Five quick questions: What did Joe Biden say about Julian Assange and what could it mean?

Link.

Don't let this arzehole off the hook Team USA. He needs to front your judicial system and if it finds the prick not guilty, ok.

But, no favours here. Stuff this Aussie.

I want no part of any deals.

 

It's an interesting question whether what Assange leaked should be public knowledge. Does the public have the right to know what their armies do overseas? This includes friendly fire, civilian deaths, and just general behavior.

 

Not if it exposes people to harm.....(yeas I do get that harm was done to those innocent attack victims....you cannot put genies back in bottles,) and Assange had no intent other than to aggrandise himself. He has a Messiah complex and he should face US justice.

This bleat about enough being enough is all his own doing in breaching the terms of British bail/justice.

He has not spent one day behind bars because of the USA charges per se.

 

I think the key issue is that isn't a simple question. There are plenty of things that should be in the public domain that politicians and/or the military would want to keep secret but there are also things that a legitimately secret or restricted.

The problem with Assange is that he sought out and released both (sometimes without necessarily knowing which it was). The underlying principle of Wikileaks was initially that almost everything should be public and while the organisation stepped back from that somewhat, I'm not convinced Assange has. Also, the nature of Wikileaks as a repository of third party documents rather than relevant reporting about them challenges the defence of journalism. I think Assange cherry-picks concepts of journalism, using their rightful legal protections when they're beneficial but ignoring some of the related responsibilities.

That said, I do think the ongoing efforts by the US to extradite and prosecute him should be ended, on a "not in the public interest" principle, given the economic and political cost for very little gain, even if he was eventually convicted of anything.

 

Some Americans have faith in the justice system if applied to Assange, but declare that Trump is a victim if exposed to their justice system.

 

What? Since when did economic or political considerations enter into whether to prosecute a person for breaching US security/intelligence laws?

Further, the money has already been spent, and there is zero political gain for the USA in allowing this turd to walk. He is a nobody and no serious number of votes attach to his circumstances either here or in the USA.

There is ZERO compelling reason for the USA to relax its Laws as a favour to Assange or Australia. If the USA takes this idiot to Justice the US/Australia relationship needle will not move a squillionth of a millimeter in either direction.

Biden should tell Australia that it will prosecute its Laws no matter who is involved.

 

I figured at some point there'd be some morons in power who thinks Assange should get a free pass.

 

The cost of bringing a prosecution is always a legitimate factor in how to go ahead. That's why a lot of people get warnings or have guilty pleas to lesser offences accepted. While I accept this is at an entirely different level, some of that principle still applies.

On political considerations I'd agree on principle that they shouldn't matter, but given the motive for pursuing him in the first place was entirely political, the actual political impact of proceeding is relevant.

I suspect most of the money has been spent by the UK at this point. Successfully extraditing Assange to the US would just be the start of the long and expensive process of trails and appeals.

Again, I'm no fan of Assange and agree he did plenty wrong in this, but I don't think the manner in which the US pursued him on it was the smartest. They've somewhat painted themselves in to a corner and I don't think they'll be able to get out without making a mess.

 

Our govt cant be trusted with secrets. Maybe it used to could, maybe it can someday again, but it has long lost any trustworthiness and has alot to answer for to get it back.

Assange is a hero and is imprissonned by an evil empire that doesnt want us to know about its evil.

 

He should, at least, stand trial. The outcome will be up to the criminal justice system.

 

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/pentagon-wikileaks-endangers-soldiers-afghans/

I doubt the family members of those us soldiers agree with you.

 

I don’t think the British are still an empire or all that evil anymore

 

This.
The method and manner of his acts would be the subject of the trial.

The content of the information published can be the subject, if necessary, to argue mitigation at a possible sentencing procedure.

 

Assange isn't running against Biden for president...lol

 

He is imprisoned because he breached his bail conditions.

 

I think both are true. Both Assange and Trump are getting railroaded; both being the victim of what has become the new legal standard: The "novel legal theory."

Trump's legal issues have been amply covered on this forum, but there has been surprisingly little attention given to Assange's. Assange was simply the "publisher" of the classified information that the American traitor Bradley Manning stole. It's been standard in First Amendment law, at least since New York Times V United States that the publisher of classified information doesn't have any criminal liability.

So the Justice Department concocted a "novel legal theory" to indict Assange. So if convicted he'll be the first publisher to be convicted for releasing classified information. This has been a trend lately of the Justice Department concocting all matter of nonsense theories to run roughshod over the first amendment, such as the recently convicted Douglass Mackey.

Assange should be pardoned and end this ridiculous case (Mackey too by the way.) Also the authoritarians in the Justice Department who are leading this should be fired, although that's not happening under the current administration.

 

Are we talking about this guy?

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/how-did-wikileaks-become-associated-with-russia/

 

Yes.

 

I think he’s just being polite to the aussies. It isn’t gonna happen, but no need to embarrass them publicly

 

I assume you work in the legal industry.
I don’t, and am obliged to let the machinery of law grind on, I don’t feel competent enough to cherry pick like this.
Like, there is a trial or legal case, but then endless trials and legal cases to establish validity.

 

Manning is a traitor but Trump is not, yet both disclosed secret information? Manning had a higher moral standing in his reasons than Trump

 

‘Amazing, isn’t it.

There are still people out there who think this guy was doing something noble.

Of course, Trump and Roger Stone would be on that list!

No one ever seemed to notice that his “transparency” campaigns were never aimed at authoritarian regimes, or countries with no real free press.

Instead they were all aimed at embarrassing Western democracies.

‘So, it came as no surprise to me to learn that Wikileaks was the conduit that the Russians used to funnel the DNC e-mail hack through. Roger Stone was the cutout to the Trump campaign. Stone was not officially part of the campaign at that point,so plausible deniability existed.

And it was no surprise to me that Russian “technicians” arrived at the Ecuadorian Embassy to remove FSB encryption software from Assange’s computers.

 

The legal history of free speech is a bit different from the UK and the commonwealth countries. The US tends more towards absolutism in that area due to the First Amendment, so issues like this have long since been resolved in the courts.

 

Most traitors feel they have a higher moral reasoning. That's one of the things that make them feel it's OK to commit treason.

 

Is it most? I know it's a reason, but thinking about stuff I've seen on double agents/spies, it can be a lot of different things. Feeling disrespected and underappreciated, not wanting some compromising info to be exposed, being coerced, getting lots of money, to name a few.