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Julian Assange urges US to end Wikileaks 'witch-hunt'

bbc.co.uk

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Re: Julian Assange urges US to end Wikileaks 'witch-hunt'

#61

Post by icebraining »

alayne wrote: post #57
_b8r0 wrote: post #53

I'm surprised no-one's pointed out the irony of a man locked up in a building in order to stop him from being locked up in a building. Seriously though, lets try to look at this objectively. We have a man who is wanted for questioning relating to sexual offences and is actively trying to escape the charges. In any normal situation, we would all say that he should go and face the courts and if guilty do the time. Pro-…

You say you want to look at it objectively and then right away you claim he is "actively trying to escape the charges." The Assange side has only ever claimed they were concerned with due process. I think most people would agree that without due process there is no proper justice. Sweden won't guarantee that it will not extradite Assange to the U.S. If this is about justice for the rape charges, then why can't they m…

Playing Devil's advocate, Sweden has treaties with the U.S. about extradition; is it reasonable for a country to suspend them because a suspect demands so?

Re: Julian Assange urges US to end Wikileaks 'witch-hunt'

#62

Post by _wp3r »

cletus wrote: post #51

A lot of the questions and opinions about Assange came up when Ecuador granted him asylum (eg [1]) as I'm sure they come up every time Wikileaks or Assange makes the news. I just can't escape the opinion that something about Assange is just off . Don't get me wrong: something is very strange about the way Swedish prosecutors are acting. But think about this: if these charges were exactly what they appeared to be and…

I do not see the point in actively chasing a pawn. Assange was nothing more than a middle man for the crimes committed. Other than putting charges against him in the US as an administrative posture, I do not see the justification for the loss of any political currency in getting him extradited. He is simply not worth it. There is no public opinion win for the the US government in that play, except for maybe we got the guy there were charges against. He has no access to anything. He is no different to a person looking to leak information, than a non-US news agency. It would also make him a martyr which is worse than a publisher.

edit to remove thread hijack cause

Re: Julian Assange urges US to end Wikileaks 'witch-hunt'

#63

Post by Tycho »

magoon wrote: post #59
cletus wrote: post #51

A lot of the questions and opinions about Assange came up when Ecuador granted him asylum (eg [1]) as I'm sure they come up every time Wikileaks or Assange makes the news. I just can't escape the opinion that something about Assange is just off . Don't get me wrong: something is very strange about the way Swedish prosecutors are acting. But think about this: if these charges were exactly what they appeared to be and…

> I also find the idea that you can prosecute someone with espionage (most likely) for what is essentially journalism very disturbing. Is it journalism? I never saw a story when I read the leaks; it seems that their purpose has been to disclose private (stolen) conversations that are obviously state secrets. Update: I'm backing away from this; my only intention was to ask whether it would make anybody a "journalist"…

Well in the era of Watergate it wasn't like dumping the information onto bit-torrent was a viable option for the investigative journalists. They had to write it up in article form just to communicate their findings.

Re: Julian Assange urges US to end Wikileaks 'witch-hunt'

#64

Post by trevelyan »

magoon wrote: post #59
cletus wrote: post #51

A lot of the questions and opinions about Assange came up when Ecuador granted him asylum (eg [1]) as I'm sure they come up every time Wikileaks or Assange makes the news. I just can't escape the opinion that something about Assange is just off . Don't get me wrong: something is very strange about the way Swedish prosecutors are acting. But think about this: if these charges were exactly what they appeared to be and…

> I also find the idea that you can prosecute someone with espionage (most likely) for what is essentially journalism very disturbing. Is it journalism? I never saw a story when I read the leaks; it seems that their purpose has been to disclose private (stolen) conversations that are obviously state secrets. Update: I'm backing away from this; my only intention was to ask whether it would make anybody a "journalist"…

There is no copyright on government documents. Once you know something it is no longer a secret by definition and you are free to discuss and report on it. It seems with Wikileaks that this is no longer the case, making this a stunning attack on freedom of the press and freedom of speech.

If you want to get uptight about the security implications of the leaks, a better place to start is wondering who setup the system that allegedly allowed a mentally unbalanced soldier to carry evidence of war crimes and private diplomatic correspondence out of a military facility on a USB key. Assuming it was Manning who leaked the information AND it constituted any real security threat, it seems clear he should never have had access to that sort of material.

Re: Julian Assange urges US to end Wikileaks 'witch-hunt'

#65

Post by uvdiv »

gasull wrote: post #12
smokeyj wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I highly suspect Assange is actually just trying to avoid jail time, if he's going to these lengths to avoid going to Sweden for questioning on unrelated accusations of sex crime. He offered to be interviewed from the embassy. Isn't it suspicious that Sweden won't accept that, given that this man hasn't been charged with anything?

This is something to remember: Assange hasn't been charged of anything yet, and still Interpol issued a red notice against him (while not even Gaddafi had a red one). Something smells fishy here.

Where is this meme from? Most Interpol notices are red (3 out of 4). The color codes are not a ranking of severity.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interpol_notice#Notice_types

http://www.interpol.int/fr/Expertise/Notices

(while not even Gaddafi had a red one)

Under what nation's police jurisdiction? Gaddafi was a head of state! (Although Interpol did issue a red notice at one point, at the request of the ICC...

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/africa/2011/09/201199949503933...

Re: Julian Assange urges US to end Wikileaks 'witch-hunt'

#66

Post by Tycho »

icebraining wrote: post #61
alayne wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You say you want to look at it objectively and then right away you claim he is "actively trying to escape the charges." The Assange side has only ever claimed they were concerned with due process. I think most people would agree that without due process there is no proper justice. Sweden won't guarantee that it will not extradite Assange to the U.S. If this is about justice for the rape charges, then why can't they m…

Playing Devil's advocate, Sweden has treaties with the U.S. about extradition; is it reasonable for a country to suspend them because a suspect demands so?

It would be reasonable for all parties to be transparent with respect to what they plan to do re:extradition.

Re: Julian Assange urges US to end Wikileaks 'witch-hunt'

#68

Post by magoon »

trevelyan wrote: post #64
magoon wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I also find the idea that you can prosecute someone with espionage (most likely) for what is essentially journalism very disturbing. Is it journalism? I never saw a story when I read the leaks; it seems that their purpose has been to disclose private (stolen) conversations that are obviously state secrets. Update: I'm backing away from this; my only intention was to ask whether it would make anybody a "journalist"…

There is no copyright on government documents. Once you know something it is no longer a secret by definition and you are free to discuss and report on it. It seems with Wikileaks that this is no longer the case, making this a stunning attack on freedom of the press and freedom of speech. If you want to get uptight about the security implications of the leaks, a better place to start is wondering who setup the system…

Now I'm uptight?

I raise a valid point -- journalists don't capture and disseminate private conversations, they report. I have never seen a journalistic article from Wikileaks, much as I have never seen a journalist simply distribute a bunch of private conversations with no story.

Re: Julian Assange urges US to end Wikileaks 'witch-hunt'

#69

Post by kungfooguru »

_wp3r wrote: post #62
cletus wrote: post #51

A lot of the questions and opinions about Assange came up when Ecuador granted him asylum (eg [1]) as I'm sure they come up every time Wikileaks or Assange makes the news. I just can't escape the opinion that something about Assange is just off . Don't get me wrong: something is very strange about the way Swedish prosecutors are acting. But think about this: if these charges were exactly what they appeared to be and…

I do not see the point in actively chasing a pawn. Assange was nothing more than a middle man for the crimes committed. Other than putting charges against him in the US as an administrative posture, I do not see the justification for the loss of any political currency in getting him extradited. He is simply not worth it. There is no public opinion win for the the US government in that play, except for maybe we got th…

Umm, what? Who was this attacker? I assume you simply mean an attack happened due to finding out the abuses committed by the US government. As opposed to what you seem to try to imply that the leaks themselves put someone in danger.

The truth didn't kill anyone. Those who committed the acts and gave the orders that became the truth that had to be leaked did.

Re: Julian Assange urges US to end Wikileaks 'witch-hunt'

#70

Post by orbitingpluto »

magoon wrote: post #59
cletus wrote: post #51

A lot of the questions and opinions about Assange came up when Ecuador granted him asylum (eg [1]) as I'm sure they come up every time Wikileaks or Assange makes the news. I just can't escape the opinion that something about Assange is just off . Don't get me wrong: something is very strange about the way Swedish prosecutors are acting. But think about this: if these charges were exactly what they appeared to be and…

> I also find the idea that you can prosecute someone with espionage (most likely) for what is essentially journalism very disturbing. Is it journalism? I never saw a story when I read the leaks; it seems that their purpose has been to disclose private (stolen) conversations that are obviously state secrets. Update: I'm backing away from this; my only intention was to ask whether it would make anybody a "journalist"…

I would say yes.

Journalism is supposed to guide you to readily available and verifiable facts whenever possible. The journalist gives you insight into an event. One is then able to leapfrog the initial hurdle of that initial research and more easily educate yourself about the world you live in.

Without facts and sources, it's just storytime.

EDIT: More importantly, you can't divorce journalistic research from journalism itself.

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