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Former U.S. officials describe details of the CIA’s proposals to abduct Assange

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Re: Former U.S. officials describe details of the CIA’s proposals to abduct Assange

#271
post #50

Sowing discord within the group seemed an easier route to success 2017 fits the period in which one hacker of the group was publicly accused of sexual harrassement by a female employee of the Tor project

Weren't two guys removed from Linux kernel development that uncovered the NSA trying to put a backdoor in it multiple time?

That is why you need some fervent believers in some arbitrary COC. Worked for the church, why shouldn't it work for intelligence agencies. Just get some crazy something to stick it to the patriarchy. You always find tools like that.

Re: Former U.S. officials describe details of the CIA’s proposals to abduct Assange

#272
post #261

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ah, I did qualify that statement with the search term 'SECRET' (classification level box) on the CableGate archive. Yes, there are unclassified and even classified cables discussing human rights initiatives - but I'm guessing 'SECRET' is what they really care a lot about, and that stuff in my experience of reading literally hundreds of cables (okay I was leaning more towards energy research) that's just not an issue…

Oh I see, I misread it as scare-quoted secret rather than specific classification level but there are also piles of SECRET documents/cables that are about human rights, promotion of democracy, etc as well. I don't think it makes much difference either way because I think you're over-interpreting the classification level as some sort of extra level care. All of this stuff was readily available to a Private First Class…

Really? You have specific sources? Pretty sure last time I checked there wasn't much 'SECRET' communication about Saudi human rights abuses for example. Not anywhere really. . . I mean, we want to ban solar panels from China 'cause 'human rights' but where's the ban on Saudi oil imports?

Re: Former U.S. officials describe details of the CIA’s proposals to abduct Assange

#273
post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just so everyone is clear, you think Trump would have been the better choice than Biden?

This is a false choice, they can both be awful along different axes. Biden however has a MUCH longer public record of bad policy decisions. Biden's crime bill from 1994 and the Iraq war which he supported caused more human misery than anything Trump had the opportunity to do in 4 years, all prior to the recent election. For all of his faults and criminality, Trump was mostly bluster and didn't actually do very much w…

You're making Trump out as being way too harmless.

Trump led our society straight into Covid denialism, and subsequently vaccine denialism. The root has been there, but the main power of a politician is to lead people, and he led the mainstream right into solipsistic "skepticism" of what would otherwise be pretty straightforward topics.

Trump is also directly symbiotic with reactionary groups that aren't criticizing our society to improve it, but rather to drag us back to the stage when their simple minded prescriptions were useful. As a libertarian, it's easy to explain away many of the other criticisms through different priorities, tradeoffs, relativism, media sensationalism, etc. But those two stick in the absolute sense.

Like every high level politician they're both terrible people, but Biden at least serves the corporate status quo that is the backbone of the country - the "deep state" if you will. I fully support Wikileaks et al, and I wish CIA/NSA/etc were disbanded and prosecuted. But as a self-interested American I'd rather the "deep state" continue causing global mayhem for economic gain, than to have a civil war at home (sorry). If you value global stability you probably should too, despite how disgusting it is.

The way I see it, 2022 is going to be a barometer and 2024 will be the jury verdict on our society. If people have come to see the destructiveness of Trumpism, the conservatives (democrats) will gain ground, and the incumbent power structure can continue sauntering on as it's slowly usurped by technology (ideally p2p rather than big tech middlemen, but that's orthogonal). Whereas if disenfranchised people continue to put performative dissent above rational self interest, the radicals (republicans) gain ground. They'll continue to create more elective crises that drive even more disenfranchisement (hello last 50 years of trickle down inflationism), and we're solidly in a death spiral.

Re: Former U.S. officials describe details of the CIA’s proposals to abduct Assange

#274

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The story that was rolling on the 24 hour news for weeks wasn't about the contents of the leaks. It was all about Snowden. If you wanted to know what the leaks said, you basically had to go to the source materials. If you wanted to hear some talking head give his opinion about whether or not Snowden did "treason," who more often than not said it was, you didn't have to work very hard.

You must watch fox "news" all day. You missed the bits about 'the NSA had a direct pipe into google, microsoft, yahoo, att and hoovered up everything you said, did and wrote'

The fact that he leaked "sensitive and classified" information about "NSA collaboration with major tech companies" was about the maximum extent that most outlets reported when they were pressed to. The framing was to make it look like "this is their mission anyway" and to focus on the "leaking of these classified reports" rather than attempt to report on the specifics on how the natsec state undermines our rights as citizens.

This wasn't just a case of the partisan press with whom you disagree. This was the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal.

Re: Former U.S. officials describe details of the CIA’s proposals to abduct Assange

#275
post #255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Those are all essentially client states of USA, dependent on USA as security provider. Some even argue they are occupied.

Even if true, that’s irrelevant to the question asked?

I disagree. You cannot say a country is democratic "despite" thirty thousand US soldiers camping inside with little to no accountability.

Re: Former U.S. officials describe details of the CIA’s proposals to abduct Assange

#276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s ridiculous to this non-US person that the United States thinks they should have jurisdiction here. This is an Australian citizen who published in the UK and Europe. The whole case is baseless, he’s not subject to the US’s Espionage Act. And of course the ‘assisting hackers’ stuff is nonsense that was tacked on when it looked like the initial indictment wouldn’t stick because of the rules about not extraditing fo…

IANAL but I've been told by a lawyer that international law is messy. The US has jurisdiction if your host country says that they do. Countries are also free to tell the US to pound sand. I'd just like some answers. I'd like it to be tried in court. I don't think the trial would necessarily be unfair. These conversations go in circles because we are all denied the truth so we argue hypotheticals.

What answers do you want? The "assisting people with cybercrimes" shit you brought up was already covered in Manning's trial. Manning asked Assange to crack a generic Windows account so she could theoretically access data she already had access to more secretly.

Assange said he'd try. The only answer unknown is whether he did try, and I doubt the US has any evidence showing that he did. That's it.

The trurth to all his charges is basically already out there.

Re: Former U.S. officials describe details of the CIA’s proposals to abduct Assange

#278
post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can’t see clear to what other point you could possibly be trying to make in this context. Perhaps you should clarify what you meant then?

If you don't know what I meant then why assuming malice as your first reaction?

The only reason I can figure you would make those points in this context is malice. You don't seem inclined to clarify or correct me, either, so...

Re: Former U.S. officials describe details of the CIA’s proposals to abduct Assange

#279
post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not after the entirety of the liberal press branded him a Putin stooge because he emabarrassed Hillary Clinton, that's for sure. Embarrassing the Clintons generally doesn't do any favors to one's life expectancy in this banana republic.

I agree that the "liberal" press does a very poor job to get to the bottom of anything recently, it just reiterates propaganda and I don't think they are able to hold anyone accountable. Educational deficits of young journalists are pretty appararent. That said, you don't need to add some weird stuff here.

Serious question: was Assange's life expectancy longer before the event or after? And if the answer is "before", why is this "weird stuff"?

Re: Former U.S. officials describe details of the CIA’s proposals to abduct Assange

#280

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your bogeyman largely did nothing for four years. Actually sorry, he was the first politician anywhere in this country to guarantee women basic human rights... The theocrats he nominated for the Supreme Court will be there for decades, ensuring that no women without the resources of, say, a Trump family member, will be able to maintain control of their own bodies.

Your shortened, incomplete quote of what I said takes me out of context completely. But you're not refuting the actual point that I made, you're going on some tangent. Also the "theocrats" that he's appointed to the Supreme Court haven't even towed his line on any major decisions they've had to vote on and basically have completely stabbed him in the back if you take things from his sides' perspective.

But you're not refuting the actual point that I made, you're going on some tangent.

Your actual point was that Trump "did nothing for four years." I refuted that point. Three SCOTUS seats occupied by religious ideologues aren't "nothing."

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