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The US Is Preparing to Prosecute Julian Assange

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Re: The US Is Preparing to Prosecute Julian Assange

#221

Post by sonnyblarney »

merlincorey wrote: post #200
sonnyblarney wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Would you though?" Yes. There's a difference between drone programs 'crossing the line' say, in a hunt for known terrorists, they blow up a building that has civilians next door our just outside ... and arbitrary targeting of 'annoyances of the state'. There are actually quite scant false flag operations in US history, and many of them weren't even false flag so much as 'purposefully misrepresented'. And besides - t…

> There are actually quite scant false flag operations in US history, and many of them weren't even false flag so much as 'purposefully misrepresented'. What's the difference between "purposefully misrepresented" and a false flag? I am honestly not sure -- I thought the concept of a false flag was a purposeful misrepresentation of an event.

A false flag is an intentional action that creates false justification for something.

A misrepresentation is just that.

So - if the US sent in CIA agents and planted WMD's in Iraq, and then had the UN inspectors show up and 'find' them - that would be a false flag.

Otherwise, say the inspectors find some WMD but it's only a small account, and then the government says "Look WMDs, therefore war!" - that's another scenario. The 2003 war was not based on false flag, more along the lines of misrepresentation of information.

Sometimes it can be shady, as I believe the gulf of Tonkin was a sketchy one. There was an incident between US and Vietnamese ships, but later, during a second encounter, the US knew it was unlikely there were Vietnamese ships (just misleading radar signature) but used it anyways as justification for escalation.

But consider that this is just populism anyhow - the 'good' reasons for conflict, are often at odds with the 'populist' reasons for war. WW2 being possibly a good example: it might have been much better for everyone were the Americans to be involved much earlier ... but the public was not down with it until Pearl Harbour.

Consider for a moment if there was no attack on Pearl Harbour. Consider if the Germans did not have to pull resources from the Russian front to fight in Italy, Africa and then France ... my gosh man that would re-shape world history.

As for Assange, I don't believe his leaks represent quite the malicious acting by the US that some believe, although maybe they are important, moreover, I understand that he has very serious character flaws - this from his relationships with his own allies at the Guardian and Spiegel etc. and his recent involvement with the Russians.

Re: The US Is Preparing to Prosecute Julian Assange

#222

Post by monocasa »

hnmonkey wrote: post #219
monocasa wrote: post #212

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you really questioning the idea that the Secretary of State had a hand in approving a CIA-led assassination mission when there's literally pictures of her watching it go down?

I never said that I questioned that in the slightest. Not sure where you get that at all. I did however basically say that she did not send the team to get him. That's what a President signs off on and military leaders plan.

>> Very interesting. Because she was in the room that meant she sent the team to kill Bin Laden?

> I never said that I questioned that in the slightest. Not sure where you get that at all.

You literally just questioned that.

And it was a CIA-led, ie. civilian led, operation, not a military-led one.

Re: The US Is Preparing to Prosecute Julian Assange

#224

Post by topmonk »

hnmonkey wrote: post #178
buboard wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even if he is partial to putin, his work benefits the world by pushing others to do the same. I 'd rather live in a world where governments compete to expose each other's secret than one in which they conspire to hide as many as possible from their people. That's medieval

Medieval? It's what every country has been doing forever. Every spy agency on earth does this and has done this since their inception. It's practically their MO. So... you do live in that world.

> Every spy agency on earth does this and has done this since their inception.

They don't expose the information. They keep it and use it for themselves.

Even if Assange is a Russian agent, I'd rather have him exposing things that go on than not. If he refuses to publish dirt on Russia, the leaker can go to someone else.

By making an example of him, you're just giving governments of the world more control. I can't see how you can defend this position.

Re: The US Is Preparing to Prosecute Julian Assange

#225

Post by tibyat »

hnmonkey wrote: post #112
resters wrote: post #64

By doing this the US is coming to the aid of the many dictators and despots whose crimes Assange has helped reveal. Also, by ignoring the crimes revealed by the Iraq and Afghanistan war logs, the US makes it very clear that war-making cronies rule both parties and would never hold each other accountable for anything. To be clear, the war logs revealed that the US classified information solely because it revealed that…

While some of the things that were exposed were certainly illegal and should be handled as such, it's hard to feel any empathy for a guy who is essentially a Russian asset. If you think of him as an extension of Russian military intelligence conducting propaganda wars against its adversaries then it becomes a lot easier to understand why prosecuting him is a genuinely good thing. Russia airing the dirty laundry of ot…

really? with no source whatsoever?

Re: The US Is Preparing to Prosecute Julian Assange

#226

Post by hnmonkey »

monocasa wrote: post #222
hnmonkey wrote: post #219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I never said that I questioned that in the slightest. Not sure where you get that at all. I did however basically say that she did not send the team to get him. That's what a President signs off on and military leaders plan.

>> Very interesting. Because she was in the room that meant she sent the team to kill Bin Laden? > I never said that I questioned that in the slightest. Not sure where you get that at all. You literally just questioned that. And it was a CIA-led, ie. civilian led, operation, not a military-led one.

The military explicitly played a critical role in planning, leading, and executing this.

From: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Osama_bin_Laden#Opera...

U.S. Naval Special Warfare Development Group (DEVGRU) and at least 6 members from JSOC planned it in coordination with the CIA.

Re: The US Is Preparing to Prosecute Julian Assange

#227

Post by consumer451 »

buboard wrote: post #220
consumer451 wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are responding to textbook whataboutism, aka “tu quoque logical fallacy.” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whataboutism

Not everything is whataboutism. The parent is making a propositional fallacy in the form of a question "If A then B. B therefore A" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Affirming_the_consequent

This is a fair and logical argument. However, in this context, I would still like to know the what the grand parent was referring to when they mentioned “war crimes.”

Btw, personal opinion: I am completely biased against Assange given his lack of openess against everyone but the Democratic Party. I used to think he was one of my heroes, now I think that he is just someone trying to save his own skin. His actions and reading his AMA’s on Reddit really changed my opinion regarding the idea that he might be an unbiased arbiter of truth. Assange is no Snowden.

Re: The US Is Preparing to Prosecute Julian Assange

#228

Post by curioussavage »

darawk wrote: post #199
stavros wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Whataboutism is when an argument is presented with a counterargument of hypocrisy, ie literally what the person replying to me was doing. The argument was "the US leaders are protecting themselves by extraditing Assange, who uncovered their crimes", and the reply was "but Assange is a Russian asset, so he's not so great either". Asset or not, the crimes were still committed, and the people who committed them are stil…

> The argument was "the US leaders are protecting themselves by extraditing Assange, who uncovered their crimes" No...they are not protecting themselves. Their crimes have already been exposed. They are prosecuting someone for something that was criminal. > who uncovered their crimes", and the reply was "but Assange is a Russian asset, so he's not so great either". Asset or not, the crimes were still committed, and t…

No, it’s about getting revenge for exposing them and sending a message.

Re: The US Is Preparing to Prosecute Julian Assange

#229

Post by elliekelly »

random314 wrote: post #135
elliekelly wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I didn't say the emails were fake. I said they were altered. The metadata, specifically. According to the NY Times they were alter to make it look like they were downloaded directly from a computer in the U.S. and to change the date the documents were obtained. And publishing false information is not illegal. Knowingly aiding a foreign government in their efforts to undermine an election is treason.

> Knowingly aiding a foreign government in their efforts to undermine an election is treason. Assange is not a US citizen.

I don't believe citizenship is a requirement to be convicted of treason. There are a lot of members of the U.S. military who are not citizens. Surely they would be guilty of treason if they divulged secrets or aided a foreign country. People with green cards as well. Not that either of those situations apply to Assange.

I've definitely read several news articles that say he stands accused of both treason and espionage, though. I do wonder how that works for a foreigner. Has he ever even been to the United States?

Re: The US Is Preparing to Prosecute Julian Assange

#230

Post by monocasa »

midniteslayr wrote: post #34
boomboomsubban wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, they are a news organization. Covering the election is what a news organization should do, and it's hard to argue the Clinton emails weren't newsworthy. >They have been to be a known tool for the Russian government, even going as far as creating a show for Julian Assange on the state-backed RT TV Network This is untrue. There is nothing suggesting that Wikileaks has knowingly coordinated with Russia. And that TV…

If they are a news organization, they do a terrible job of reporting the news. They are a black box repository for leaked data. They were once a great resource for info hackers and leakers to push their data, like back in 2008/2009. But that was before news organizations started using their own secure drop servers for sources. Once WikiLeaks sources started to not go to them, they started to look for other benefactor…

Was Ellsberg a terrible reporter since he managed to get the entirety of the Pentagon Papers (~4k pages) publicly released?
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