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USA vs. Julian Assange Judgment

judiciary.uk

411–420 of 646 posts

Re: USA vs. Julian Assange Judgment

#411
post #406

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Wikileaks is not a journalistic organisation because it lacks the editorial expertise, ethics, and resources essential to carry out responsible journalism. There's (luckily) no exams (yet) for what makes a journalist. Someone who has a blog is no less a journalist than anyone at a national newspaper. > They have to rely on real newspapers or the pentagon (!) to do it for them. It’s no defence to say: we tried to ge…

> it shows WikiLeaks had the intention to redact No, it shows that Wikileaks can be just as disingenuous as any other "journalistic" organization. Wikileaks made a request to the US government that it had to know the US government would refuse (for the reason I gave in my other post in response to you upthread). It did that so it could disingenuously claim that it gave the US government a chance to protect people's n…

> Wikileaks made a request to the US government that it had to know the US government would refuse (for the reason I gave in my other post in response to you upthread). It did that so it could disingenuously claim that it gave the US government a chance to protect people's names and the US government refused, making it seem like it's the US government's fault

It's the U.S. government who committed war crimes here and used secrecy to conceal their crimes. Of course it's the U.S. government's fault. The option to not commit war crimes and use the secrets act to conceal it was there. They didn't take it.

The U.S. Government proved it will use 'top secret' to hide not only information that is actually top secret but also information that is embarrassing. This would be a pretty clear motivator for the Pentagon not to respond and for WikiLeaks to go ahead with the publication.

> Wikileaks could have published that information without publishing anyone's name.

No. Names as such are vital. It lets you know WHO needs to be held accountable. Most leaks are published with names in them. There are names that the U.S. government could have suggested (not demand) to be redacted and WikiLeaks could have agreed to either some or all of the requests. They refused to cooperate. It's pretty clearly on them.

I also love how the people exposing war crimes are getting more heat that the actual war criminals who never spent a day behind bars. Speaks volumes.

Re: USA vs. Julian Assange Judgment

#412
post #405

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except of course she fails to note that Assange tried[1] to do that and was rejected. She cites the Guardian who has a history of questionable reporting on Assange and WikiLeaks because they didn't do a good job[1][2]. In fact WikiLeaks made a point of going via the newspapers after being blamed. 1 - https://www.salon.com/2010/08/20/wikileaks_5 2 - https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-51633303

> Assange tried to do that and was rejected. Assange tried (at least he claims he tried) to get the US government to help him remove names that it felt should not be released. The US government refused. Which is perfectly understandable: why should the US government tell Wikileaks exactly which names in some leaked documents are the names of actual US government informants? That would be stupid. Assange then chose to…

He was right to publish it, I as a non-American care less about US operatives than about knowing the truth, esp. considering what was revealed. We're talking about people who were complicit in the organization that claimed there were WMDs in Iraq, among other bs.

Re: USA vs. Julian Assange Judgment

#413

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did Julian Assange commit his alleged crimes while in the US? This scenario is more like person who's never left B gets shipped off to C because he said something C didn't like.

You don't need to be in a country to commit crimes in that country. A lot of financial crime wouldn't be a prosecuted in that case.

A lot of financial crime does not get prosecuted

Re: USA vs. Julian Assange Judgment

#414
post #407

If there's anything to learn from Assange and Snowden: 1. Our western "liberal" democracies stop being liberal when the government gets angry at you at a personal level. 2. With enough propaganda, you can make people believe anything, even that Snowden is a "traitor" to the US. 3. Politically vociferous people (the mob) don't give a shit about you unless you're instrumental to support the cause du jour

> Our western "liberal" democracies stop being liberal when the government gets angry at you at a personal level. That's a fairly weak observation both because liberal democracies still punish criminals and many people do take serious issue with what Assange is and has done - it's just not a common thing to say on hackernews.

> it's just not a common thing to say on hackernews.

It's a heavily penalized sentiment in this portion of the internet.

Re: USA vs. Julian Assange Judgment

#415
post #239

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are we sure that Assange is better off in the UK? Reports from other sources suggest he is being kept in terrible conditions in UK as well. https://www.telesurenglish.net/news/julian-assange-is-kept-u... >> "Each day Julian is woken at 5 am, handcuffed, put in holding cells, stripped naked, and x-rayed. He is transported 1.5 hours each way in what feels like a vertical coffin in a claustrophobic van,” Morris said. >>…

on what charges is he being held in the UK?

For skipping bail

Re: USA vs. Julian Assange Judgment

#416

Earlier quoted context omitted.

on what charges is he being held in the UK?

Arrested in 2019 when his Ecuadorian asylum was revoked, charged with conspiracy to commit computer intrusion, maximum 5y sentence. Was changed a month later to be the Espionage Act charges. Those all stem from the US though, I think he's only detained by the UK for extradition? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indictment_and_arrest_of_Julia...

Yes. We prosecuted him for jumping bail by going to the embassy, but he's served his sentence for that. He's only being held for possible extradition.

Re: USA vs. Julian Assange Judgment

#417

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It doesn't matter what you think is investigative journalism. What Assange did is investigative journalism... as proven by Bellingcat, that literally bought private phone, flight, bank and train ticket data on private individuals to show how FSB tried to kill Navalny.

well bellingcat went (and still goes) looking for information, sources and then publishes article on those stories, which is not exactly what Assange did, which was mostly making confidential documents (sent by a variety of sources) available to the wider public

Assange first provided the cables to newspapers like The Guardian, Der Spiegel and El Pais, so that they could write articles about them. After they had had time to work through the material and write up a series of articles, WikiLeaks published redacted versions of the cables.

Re: USA vs. Julian Assange Judgment

#418
post #405

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except of course she fails to note that Assange tried[1] to do that and was rejected. She cites the Guardian who has a history of questionable reporting on Assange and WikiLeaks because they didn't do a good job[1][2]. In fact WikiLeaks made a point of going via the newspapers after being blamed. 1 - https://www.salon.com/2010/08/20/wikileaks_5 2 - https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-51633303

> Assange tried to do that and was rejected. Assange tried (at least he claims he tried) to get the US government to help him remove names that it felt should not be released. The US government refused. Which is perfectly understandable: why should the US government tell Wikileaks exactly which names in some leaked documents are the names of actual US government informants? That would be stupid. Assange then chose to…

> Assange tried (at least he claims he tried) to get the US government to help him remove names that it felt should not be released. The US government refused. Which is perfectly understandable: why should the US government tell Wikileaks exactly which names in some leaked documents are the names of actual US government informants? That would be stupid.

If that's stupid then complaining asking him to redact names without telling him which ones is even more stupid and gives the U.S. no right to complain. Especially when top secret is used to conceal war crimes.

> Assange then chose to release all the material anyway

Not publishing war crimes because those who commited them refuse to cooperate in redacting names would be a great way for the Pentagon to make sure their crimes stay hidden. In fact it appears that was their goal in not cooperating.

> Newspapers, in the same position, did not publish the names.

Newspapers were NOT in the same position. They published the leaks but Pentagon started cooperating with them by then.

It's remarkable that people exposing war criminals get more blame that actual war criminals who did not face any consequences and laughed about while murdering civilians including journalists.

Re: USA vs. Julian Assange Judgment

#419

If there's anything to learn from Assange and Snowden: 1. Our western "liberal" democracies stop being liberal when the government gets angry at you at a personal level. 2. With enough propaganda, you can make people believe anything, even that Snowden is a "traitor" to the US. 3. Politically vociferous people (the mob) don't give a shit about you unless you're instrumental to support the cause du jour

> Our western "liberal" democracies

....are by far not all like the United States.

Re: USA vs. Julian Assange Judgment

#420
post #306

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>dump his body in the ocean Yeah that's a bit crazy if you ask me.

Crazy? That's literally what they did. https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2011/05/osama-bin-laden-...

The post was claiming that the raid never happened and articles like the one you read are propaganda.
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