Ecuador Says It Still Backs Assange, but WikiLeaks Says It Cut His Internet
nytimes.com
nytimes.com
I am troubled by how the internet has enabled us to gossip on a global scale.
[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12725427
[2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12737178 - someone pointed out I actually did not know the meaning of the word "reactionary", which was my original word choice.
Seriously: everyone here does this when we get to crazy time in the election. You're just seeing it on HN more because the Wikileaks kerfuffle happens to overlap the digital liberty stuff we talk about when the election isn't looming.
If 40% of the country doesn't accept the results because their candidate is telling them not too, things can quickly get out of hand.
This is true, of course. But you have seen that stuff all over the right wing media, reliably, in every election of the past few decades. Trump is merely terrible at message discipline (which is to say: unlike his more mature peers, he actually believes this stuff and will repeat what he reads on Drudge); the specter of brown democrats rigging elections has been a subtext of republican electioneering forever.
The difference is mostly one of scale not kind. Except for the major difference that the candidate himself has never said something like this directly, and that candidates have always graciously conceded defeat.
If Donald Trump comes out on November 9th and says "I told you it was rigged. They stole the election from us.", I really don't know what will happen.
I think it's fairly likely there will be at least some small-scale rioting.
I think the best case long term scenario, if this happens, is the creation of a new much more openly racist and xenophobic political party that is too small to gain any real power.
The worst case scenario is obviously civil war, but I think that is still extremely unlikely. Especially because Trump isn't the incumbent, so he lacks any actual power. If he were the losing incumbent, and Hillary was the challenger, I think most die hard Trump supporters would back a power grab.
And the most likely scenario is that a slightly smaller Republican party gets pulled even further right.
Typically they conduct what is today recognized as domestic terrorism: lynch mobs, church bombings, bombing the Oklahoma City Federal building, shooting congregants at mosques, killing worshippers at synagogue, etc. More recently, we even saw one example of disenfranchised whites occupying a Federal Bureau of Land Management building in Bend, OR. One notable exception is the 1921 Tulsa Race Riot where whites destroyed a prosperous black section of Tulsa. [0]
Anyway, this is to say that the rioting for non-whites is very different than the resistance exhibited by whites. The socioeconomic reasons for such differences are too various to list, but as a very general statement, poor disenfranchised urban dwellers of color do not have access, mobility, motivation, or organization to attack the forces that undergird their civic misery. In this sense, riot is cathartic, reactionary, and self-defeating.
The targeted violence that characterizes acts of US domestic terrorism may also come from similar feelings of disenfranchisement, but rarely, if ever, do they result in the wholesale destruction of the local environments of the aggrieved.
When I wrote small scale rioting I was thinking more along the lines of small groups of people hunting specific targets. Vandalizing or setting fire to minority houses/churches/businesses.
These kinds of accusations are very hypocritical. I have yet to see Democrats accept a loss without claiming stolen or rigged elections. They refuse to accept the 2000 election, said that Republicans stole the state of OH in 2004, and even now claim that the current Republican majorities in both the House and Senate are the result of "gerrymandering."
Based on his current rhetoric, it's seems pretty likely that Trump will come out on November 9th and say the election was stolen.
Sure most people will ignore it, but I live in the South, in the middle of Trump country. The majority of people that I know, over 40, think that Obama and Hillary are evil. They don't disagree with them, they think they are evil.
They thought that the Federal government was going to invade Texas during Jade Helm. A fair amount of them think that Hillary is literally possessed by the devil. Breitbart is the most mainstream news source that they'll listen too, and they get most of their news from conspiracy sites spreading clickbait lies on Facebook (I know because many of them are family members and I see it). They don't believe the polls, and they really think that the only way Trump can lose is if the election is rigged. Oh and they're all heavily armed because they've been buying up ammunition since Obama was elected, in anticipation of a gun ban. (I have guns myself, but I don't have dozens of cases of ammunition in preparation for "the shit hitting the fan" like many people I know do.)
I've never seen anything this bad, even when Obama was elected. I think the major difference is the polarizing effect of most Trump supporters getting the majority of their news from Facebook. Combined with the realization by some that demographics are changing, so this may be the last election they can win.
Again, I think that actual civil war is extremely unlikely because luckily Trump won't be a losing incumbent. But I think that if Trump refuses to concede, a few acts of domestic terrorism are likely.
The FBI just stopped a group of white nationalists who were trying to kick off a religious war by detonating a truck bomb in a mostly Somali apartment complex.
I agree that Clinton's repeated conspiratorial assertions that Russia is trying to rig the election is dangerous to democracy.
Chinese and Russian state hackers are constantly breaking into US systems. I'm sure American state hackers are constantly breaking into theirs. This is nothing extraordinary.
Thank you for validating that Clinton's repeated conspiratorial assertions are dangerous to democracy. It seems like you will doesn't accept the results you don't like, just Democrats have always done when they lose.
Now that we've got that out of the way. Hillary isn't making claims of vote rigging, she's making claims that Russians hacked emails and released them to influence the election.
Her claims are backed up by the United State's intelligence agencies.
Her claims the Russians are trying to rig the election for Trump are absolutely not backed up by the United State's intelligence agencies.
Answer the question. Do you think claims that the election is rigged is dangerous or not? You can simultaneously believe both candidates are acting dangerously.
There is however, a very big difference between the 2 claims. Clinton claims that Russia is trying to influence the election. Trump claims that the election is rigged at the polling booths.
>Her claims the Russians are trying to rig the election for Trump are absolutely not backed up by the United State's intelligence agencies.
The United State's intelligence agencies issued public statements that they believe DNC emails were hacked by Russia. The emails were then leaked during an election. That's pretty good evidence that they are trying to influence that election.
Russia also has a history of propping up right wing parties throughout Europe. Add that in, and she has very strong evidence to suggest the Russians are trying to influence the election.
Notice she hasn't said that they've successfully rigged the election. She said they are attempting to influence it.
I don't have a problem with Donald Trump saying the media is trying to influence the election in Hillary's favor. I have a problem with him saying the vote is rigged and that the election was stolen. Especially before the ballots have been cast.
People are waking up, and they're angry at the machinizations that have been used to influence and flat out control what we believed to be a free democracy.
Personally, I am gratified that HN contains people who are not so cerebral that they would only talk about linux package managers at such a time.
Unfounded reactionary conspiracies, at least that's the context to this thread. I don't think anyone is appealing to a universal morality of "right" or "wrong".
Just yesterday someone implied that the FBI was colluding with the Clintons to falsely blame the Podesta hacks on Russia, and I was downvoted for saying that without proof it's absurd.
Conversely, how can you prove that a state did not participate in a cyber attack?
Numerous independent cybersecurity firms and experts have already said Guccifer 2.0 is linked to two Russian intelligence agencies
I don't understand the "and", I specifically wrote "FBI or Clintons".
> Numerous independent cybersecurity firms and experts have already said Guccifer 2.0 is linked to two Russian intelligence agencies
Many of them refer to [1], a post that I wasn't aware of (seriously, I just read claims from politicians whereever I went)
[1] https://www.crowdstrike.com/blog/bears-midst-intrusion-democ...
Since they are the "plaintiffs" I was (and am) assuming it's their duty to come up with evidence but this doesn't at all exclude evidence from third parties.
Honestly, I would like to see a thorough discussion about what is probably true and what not. In the media I only hear "It's them", "No, it wasn't us", "Yes, it was!", ...
Apart from that there is always a grain of doubt when it comes to enemies of the state (Putin, Assad, Hussein, Gaddafi, ...) because more often than not "Our sources confirm that ..." don't come with any evidence at all.
And I'm also taking CrowdStrike, Fidelis Cybersecurity, Mandiant, SecureWorks, ThreatConnect, and the editor for Ars Technica at face value as well: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guccifer_2.0
This prevalence of your reactionary conspiracy witch-hunt is precisely what this thread is about.
Well, that's your straw man. The evidence shows that Russian intelligence is meddling in the 2016 U.S. Election, and it's focused solely on attacking Trump's competition.
There's no publicly available evidence that shows collusion between Trump's campaign and Russia, other than Trump publicly calling for the Russians to hack Hillary's email accounts.
Everyone has to decide for him or herself what to up/down-vote.
Like that whole Trump sexual assault video. When it first came out, I thought it was terrible, but I waited for Trump to respond.
I wish more people would `take a measured approach` as you suggested.
What's changed is that we have more leaked documents, more ability for whistleblowers to mass broadcast anonymously, and more tools for immediately uncovering discrepancies in people's stories. So the rumor mill probably is a little more accurate than in prior eras, but it was probably already reasonably reliable even before the advent of WikiLeaks or whatever.
The other difference is that people now have a lot more incentive to turn to the rumor mill (e.g. r/dncleaks, r/wikileaks, r/the_donald) since the mainstream media has been blatantly ignoring a lot of this stuff, and with the advent of Facebook they can spread whatever they find a lot faster.
I sometimes have to turn to foreign news like Russia Times (RT), Al Jazeera, and the Israeli Haaretz news (and news from many other countries) to see news stories that are effectively blocked out in the USA. I do look with appropriate scepticism at all foreign and domestic news sources, but when major stories are not covered in domestic news sources there is no choice but to look around the web.
It drives me a little crazy when friends who watch MSNBC, Fox News, CNN, etc. think that they are getting a full and accurate picture of world events.
Um, that is, numerically more are provably correct, not more as a percent. There are far more conspiracy theories (of which I am aware) than there were in the past. I don't know that the fraction that are provably correct is any higher now.
That argument practically disappeared from public discourse in a crazy short time span. To me it seemed like the Snowden/NSA stuff was the nail in the coffin for that one.
I don't get the grandparent's Iraq WMD example. That was obvious BS at the time it was being sold to the public. That's an example of propaganda and manipulation of public opinion, but not a conspiracy.
But for most people, these were conspiracy theories. Because the government said they were not true. In the press, in congressional hearings, everywhere. That's enough for most people.
In all honesty though, I've learned I can't use my intuition to predict what people will believe or not. I mean, the Iraq WMD and 9/11 connection stuff was so obviously BS that it was like an absurdist comedy routine. But 70% of Americans believed Saddam was connected to 9/11. And I don't know what the WMD story success rate was but it had to be higher right?
What a delightful phrase!
Most people think about politics in terms of how much they can trust individual politicians to tell the truth or maybe in terms of spin and narratives and talking points. But we live in a world where people like Vladislav Surkov exist [1][2][3], the professionals are working at a level that is barely understandable to the rest of us.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vladislav_Surkov [2] http://www.economist.com/news/europe/21577421-what-departure... (from 2013, Surkov is currently a personal advisor to Putin) [3] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tyop0d30UqQ
edit: %s/treats/threats
Well, Halloween is just around the corner, I wonder how many full-size snickers bars they'd need... :->
http://www.alternet.org/civil-liberties/how-cia-invented-and...
I am not troubled by how the Internet enables gossip on a global scale. Improved capability for communications and cross-culture dialog is always a good thing. Not all human communication is Yeats poetry.
"conspiracy theory" (in my opinion) is a weakened phrase which in modern usage seems to mean "narrative I find unbelievable" rather than an actual conspiracy.
For better or worse, it seems to be a phrase that indicates a profound arrogance of the speaker, rather than a description of the topic they don't believe. I wish this phrase would die. It is a polarizing tool that is not effective for persuading people who are inclined to disagree.
Even if you make ad hom accusations of speaker bias, i.e. "MSM is rigged against me!", it doesn't immediately invalidate the message.
He's right though, data talks. The only model that was even more accurate than 538's in the 2012 election was Sam Wang's model at the Princeton Election Consortium and Sam Wang did only the bare minimum to mesh the gears* whereas Nate Silver was trying to "weight" some of the polls and blew the call on some states.
* Note that there's a difference between accuracy and precision. A poll can be very accurate (little variation between measurements) but not very precise (the center of the distribution is skewed to one side). For example Rasmussen is famous for this, they are a super accurate pollster but average something like +7 Republican. Different types of polls survey different groups of people (landline, cell, online, focus-group, etc) and you have to take that "house effect" out to really average different types of polls together.
Which "non-data factors" does the polls-plus model use, specifically?
There was little to no information available and Wikileaks had released pre-commitment hashes just hours before.
Conspiracy theories are not intrinsically evil you know. They are a natural byproduct of lack of information + high stake issue.
And it should be no surprise that conspiracy theories arise when talking about Wikileaks, a non-profit defying the most powerful political/military apparatus on earth. And with that, right in the middle of v. high-stake national election.
People speculate, they try to infer what is going on despite lacking information and uncover hidden power dynamics. I recommend you read Thucydides's War on Peloponnese just so you can realize how conspiracies are daily occurrences in politics and any structure that holds power. Now what you should not do is believe all of them uncritically. This is another thing. I don't think it is the case here.
> how reactionary we are?
I don't think we have the same definition for the word reactionary? What do you mean?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reactionary
It's one of those words you think you can derive meaning from using context clues, but in this case I was wrong.
That is really not the word I thought I was saying.
The word I should have used is "impulsive".
Thank you for correcting me and teaching me something new.
It's a big problem because people mostly don't notice corrections. A lot of people will remember that the US or UK cut off Assange's internet in an attempt to stop the flow of leaks. And of course WikiLeaks deliberately prompted this by making their initial announcement extremely vague and suggestive. The result is that a bunch of people now possess negative information on this issue. They're contributing to the dumbing down of the world.
It's troublesome that this article which actual has the information about who cut the internet access is dropping off the front page much faster than the previous article which left people with the wrong impression. This is an old tactic; generate headlines by insinuating something, and most people will have moved on to something else when the correction comes. The result is that most people are left with the false impression, even after the facts come out.
It's troublesome that the reaction many people have to their conspiracy theories being proved false are to shrug and say that this doesn't change anything. "If the Clinton campaign didn't get the CIA to do this, then the U.S. government must have pushed the Ecuadorians to do this" or "It was perfectly reasonable to assume a conspiracy based on no evidence because the government does things like this all the time." If proof that your conspiracy theory was based on nothing doesn't trigger any kind of self-reflection or at least admittance of error, then it seems like your world view isn't influenced by facts.
So yes, I'm troubled by several aspects of this.
Putting huge effort into explaining a true emergency (eg fire, fight etc) is evolutionary useful, doing so for a non emergency is not.
For a complex of reasons related to modern communication and the nature of celebrity among other things, the latest events around Assange feel like an emergency to some people and so they desperately seek an immediate explanation at all costs.
In general this is always a problem because those removed from events could use their distance by calmly looking at the situation objectively and rationally instead of promulgating a wave of attractive but erroneous conspiracy theories (which are always entirely destructive).
As a life rule it is convenient to note which category various information sources fall into.
Multiple US sources say Trump is the anti christ.
Multiple US sources say Assange is a false flag placed by the Reptilians.
Wow, this is easy!
Do you have other evidence to bring to the table? Do you have reason to doubt a.) or b.)?
http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?allowed_in_frame=0&searc...
Given that the English (/Germanic) is "name" and the French is "nom", I would have expected the PIE for name to be some sort of "nVm"-ish thing, whence I expected the Greek to render it is some sort of "non"-ish thing. The actual Greek is ónoma, with the PIE being something like *hnómn. (So my PIE guess was right-ish, but the transition to Hellenic was wrong).
The New York Times and The State Department are both putting their reputation (however much that means to you) on the line with their quotes, whereas WikiLeaks and its anonymous source, aren't putting anything on the line since a large part of their business model depends on making claims that can only be proven in their favor, but never in reverse.
Example, this claim about who is responsible for cutting Assange's internet access. Let's say the US did not cut his internet. There is absolutely nothing The State Department can say to make WikiLeaks supporters believe them. Whereas, anything WikiLeaks says about the US government will be eaten up by their supporters since the only people that can provide evidence to the contrary, WikiLeaks supporters don't trust. It's the same approach taken by Alex Jones (They want to take your guns, they want to put you in fema camps, etc...), Trump (A lot of people are saying...)
Oh and btw, I'm not saying you should just blindly believe what the government tells you, but until any actual evidence is provided to support another explanation, there is no reason to assume it is true.
Bonus hypocritical Trump tweet: https://twitter.com/realdonaldtrump/status/78183870603031347...
It used to be a saying that geeks can't do politics. And now after what I've seen of years of slashdot, digg, Reddit, and HN I think its fair to say that saying is true. The problem I see is that people who think they're smart think they must automatically be immune to propaganda, bias, etc because, well, they're so smart. I find the techie personality to be unusually vulnerable to propaganda and conspiracy theories. I think this type of thinking gives simple answers and black and white thinking that are intellectually satisfying and dismiss the incredible complexity of human interactions. Its very easy to just eat up anti-US college identity politics and make the US be the devil in all things. Its simple and is emotionally satisfying. The problem is that its also incorrect, especially when your "good guys" are Russia, China, and Iran.
We cannot have any sort of meaningful dialog when the opposition on both sides is painted into a caricature.
George W. Bush had an amazing quote during the memorial service for the fallen Dallas PD officers. Paraphrasing but: "We judge other groups by their worst and ourselves by our intentions"
I think the disconnect here is just how much weight you put on this statement here. For a significant number of people a lot of recent news has severely damaged the reputations of these institutions as well as shown that their reputations really wouldn't be impacted by their claims being shown to be false.
How so?
If ecuador was going to give in to US demands, why wouldnt they just let the US extradite Asssange?
Clearly the US doesnt have the type of pull with Ecuador to force their hand, why would you think this is any different?
you believe that john kerry alone was able to convince them to cut the internet, but the fact that 3 separate countries want him arrested is meaningless to them?
Doesnt sound believable to me at all. so yes, i have reason to doubt a)
The FARC deal is now dead as it seems since the referendum has failed but if there was anything in those emails that could have jeopardized the deal it should not have been released.
Everyone comes to the table with points that would make the other side walk away, and everyone has their initial redlines.
These change during the negotiations, premature release of information backs one or both parties into a corner in which further negotiations are no longer possible.
This is the real world, not some fairy tale.
Indeed. And in this world now, information asymmetry is greatly reduced. Politicians can live with it.
The fairy tale is you can hide your dirty laundry until you've fleeced your negotiating opponent.
Look at how many deals with Iran and N. Korea blew up early own because one side leaked (usually intentionally to tank the negotiations) some information that meant no further negotiations would be possible.
If say there was an email from hilary saying that "The US would back X amount of billions in guaranteed loans to provide funding for infrastructure informer FARC controlled zones" one party now knows exactly how much to ask for, one party now knows a limit, one party now has more power... Or here is another example say on day 2 of the negotiations there would be some preliminary agreement on how many and what type of sentences would be commuted that's just one small point of the negotiation it hasn't been finalized but if leaked it can blow up the entire deal. FARC can say it's too little, the Colombian government/people can say it's too much, and all over something that haven't been finalized or agreed upon, on something that is likely to change 50 times over during the negotiations. You seem to think for some reason that leaking things prematurely isn't using you as pieces, it is you are a puppet of your emotions and feeding you specifically tuned information is effectively playing you like a string.
It has become (and assuming we are still here in the future, it will become even moreso) easier to broadcast more. The primary reason people don't go around broadcasting everything is because they can't. Most people have been capable of broadcasting very little.
Consider what you are arguing (or at least, appear to be): "Yeah, we fucked you over in the past (and we may do so again in the future) and we didn't want to tell you about it (and tried not to [and will try to not tell you about it in the future]), but just play nice and give us this stuff we want, please?"
I see this argument continuing to be rejected wholesale.
People are irrational because they are irrational.
So let's fix that first instead of continuing to manipulate the flow of information; the rest will follow.
Because our few pounds of gray matter will never be rational. Us techies tend to think we are, which is exactly why we're even more prone to act irrational in some situations!
Imagine trying to end WWII if every citizen of every nation in that war were sitting at the negotiating table.
A good modern example would be the middle east peace process, every time there are negotiations and a deal is on the table it blows up more often than not because of premature and selective release of information.
The selective part doesn't have to be intentionally i.e. in one side only releasing part of the information but simply because the other points were not settled upon yet.
Negotiations are like trying to balance an egg on a point of a needle, if they aren't they are often one sided.
Stores in the US generally don't price negotiate at the register, but they do have coupons that discriminate shoppers into loyal shoppers (those that take the time to track down the coupons or join the store's particular flavor of loyalty program) and ordinary shoppers.
So how does your income play into house prices? We had many houses on offer when I bought last year. We spoke with experts and offered slightly below market. If they countered above market, we would have walked.
> Stores in the US generally don't price negotiate at the register, but they do have coupons that discriminate shoppers into loyal shoppers (those that take the time to track down the coupons or join the store's particular flavor of loyalty program) and ordinary shoppers.
Isn't that more to do with advertising than income discrimination? I know wealthy housewives who have the time to clip coupons, my working class wife and I do not.
I'm not denying these practices exist, but its always sleazy businesses that engage in them and most consumers end up moving on once they catch wise. Grocery store vs. Amazon for example.
If the seller knows you are making a million a year, it's a fact that balances against their desire to sell. While their desire to sell could be greater and they might capitulate anyway, they may very well hold faster to their asking price because they know you're able to afford it.
If Warren Buffet makes an offer on my house and tries to negotiate me down on price, I'll hold out and even sell to someone else who also negotiates down on price, but isn't him; all things being equal, I'd rather feel like I helped someone out than was taken advantage of. This is among the reasons people with wealth will often use intermediaries to close deals.
> I'm not denying these practices exist, but its always sleazy businesses that engage in them and most consumers end up moving on once they catch wise. Grocery store vs. Amazon for example.
Amazon owns woot.com, which allows them precisely to engage in price discrimination and the benefits of time-scoped deals while simultaneously offering a more "supercenter" experience on their main site. They capture both sides of the market---people who like to feel they are getting a special deal, and people who prefer the simplicity of one price.
(Besides, since Amazon brokers trades between buyers and sellers who are selling at different prices, they don't even practice "one product, one price" on their main site, really. And they have Amazon Prime, which is a loyalty program).
http://www.sfgate.com/business/article/Mark-Zuckerberg-s-mor...
"When you can borrow at a rate below inflation, you're borrowing for free," McBride said. "This is the concept of using other people's money and it preserves financial flexibility for the borrower."
If you're borrowing at under market rates, we, the market are effectively subsidizing you. Does Zuckerberg need subsidies in order to have a mortgage?
The mortgage was likely only one piece of the deal negotiated. It costs the bank nothing to write an at-cost mortgage, but gives Zuckerberg value though additional liquidity. Items that cost nothing yet provide value to the other side are excellent things to throw on the table during negotiations to help seal the deal. One example: The bank may have the adjustable rate tied to the balance in an asset management account -- if Zuckerberg takes his money elsewhere, the mortgage also becomes profitable.
edit: getting source
Here you are:
https://theintercept.com/2016/08/06/accusing-wikileaks-bias-...
People talk a lot about how Putin is an opportunist. I think he saw how bitter Assange was becoming and understood if he gave him the documents, he could step back and let him carry out his vengeance against a woman who had a huge role in forcing him to ground in the embassy ("can't we just drone this guy?"). I'm told this is a Rule of Power. But that is speculation.
In any case, here's Assange himself discussing this exact thing recently:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x6mARUrPtXk&feature=youtu.be...
Doesn't seem like much of a vendetta according to him.
"There’s been a lot of misquoting of me and WikiLeaks publications. In this particular case, the misquoting has to do with that we intend, or I intend, to harm Hillary Clinton or that I don’t like Hillary Clinton. All those are false. They come about as a result it seems of this campaign and those who are trying to personalize our publications."
Not "for maximum impact", or if threatened, or "if something happens to me", or any other variation.
If nothing else, it frees (or minimizes) accusations of you being bribed, blackmailed, extorted, having an agenda beyond "releasing information".
No idea on the glasses. Maybe a reference to the stereotypical g-man? i.e. he was trying to say that Jews control the government?
Regardless, the parentheses are pretty straightforward.
So it seems to boil down to, "It seems like most of our critics are those upwardly-mobile Jews." Another sad chapter in the descent of WikiLeaks from a journalistic organization that was a reason to hope for humanity into a the Daily Mail for the Kremlin instead of GCHQ.
They really aren't, as the tweets hint they've recently been some sort of an anti-anti-semitism symbol, with lots of jewish people on twitter putting them around their names.
"Not only the denigration of the ((())) symbol but also the use of the term ‘tribalist’ to imply Jews is, of course, base racism, a particular racism that Putin shares."
The idea that the "denigration" of an anti-semitic symbol is itself "base racism" is bizarre. Saying that he's using the word "tribalist" to refer to Jews is just incorrect, because the vast majority of the people who surround their names with parens are not Jewish, just doing it in sympathy. Using this accusation to associate him with Putin is just propaganda.
I think the tweet was a bit of pointless adhominem after noticing that a lot of their prominent critics seem to be a monoculture of very similar types of people. It annoys me when Wikileaks tries to act cute and smartassy (which is often), and this tweet bit them in the ass. It was this same hubris that made Assange think he had suddenly become a hot guy when he was in Sweden. Watching the video of him dancing, you can see a guy who thinks that he's finally turned into a butterfly.
And it gets even harder to defend the @Wikileaks Twitter account from pandering to anti-Semitism after looking at several of the other tweets unearthed by this search... https://twitter.com/search?q=from%3Awikileaks%20jewish&src=t...
Oh yeah they are just rabid anti-semites. http://www.twitlonger.com/show/92hpnj
Your link shows completely normal use of the word "Jewish".
I would understand if Kerry asked Ecuador to stop Assange from publishing Clinton docs until she has been elected or until after the next presidential debate. That would make a lot of sense. But this FARC <--> Clinton doc connection doesn't.
What would they have to do to appear unbiased but still be able to release information damaging to the DNC and Clintons?
If they only used Twitter to make announcements and highlight interesting documents, I think they would be orders of magnitude more trustworthy. Let the documents speak for themselves, and let other people write the commentary.
If they are truly unbiased, they should release all the information they've got at once; or hold onto it until after the election; or also release other information they've got about Trump and other countries. Let the readers decide.
The fact that they release the emails in daily batches clearly shows they have an agenda and want to influence the outcome of the election. Which is fine, if that's what they aim for.
If he is holding something excessively damning it's quite problematic for for his supports and him, eventually that information would start losing it's value and it will not be a dead-man switch anymore.
This is also a problem because it forces him to dig more and more dirt that can be used as a dead-man switch rather than releasing the information.
You mean the philosophy that has him releasing material with carefully timed consideration to maximize attention to his own pet cause?
http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/presidential-races/29345...
He then says that they would like to get hold of internal documents from the Trump campaign and calls publicly for people to send in things to be published from the Trump campaign.
If there was someone else out there claiming they sent wikileaks material of signifance that was not being published then that would be different.
Instead, we're getting hints. That's called a "stunt", folks.
But why would WikiLeaks sacrifice their reputation like that?
Fundamentally Assange is a partisan hack at this point who's using what stored credibility he has from his activist days to make a play at influencing a foreign election.
I mean, speaking of reputation damage, hadn't Assange finally managed to bargain an arrangement in which he could face potentially very damaging questioning, but under the auspices of a state actively hostile to the principle of prosecuting him, using their prosecutor, questions prepared in advance and without any prospect of Sweden actually arresting him afterwards? Wasn't that supposed to have been yesterday? Wasn't the announced reason that despite having scheduled the interview exactly the way his legal team and his protectors at the Ecuadorean embassy wanted it, well in advance, his legal team had unfortunately concluded they would be unavailable on that day? Have many people stopped believing that Assange is actually really, really willing to talk to Swedish prosecutors that just keep putting all these unfair obstructions in his way as a result?
Why would a denial or two from Ecuador or even a time-stamped email from Assange at 6pm on Saturday night talking about how much fun he was having on the internet at that moment change anyone's view of Wikileaks?
Assange has been couch-surfing for 6 years now and by all accounts he's not a particularly good house guest. Nobody likes that arrogant asshole who gets drunk and smashes up your furniture. [1]
Sure, he doesn't have anywhere to go, but at the end of the day that's not Ecuador's problem. He's thrown himself on their good graces and he's not being very gracious about it. Indeed he's even working with Russia to stir up trouble - not just publishing Russian-sourced material, but working directly with Russia, to the extent that RT was linking into Wikileaks content even before Wikileaks announced they were up [2]
I imagine the police reports filed earlier this month alleging that he was trying to groom an 8-year-old for sex online aren't helping matters either [3]. That's very possibly the direct catalyst for cutting off his internet at this juncture.
On a personal level I do feel bad for Assange. It can't be easy to be in de-facto house arrest in someone else's house for 6 years, so it's not surprising that he's succumbing to some potential alcohol-related issues and lashing out on a personal and professional basis.
[1] https://www.buzzfeed.com/jamesball/mr-white-and-mr-blue
> A security guard was on duty at around 8:30pm on 6 September, when Assange was in the embassy with two associates. Around this time, the guard discovered that Assange had made his way into the embassy’s secure control room – a room strictly off-limits to him – and started tampering with the security equipment. This led to a scuffle between Assange and the guard that caused damage to the embassy’s equipment.
> The report then details conflicting accounts of what happened. According to the security guard’s account, Assange was asked to stop messing with the embassy’s systems and to leave the secure room, which he initially refused to do. The guard alleges that Assange then punched over a computer monitor before grabbing him by the shirt. This led, according to the guard, to an altercation for a number of minutes that spilled out into the corridor.
> Assange’s account lays the blame on the security guard, who he claimed had accosted him.
> A filmmaker who was present for the incident, the report notes, told embassy staff he did not see the beginning of the scuffle, but that Assange was “out of control” and very upset, and clearly wanted to be verbally offensive and to provoke a reaction.
> However, just a few months later a separate report notes a similar incident of seemingly erratic behaviour from the WikiLeaks chief shortly before dawn on 4 January 2013. The report painstakingly notes Assange’s movements from minute to minute – further evidence of how closely the Ecuadorians monitored “Mr Guest” – reporting that he seemed to wake at 6:05 that morning. Then, just five minutes later, the security guard heard a loud crash from Assange’s room.
> The report painstakingly notes Assange’s movements from minute to minute – further evidence of how closely the Ecuadorians monitored “Mr Guest” – reporting that he seemed to wake at 6:05 that morning. Then, just five minutes later, the security guard heard a loud crash from Assange’s room.
> Assange came to the door, assuring the on-duty guard that everything was fine, but (according to the guard’s account) seeming to try to block his view of the room’s interior. A few minutes later, Assange left the room carrying his laptop into a nearby room designated as his bathroom, where he remained for a period of hours.
> During this time, the memo continues, the guard was able to see inside Assange’s bedroom, where a large, smashed bookshelf was strewn across the room. The guard took photographs of the room’s condition.
> Assange later told embassy staff that the bookshelf had fallen over of its own accord, according to the same memo, but this seemingly did little to assuage their concerns about the wellbeing of Assange or those around him. As before, the incident was passed up the embassy’s chain of command – reference is made to a daily report on his activities – including, once again, “Mr White” and “Mr Blue”.
> The report notes with concern a regular comment in “internal daily reports” on Assange recording his tendency to “shout and talk incoherently” at night, attributed to night terrors. It then goes on to note: “This episode is nothing more than the result of the stress that Mr Assange could be feeling as a result of his isolation.
> The report continues in quite a critical manner as to Assange’s intrinsic “nature”, independent of his stressful situation, stating that his “evident anger” and “feelings of superiority” could cause stress to those around him — “especially the personnel who work in the embassy, mainly women”.
> The report contains multiple recommendations to improve the situation, including a proposal from “Mr Blue” for regular assessments of Assange’s physical and mental health, regular meetings with Assange’s confidantes to assess his demeanour and state of mind, and efforts to prevent Assange becoming isolated.
> The report also notes a need to “control access to alcohol”.
[2] http://usuncut.news/2016/10/13/breaking-evidence-russia-is-b...
> RT America tweeted with a link to the documents at 6:09 AM. However, WikiLeaks had not yet announced the release. They didn’t do so, in fact, until 23 minutes later.
> How did RT America know that the emails were being released and how did they know where to find the documents? It’s looking more and more like Julian Assange and WikiLeaks are working directly with the Russian government to destroy the Democratic presidential candidate.
[3] http://www.prweb.com/releases/united-nations-report/julian-a...
> Toddandclare became a participant in the UN Global Compact program in May 2016. This required them to release certain company records to the UN, including details of their legal interactions with Assange — which by then included a report from the Royal Bahamas Police about an investigation into Assange. (Assange is no longer involved in KATIA.)
> On September 28 this year a Canadian family holidaying in the Bahamas reported to the police that their 8-year-old daughter was “sexually molested online” by Assange on Toddandclare.com, including propositioning her “to perform oral and anal sex acts.” She was presumably accessing the site through her 22-year-old sister’s account. Whether these chats were recorded or not isn’t clear but the family claims they identified Assange.
I can't speak to their particular reputation or the veracity of the conduct in the police report, but they seem to be standing by their police report. You can view a copy of it on their official Facebook site account [2] as well as a followup on their website [3]. Unprofessional and goes off the rails IMO but they're sticking to their story.
As for my own post, I'm not making claims on my own and I have no particular reason to regard Todd & Claire's claims as factually untrue. Not proven either, but my posts certainly don't rise to the factual standard of libel ("knowing/reckless disregard of the truth"/"provable malice").
[1] https://www.unglobalcompact.org/what-is-gc/participants/8376...
[2] https://www.facebook.com/toddandclare/posts/1191392577583146
[3] https://www.toddandclare.com/datinglife/online-dating/united...
This serves Assange more then it serves WikiLeaks.
You like being ruled by corrupt criminals?
All the critics seem to have is claiming a Russia connection without proof. But even if that was indeed true, Russia speaking the truth is bad for humanity?
Thanks, I'll stick to the narrative of the guy that provably tells the truth and actually has to risk his life for it like once people resisting the Soviet and Nazi regime had to.
But for someone like you, I don't think any evidence will update or change your opinion. For some reason you've equated WikiLeaks and Russia, and don't have a solid grasp on how WikiLeaks actually works (anonymous source dumps data to WikiLeaks, WikiLeaks releases that data without any contact from the source whatsoever).
No one has shown any evidence. The US government just claims that Russia did this just as it claimed that Iraq had WMD's. Please show us the evidence that you have found.
They're not journalists, they've never claimed to be.
But seriously, if you were him, how confident would you be that the phone wasn't tampered with, no matter who you received it from? How could Assange trust anyone at this point? I'd imagine he would be quite paranoid given what he deals with and probably more so from the period of confinement.
It's kind of amazing to see what people come up with in the absence of information.
This is the important support.
https://twitter.com/wikileaks/status/788413380843503616
These people running the US government must be complete morons to even consider running this story. (yes: the US media is controlled by the US government, I have no doubt about it)