Assange! Free at last!

[Strange]

4 minutes ago, Sensei said:

How can you protect somebody against criminals tossing illegal things for revenge for revealing their criminal activity.. ??

Right. So there is no point having any laws or police because it is not possible to protect anyone from criminals.

 

[Sensei]

30 minutes ago, Strange said:

Right. So there is no point having any laws or police because it is not possible to protect anyone from criminals.

No. You want to force witness to continue working with criminals whom witness just denounced..... and then expect criminals to do nothing in revenge.. how naive and silly is it.. ? What for all these "witness protection programs" (i.e. keeping witnesses as far as possible from criminals they denounced)... ? But you want exactly reverse: keep witness close to criminals, the next desk, or the next room...

Edited April 12, 2019 by Sensei

[Strange]

14 minutes ago, Sensei said:

You want to force witness to continue working with criminals 

Of course I don’t. 

[MigL]

I imagine it all depends on your background.
Some of us may come from countries where political 'whistleblowers' are routinely disappeared, or assassinated with ricin or radiation poisoning ( even while residing in other countries ). Or perhaps hit squads of young gullible girls are sent to assassinate political opponents with nerve agents in airports. Or  ( mediocre ) journalists who report on a  morally bankrupt kingdom are butchered in foreign embassies.

I don't think we, in the West, have become cynical enough to believe that of our Governments yet.
( certainly not in Canada or Europe, although one never knows with D Trump )

Edited April 12, 2019 by MigL

[zapatos]

1 hour ago, Sensei said:

How can you protect somebody against criminals tossing illegal things for revenge for revealing their criminal activity.. ??

 

Yes, that is why people are as safe in Congo as they are in Finland.

[swansont]

5 hours ago, Sensei said:

That's quite absurdist.. Suppose so somebody learn that politician ordered killing somebody from foreign country or locally.. Attempt to report it to the government, who is actually behind the whole crime, would just mean that such "whistle-blower" would be killed, "have accident" or disappear or blackmailed.. For lighter crime of somebody from government, "whistle-blower" would be discredited in advance or blackmailed..

The law is supposed to protect them from repercussions. Absurd or not (and your scenario itself is quite absurd) it is still a fact. That is what a whistleblower is, in terms of government employees. If you give the information to a journalist, you are not whistle-blowing. It’s something else.

 

 

[rangerx]

4 hours ago, swansont said:

The law is supposed to protect them from repercussions. Absurd or not (and your scenario itself is quite absurd) it is still a fact. That is what a whistleblower is, in terms of government employees. If you give the information to a journalist, you are not whistle-blowing. It’s something else.

Right, a whistle blower is an affected employee, often representing other employees going over the heads of their supervisors to report an incident, negligence or other inappropriate action.

I'm inclined to think that commissioning a hack for unauthorized access, downloading classified documents and redistributing personal information would disqualify whistle blowing.

More of a criminal matter than a civilly disobedient one. The public interest wasn't served.

Most whistle blowers aren't disappeared or convicted. They're usually end up losing their job/career or otherwise blackballed in some way.

One thing I can say about Assange, he's got no reason to lie. He's pretty straight up with his douchebaggery. I am curious to hear what he has to say about Paul Manafort, Roger Stone, G2 and a few others in the Trump/Russia orbit.
 

[Carrock]

The disinformation and ad hominem attacks go on....

 

5 hours ago, rangerx said:

I'm inclined to think that commissioning a hack for unauthorized access, downloading classified documents and redistributing personal information would disqualify whistle blowing.

More of a criminal matter than a civilly disobedient one. The public interest wasn't served.

Manning initially approached Assange. Whether Assange did anything more with Manning than most investigative journalists (not whistleblowers) would do is very questionable at present. The difficulty for the U.S. was/is finding a charge which would not also apply to a few million other journalists.

The relatives of victims of the war crimes in Iraq and elsewhere who would otherwise never have known what happened likely have a different view on what is in the public interest than you do. Perhaps, like Hillary Clinton, you think the harm he did to the democrats outweighs this?

 

5 hours ago, rangerx said:

Most whistle blowers aren't disappeared or convicted. They're usually end up losing their job/career or otherwise blackballed in some way.

Chelsea Manning was convicted and had her sentence commuted by Obama.

She's now 'enjoying' her freedom during an indefinite prison sentence, much of her time in solitary confinement.

A somewhat disproportionate sentence for an unnecessary witness?

 

Quote

While everything she did with WikiLeaks in 2010 came out in her trial, in March she was nevertheless ordered to testify again in front of a grand jury, now known to have been investigating Assange.

Manning, a strong critic of the secret panels often used by prosecutors in high-profile cases, said she objected "strenuously" to the subpoena.

"We've seen this power abused countless times to target political speech," she said, making clear that she would be willing to testify in public.

On March 8, the judge ordered her locked up in an Alexandria, Virginia detention center until she testifies or the grand jury is wound up.

The indictment of Assange -- issued secretly in March 2008 -- would appear to negate the need for her testimony.

Secret justice is often more expedient than disappearing people.