Now we are heading off on our new course to become more like Venezuela.
If only we had Venezuela's poverty reduction and nationalized resources benefiting the entire population and not just the 1%. But no, about the only things we have in common are a draconian prison system and a corrupt media.
So the Islamic doctrines of Jihad, which date back to 730AD
What about the Hebrew doctrine of invading a country and committing genocide upon the native population to take their land, which predates Islam by millennia?
I've been to Syria recently -- well in the last couple of years, after the start of the revolution.
You mean the proxy war funded - with both fighters and money - by Syria's enemies.
I experienced first hand the extreme corruption, the ever-present secret police, and the aura of fear and intimidation.
Did you experience the ethnic cleansing performed by anti-Assad forces backed by the U.S. government? How about the organ eating rebels, happen to catch that? And for their next trick, Kerry and Obama are talking about how we might have to go in with force not to fight Assad, but to attack the Al Queda franchise that's been gaining power in Syria.
The franchise that Kerry and Obama have spent the last two years arming, so they would fight Assad.
Which does....what to change the fact that he is most wanted in the United States, and thus might want an American lawyer? Did you come up these deep, insightful questions all by yourself?
If she didn't get strip searched (with a good cause, too), she should be thankful.
You do know you out yourself when you want the whisteblowers and anyone connected to them strung up by their toes, but don't give a shit about the lawbreaking they reveal, right? See also this.
Freedom to say only what people consider nice and acceptable is no freedom at all. Any country that has "hate speech" laws has no grounds to criticize US lack of free speech.
George Tiller. Tides Foundation. Rwandan Genocide. You have no grounds to criticize hate speech laws if you don't understand the effects of incitement to violence combined with dehumanizing rhetoric.
They went to jail over $450 they didn't pay. Then, once in jail, managed to get $900 to pay off fees to that point to get out.
Did you leave this part out on purpose?
"They were released only after relatives brought $900 to the Childersburg jail.
You make it sound like they had that money just sitting around in a checking account and just didn't want to pay up.
That's one reason why deadbeat dads getting sent to jail is so common and encouraged.
Because a good portion of Americans are punitive pricks that would rather be tough than effective. Most "deadbeat dads" are really dead broke dads. They are behind on their payments not because they drive BMW's while their kids live in refrigerator boxes, but because they cannot afford that $150 a week. Same goes for non-custodial mothers who are behind on their child support payments.
There was nothing stopping the cops from saying "hey judge, you sure about this warrant for a 9 year old video? We'll try and get to it after we round up our rape, murder and robbery suspects."
Why should they make promises to a suspect of a crime?
Why are you concern trolling? Sweden uses pretrial detention and holding suspects incommunicado to such an extent that it was heavily criticized by the UN Committee Against Torture. Because Sweden has a penchant for handing people over to the U.S. who are then sent overseas to be tortured.
Because, if this is about rape allegations, there is no excuse whatsoever for limiting it to rape allegations and promising not to hand Assange over to the U.S.
He's a suspect in a crime... Since when do suspects get to set conditions for interviews?
Since he asked for and was given permission to leave Sweden in the first place? Since Sweden has a medival Star Chamber judicial system, where suspects can be thrown in solitary confinement without contact with the outside world?
Here, that Sweden isn't making a bunch of promises to Assange
Here is where Sweden is full of it, as are it's defenders. If this is really about rape allegations, then promise Assange he will be questioned on said rape allegations and not handed over to the United States. You are defending an indefensible position.
Sweden can't make any such promise because Extradition is a court matter
Repeating Big Lies you've been told doesn't make them true.
"It is simply untrue that it is Swedish courts, rather than the Swedish government, who are the final decision-makers in extradition requests. It is equally untrue that the Swedish government has no final decision-making power regarding extradition requests that are legally sanctioned by the Swedish judiciary. These are not matters for reasonable debate. The law is clear."
And at the end of the day, he's hiding out in an embassy in a foreign country - who will charge him with skipping bail the second he emerges - in order to avoid even the questioning.
Errr did you even read the summary? He's repeatedly offered to answer questions, either remotely by phone or in the Ecuadorian embassy. This is all moot, though, because Assange has offered to return to Sweden in return for a promise not to be extradited to the United States. Offers made before he sought asylum.
Journalistic privilege is held very highly in the US. He would have the entire journalism industry on his side.
On some other planet where the U.S. press isn't a willing sycophant and stenographer for the U.S. "security" complex? Where it hasn't shown overt hostility to Greenwald, a fellow member of the press, much less leakers like Assange?
Assange strikes me as someone that's lost in his own self importance
You strike me as a person repeating a tautology.
The reports of his actions in Sweden don't paint him in a very good light.
Reports of Richard Jewell didn't paint him in a very good light, either.
All that said is doesn't make any sense, other than flexing of muscles, for the Swedish Prosecutor not to call his bluff and interrogate him in the UK (or Ecuador as he is at the moment). Its just posturing and dick waving on behalf of the Prosecutor not to do it.
What really makes it obvious that this is a dick-waving government is the fact that Assange has said he would voluntarily return to Sweden in exchange for a promise not to be extradited to the United States. An offer made before he sought asylum with Ecuador, an offer that has been consistently ignored.
To answer the charge of skipping bail, contempt of court, etc. Then he can - LIKE HE ALWAYS COULD HAVE - argue that he should be legitimately put on trial in a "friendly" country.
Except Sweden ALWAYS COULD HAVE taken up Assange on HIS OFFER TO RETURN TO SWEDEN if authorities promised that he would NOT be extradited to the U.S.
If it's really about answering rape allegations, then let it be about answering the goddamn rape allegations instead of an excuse to hand him over to get the Bradley Manning treatment.
trying to argue that he never actually had sex with them would be him changing that story, raising the questions of whether he was lying then or lying now, and what else is he lying about?
No, the question is what are Swedish authorities lying about, given the fact that Assange has offered to return to Sweden if the government promises not to hand him over to the United States. Sweden has so far ignored that offer, just as it's ignored offers to interview him by phone or by meeting Swedish investigators in the Ecuadorian embassy.
....in the first world. They may have hippie health care and higher education, but their judicial system is a medieval star chamber.
And, like everyone else, the prosecutor should interrogate him in the town/city where the crime was committed.
Except, unlike anywhere else in the first world, you do not have the right to have an attorney present while being interrogated by police or prosecutors. Who can hold you in custody for months without a hearing or outside contact.
Refusing to return to the country with jurisdiction and demanding to be interrogated in a third country is special treatment.
Except it's not. Swedish authorities have done just that before, but refuse to do so with Assange. For some reason.
Besides, this is all moot given the fact that Assange has offered to return to Sweden if the government promises not to then hand him over to the U.S., but Swedish authorities refuse to do so.
Which tells anyone with a function brain that there's a motivation here that has nothing to do with rape allegations.
I refer you to Public Law 107-40 commonly known as Authorization For Use Of Military Force
And I refer you to the fact that only applies to those who directly planned and carried out the 911 attacks, as well as the fact that those people are all dead or imprisoned. But when have you let facts get in the way of authoritarian apologia?
Mr. Paul, you are a UNITED STATES SENATOR. You have all the power you need to put a stop to anything government does that you don't like. Write legislation. Get it passed.
You mean get it passed with a 67% margin in both chambers to override a presidential veto. The chances of that happening with this Congress (and Hoover-type blackmail) are slim to none, and Slim's on his way out of town.
Compared to trying to have the courts strike it down. Which is the point of having three co-equal branches: that one will try and uphold the rule of law if the other two fail.
Also while you're at it, repeal the 17th amendment.
While you're at it, read up on this thing we call the 19th Century and the massive corruption involved with state governments picking Senators instead of voters.
Who specifically has been harmed in which specific manner? What were the specific monetary damages incurred?
Specifically, it doesn't matter if there are damages. Spying on Americans without warrants is punishable by a $10,000 fine and a five year prison term. For each individual offense.
The first thing Obama did was get Congress to sign off on all the domestic spying so that he wouldn't take the fall.
Senior members of Obama's own party have said they find out about these programs from the press, via whisteblowers like Snowden, before being briefed by the White House. How are you supposed to stop something you know about, and even if you did know, how does that make you more responsible than the trigger-man?
not the organisations that they worked for, where the fine would just be added to the national tax bill.
Ah, the "taxpayers" chestnut. First, costs of judgements are borne by insurance companies, not local taxpayers. Second, if the problem is systemic, the system should pay some of the price, not just individuals (see: LAPD). Third, if taxpayers had a line item on their forms to make reparations for the 20 to 30 million people the U.S. has killed or gotten killed since WWII, maybe the taxpayers would dust off their voting hats and make some changes, and send some politicians to prison.
Slashdot Mirror
If only we had Venezuela's poverty reduction and nationalized resources benefiting the entire population and not just the 1%. But no, about the only things we have in common are a draconian prison system and a corrupt media.
Pfft, that's nothing. Meet Admiral Sir Manley Power.
What about the Hebrew doctrine of invading a country and committing genocide upon the native population to take their land, which predates Islam by millennia?
Idiots.
Actually, more than the rest of the planet combined.
You mean the proxy war funded - with both fighters and money - by Syria's enemies.
Did you experience the ethnic cleansing performed by anti-Assad forces backed by the U.S. government? How about the organ eating rebels, happen to catch that? And for their next trick, Kerry and Obama are talking about how we might have to go in with force not to fight Assad, but to attack the Al Queda franchise that's been gaining power in Syria.
The franchise that Kerry and Obama have spent the last two years arming, so they would fight Assad.
You do realize that's a non sequitur if he bought the games through Steam and has had his other Steam purchases blocked, right?
Here you go.
Which does....what to change the fact that he is most wanted in the United States, and thus might want an American lawyer? Did you come up these deep, insightful questions all by yourself?
You do know you out yourself when you want the whisteblowers and anyone connected to them strung up by their toes, but don't give a shit about the lawbreaking they reveal, right? See also this.
George Tiller. Tides Foundation. Rwandan Genocide. You have no grounds to criticize hate speech laws if you don't understand the effects of incitement to violence combined with dehumanizing rhetoric.
Did you leave this part out on purpose?
"They were released only after relatives brought $900 to the Childersburg jail.
You make it sound like they had that money just sitting around in a checking account and just didn't want to pay up.
Because a good portion of Americans are punitive pricks that would rather be tough than effective. Most "deadbeat dads" are really dead broke dads. They are behind on their payments not because they drive BMW's while their kids live in refrigerator boxes, but because they cannot afford that $150 a week. Same goes for non-custodial mothers who are behind on their child support payments.
There was nothing stopping the cops from saying "hey judge, you sure about this warrant for a 9 year old video? We'll try and get to it after we round up our rape, murder and robbery suspects."
Non sequitur.
Why are you concern trolling? Sweden uses pretrial detention and holding suspects incommunicado to such an extent that it was heavily criticized by the UN Committee Against Torture. Because Sweden has a penchant for handing people over to the U.S. who are then sent overseas to be tortured.
Because, if this is about rape allegations, there is no excuse whatsoever for limiting it to rape allegations and promising not to hand Assange over to the U.S.
Since he asked for and was given permission to leave Sweden in the first place? Since Sweden has a medival Star Chamber judicial system, where suspects can be thrown in solitary confinement without contact with the outside world?
Here is where Sweden is full of it, as are it's defenders. If this is really about rape allegations, then promise Assange he will be questioned on said rape allegations and not handed over to the United States. You are defending an indefensible position.
Repeating Big Lies you've been told doesn't make them true.
"It is simply untrue that it is Swedish courts, rather than the Swedish government, who are the final decision-makers in extradition requests. It is equally untrue that the Swedish government has no final decision-making power regarding extradition requests that are legally sanctioned by the Swedish judiciary. These are not matters for reasonable debate. The law is clear."
Errr did you even read the summary? He's repeatedly offered to answer questions, either remotely by phone or in the Ecuadorian embassy. This is all moot, though, because Assange has offered to return to Sweden in return for a promise not to be extradited to the United States. Offers made before he sought asylum.
On some other planet where the U.S. press isn't a willing sycophant and stenographer for the U.S. "security" complex? Where it hasn't shown overt hostility to Greenwald, a fellow member of the press, much less leakers like Assange?
You strike me as a person repeating a tautology.
Reports of Richard Jewell didn't paint him in a very good light, either.
What really makes it obvious that this is a dick-waving government is the fact that Assange has said he would voluntarily return to Sweden in exchange for a promise not to be extradited to the United States. An offer made before he sought asylum with Ecuador, an offer that has been consistently ignored.
Except Sweden ALWAYS COULD HAVE taken up Assange on HIS OFFER TO RETURN TO SWEDEN if authorities promised that he would NOT be extradited to the U.S.
If it's really about answering rape allegations, then let it be about answering the goddamn rape allegations instead of an excuse to hand him over to get the Bradley Manning treatment.
No, the question is what are Swedish authorities lying about, given the fact that Assange has offered to return to Sweden if the government promises not to hand him over to the United States. Sweden has so far ignored that offer, just as it's ignored offers to interview him by phone or by meeting Swedish investigators in the Ecuadorian embassy.
....in the first world. They may have hippie health care and higher education, but their judicial system is a medieval star chamber.
Except, unlike anywhere else in the first world, you do not have the right to have an attorney present while being interrogated by police or prosecutors. Who can hold you in custody for months without a hearing or outside contact.
Except it's not. Swedish authorities have done just that before, but refuse to do so with Assange. For some reason.
Besides, this is all moot given the fact that Assange has offered to return to Sweden if the government promises not to then hand him over to the U.S., but Swedish authorities refuse to do so.
Which tells anyone with a function brain that there's a motivation here that has nothing to do with rape allegations.
And I refer you to the fact that only applies to those who directly planned and carried out the 911 attacks, as well as the fact that those people are all dead or imprisoned. But when have you let facts get in the way of authoritarian apologia?
You mean get it passed with a 67% margin in both chambers to override a presidential veto. The chances of that happening with this Congress (and Hoover-type blackmail) are slim to none, and Slim's on his way out of town.
Compared to trying to have the courts strike it down. Which is the point of having three co-equal branches: that one will try and uphold the rule of law if the other two fail.
While you're at it, read up on this thing we call the 19th Century and the massive corruption involved with state governments picking Senators instead of voters.
Specifically, it doesn't matter if there are damages. Spying on Americans without warrants is punishable by a $10,000 fine and a five year prison term. For each individual offense.
This day in simple answers to bad questions.
Senior members of Obama's own party have said they find out about these programs from the press, via whisteblowers like Snowden, before being briefed by the White House. How are you supposed to stop something you know about, and even if you did know, how does that make you more responsible than the trigger-man?
Ah, the "taxpayers" chestnut. First, costs of judgements are borne by insurance companies, not local taxpayers. Second, if the problem is systemic, the system should pay some of the price, not just individuals (see: LAPD). Third, if taxpayers had a line item on their forms to make reparations for the 20 to 30 million people the U.S. has killed or gotten killed since WWII, maybe the taxpayers would dust off their voting hats and make some changes, and send some politicians to prison.