What could he possibly do next (if he avoids a prison term)?
If his brain still works he could take another tilt at the Senate.
Julian Assange has reached a plea deal with the U.S., allowing him to go free
141–150 of 1001 posts
Re: Julian Assange has reached a plea deal with the U.S., allowing him to go free
#142Re: Julian Assange has reached a plea deal with the U.S., allowing him to go free
#143It amazes me that so many people care more about the act of whistleblowing, which informs us, the citizens, about what our governments are doing that's illegal, than about the illegal activities themselves. What does that say about those people? Are they easily led by emotion? They certainly don't care about the rule of law, if breaking the law by others can so easily be ignored. They aren't particularly patriotic, i…
>It amazes me that so many people care more about the act of whistleblowing... This is true in both directions and Assange is the perfect example of that. Someone being a whistleblower is not a get out of jail free card and there are still laws regarding how whistleblowing should be handled and what qualifies. Assange leaked a lot of important stuff that qualifies, but that wasn't all he leaked or did. A shockingly f…
First, Assange isn't a whistleblower, nor a leaker. He was a publisher. Wikileaks received leaked documents from whistleblowers and published them. Or at least received documents from somewhere and published them.
In the beginning Assange tried to vet the leaks he published. He contacted the US over the Manning leaks to go over them so he could publish without risk, the US refused.
So Assange set up a huge team of journalists to comb through the documents to see what was safe to publish. One of those journalists working for The Guardian proceeded to publish the key to the entire database, ensuring everything was leaked
Shortly after, he ends up in embassy and was unable or unwilling to do similar things.
Re: Julian Assange has reached a plea deal with the U.S., allowing him to go free
#144[flagged]
Re: Julian Assange has reached a plea deal with the U.S., allowing him to go free
#145Earlier quoted context omitted.
Much like Snowden, people attach to whatever the highest-profile thing they released was, and act like that's the only thing they released. It's not, it's just what got the most attention. It's maybe 0.5% of the portfolio if you're being generous. Both Snowden and Assange went far beyond "blowing the whistle" in what they leaked and/or solicited.
Yes and they are great for releasing all that extra information. Its a fantastic public service they have provided.
The details matter because most people don't think everything their governments do should be public knowledge, but also don't think everything they do should be a secret. So most people will judge something like this based on how close they think the leaker got to hitting the right mark with what they released.
Re: Julian Assange has reached a plea deal with the U.S., allowing him to go free
#146How do plea deals work for precedent? As despite the constant claim that he was only being charged for assisting in hacking US computers, the plea deal is over violations of the Espionage Act specifically about receiving and publishing classified documents. Or basically his acts as a journalist. Can this be used to indict other journalists who receive and publish classified information? As if so, this feels like a hu…
Journalists generally avoid asking for classified information. The belief is that (in the US) a journalist that passively receives classified information & publishes it isn't committing a crime due to the First Amendment. The actual crime itself was committed by the person leaking the information. Julian Assange actively solicited leaks of information. That's where the espionage claim comes from. There's not much pre…
There is a precedent from the Pentagon Papers:
https://firstamendment.mtsu.edu/article/new-york-times-co-v-...
As the last paragraph points out, not a clear victory for the free press, but the Assange prosecutors know this case very well and you are absolutely right that they want to avoid another one.
Re: Julian Assange has reached a plea deal with the U.S., allowing him to go free
#147Earlier quoted context omitted.
Much like Snowden, people attach to whatever the highest-profile thing they released was, and act like that's the only thing they released. It's not, it's just what got the most attention. It's maybe 0.5% of the portfolio if you're being generous. Both Snowden and Assange went far beyond "blowing the whistle" in what they leaked and/or solicited.
OK, so Snowden ann Assange deserve punishment. Where is the punishment for the people commiting the crimes and treason that Snowden and Assange exposed?
They deserve punishment too.
Re: Julian Assange has reached a plea deal with the U.S., allowing him to go free
#148[flagged]
Priorities change. He's not really a threat anymore. They've thoroughly scared people who might copy him.
Assange wasn't really a threat on his own. He was merely an outlet for others (Chelsea Manning, Russian propagandists). The question was whether he encouraged others.
Snowden showed that leakers didn't need Wikileaks for Chelsea Manning-like releases and the Russians have just switched to directly releasing on Twitter.
Re: Julian Assange has reached a plea deal with the U.S., allowing him to go free
#149Earlier quoted context omitted.
Much like Snowden, people attach to whatever the highest-profile thing they released was, and act like that's the only thing they released. It's not, it's just what got the most attention. It's maybe 0.5% of the portfolio if you're being generous. Both Snowden and Assange went far beyond "blowing the whistle" in what they leaked and/or solicited.
OK, so Snowden ann Assange deserve punishment. Where is the punishment for the people commiting the crimes and treason that Snowden and Assange exposed?
> Where is the punishment for the people commiting the crimes and treason that Snowden and Assange exposed?
Other funny things have been exposed too and nothing ever happens.
Like for example $12 billion, in hundred dollars bills, being send by a military cargo plane to Iraq, after the Iraq war. Of these $12 billion, $9bn are totally unaccounted for: it's not even clear if they ever made it to the plane. That is well documented.
Just imagine the number of crooked politicians and military officials involved in such a highway robbery: robbing the people, to enrich themselves.
"Which fraud are we going to commit today, we didn't steal enough money: we need to choke on more money, what's our plan?" "I know, I know, let's make $10 bn in hundred dollar bills disappear!"
It is also very likely, but probably too soon to be exposed/revealed, that such similar shenanigans happened with SBF/FTX and the funding of the war in Ukraine, where monkey business happened with US donations that probably never made it to Ukraine.
To me it's no coincidence that all the charges against SBF concerning the bribing of politicians have been dropped: that's quite the can of worms for it's certainly related to money which disappeared while supposedly going to Ukraine.
Another really funny one too is the government refusing the audit of the (missing) gold in Fort Knox (yeah, no, if out of $12 bn we know that $9bn vanished, I guarantee you there's no way all the gold supposed to be in Fort Knox is there). "It's too complicated to do an audit". I read: "a sizeable amount of that gold indeed vanished, like those $10 bn in $100 bills".
That's my main reason for wanting to pay as little taxes as possible: it makes me puke to know I encourage crime.
Now although these traitors and petty thieves shall never ever be send to jail, at the end of the day there are more important things, like having a clear conscience and being able to look your kid in the eyes.
So let these traitors choke on their ill-acquired wealth, they deserve to be the miserable cockroaches they are.
Re: Julian Assange has reached a plea deal with the U.S., allowing him to go free
#150It amazes me that so many people care more about the act of whistleblowing, which informs us, the citizens, about what our governments are doing that's illegal, than about the illegal activities themselves. What does that say about those people? Are they easily led by emotion? They certainly don't care about the rule of law, if breaking the law by others can so easily be ignored. They aren't particularly patriotic, i…
Julian's not a whistleblower, he's a journalist. Whistleblowers are people within the organization.
He's also not a journalist by traditional definitions i.e. no formal training, no accreditation, no redaction to protect innocent parties, no protection of sources.
He's more akin to an activist.