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Why Julian Assange Should Embrace 'The Fifth Estate'
Nerval's Lobster writes "It's no secret that WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has a low opinion of the new film, "The Fifth Estate," in which he's portrayed by Benedict Cumberbatch. He's railed against it several times, culminating in a lengthy statement (posted Oct. 9) in which he called it 'a geriatric snoozefest that only the US government could love.' That's in addition to a letter in which he refused to meet with Cumberbatch, saying that the script would force the actor to give a 'talented, but debauched, performance.' WikiLeaks and Assange are clearly attempting a bit of damage control ahead of the film's Oct. 11 release in the U.K. (followed by its U.S. debut on Oct. 18). But what if that pushback is the wrong reaction? That's not to say that Assange should gleefully embrace the film —the script portrays him as something of a hustler who freely lies about his past. Whatever its qualities, however, the film could get people talking about WikiLeaks' role in the broader geopolitical context, and that's ultimately a good thing for the organization: It's been quite some time since Assange and company have provided the world with an explosive, game-changing revelation. If nothing else, Assange can take some cold comfort from the case of Mark Zuckerberg, who faced similar issues when the David Fincher-directed 'The Social Network' made its debut in 2010; Facebook's PR team was probably preparing for the worst as the release date approached, but the film — despite its impressive box office, and the awards it won — ultimately did little to harm either the real-life Zuckerberg's reputation or Facebook's continuing growth."
...cannot be a good thing for his credibility, no matter what geopolitical issues it brings to the fore.
That's in addition to a letter in which he refused to meet with Cumberbatch, saying that the script would force the actor to give a 'talented, but debauched, performance.'
That sounds vaguely like the changes against Assange in Sweden .... talented but debauched performance.
Don't. Stop. Don't. Stop. Don't . . . stop. Don't stop.
What Assange should embrace is a better legal team to get him out of the embassy.
Do laws matter for governments anymore?
I hope that Wikileaks can continue to get information to the public. I suspect that government agents have infested WikiLeaks in every way they can and wonder if Wikileaks can still function.
the case of Mark Zuckerberg, who faced similar issues when the David Fincher-directed 'The Social Network' made its debut in 2010; Facebook's PR team was probably preparing for
Taking extra money showers, then wiping their arse with $100 bills? Please! The entire business model of Facebook has been around monetization. They don't care about reputation as long as it sells. "Zuckerberg is evil! Buy this book!" Er, ok. "Zuckerberg is God! Buy this book!" Er, ok. Either way... the book is bought.
#fuckbeta #iamslashdot #dicemustdie
Thanks to the casting choice of this movie, If I ever meet Julian Assange, I am going to walk up to him and say "KHAN!!!!!"
Our good friends at Mirriam-Webster define terrorism as "the use of violent acts to frighten the people in an area as a way of trying to achieve a political goal".
I get the political goal part, but I'm really not seeing any sort of violent acts or fearmongering.
He's closer to being just another dickwad politician than he is a terrorist.
> These guys employ terrorist tactics,
Citation needed. What have the blown up? How many people have they taken hostage and/or beheaded? Or do you just mean they keep secrets? In which case every teenager is a terrorist.
> act like they are above any law
Citation needed. Above any law? Would that be when he (not wikileaks the org) offered to meet with prosecutors, just not in their custody on their terms....for mere "questioning"? Would that be when he asked for legal assylum from another country over concerns that the prosecution was a thinly veiled attempt to extradite him for other reasons?
> That's terrorism
who is being terrorized exactly? War criminals? Banksters? Politicians? People with dirty secrets hiding evidence of their own crimes?
I have seen a number of wikileaks, going back before the government leaks, back when it was all banks and companies and their dirty dealings. I have yet to see anything from them I would call terrorism.
"I opened my eyes, and everything went dark again"
Seems to me this is a pretty good attempt for the media to portray Assange any way they like. The public will lap it up and believe every bit of it, regardless of it's true-to-life accuracy. It's a lot easier to vilify people when you have the masses on your side already.
Join the Slashcott! Feb 10 thru Feb 17!
How many plays have been forgotten to time compared to how many have actually influenced public opinion? Odds are this movie will be good to rake in a few million bucks over the next couple years and be forgotten within a decade outside of certain niche political history classes.
It's no secret that the US military has a close relationship with hollywood at times. They loan military hardware for use as props, in return for assurances that the movies will portray them in a good way. This isn't a shadowy backroom dealing - a few minutes googling will show it's all done out in the open. There is even a small department within the Pentagon, the Film Liaison Office, dedicated to the task.
So is it possible that someone pressured the studios involved (Principly Dreamworks) to make sure that Assange was shown in a suitably scoundral-like manner? I'm not talking about anything serious like threats of jail for no-cooperating, just a reminder that studios which insult the military or lend support to wanted enemies of the state are not going to be getting any of those oh-so-useful support agreements in future. 'If you make Assange look good, don't come to us next time you want to film scenes on an aircraft carrier.'
Wow, so much stupidity packed in so few sentences! Congratulations!
embrace, extend, extinguish? :-)
It's a movie, it's made for entertainment purposes.
It's not meant to be taken seriously, so as long as the party being fun of doesn't, neither will the audience.
History would indicate otherwise. The move "The Patriot" with Mel Gibson took terrible liberties with history, painting the British to be far worse than they ever were. One example, the movie contains a scene where locals were rounded up, herded into a church, and burned alive (with the church). This happened...in France, during world war II. So Mel Gibson and his writers took a Nazi atrocity perpetrated in France, and portrayed it as an atrocity committed by the British against Americans, when no such thing ever happened.
Similiar falsehoods were spread in another Mel Gibson movie, Braveheart, regarding the Scottish rising up against the English (true) in reaction to various English atrocities against the Scots portrayed in the movie that were demonstrably false and never happened.
The result in both cases: acts of intimidation, threats, and in some cases violence against the English by Americans (in the case of "The Patriot") and the Scots (in the case of "Braveheart"). These type of historical falsehoods are not rejected by audiences, and are in some cases taken very seriously. If similar falsehoods are being spread about Wikileaks and Julian Assange, then he is right to be pissed off, and right to push back.
The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
These guys employ terrorist tactics, and act like they are above any law. That's terrorism
I thought that was governments and corporations?
Most of the people who will see the film can tell the difference between fact and fiction, including being able to generally identify the wide swath in between. This is not going to be a "Batman" blockbuster. It's not even going to be a "The Social Network" blockbuster.
Anyone who had an opinion on whether or not Mark Zuckerberg was sort of a sleaze did not have their opinion changed by seeing "The Social Network."
He's being portrayed in a way he doesn't like by somebody that has an agenda that involves gain on their part by making others look bad. This is happening by using information provided by others and the whole thing is outside of his control. The media is then being involved to make sure that the exploitation is maximized for greatest impact. The bully gets his due and doesn't like the taste of his own medicine and is off to cry to his mommy about how others are treating him.
This couldn't have happened to a more deserving person if they tried. Live by the sword, die by the sword.
The fifth estate is a mediocre movie. The fact that the talented Cumberbach plays Assange means that Assange becomes human rather than a political figure. When Cumberbach is not on screen, it has the feel of a PBS UK import.
The movie is through the perspective of Assange's friend and so, Assange comes off as a mystery rather than a liar.
As for the movie, it is just middling. People who dislike Assange will find more reasons to confirm their dislike and those who like Assange will find more reasons to do so.
Maybe I missed it during the movie but the speech where Assange/Cumberbach says "they are afraid of you" that is in the trailers is not in the movie.
And that's important to anything how?
While I think Wikileaks is a good thing for the world, I also think Assange is an attention whore and mostly self-serving.
High profile people tend to have large egos. Go figure.
He's not the one putting his neck on the line to disclose secret information,
And yet he *is* stuck in an embassy for reasons that defy any real logic, stemming from a case that has been prosecuted in a truly baffling manner.
Just one example would be the level of commitment the UK police have demonstrated in ensuring he stays in that embassy -- a 24x7 stakeout for coming up on 16 months at cost of around 300,000 GPB per month... so closing in on 5 million GPB for a guy accused of something ranging from a misdemeanor sexual assault to something like date-rape.
Not that I condone date rape or think he should get away with it... but 1 in 4 college women surveyed are victims of rape or attempted rape... how many UK rape victims could they have investigated with 5 million GPB?
One would think it would be pretty hard to justify that budget for keeping one penned up in an embassy for years on end over a sexual misconduct in another country for which the evidence ultimately amounts to he-said she-said.
But with Assange throwing a hissyfit over this one, people will start to wonder...
How would you feel if you had started a movement that you truly believed it, only to have some filmmaker come along and try to discredit that movement on the big screen by smearing your personal life with a cartoonish, exaggerated, and sometimes downright fictional portrayal (based on the work of a guy who had betrayed said moment, no less)? I can understand why he might be more than a little pissed at that.
The cow says "Moo." The dog says "Woof." The Timothy says "Thanks, valued customer. We appreciate your input."
Repeating an assertion without evidence doesn't make it true. How has Asange made it about himself - it's not like he asked the Swedish government to cook up a witch hunt as a pretext to hand him over to the United States, after he asked for and was given permission to leave the country.
Reminds me of the pro-gov slanted news and media in Russia, China, Syria, etc.
Just mix in some non-factual shit, call it "artistic license", and you can paint whichever real events however you want in the minds of fools -- The largest voting demographic...
Wikileaks is about exposing hidden truth. Assange would be a hypocrite to go along with a production that he feels hides the truth.
Assange might be wrong about what constitutes truth in this situation because, unlike something as straight-forward as publishing secret documents, some truths are a matter of perspective. Nevertheless, you can't reasonably expect Assange to go along with something he believes is not truthful.
Comparisons to facebook miss the point. Facebook is about making money and while they may have lofty corporatespeak goal - they are a publicly traded company and therefore can't honestly aspire to anything more than the almighty dollar.
He's even offered to return to Sweden, if Sweden promises not to hand him over to the United States. That Sweden refuses to do so tells you all you need to know about what their intentions actually are and how much of a shit they give about the allegations.
Which is also a brave move on Asange's part, because while Sweden has great hippie health care and education, their justice system is straight up authoritarian. The state can hold suspects for extended periods of time without bail, and also incommunicado. So if Asange goes back he could be held for months without outside contact or an attorney.
They don't pay as well?
These guys employ terrorist tactics, and act like they are above any law.
Sure, the NSA is bad, but what was your point about Assange?
Thank you folks, I'll be here all week.
The cow says "Moo." The dog says "Woof." The Timothy says "Thanks, valued customer. We appreciate your input."
No. The burned church full of people happened in the USA during the revolutionary war.
It didn't involve 'what's his fuck', the villain in 'the Patriot' who is also the hero in much English fiction.
I'll trust the Scots before I ever trust the English regarding Scottish history.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
s/Assagne/Snowden/
s/Wikileaks/The Guardian/
In every dictionary of English, the explanation of the political term 'useful idiot' should use Snowden as the primary example. Anyone who knows ANYTHING about the recent history of whistle-blowing and leaking KNOWS The Guardian was created to destroy honest, non co-opted groups that were attempting to give public access to 'secret' information. Snowden was chosen because of his hacker personality. The group overseeing the real control of The Guardian and Snowden was led by British Intelligence, under another of Tony Blair's war-mongering projects.
The British have a long history of using these intelligence methods ... such as electing cowardly drunks.
Snowden was the stooge used to excuse the circumstances for strife at home after war in the Middle East- especially Iraq and Afghanistan. Not one of his so-called 'leaks' harmed Ire land or the UK- what an amazing coincidence. Snowden's ego (and high intelligence) made him the ideal dupe.
On the other hand, Assange is the real deal- except even in his case he is a dupe telling us powerful truths, but truths that your masters decided had better come into the open at this time- for fear that an uncontrolled release of the truth later could have a very nasty, uncontrollable backlash. Assange was allowed to gather and inform us of a FRACTION of the extent of abuses by the warmongers of the West in an inoculation (you inject a little bit of the real 'poison' to allow the body to become immune to further 'poison' in the future).
Now when informed people tell their SHEEPLE ::Baa-aa-aa:: friends about the extent of government evil, their friends yawn, shrug their shoulders and say "heard it all before, and what can anyone do about it?".
The monsters that rule you spend tens of billions of each on psychological warfare against YOU. You, on the other hand, have exactly one person's collections of resources to fight back- not exactly an even contest. So when YOU try to figure out the real truth behind Assange and Snowden, if there is ANY SHEEPLE ::Baa-aa-aa:: instinct in you, you will fail. In truth, even if you consider yourself cynical, you still believe the 'push' information the mainstream media feeds you. You WILL be distracted by the treason charges against Snowden, for instance, thus limiting your ability to see the bigger picture- that Snowden is an identical play to so many used by the British during WW2.
Clearly, the conspiracy knows no bounds...
No. The burned church full of people happened in the USA during the revolutionary war.
It didn't involve 'what's his fuck', the villain in 'the Patriot' who is also the hero in much English fiction.
I'll trust the Scots before I ever trust the English regarding Scottish history.
I'll trust a history book or even a documentary before I trust a movie to get facts right.
Really... who the hell watches a movie to get the unvarnished truth or history? Whoever you are, I have a bridge in Brooklyn to sell you....
Producer (one of them)
Steve Golin (born March 6, 1955)[1] is the founder and CEO of Anonymous Content LLP, a multimedia development, production and talent management company and co-founder and former CEO of Propaganda Films.[2]
"producing spots and campaigns for Nike, Intel, Citibank, United Airlines, Ford, Audi, Coca-Cola, Pepsi"
Well versed in propaganda, or for the slow people "A really good liar"
Bill Condon ( winner of the Golden Raspberry Award for Worst Director for his work on The Twilight Saga) is a shlock artist well versed in writing mindless garbage, also a big fan of propaganda (that benefits him of course).
All in all the reason Assange isn't happy about the film is it's a hit piece, a dilution of a critical issue.
Making a movie is the first step to marginalizing Assange and wikileaks into meaningless.
Hollywood knows this, look at how well they marginalized the American public and destroyed this country.
The comparison to the Facebook movie is a naive and simplistic view that is entirely incorrect.
Everyone making that film knew it would appeal to the young set.
"If any question why we died, Tell them because our fathers lied."
No, that was only one option presented, they could conduct their questioning (not trial, or anything else) on neutral ground. Or does respecting the principle of legality extend to countries which you are not in and mean you must expose yourself to their legal system if they make an accusation, even if you are not within their country?
"I opened my eyes, and everything went dark again"
It's a movie, it's made for entertainment purposes.
It's not meant to be taken seriously
yeah we have a long tradition of not following that schema.
Just another second banana
Assange was chosen because of his sociopathic personality.
Agreed. Assange is a melodramatic narcissist. As much as he might be railing about the fact that the film will portray him negatively, I can assure everyone here that he probably also masturbates on a regular basis, to the thought that anyone associated with the government has made a film about him at all.
Assange is an archetypical grey hat. I used to know a few of them on IRC in the mid to late 1990s. They are sociopathic vermin, and completely without any vague semblance of honour; but because of the dependence we now have on computers, they think they are God.
If you are wondering whether or not to view either Assange or Snowden as legitimate, then I can tell you one very important detail. Nobody, and I mean NOBODY, becomes prominent, viral, or in any way noticed on the Internet by accident. It never happens. "Organic," or grassroots Internet publicity is a lie. The only reason why anyone like Assange or Snowden becomes well known, is because it is arranged by the psychopaths. They want you to believe that anyone can become known, but I can assure you that the opposite is true. If you want publicity, you can't afford to seriously offend anyone, because you want the big people and the psychopaths to spend money on getting fake YouTube views for you, and all of the other dirty tactics they use.
You have to be a complete sellout morally, and you also have to be someone who they will find useful in some way. If you have both of those characteristics, then yes, they will make you famous; but they will also own you, and they will destroy you if you do anything that they do not like.
After WWII, the Jews and everyone else considered Pope Pius XII a hero It wasn't till a 1960s play, based on the author's imagination, portrayed him and the Catholic Church in Germany as having done nothing to help the Jews that everyone started jumping on the hate bandwagon. People believe what they see, especially if it corresponds with their prejudices.
How many date rapists are high profile and hide out in embassies openly defying the law?
Relevancy?
And if the 24x7 police guard wasn't there he'd have vanished into obscurity a while ago.You don't get to point to the exception situation the UK police have created as justification for their exceptional behavior. That's circular.
Date rape is something that the take fairly seriously in Britain. It's a violent crime from someone accused of two different sexual assaults that refuses to face justice.
Saying its a "violent crime" doesn't make it so and is just inflammatory rhetoric.
Does he deserve to be arrested and face justice for it. Yes. Does it really rise to the level of an international extradition? Worth spending millions on?
. They certainly aren't spending the money to keep him /in/ the embassy, as they would far rather he come out so that he could answer for the crimes he has been accused of.
So ... 5 million GPB... is money well spent?
As for your 1 in 4 figure...
Splitting hairs between rape vs attempted rape, or consensual activity, activity that happened despite being actively rejected, activity that didn't happen because it was successfully actively rejected, and activity that happened that wasn't actively rejected but was still unwanted isn't really the point here.
Whatever number you like, or however you wish to count it, there are far better things for the UK police to be doing.
I also think Assange is an attention whore and mostly self-serving.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QI4O8byPw7g
Your comment caused me to go and look this song up, and listen to it. ;)
Citation needed.
Please don't use the citation needed troll. Yes, the person you're responding to is a fairly typical brainwashed American, but that response implies that you are someone who doesn't believe anything, unless it comes to them second-hand.
You wouldn't want us to think that, would you?
Ooo, look, anther Zombie Lie. The Swedish courts can prevent the government from extraditing someone, but they cannot compel it.
He's even offered to return to Sweden, if Sweden promises not to hand him over to the United States. That Sweden refuses to do so tells you all you need to know about what their intentions actually are and how much of a shit they give about the allegations.
That's very generous of him, but in the end he skipped bail in the UK after running from Sweden, and no governement would make such a promise - it is quite likely that the USA don't have anything that would require an extradition, but if they do, then not extraditing him would be highly illegal.
Its more of a jab than a troll. I am perfectly fine with no citations however, those are some pretty extraordinary claims. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, which in this case, should at LEAST be a citation of some sort.
I mean seriously "Wikileaks uses terrorist tactics"? I am a pretty staunch supporter, but if that were true, I would need to seriously rethink my feelings on them. Everything I know about them indicates this is false for any reasonable definition of "wikileaks" or "terrorist tactics".
So yes, if he or anyone else, wants to be taken seriously on a statement like that, a citation should be included. If its true then either there is a citation out there, or the poster has inside information which seriously needs to be published ASAP. Either way, without that, its just an unfounded and nonsensical claim.
"I opened my eyes, and everything went dark again"
In both cases the sex act was consensual. In one case he told the woman he would wear a condom and didn't. In the second case, a day earlier than the first, he had sex with a condom and then woke up in the middle of the night and had sex again, this time without a condom. The women, who knew each other, wanted him to get tested for stds. Both charges are misdemeanors in Sweden, punishable by a fine, and not even a crime in the UK.
Assange has offered to receive questioning in a neutral location and Sweden has refused. He has offered to return to Sweden for questioning if they promise, with the force of law, that he will not be extradited to the U.S. Again, Sweden refused. Between Sweden and the UK, they have spent more than $10 million on this case.
What Assange did is not acceptable behavior, but the actions of Sweden and UK make little sense solely given the crimes for which he is accused.
Not that I condone date rape or think he should get away with it... but 1 in 4 college women surveyed are victims of rape or attempted rape... how many UK rape victims could they have investigated with 5 million GPB?
One would think it would be pretty hard to justify that budget for keeping one penned up in an embassy for years on end over a sexual misconduct in another country for which the evidence ultimately amounts to he-said she-said.
My god. Where to even begin. If your numbers are to be believed, then prosecution is REQUIRED to change the situation, be it this one man, or any man. One problem is the stigma assigned to the victims in the US and UK. As long as men are allowed to laugh off sexual assault as business as usual, this is one shit culture that we live in.
The only thing worse than a Democrat is a Republican.
He doesn't need a legal team, he just needs to realize that he's already served a longer self-imposed prison sentence than the period of time he would be held for "questioning" if he just walked out the door. He'd be questioned and released, most likely.
His fear of being transferred to the US is baseless, he's not even accused of a crime here; and his role was clearly legal under US law. The US strategy has been to make baseless threats and scare him into a corner, which surprisingly worked.
accused of something ranging from a misdemeanor sexual assault to something like date-rape.
Actually, it's not in this range at all, unless by "accused" you mean "accused by random people and the mainstream media", since Assange has not been charged with any crime in Sweden. They want him for "questioning", so they have an EU (!) arrest warrant out, but that's it. It is clear as day they have a deal to extradite him to US as soon as he lands there. If they were in fact interested in questioning him, they could use linphone.
Ecuadorian officials at the London embassy offered to allow Swedish prosecutors to question Assange there. This offer was rejected by the Swedish authorities.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julian_assange#Request_for_political_asylum_in_Ecuador
Questioning my ass.
Well, in that case we've learned even more recently that it turned out that the Catholic Church was helping the Germans to launder the gold teeth they extracted from Jews they had murdered, and receiving valuable art and other plunder for their role. So it was the play that got people onto the right track as to what really happened. Maybe it wasn't the author's imagination at all!
What acts of violence are those? I doubt you can find even 1 that is recent and not defensible. You may not agree with the defense, but if there is legit debate over what is a just military action and what isn't, then you're intentionally lying by saying you'd have to be "blind" not to agree. It is only things that are not reasonably debated where you'd be "blind" not to see it.
So in addition to being a coward, you're also a liar.
Even if you're against most US military action, you'd be blind not to see that there is a serious difference of opinion about what is Just and Good.
My god. Where to even begin. If your numbers are to be believed, then prosecution is REQUIRED to change the situation
Uh... the guy is persona non-grata in Sweden, and then again in the United Kingdom too.
If someone sexually assaulted a woman you know, and then had to flee the country, and then had to flee the country he fled to the 3rd world to avoid extradition... for a relatively non-violent sexual assault.
Exile to the 3rd world, with automatic arrest and extradition if he tries to come back anywhere with an extradition treaty with the UK/Sweden is pretty stiff consequences.
As long as men are allowed to laugh off sexual assault as business as usual, this is one shit culture that we live in.
God god indeed. I don't think anyone is "laughing it off".
They've got an arrest warrant out for him on INTERPOL. What more do you really expect?
That's the extent of the police responsibility here -- they hardly need to maintain 24x7 guard on an embassy.
Next time someone gropes your daughter, and the guy flees the country, then flees that country he fled to to the 3rd world to escape international warrants... what then do you expect the army to be flown in to invade Peru for extraordinary rendition?
What more do we want here? The women of Sweden are safe from Julian Assange; as is pretty much the rest of the first world. He's a persona non grata in most of the civilized world.
So that's laughing it off?
He's even offered to return to Sweden, if Sweden promises not to hand him over to the United States. That Sweden refuses to do so tells you all you need to know about what their intentions actually are and how much of a shit they give about the allegations.
Which is also a brave move on Asange's part, because while Sweden has great hippie health care and education, their justice system is straight up authoritarian. The state can hold suspects for extended periods of time without bail, and also incommunicado. So if Asange goes back he could be held for months without outside contact or an attorney.
That is a fake offer, made in poor faith; they can't promise not to hand him over if he's charged with a crime in the US. And since he hasn't been charged with any crime here, they can't even give a conditional promise not to hand him over for a specific charge. What if it turned out he'd murdered somebody? I'm not suggesting he has, or suggesting that there is any accusation that he has. But you can't know what crimes somebody didn't commit. You can't make a blanket promise not to extradite somebody to countries you have extradition agreements with.
And honestly, as an American, it seems pretty absurd that somebody in his situation would have real fear of charges. No US jury would convict him. Even a jury that hates him would find him "not guilty." The people who leaked to him often committed crimes in the US, but he did not, and since his intent was clearly to act as a journalist, even if he'd been in the US when he did it, his part in it is explicitly protected. The US simply made vague threats and he got so caught up in his anti-American propaganda that he freaked out and hid in a closet. And presumably he's given himself a life sentence.
Extraordinary evidence isn't required in a forum where people are talking. Citations are laziness. What is really called for to accompany an extraordinary claim would be an extraordinary argument of support. Which is lacking, granted. :P
Worked into turning him into a successful political activist you mean.
The US political elite made it clear they wanted a stop to wikileaks and commented as such to their tame press.
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
Just and Good was supporting Saddam invading Iran?
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
There has been plenty of activity in the US on the assumption that he would be delivered to the US at some point and be there to stand trial on the charges that were being prepared. It was a while ago but was all over the press and I suggest you look into it before expressing your ignorant opinion again.
Get real - he's less of an attention seeker than anyone in Hollywood, "reality" TV or US politics. That line is just an empty and pointless insult thought up by some intern at a thinktank when they were looking for a way to discredit him.
Do you really think he'd get a civil trial instead of GIMTO treatment or even extraordinary rendition to Egypt or wherever for a spot of torture? If he gets with reach of US spook agency vengence he's fucked. Those guys see the law as nothing but a blunt instrument.
However in the absence of a cogent argument, citations will do for making the point. Especially since holding someone to such a high standard as being able to summon such an argument may be unfairly hamstringing him.
"I opened my eyes, and everything went dark again"
Religion isn't the nail this time. I'm sorry but your example is just as clueless as the idiotic climate science is a religion/biology is a religion/geology is a religion/apple fanboyism is a religion posts.
The Manning incident proved you wrong. He went to several newspapers with a reputation of publishing leaks but they would not touch it.
I'll raise you from that example to a very high profile movie director wanted for raping a thirteen year old girl who has been openly defiant for decades. Do you see how worthless your argument is now? The attention can't possibly be due to the suspected minor sex crime.
1984 was written as a response to Brave New World; without it, 1984 would not have happened. 1984 is based upon almost entirely negative feedback and censorship for total control. Brave New World was based entirely upon positive feedback controls and distraction; censorship wasn't heavy handed; it didn't need to be. It was more imaginative and trying to point out new methods of control (which were beginning to be used at the time) and new problems while 1984 was a rebuttal, reminding people how human nature has always worked and therefore is likely to continue to work - both go to extremes in their opposite directions for emphasis. Both fail (probably intentionally) to address the flip side.
Creating entertaining versions of history and news which distort truth while NOT censoring the actual truth is totally like Brave New World and is not like 1984. Conditioning people to be such wimps that when they do find the truth it is so unpleasant that they essentially punish themselves with their inability to handle truth.... meanwhile being surrounded in numerous escapes... also makes it difficult to spread bad news around-- no big brother required... distributed decentralized control is even possible. FOX News is a great example, they use both techniques.
You don't need to Torture somebody to make them a loyal party member.
Democracy Now! - uncensored, anti-establishment news
FTFY.
In both cases the sex act was consensual. In one case he told the woman he would wear a condom and didn't. In the second case, a day earlier than the first, he had sex with a condom and then woke up in the middle of the night and had sex again, this time without a condom. The women, who knew each other, wanted him to get tested for stds. Both charges are misdemeanors in Sweden, punishable by a fine, and not even a crime in the UK.
Assange has offered to receive questioning in a neutral location and Sweden has refused. He has offered to return to Sweden for questioning if they promise, with the force of law, that he will not be extradited to the U.S. Again, Sweden refused. Between Sweden and the UK, they have spent more than $10 million on this case.
What Assange did is not acceptable behavior, but the actions of Sweden and UK make little sense solely given the crimes for which he is accused.
The extradition has been challenged in an English court. If the allegations, as described by the Swedish authorities, were not crimes under English law, Assange would not have lost the challenge.
The statement "Both charges are ... not even a crime in the UK" has been ruled factually false by a British judge. And it should be pretty obvious to you. If a woman agrees to have sex with you only with a condom and she wakes up one morning to find you already having sex with her and without a condom, damned right it's rape. How could you possibly think otherwise?
I don't know if the allegations are true or not, that's a question for the Swedish legal system to determine when it gets the chance, but Assange's actions are not those of a man who is confident of acquittal.
By the way, the extradition to the USA thing is bullshit. Assange was fighting to stay in the UK and it's not as if the Americans have any trouble extraditing people from the UK when they want to.
All I want is a secure system where it's easy to do anything I want. Is that too much to ask ~~ Randall Munroe
It is clear as day they have a deal to extradite him to US as soon as he lands there.
No it isn't. Why didn't the USA initiate proceedings in the UK when we had him in custody? The answer is that they have nothing to charge him with.
All I want is a secure system where it's easy to do anything I want. Is that too much to ask ~~ Randall Munroe
Because at the time the citizens of the UK were fucked off with a constant stream of absurd extraditions to the US and another high profile one like Assange would've been political suicide for any government to accept, especially as the government in question was elected on the platform of putting an end to such idiocy. Couple this with the height of austerity measures and a government at it's lowpoint of popularity, that was also a coalition, part of which strongly sympathises with Assange's cause and which if disbanded would bring down the government as there's no way the Tories could operate as a minority government and you can see why there wasn't a chance in hell they were going to take that risk.
The Tories will have made a calculated decision to make it clear to the US they couldn't help them without risking losing everything. If they'd gone ahead with such a request they wouldn't be in power long enough to action it and the opposition being the opportunists they are would seize on the issue to decimate the number of seats the Tories held taking away all power from them for the foreseeable future.
It just wasn't politically feasible for the Tories to extradite Assange at the request of the US, not least because he'd committed no crime in the UK - it took them long enough to get rid of the likes of Abu Hamza.
Given the King's status of head of the Church (making it improbable any soldier would try such a deed and get away with it), the fact that such an attrocity would be worse than the more famous attrocities committed against Americans yet is unheard of, and the fact that, as the GP said, a famous incident fitting the description did occur, but in Nazi occupied France, I'm inclined to believe the GP and not you.
But that said, if you can point at a historical account of this attrocity, I'll be interested in reading it and am perfectly willing to change my mind.
You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
That's a bit of a herp-a-derp type of silly and obviously wrong nonsense. He was already a successful activist. And hiding in the closet has mostly kept him out of view and prevented him from continuing to be successful.
Right... people said words and he hid. That is what I said. You shouldn't have to like the US, or live here, to realize that politicians can't just file political-based criminal charges without a legal basis. He could have just checked with a lawyer to find out if his actions had legal consequences in the US, or if when they said they were "looking" it just meant, you know, "looking." And anybody in the US or who looks into it should be able to tell him, if he parks illegally they'll be right on it, but being the journalist receiving secrets is not a crime here, nor is publishing them. Only the person leaking is breaking the law. He is hiding from the words of elites, not any likely or even possible US charges.
If you have to go back that far, you're almost arguing against yourself. But yeah, you make my point very well; it is not clear-cut, it is a matter of differing values and opinions. A matter of real, actual differences in what people believe is Good. You shouldn't need to land on one side of that, or the other, to see that they are real opinions.
Actually, it is silly of you to claim I don't know that. If you were aware of the details of the things you would have me look up, you'd know that you're stating it in a misleading way. The reports you saw in the media did not talk about activity "on the assumption that he would be delivered to the US at some point." The activity was to meet and look at secret evidence and make a show of looking for something to charge him with, to scare him. Which worked.
Since you vaguely remember having read about it, you probably remember enough for your google search to find the details.
Citations are silly, people can look it up. I'd rather they look it up and educate themselves, than choose propaganda to feed them.
Emails leaked by WikiLeaks from Stratfor, a private intelligence firm, have discussions surrounding a secret grand jury with a secret indictment. Later, the media organisation received declassified diplomatic cables that confirm a secret indictment exists.
So he is, in fact, accused of something here in US of A, probably "aiding the enemy" or something equally inane.
Nonsense. Foreign countries refuse to extradite people to the United States all the time, based on our death penalty and atrocious civil rights record. Given the psychological torture inflicted upon Bradley Manning, and Obama personally intervening to keep a journalist brutally imprisoned in Yemen, any country in the world has a perfectly valid reason refuse to hand over whisteblowers and journalists to the U.S.
If you want to try and run with this "you must extradite" line of reasoning, why don't you start by demanding the State Department turn over Luis Carriles to authorities in Cuba and Venezuela to face trial for bombing air planes. And when will George W. Bush be arrested and turned over to Malaysian authorities?
Hardly. U.S. charges would of course be based on Assange's activities at Wikileaks, so it would of course be trivial to make a promise not to extradite for anything having to do with journalism. If the FBI suddenly turns up video and DNA evidence that Assange was a triple ax murderer in Ohio, then they could request extradition for those charges.
It's also well known that the DOJ has a sealed indictment against Assange, which means they have charged him, they just haven't been open about it.
On some other planet where a whisteblower wasn't just handed a longer sentence than eight spies who sold secrets to Russia, for money? Where the only person to do jail time for the Bushco torture program was the person who confirmed it's existence?
Stones, glass houses:
We don 't extradite to those countries.
And no, it isn't "well known" that the DOJ has a "sealed indictment" against Assange. It has been widely speculated in foreign press. And if you knew anything about US law, you'd know better than to believe that nonsense.
And I don't see what is so hard to understand about the claim that the person leaking classified information is committing a serious crime, and the journalist they leak it to is protected by the US Constitution. If you can't even understand that part of my point, then why bother? You know you don't know anything about the US legal system if you're having trouble with that basic distinction.
With respect, you are showing how naive you are if you think it's going to be dealt with via the US legal system. Have you slept for the last decade?
No, it's very "silly" of you not to take it into consideration and have to be reminded of it.
Are you joking or attempting to be serious here? Nobody wastes so much time just to "scare" a jornalist/blogger/etc. It could not have been anything other than the real deal unless you are one of those conspiracy theory losers that think 99% of everything governments do is waste.
Of course I'm being serious. And yes, in the US, making scary words is all the government ever ever ever ever ever spends their time on in regards to charging journalists with crimes. Journalists are not charged with crimes in the US. In most of the world, journalists can spend time in jail if they make the wrong person in government mad. I'm not asking you to stop hating America. Just learn this one factual detail about the situation here. Our media sucks, but it isn't the Government's doing.
False. We have extradition treaties with both Venezuela and Malaysia. Either Bush and Carrieles are as subject to extradition as Assange, or your argument is invalid.
Yeah. It is.
Where the Obama administration has subjected reporters to criminal investigations and prosecuted more whisteblowers than all previous administrations times two? If you are so ignorant as to US legal system is and has been working maybe you shouldn't be commenting on the subject.
No amount of poutrage is going change the fact that you're wrong. Manning showed how the USG is willing to treat whistleblowers and Padila showed how even civilains are subjected to brutal military prison conditions. And that was before the passage of the NDAA, which allows indefinite military detention without trial.
In the age of information, ignorance is a choice.
Rolling Stone isn't a news outlet. I know, shocking, painful thing to find out.
A private intel company, connected to the CIA, leaked... an email. of their own. to themselves. with scary words.
Even Rolling Stone comments, "The news, if true, was a bombshell." Yeah. Exactly. "If true."
If you actually read the story, that alleged email wasn't leaked. Somebody claims to have stolen them, and we don't even know who, so that is exactly the kind a sane person will ignore; especially when most of the people involved are intel agencies or companies. There is just no way to know which documents are forged by the person who stole them, which were forged by stratfor, which were forged by the CIA, etc.
And get a clue, look it up, the US doesn't prosecute journalists. Period. Look that one up. I'm serious.