What is he going to be tried for? Doing actual journalistic work rather than being a "pretend journalist" that we have working in all our "news" companies?
Matt Taibbi did a pretty good write-up on why the indictment is big deal.[0]
Basically, there has been a long push towards a "leaks are criminal activity" mentality. If publishing leaked information gets classified as a crime, soon there will be no real reporting left.
The moneyshot of the article is about third of the way in: "Reporters regularly publish stolen, hacked and illegally-obtained material. A case that defined such behavior as criminal conspiracy would be devastating. It would have every reporter in the country ripping national security sources out of their rolodexes and tossing them in the trash."
So whatever you may think of Assange the person, his case can have far-reaching consequences.
This is where hacker news pretends to be in favor of free speech and freedom of the press while screaming for Assange to be prosecuted for exposing Hillary.
This is where hacker news pretends to be in favor of free speech and freedom of the press while screaming for Assange to be prosecuted for exposing Hillary.
There is where people understand that working with military intelligence services to receive hacked materials isn't "Free speech", it's clandestine espionage, and "journalism" isn't any more of a cover for espionage and spying and military intelligence operations than "diplomat" is.
Actually, diplomat is a far superior protection for spying than journalism.
If Julian was smart enough to ingratiate himself to his masters earlier instead of playing his megalomaniac NGO power-info-broker game, he might not have voluntarily locked himself in an Embassy for half a decade. He might have found himself with a sweet Snowden gig, a little quid pro quo here and there and you get quite the setup in Russia.
But no American who believes in LIBERTY (not freedom. Liberty is freedom with common sense limitations. Anarchy tempered with rules for society and enforcement of rules) will have any problem with a spy being prosecuted for attacking our elections on the behest of a foreign power whose military intelligence this past month used a defense against Mueller charges in American courts of "America is the enemy, we were committing an act of war, it doesn't fall under civilian law"[1]. Great company, Julian!
Oh look, this post vanished off the front page. This community censors more than Stalin. It’s a giant echo chamber and if you go against the grain you get shadow banned. Seriously, fuck this place.
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[ 3.3 ms ] story [ 46.0 ms ] threadhttps://www.ted.com/talks/will_potter_the_secret_us_prisons_...
You do that with a person as visible as Asange and the entire international treaty system breaks down
Basically, there has been a long push towards a "leaks are criminal activity" mentality. If publishing leaked information gets classified as a crime, soon there will be no real reporting left.
The moneyshot of the article is about third of the way in: "Reporters regularly publish stolen, hacked and illegally-obtained material. A case that defined such behavior as criminal conspiracy would be devastating. It would have every reporter in the country ripping national security sources out of their rolodexes and tossing them in the trash."
So whatever you may think of Assange the person, his case can have far-reaching consequences.
0: https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/taibbi-j...
Actually, diplomat is a far superior protection for spying than journalism.
If Julian was smart enough to ingratiate himself to his masters earlier instead of playing his megalomaniac NGO power-info-broker game, he might not have voluntarily locked himself in an Embassy for half a decade. He might have found himself with a sweet Snowden gig, a little quid pro quo here and there and you get quite the setup in Russia.
But no American who believes in LIBERTY (not freedom. Liberty is freedom with common sense limitations. Anarchy tempered with rules for society and enforcement of rules) will have any problem with a spy being prosecuted for attacking our elections on the behest of a foreign power whose military intelligence this past month used a defense against Mueller charges in American courts of "America is the enemy, we were committing an act of war, it doesn't fall under civilian law"[1]. Great company, Julian!
[1] https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/russi...