the shit for all of this. Some douchebag congressman wanted to execute him. Why is getting truth out so bad guys?
This is just intelligent load-balancing. Offload enough of the responsibility to enough political or apolitical parties and regardless of what happens, there's multiple legal or quasi-legal entities hosting it. This is essentially a guarantee that the data will exist in several locations no matter how many you try to take down. It's always somewhere that you can't get to.
When the foot seeks the place of the head, the line is crossed. Know your place. Keep your place. Be a shoe.
I'd think that the activities and speech of a particular elected group of representatives would be off limits to outside governments as a matter of Swedish sovereignty.
That's why we made the CIA, you know, to fix that little global oversight.
It depends on the nature of the treaties between the two governments.
Just because the US Government wants something from another government doesn't mean they're going to automatically get it, even when a treaty is involved. National laws may carve out exceptions, and sometimes the government in question will just say "no", regardless of the treaties that are in place.
I like you, Stuart. You're not like everyone else, here, at Slashdot.
....Julian Assange has officially changed his name to Captain Hook.
Authority questions you. Return the favor.
If I recall correctly, in Sweden the servers of political parties, served from their political offices, are immune to prosecution for a variety of offenses. It's intended to protect the freedom of independent parties. It just adds another layer of shielding on top of Sweden's other protections.
They would have no more political obligation to remove the material in response to an outside government's request than the Republican party in the U.S. would in response to a request from the Chinese government to remove documents from a GOP server.
It doesn't hurt to be nice.
Correct. It would be much easier for a foreign government (lets say the U.S), to pressure ISPs within its borders to prevent access to the website and/or persecute those who host leaked information within their borders. That's not necessarily easy or without political repercussion, however, and would probably draw some negative press coverage. Given the sometimes inexorable spread of information, if the Pirate Party were to become elected within the Swedish Parliament, then it would ensure that most of the information on Wikileaks would be available in some form or another, even if foreign governments succeeded in the aforementioned pressure efforts - as long as they remained elected.
More likely to use the slowness of the systems against the powers that be. Information moves quickly. A takedown in one country may be able to stop the flow of information quickly but coordinating takedowns to happen quickly around the world is too difficult with multiple jurisdictions and legal systems. It's a very smart idea.
Wikileaks is the future, plain and simple. Governments will not be able to legislate restrictions on the internet forever. Pandora's box is essentially open.
This approach to data-distribution and careful evasion of embarrassed (or harmed) governments is bound to remain, as it's a natural capability of the internet. Nations under-represented on the world stage (or more principled in their respect of free speech) will continue to host those responsible for sites like Wikileaks, and fully-distributed, and virtually untrackable, delivery systems are certain to take hold for the proliferation of this type of information.
The law is no substitute for tight security, despite years of governments being trained to the contrary.
You mean media whore....
.. he gets upset when he isn't getting enough attention.
A whistle blower would go through the data and make a something that at least resembles a case. He doesn't want to do any real work, like analyze the data, strip out names to protect innocent parties, or provide only truly relevant data. Instead, he prefers to vomit data and let other people make sense of it.
Assange suffers from attention deficit disorder
I rarely read replies, it's my opinion and if you thought about your opinion a little more, I'm OK with that.
No. The swedish government might, if they've signed some treaty saying they will. Assuming you are a USian, consider what would happen if the federal government of Iran demanded that the Green party drop all information pertaining to Israel from their site. (Mostly: laughter).
"Who is the Journal of Quantum Physics going to believe?" --Stephen Hawking
Sorry, you must be new here.
The truth is not nearly as important as their truth, or my truth, as told to me, by me (and others).
Beyond self-deception, there are many who are drawn to the idea of being a sort of "information royalty." The idea that you know more than others, and deserve to know more, because you're special, is very attractive.
Then there's the reality of tactical and strategic advantages. Sometimes you're just better off knowing more than others (information asymmetry), and sometimes you're just better off with others dead. It's a matter of personal assessment. I'm not talking about morality here, just power. For most of us, killing someone else would be something that we would at least say is unthinkable. For some of us, punishing someone for telling the truth would be in the same boat. Both of these proportions may be significantly smaller than you or I would hope.
It's obvious to me that by aligning with a particular political party, Wikileaks is publicly announcing the abandonment of any semblance of editorial neutrality. Their Noble effort to bring additional transparency to the world is now forever tainted.
Apocalypse Cancelled, Sorry, No Ticket Refunds
Let us say there is a secret US military document. Say this document has complete details of a plan to attack Canada two months from now. Someone in the military leaks it out and Wikileaks publishes it on a server hosted by Pirate Party. Questions: 1. Who should be jailed? (a)The military guy who leaked it (b)Wikieaks chief (Assange) (c)the Pirate Party chief (Falkvinge)? 2. What if the plans were to take out an Iranian nuclear facility? Would your answers change? 3. What if the plans were to take out a North Korean chemical weapons facility? Would your answers change? 4. What if the plans were to take out an AlQaeda hideout? Would your answers change?
Assange is handing out free ammunition for those who would like to legislate tighter restrictions on internet freedoms. Tying itself to a particular political party will only make that easier.
At one point I held onto the romantic, idealistic hope that a Pirate Party could take hold here in the U.S. eventually. I think this publicity stunt will effectively keep that from happening.If a PP on American soil starts to gain any ground, they are going to be immediately lambasted and hung out to dry as terrorist supporting, anti-American, extremists because, hey, look, the Swedish branch helped embarrass the U.S. Military.
Ah well, time to start looking for a new source of hope in the States.
Motorcycles, Robots, Space Gossip and More!
It's more just falling in line with the party, and offering another level of protection for the site.
The reason that Sweden's Pirate Party got political support in the first place was because Americans pushed political pressure on the Swedish government to take action, thus causing the first raid on The Pirate Bay. When the public got wind of this, there was massive public outcry saying that they shouldn't allow American corporate interests (and American copyright law) dictate what the Swedish government did. So all of a sudden there was a ton of political support for people that opposed American-style copyright.
This is a political move not to equate wikileaks to the Pirate Party, but instead to show that the Pirate Party operates as a safe haven for information so it cannot be tampered with by foreign interests (most notably, the American government and American corporations, who seem to believe that they are the authorities to determine what copyright law SHOULD be rather than the constituents of these so-called democracies).
This just falls in line with what the party represents. I think that the Swedish people would sooner resent America for trying to impose its beliefs on their democratically elected governments than they would be worried of the consequences of staving those companies off. It's not like America is about to bomb them because they run filesharing sites. And if they did, then Sweden would have an entire international body of allies who would object.
Karma: Non-Heinous
You see the problem with governments who want to censor their people is they still do all of this by the book. From a purely hypothetical point of view it would be more efficient to coordinate the "disappearing" of the people you don't like without trials or convictions. Then again the political backlash would be severe but by the time you are considering censoring the opposition you've lost the battle anyway, so why not take out the enemy while you still can. This is all purely hypothetical .
Now we have someone to bomb! /kidding
Well... /halfkidding
By aligning itself with a political movement, we now have a political entity of a foreign state aiding and abetting our enemies. I don't think we're going to be invading Sweden any time soon, but now we have someone to yell at when people are killed thanks to this info getting leaked out. Heckuvajob, Swedes... the Afghan informants' blood is on your hands now!
Hire a Linux system administrator, systems engineer,
As a political entity, wouldn't the pirate party have some sort of international obligation to comply when other federal governments ask them to remove information?
Yes, there is an international obligation to comply. But they are only required to wear black patches over one eye, get a peg leg, and sport a parrot on their shoulders (a Norwegian Blue should be suitable). Otherwise when queried by "other federal governments", they can answer, "Arrgg maties, thirty days at see, and not a wench to be seen! Grease up the monkey!"
Schroedinger's Brexit: The UK is both in and out of the EU at the same time!
So explain to me then how Dick Cheny and Robert Novak conspired to "leak" the name of a CIA operative that was actively engaged in operations, compromised her and everyone she had contact with, but that wasn't treason?
In the U.S., rich people don't commit treason (or any other crimes) unless they're caught with the cocaine straws up their noses.
!#@%*)anks for hanging up the phone, dear.
A while back, in a post on a previous thread regarding Julian Assange shortly after the Afghanistan files were leaked, I posited the question, "Why is Julian Assange still alive?".
I had assumed that if he did indeed have dirt on the US military establishment he would be pushing up daisies in some backwoods of Virginia.
Now I know that he is simply a very cautious, very smart player that is using EVERYTHING at his disposal to protect himself and what he does. The people he is aligning himself with are NOT idiots and they themselves are protected by laws that other nations are somewhat obligated to respect (the repercussions of ignoring these protections would probably be worse then any damage leaks might cause--think Barbra Streisand). He now has political AND journalistic protections. And don't forget about the "Insurance" file. Not a fucking clue, and I am not going to begin to guess.
( http://leakmirror.wikileaks.org/file/straw-glass-and-bottle/insurance.aes256 )
I am starting to like this guy.
The U.S. is prepared to take out Assange and Wikileaks by force. Putting this material on Swedish government property would make Sweden their enemy.
From every mountain top let freedom ring! Freedom of information needs to be ringing out more than most other freedoms. I only hope the folks at Wikileaks and in the Pirate Party are safe from the more sinister forces that might be put upon them.
First, it's Cheney. Second, it was Armitage and Novak.
**IT DOES NOT MATTER** what he "leaked"
You heard it here first people: if bsDaemon came across documents that showed the US Military was shoveling terrorist suspects into ovens, he'd ignore it and continue to do his job. Or maybe not that... maybe if he came across documents showing that we were burning women and children to death with phosphorous weapons, he'd just ignore it and continue to do his job. Okay, maybe not that...
Of course the line is drawn somewhere. To pretend otherwise is ***FUCKING INHUMAN*** and a good way to end up doing a lot of evil shit for the paltry reward of state loyalty.
It was treason.
We don't know what kind of deal they cut by having Scooter Libby take the fall. But clearly it wasn't enough, because Republicans still walk the Earth.
The Pirate party isn't a part of the Swedish government. They are not even a party in the parliament.
I would be very interesting to see an American military assault on Sweden however. Would you bomb Stockholm or make an amphibious landing? How would that look? The only remaining superpower beats up a democratic country with 9 million citizens.... Should the Swedish Afghanistan force start firing on their US allies as retaliation?
PRQ - the network cum ISP created to serve the Pirate Bay (and still doing so) - has been hosting much of Wikileaks since 2008.
Lots of people give the Pirate Bay guys shit for being a bunch of thieves hiding behind big words, but when it comes down to it, they walk the walk too. A lot more so than the MAFIAA has.
When information is power, privacy is freedom.
An interesting question & answer chat with Julian Assange, who founded WikiLeaks was published (in English) by Dagens Nyheter, the biggest morning newspaper in Sweden, today.
It gives some insight into his thinking as well as the seriousness of their task — two of their contributors have already been assassinated.
Trusted Computing FAQ | Free Dawit Isaak!
I wish the 'Pirate Party' would stop calling itself that. Piracy is seriously wrong - there's nothing glamorous about it. By equating song and movie downloading with piracy, they surrender the argument to those who say they're a bunch of thieves.
And wikileaks should have been more careful about what they leaked. Their sloppiness doesn't help the cause of peace, freedom, or justice either.
Now that the pirates and leakers have combined forces, the mud on one will stick to to the other. Aside from the heightened press attention for the pirate party, I can't see how that's good. And the heightened press attention will be bad if the real message doesn't get out.
The Pirate party isn't a part of the Swedish government. They are not even a party in the parliament.
I would be very interesting to see an American military assault on Sweden however. Would you bomb Stockholm or make an amphibious landing? How would that look? The only remaining superpower beats up a democratic country with 9 million citizens.... Should the Swedish Afghanistan force start firing on their US allies as retaliation?
So you're saying it's OK for Sweden to publish classified US government information - something which could be considered an act of aggression and NOT OK for the US government to protect its interests?
Perhaps the US government should bug some Swedish government offices and broadcast all of Sweden's classified information too, instead. Maybe a nice game of tit for tat.
Please do. If you find any Swedish secrets we would sure want to know.
Some thing we would like to know about is:
*) What did happen in the government during the tsunami in Thailand? Why do we need to keep these e-mails secret for 50 years?
*) What did happen to Raul Wallenberg?
*) Why is a big part of the Palme murder still classified?
*) Why can't we all see the old Stasi files handed over from Germany?
*) Did we really had submarines here during the cold war and where they US or Soviet?
Assange is employing a multi-layered defense strategy and he seems to be quite smart in his plans and execution.
However, this is just bidding for time: through his actions Assange made himself an enemy of the USA and also of the NATO coalition on the ground in Afghanistan. While I don't believe Poland will actively pursue his arse throughout the world, I am pretty sure the Americans will get a benevolent help from almost all NATO partners. Ouh, did I mention Sweden is part of the Partnership for Peace framework since 1994?
I'm a journalist by trade and education and I can assure you his revealings were not of the Woodward & Bernstein kind. A responsible journalist is always protecting the sources and editing sensitive data (be it sensitive for national security ofr for the safety of innocents). Assange did nothing like this, and people are currently dying in Afghanistan because of that.
For all I can see, he's just a narcissistic enemy of the United States, and he'll be soon meeting his fate (which I assume involves some Gitmo holidays).
Catalin Braescu
Ofaly.com
The Attitude that I can break the law in you country because I am not there and you can not touch me. It bodes very poorly for the internet. And I sure any extradition treaty that results will make no one happy.
The U.S. government has been leaking classified information of other countries for over hundred years. Make sure there isn't blood on your knuckles before you accuse someone of assault buddy.
http://wwww.zerospeaks.com
Why the fuck not? US laws don't apply in Sweden, believe it or not [European Country] is not a state in the US. It's hardly even like Sweden (or Wikileaks...) even leaked this shit. It was a US soldier.
The cat is out of the bag, suck it the hell up.
"linux is just DOS with a UNIX like syntax" -- Galactic Dominator (944134)
Perhaps the US government should bug some Swedish government offices and broadcast all of Sweden's classified information too, instead. Maybe a nice game of tit for tat.
This reminds me of ECHELON. Remember, when US spies on UK citizens (spying on US citizens would be illegal, but spying on foreign ones is okay), UK spies on US citizens, and then they exchange data. What you propose is a similar thing in reverse - Sweden citizens spy on US government and (legally) publish the results from Sweden, US citizens spy on Swedish government and (legally) publish the results from US, and then both know what their respective governments are up to.
Hey, it actually sounds like a good idea! Can you please write a letter to your representative asking them to start spying on other countries and publishing that info ASAP? The sooner they start, the faster they'll get to my country. ~
Try reversing that assumption for a few seconds. If a US political party posted some information online, and a foreign government asked them to remove it, how far do you think that would go?
/. seemed to miss that particular abuse of power. Back then, the secret service (or some other branch) didn't have any trouble removing Wikileaks from the internet for (at least) a while. This includes a number of mirrors, although not all of them got knocked down. I can only assume this was done at the root DNS level, because IP only addressing worked for all the hosts outside the USA. Having a legitimate political party (more or less) hosting a mirror means wikileaks will be MUCH harder to take down next time. It also means that if it is taken down, through whatever means, that can be leveraged politically.
One could imagine an "accidental" information posting being removed at the request of the UK government, for diplomatic reasons. One would be hard pressed to imagine the Iranian government getting the same courtesy. Lets not be confused, it's a courtesy. There is no LAW that requires it.
Furthermore, I'm of the opinion that a significant portion of the reasoning behind this is political pressure/clout. Wikileaks being handled by a playboy like Julian is one thing. Wikileaks being handled by an international consortium of political activists dedicated to freedom in all forms is another thing entirely.
Anyone remember when Palin's email was "hacked" by 4chan? Anyone remember Wikileaks being blackholed for a couple days because they were the primary host for the downloaded data? No, I didn't think anyone did.
So explain to me then how Dick Cheny and Robert Novak conspired to "leak" the name of a CIA operative that was actively engaged in operations, compromised her and everyone she had contact with, but that wasn't treason?
It wasn't Dick Cheney that out'ed Valerie Plame to Robert Novak.
It was Richard Armitrage, US Deputy Secretary of State. Robert Novak identified his source very early in the investigation, so Patrick Fitzgerald knew who it was. Yet, he was able to convict "Scooter" Libby on charges of lying under oath. Ironically, those falsehoods concerned when Libby learned that Plame was a CIA agent, not whether he told anyone else.
While Novak would not be subject to the laws concerning publication of classified information, Armitage was --- and at this date, he has not been prosecuted.
What the hell have you been smoking? Where do you get the idea that the US is in any way prepared to take action against Assange? Have indictments been handed down? A crack team of commandos deployed? CIA operatives given kill orders?
This is Obama's America, not Stalin's Russia.
Lastly, if the USA wanted wikileaks off the net at any cost, it would be GONE. They did it when Palin's email was hacked, and they'll do it again if "national security" can be cited as a reason. Yes, we are all geeks, and we all know WE can still find wikileaks and places like it if the governments actually start going after them. Technologically it's very nearly impossible to stop us. However, it's dead simple to stop 95% of the population. Domain name not found. Done.
The word aggression... you keep using it, are you sure you know what it means?
... oh I don't know... starting killing people? You know laughably little about international politics. A flag member of the EU, and a sovereign nation in good standing with the UN and USA is not subject to any such thing for anything short of an act of war. Leaking classified documents is messy, but it's not an act of war.
Are you saying that IF "Sweden" publishes classified US documents, that it would be "ok" for the USA to
I will now turn off my internet and declare the day complete.
"The ability to delude yourself may be an important survival tool" - Jane Wagner -
citation needed
"The ability to delude yourself may be an important survival tool" - Jane Wagner -
My statement presumes the Pirate party gets into the government; that's kind of the point of politics. They then take the wikileaks server with them.
You would then send a lone white man into their offices in Parliament and have him swing a baseball bat at their wikileaks servers.
No need for an invasion. Just enough directed energy to get the job done, then let the diplomats work out the cease-fire and reparations.
The US Soldier handed it to Wikileaks.
Wikileaks handed it to the Taliban.
The US Soldier committed one crime.
Wikileaks committed another.
The US gets to retaliate against both of them.
Two wrongs do not make a right.
Seems like somewhat the ones that care about that moved to the other side of the ocean. In the original place that phrase got changed to "we, the government", "we, the corporations", or even "we, the army", and the people there seems to be happy with that.
Where do you get the idea that they will hesitate to end Assange if he tries to release information that could put lives at risk?
So, sitting in a server room with the orders of "keep the network going" and "don't poke around in stuff you shouldn't" was too damned Nazi-rific for this soldier to obey. And after he got into a fight with another soldier and was demoted he suddenly had to standup against, whatever, and poke around the network like he wasn't supposed to, then start trading files that he knew he shouldn't be in.
Not trading files and State Department cables has nothing to do with the Nuremberg Defense. The soldier in question is a mistake maker in his personal and professional life.
The Pirate Party is a fringe 1 issue group and not a conventional party. Besides your simplistic idealism does not work in the real world when you have the USA claiming it can kidnap or kill anybody anywhere even its own citizens for national security purposes and parts of the US government (military parts at that) are trying to label wikileaks as a really serious security threat. This is not ticking off a nation, this is ticking off a HUGE empire who has flagrantly violated international law just recently. The Pirate Party of Sweden is probably the LAST stronghold of actually free speech outside of actual US enemy nations.... which would seriously look bad if any form of partnership was formed... as well as raise legitimate legal issues.
Democracy Now! - uncensored, anti-establishment news
"Let's see how long public support in Sweden for the Pirate Party lasts when residents cannot communicate with others outside the country."
Yes, let's make Rick Falkvinge Prime Minister indeed.
Not quite. Members of parliament there, as in many countries, have immunity from prosecution. But the Pirate Party is not, as of yet, represented in the Swedish parliament. There's a 4% of the popular-vote threshold for entry.
That said, Sweden has much more powerful transparency laws than most nations. Prior restraint on publication is banned, with the exception of cinema* and matters of national security. This can be challenged in court of course, like every democratic country they have due process. Every government document is public (per the constitution) unless explicitly classified, and has to be handed over, without question or delay. (E.g. anyone can waltz in to Rosenbad, the executive offices, and ask for a copy of the Prime Minister's e-mail from the last week). Classification requires explicit action (which again can be challenged in court) and is limited to national security, personal privacy, documents which are still under preparation, and a few other fairly obvious exceptions.
Source protection is exceptionally strong; If a classified document is leaked, it is illegal (unconstitutional, even) for the government to investigate, much less prosecute, the source of the leak. The only exceptions are essentially if the leak constitutes espionage or treason, or if it was an intentional violation of confidentiality (the latter is difficult to prove in court). In short, their government is severely limited in its powers to stop even its own leaks, much less leaks of information pertaining to foreign governments.
(* Cinema releases have to pass a ratings board that has the authority to cut footage or even ban releases. It's fairly inactive, today they only cut a few minutes of footage in total every year, almost exclusively for violence, not profanity or nudity. I believe the last movie that was banned from cinematic viewing altogether was the original Texas Chainsaw Massacre, 36 years ago)
Arguably, he already has, and AFAIK, is still alive. Furthermore, while I'm not naive enough to believe it, our government has explicitly stated that they don't do that sort of thing (anymore)((publicly)). At this point Assange is a public figure, his death would not come without some fairly serious questions. Therefore, it's reasonable to assume that given the first, and second points here, "they" will not act to "end" him... not directly. This is the sort of thing that smear campaigns are for.
It's about time we learned what is in those meatballs!
I think what KahabutDieDrake is trying to say is that Obama does not care if soldiers from American/British/etc are put at risk anymore than he cares about any Afghan's that are considered traitors by the Taliban.
I have to agree with KahabutDieDrake, here.
I also think that most countries have figured out that Obama is more interested in being liked by everyone which is why he treats our enemies better than he treats our friends (he assumes our friends will put up with this treatment.) Not that our enemies are impressed. They recognize a spineless sap when they see one.
Labour want to implement a 100mb/s (apparently 1gb/s now) fiber broadband network, and have started rolling it out.
Liberals want to scrap that and put in a "up to" 12mb/s national network.
Obviously Labour are going to have the bandwidth..... ;-)
Ask the administration. But they're not secret for 50 years, they're temporarily sealed for 3 (now 2) years pending investigation on whether the law should be changed re: backup copies. I don't think it's going to happen in the end.
By Soviet accounts, he was executed in Lubyanka prison in 1947.
Because it remains an active police investigation.
That soldier may have committed a crime, but he is a hero for it. Had he "obeyed the law" he would have been no better than everyone else in history who justified their actions, or lack of actions, with the classic "I was just following orders".
Show me the Swedish law that forbids releasing information to the general public that is only classified in other countries.
"linux is just DOS with a UNIX like syntax" -- Galactic Dominator (944134)
Not Stalin's USSR yet, but Obama definitely represents a continued worsening of the neo-con BS Bush II took to heights once thought unsurpassable.
What changed under Obama? Nothing Good
The Pirate party isn't a part of the Swedish government. They are not even a party in the parliament.
I would be very interesting to see an American military assault on Sweden however. Would you bomb Stockholm or make an amphibious landing? How would that look? The only remaining superpower beats up a democratic country with 9 million citizens.... Should the Swedish Afghanistan force start firing on their US allies as retaliation?
So you're saying it's OK for Sweden to publish classified US government information - something which could be considered an act of aggression and NOT OK for the US government to protect its interests?
Perhaps the US government should bug some Swedish government offices and broadcast all of Sweden's classified information too, instead. Maybe a nice game of tit for tat.
As a Swedish citizen, I'm fine with that. Governments should not keep secrets.
GAAH! MY PRINTER IS ON FIRE!!! PUT IT OUT! PUT IT OUT!
Aren't they doing it pretty much already? (Russia, IIRC?)
One that hath name thou can not otter
bork bork borked ?
I disagree about Obama caring about coalition soldiers and/or Afghans. However, there are reports from the Middle East that politicians in Arab countries figure Obama is a bit spineless and that if they want a counter-weight to the Iranians, the Jews in Israel appear to have the right sized balls. The notion of Iran with nukes is changing their perspective about Israel, but it is being encouraged by a perceived weakness in Obama. Actually, it is somewhat surprising in that Obama has been much more aggressive in America's responses to Islam-inspired terrorism than Bush ever was. I guess the problem is that Obama doesn't appear as nuts as Bush (or Reagan) which gets interpreted as weakness.
if the Pirate Party were to become elected within the Swedish Parliament
And as a background: They will need over 4% of the votes to get seat. They got 7,1% in the last election to European Parliament. They are third largest party if measured by members of the party.
He's saying it's legal in Sweden for an organisation protected by Swedish law to publish documents whose publication isn't controlled under Swedish law, such as (one assumes) US classified information. He's saying at this point it's not a conflict between the two governments because the Pirate Party isn't a member of the Swedish government or even a member of the country's legislature. Pirate Party does not equal Sweden just as Green Party does not equal USA. (Couldn't figure out how to use unicode to get the "does not equal" symbol to show up) He's saying as a practical matter it's not clear what the US can do about it, despite all its power and resources, without making more trouble that it's worth. But maybe the US will find a way.
Dagens Nyheter
wow, there's a flashback to The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. hey, that's an idea--Lisbeth Salander would make the perfect mascot for WikiLeaks!
Media that can be recorded and distributed can be recorded and distributed.
-kfg
We're missing the "publishing" part.
Sez who?
Is Iran allowed to decide which actions of Americans in America are crimes too?
The US may have the power to "retaliate" against WikiLeaks.
Might does not make Right.
(By the way, normally one does not "retaliate" for a crime. One punishes the criminal. Assuming they're convicted in a court of law, of course. Maybe these basic principles of civilized behaviour are unknown to you?)
Watch this Heartland Institute video
That soldier may have committed a crime, but he is a hero for it.
Only to fools who have no concept of the law.
There are rules about what should and should not be classified. There are procedures for reporting material that should not be classified. And there are rules in those procedures for protecting whistleblowers from retaliation.
What he did was unnecessary and went far beyond exposing the problem. There was a way to get that job done that did not risk lives further or damage the force's ability to make Afghanistan secure.
What he chose to do was to act on an impulse to fulfill the pitch he was getting from people who trade in classified information for their own gain. It was shortsighted, selfish, and criminal.
He saved no lives, shortened no war, and made things a lot more dangerous for everyone but the Taliban. It was the opposite of heroic.
Is Iran allowed to decide which actions of Americans in America are crimes too?
They do. Look up fatwa.
Also look at what they're trying to do to Israel.
You might also want to check out what Australian law and the ANZUS and NATO treaties have to say about this. I'm pretty sure it was illegal for him to traffic in that information regardless of his being non-American.
We don't assassinate people in lieu of bringing them to justice for crimes they have committed.
However, people who are in the act of committing crimes are fair game. In fact, it doesn't even take government authority to justify killing them if the crime they are committing is the sort of crime that kills people.
I think your post is nonsense from top to bottom.
Obama doesn't treat our enemies as anything but enemies. And he cares a great deal about soldiers on our side.
I recognize a trolling sap when I see one.
Fatwa: Judgement issued by accepted religious authority
So, what Fatwa have been issued by accepted religious authorities associated with the Iranian government?
Do you accept the validity if any such Fatwa?
Because, frankly, I would give exactly as much respect to such a Fatwa as I would give to US claims that someone broke US law in a foreign country,
You're pretty sure. Fuck, that's an authoritative source.
You might be right. But you, as you admit you might be wrong. So why did you bother to write this?
Watch this Heartland Institute video
Sweden isn't a member of NATO and hasn't agreed to its treaties.
Sweden has opposed pretty much every act of aggression NATO has been involved in and offered asylum to the refuges. During Vietnam Sweden offered asylum to US soldiers fleeing the draft AND to Vietnamese guerrillas.
The Pirate Party is not just a reaction against anti-pirate lawsuits or US-American meddling. It has a coherent ideology, with three pillars:
* Privacy
* Free culture (both free as in speech and free as in beer)
* Free knowledge (meaning, no patents)
P.S. The Pirate Party actually made a clever contribution to the gender issue the other week. The Feminist Party (too small to be in the parliament) suggested that the government should recognise three genders instead of two, for transvestites and others who didn't want to be narrowly defined by the two biological genders.
The Pirate Party naturally responded that the government didn't need to register people's genders at all, since most legislation is neutral with regards to gender. Then people could define their own genders whichever way they wanted, without government intervention.
Technically, the European Convention (which deals with human rights) is part of the legislation of all signatory countries. It doesn't need to be implemented in the laws of the individual countries; it is in itself a law in each of them.
The laws passed by the European Parliament, however, do need to be implemented in national law to be valid.
The U.S. is prepared to take out Assange and Wikileaks by force. Putting this material on Swedish government property would make Sweden their enemy.
So, when will they start bombing?
I don't think the other countries in Europe would sit idly by and enjoy the show. It would create a rather nasty precedent the next time USA tries to order them around.
Ask Mr. Rushdie about Fatwas.
As for my authority, it's coming along fine. Yours is probably in the mail.
And what I was allowing myself to be wrong about was not the point of the discussion. It was an aside, indicating that the point might be moot, if the US doesn't have to do anything but call the Australian po-po.
But has Sweden been involved in releasing NATO secrets to NATO's enemies?
Because that steps over the line between neutral sanctuary and active combatant.
If the data ends up being served from the Swedish Parliament, it may be immune from the Swedish courts, but they won't be the ones trying to stop it.
Perhaps the US government should bug some Swedish government offices and broadcast all of Sweden's classified information too, instead. Maybe a nice game of tit for tat.
Thank you, that would save us the trouble of fighting for our freedom ourselves.
While you're at it, could you try to sabotage our government's new Internet surveillance system (FRA)?
Actually, Julian Assange is Australian, so there would have to be an Australian law forbidding people to spread information which is classified in other countries.
There are rules about what should and should not be classified. There are procedures for reporting material that should not be classified. And there are rules in those procedures for protecting whistleblowers from retaliation.
If those rules and procedures worked, how come every scandal is covered up until a whistle blower comes along and forces them to open up?
The military doesn't WANT reports of their own inefficiency to come out. You can report a misclassified document to your superiors as many times as you want, it still won't make them change their minds if they think the document is embarrassing to them or their superiors.
You might also want to check out what Australian law and the ANZUS and NATO treaties have to say about this. I'm pretty sure it was illegal for him to traffic in that information regardless of his being non-American.
If that was the case, the USA would already have had him extradited. The reason they haven't done anything is because they don't have any legal grounds. They're just shaking their guns and making noises, hoping to scare people from doing similar things in the future.
And, in case there is any doubt: The leaked documents do not risk the lives of American soldiers. They expose the inefficiency of the American military. That is the real issue here.
If that failed, the US could focus on physical internet infrastructure...cutting communications lines into and out of the country. The list of non-violent combative options is considerable. Let's see how long public support in Sweden for the Pirate Party lasts when residents cannot communicate with others outside the country.
Jesus, you think you could do that without starting a war with every other nation in the EU?
Your attitude gives me a better understanding of US foreign policy.
... and the next day, the member of parliament drops off a new computer at his office and restores the site from backups. While the diplomatic repercussions last for months or years.
Except that Julian Assange has not committed a crime, and is not about to commit one either. Releasing the US classified information is perfectly legal.
It wasn't Dick Cheney that out'ed Valerie Plame to Robert Novak.
Not for lack of trying. There was a group of people in the Bush Administration who were tying to leak Plame's identity - just because Armitage's leak is the one that got published does nothing whatsoever to change the fact that others were trying to out her identity to the press at the same time.
Gripen is pretty adaptable and can in worst case scenario be adapted to use R-77 (AA-12 Adder). Or just sit tight until 2015 and use MBDA Meteor which it is already prepared for.
Even countries that have extradition treaties with the US have the caveat that the law that the person is being extradited for should be one that is a law in the country doing the extradition. It's not that they're breaking the law, it's that they're breaking an AMERICAN law that isn't a SWEDISH law.
Karma: Non-Heinous
That would be known as "political suicide."
Karma: Non-Heinous