Julian Assange and Our Impunity Democracy, by James Bovard

In America you’re much more liable to get in trouble for telling the truth, particularly about the American government, than for telling a lie, which has become routine and commonplace. From James Bovard at mises.org:

On Saturday, protests supporting Julian Assange will occur around the world. In London, Assange supporters will link arms around the parliament building. Protests will also occur outside the Justice Department headquarters in Washington (I’ll be one of the speakers), D.C., and in San Francisco, Tulsa, Denver, and Seattle, as well as in Australia.

Four years ago, I wrote a USA Today column calling for Assange to receive a Presidential Medal of Freedom. My piece failed to sway the Trump White House and the Biden administration has taken up the prosecution of one of the most important truth tellers of this century. Assange has been locked away for years in a maximum-security prison in Britain. He is facing extradition to face 17 counts of violating the Espionage Act for disclosing classified information. If the Brits deliver Assange to the U.S. government, he has almost no chance for a fair trial because of how prosecutions are rigged in federal court.

The last four years have revealed why activists like Assange, who has been held for years in a maximum-security British prison, are vital to any hope of making rulers accountable to the citizenry. Attorney General Ramsey Clark warned in 1967, “Nothing so diminishes democracy as secrecy.” At this point, America is an Impunity Democracy in which government officials pay no price for their abuses.

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