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Julian Assange can be extradited to the US, court rules

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Re: Julian Assange can be extradited to the US, court rules

#581
post #549

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Above a certain threshold, every veneer of civilization vanishes no matter what the country (some have a higher threshold than others). > At this level, only power matters. And the first rule of power is: Don't embarrass the powerful unless you can call on a lot of power to defend yourself. Steven Donziger is another great example of this rule: https://theintercept.com/2020/01/29/chevron-ecuador-lawsuit-... Chevron…

Whatever happened to our benevolent anonymous hacker groups that were supposed to be so organic and decentralized they could never be ended?

War on terror?

Re: Julian Assange can be extradited to the US, court rules

#582
post #265

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>This doesn't mean that any country can prosecute foreign people with arbitrary laws at their leisure, though. Most extradition agreements would require that the offense be a crime in both countries, for example. Ok but Anne Sacoolas ran over and killed a kid (definitely a crime here) and she wasn't extradited. While Julian Assange exposed a US war crime and is extradited because US espionage law literally counts tha…

Anne Scoolas had diplomatic immunity, right? That's an entirely different ball of wax. Perhaps Scoolas isn't a good example for your case.

Sure, despite there being a formal agreement that people at that specific base _not_ receive diplomatic immunity.

I'm my opinion though, this just reinforces the idea that it didn't matter what the rules were - people in power were sufficiently motivated to justify what they wanted to do, they just needed a way to make it relatively palatable to the general public.

Re: Julian Assange can be extradited to the US, court rules

#583
post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Assange is more of an editor / publisher. This is akin to the Washington Post publishing the Pentagon Papers. As a reminder, this is why the US wants to punish Assange: > Wikileaks reveals video showing US air crew shooting down Iraqi civilians > https://www.theguardian.com/world/2010/apr/05/wikileaks-us-a...

This can definitely be one reason but I find your cherry picking very disingenuous. His disclosures have shown a consistent bias to damage the Democrats, support the Republicans, Trump, and the Putin regime. He also endangered the lives of multiple assets by revealing their names and locations. It's a lot more nuanced than you portray it.

This is completely untrue. He used to be loved by the Democrats when he was exposing Bush's war crimes. The claim that he was working with Russia to help Trump came from the Hillary campaign.

Re: Julian Assange can be extradited to the US, court rules

#584

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Well can you elaborate why you think it is? Because "we'll revoke your First Amendment rights if we don't like how you're using them" is a very big step on a very steep and very slippery slope. Assange's defense is likely to revolve around the First Amendment. Weakening it would hurt him, even.

My point is the way founding fathers envisioned first amendment protection, they never foresaw the rise of a small billionaires oligarchs owning large stake of media and newspapers to promote views favouring their narratives. I am not speaking of first amendment of individuals which I think is also under attack by the same group of people, look how the mainstream media would love to cancel certain people they don’t l…

> My point is the way founding fathers envisioned first amendment protection, they never foresaw the rise of a small billionaires oligarchs owning large stake of media and newspapers to promote views favouring their narratives.

That sounds to me like a problem with the existence of billionaire oligarchs and not a problem with the first amendment.

Re: Julian Assange can be extradited to the US, court rules

#585
post #246

Fabricate a narrative that allows your country to murder tens of thousands of people == fine and not illegal. Tell soldier how cryptographic maths work == double castration and the CIA tries to assassinate you. Don't forget that the Collateral Murder video showed not only Iraqi citizens but also Reuters journalists being machine-gunned from the sky. No person has ever been criminally charged for these murders.

As an American, I find it very hard to decide what to think about these issues. Our military certainly makes mistakes, and people should be held accountable, but on the other hand the U.S. upholds much stricter rules of engagement than any of its enemies (hell, even stricter than our cops). Should credit not be given for that?

> the U.S. upholds much stricter rules of engagement than any of its enemies

Where is your evidence of this? I can't remember the last time a drone attacked US soil and killed innocent civilians. And have you actually seen the main video that Assange released with Apaches killing civilians?

Re: Julian Assange can be extradited to the US, court rules

#586
post #385

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cry me a river. The vendetta clearly went both ways given what Assange was willing to do to sabotage her campaign.

Assange reported on information. That's what journalists do. Hillary sabotaged her own campaign by the actions she/her team/the DNC took. You can't put the blame on the journalist.

Ah, yes. Collaborating with hackers to publish internal campaign emails, exactly the behavior of an upstanding journalist

Re: Julian Assange can be extradited to the US, court rules

#587

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It might be the case right now but it came out earlier this year that the CIA was entertaining this idea in 2017. This [0] appears to be the originating story and there are corroborating accounts in many other outlets. [0] https://news.yahoo.com/kidnapping-assassination-and-a-london...

> It might be the case right now but it came out earlier this year that the CIA was entertaining this idea in 2017. CIA, DoD, and lots of agencies “entertain” lots of ideas, and even develop plans, for lots of things that never get close to being policy.

Planning to commit a murder or a terrorist attack is a felony that will put an individual in prison for a long time.

Re: Julian Assange can be extradited to the US, court rules

#588
post #500

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> but on the other hand the U.S. upholds much stricter rules of engagement than any of its enemies (hell, even stricter than our cops). Should credit not be given for that? In all honesty and at the very minimum, being criticized openly and fairly for atrocities is the cost of being seen as capable of virtuous military action. The older I get though, the less objective distinction I see. I'm sure that's how the dead…

I'm ashamed to admit I forgot about that once the news cycle moved on. Someone should definitely be held accountable, especially since all evidence points to it not even being an honest mistake, but rather a PR move made against the advice of ground commanders.

It was Biden who was accountable. What are we gonna do, hold re-elections? Just after the democracy was shaken to its core by the January 6th attack? Hand over the control to the republicans who have shown themselves to be absolutely incapable of formulating rational thought or speaking the truth to their own voter base? Admit that the democratic party is so thoroughly corrupt that even after losing the easiest election in US history to a buffoon, they could not come up with a candidate with the smallest amount of integrity or backbone, and pushed up some guy who would step over the bodies of children just for a shot of giving the illusion that the US is actually in control of the rushed evacuation from a war he's been losing for a decade.

Re: Julian Assange can be extradited to the US, court rules

#589
post #256

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I suspect Assange doesn't regret this. I kind of get the impression that becoming a martyr was a sacrifice he was prepared to make if he managed to rip off the mask and expose the unbridled imperialist evil lurking underneath the "civilized press conference veneer" presented by the US government.

My sense, and I don't think it is a popular opinion on HN, was that Assange became, perhaps unwittingly, a pawn of Russia. Selectively releasing documents, which is how I see it, doesn't show an even hand of justice exposing "the unbridled imperialist evil". I'm no fan of Assange. But I also have not read a lot about Assange so I may be ignorant.

yeah, a pawn of russia. just like trump. yet it is biden who said yes to the biggest russian infrastructure project for germany with the pipeline.

the narrative of being a russian pawn doesnt work. everyone loved assange until he underlined the oblivious corruption of clinton and hence contributed to make her loose rightfully so the election. I am no trump fan and I am for a non partisan vision of the world. a vision where freedom means telling the truth even if it hurts yourself or your political leaders. Assange is a victim of usa and it is sad to bring russia to the equation

Re: Julian Assange can be extradited to the US, court rules

#590

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It might be the case right now but it came out earlier this year that the CIA was entertaining this idea in 2017. CIA, DoD, and lots of agencies “entertain” lots of ideas, and even develop plans, for lots of things that never get close to being policy.

Planning to commit a murder or a terrorist attack is a felony that will put an individual in prison for a long time.

> Planning to commit a murder or a terrorist attack is a felony that will put an individual in prison for a long

Unless it is with other people and, more critically, at least one of the people involved goes beyond planning and takes some concrete step to advance the execution of the plan (at which point it becomes the separate crime of conspiracy), no, planning a crime, even of that seriousness, is not itself a crime.

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