And since the US are not part of the ICC, the only thing that actually matters here is the viewpoint of the US department of Justice. People may not like it but that's the reality, the US aren't full participants to the International criminal justice system and they don't hide itI'm not in any moral sense, but they are both non-state actors who got on the wrong side of US law. And since neither are representatives of countries, the US can use whatever intentional leverage it has (which is considerable) to bring them to justice,.
That's not how the system works. International law is generally only applicable to nations outside the security council. Those within it, can simply ignore it when it suits them, with no repercussions. There is no such thing as a world government with an ability to enforce international law on all nations.
Its an organization that doesn't represent a nation, but is simultaneously taking on governments, which means they will view it as such - especially given the geopolitical nature of information published.If I recall it was Pompeo who described WL as a non-state actor. I take a different view, surprisingly.
assange published documents which had the same public interest value in 2010 and 2011 as those published by Ellsberg in 1971. what chance does he have for a fair trial in the US? slim to none. he's been held in maximum security prison on zero charges in the UK which is a scandal in itself. they could easily have placed him on remand and house arrest. the point is that this is political and anyone saying otherwise is lying to themselves.Mr Albanese - a signatory to the Bring Julian Assange Home Campaign petition - last year said the 50-year-old should be freed.
"Enough is enough," he said at a party room meeting.
"I don't have sympathy for many of his actions but essentially I can't see what is served by keeping him incarcerated."
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-australia-61727941
Good point. US institutions are often more powerful than international ones. The U.S. Federal Reserve, for instance, has been called the world's most powerful international organization because of the profound knock on effects Fed policy has on international markets. DOJ also has significant international reach - think of when they publicly slapped Sepp Blatter around a few years ago.And since the US are part of the ICC, the only thing that actually matters here is the viewpoint of the US department of Justice. People may not like it but that's the reality, the US aren't full participants to the International criminal justice system and they don't hide it
The way I see it it was an attempt at actual journalism, which in meaningful democratic society is meant to hold power to account. It was roundly savaged. Even by the ego-driven NGO world, surprise surprise.Its an organization that doesn't represent a nation, but is simultaneously taking on governments, which means they will view it as such - especially given the geopolitical nature of information published.
If it was journalism he would've done what I suggested in an earlier post - expose the issue accompanied by a video through a newspaper/magazine article. The fact that he decided to create a sensational daily drip of every document he had, took himself out of the journalism category and into one where he would face serious scrutiny for facilitating the hacking of US classified systems. Had he just used the video, I think he would be walking around a free man.The way I see it it was an attempt at actual journalism, which in meaningful democratic society is meant to hold power to account. It was roundly savaged. Even by the ego-driven NGO world, surprise surprise.
that's exactly what the Guardian and Spiegal did with the NYT with Snowden's documents. They won awards for it, jointly. They used the same staggered release system that Assange did.If it was journalism he would've done what I suggested in an earlier post - expose the issue accompanied by a video through a newspaper/magazine article. The fact that he decided to create a sensational daily drip of every document he had, took himself out of the journalism category and into one where he would face serious scrutiny for facilitating the hacking of US classified systems. Had he just used the video, I think he would be walking around a free man.
Did they help Snowden hack government systems as well ?that's exactly what the Guardian and Spiegal did with the NYT with Snowden's documents. They won awards for it, jointly. They used the same staggered release system that Assange did.
no, but neither did Assange. the conversation cited with Manning is not "helping" to hack government systems. but let's say he did, for the sake of argument. Ellsberg "hacked" the Pentagon and published the material. He was also involved in the release of the 2010 documents as he notes himself. it's about the public interest value being greater than the initial harm. people who don't defend that are lost.Did they help Snowden hack government systems as well ?
That's the scrutiny Assange will face when he comes to the US. If he in any way provided tips to Manning on how to obtain the information, how to bypass security protocols, how to get it out of secure facilities, or any combination thereof, then he will meet the threshold for helping to hack. It wouldn't matter where Assange was located at the time. On the other hand, if Assange did nothing at all and Manning did everything by himself, then he should have little to worry about.no, but neither did Assange. the conversation cited with Manning is not "helping" to hack government systems. but let's say he did, for the sake of argument. Ellsberg "hacked" the Pentagon and published the material. He was also involved in the release of the 2010 documents as he notes himself. it's about the public interest value being greater than the initial harm. people who don't defend that are lost.
And as Ellsberg and others have been at pains to say, being charged under the Espionage Act means there is no public interest defense available.no, but neither did Assange. the conversation cited with Manning is not "helping" to hack government systems. but let's say he did, for the sake of argument. Ellsberg "hacked" the Pentagon and published the material. He was also involved in the release of the 2010 documents as he notes himself. it's about the public interest value being greater than the initial harm. people who don't defend that are lost.
exactly. it amounts to "we want to put you on trial in conditions where you cannot defend yourself with your only valid defense, which is public interest". it isn't possible for a judge to find him not guilty if the public interest value cannot be introduced which is the case under the EA. it's a sham.And as Ellsberg and others have been at pains to say, being charged under the Espionage Act means there is no public interest defense available.
These are all things he should've considered before embarking on his Wikileaks project. If he applied a bit more careful thought in terms of repercussions and how to go about publishing information, then he wouldn't be in the predicament he's in.exactly. it amounts to "we want to put you on trial in conditions where you cannot defend yourself with your only valid defense, which is public interest". it isn't possible for a judge to find him not guilty if the public interest value cannot be introduced which is the case under the EA. it's a sham.
but this kind of argument only serves to invalidate investigative journalism and publishing which relies on whistleblowers. what Assange did in 2010 and 2011 was of great value to the world in general. I don't see how anyone can argue the opposite and seriously believe it whatever their opinion of Assange personally. you have to then side with the US against Ellsberg, against Snowden, against every former and potential whistleblower in the same class.These are all things he should've considered before embarking on his Wikileaks project. If he applied a bit more careful thought in terms of repercussions and how to go about publishing information, then he wouldn't be in the predicament he's in.
I'm not outraged at assange leaking stuff I'm glad. I'm just saying, by law, this isn't something really surprising or newHow dare someone expose the fact that America is committing far crimes and spying on not only their own citizens but also other world leaders.
Shows their governments, and those who support this extradition, mentality that rather than being outraged at these crimes and holding those responsible accountable, they're going after the person who exposed this. It's like if someone leaks sexual harassment going on at a company, the company fires that person rather than doing anything about the sexual harassment going on.
You should similarly be outraged at the people who hacked and leaked the Panama papers then.
I think that it would severely impugn his credibility if it were revealed he's been collaborating with Russian intelligence on the publishing of DNC information; ostensibly becoming an agent of the Russian government to attack the US (thereby helping to facilitate a Trump victory 2016)The only thing I will say is that Assange became nothing but a man on a crusade against the US while he has stopped publishing about evils from other countries not aligned with the West long ago. If you were to publish wrongdoings from everyone, you don't pick sides. Instead, he made a deal with the devil and went on to sell shit from and for the Kremlin.
I think it would be the end of him should that part be revealed as evidence in court. His own credibility was already shot when he supposedly was about to release a ton of dirt on the Syrian government in the context of the civil war only for that bit to never be published for whatever reason. I guess the Kremlin had something to do with it, and I remember reading somewhere that former Wikileaks contributors disagreed really hard with Assange regarding the unreleased bit of Syrian dirt.I think that it would severely impugn his credibility if it were revealed he's been collaborating with Russian intelligence on the publishing of DNC information; ostensibly becoming an agent of the Russian government to attack the US (thereby helping to facilitate a Trump victory 2016)
https://consortiumnews.com/2022/07/25/john-kiriakou-the-whistleblower-crackdown/National Whistleblower Week is a call to action on behalf of Julian Assange, who marks a new extreme in a series of legal reprisals that have gotten more draconian since Kiriakou’s own national-security case in 2012.
This is National Whistleblower Week, with Saturday marking National Whistleblower Appreciation Day. The National Whistleblower Center in Washington has its annual lunch, seminar and associated events scheduled. Whistleblowers from around the U.S. attend, a couple members of Congress usually show up and we talk about how important it is to speak truth to power.
I’ve been attending these events for much of the past decade. But I’m not sanguine about where our efforts stand, especially on behalf of national security whistleblowers. Since I blew the whistle on the C.I.A.’s torture program in 2007 and was prosecuted for it in 2012, I think the situation for whistleblowers has grown far worse.
In 2012, when I took a plea to violating the Intelligence Identities Protection Act of 1982 for confirming the name of a former C.I.A. colleague to a reporter who never made the name public, I was sentenced to 30 months in a federal prison.
In 2015, former C.I.A. officer Jeffrey Sterling, who blew the whistle on racial discrimination at the agency, was sentenced to what Judge Leonie Brinkema called “Kiriakou plus 12 months,” because I had taken a plea and Jeffrey had had the unmitigated gall to go to trial to prove his innocence. So, he ended up with 42 months in prison.
Things just got worse from there.
The prosecutors of drone whistleblower Daniel Hale asked Judge Liam O’Grady to sentence him to 20 years in prison. O’Grady instead gave Hale 46 months. But to spite him, and to show prosecutors’ anger with the sentence, the Justice Department ignored the judge’s recommendation that Hale be sent to a low-security hospital facility in Butner, North Carolina, and instead incarcerated him in the supermax facility in Marion, Illinois, with no treatment for his debilitating post-traumatic stress disorder.
I was in the courtroom during Hale’s sentencing. When prosecutors asked for the draconian sentence, Hale’s attorneys cited my sentence of 30 months and Sterling’s 42 months. Prosecutors retorted that they had “made a mistake with Kiriakou. His sentence was far too short.”
It was clear that since my own case, the Justice Department’s ongoing prosecutions of national security whistleblowers wasn’t discouraging people from going public with evidence of waste, fraud, abuse, or illegality in the intelligence community. Perhaps, they thought, tougher sentences would do it. Don’t count on it, I say.
In the meantime, I ran into another national security whistleblower at an event recently. He told me that the F.B.I. had recently paid him a visit. I chuckled and said, “Because you’re so close to them and they’ve been so kind to you?”
We laughed for a moment, but he was serious. He is still on probation and the F.B.I. offered to get that probation lifted if he would tell them anything and everything he knows about Julian Assange and Ed Snowden. He told them that he speaks through his attorney and wanted no further contact with them. His attorney told the F.B.I. that his client had nothing to say, would tell them nothing about Assange or Snowden even if he knew something and to not contact his client again. They haven’t.
The Assange Nightmare
If you’re reading this, you’ve likely followed the nightmare that Julian Assange has been experiencing for years now. He could be extradited to the United States by next year and he faces more than a lifetime in prison. That’s the Justice Department’s goal — that Assange die in a U.S. prison. Ed Snowden likely faces the same fate if he were to find his way back to the U.S.
In order to try to smooth the path for Assange’s extradition, prosecutors have promised British authorities that Assange would not be placed in a Communications Management Unit or a Special Administrative Unit, where his access to the outside world would be practically nil.
They’ve also promised that he would not be placed in solitary confinement.
But that’s all nonsense. It’s a lie. Prosecutors have literally no say in where a prisoner is placed. It’s not up to the judge and it’s not up to the prosecutors. Placement is solely at the discretion of the Bureau of Prisons (on recommendation from the C.I.A., which spied on Assange and his lawyers) and they haven’t made any promises to anybody.
Belmarsh Prison in London is awful. But Supermax Marion, Supermax Florence, USP Springfield, USP Leavenworth, USP Lewisburg and any of the other American hell-holes where Assange and other whistleblowers are and can be placed would be worse.
Though it’s National Whistleblower Week, we can’t pause to celebrate. We can’t bask in minor successes. We have to keep up the fight because that’s what the Justice Department is doing.
John Kiriakou is a former C.I.A. counterterrorism officer and a former senior investigator with the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. John became the sixth whistleblower indicted by the Obama administration under the Espionage Act—a law designed to punish spies. He served 23 months in prison as a result of his attempts to oppose the Bush administration’s torture program
does the fact that there's no proof of that and that all the people within the journalistic and whistleblowing as well as human rights communities oppose the extradition not bother you at all or do you just make tough sounding comments based on received information you cannot possibly have verified?Got in bed with Russia and paid the price, export him already. Journalist my arse.
Seems plainly obvious to me, so no it doesn't bother. He's a hacker who conducted espionage against a specific country on behalf of another, hiding under the guise of journalism/whistleblowing.does the fact that there's no proof of that and that all the people within the journalistic and whistleblowing as well as human rights communities oppose the extradition not bother you at all or do you just make tough sounding comments based on received information you cannot possibly have verified?
it's that part that there's no evidence for. it's also not what he's charged withSeems plainly obvious to me, so no it doesn't bother. He's a hacker who conducted espionage against a specific country on behalf of another, hiding under the guise of journalism/whistleblowing.
It would come out when he's on trial in the US since they will throw everything they can at him, which means everything from the Manning data dump through intercepts of his interactions with Russian GRU during the Trump campaign.does the fact that there's no proof of that and that all the people within the journalistic and whistleblowing as well as human rights communities oppose the extradition not bother you at all or do you just make tough sounding comments based on received information you cannot possibly have verified?
it's going to be a rigged trial if he's extradicted. no one in the states especially within the intel or political communities are interested in seeing justice done here. it really has nothing to do with justice. anyway, i don't think they can prove that wikileaks received any info from the gru and definitely not knowingly. but suppose they can prove there was direct assange-gru interaction, it will be assange-dcleaks not gru because the russians weren't telling people they were russian spies.It would come out when he's on trial in the US since they will throw everything they can at him, which means everything from the Manning data dump through intercepts of his interactions with Russian GRU during the Trump campaign.
It would only be rigged if you go into it thinking he's innocent no matter the evidence. There will be plenty of evidence that has been accrued over the years, which will guide the outcome.it's going to be a rigged trial if he's extradicted. no one in the states especially within the intel or political communities are interested in seeing justice done here. it really has nothing to do with justice. anyway, i don't think they can prove that wikileaks received any info from the gru and definitely not knowingly. but suppose they can prove there was direct assange-gru interaction, it will be assange-dcleaks not gru because the russians weren't telling people they were russian spies.
i can see the argument which says "if he's innocent then let him stand trial" and i don't agree with it for many reasons but the main one is that even if he's innocent he can still be found guilty under the espionage act which doesn't allow for him to make public interest defense among other things. take that away and there is no defense.
i don't think assange knowingly conspired with the russians at any point. and it isn't because i don't think he'd be open to the data but because i do think he's too intelligent to act knowingly on behalf of a state against a state which amounts to something other than whistleblowing and destroys all wikileaks credibility.It would only be rigged if you go into it thinking he's innocent no matter the evidence. There will be plenty of evidence that has been accrued over the years, which will guide the outcome.
That's why they have trials - to see what's legit and what isn't.i don't think assange knowingly conspired with the russians at any point. and it isn't because i don't think he'd be open to the data but because i do think he's too intelligent to act knowingly on behalf of a state against a state which amounts to something other than whistleblowing and destroys all wikileaks credibility.
https://consortiumnews.com/2019/04/18/the-guccifer-2-0-gaps-in-muellers-full-report/
there's a lot of contradictory evidence surrounding the russian thing and assange. on the other one which he's actually charged with, the manning one, i don't think the us should be punishing people for blowing the whistle on warcrimes.
not these kinds of trials where all whistleblowing is basically considered a crime.That's why they have trials - to see what's legit and what isn't.
If its a crime then its not whistleblowing, its a criminal act. That's why there are legal inquiries (aka trials) to ascertain what actually happened.not these kinds of trials where all whistleblowing is basically considered a crime.
almost all substantial whistleblowing is considered a criminal act. that's because the info moves from the institution to the outside press because the whistleblower lacks confidence that the institution itself is capable of reform or self-scrutiny. that's evidently true in all major cases. that constitutes a breach of law but is understandable because it serves a far greater public interest good. but as you know, the espionage act does not allow for public interest defense. that's why this trial is not an inquiry but a prosecution. they know what happened. they just want to punish the person who told everyone else it was happening.If its a crime then its not whistleblowing, its a criminal act. That's why there are legal inquiries (aka trials) to ascertain what actually happened.
That's the risk people like Assange take on by wanting to be self-aggrandizing hackers. If he didn't want to deal with the predicament he is in now and for the rest of his life, he should've considered journalism instead.almost all substantial whistleblowing is considered a criminal act. that's because the info moves from the institution to the outside press because the whistleblower lacks confidence that the institution itself is capable of reform or self-scrutiny. that's evidently true in all major cases. that constitutes a breach of law but is understandable because it serves a far greater public interest good. but as you know, the espionage act does not allow for public interest defense. that's why this trial is not an inquiry but a prosecution. they know what happened. they just want to punish the person who told everyone else it was happening.
Cynical, naive, and/or disingenuous take.That's the risk people like Assange take on by wanting to be self-aggrandizing hackers. If he didn't want to deal with the predicament he is in now and for the rest of his life, he should've considered journalism instead.
That's the risk people like Assange take on by wanting to be self-aggrandizing hackers. If he didn't want to deal with the predicament he is in now and for the rest of his life, he should've considered journalism instead.
https://caitlinjohnstone.com/2019/04/07/assange-is-not-a-journalist-yes-he-is-idiot/As we discussed yesterday, whenever Assange is in the news and people are defending him you always see a bunch of hyper-emotional empire loyalists running around online trying to manage the narrative about him. One of the most common talking points which comes up is that Assange is “not a journalist”.
The reason this talking point comes up, of course, is because the WikiLeaks founder is besieged by powerful forces who are attempting to imprison him for publishing inconvenient facts about them, and his defenders often voice their concerns about what this means for the future of press freedoms. The completely baseless claim that Assange is “not a journalist” is used in an attempt to defuse the argument that his prosecution by the US government could lead to the same fate for any news media outlet which publishes leaks on the US government anywhere in the world. If he’s not a journalist, then his prosecution sets no precedent for real journalists.
This argument, if you can call it that, is fallacious for a number of reasons. For starters, as The Intercept‘s Glenn Greenwald explained last year, there’s not any legal distinction in the US Constitution between news media outlets like the New York Times and an outlet which solely focuses on publishing leaks. If you set the precedent with any publisher, you’re necessarily setting it for all of them. Greenwald writes the following:
Secondly, anyone with a functioning brain can see that Julian Assange is indeed a journalist. Publishing facts so that the citizenry can inform themselves about what’s going on in their world and what’s happening with their government is the thing that journalism is. Duh. The need for an informed citizenry is the entire reason why press freedoms are protected so explicitly under the US Constitution, and publishing facts about the most powerful institutions on earth indisputably does create a more informed citizenry.To begin with, the press freedom guarantee of the First Amendment isn’t confined to “legitimate news outlets” – whatever that might mean. The First Amendment isn’t available only to a certain class of people licensed as “journalists.” It protects not a privileged group of people called “professional journalists” but rather an activity: namely, using the press (which at the time of the First Amendment’s enactment meant the literal printing press) to inform the public about what the government was doing. Everyone is entitled to that constitutional protection equally: there is no cogent way to justify why the Guardian, ex-DOJ-officials-turned-bloggers, or Marcy Wheeler are free to publish classified information but Julian Assange and WikiLeaks are not.
You can look at any conventional dictionary definition of the word and come to the same conclusion. Merriam-Webster offers “the public press” and “the collection and editing of news for presentation through the media”. The Oxford English Dictionary offers “The activity or profession of writing for newspapers, magazines, or news websites or preparing news to be broadcast.” Your Dictionary offers ” the work of finding, creating, editing and publishing news, or material written and presented for a newspaper, magazine or broadcast news source.” These are activities that WikiLeaks is undeniably involved in; they collect and publish newsworthy information to be circulated by themselves and other news sources. The fact that they do their part differently (and better) than other outlets doesn’t change that.
Which explains why the WikiLeaks team has racked up numerous awards for journalism over the years, including the Walkley Award for Most Outstanding Contribution to Journalism (2011), the Martha Gellhorn Prize for Journalism (2011), the International Piero Passetti Journalism Prize of the National Union of Italian Journalists (2011), the Jose Couso Press Freedom Award (2011), the Brazillian Press Association Human Rights Award (2013), and the Kazakstan Union of Journalists Top Prize (2014).
The claim that Assange is “not a journalist” is both an irrelevant red herring and a self-evident falsehood. It is made not by people with an interest in maintaining a small and specific linguistic understanding of what the word journalism means, but by people who want to see Julian Assange imprisoned by the same government which tortured Chelsea Manning because he made them feel emotionally upset. It’s a fact-free argument made entirely in bad faith for inexcusable motives: the desire to see a journalist imprisoned for telling the truth.
Its also reality. He has always been in it for himself, as evidenced by the defections within his own ranks and claims by his former Wikileaks associates that he lost the plot. He made his bed and will have to sleep in it.Cynical, naive, and/or disingenuous take.
So being an arsehole is now punishable with torture and decades in prison? Pretty selective enforcing going on here.Its also reality. He has always been in it for himself, as evidenced by the defections within his own ranks and claims by his former Wikileaks associates that he lost the plot. He made his bed and will have to sleep in it.
He had a different path and chose not to take it. For instance, he could written a long story about a particular incident (such as the helicopter attack during the Iraq war) and publicized it along with a video backing up his article. Instead he opted for a mass dump of everything he had. Ultimately, its that which will sink him since it didn't have anything to do with the original incident and involved cyber hacking to obtain the information (ie. Assange instructing Manning on how to get information out of a system for which Manning was legally not allowed remove).https://caitlinjohnstone.com/2019/04/07/assange-is-not-a-journalist-yes-he-is-idiot/
i think he is and was a journalist. hacktivism doesn't mean you aren't a journalist as der spiegal and guardian and nyt writers will tell you.
Being a self-satisfying narcissist is simply a data point that turned many of his associates against him. Cyber hacking is the charge that will probably be his undoing.So being an arsehole is now punishable with torture and decades in prison? Pretty selective enforcing going on here.
