Wikileaks - Page 3

Originally Posted by crazychester

Did you read his reply? Because frankly (NPI), I was heartened by it. And my politics are as different from Frank's as is imaginable.

But at least he still has an open mind.

The number of times I've wished in the past few years "why couldn't this happen to sego, or sammi jo or trumpty or SDW" or somebody who damn well cared.

It breaks my heart that I put everything on the line for somebody like you sego.

Damn you to hell. Whatever your BS political position.

Originally Posted by segovius

Umm...this reply is unintelligible Chester. I think you (or we) may have some crossed wires.

Please explain your issue more clearly as I fail to understand it...then we can debate it. Is good to have someone here who actually WANTS to debate so welcome back!

PS - you can use insults even...I am impossible to offend !

The sad truth is, sammi jo, sego and trumpty agree more than they know. But in order to realize that, they all need to recognize that one of the key weapons deployed by governments (of all persuasions) is divide and conquer.

This is not the time to let them achieve this. I've been a member long enough here to know you are ALL better than that. And I would welcome the sort of balanced yet fearless discussion of what is happening here that first made me register all those years ago.

You could start here (don't be put off by the title). It reminds me of what we used to be. All of us.

You know trumpty. I don't agree with virtually a thing you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.

That is what this is all about.

Originally Posted by crazychester

No you go back and read my original post..

Originally Posted by segovius

How about just plain old execution then? A la Palin?

A year after the Act's passage, Eugene V. Debs, Socialist Party presidential candidate in 1904, 1908, and 1912 was arrested and sentenced to 10 years in prison for making a speech that "obstructed recruiting."

In United States v. Motion Picture Film (1917), a federal court upheld government seizure of a film about the Revolutionary War entitled "The Spirit of '76" because it claimed that the depiction of cruelty by British soldiers might undermine support for a wartime ally. The producer, Robert Goldstein, a Jew of German origins, was prosecuted under Title XI of the Act, and received a ten-year sentence plus a fine of five thousand dollars.

In March 1919, President Wilson, at the suggestion of Attorney General Thomas Watt Gregory released or reduced the sentences of some 200 prisoners convicted under the Espionage Act or the Sedition Act.

In June 1971, Daniel Ellsberg and Anthony Russo were charged with a felony under the Espionage Act of 1917, because they lacked legal authority to publish classified documents that came to be known as the Pentagon Papers.

Alfred Zehe was arrested in Boston in 1983 after being caught in a government-run sting operation in which he had reviewed classified U.S. government documents in Mexico and East Germany. His attorneys contended without success that the indictment was invalid, arguing that the Espionage Act does not cover the activities of a foreign citizen outside the United States.

Originally Posted by jazzguru

And Sarah Palin weighs in with an example of Right-wing psychosis.

Originally Posted by Splinemodel

What I've learned from Julian Assange is that, if you start a provocative web site, you can have sex with two Swedish birds in one day. (I'm not being incredibly serious here). The guy is creepy looking. I'm not sure I believe the rape charges are legit, but he does have this sort of weird pederast vibe.

Anyway, transparency was one of Obama's campaign promises. Maybe they are buds.

Although Julian Assange sparked a media firestorm when he revealed thousands of pages of Pentagon reports proving that the U.S. military concealed more than 15,000 civilian deaths in Iraq, that rampant corruption and negligence among private contractors there poses a profound security risk, and that the U.S. State Department continually questions the strength of Russia's democracy, the fact remains that nobody wants to listen to an annoying little tattler.

Numerous sources have confirmed that the 39-year-old founder of  WikiLeaks should just quit worrying about what every world power is up to, and shouldn't go squealing to everyone about how the U.S. thinks the prime minister of Italy is feckless and ineffective. While his parents probably taught him it's impolite to be a sniveling little pip-squeak, Assange still told on America for failing to investigate reports of abuse, rape, and murder by Iraqi police and soldiers, even though it's not his job to be the boss of this country. The whistle-blowing know-it-all is from Australia, so it really has nothing to do with him. Who is he trying to impress, anyway?
Seriously, get a life.

When Assange obtained evidence that an Apache helicopter killed 12 people, including two journalists, during a 2007 air strike in Baghdad, the whiny big mouth repeatedly threatened to tell on the U.S. Army, as if the whole military was going to be in soooo much trouble because of some stupid video footage. And though the Chinese government ordered attacks on American computer networks, it's still none of your beeswax, Julian. You're nothing but a big baby who wants special attention and cries all the time because world leaders call Mahmoud Ahmadinejad "Hitler" in private, but refuse to do so on the record. Boohoo! Don't you have somebody else to irritate? Everybody wants you to go away. And you have a girl's name. Creep.

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange claimed Friday that the United States is pursuing him in secret, legally speaking. In broadcast interviews conducted following his release on bail from a British jail, he complained that US prosecutors are carrying out a secretive grand-jury probe into WikiLeaks activities and that they may already have obtained a sealed indictment against him.


Is he right? Is the Justice Department secretly beginning a case against him?

Bradley Manning, the 22-year-old U.S. Army Private accused of leaking classified documents to WikiLeaks, has never been convicted of that crime, nor of any other crime. Despite that, he has been detained at the U.S. Marine brig in Quantico, Virginia for five months -- and for two months before that in a military jail in Kuwait -- under conditions that constitute cruel and inhumane treatment and, by the standards of many nations, even torture. Interviews with several people directly familiar with the conditions of Manning's detention, ultimately including a Quantico brig official (Lt. Brian Villiard) who confirmed much of what they conveyed, establishes that the accused leaker is subjected to detention conditions likely to create long-term psychological injuries.

From the beginning of his detention, Manning has been held in intensive solitary confinement. For 23 out of 24 hours every day -- for seven straight months and counting -- he sits completely alone in his cell. Even inside his cell, his activities are heavily restricted; he's barred even from exercising and is under constant surveillance to enforce those restrictions. For reasons that appear completely punitive, he's being denied many of the most basic attributes of civilized imprisonment, including even a pillow or sheets for his bed (he is not and never has been on suicide watch). For the one hour per day when he is freed from this isolation, he is barred from accessing any news or current events programs. Lt. Villiard protested that the conditions are not "like jail movies where someone gets thrown into the hole," but confirmed that he is in solitary confinement, entirely alone in his cell except for the one hour per day he is taken out.

Originally Posted by jazzguru

If they can do this to Manning, they can and will do this to you and me if we are deemed a "threat to national security", even if we have not been charged with or convicted of any crime..

Originally Posted by jazzguru

Thank goodness Obama has closed Gitmo, eh?

Originally Posted by jazzguru

Wikileaks documents show WMDs found in Iraq

Originally Posted by FloorJack

Does anyone find it absolutely hilarious that some of Assang's supports are outraged that the details of the rape case against him were leaked. They are really worried about the damage this does to him

Originally Posted by jazzguru

Is it good? Is it bad?

Wikileaks: Secret Iraq War Death Toll Reportedly at Least 100,000

The Iraq Archive: The Strands of a War

Greatest Data Leak in US Military History

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"If a nation expects to be ignorant and free in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be." -- Thomas Jefferson, letter to Colonel Charles Yancey, January 6, 1816

Originally Posted by segovius

No...no-one does.

It's just you - but then you find the planet getting fucked up beyond help by your overlords funny too so perhaps you;re not the best benchmark.

Originally Posted by gerald apple

Bad Wikileaks is trouble and she be completely eliminated.This is just agitating people and countries and eventually will become a big problem for the US.Assange is a traitor who should rot in a military jail for at least 30 years.

crimes. One guilty of treason.

The betrayal of one's own country by waging war against it or by consciously or purposely acting to aid its enemies.

Under Article III, Section 3, of the Constitution, any person who levies war against the United States or adheres to its enemies by giving them Aid and Comfort has committed treason within the meaning of the Constitution. The term aid and comfort refers to any act that manifests a betrayal of allegiance to the United States, such as furnishing enemies with arms, troops, transportation, shelter, or classified information. If a subversive act has any tendency to weaken the power of the United States to attack or resist its enemies, aid and comfort has been given.

The Treason Clause applies only to disloyal acts committed during times of war. Acts of dis-loyalty during peacetime are not considered treasonous under the Constitution. Nor do acts of Espionage committed on behalf of an ally constitute treason. For example, julius and ethel rosenberg were convicted of espionage, in 1951, for helping the Soviet Union steal atomic secrets from the United States during World War II. The Rosenbergs were not tried for treason because the United States and the Soviet Union were allies during World War II.

Everyone should enjoy a basic right to privacy, according to one of the more compelling arguments against WikiLeaks megaleak of over 250,000 diplomatic cables.

In this view, a diplomatic communication should be protected so U.S. diplomats can communicate candidly to Washington, without fear their words will be made public and used against them.

Yet, regardless of this arguments merits, it is curious that many of those making it were comparatively silent over the National Security Agencys warrantless wiretapping program that was exposed back in 2005, when it was the Bush administration deciding, without judicial oversight, to pry into the private communications of American citizens and others.

Following the disclosure of this surveillance program, which was widely seen as violating the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act as well as the privacy rights of millions of Americans, Congress simply amended the law to make President George W. Bushs activities legal.

So, according to the view of a majority in Congress, intercepting the private e-mails and phone calls of American citizens is fine if they were thought to be traveling abroad, but releasing secret diplomatic cables makes WikiLeaks a criminal enterprise and Julian Assange a high-tech terrorist, according to Vice President Joe Biden.

Nevertheless, it is troubling that at the highest political levels in Washington, there is an equation being made between exposing government secrets and terrorism, a comparison that is especially worrisome in light of a U.S. Supreme Court ruling last June that upheld the material support clause of the USA Patriot Act.

In a June 21 decision, the Court ruled that associating with groups designated as foreign terrorist organizations by the State Department, including providing expert advice to these organizations, can open up American citizens to prosecution.

Essentially, the Court agreed with the plaintiffs that the statute does criminalize speech on the basis of its content, but decided that the governments interest in isolating groups on the State Departments foreign terrorist organization list was sufficiently great to overcome the heightened level of scrutiny.

Yet, while the political establishment lashes out over people revealing government secrets, there is no corresponding outrage over the loss of regular Americans right to privacy. Only the government, it seems, is entitled to this privacy, not the American people.

This double standard applies even though WikiLeaks has revealed a high degree of duplicity, corruption and illegality in the conduct of U.S. foreign policy. So far, the surveillance of U.S. citizens has yielded little of substance, despite opening files on tens of thousands of Americans for suspicious activities and spying on Americans believed to be traveling abroad.

We, among many law abiding citizens of the world deplore and condemn, as applicable, your utterances and writings calling for the extra judicial ie unlawful: kidnapping/assassination/murder/physical harm of Julian Assange, his supporters, Wikileaks workers or members of Assange's family.

We remind you of the laws in your country and others against incitement, inter alia:

Common law:

In English criminal law, incitement was an anticipatory common law offence and was the act of persuading, encouraging, instigating, pressuring, or threatening so as to cause another to commit a crime....The inciter must intend the others to engage in the behaviour constituting the offence, including any consequences which may result, and must know or believe (or possibly suspect) that those others will have the relevant mens rea."

Codified Incitement Law:
(1) Australian Commonwealth
11.4 Incitement
(1) A person who urges the commission of an offence is guilty of the offence of incitement.
(2) For the person to be guilty, the person must intend that the offence incited be committed.

(2) Canada
464. Except where otherwise expressly provided by law, the following provisions apply in respect of persons who counsel other persons to commit offences, namely,(a) every one who counsels another person to commit an indictable offence is, if the offence is not committed, guilty of an indictable offence and liable to the same punishment to which a person who attempts to commit that offence is liable; and

(3) United Kingdom
(1)A person commits an offence if
(a)he does an act capable of encouraging or assisting the commission of an offence; and
(b)he intends to encourage or assist its commission.

(4)USA
There is no automatic 1st Amendment protection per
Brandenburg v. Ohio, 395 U.S. 444 (1969):
Freedoms of speech and press do not permit a State to forbid advocacy of the use of force or of law violation except where such advocacy is directed to inciting or producing imminent lawless action and is likely to incite or produce such action

We remind you that while such prima facie incitement by way of utterances and writings may go unpunished in your country, they will not necessarily go unpunished in others, and especially so should you have the courage of your convictions to repeat them in those other jurisdictions.

We ask you respectfully, to contemplate this writing of Mahatma Ghandi:

An error does not become truth by reason of multiplied propagation, nor does truth become error because nobody sees it. Truth stands, even if there be no public support. It is self sustained.

And that truth is that Julian Assange is no terrorist; he is not a war defined "belligerent" acting against the United States; he cannot ever be a "traitor"to the USA since by definition he is not a citizen of the United States.

And lastly as Ron Paul put it so well:
In a society where truth becomes treason, however, we are in big trouble. The truth is that our foreign spying, meddling and outright military intervention in the post-World War 2 era has made us less secure, not more, and we have lost countless lives and spent trillions of dollars for our trouble. Too often its the official government lies that have given us endless and illegal wars resulting in hundreds of thousands of deaths and casualties.

A mental health specialist recommended that the Army private accused of leaking classified material to the anti-secrecy Web site WikiLeaks not be deployed to Iraq, but his immediate commanders sent him anyway, according to a military official familiar with a new Army investigation.
The recommendation by the specialist at Fort Drum, N.Y., did not disqualify Pfc. Bradley E. Manning from being sent to Iraq. The final decision on whether a soldier is fit to go to a war zone rests with his immediate commanders.
But an Army investigation has concluded that the commanders' decision not to heed the specialist's advice and their failure to properly discipline Manning may have contributed to one of the most high-profile classified military network breaches in decades, the military official said.....

Originally Posted by MJ1970

OPEN LETTER TO THOSE INCITING MURDER UPON JULIAN ASSANGE AND/OR MEMBERS OF HIS FAMILY:

London (CNN) -- Lawyers for WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange have set up a Facebook page asking for donations to his legal defense fund.
As of Friday afternoon, about $5,700 had been raised on the site, which featured a picture of Assange with the words, "I need your help. Please give."

On its website, the law firm gave information including a bank account number and sort code, and a PayPal link, so donors can give money directly to the fund.