Posts: 27,163
Threads: 2,254
Joined: Sep 2002
Reputation:
21
Wikileaks
12-05-2010, 09:08 PM
(This post was last modified: 11-17-2017, 02:32 PM by Bob Schroeck.)
I am of two minds about the Wikileaks excitement this past week. On the one hand I am concerned about the damage to the US the release might cause. On the other, I remember the honored examples of the Pentagon Papers, Watergate, and other whistleblowers, and the duty in a free society that the press -- and any other concerned parties -- has to make sure the government operates with transparency.
However, regardless of whichever way I end up navigating between these two opinions, I am unarguably opposed to the outright acts of censorship the US government is imposing on the information and Wikileaks itself. As you may or may not have heard, US pressure has forced the site off of at least one host so far, and has also forced its DNS to remove the entry for Wikileaks, to keep readers from getting there. (I suppose I should note that such reactions only encourage me to embrace the second of my two positions, as they only undermine any moral high ground the US government might try to claim...)
Fortunately, this is the Internet, and we have ways of thwarting two-bit bullies when they attempt such strong-arm tactics. There has been a massive backlash against the US-backed censorship. Like other groups before it, the US government is discovering that trying to quash something it doesn't like only results in thousands of copies of it popping up in more places than it can throw its weight around in. Of particular interest is a suggestion (that many are following) that folks around the world add a subdomain to their sites that points to Wikileaks.
There is also a Twitter tag for people interested this and other censorship circumvention methods.
-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.
CattyNebulart
Unregistered
Personnaly I support wikileaks. Many of the things they released had no buisness being secret in the first place, and all the hue and cry over releasing has seriously damaged the seriousness with which i view those allegations.
I recall reading an article that actually reviewed the numbers on how many informants names where not redacted, and it was a grand total of 3, one of whom was already dead before the release and one of whom both sides knew he was a double agent. As a side note, two people can keep a secret if one of them is dead is a well known saying, and if half a million people have access to the information it's not secret. One of the senators was even complaining that wikileaks released data that the DoD wouldn't share with him, but did share with half a million other people. And even now that it has been leaked they won't give him access... and he makes these complaints while demonizing wikileaks.
I believe later the pentagon made a note that after some analysis the breach wasn't that serious, but i can't find the press relaese on that. And wikileaks has offered the goverment the chance to work together to redact some information, but the goverment refused. It makes sense in a way since the goverment doesn't want to sanction the release of the information, but this way they would at least get a chance to mitigate the damage.
If it wasn't for the rampant overclasification in the goverment sites like wikileaks couldn't thrive because all the information they would release would be genuinely hurtful, which would quickly undercut their support.
And then we get to the interpol notices for Assange, when interpol doesn't usually get involved in anything as low key as rape cases, there is some doubt as to the validity of the charges (in both cases the sex started as consensual, and in any case Sweden's rape laws are a little bit wonky which is why they have a less than 10% conviction rate IIRC.), Then there is the on again and of again nature of the charges, and his offers of cooperation getting rebuffed, then compelled trough an improperly filed warranrt, then rebuffed again.... yeah sure it's not politically motivated, really I believe you. /sarcasm.
E: "Did they... did they just endorse the combination of the JSDF and US Army by showing them as two lesbian lolicons moving in together and holding hands and talking about how 'intimate' they were?"
B: "Have you forgotten so soon? They're phasing out Don't Ask, Don't Tell."
Posts: 4,795
Threads: 299
Joined: Jul 2010
Reputation:
8
I amn't touching the Assange rape thing... but something about it smells. Especially how the charges were dropped and reinstated, almost like somebody was being pressured by someone else....and what the charge actually is. The 'sex crimes' listing on the Red Notice is oddly vague.
Wikileaks itself.
Well frankly, there're some things that deserve to be leaked. I for one am hoping that all the information surrounding the bank baiilout, and the bank guarantees here over the last 2 years will come out sometime sooner than after the mandatory 30-year period. Hiding dirty laundry behind layers of classification removes government accountability and there's a lot for this government to be held accountable for.
Also consider the ACTA treaty which for the longest time was being negotiated behind closed doors.... when that got leaked and people actually saw what it said, they responded with a 'hell no!'. That was kept specifically secret in order to stifle activism against it.
It's interesting to note, however.... that on evamade.net, those most vehemently opposed to wikileaks are in the US armed forces(or related to), while those most in favour of the site, aren't American.
________________________________
--m(^0^)m-- Wot, no sig?
CattyNebulart
Unregistered
Dartz Wrote:It's interesting to note, however.... that on evamade.net, those most vehemently opposed to wikileaks are in the US armed forces(or related to), while those most in favour of the site, aren't American.
Well listening to C-SPAN my impression is that most of the grunts actually support wikileaks, though most that call in are veterans of older wars. Not a statistically significant sample though. I imagine it's a bit different though if you are on the front lines and you are hearing all this noise about threat to life and limb.
The USA should never have gone to Iraq, but instead finished up Afganistan, then they would probably be done by now. or instituted a draft to get sufficient manpower. Of course a draft would have been political suicide, but it should still have been done to get the manpower necessary for two wars if you are determined to do it at all. anyway this is drifting of topic.
----
E: "Did they... did they just endorse the combination of the JSDF and US Army by showing them as two lesbian lolicons moving in together and holding hands and talking about how 'intimate' they were?"
B: "Have you forgotten so soon? They're phasing out Don't Ask, Don't Tell."
Posts: 27,163
Threads: 2,254
Joined: Sep 2002
Reputation:
21
12-06-2010, 10:37 PM
(This post was last modified: 11-17-2017, 02:33 PM by Bob Schroeck.)
Two further links people might be interested in:
The first is a blog entry by George Brock, Professor and Head of Journalism at City University in London, about the effects of the cable leak: Wikileaks and the cables: what changes, what doesn’t.
The second is a beta of a search engine for the cables, sponsored by the Dutch-Flemish association of investigative journalists VVOJ. Right now it's only running on about 1000 of the messages, but when they're satisfied it's working properly they'll be putting everything in it.
-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.
Posts: 27,163
Threads: 2,254
Joined: Sep 2002
Reputation:
21
12-07-2010, 08:38 PM
(This post was last modified: 11-17-2017, 02:33 PM by Bob Schroeck.)
Detailed information on mirroring Wikileaks, thanks to Cryptome.org.
-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.
Posts: 27,163
Threads: 2,254
Joined: Sep 2002
Reputation:
21
12-08-2010, 05:53 PM
(This post was last modified: 11-17-2017, 02:34 PM by Bob Schroeck.)
A couple more links:
First, a little symbolic hypocrisy: US State Department declares "World Press Freedom Day".
One of Assange's sex-crime accusers appears to have CIA ties
And I'm starting to hear that these charges are not rape but something else under Swedish law called "sex by surprise" or "unexpected sex", and seem to have more to do with a broken condom than non-consensual assault. Has anyone heard anything along these lines?
-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.
Posts: 4,795
Threads: 299
Joined: Jul 2010
Reputation:
8
Yeah... that's been going around for a few days, though the source on that originally as I recall was Assange's Lawyer. I've also been hearing the opposite. Sex by Surprise, if I've read correctly, is a €750 fine on conviction, at most. If that's the case that's a bit like issuing a Red Notice over a hefty unpaid speeding ticket It's interesting to note that the Red Notice merely said "Sex Crimes", without elaborating the exact nature of the crime. It certainly more emotionally charged than a more detailed description. But I'm still taking that all with a grain of salt.
Sweden doesn't have an extradition treaty with the US for espionage, however. It might just be someone in the United States stalling for time to actually bring espionage charges against Assange, something for which the British courts will extradite him the the US... especially if the Swedes drop their extradition request. That'll take priority over any United States extradition request since it got in first.
________________________________
--m(^0^)m-- Wot, no sig?
Posts: 3,394
Threads: 588
Joined: Sep 2002
Reputation:
0
I'm not for Wikileaks and I think Assange is... well, HE thinks he has good intentions. But it's the sort of "good intentions" that thinks the US is too powerful and the best thing for the world would be to decrease our power etc, etc. He is, in the classic sense, a "useful idiot".
But I also think this "Sex Crime" charge is bullshit. Something really stinks about this whole deal and at least on this point, it's not coming from Wikileaks. I think this is a classic set-up. And as much as I think Assange is a little prick that deserves whatever he might get IF it were related directly to an espionage charge, (and there's no guarantee that whatever Wikileaks did rises to that level) I DON'T think he deserves this and if this is indeed an "Op" by the US to drag him in this is the WRONG damn way to do it.
What I don't get is this:
Assange had mentioned and or implied at some point that if he and/or Wikileaks were "taken out" that there is some kind of massive file containing really embarrassing and/or dangerous files from the US (state department or one of our intelligence services) and that the files would be released via several sources if that were to happen.
I don't see how he could not understand that doing that would put him MORE at risk of death? From, say - Russia? Or Iran? Or China?
I mean think about it - if they (the countries I mentioned and/or others) think he really does have files that would seriously damage the US and its intelligence services that badly, wouldn't THEY want to kill him so that those files get released?
That's not a real good insurance plan there!
Posts: 27,163
Threads: 2,254
Joined: Sep 2002
Reputation:
21
The insurance file is out there -- I even considered downloading a copy of it myself a while back. As for its contents -- nobody but Assange knows what's in it. And up until now, he had dropped no hints about its contents, save that they were essentially a "final strike". That was, I feel, entirely too little for anyone to base an op on.
-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.
Posts: 1,407
Threads: 182
Joined: Mar 2006
Reputation:
2
Logan Darklighter Wrote:I'm not for Wikileaks and I think Assange is... well, HE thinks he has good intentions. But it's the sort of "good intentions" that thinks the US is too powerful and the best thing for the world would be to decrease our power etc, etc. He is, in the classic sense, a "useful idiot". Yeah, on the one hand Assange is a bit of a douche.
On the other hand the US has been deliberately covering up the actions of people who engage in child sex slave trading.
I was on the fence about wikileaks until that. Once you start aiding and abetting the actions of people who engage in the systematic rape of eight year old boys, you lose all moral justification for anything.
-----------------
Epsilon
Posts: 27,163
Threads: 2,254
Joined: Sep 2002
Reputation:
21
12-09-2010, 09:04 PM
(This post was last modified: 11-17-2017, 02:35 PM by Bob Schroeck.)
Hm. Looks like the so-called "sex crimes" turn out to be basically misdemeanors, stemming from consensual unprotected sex, that the "victims" initially boasted about: Times of India article here.
And here's a great commentary column from the Guardian in the UK, in which the writer -- a professor in the understanding of technology -- basically tells modern governments "get used to Wikileaks and things like it -- or just give up the pretense of being free societies and shut down the internet".
-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.
I'm disinclined to pass judgement on Assange's accusers either way, given that there is an enormous incentive for very large camps to both demonise both them and him. I would be very wary of falling into any trap of blaming the victim here, though of course one should not presume Assange's guilt either. We'll see what comes out in the courts.
And of course the timing is awfully convienent, but that doesn't make him innocent. Of course, whether or not Assange is a rapist (or "terrorist", or the various other things he's been accused of) really doesn't have a lot to do with the moral standing of Wikileaks itself, but good luck reminding people of that.
Posts: 1,576
Threads: 94
Joined: Oct 2002
Reputation:
0
I don't know if anyone's realised this but going by the Bacon number theory Julian Assange is a few hops from Ed Becerra.
Julian 'Mendax' Assange -> Electron/The Realm -> Chaos Computer Club -> Karl 'hagbard' Koch -> Tasha -> Ed Becerra
I wonder if Ed's seen 23, then again he's probably sitting on a much more volatile story going by my interpretation of what Ed's written on the subjects of Karl Koch, Germany, and Tasha.
As for Wikileaks when they add similar Russian & Chinese material to it......hoo boy.
The article in this weeks Time in regards to Wikileaks was more disparaging to the US gov over it's classifying of material which didn't require it, the handling of the distribution of said classified material and who was authorised to classify the material in the first place. It also had a comment that under the British Official Secrets Act, a person could've once been charged with violating it by commenting on the state of the cheese sandwiches served in the lunchroom.
--Rod.H
Posts: 27,163
Threads: 2,254
Joined: Sep 2002
Reputation:
21
Not blaming the victim here, just pointing out that contrary to the automatic American assumption that "sex crimes=necrophiliac pedophile cannibal", the charges involved appear to be so minor that issuing an Interpol warrant for them is equivalent to an international manhunt for a shoplifter. I won't pretend to understand the statutes involved, but everything I've read where the writer has actually looked at what's going on in the Swedish legal side has said more or less the same thing -- this isn't rape and the characterization of the charges as rape in American and other news media is an exaggeration.
-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.
Posts: 4,795
Threads: 299
Joined: Jul 2010
Reputation:
8
Speaking of charges, according to The Register, Assange's lawyer expects charges will be brought against him under the US' Espionage Act.
Is that even possible? Considering Assange technically didn't commit any crime within US jurisdiction. Unless somebody finds a loophole with the information being hosted on an Amazon server within the States and tries to push that.
________________________________
--m(^0^)m-- Wot, no sig?
Posts: 1,407
Threads: 182
Joined: Mar 2006
Reputation:
2
Even if Assange did hosts the leaks on a US server he still commited no crime. The private who originally leaked them very well might have, but Assange himself is no more guilty than the New York Times or any other newspaper that has ever printed a story containing leaked information before.
This doesn't stop Leiberman from calling for the trial and punishment of the NYT of course, but Lieberman has his head so far into fantasy land that I'm not certain anything he says can be taken seriously.
And even if Assange is convicted (or detained in a black box facility at some CIa torture mill) this will not stop wikileaks. Also, sites dedicated to desiminating leaks in the same manner of Wikileaks are already appearing out of the woodwork. The US's feeble attempt to order the tide to not rise grows more and more hopeless.
---------------
Epsilon
Posts: 27,163
Threads: 2,254
Joined: Sep 2002
Reputation:
21
12-11-2010, 04:36 AM
(This post was last modified: 11-17-2017, 02:36 PM by Bob Schroeck.)
Dartz Wrote:Speaking of charges, according to The Register, Assange's lawyer expects charges will be brought against him under the US' Espionage Act.
Is that even possible? Considering Assange technically didn't commit any crime within US jurisdiction. Unless somebody finds a loophole with the information being hosted on an Amazon server within the States and tries to push that. The US government has a history of persecuting, excuse me, "prosecuting" foreign citizens for acts committed in foreign countries that are legal in those countries, even in cases where those foreign citizens had never set foot in the US before. In the past those cases have involved fairly blatant political corruption--British executives of online poker companies that compete with state lotteries and Russian programmers who crack DRM, for example. It's hardly surprising that they would be willing to do the same to protect their own interests. This sort of thing is obviously ridiculously unjust, but then, so is the US government. And since there's very strong support for the whole "Amerika, Amerika über alles, Über alles in der Welt" attitude, so there's really no chance of this ever changing from within the US.
Posts: 1,407
Threads: 182
Joined: Mar 2006
Reputation:
2
Tangentally related but awesome
12-12-2010, 02:22 AM
------------
Epsilon
Posts: 417
Threads: 27
Joined: Jan 2006
Reputation:
0
Dartz Wrote:Speaking of charges, according to The Register, Assange's lawyer expects charges will be brought against him under the US' Espionage Act.
Is that even possible? Considering Assange technically didn't commit any crime within US jurisdiction. Unless somebody finds a loophole with the information being hosted on an Amazon server within the States and tries to push that. Unlikely. This is far more a case of lawyer throwing stuff out to muddy things up. I suspect however if Assange ever visits the U.S. in the future he's more than likely to face arrest and face federal charges of some sort. He's far more likely to get killed when and if he ever releases something embarrassing to the Russian Government. Anybody recall that incident in England involving a former Russian agent and radioactive thallium in a cup of tea? See http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/6179074.stm
I'm admittedly not a fan of Assange and wikileaks. I can support the idea in abstract however the way Assange and wikileaks have behaved at times has pretty much lost them my support. I particularly was offended by the way they edited and titled the video of the incident in Iraq in which a Reuters photographer and reporter who got killed along with a bunch of insurgentstoting AK 47s and a RPG-7 by an AH-64. If there was one thing I did learn growing up in Guatemala during the 80s was don't do things that will from a distance make a soldier think you are a potential threat and the reporters in question did that in spades.
--Werehawk--
My mom's brief take on upcoming Guatemalan Elections "In last throes of preelection activities. Much loudspeaker vote pleading."
Posts: 27,163
Threads: 2,254
Joined: Sep 2002
Reputation:
21
12-13-2010, 09:42 PM
(This post was last modified: 11-17-2017, 02:36 PM by Bob Schroeck.)
In re: attempts/intents to charge Assange with something -- anything -- under American law, here's a good article on it that I just came across. I love the fact that lawmakers are not only scraping the bottom of the barrel looking for anything they can throw at him in the hopes that it will stick, some are expressly intending to violate the Constitution with a new ex post facto law specifically intended to turn him into a criminal after the fact. Of course, the odds that any of this will actually work are low, but you never know. You get the right judge with a grudge or a legal blind spot...
-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.
Posts: 4,795
Threads: 299
Joined: Jul 2010
Reputation:
8
Speak of the devil In an interview with Al-Jazeera, Assange's lawyer has stated that a grand jury is meeting in order to actually determine whether and how to charge Assange. Again... it's from Assange's own lawyer.
Also... am I the only one who feels like were watching a cheap techno=thriller novel unfold in live action? Very cheap.
________________________________
--m(^0^)m-- Wot, no sig?
Posts: 417
Threads: 27
Joined: Jan 2006
Reputation:
0
Dartz Wrote:Speak of the devil In an interview with Al-Jazeera, Assange's lawyer has stated that a grand jury is meeting in order to actually determine whether and how to charge Assange. Again... it's from Assange's own lawyer.
Also... am I the only one who feels like were watching a cheap techno=thriller novel unfold in live action? Very cheap. Given that it is an English lawyer...With all the foibles of the breed...
Now that you mention it...indeed it is turning into a parody of a techno thriller novel.
--Werehawk--
My mom's brief take on upcoming Guatemalan Elections "In last throes of preelection activities. Much loudspeaker vote pleading."
Posts: 27,163
Threads: 2,254
Joined: Sep 2002
Reputation:
21
Better Build Some New Jails...
12-15-2010, 05:03 PM
(This post was last modified: 11-17-2017, 02:37 PM by Bob Schroeck.)
According to the United States' Espionage Act of 1917, anyone who has "read, written about, commented upon, tweeted, spread links by "liking" on Facebook, shared by email, or otherwise discussed "classified" information disclosed from WikiLeaks" is potentially a felon, according to a legal expert consulted by Computerworld.
-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.
|
