Kind of amazing how the fearless, heroic folks at Wikileaks are doing their best to elect Donald Trump president.
Just heightening the contradictions, I’m sure.
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In the early days of Wikileaks it was simply assumed that Assange was a benevolent figure. I bought into the myth hook line and sinker. The rape allegations were what turned me off as far as Assange was concerned. The site itself has over time veered from its mission of providing a place for whistleblowers to place their info to something else altogether. Truth is, it is questionable as to how useful Wikileaks is any more. The recently leaked info on the abuse of refugees in Nauru was not given to Wikileaks but instead to a major news outlet. The information is quite available for all to read, and if acted upon, ideally should bring down the current recently elected government (plenty of culpability among both Liberal and Labor politicians, by the way).
I’m proud to have tried to warn the Frog Pond about this Assange fellow and what his interventions are explicitly intended to accomplish.
He’s no friend of pacifists, no friend of freedom of the press, and no friend of the modern liberal project.
You seem to know what he’s not, but maybe you can remind us what he is? What is he trying to accomplish? I didn’t note your earlier remarks about him.
Well, at the moment he’s trying to manipulate the American electorate in order to get them to elect Donald Trump President, at which point he believes the U.S. government might stop pursuing criminal charges against him.
Given that Trump has openly spoken during his Presidential campaign of working after his election to change libel laws and other laws and regulations so that journalists and their publications could be more easily punished for writing stories Trump dislikes, this puts to rest Assange’s true views about press freedoms and governmental tranparency.
Given Trump’s numerous statements that he would direct the U.S. government to torture people and kill the families of people he decides are terrorists, and given that Trump is running on increasing our Defense spending dramatically, and given that Trump has communicated fairly clearly that he would use major military weaponry in genocidal warfare to “defeat ISIS so quickly,” these put to rest Assange’s true views about state-sponsored violence.
And we haven’t even gotten to Trump’s vile domestic policy plans which Assange thinks are just fine, given that he is using WikiLeaks as best he can to serve the goal of electing Donald Trump President.
All of this still leaves the criminal charges filed against Assange by the Swedish government for rape, the primary charge which drove him to make the decision to ask the Ecuadorian government to allow him asylum within their embassy in London.
An article from a couple years ago that goes into Assange’s beliefs (as well as Snowden and Greenwald) that might be worth a look. Basically the ideology to the extent it exists is characterized as “paranoid libertarianism.” Assange’s Wikileaks Party when he made his run for political office in Australia threw in with that nation’s far right parties, which itself should have set off alarms among those on the left. The apparently cozy relationship with Putin’s regime should also be troubling. Although the US is no saint on the human rights or transparency fronts, Putin’s government is hardly a champion of either.
A Crowd of Paranoid Libertarians Neatly Package by A Jacksonian
Of course, Greenwald too is complicit in the Snowdon affair with Wikileaks … ouch for Obama, NSA and in a straight line to Democratic presidential hopeful HRC.
○ Democrats’ Tactic of Accusing Critics of Kremlin Allegiance Has Long, Ugly History in US
○ Clinton cites RFK assassination to stay in race – 2008
See my new diary – Morrell and Negroponte Endorse HRC for President.
Look….Trump publicly asked the Russian government to continue to manipulate the Presidential election. Trump is personally calling for an allegiance with the Kremlin.
This is not mysterious or propagandistic. It is simply a truthful observation.
You have something against peace?
I have something against publicly supporting the efforts by another major power to subvert our Presidential election.
Don’t you?
“another major power”
Where did you get that idea? According to president Barack Obama, Putin just leads a regional power … 12 in a dozen! 😉
○ Ukraine crisis: Russia is a regional power – but US is most powerful nation in the world, Obama warns Putin | March 2014 |
Just don’t ever accuse the United States of influencing any foreign presidential election, remove elected officials or use its military for regime change … never, never ever! Oops … my bad:
○ US Senate probes Obama funding for anti-Netanyahu campaign – report | Russia Today – March 18, 2015 |
Well, I don’t mind a bit in this instance, I didn’t like Binyamin either.
Russian propaganda you say? I don’t think so … Obama’s shocking interference into Israel’s election process | Jerusalem Post | … US funds aided 2015 campaign to oust Netanyahu, Senate probe finds | Times of Israel |. Spokesperson replies it’s not illegal. Guess we do it quite regularly.
The‘Anyone but Bibi’ mission is headed by Jeremy Bird, Obama’s National Field Director in his successful presidential campaigns. Under Bird, a group called “Victory 15” [V15] has been set up. It has recruited the young activists from Israel’s 2013 social protest movement and will man a massive social network and personal contact campaign to defeat Bibi. V15 is financed by an NGO called “One Voice” whose motto is to be “the voice of mainstream Israelis and Palestinians.” Research finds that One Voice is funded by John Kerry’s State Department.
And you are bothered by a bit of rhetoric during the election campaign?
Oui, we’re not going to come to agreement on this.
I’m more than bothered by Trump’s rhetoric; I’m horrified. His campaign is a wholesale change from what has come before from a major Party candidate.
Those who enter historical and current attacks on the U.S. government in their attempts to provide backhand justifications for the rhetoric and policies of Trump are severely damaging their credibility with me, post by post, day by day. I think it’s a damn shame.
We can and must improve transparency in our government. But the misty world many seem to be demanding here is a U.S. government which engages in little to no intelligence or espionage activities.
I also note that many here are posting some pretty damn suspect evidence for their claims, looking at Western media and government sources extremely critically while presenting information from other sources which don’t appear to have been examined with that same critical eye.
Those who are forwarding these claims and implied policy demands are not thinking through the implications of the very different world they’re imagining. I am unpersuaded that U.S. governmental policy changes which might meet their preferences in whole would bring world peace, greater worldwide civil rights and improved standards of living.
LOL I just wish he had done a better job. Turn about is fair play.
I’m sorry, I obviously do not understand your method here, because with all the links here, this feels like free association.
○ U.S. v. WikiLeaks: First Amendment or Prosecution under Espionage Act of 1917