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Julian Assange To Run For Australian Senate

New submitter bozman8 writes "Announced recently on social networking platform Twitter, Julian Assange has found a way to run for the Upper House of the Australian Senate, despite being detained under house arrest in Britain. Along with Julian's candidacy, WikiLeaks has announced that they are going to run a nominee against current Prime Minister Julia Gillard in her local electorate."

6 of 207 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Good luck with that. by dbIII · · Score: 4, Informative

    He has no chance of winning but the number of votes he gets will be noticed and may influence policy. Runing for the senate in Australia is not the Billionaire's game that it is in the USA. Last election I recall something like six canditates standing on shooting and fishing issues in my state, as well as a few other single issue canditates. You could just about use the senate ballot paper as a tablecloth.

  2. Senate by deimtee · · Score: 4, Informative

    I hope he runs in Vic. I'd vote for him.
    The senate has proportional voting.
    Everyone ranks all the candidates, then they start counting. As soon as a candidate has enough to get elected, any further votes move to the second preference. You can end up with some funny results if everyone puts the major party they don't like last.

    --
    I'm guessing that wasn't on their radar screen...
  3. From the Department of Redundancy Department... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Informative

    The Upper House of the Australian parliament is the Senate, "Upper House of the Australian Senate" doesn't make any sense.

  4. Re:Yeah...I don't like this. by Confusedent · · Score: 5, Informative

    I'm sorry, did you forget about the part where the US government covered it up and lied to Reuters about the investigation? Do you particularly think it's all ok just because it was in their "Rules of Engagement"? If the government says that torturing and killing your family is part of their "Rules of Engagement," is that ok with you? Weekly Standard is neoconservative propaganda founded by News Corp and supported solely by people like Rupert Murdoch (according to Wikipedia the magazine has NEVER been profitable, citing the NY Times), the same liars who spread the same government propaganda that started the Iraq War (remember those WMDs? Whatever happened to those, hm?). US apologists make me sick.

  5. Re:Good luck with that. by Confusedent · · Score: 4, Informative

    I wasn't aware that anyone actually took those allegations seriously. They basically amount to a condom having broken and claiming that he intentionally broke the condom, or that he began having sex with them while they were asleep. IIRC, after originally issueing the warrants (or whatever) in Sweden, a higher up judge later dismissed it for lack of evidence, which was then later overturned by another higher up. These women were openly bragging about their relationship with him only days before filing charges, and only did so once they found out he was involved with both of them. They were both seen attending one of his speeches and comfortable watching (this is on video) a few days later. It's rather transparent that the US government (among others) are using BS sex-crime allegations to try and silence someone blowing the whistle on their corrupt practices. Try this, if you'd actually like to hear the other side of the story (that doesn't involve the political motivation to shut down wikileaks and scare off other whistleblowers).

  6. Re:Good luck with that. by Confusedent · · Score: 5, Informative

    Oh trust me, I am aware. I've been arrested (case later dismissed) because of women lying about me, and even had to call the cops three months ago to explain how another girl I'd been involved with was trying to spoof emails to frame me for "harassment" in order to avoid paying me the money she owed me. But the US government has wanted to get Assange extradited to the US so they could try him under the Espionage Act ever since the Collateral Murder video. I don't see how they'll be able to do that just from this, maybe they think they can put more pressure on the Swedish government than the UK, or maybe they think discrediting him as a rapist or putting him in Swedish jail is satisfactory. Sure, I admit I can't prove it's part of an ochestrated smear campaign or conspiracy, but given the fact that the accusations are based on an apparently obscure and rarely used "surprise sex" law, the timing of the incidents, the fact that at least some people in the Swedish legal system wanted to just throw the case out when it originally happened (this is from memory, sorry I couldn't find a link), I think I'd have to be gloriously naive to think the US didn't play a role in all this, even if they weren't directly involved with the two women making the accusations.

    If this is unreasonable, call me out on it, but honestly how can anyone take these charges seriously?