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Michael Moore Posts Julian Assange's Bail
digitaldc quotes Michael Moore in a story running on the Huffington Post where he says "Yesterday, in the Westminster Magistrates Court in London, the lawyers for WikiLeaks co-founder Julian Assange presented to the judge a document from me stating that I have put up $20,000 of my own money to help bail Mr. Assange out of jail. Furthermore, I (Michael Moore) am publicly offering the assistance of my website, my servers, my domain names and anything else I can do to keep WikiLeaks alive and thriving as it continues its work to expose the crimes that were concocted in secret and carried out in our name and with our tax dollars."
um...
"WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange is back in court today, and has been granted bail by a British judge. He has been in a British prison for a week after being denied bail last week. Assange is wanted for questioning for alleged sex crimes involving two women in Sweden. It is thought that one of the women, Anna Ardin, may no longer be cooperating with prosecutors."
Living With a Nerd
Having a successful Hollywood producer with a track record of successfully embarrassing big companies and governments as a supporter can't hurt.
So, since he's fat, he's lazy? Piercing insight, that.
I don't care much for Moore, but he's doing the right thing here, so maybe store the venom up for a day when he's not?
That's probably going to hurt Julian in the long run. Michael Moore is kind of the Rush Limbaugh of the Liberals, and as odd as it is, it seems that the two-party system here has decided that Wikileaks is on the liberal side. So this will only re-enforce that.
I'm still confused why the people that are supposed to be for a smaller government would be nay saying evidence that big government is doing horrible things behind our backs.
Why doesn't Michael Moore just move to a country more to his liking since he clearly hates the one he is a citizen of? Cuba, perhaps?
A lot of people here like this country just the way it is and don't want anyone, Moore, Obama, or anyone else changing it in to something else.
Leave, Michael! You'd be happier, and we'd be happier.
If you think that allowing a government to flat out lie to us is 'loving your country', then I'd personally rather YOU leave. I don't care for Moore, but I care even less for all the sheep begging to be shorn!
Your distaste for Michael Moore is causing you to lobby against THE TRUTH for crying out loud. And I'm sorry, but that's just morally bankrupt.
I do not understand comments like these. I have no reason to dislike him as a person from what I know of his personal life, but lets face it, I do not really know the guy. Hes not my neighbor. I love the professional work he does. There does seem to be allot of FUD attached to his person mainly due to people wanting to discredit him. I find people who believe it do not look deeply into whatever issue is involved.
My problem with him on a personal level is he doesn't let the evidence speak for itself...he seems to find it imperitive to make sure that you know that he's the one saying it.
Like I said, I absolutely support and love the work he does, but the man's need for attention pisses me off.
Living With a Nerd
Although I don't like Michael Moore (he's comparable to a propagandist) he sometimes does the right thing. His mid-90s movie about manufacturing an excuse to declare war (and give the president a boost in popularity) was very good. And this act to bail a Reporter out of jail and protect the Right to a Free Press is also very good.
Without wikileaks we wouldn't know that US Soldiers were killing innocent journalists and children (the Pentagon denied the event happened). That Hillary Clinton was stealing credit card numbers from foreign diplomats. The content of the ACTA treaty to make backing-up your CDs or DVDs or MP3s and illegal act. And on and on and on.
Democracy can not work when the people are kept in the dark about what their public servants are doing.
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
I am not a Michael Moore fan, but he should be lauded for the action. Hopefully others will follow Mr. Moore's lead and take a stand for freedom of speech.
It is thought that one of the women, Anna Ardin, may no longer be cooperating with prosecutors."
It should be mentioned that this statement stems from the fact that she is currently on a three month stay in Israel with an ecumenical Christian group. She has been blogging how excited she is about this trip for months.
FTFA:
I have put up $20,000 of my own money to help bail Mr. Assange out of jail. [emphasis to aid jackasses who can't fucking read]
But hey, look at me quoting what a person actually says he did instead of trusting the headline written by a Slashdot editor.
"I guess the moral of the story is, don't paint your airship with rocket fuel." -- Addison Bain
You do not have to post any actual money when you provide a surety in the UK. You only have to show that you have the sum available and are liable for the sum in the event the (alleged) offender breaches bail conditions in some significant manner. See http://www.yourrights.org.uk/yourrights/the-rights-of-defendants/bail.html for a further explanation.
Donte Alistair Anderson Roberts - hi son!
Karma: Chameleon
I enthusiastically applaud his work in pulling off the lamb outfit from world governments and corporations.
What purpose is served in releasing the fact that Hilary Clinton worries about the mental health of other world leaders? How does that aid in our international relations?
That's just one of 1000's of items that were released that are not crimes, are not important for the American people to know, and still undermine our government's ability to operate on the world stage.
Releasing those kinds of documents doesn't serve a greater good. It doesnt expose any wrong-doings. It doesn't help create stability, ensure -anyone's- safety, or promote any kind of cooperation between nations. It was released to embarrass the US government and garner sensationlistic attention from a little weasle.
Not to mention that this guy released the names of confidential informants in the middle east. In doing so he signed the death warrants of those people. What greater purpose was served by releasing their names? What good will come of that? What crime did they commit? What evil are they responsible for? Where are your indignant tears for them and their families who will almost assuredly be slaughtered?
"But we have to pass the bill so that you can find out what is in it,..." - Nancy Pelosi
youre an american maybe. from the outside, we see moore a hero. maybe its possible that the endless propaganda perpetrated by corporate owned mass media have twisted you american people's views about moore, just as it twisted your views about wikileaks.
Read radical news here
He makes some good points, but he makes them incredibly badly. He's the kind of person who could turn 'water is wet' into a controversial statement. Even when he says something that I agree with, he makes me want to argue.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
What purpose is served in releasing the fact that Hilary Clinton worries about the mental health of other world leaders? How does that aid in our international relations?
That's just one of 1000's of items that were released that are not crimes, are not important for the American people to know, and still undermine our government's ability to operate on the world stage.
Releasing those kinds of documents doesn't serve a greater good. It doesnt expose any wrong-doings. It doesn't help create stability, ensure -anyone's- safety, or promote any kind of cooperation between nations. It was released to embarrass the US government and garner sensationlistic attention from a little weasle.
If they have nothing to hide, they have nothing to worry about...right? I mean, that's what they told us with the Patriot Act and warrentless wiretapping, so...
Not to mention that this guy released the names of confidential informants in the middle east. In doing so he signed the death warrants of those people. What greater purpose was served by releasing their names? What good will come of that? What crime did they commit? What evil are they responsible for? Where are your indignant tears for them and their families who will almost assuredly be slaughtered?
Can you find me one single recorded instance of anyone over there being killed directly because of the Iraq/Afghanistan war docs?
Living With a Nerd
> Assange is wanted for questioning for alleged sex crimes involving two women in Sweden.
What annoys me with media is that they twist the sentence above to say that he's wanted for rape charges.
There are no atheists when recovering from tape backup.
If would be sweet, sweet irony if it turns out that Wikileaks has something on Michael Moore, like that's he a paid corporate shill, or that he has an account on iheart12yoldboys.com. /just sayin'
Right, it's the worst atrocities, or nothing. Nobody's supposed to condemn any of the other stuff in between. Certainly they're not supposed to address the issues that they, personally, find important. What the hell would we have then? Freedom? The hell with that.
No kidding!!! What do you say at this point?
Moore is a counterpoint to places like Fox News and CNN which screech really loudly their views. They sure as hell aren't letting the evidence speak for itself -- they speak for it, and sometimes, in lieu of it.
I don't think Moore has ever denied that he has an agenda, and that he's telling the story his way.
Well, Sarah Palin is no different, really ... just with a different set of biases. Same goes for most of the talking heads on CNN.
Heck, I remember watching some guy on CNN several years ago saying that the crash of 2008 was coming because of all of the crap credit out there. He basically got shouted down by a bunch of arch-conservative guys who believed that it could never happen.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
so this is different from fox news, all the corporate news channels, how ?
Moore works to expose corruption, while corporate media generally helps enable it. I'd say that's a pretty big difference.
Living With a Nerd
Good point. There isn't really a health care crisis in this country and we weren't lied into the Iraq war. Thanks for clearing that up.
I swear to God...I swear to God! That is NOT how you treat your human!
I despise Moore as a person. .
Michael Moore went through a mass character assassination to similar to Julian Assange. Note that as the stream of negative publicity backfired as the ulterior motives were exposed and people stopped swallowing so much shit, the pictures attached to news articles changed from an seedy looking, sneering, oily Gollum lookalike into a reasonably normal looking guy. They could both be asshats or great guys, I have no idea but I certainly don't intend to allow two faced news rag peddlers dictate my opinions of anyone.
Lacking the opportunity to meet these people within my normal social circles, I prefer to form my own opinions based upon unedited and unbiased interviews of a reasonable enough length to prevent any contextual manipulation. Sadly that's not how the news will ever portray someone, it doesn't sell so well.
I got disgusted with him after watching a part of Bowling for Columbine where he went to the Shopko (or some other store) where the assailants bought bullets. He then proceeded to badger one of the cashiers at length, insinuating that they bore responsibility for those murders because they sold bullets. That was when I was done with Michael Moore forever. Even if I agreed with his point (which I don't), that's no excuse to badger someone.
"16MB (fuck off, MiB fascists)" - The Mighty Buzzard
Journalist John Pilger and socialite Jemima Khan are putting up $31,600 surety each, with bail set at $380,000. It looks like enough people like Michael Moore have guaranteed the bail money as he has been bailed pending appeal (the prosecutors have 2 hours to appeal). He should be released by the end of the day.
He has had his passport confiscated, been electronically tagged, is under curfew and house arrest during the evenings, and must report to the police station every day. This is fair enough, it is no different to any other offender afaik. Certainly not the Guantamo Bay scenario he has had the past week, with "absolutely no access to any electronic equipment, no access to the outside world, no access to outside media" and no correspondence allowed.
The fast tracking through political influence, and the imprisonment for an as yet unfounded allegation in a foreign country, is a blot on our country's record, but it's good to see our strong and mostly fair legal system reassert itself after a short delay.
Phillip.
Property for sale in Nice, France
first rule of getting off charges. never corporate with police.hell its the only rule. never talk to them without your attorney. 90% of all people in jail are because they talked.
I have a better idea:
Let's bring the soldiers home so they can't accidentally kill children, journalists, or innocents. Or get killed themselves. And I don't mean two years from now ('bama's schedule) but immediately. Tomorrow. The Soviets wisely stopped fighting in Afghanistan when they realized it's hopeless to civilize that mountain country, and we should too. We'd save a LOT of lives.
>>>you didn't know that in war civilian sometimes get killed?
Of course. But that doesn't excuse the Pentagon lying about it and pretending war is as clean as a hospital room ("surgical precision to avoid civilian casualties" they claimed). It's good to have these videos exposed to reveal the lie.
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
What the hell is it about Wikileaks that brings out the nutbag libertarians?
Non impediti ratione cogitationus.
Everyone believes they are in the middle.
I'd mod you up if I hadn't already posted in this topic. Really, the only things you should say to a police officer are the following:
I write sci-fi for metalheads
How does it aid your international relations?...
Fuck you and your country's international relations.
People in a lot of countries are getting a wakeup call on how the US really views them and their elected (or not elected) leaders, and while it has been 'known' by those in the know... Still to have it exposed to the public in such a manner means it's much harder to try hiding it from the people.
Much of it is just embarrassing and not really 'relevant' stuff, true. Yet being a 'crime' is not really the standard by which we should filter them... Cause in that case even talk of acts of torture would be considered not interesting considering what the US has been up to lately.
Remember; these leaks are not primarily for the American people. They are for the rest of the world.
- These characters were randomly selected.
If Assange goes missing and Moore puts on another 90lbs, I think we can chalk this up as the most expensive Take-Out meal ever
Yes, in war civilians get killed. That does not make it OK to lie about how those people died. If it is only a few then the public will probably accept it as acceptable collateral damage. If not, then the public can put pressure on politicians to change how things are progressing. It is a check upon the workings of the government. But, if the government lies about it, then that check is circumvented. If you don't know the truth about what is going on, then how do you judge whether your government is acting in your best interests (as opposed to the best interests of the rich and powerful)?
First of all what you are saying is not true. He offered the State department the chance to redact the documents, which they declined, then worked in conjunction with respectable papers such as the Guardian and New York Times to publish them.
Secondly, the job of a journalist is to find stories in the public interest and publish them. They aren't all caped crusaders. At least Wikileaks is only publishing information that is anonymously sent to them. In the UK journalists are quite happy to break the law, hack into people's private information, and do whatever it takes to get a story. News of The World in the UK hacked into the voicemail of celebrities, politicians and royal family to get stories (list of victims here).
I would trust Julian Assange to be more apolitical than Michael Moore.
Phillip.
Property for sale in Nice, France
You know, Michael Moore may resort to half-truths and tugging at the heart strings, but if you have a brain you can see beyond that while still finding a valid message.
If you're an idiot, I'd still rather have you following Michael Moore's rhetoric than Glenn Beck's.
No sig for you!!
I hear this all the time, "He makes some good points but makes them badly." I don't understand this at all. You agree with him, but the way he says things makes you not want to agree? How does that work? What is it about his communication style that makes you want to disagree with things you actually agree with?
Are you sure you agree with what he is saying? Maybe you do agree with him, but you really don't want to agree with him? Maybe you don't want a fat hippie liberal slob to be right, because it sets a bad precedent and then other fat hippie liberal slobs might start speaking up? I don't know, I'm just guessing here. Maybe it is because he is a populist, and you are an elitist, and even when populists are correct, elitists have to put them down, to maintain their elite status? Maybe "He makes some good points but makes them badly." is some sort of code for "I really don't want to agree with him, but I have pretensions of intellectual honesty I am loath to give up, and I have to admit that he is telling the truth even though I don't want to."
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
His version of the Iraq War? That the United States
1) Manufactured intelligence about WMDs
2) Ignored all international inspectors who said there were no WMDs
3) Kicked the inspectors out so they could have their war
4) Lied to the American people about the cost and length of war, with Rumsfeld publicly stating that it won't last "much longer" than 5 months or cost more than 50 to 60 billion dollars
5) Ended up torturing Iraqis in the same prisons where Saddam did his dirty work
6) Pretended that we hadn't supported Saddam right through his worst atrocities in the 80s, including supplying him with "dual use" technology to wage a war with Iran that killed a million people and
7) Removing Iraq from the State sponsors of Terror list in 1982 so US firms could also sell him biological weapons to kill Kurds with
If you were born in Germany in 1920, you would have died wearing a belt buckle that read "GOTT MIT UNS." Blind fealty to the flag is fucking pathetic.
What the hell? I never said the two were equivalent by any means. Your sense of reading comprehension needs work.
"16MB (fuck off, MiB fascists)" - The Mighty Buzzard
I learned something recently about this. If you don't talk to the police, they will try to coerce you. Remember, they can hold you for 72 hours without filing charges. So, if you don't talk to them, expect to be arrested, booked, spend 12 hours in holding cells, held in jail with convicted criminals until they finally choose not to file charges against and release you. Bail is so high its impossible for non-celebrities to pay. Even bail bonds cost you 10% and that's a fee. I spent 3 days in jail vs paying $5,000 bail bond (on $50k bail). It was an educational experience. I was exercising my civil rights and for that I was treated like an animal. Hand cuffed, strip searched, DNA scanned. Jail is so dehumanizing.
the man engages in ideological arguments that don't guarantee any financial return. he could take the money he earns and lead a much more lucrative life, not doing things like, for example, springing for assange's bail
look: you don't have to like michael moore, but you have to admit that he is a man of conscience, that what motivates him is belief, not greed. to say that someone like michael moore is really just motivated by money, when he clearly is a shining example of a person motivated by ideology, is just a lame weak ignorant smear on your part
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
You know, Michael Moore may resort to half-truths and tugging at the heart strings, but if you have a brain you can see beyond that while still finding a valid message.
The thing is, there IS a valid message, and he doesn't need to resort to half-truths to get that message across. The message should speak for itself. Embellishments and falsehoods are only going to cloud the validity of that message.
The libertarian solution to the failures of capitalism is to apply more capitalism til the failures are fixed.
Uh, wow. Just... wow. You saw this movie? You saw a movie named "Bowling for Columbine," and you watched the whole thing? Really?
I am reminded of a scene in A Fish Called Wanda and a line that goes "The central theme of Buddhism is NOT 'Every man for himself.'" You think the central theme of Bowling for Columbine is gun control?!? Really?!?
I just have to ask, what about the whole last half of the movie? What about Canada? Micheal discovers that gun control isn't the answer, because guns were never the problem in the first place, and he makes that very clear.
So, I'm afraid I'm going to have to stop you right there and ask you to actually watch one of Micheal Moore's films before you critique him.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
The reason that I want specific examples, rather than a general fucking google search, is that I can rebut specific examples. Thanks for wasting everyone's time with your useless contribution to the discussion. Give me some specific examples of Micheal Moore lying so I can prove he isn't, or shut the hell up.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
I'm a nutbag anarcho-capitalist, and I donate to Wikileaks.
And Ron Paul supports Wikileaks as well. Good old Wikileaks, bringing the nutbag socialists (myself) and nutbag libertarians into agreement. But really, why should government transparency be a right-wing/left-wing issue? The ones who paint it as a liberal/conservative issue are just trying to demonize their opponents. A sad effect of the two-party system in the U.S.
"From the depths of my skeptical and rationalist soul, I ask the Lord to protect me from California touchie-feeliedom."