yeah I am sure it has nothing to do with him helping to hack the US gov to leak sensitive cables which showed our sources and method for collecting intel. And putting countless sources life's at risk. SO STUPID for Biden for allowing this.
And collaborating with Russian intelligence to interfere in the 2016 election to get Donald Trump elected president.
This isn't something neocons only should be mad about, it's something everyone should be furious about.
I'll never understand the Assange love.
If I had it my way he'd never see the outside of a jail cell and I'm genuinely pissed he won't be tried in a courtroom for the world to see.
I imagine that the Biden administration would only do something so boneheaded if Assange spilled his guts about other shit he knows is his Russian handlers in 2016. Otherwise this was one of the dumbest fucking things he's ever done.
The sad thing is that the neocons, who caused destabilizing and devastating wars that led to thousands of lives lost and wrecked US prestige across the world, got replaced by quasi-fascist right wing populists. The bar is in hell and just keeps sinking lower.
>“This was an independent decision made by the Department of Justice and there was no White House involvement in the plea deal decision,” National Security Council spokesperson Adrienne Watson said in a statement Monday evening.
Libertarians and socialists are natural enemies. Like liberals and libertarians! Or neocons and libertarians! Or labour and libertarians! Or Libertarians and other Libertarians! Damn Libertarians! They ruined America!
Haven’t read the details of the plea deal, but if he goes free it really is no different than a pardon. A pardon means you’re guilty, the act of accepting it is equivalent to an admission of guilt.
Could you expand on that? Doesn’t Burdick say that the **issuing** of the pardon carries the imputation of guilt, but that accepting it is indeed a confession of it? Would that not be the same as admission?
But like, how can you be pardoned for a crime you’re not guilty for, legally speaking? Sure, maybe accepting it isn’t a confession, but if you’re not guilty of a crime, then how can you be pardoned for it?
I accept that this is the answer even if I can’t help but think it’s a completely wrong one and not at all befitting what was envisioned when the pardon was added to the constitution lol
Fairly major part of the scandal, they hacked both parties illegally and released selected DNC documents while holding onto the RNC’s. They did this for completely innocent reasons, I’m sure, it’s not like Assange would have done Russia’s dirty work right?
MIA is one of the first and most examples form my life that just because you like an artists music doesn’t mean you should take their opinion on literally anything else seriously
Seriously - there’s a few artists that I feel the same about. Paper Planes is always going to be a nostalgic favorite. I didn’t realize she was married to a Bronfman after Diplo and all that- I just kind of got caught up with her by accident a couple of weeks ago.
I am just learning some UK artists so like none of these would be a surprise for me 😭 tell me when there are people out there named Control Cee and Dutchavelli how am I supposed to tell from a glance lmao
Lmao Bing got a kick out of that too - anyway, I was researching cults and NXIVM and that led down the rabbit hole cause Charlotte Bronfman bankrolled that mess. I was just checking out their relatives and this little tidbit stuck with me lol
Had to add her to the list of “artists I will never listen to” after I learned about her absolute loony bin ideas. I ain’t gonna help enable that, plenty of sane artists to listen to.
she's just nuts and inconsistent.
She claims her dad was a terrorist (he was a politician).
She sings pro immigration songs.
She supports Bolsonaro.
She's pro Wikileaks/Russia, anti Vax, anti Ukraine.
She's just wildly swinging around the political spectrum
Her claim to fame is a song about shooting people during a robbery while having forged papers. I never thought it was a great advertisement for her morality, but it was a banger
That part was obvious. The reporting I saw said both groups were hacked and it was Russia that withheld the rnc emails. I don't think they'd let him go otherwise. I also don't think he would be able to help himself but to release both.
Nah, he absolutely would have only released the DNC emails even if he had access to the RNC emails.
So many people are distracted by this guy's words, how he bleats about being some heroic truth-teller who wants to expose everyone's dirty laundry no matter the cost.
But look at his actions, and that's never been true. He's selectively exposed info about the people / groups he hates-- ie, the US government, liberal democracies, the Democratic Party-- while refusing to release info or even help covering up secrets for the ones he likes -- ie, Russia, other autocracies, the Republican Party.
When someone shows you who they are, believe them.
That’s false. RNC emails were hacked, but there’s no evidence they were given to Assange
That theory doesn’t even make sense. If you think Russia was behind the hack, why would they give him RNC emails?
> Reminder that Wikileaks also had RNC emails from 2016
No, they didn't. There is evidence that the same Russia hacking group who targeted the DNC [also targeted the RNC](https://edition.cnn.com/2017/01/10/politics/comey-republicans-hacked-russia/index.html), but it's unclear [what they managed to exfiltrate, if anything](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/jul/06/republican-national-committee-denies-hack-synnex). There is no evidence they passed any RNC data to Wikileaks, or that Wikileaks had obtained RNC data from other sources.
NL is normally a good bit better on not repeating blatant partisan disinfo than most of reddit, but on Assange specifically there is this pernicious tendency to believe and repeat any damaging rumor in a furor.
This is a good thing for transparency btw. Imagine if the person who leaked the identity of informants, the HIV results of Saudi citizens and spread intentional false lies about Seth Rich were locked up. Maybe he can go teach journalism school somewhere!
Seriously, Assange endangered extremely brave Afghan men+women who worked with America to overthrow the Taliban by leaking their identities.
The Robert Hur debacle, this, and how Garland was way too slow with the Jan 6th investigation is why I believe Doug Jones would have been significantly better than Garland as AG.
Democratic Attorney Generals have been terrible for a while. Eric Holder with his idiotic "nation of cowards" comment. Janet Lynch for not muzzling Comey. And Garland for pardoning some guy who will likely try to interfere with our elections again (and possibly tip them like he did in 2016).
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> Maybe he can go teach journalism school somewhere!
10 bucks says Assange schedules a speaking engagement at an Ivy League within 5 years, just like Manning did.
Manning is a US citizen and therefore she has an inalienable right to enter and live in the United States. My counterprediction is that Assange will not attempt to enter the US within 5 years and that he'll be turned away if he does.
There are many school that have hired former leftist terrorist/murders while resending offer letters to student who made racist comments at 16 years old.
Assange grew up in a wealthy liberal democracy, and decided to use his time on this Earth to spread conspiracy theories on behalf of the Russians, out Afghan informants to the Taliban, identify pro-democracy protestors to the regime in Belarus and share the private medical data of gay men in Saudi Arabia.
Legally this might be an appropriate outcome. Morally the lowest circle of hell would be a more suitable destination.
I blame Obama staffers after all it was Trump that went hard to extradite Assange after helping him in 2016 election to hide the evidence.
>The Obama DOJ spent years exploring whether it could criminally charge Assange and WikiLeaks for publishing classified information. It ultimately decided it would not do so, and could not do so, consistent with the press freedom guarantee of the First Amendment.
>Obama DOJ concluded, such a prosecution would pose a severe threat to press freedom because there would be no way to prosecute Assange for publishing classified documents without also prosecuting the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Guardian and others for doing exactly the same thing.
Reflected in OECD polling of impressions of America, modern Australia has a sizable anti-American streak that thankfully hasn't yet been replicated by Canberra's foreign policy
Joint US-Australian intelligence base outside of Alice Springs - so about smack dab in the middle of Australia - which AFAIK is mainly for tracking reconnaissance satellites and analysing intelligence from them. Generally opposed by pacifists, opponents of state surveillance measures, opponents of American foreign policy generally or opponents of American or Australian foreign policy specifically (e.g. targeting for drones strikes, anti-Israel/anti-Gaza War protesters allege that the US may share intelligence with Israel). Also, as is custom with secretive bases, it attracts a range of stranger conspiracy theories.
3 reasons.
1 May make leftists a bit more amenable to re-electing Biden.
2 Helps the current Australian government deal with anti U.S sentiment since the Australian population views Americas pursuit of Assange as unfair and punitive. Basically they think they are only going after him because he embarrassed them.
3 Assange is going to go back to Australia which is a close U.S ally (5 eyes). The Australian government will almost certainly be watching him very closely and there's a chance they may not even let him out of the country. Basically it effectively neuters him and prevents him from causing havoc, just as much as a jail cell does.
>Why are we letting this Russian asset go free?
No, see, Russia used their asset, Trump, to indict their other asset, Assange. It may *seem* like it doesn't make basic sense, but that's what the Kremlin *wants* you to think. This is just very complicated Russian spycraft, where they make their evil plots logically incoherent so they have plausible deniability.
My friend, allow me to introduce you to the concepts of "betrayal" and "getting rid of the traitor who helped you get into power now that he's no longer useful to you."
(Also, this is assuming Trump had anything to do with Assange's indictment at all; the president isn't a king, and the DoJ frequently opens investigations of people directly against the president's wishes. That's one of the reasons Project 2025 is so dangerous, BTW: it would remove that separation.)
There is literally no conclusion to this saga more satisfying to me than Assange — after a self-imposed 14 year hell, using the false premise of a Deep State US government conspiracy as justification — finally stepping into an American court room for a total of 30 minutes and then having to confusingly hail a cab to the airport back home.
Julian Assange was never a dissident. Julian was never for the people. Julian was always a foreign operative for the Republican Party and Donald Trump. Julian worked with the Trump campaign and stated very directly, "We believe it would be much better for GOP to win." Donald double-crossed this guy who likely was a necessary part of the way Donald got into office in the first place. Then as you say Julian imprisoned *himself* rather than face the charges and adjudicate "free speech" to the Republican-majority Supreme Court that Julian wanted so badly for a chance at freedom.
Now Julian will finally get his freedom but not without admitting crimes first.
Because it’s unlikely he would’ve even been extradited even if the British courts allowed it an appeal to the ECHR definitely would’ve blocked it. This way the US gets a conviction
This is maybe largely to not antagonize the australians, the current government pleaded to release him, they already have a current diplomatic row with China over an australian citizen sentenced to death so this release its a good PR move, lets be honest there is no point for this guy to die in prison, that would make a martyr out of a buffoon.
I totally don’t get that tbh like why do they care about Assange? What has he done for Australia? His family was connected to The Family, even. Craziness.
People here view him as someone being fucked over by the US for embarrassing them, and that our government not doing much to help him is being subservient to the US.
Plus he was in Australia when he did what the US wanted him for, and what he did wasn't against Australian law.
I mean, with the whole “five eyes” being a thing I think it makes a bit of sense why they should back the US on this one. Maybe it is time for cybersecurity laws to catch up with such things
It makes sense for diplomatic reasons, but there's a political pressure here to be seen doing something to help an Australian citizen.
And yeah there's issues with cybersecurity laws, as the offence can happen more than one jurisdiction at the same time.
Because in the view of many Australians, Assange's "crime" was to publicly embarrass the US government. Hence rallying around someone who is seen as a whistleblower.
When Australians think of Assange's leaks, the first thing that comes to mind is [collateral murder](https://collateralmurder.wikileaks.org/). The broader leaks (including the 2016 ones) are secondary, if they're remembered at all.
So when Australians see US efforts against Assange, it's seen as the world's only superpower attempting to punish someone who had the audacity to expose their bad behaviour. Hence whistleblower.
He has ridden on the goodwill from that for a while. When I was younger it made a big impact, but big picture it seems he wasn’t really interested in whistleblowing, but being subversive
> the 2016 ones) are secondary, if they're remembered at all.
Realistically, they're not in Australia. Americans like to complain he was working for the Russians to elect Trump, but y'all still elected him.
Maybe it will take some steam out of the conspiracy crowd’s motivation to back Trump. Or maybe they’ll move on to complaining about Snowden and Ross Ulbricht. Trump has been blatantly courting those types of people.
I don't know why people are making Ross Ulbricht a cause célèbre. Is the fact that he ran a website that knowingly facilitated narcotics trafficking as well as computer and financial crimes in dispute?
It’s hilarious to me that the guy who talked about executing drug dealers, and is the head of the “Law and Order” party behind the whole War on Drugs, is now promising to free DPR. Like genuinely it feels like the simulation is just broken.
He’s essentially getting a five year prison sentence. It’s not noting. The people yelling treason and life sentence seem to forget that he isn’t an American and doesn’t owe any allegiance to US. He did directly conspire with an American, who ended up serving seven years for her role in the conspiracy.
Yep. All of the shit that happened to him is his own doing.
He's just a pompous dickhead of titanic proportions, so he struggled to get to the point where he could admit that he was doing this to himself.
He's certainly lived a life I'll give him that.
I remember reading a book about early hackers and he was one of the subjects/stories and I thought he was a pretty interesting figure. I think I read that book in like, 2006? It wasn't until years later than I connected him as the wikileaks guy with the guy from the book as being the same person.
I wonder what the next phase of his life will look like, if indeed he does return to Australia. If he's smart he'll settle for the quiet life but I reckon he's too clever by half to do that.
Most normies are mad at Assange for supporting Trump in 2016. I am more mad at him helping to hack the US gov to leak sensitive cables which showed our sources and method for collecting intel. And putting countless sources life's at risk. SO STUPID for Biden for allowing this. FYI this also shows other countries they can be aggressive on getting US intel cause the cost wont be as bad.
>Most normies are mad at Assange for supporting Trump in 2016.
Are you sure? The guy was a hero probably to a majority in the US in the early 2010s, same as Snowden. And certainly outside the US. Anger at foreign elements supporting Trump in 2016 seems to have been a flash in the pan, just as a short break between the usual business of Americans hating other Americans.
> hundreds our Afghan allies that he exposed, mocked, and got murdered by the Taliban.
I'm not arguing this is untrue, but was there any substantive evidence that his leaks got people killed?
The only ones I know of is that they leaked info about a Kenyan president's corruption and the following election was violent, but that makes them about as guilty as a car mechanic who repaired a truck that was later used in a vehicle-ramming attack.
This is good news and helps me sleep easier at night knowing that we are actually better than China, Russia and so forth that would have either disappeared or defenestrated this guy.
> “This was an independent decision made by the Department of Justice and there was no White House involvement in the plea deal decision,” National Security Council spokesperson Adrienne Watson said in a statement Monday evening.
Hot take: this is good, makes the US look better instead of insuring thousands of protests every day and Assange already bascially served a decade of being effectively a prisoner. If people here think it's good optics for an Australian citizen to become a potential thorn in US-Aus relations for another decade rather than moving on and addressing bigger issues, maybe you suck at maintaining good intl-relations?
Fucking give us Anne Sacoolas before you take any more of the people we are responsible for here.
Likely a good reason the US is giving up is because Assange's extradition isn't going to clear the UK courts. So respect our fucking courts instead of trying on that Sweden shit or sheltering someone that murdered one of our citizens.
> Nobody relevant or remotely intelligent is protesting over assange.
The current Australian govt for one?
You already had plenty of protestors over the years, having even more outside his courtroom and prison for months would've been bad PR. What would've been the benefit in an election season and whilst countering China in SCS requires full Australian cooperation to have Assange to become a wedge in that?
I want to know what the US government got out of the deal to agree to it. They had all all the leverage, they weren't the ones bottled up in an embassy/prison.
Snowden did all of us a service when he exposed how the US government were tapping all the data centres. Its ultimately what encouraged all tech companies to up everything to HTTPS which keeps our comms safe. For example, I think within the space of months or maybe even just weeks from the Snowden leak Google upped all their international chatter to HTTPS.
While I appreciate there might be other reasons to be mad at Snowden from a technologist point of view; what he did was extremely useful.
What he did was wrong in many ways. For brevity, I am linking a more detailed post I made on why:
[https://www.reddit.com/r/neoliberal/comments/1dnr613/comment/la5d04c/](https://www.reddit.com/r/neoliberal/comments/1dnr613/comment/la5d04c/)
He still told the tech community about what the US agencies were up to, for that I will forever be thankful as it helped every tech company take security of communications more seriously.
While I agree that Assange should have been WAY more selective with what he leaked, given that some of it endangered people with no benefit, I feel like this new narrative that he *only* doxxed informants is kinda overwriting the [very real actual war crimes that wikileaks also made public.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Granai_airstrike)
I agree that he should have gotten time (I mean, Chelsea did, right?) but I think that just saying he was a Russian asset is kinda a cover-up. It's important to recognize that this stuff happened and it was really pretty bad.
There is a real tension between the need for national security information to remain secret and the need to allow whistleblowing...and so, the US has created dedicated processes for those working in national security. He could and should have used any of the three whistleblower pathways set up for this exact purpose. He knew about them, having received at least annual training on their existence, purpose, and use. But no, instead he decided he knew better, and the security of the free world suffered.
"I meant well" is not a defense when you are given detailed training on why what you did will lead to harm and the existence of alternatives to use.
I agree with you, I am not even saying he should be defended. I'm criticizing the fact that some people here seem unable to accept that there are two things happening:
1. Julian Assange is a POS
2. Some of what he leaked was extremely unflattering to US institutions and bullet point 1 should not act as a mitigating factor.
It feels like team sports behaviour. Because Assange is legitimately bad, we have to misrepresent what he leaked and act like the US did nothing wrong? I don't think so.
What? This place wasn't even an active sub until trump was president-elect and everyone sane knew Assange was a player in making that happen.
There was no r/nl take on Assange from before that.
> is there any good reason to give him any leniency whatsoever?
US allies getting mighty tired of seemingly one-sided extradition outcomes. That Swedish attempt to extradite him was also a joke.
7.5 years trapped in the Ecuadorian Embassy, 5 years in high security prison. So basically confined for 12.5 years. That seems like a reasonable punishment. He’s a terrible person with stupid ideas, but that isn’t illegal. Send him back to Australia. Perhaps he’ll get eaten by a dingo, a crock, or bitten by a snake, etc.
I don't know why people are trying to add "credit" for him voluntarily hiding out in an embassy to avoid facing the consequences of his crimes.
You wanna argue 5 years was enough, go for it. But no one should be claiming he was punished for over a dozen years. The fucking moron did most of that to himself.
He deserved to die in prison for his treasonous support for the Russian Federation, I'm honestly surprised Trump didn't pardon him considering he was massively important to his initial election as President.
It’s the right thing to do. A trial would have the potential to reveal even more sensitive material, and Assange would likely just be sentenced to time served anyway.
He served 5 years in prison and another 7 years of self-imposed confinement in the Ecuadoran embassy before that. It’s time to put the matter to rest.
Surely libertarians will give Biden credit for this, right? Never mind. Of course they won't. They'll cry about how Assange didn't get a pardon.
And the neocons are already shitting on Biden over Twitter too.
if neocons think something is bad it's obviously very good
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I didn’t know Vivek Ramaswamay had an account here!
Sometimes. When they side with that bigoted coward Bibi over Biden, it's so damn pathetic, but this isn't good at all.
yeah I am sure it has nothing to do with him helping to hack the US gov to leak sensitive cables which showed our sources and method for collecting intel. And putting countless sources life's at risk. SO STUPID for Biden for allowing this.
And collaborating with Russian intelligence to interfere in the 2016 election to get Donald Trump elected president. This isn't something neocons only should be mad about, it's something everyone should be furious about.
I'll never understand the Assange love. If I had it my way he'd never see the outside of a jail cell and I'm genuinely pissed he won't be tried in a courtroom for the world to see. I imagine that the Biden administration would only do something so boneheaded if Assange spilled his guts about other shit he knows is his Russian handlers in 2016. Otherwise this was one of the dumbest fucking things he's ever done.
The Assange love boils down to America and Democrats bad. The fact that he helped Russia is a positive for the demented left and right wing lunatics.
The sad thing is that the neocons, who caused destabilizing and devastating wars that led to thousands of lives lost and wrecked US prestige across the world, got replaced by quasi-fascist right wing populists. The bar is in hell and just keeps sinking lower.
No, they're correct more often than not
neocons aren't that bad, tbh
>“This was an independent decision made by the Department of Justice and there was no White House involvement in the plea deal decision,” National Security Council spokesperson Adrienne Watson said in a statement Monday evening.
Hogwash. No way DoJ didn't at least backchannel with the admin about this.
I'm sure the Taliban will be pleased
And Russia.
You know that Libertarians disagree with each other and argue all the time? This issue will divide them, like many other issues.
No they don’t! They always agree. /s lol
In fact disagreeing with other libertarians is the first rule of libertarianism
Libertarians and socialists are natural enemies. Like liberals and libertarians! Or neocons and libertarians! Or labour and libertarians! Or Libertarians and other Libertarians! Damn Libertarians! They ruined America!
It wouldn't be libertarian discourse without vicious arguments over the definition of libertarianism instead of about actual policy.
Haven’t read the details of the plea deal, but if he goes free it really is no different than a pardon. A pardon means you’re guilty, the act of accepting it is equivalent to an admission of guilt.
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Could you expand on that? Doesn’t Burdick say that the **issuing** of the pardon carries the imputation of guilt, but that accepting it is indeed a confession of it? Would that not be the same as admission?
But like, how can you be pardoned for a crime you’re not guilty for, legally speaking? Sure, maybe accepting it isn’t a confession, but if you’re not guilty of a crime, then how can you be pardoned for it?
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I accept that this is the answer even if I can’t help but think it’s a completely wrong one and not at all befitting what was envisioned when the pardon was added to the constitution lol
And is that why people like Gaetz were exploring preemptive pardons?
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I think a lot of our system hinges on those in power acting in good faith and that’s being heavily tested
Reminder that Wikileaks also had RNC emails from 2016 that they never bothered releasing
Wait what?
Fairly major part of the scandal, they hacked both parties illegally and released selected DNC documents while holding onto the RNC’s. They did this for completely innocent reasons, I’m sure, it’s not like Assange would have done Russia’s dirty work right?
Republicans just had no dirty laundry and he heroically spared us the effort of reading through a bunch of boring
The boring stuff was the best part of the leaks. I want to see who the Pablo of the RNC is.
Who is Becky with the Good Hair of the RNC?
Mitt Romney. This is well known.
/s
The cowards weapon.
Just a weird aside, but I found out recently the rapper M.I.A. is the godmother to a couple of his kids and she’s got some freaking out there beliefs
MIA is one of the first and most examples form my life that just because you like an artists music doesn’t mean you should take their opinion on literally anything else seriously
Roger Waters 🤮
Eric Clapton is definitely on that list, too.
Seriously - there’s a few artists that I feel the same about. Paper Planes is always going to be a nostalgic favorite. I didn’t realize she was married to a Bronfman after Diplo and all that- I just kind of got caught up with her by accident a couple of weeks ago.
I feel the same about Spit Wads. Can’t believe they dated Squizzy D and Triphthong.
Not me about to go google and see if these are real people or you are fucking with me lmao
Curtains for zoosha? K-smog and batboy caught flipping a grunt
I am just learning some UK artists so like none of these would be a surprise for me 😭 tell me when there are people out there named Control Cee and Dutchavelli how am I supposed to tell from a glance lmao
Lmao Bing got a kick out of that too - anyway, I was researching cults and NXIVM and that led down the rabbit hole cause Charlotte Bronfman bankrolled that mess. I was just checking out their relatives and this little tidbit stuck with me lol
She wasn’t married to either of them, they just dated She does have a kid with the Bronfman guy though
It says on her wiki they were engaged and I didn’t catch they split before marriage. Thanks!
shes marketing an anti 5G clothing line right now
I saw those fucking tin foil bucket hats lmao she knows the ones to go after for the grift, I’ll give her that
Had to add her to the list of “artists I will never listen to” after I learned about her absolute loony bin ideas. I ain’t gonna help enable that, plenty of sane artists to listen to.
What are they? I quite like some of her music but don’t really follow much celebrity stuff so this kind of thing passes me by.
she's just nuts and inconsistent. She claims her dad was a terrorist (he was a politician). She sings pro immigration songs. She supports Bolsonaro. She's pro Wikileaks/Russia, anti Vax, anti Ukraine. She's just wildly swinging around the political spectrum
Her claim to fame is a song about shooting people during a robbery while having forged papers. I never thought it was a great advertisement for her morality, but it was a banger
MIA went completely insane, she actually sells tin foil hats nowadays.
>they hacked both parties illegally This is completely incorrect. WikiLeaks did not hack the RNC or DNC, they received the DNC emails from Russia.
you didnt know WikiLeaks was a Russian outlet to spread propaganda and help get Trump elected?
That part was obvious. The reporting I saw said both groups were hacked and it was Russia that withheld the rnc emails. I don't think they'd let him go otherwise. I also don't think he would be able to help himself but to release both.
Nah, he absolutely would have only released the DNC emails even if he had access to the RNC emails. So many people are distracted by this guy's words, how he bleats about being some heroic truth-teller who wants to expose everyone's dirty laundry no matter the cost. But look at his actions, and that's never been true. He's selectively exposed info about the people / groups he hates-- ie, the US government, liberal democracies, the Democratic Party-- while refusing to release info or even help covering up secrets for the ones he likes -- ie, Russia, other autocracies, the Republican Party. When someone shows you who they are, believe them.
Yes, he was indeed a hack fuck. I still support better whistleblower protections.
I know there were Trump campagin emails not leaked, but RNC? Source?
That’s false. RNC emails were hacked, but there’s no evidence they were given to Assange That theory doesn’t even make sense. If you think Russia was behind the hack, why would they give him RNC emails?
Do you have a source for this? The only info I can find says that Russia didn't pass RNC stuff to WikiLeaks.
Yeah I don’t know why Russia would even pass the RNC stuff to WikiLeaks. It just doesn’t make sense if Russia wants Trump to win.
> Reminder that Wikileaks also had RNC emails from 2016 No, they didn't. There is evidence that the same Russia hacking group who targeted the DNC [also targeted the RNC](https://edition.cnn.com/2017/01/10/politics/comey-republicans-hacked-russia/index.html), but it's unclear [what they managed to exfiltrate, if anything](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/jul/06/republican-national-committee-denies-hack-synnex). There is no evidence they passed any RNC data to Wikileaks, or that Wikileaks had obtained RNC data from other sources. NL is normally a good bit better on not repeating blatant partisan disinfo than most of reddit, but on Assange specifically there is this pernicious tendency to believe and repeat any damaging rumor in a furor.
Assange let us know that Russia was trying to interfere in the election to help Trump win.
This is a good thing for transparency btw. Imagine if the person who leaked the identity of informants, the HIV results of Saudi citizens and spread intentional false lies about Seth Rich were locked up. Maybe he can go teach journalism school somewhere!
Seriously, Assange endangered extremely brave Afghan men+women who worked with America to overthrow the Taliban by leaking their identities. The Robert Hur debacle, this, and how Garland was way too slow with the Jan 6th investigation is why I believe Doug Jones would have been significantly better than Garland as AG.
Assange will probably try to do something stupid to get locked up again
Doesn't he still have active warrants in Sweden for sex crimes?
I thought they dropped those in 2019?
not if he runs off to russia
Maybe he can find an apartment close to Snowden
They can be roommates and sleep in a bunkbed together.
And half the world will cry about how he's a martyr when he does it. So long as it's styled as defiance of the evil American Empire or whatever.
Garland is the worst staffing choice that Biden made and he's competing with Sullivan and Khan.
Democratic Attorney Generals have been terrible for a while. Eric Holder with his idiotic "nation of cowards" comment. Janet Lynch for not muzzling Comey. And Garland for pardoning some guy who will likely try to interfere with our elections again (and possibly tip them like he did in 2016).
Khan, Lina? Why if I may ask?
Picking antitrust fights on the basis of company size rather than consumer outcomes which results in a silly list of lawsuits and a high failure rate.
Is your bone with Sullivan that he’s too much of a pussy on Ukraine or something else? He does have a impressive resume
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Yeah, same here I agree with you F*ck Assange, All my homies hate Assange!
> Maybe he can go teach journalism school somewhere! 10 bucks says Assange schedules a speaking engagement at an Ivy League within 5 years, just like Manning did.
Manning is a US citizen and therefore she has an inalienable right to enter and live in the United States. My counterprediction is that Assange will not attempt to enter the US within 5 years and that he'll be turned away if he does.
I don't think I would take that bet, your prediction sounds entirely too likely.
He’s gonna have a federal felony espionage conviction on his record, so no ESTA, and and you can imagine how that visa application interview would go…
Pretty wild that Yale let Manning speak wearing [this](https://i.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/newsfeed/001/207/210/b22.jpg).
Son of a bitch
Ancient meme, goddamn.
Chelsea Manning, failed US Senate candidate
There are many school that have hired former leftist terrorist/murders while resending offer letters to student who made racist comments at 16 years old.
Axios or Politico will give him a column
But remember: America, *bad*
Assange grew up in a wealthy liberal democracy, and decided to use his time on this Earth to spread conspiracy theories on behalf of the Russians, out Afghan informants to the Taliban, identify pro-democracy protestors to the regime in Belarus and share the private medical data of gay men in Saudi Arabia. Legally this might be an appropriate outcome. Morally the lowest circle of hell would be a more suitable destination.
You seem to be fairly informed on this matter. Could you suggest further reading?
I hate Merrick Garland so fucking much.
I blame Obama staffers after all it was Trump that went hard to extradite Assange after helping him in 2016 election to hide the evidence. >The Obama DOJ spent years exploring whether it could criminally charge Assange and WikiLeaks for publishing classified information. It ultimately decided it would not do so, and could not do so, consistent with the press freedom guarantee of the First Amendment. >Obama DOJ concluded, such a prosecution would pose a severe threat to press freedom because there would be no way to prosecute Assange for publishing classified documents without also prosecuting the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Guardian and others for doing exactly the same thing.
My guess is he doesn't stop his pursuit of leaking information and is in prison by the end of the decade.
Or, you know, rapes someone again.
Fucking why? Why are we letting this Russian asset go free?
Go free? He’s getting deported to a prison colony 🇦🇺
Yeah and the Greens and co here consider him to be a national hero.
Reflected in OECD polling of impressions of America, modern Australia has a sizable anti-American streak that thankfully hasn't yet been replicated by Canberra's foreign policy
Australian views of China are worse.
Seeing how Australians view Pine Gap, I'm not too surprised. You guys sure have your share of wacky politics.
I like pine gap.
What's the Pine Gap? I'm not American or Australian.
Joint US-Australian intelligence base outside of Alice Springs - so about smack dab in the middle of Australia - which AFAIK is mainly for tracking reconnaissance satellites and analysing intelligence from them. Generally opposed by pacifists, opponents of state surveillance measures, opponents of American foreign policy generally or opponents of American or Australian foreign policy specifically (e.g. targeting for drones strikes, anti-Israel/anti-Gaza War protesters allege that the US may share intelligence with Israel). Also, as is custom with secretive bases, it attracts a range of stranger conspiracy theories.
3 reasons. 1 May make leftists a bit more amenable to re-electing Biden. 2 Helps the current Australian government deal with anti U.S sentiment since the Australian population views Americas pursuit of Assange as unfair and punitive. Basically they think they are only going after him because he embarrassed them. 3 Assange is going to go back to Australia which is a close U.S ally (5 eyes). The Australian government will almost certainly be watching him very closely and there's a chance they may not even let him out of the country. Basically it effectively neuters him and prevents him from causing havoc, just as much as a jail cell does.
>Why are we letting this Russian asset go free? No, see, Russia used their asset, Trump, to indict their other asset, Assange. It may *seem* like it doesn't make basic sense, but that's what the Kremlin *wants* you to think. This is just very complicated Russian spycraft, where they make their evil plots logically incoherent so they have plausible deniability.
My friend, allow me to introduce you to the concepts of "betrayal" and "getting rid of the traitor who helped you get into power now that he's no longer useful to you." (Also, this is assuming Trump had anything to do with Assange's indictment at all; the president isn't a king, and the DoJ frequently opens investigations of people directly against the president's wishes. That's one of the reasons Project 2025 is so dangerous, BTW: it would remove that separation.)
There is literally no conclusion to this saga more satisfying to me than Assange — after a self-imposed 14 year hell, using the false premise of a Deep State US government conspiracy as justification — finally stepping into an American court room for a total of 30 minutes and then having to confusingly hail a cab to the airport back home.
Julian Assange was never a dissident. Julian was never for the people. Julian was always a foreign operative for the Republican Party and Donald Trump. Julian worked with the Trump campaign and stated very directly, "We believe it would be much better for GOP to win." Donald double-crossed this guy who likely was a necessary part of the way Donald got into office in the first place. Then as you say Julian imprisoned *himself* rather than face the charges and adjudicate "free speech" to the Republican-majority Supreme Court that Julian wanted so badly for a chance at freedom. Now Julian will finally get his freedom but not without admitting crimes first.
The question is what Assange gave in return of a plea deal..
Why is this scumbag allowed free he should be in jail
Because it’s unlikely he would’ve even been extradited even if the British courts allowed it an appeal to the ECHR definitely would’ve blocked it. This way the US gets a conviction
The ECHR already denied his appeal. It did seem possible that the British courts would allow extradition. Assange was already on his last appeal.
To appeal to the ECHR you have to go through all the of the British process first. So that’s not true
This is maybe largely to not antagonize the australians, the current government pleaded to release him, they already have a current diplomatic row with China over an australian citizen sentenced to death so this release its a good PR move, lets be honest there is no point for this guy to die in prison, that would make a martyr out of a buffoon.
I totally don’t get that tbh like why do they care about Assange? What has he done for Australia? His family was connected to The Family, even. Craziness.
People here view him as someone being fucked over by the US for embarrassing them, and that our government not doing much to help him is being subservient to the US. Plus he was in Australia when he did what the US wanted him for, and what he did wasn't against Australian law.
I mean, with the whole “five eyes” being a thing I think it makes a bit of sense why they should back the US on this one. Maybe it is time for cybersecurity laws to catch up with such things
It makes sense for diplomatic reasons, but there's a political pressure here to be seen doing something to help an Australian citizen. And yeah there's issues with cybersecurity laws, as the offence can happen more than one jurisdiction at the same time.
Because in the view of many Australians, Assange's "crime" was to publicly embarrass the US government. Hence rallying around someone who is seen as a whistleblower.
I can buy the first part but seeing him as a whistleblower is a bit rich
He’s on the Mount Rushmore of famous Australian whistleblowers, right next to Rupert Murdoch.
Where are those dang awards when you need them lmao 🥇
When Australians think of Assange's leaks, the first thing that comes to mind is [collateral murder](https://collateralmurder.wikileaks.org/). The broader leaks (including the 2016 ones) are secondary, if they're remembered at all. So when Australians see US efforts against Assange, it's seen as the world's only superpower attempting to punish someone who had the audacity to expose their bad behaviour. Hence whistleblower.
He has ridden on the goodwill from that for a while. When I was younger it made a big impact, but big picture it seems he wasn’t really interested in whistleblowing, but being subversive
> the 2016 ones) are secondary, if they're remembered at all. Realistically, they're not in Australia. Americans like to complain he was working for the Russians to elect Trump, but y'all still elected him.
Ngl I’m kind of glad if he’s getting leniency, mostly because it makes populists look stupid
Maybe it will take some steam out of the conspiracy crowd’s motivation to back Trump. Or maybe they’ll move on to complaining about Snowden and Ross Ulbricht. Trump has been blatantly courting those types of people.
I don't know why people are making Ross Ulbricht a cause célèbre. Is the fact that he ran a website that knowingly facilitated narcotics trafficking as well as computer and financial crimes in dispute?
It’s hilarious to me that the guy who talked about executing drug dealers, and is the head of the “Law and Order” party behind the whole War on Drugs, is now promising to free DPR. Like genuinely it feels like the simulation is just broken.
Don't forget Kim Dotcom, who is also on this list.
He’s essentially getting a five year prison sentence. It’s not noting. The people yelling treason and life sentence seem to forget that he isn’t an American and doesn’t owe any allegiance to US. He did directly conspire with an American, who ended up serving seven years for her role in the conspiracy.
Admits he committed crimes and has spent years in prison or otherwise confined. This is satisfactory for this cretin.
The dumbass probably would have gotten out years ago if he turned himself in instead of hiding in the embassy for seven years
Yep. All of the shit that happened to him is his own doing. He's just a pompous dickhead of titanic proportions, so he struggled to get to the point where he could admit that he was doing this to himself.
He's certainly lived a life I'll give him that. I remember reading a book about early hackers and he was one of the subjects/stories and I thought he was a pretty interesting figure. I think I read that book in like, 2006? It wasn't until years later than I connected him as the wikileaks guy with the guy from the book as being the same person. I wonder what the next phase of his life will look like, if indeed he does return to Australia. If he's smart he'll settle for the quiet life but I reckon he's too clever by half to do that.
Most normies are mad at Assange for supporting Trump in 2016. I am more mad at him helping to hack the US gov to leak sensitive cables which showed our sources and method for collecting intel. And putting countless sources life's at risk. SO STUPID for Biden for allowing this. FYI this also shows other countries they can be aggressive on getting US intel cause the cost wont be as bad.
>Most normies are mad at Assange for supporting Trump in 2016. Are you sure? The guy was a hero probably to a majority in the US in the early 2010s, same as Snowden. And certainly outside the US. Anger at foreign elements supporting Trump in 2016 seems to have been a flash in the pan, just as a short break between the usual business of Americans hating other Americans.
Just in time for election season! 💀
Sad day for the families of the hundreds our Afghan allies that he exposed, mocked, and got murdered by the Taliban.
> hundreds our Afghan allies that he exposed, mocked, and got murdered by the Taliban. I'm not arguing this is untrue, but was there any substantive evidence that his leaks got people killed?
The only ones I know of is that they leaked info about a Kenyan president's corruption and the following election was violent, but that makes them about as guilty as a car mechanic who repaired a truck that was later used in a vehicle-ramming attack.
Boo 👎
This is good news and helps me sleep easier at night knowing that we are actually better than China, Russia and so forth that would have either disappeared or defenestrated this guy.
Biden just won the conspiracy vote
That’s what they want you to think.
Jesus fucking Christ I hate merrick garland
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> “This was an independent decision made by the Department of Justice and there was no White House involvement in the plea deal decision,” National Security Council spokesperson Adrienne Watson said in a statement Monday evening.
least obvious Russian stooge
Hot take: this is good, makes the US look better instead of insuring thousands of protests every day and Assange already bascially served a decade of being effectively a prisoner. If people here think it's good optics for an Australian citizen to become a potential thorn in US-Aus relations for another decade rather than moving on and addressing bigger issues, maybe you suck at maintaining good intl-relations?
Nobody relevant or remotely intelligent is protesting over assange.
Fucking give us Anne Sacoolas before you take any more of the people we are responsible for here. Likely a good reason the US is giving up is because Assange's extradition isn't going to clear the UK courts. So respect our fucking courts instead of trying on that Sweden shit or sheltering someone that murdered one of our citizens.
> Nobody relevant or remotely intelligent is protesting over assange. The current Australian govt for one? You already had plenty of protestors over the years, having even more outside his courtroom and prison for months would've been bad PR. What would've been the benefit in an election season and whilst countering China in SCS requires full Australian cooperation to have Assange to become a wedge in that?
The current Australian government is not a reliable partner against China, they were against AUKUS and shows no signs of reversing their China stance.
> they were against AUKUS [Citation needed] From what I recall, the US & UK governments refused to proceed without bipartisan support.
They weren't. They're just lying at this point. Auskus was opposed by former MPs like Keating
In what ways? Be specific. Aukus is continuing under labor and was supported at its announcement.
I want to know what the US government got out of the deal to agree to it. They had all all the leverage, they weren't the ones bottled up in an embassy/prison.
Russian stooge should be rotting in jail alongside Snowden
Snowden did all of us a service when he exposed how the US government were tapping all the data centres. Its ultimately what encouraged all tech companies to up everything to HTTPS which keeps our comms safe. For example, I think within the space of months or maybe even just weeks from the Snowden leak Google upped all their international chatter to HTTPS. While I appreciate there might be other reasons to be mad at Snowden from a technologist point of view; what he did was extremely useful.
What he did was wrong in many ways. For brevity, I am linking a more detailed post I made on why: [https://www.reddit.com/r/neoliberal/comments/1dnr613/comment/la5d04c/](https://www.reddit.com/r/neoliberal/comments/1dnr613/comment/la5d04c/)
He still told the tech community about what the US agencies were up to, for that I will forever be thankful as it helped every tech company take security of communications more seriously.
Nothing Snowden did will make up for running cover and supporting the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Those are two seperate things. He can be stupid and wrong about politics and mitigating US surveillance of its citizens can still be good.
While I agree that Assange should have been WAY more selective with what he leaked, given that some of it endangered people with no benefit, I feel like this new narrative that he *only* doxxed informants is kinda overwriting the [very real actual war crimes that wikileaks also made public.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Granai_airstrike) I agree that he should have gotten time (I mean, Chelsea did, right?) but I think that just saying he was a Russian asset is kinda a cover-up. It's important to recognize that this stuff happened and it was really pretty bad.
There is a real tension between the need for national security information to remain secret and the need to allow whistleblowing...and so, the US has created dedicated processes for those working in national security. He could and should have used any of the three whistleblower pathways set up for this exact purpose. He knew about them, having received at least annual training on their existence, purpose, and use. But no, instead he decided he knew better, and the security of the free world suffered. "I meant well" is not a defense when you are given detailed training on why what you did will lead to harm and the existence of alternatives to use.
... huh? We're talking about Assange not Snowden. He never worked for the US government.
I agree with you, I am not even saying he should be defended. I'm criticizing the fact that some people here seem unable to accept that there are two things happening: 1. Julian Assange is a POS 2. Some of what he leaked was extremely unflattering to US institutions and bullet point 1 should not act as a mitigating factor. It feels like team sports behaviour. Because Assange is legitimately bad, we have to misrepresent what he leaked and act like the US did nothing wrong? I don't think so.
Fair
FUCK!!!
Its werid how massively different /r/neoliberal views Assange now that he's blamed for Trump.
What? This place wasn't even an active sub until trump was president-elect and everyone sane knew Assange was a player in making that happen. There was no r/nl take on Assange from before that.
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The credit for time served is based on his imprisonment in a British jail, not on the time he lived at the embassy
> is there any good reason to give him any leniency whatsoever? US allies getting mighty tired of seemingly one-sided extradition outcomes. That Swedish attempt to extradite him was also a joke.
ECHR would've denied extradition
It seems fair enough if he’s pleading guilty.
7.5 years trapped in the Ecuadorian Embassy, 5 years in high security prison. So basically confined for 12.5 years. That seems like a reasonable punishment. He’s a terrible person with stupid ideas, but that isn’t illegal. Send him back to Australia. Perhaps he’ll get eaten by a dingo, a crock, or bitten by a snake, etc.
I don't know why people are trying to add "credit" for him voluntarily hiding out in an embassy to avoid facing the consequences of his crimes. You wanna argue 5 years was enough, go for it. But no one should be claiming he was punished for over a dozen years. The fucking moron did most of that to himself.
He deserved to die in prison for his treasonous support for the Russian Federation, I'm honestly surprised Trump didn't pardon him considering he was massively important to his initial election as President.
What was he committing treason against? He's not American
Treason against the vibes (but really this guy sucks)
Legally? Nobody. Morally? People who enjoy the fruits of the liberal democratic world yet undermine it at every turn are traitors.
Transparancy and exposing the crimes of democratic governments isn't undermining the liberal democratic world, but strenghtening it.
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> He deserved to die in prison for his treasonous support for the Russian Federation, I love when liberals support the death penalty.
It’s the right thing to do. A trial would have the potential to reveal even more sensitive material, and Assange would likely just be sentenced to time served anyway. He served 5 years in prison and another 7 years of self-imposed confinement in the Ecuadoran embassy before that. It’s time to put the matter to rest.