wikileaks

wholly quacamole.....

they are trying to really silence Assange, cut his internet access.
What's next? ruled suicide with 2 shots in the back of the head?

We live in Strange and scary times...

gyraf said:

We live in Strange and scary times...

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Agreed.

Assange's internet connection was reportedly cut by Ecuador, the embassy he is currently enjoying amnesty in. There is no doubt multiple governments would like to silence him. We don't know the full story yet.

Wikileaks reportedly has a doomsday machine to release a cache of uncensored files on BP, Gitmo, etc. His cryptic tweets the other day are reportedly a dead man's trigger to start the doomsday process..

He does not appear to be dead yet (as initially reported), but if he triggers a total data dump, he has no more leverage to trade..

I find it hard to accept his self-appointed moral authority, after he jumped bail and requested asylum to avoid extradition to face sexual assault charges in Sweden.  Innocent until proved guilty but not behaving like an innocent man (perhaps a paranoid man). He trades in purloined confidential information. Revealing other people's confidential immorality does not clean your slate and is criminal behavior itself.

Interesting times but interesting for different reasons. It seems like there are too many foreign cooks stirring our domestic election pot, while these may just be modern conspiracy theories.

JR 

I think it's hard to evaluate his "moral authority" without knowing whether or not he is guilty of the crimes he's accused of. If he's innocent then I certainly see his point of view. In some jurisdictions it's far too easy to be convicted for those types of crimes (Sweden being one of them) and that in conjunction with the fear of extradition to the US makes his actions not invalidate a moral authority in my opinion - again assuming he's innocent. If he's guilty, then that doesn't really apply.

As for local (national) elections and international meddling; I think we're in the beginning of a new era where a lot of this will play out on the internet. Not only that, but apart from governments trying to control information, the giants like Google will play a huge role, and to a not insignificant degree non-state/non-business individuals and organizations.

After all, many evaluations we do of state actors hinge upon their "legitimacy". But since the basic concept of a nation-state is an intellectual construct it's easy to see how many people in the future may give more legitimacy to an intellectual construct such as Wikileaks or Anonymous than to nation-states or for-profit businesses.

I guess that Ecuador has either decided to call time, or has been promised something to make it worthwhile to dump him, time will tell.

I judge freedom fighters on the Nelson Mandela standard, hiring prostitutes in Sweden does not cut it for me.

DaveP

Ex Bay watcher Pamela Anderson visited him at the Uruguayan embassy the other day and brought him lunch. Probably bacon in a couple of baps.

Cheers

Ian

I wish I could "like" that but the button is no longer there! ;D

DaveP

DaveP said:

I guess that Ecuador has either decided to call time, or has been promised something to make it worthwhile to dump him, time will tell.

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Yep. I mean, I'm not even sure someone cut him out, sometimes stuff just happens with technology. It's hard to tell sometimes seeing that part of Assange is spreading documents etc, and part is narcissistic self-promotion.

DaveP said:

I judge freedom fighters on the Nelson Mandela standard, hiring prostitutes in Sweden does not cut it for me.

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"hiring prostitutes"?

Btw; I'd like to point out to those who aren't Swedish that there are some pretty horrible legal cases in Swedish history that would absolutely warrant Assange's caution and insistence on not going there.

mattiasNYC said:

Btw; I'd like to point out to those who aren't Swedish that there are some pretty horrible legal cases in Swedish history that would absolutely warrant Assange's caution and insistence on not going there.

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Are you suggesting that the Swedish sexual assault charges against Assange are "trumped" up (pun intended).  8)

JR

JohnRoberts said:

Are you suggesting that the Swedish sexual assault charges against Assange are "trumped" up (pun intended).  8)

JR

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Nice pun!

I'm not suggesting that they actually are fabricated or exaggerated, but I'm saying it's absolutely possible. If that's the case, I'm still not saying there's a state-actor behind it, it could just be these women themselves. So again, from his perspective, having a bit of knowledge about these troublesome cases in Sweden, caution would be highly advisable.

It possibly sounds outlandish because people wouldn't normally associate Sweden with a poor legal / criminal system, but over the past two decades or so there have been some absolutely hair-raising stuff revealed.

mattiasNYC said:

It possibly sounds outlandish because people wouldn't normally associate Sweden with a poor legal / criminal system, but over the past two decades or so there have been some absolutely hair-raising stuff revealed.

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like in the rest of the 193 ish countries over the world ? (minus Switzerland of course, the last country of brave and free men around)

I don't like the guy either, he really seems suspicious, but that could just be a projected image due to heavily biased media coverage from both supporters and his opponents. who knows a person really anyway? Bet he did the right thing to run away from his perspective, guilty or not.

Michael

All things even, there should be 3-4 extra layers of legal protection on people that risk their lives for telling the public about how governments are acting when they believe they're secret.

This is the traditional protection that to some degree guarded journalists - but nowadays with media being so politisized it looks like someone else has to do the dirty jobs of the press.

Carrying the dirt should come with that kind of protection - but the need to seek asylum in south-america obviously shows that this is either non-existing, or not really trustworthy.

Jakob E.

Latest news is that Ecuador cut his internet to stop him influencing the outcome of the US election!!

They obviously have vested interests in the result.

DaveP

audiomixer said:

like in the rest of the 193 ish countries over the world ?

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I just meant that the image of Sweden is that it's got a legal system that works well. I'm not so sure I agree with that image.

gyraf said:

nowadays with media being so politisized it looks like someone else has to do the dirty jobs of the press.

Carrying the dirt should come with that kind of protection - but the need to seek asylum in south-america obviously shows that this is either non-existing, or not really trustworthy.

Jakob E.

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I agree. It's essentially inherent in state-systems for them to protect and perpetuate themselves and what they are, right or wrong. So almost inherently we're likely to almost always see states fight free information and free media. And 'yes', I agree that new entities ultimately will need to take the place of corporate mainstream media as it gets cozier and cozier with governments.

There was an article where Assange details his encounter with Google execs where he then talks about what Google and its leaders now are, and it's a chilling read. Something as seemingly neutral as a search engine.....

DaveP said:

Latest news is that Ecuador cut his internet to stop him influencing the outcome of the US election!!

They obviously have vested interests in the result.

DaveP

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I think Ecuador would do well to tread carefully. Groups like Anonymous might not look kindly upon such action. I would not be surprised if there was some sort of retaliation.

gyraf said:

All things even, there should be 3-4 extra layers of legal protection on people that risk their lives for telling the public about how governments are acting when they believe they're secret.

This is the traditional protection that to some degree guarded journalists - but nowadays with media being so politisized it looks like someone else has to do the dirty jobs of the press.

Carrying the dirt should come with that kind of protection - but the need to seek asylum in south-america obviously shows that this is either non-existing, or not really trustworthy.

Jakob E.

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In the US press and media and even individuals are protected by the 1st amendment and there is even additional legislation covering ownership of media to presumably control too much concentration of influence. Modern technology has leapfrogged some of the legislative prophylaxis.

On the other side modern government seems a little too comfortable using government force against individuals they don't like. The behavior of the IRS is disturbing revealing politicization and targeting.

There was a good road map (constitution) we need to back on the right road. Times have changed, for better and worse. Social media has re-written the play book for politics. Maybe this will reduce some of the big money influence and replace it with creativity, but I'm not holding my breath. 

JR

All things even, there should be 3-4 extra layers of legal protection on people that risk their lives for telling the public about how governments are acting when they believe they're secret.
This is the traditional protection that to some degree guarded journalists - but nowadays with media being so politisized it looks like someone else has to do the dirty jobs of the press.
Carrying the dirt should come with that kind of protection - but the need to seek asylum in south-america obviously shows that this is either non-existing, or not really trustworthy.
Jakob E.

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There has always been a tension between the press and government when it comes to classified information. I think there should be protection for whistleblowers, but there also needs to be some protection for state secrets. I don't think anybody in their right mind would want to do away with all state secrets. Only anarchists would favor that.
Wikileaks has shown itself to be entirely unconcerned with curating data before release, even if it puts people at risk unnecessarily, and has shown itself to have political, not principled, motivations. I respect Snowden much more than Assange.

-edit typo fixed

dmp said:

There has always been a tension between the press and government when it comes to classified information. I think there should be protection for whistleblowers,

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In one sense there is an indirect protection; by protecting journalists and not forcing them to disclose their sources. Of course that only goes so far.

dmp said:

but there also needs to be some protection for state secrets. I don't think anybody in their right mind would want to do away with all state secrets. Only anarchists would favor that.

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Well, true Anarchists are in favor of getting rid of the state entirely so it really doesn't matters at that point what they think about state secrets, right? It'd be a moot issue.

dmp said:

Wikipedia has shown itself to be entirely unconcerned with curating data before release, even if it puts people at risk unnecessarily, and has shown itself to have political, not principled, motivations. I respect Snowden much more than Assange.

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As far as I know the content of Wikileaks was vetted before it was released, and as far as I know no lives were in danger.

To my recollection almost all information that has been kept secret by governments which was subsequently either released decades later or made public by whistle-blowers falls in the category of being either entirely insignificant and not warranting the secrecy it was given or being predominantly embarrassing more than anything. By the latter I mean that it's not like the leaks contain launch codes to nuclear weapons or anything but instead tend to show how politicians lie and deceive not just each other but also the people that elected them.

So while I agree that some things need to be kept secret I'm of the opinion that the vast majority likely doesn't. Because as I said, the sensitive things that come out only seem to highlight politicians doing things we say we don't want them to do. So aren't we better off knowing this so that we actually can vote for those that do what we want?

Of course that assumes we want democracy. I'm not sure everyone wants that.

http://www.advocate.com/media/2016/8/23/wikileaks-outs-saudi-gay-man-rape-victims-and-more