wikileaks thread

[VKhaun]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-19312679

How do you think the U.S. should react?
How do you expect them to react, if at all?

[NAH Grahm Cracker]

How should the U.S. react? They shouldn't do anything, I think they shouldn't be trying to get him extradited, if they are.
How do I expect them to react? They will keep trying to pursue getting him extradited or whatever they are doing now, so I don't expect them to really 'react', per se.

I don't like that whistle blowing is treated like such a bad thing.
I'm not well versed in what they've released, but has WikiLeak's activities actually put anyone in harm's way or given away a critical national security secret?
It probably revealed some mistakes made by governments, but that's a good thing. It keeps the government honest, and anyone should realize they aren't being honest most of the time.
I don't expect the government to accept that reasoning though.

Britain just wants to send him back to Sweden for the alleged sexual assault, right?
I have no idea if that story is all BS made up to smear Assange, and I can't find any useful details on it, but if there is any legitimacy then Britain isn't doing anything wrong to not let him leave the country or to extradite him to Sweden.

If calmer heads would prevail, I believe there should be more effort put into assessing his guilt on the molestation charges without requiring extradition to Sweden.
My guess is that no one in a high enough position in the British government cares about that (or they wouldn't mind him being extradited to the U.S. afterwards anyways), so they are just attempting to fulfill their part of the warrant.

Ecuador is probably doing the most reasonable thing, simply trying to protect a guy whom they believe to be an undue political target.

This must end one of three ways:
1.) British governments raids the embassy, probably causing a big hissy fit, but without any serious implications.
2.) Britain gives up and says he can leave.
3.) Assange or Ecuador gives up.
I wonder how long it will take and which one happens.

[Sillywilly]

How should the U.S. react? They shouldn't do anything, I think they shouldn't be trying to get him extradited, if they are.
How do I expect them to react? They will keep trying to pursue getting him extradited or whatever they are doing now, so I don't expect them to really 'react', per se.

I don't like that whistle blowing is treated like such a bad thing.
I'm not well versed in what they've released, but has WikiLeak's activities actually put anyone in harm's way or given away a critical national security secret?
It probably revealed some mistakes made by governments, but that's a good thing. It keeps the government honest, and anyone should realize they aren't being honest most of the time.
I don't expect the government to accept that reasoning though.

Britain just wants to send him back to Sweden for the alleged sexual assault, right?
I have no idea if that story is all BS made up to smear Assange, and I can't find any useful details on it, but if there is any legitimacy then Britain isn't doing anything wrong to not let him leave the country or to extradite him to Sweden.

If calmer heads would prevail, I believe there should be more effort put into assessing his guilt on the molestation charges without requiring extradition to Sweden.
My guess is that no one in a high enough position in the British government cares about that (or they wouldn't mind him being extradited to the U.S. afterwards anyways), so they are just attempting to fulfill their part of the warrant.

Ecuador is probably doing the most reasonable thing, simply trying to protect a guy whom they believe to be an undue political target.

This must end one of three ways:
1.) British governments raids the embassy, probably causing a big hissy fit, but without any serious implications.
2.) Britain gives up and says he can leave.
3.) Assange or Ecuador gives up.
I wonder how long it will take and which one happens.

Knowing Scandinavia the charges could very well be made up. There's no way I'd actively take on a Scandinavian government without some kind of backwoods militia watching my back. It's one of those places where you find out the government is involved with a communist movement in Thailand for it's own gain and then suddenly you're wanted for 3 counts of animal rape or something. I don't remember the exact details but for some reason I was thinking it was 2 counts of rape and the charges didn't come up until several years later after the supposed incident which seemed kinda fishy to me. I'll have to look it up later to be sure though.

The US shouldn't be involved because, fuck Sweden. We're not their personal bounty hunter service. Also I think something like wikileaks is the closest thing we will ever get to transparency in government. A law that says the government has to release closed door dealings is useless unless there is someone or something that forces them to release the stuff they don't want you to know. The government isn't going to say "oh well we gotta do it cause it's the law" anymore than the average thug would respect the law.

[Valec]

Well they did supposedly leak the names of informants in Afghanistan... so yeah, i'd say they did a bad thing. I understand whistle blowing and I also understand journalistic integrity. When you are going to release undisclosed information to the public, you should at least screen out anything that could presently endanger lives.

[ofrm1]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-19312679

How do you think the U.S. should react?
How do you expect them to react, if at all?

Ideally, the US shouldn't care as his trial has nothing to do with the US in the slightest.
Practically, the US will most definitely continue in their efforts to get him to the US so they can prosecute him.

Let's be honest. This is nothing more than a pathetic ruse to get him to the US so that he can be charged under the Espionage Act. He's already agreed to extradition to Sweden for questioning assuming they agree to the conditions that he will not be extradited to another country such as the US. Sweden claims that the US's interest in Assange has nothing to do with their criminal case and that they merely want to question him. He hasn't been charged with anything yet as they haven't been able to question him a second time to see if there is enough evidence to warrant charging him at all. This could be remedied easily as all they would have to do is send investigators to London at any time during the Extradition Hearing, High Court Appeal of the decision and the subsequent Supereme Court Appeal of the High Court's decision or even the Embassy itself yet they didn't. They clearly aren't that determined to question him as they've had over a year now to do so, instead deciding on wasting time and taxpayer money on an extradition hearing which they knew he was going to appeal ad nauseum.

The US wants him bad because they're scared. They're scared because they know they cannot possibly stop whistleblowing completely which effectively means that as long as wikileaks continues to exist, they cannot stop it at all. These charges are likely trumped up as character assassination. Assuming they stick, even if he isn't extradited to the US to stand trial under the Espionage Act, every single leak of classified documents no matter how legitimate and helpful to society they are, the words "yeah, but he's a molester. Are you really going to trust a guy who molests women?"

As far as I am aware, there has not been one documented case in which a single person has been put in harm's way due to the leaking of hundreds of thousands of classified documents. Whistleblowing is a laudable action and people should treat it as such.

This is only going to get more interesting in the next few weeks/months.