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Freed in exchange for a guilty plea in a plea deal
And time served. Guilty but free.
One of the most up voted comments on another thread about this was in effect “Assange has been cleared.” No, he pleaded guilty and served five years in prison, it’s just that he already served that time since he was never released pending trial.
He probably got a good sentence considering he never stepped foot in a US prison
No justice. 👎 Boo, hiss.
He never denied his guilt. Just disagreed with it.
Dude was locked up for longer than we would have had him in prison. Time served was the right choice and reinforces that we’re not the country assange wants to paint us as.
Making sure he pleads guilty to something that isn’t a crime equals America not having freedom of speech.
With everything that’s going on in the world, I feel like “freedom of speech” doesn’t exist. It’s just a “buzz”.
Just to name a few things;
- You want to criticize Israel? Antisemitism!
- You want to criticize US-related Israel things? Antisemitism!
- You want to provide evidence of crimes? That’s a ‘crime’!
- You are against killing innocent people? Antisemitism!
- You want to protest? You disrupt the order and therefore a crime!
Perhaps it is just me being pessimistic.
Perhaps it is just me being
pessimisticantisemitic.FIFY!
/S
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You’ve just misunderstood what freedom of speech is. The government won’t jail you for your opinions. You can say whatever you want that isn’t a threat or call to violence.
Let’s be real though. That’s why people get to call you names when they disagree with you. They also have that same protected speech.
Protesting is a thing you are doing while exercising your free speech. However, you can be doing 2 things at once. Exercising your free speech while committing the crime of trespassing, etc. That one right doesn’t make you legally immune to anything else you’re doing.
Of course, people commit crimes while protesting to give their protest some teeth, and in some cases to bring attention to the law they might be protesting. But you should be prepared to be fined and arrested during spicy protests. People sitting in the road acting shocked they get hit and dragged away just make me feel like I’m looking at too many shocked Pikachus. You should expect it. That’s why you are there. If you didn’t face violence you aren’t really showing how strongly you feel. That’s what it means to stand against opposition.
Don’t make me break out my argument about how the bill of rights is a dead letter. Every single one, including the third.
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Nah just you misunderstanding positions and arguments you’ve overheard.
Espionage is 100% a crime. You may disagree with it being a crime but it’s illegal in every country.
Revealing Chinese war crimes is also a crime in China.
If China forcefully extradites an American journalists because the journalist leaks secret Chinese state documents of Uyghur concentration camps… would you be defending China because the journalist did something “illegal”?
Well no, because one of the rules for extradition is both countries must consider it a crime.
And before you answer, I’m pretty sure China has done exactly this from countries friendly to them. Which falls under the heading of journalists needing to be aware of the realities of where they’re going. It’s just not American journalists because we still have a bigger stick for now.
So again, let me know when the NYT is running information operations to discredit China. Exposing Human Rights violations is not what Assange is guilty of.
Well no, because one of the rules for extradition is both countries must consider it a crime.
No that’s not true. Only the country demanding the extradition has to mark someone as a criminal. Often extradition treaties are made so if one country marks someone as a criminal and they flee somewhere else, that country will deliver them the criminal. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extradition
In this case America is heavily abusing the extradition treaty by marking a journalist as a criminal because he leaked evidence of war crimes.
I’m pretty sure China has done exactly this from countries friendly to them.
Accusing America of violating press freedom doesn’t mean I’m somehow defending Chinese press freedom. There’s a reason I’m equating America to China here.
Assange is not a journalist. Again, let me know when the NYT does what he did. It’s detailed in the comment above.
And yes, a country can always exercise its sovereignty. There is no physical means of forcing an extradition short of using military power.
Strange that all journalists call Assange a journalist.
So you’re saying anyone leaking classified israeli documents of war crimes is a criminal?
That’s not true. Some people who call themselves journalists call Assange a journalist.
Here’s the comment you have yet to substantively respond to.
So when the NYT colludes with Russian hackers and a campaign to interfere with elections I’ll call Assange a journalist.
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Worse, it validates the precedent that non-U.S.-citizens can be prosecuted for breaking U.S. law over things they did outside of the U.S.
Really happy that Assange gets to go home, since he’s suffered enough personally, but I really don’t like the precedent that I can be prosecuted in, say, Israel under Israeli law for things that I did in Wisconsin (e.g. boycotting).
Don’t solicit Israeli soldiers to become assets and give you classified information you will then edit to make Israel look as bad as possible?
He acted as a spy in every way.
There are reports of mass violations being committed against hostages in israeli concentration camps such as the one in the Negev desert. Which is now closed (moved elsewhere) because of all the reports coming out
Are you saying they should arrest the journalists that wrote those reports?
No. There is a massive difference between journalists and Assange. He didn’t solicit evidence of crimes. He solicited any and all classified information. Then he straight up edited the stuff he did get to make it look like the US was committing war crimes. He also released diplomatic cables entirely calculated to damage the ability of the US to conduct diplomacy. Finally he straight up interfered in an election by releasing private emails that were hacked by Russian Intelligence. Not one to leave things to chance, he didn’t exactly edit them this time. (That backfired hard when the Army just released all the footage and reports) Instead he added editorial titles to email chains he knew no one was really going to dig through. Just enough cover so conservative outlets could run attack ads and articles using his product.
Let me know when the NYT does all of that.
Have you even seen collateral murder?
Yes, and I’ve seen the full video and Army reports debunking it. That’s why it never went anywhere outside the far left and Russia/China. He had to literally edit the video and create an out of context snuff film before it suited his purposes.
Okay so you have not seen Collateral Murder. I understand.
Yikes! This reply validates my concern 100%.
Other sovereign nations get to make their own laws and legal systems without our control. They can make bullshit laws if they want to, like conflating journalism with spying. Then they can charge journalists in another country with a crime and extradite them to face charges. But, spying or journalism or criticizing their king, the details didn’t really matter, they could charge anybody anybody, anywhere in the world with any crime they want. And since it’s another country, we have no assurances of due process there.
That’s scary shit.
Yeah, they already do that. Don’t go and publish a ton of articles criticizing Lese Majeste and expect to freely travel to a Direct Rule Monarchy or any country that is a client state of a Direct Rule Monarchy.
But extreme examples aside, every country in the world will come for you if you want to reveal their military secrets, including who is working for that country secretly in other countries. This isn’t just him dropping one video. There was an entire document dump that caused the CIA to pull hundreds of people out of the field. And no matter what your personal feelings on the matter are, countries view their intelligence activities as legitimate, secret, and not subject to whistleblower rules unless a crime (that they have on the books) is being exposed. Raw dogging the entire secret intranet for everything you can fit on a USB is not whistleblowing or reporting.
Travel to those countries? The precedent here is that China has the right to extradite me for supporting democracy in Hong Kong from here in the U.S., never once even leaving my house. Assange was not a U.S. citizen, and located outside of U.S. territory.
Of course, the U.S. won’t cooperate with the extradition request, but that’s just a matter of power relationships, not principles. The principle is that everybody in the world is subject to every country’s laws. Or, every person in the world is subject to the laws of the U.S., which fundamentally breaks the rule of law.
It’s scary how many people out there are okay with that.
Are you actually managing sources of classified Chinese documents? This breathless attempt to conflate espionage with having an opinion about another country is ridiculous.
And you keep saying espionage, invoking a word as if it’s some special kind of crime exempt from the rule of law, and also immutable. China gets to define what espionage is under their laws. The U.S. did mangle it far beyond the common definition to pursue Assange.
That precedent doesn’t need validation. It’s ancient. It’s international law. Don’t fuck around and then run off to an ally.
Wat? Are you thinking of Snowden?
No?
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No it was more than that, he actively helped Chelsea hack into files she didn’t have access to. He literally hacked into classified databases of the US military. Much worse than leaking info.
He was not in trouble for leaking information. He literally helped Chelsea hack into classified files she didn’t have access to, he actively participated in breaching security inside the US military. Very illegal no matter where you stand.
This is just blatantly false. Repeating government propaganda doesn’t make it true. He did not hack the military he told someone what a VPN is.
Alright it take it back, he tried to help crack a password, but he likely failed. Looks like he was still actively pushing Chelsea to gather more classified info. I’m sorry but this is not the behavior of a journalist
In a pretrial hearing in Manning’s case, prosecutors presented evidence that Manning had asked Assange—who was instant messaging with Manning under the name Nathaniel Frank—if he had experience cracking hashes. Assange allegedly responded that he possessed rainbow tables for that, and Manning sent him a hashed password string. According to Thursday’s unsealed indictment, Assange followed up two days later asking for more information about the password, and writing that he’d had “no luck so far.” The indictment further alleges that Assange actively encouraged Manning to gather even more information, after Manning said she had given all she had.
It’s not clear if Assange ever successfully cracked the password. According to the indictment, that password would have given Manning administrative privileges on SIPRNet, allowing her to pull more files from it while concealing the traces of her leaks from investigators.
You’ve got a giant nothing burger there don’t keep digging deeper.
There’s a reason all serious journalists are defending Assagne and describing the case against him as a very dangerous precedent against press freedom.
The fact of the matter is that Assange’s policy of “leak everything” mainly only applied to the United States, which put united states assets (spies in authoritarian regimes) in danger and ended up in prison. And Assange did not extend the same courtesy to the Russians when documents were leaked from their end, and would redact and editorialize the leaks. Stack that on top conspiring to steal classified information and its not so much of a nothing burger as you call it. Yeah, let’s give blanket immunity to “journalists” who actively try to steal state secrets, leak it straight into a pipeline, and selectively put our -only- our allies in literally mortal danger while protecting that of our adversaries. Come on dude.
Holy shit these libs defending war criminals because “muh Russia”.
Did Russia claim to have freedom of speech?
What makes you think I’m defending the actions of the US? I remember watching the drone video when I was 18 years old, it was incredibly shocking and it forever changed how i saw the US military. Alternatively, do you support assange releasing the name of people in Authoritarian regimes who were working with the US? Who were imprisoned or possibly killed?
What I’m pointing out is that assange is not your ally, despite him exposing the atrocities of the US, much less a journalist. There are codes of ethics that journalists follow (and laws they have to follow as well) and if he did that, it likely could left him in a better position legally. Instead he was cavalier, and possibly even malicious with his actions. He should have kept a lawyer that specializes in whistleblower law on staff. But he probably thought because he was in Europe he could do whatever the fuck he wanted without consequence.
Did Russia claim to have freedom of speech?
I’m done here, it almost seems you are missing the point on purpose. This case is very clearly not about freedom speech.
Cool, now do Snowden
Where is he?
Right behind you!
Aus.
Need a public statement for sure but yea
fast forward a few years
“Assange is in critical condition after [near fatal car accident in bumfuck nowhere, mysteriously poisoned, ran off the road, etc.]. Although the incident seems quite suspicious, authorities have already ruled out assassination. If you question this, we will find you.”
Too bad his sexual misconduct was never explored
Wow to the people downvoting you need to rethink your definition of informed consent. Julian Assange is a repellent sociopath to anyone with two eyes and an open mind.
Unfortunately, he managed to escape trial until the statute of limitations ran out. But of course, some will defend him as a completely holsum rapist who was framed by the CIA, because you can’t believe those lying Swedish women, especially when the accused flees the country known for its humane justice system as soon as he hears he’s charged.
Or something bizarre along those lines.
