Tag Archives: Julian Assange

Cascading Cat Litter, by James Howard Kunstler

The US/British/Ecuadorian case against Julian Assange is a crock of the material cats cover up in their litter boxes. From James Howard Kunstler at kunstler.com:

And so now Julian Assange of Wikileaks has been dragged out of his sanctuary in the London embassy of Ecuador for failing to clean his cat’s litter box. Have you ever cleaned a litter box? The way we always did it was to spread some newspaper — say, The New York Times — on the floor, transfer the used cat litter onto it, wrap it into a compact package, and put it in the trash.

It was interesting to scan the Comments section of The Times’s stories about the Assange arrest: Times readers uniformly presented themselves as a lynch mob out for Mr. Assange’s blood. So much for the spirit of liberalism and The Old Gray Lady who had published The Pentagon Papers purloined by Daniel Ellsberg lo so many years ago. Reading between the lines in that once-venerable newspaper — by which I mean gleaning their slant on the news — one surmises that The Times has actually come out against freedom of the press, a curious attitude, but consistent with the neo-Jacobin zeitgeist in “blue” America these days.

Anyway, how could anyone expect Mr. Assange to clean his cat’s litter box when he was unable to go outside his sanctuary to buy a fresh bag of litter, and was denied newspapers this past year, as well as any other contact with the outside world?

US government prosecutors had better tread lightly in bringing Mr. Assange to the sort of justice demanded by readers of The New York Times — which is to say: lock him up in some SuperMax solitary hellhole and throw away the key. The show trial of Julian Assange on US soil, when it comes to pass, may end up being the straw that stirs America’s Mickey Finn as a legitimate republic.

Continue reading

How You Can Be Certain That The US Charge Against Assange Is Fraudulent, by Caitlin Johnstone

Donald Trump is willing to do something Obama wouldn’t, and it isn’t repealing Obamacare. Trump is using an indictment the Obama crew wouldn’t touch against Julian Assange. From Cailtin Johnstone at caityjohnstone.com:

Julian Assange sits in a jail cell today after being betrayed by the Ecuadorian government and his home country of Australia. A British judge named Michael Snow has found the WikiLeaks founder guilty of violating bail conditions, inserting himself into the annals of history by labeling Assange “a narcissist who cannot get beyond his own selfish interest.” So that tells you how much of a fair and impartial legal proceeding we can expect to see from the British judicial process on this matter.

But the real reason that Assange has been surrendered by the Ecuadorian government, imprisoned by the British government, and ignored by the Australian government is not directly related to any of those governments, but to that of the United States of America. An unsealed indictment from the Trump administration’s District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, accompanied by an extradition request, charges Assange with “conspiracy to commit computer intrusion for agreeing to break a password to a classified U.S. government computer” during Chelsea Manning’s 2010 leak of government documents exposing US war crimes.

Continue reading→

The Day America Died, by Raúl Ilargi Meijer

America is putting the nail in freedom of the press and America itself as the government goes after Julian Assange. From Raúl Ilargi Meijer at theautomaticearth.com:

47 years ago in American Pie, Don McLean talked about The Day The Music Died. Or of course the music didn’t really die, but at the same time it did. “The three mean I admired most, the father, son and the holy ghost, they caught the last train for the coast, the day the music died.”

Back then you could still have claimed the country merely lost its innocence. And you could have said the same in 1861 or 1914 or 1941. Today, not to take anything away from music, or the song, something much bigger died. America itself died, not just its music or innocence. America didn’t just lose its innocence, it pled guilty.

No doubt most of you would proclaim that’s a gross exaggeration, and an insane hyperbole, but you would all be wrong, sorry. There’s no way back this time.

America, the United States, with all its initial prejudice and lethal screw-ups, was founded as a place where people could direct their own lives without having to fear any other party, let alone a government, that would stand in their way while they did it. And a big part of not having to fear one’s government is not having to fear that government purposely lying to its citizens. The Founding Fathers, for all their faults, got that right. And today erases all of that in one fell swoop.

Continue reading

Warning Mr. Trump, by Raúl Ilargi Meijer

President Trump will be shooting himself in the foot if his administration prosecutes Julian Assange. From Raúl Ilargi Meijer at theautomaticearth.com:

President Donald J. Trump
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W.
Washington, DC 20500.

Mr. President,

I write to you because I’m seeing something unfold that concerns you, and I have no way of knowing if you’re aware of it, nor have I seen anyone else mention it. That is, sir, you are being set up, a trap is being set for you, and unless you are aware of it, you may well walk into that trap eyes wide open.

It may not be in your briefing this morning, but the WikiLeaks organization has reported that high-ranking Ecuadorean state officials have told them Julian Assange will be expelled from their London embassy in a matter of “hours to days”. Now, I don’t know what your personal opinion is of Mr. Assange, maybe you think he deserves punishment for leaking secret files to the public.

Your personal opinion of Mr. Assange, however, is not the most important issue here, no offense. What’s most important to your own situation, as well as that of Mr. Assange, is that the people who are after him are the very same people who have been after you for 3 years, and who will double their efforts after suffering a huge loss due to Robert Mueller’s No Collusion report.

Continue reading

A Year of Silencing Julian Assange, by Elizabeth Los

For a man who has no criminal charges against him outstanding, Julian Assange is being treated worse than many convicted felons. From Elizabeth Los at consortiumnews.com:

On this date in 2018, the Wikileaks publisher was cut off from the work of journalism, reports Elizabeth Vos.

One year ago Thursday, Ecuador’s government under President Lenin Moreno silenced Julian Assange.

WikiLeaks wrote on Twitter Wednesday: “… March 28, marks one year that WikiLeaks publisher Julian Assange has been illegally gagged from doing journalism—any writing that expresses a ‘political opinion’? even on his own treatment, after pressure from the U.S. on Ecuador.”

On this date in 2018 Moreno imposed on Assange what Human Rights Watch’s legal counsel Dinah Pokempner described as looking “more and more like solitary confinement.” Moreno cut off Assange’s online access and restricted visitors to the Ecuador embassy in London where Assange has had legal political asylum since 2012.

Moreno cited Assange’s critical social media remarks about Ecuador’s allies, the U.S. and Spain. Assange’s near-total isolation, with the exception of visits from legal counsel during week days, has been augmented by the Ecuadorian government’s imposition of a complex “protocol,” which, although eased slightly in recent months in respect of visits allowed, has not improved Assange’s overall status over the last 12 months. In some respects, it seems to have worsened.

Truck in D.C. (Pamela Drew, Twitter) Truck in D.C.,March 28, 2019. (Pamela Drew, Twitter)

Continue reading

The Psychology of Getting Julian Assange, Part 3 – Wikileaks and Russiagate: Trust Us, We’re The CIA, by Dr. Lissa Johnson

The psyop behind the presecution of Julian Assange, from Dr. Lissa Johnson at newmatilda.com:

In the third of her special investigative series on Julian Assange, clinical psychologist Dr Lissa Johnson sheds a little more light on the ways the world’s most consistently dishonest state has co-opted so many otherwise intelligent people into shooting the messenger.

Tomorrow, March 3rd, a rally calling on the Australian Government to protect its citizen, Julian Assange, from US extradition and prosecution will be held in Sydney, at the Martin Place Amphitheatre from 2pm. Acclaimed journalist and film-maker John Pilger will speak at the rally, along with respected human rights advocate Professor Stuart Rees.

The demonstration has been endorsed by musician Roger Waters and by Terry Hicks, father of former Guantanamo Bay prisoner David Hicks, Australian teachers, Disobedient Media Editor-in-Chief Elizabeth Lea Vos, and Pulitzer Prize winning author and journalist Chris Hedges.

The following Sunday, March 10th, a second rally will be held in Melbourne on the steps of the State Library at 1pm.

Julian Assange is in his ninth year of UN-declared arbitrary detention, now under effective solitary confinement, with his health failing. He faces extradition to the United States and prosecution for journalism should he step outside the Ecuadorian embassy in London.

Rally organiser James Cogan has described Assange’s persecution as the “spearhead of a global offensive against freedom of speech and… censorship of oppositional voices on the internet.” Consistent with this, when he was CIA director Mike Pompeo pledged to pursue, with “great vigour”, “small” media outlets in Wikileaks’ wake.

The rallies in Sydney and Melbourne will demand that the silence and collaboration of the Australian government in Assange’s persecution must end. Terry Hicks said of the rallies, “the fight to gain Julian’s freedom depends on ordinary people speaking out.”

Continue reading→

Twenty-One Thoughts On The Persecution Of Julian Assange, by Caitlin Johnstone

Caitlin Johnstone explains what the persecution of Julian Assange means. From Johnstone at caitlinjohnstone.com:

1. I write a lot about the plight of Julian Assange for the same reason I write a lot about the Iraq invasion: his persecution, when sincerely examined, exposes undeniable proof that we are ruled by a transnational power establishment which is immoral and dishonest to its core.

2. Assange started a leak outlet on the premise that corrupt and unaccountable power is a problem in our world, and that the problem can be fought with the light of truth. Corrupt and unaccountable power has responded by detaining, silencing and smearing him. The persecution of Assange has proved his thesis about the world absolutely correct.

3. Anyone who offends the US-centralized empire will find themselves subject to a trial by media, and the media are owned by the same plutocratic class which owns the empire. To believe what mass media news outlets tell you about those who stand up to imperial power is to ignore reality.

4. Corrupt and unaccountable power uses its political and media influence to smear Assange because, as far as the interests of corrupt and unaccountable power are concerned, killing his reputation is as good as killing him. If everyone can be paced into viewing him with hatred and revulsion, they’ll be far less likely to take WikiLeaks publications seriously, and they’ll be far more likely to consent to Assange’s silencing and imprisonment. Someone can be speaking 100 percent truth to you, but if you’re suspicious of him you won’t believe anything he’s saying. If they can manufacture that suspicion with total or near-total credence, then as far as our rulers are concerned it’s as good as putting a bullet in his head.

Continue reading

The boogeyman is coming for you… no matter where in the world you are, by Simon Black

There are no geographical limits to the application of US law. From Simon Black at sovereignman.com:

The anti-terrorism unit suited up.

This was an international affair… a deal between the USA and New Zealand, two members of the Five Eyes intelligence alliance.

Helicopters, tactical suits, high caliber firearms—the whole shebang. They busted in the doors and successfully raided the multi-million-dollar compound.

What was this… capturing the next in line after Bin Laden? Busting an international human trafficking ring?

Actually, elite New Zealand law enforcement was acting at the request of the United States to arrest a guy named Kim Dotcom.

Kim Dotcom is a large, jovial man of German-Swedish origins. He founded Megaupload, an online platform that allowed us to basically watch movies online for free.

Unfortunately for Kim, a lot of that content included American movies, with American copyrights.

Continue reading

Smear Slander Rinse and Repeat, by Raúl Ilargi Meijer

More often than not, news is no longer simply reported, it’s made up or its opinion masquerading as news. From Raúl Ilargi Meijer at theautomaticearth.com:

The way ‘news’ is reported through known outlets changes so fast hardly a soul notices that news as we once knew it no longer exists. This is due to a large extent to the advent of the internet in general, and social media in particular. On the one hand this has led to an absolute overkill in ‘news’, forcing people to pick between sources once they find they can’t read or view it all, on the other hand it has allowed news outlets to flood the former news waves with so much of the same that nobody can compare one source with the other anymore.

Once you achieve that situation, you’re more or less free to make the news, rather than just report on it. The rise of Donald Trump has made the existing mass media realize that one-sided negative reporting on the man sells better than anything objective can. The MSM have sort of won the battle versus the interwebs, albeit only in that regard, and only for this moment, but that is enough for them for now; just like their readers, they don’t have the scope or the energy to look any further or deeper.

This is in a nutshell, and we really should take a much more profound look but that’s another chapter, what has changed the news, and what will keep on changing it until the truth sets us all free. This is what drives outlets like CNN, the New York Times and the Guardian today, because it provides them with readers and viewers. Which they would not have if they didn’t conduct a 24/7 war on a set list of topics they know their audience can’t get enough of.

Continue reading→

 

 

Never, Ever Forget The Guardian/Politico Psyop Against WikiLeaks, by Caitlin Johnstone

The number of people who believe the mainstream media is dwindling, and this latest by The Guardian and Politico will accelerate the process. From Caitlin Johnstone at caitlinjohnstone.com:

For the first few hours after any new “bombshell” Russiagate story comes out, my social media notifications always light up with poorly written posts by liberal establishment loyalists saying things like “HAHAHA @caitoz this proves you wrong now will you FINALLY stop denying Russian collusion???” Then, when people start actually analyzing that story and noting that it comes nowhere remotely close to proving that Donald Trump colluded with the Russian government to steal the 2016 election, those same people always forget to come back afterward and admit to me that they were wrong again.

This happens every single time, including this past Tuesday when the Guardian published a new “bombshell” report saying that former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort had had secret meetings with WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange. When experts all across the political spectrum began pointing out that the story contained no evidence for its nonsensical claims and was entirely anonymously sourced, nobody ever came back and said “Hey sorry for calling you a Russian propagandist, Caitlin; turns out that story wasn’t as fact-based as I’d thought!” When evidence for a single one of the article’s claims failed to turn up for a day, then two days, then three days, nobody came back and said “Gosh Caitlin, I owe you an apology for mocking you and calling you Assange’s bitch; turns out WikiLeaks and Manafort are suing that publication and its claims remain completely unproven.”

Continue reading→