Saint or Sinner? Feds Arrest Suspect in Leak of Classified Documents

April 14, 2023 — bunkerville

What happens when Americans find out the truth of a matter and not gaslighted with fake news? Is it better for the government to lie to us if it will cost dearly in many ways? When are secrets too secret? Will the suspect suffer the same fate as Assange? Snowden? Reality Winner? Just to name a few. So was the leaker a Saint for giving us the unvarnished truth? Or a Sinner that burned sources probably and will probably deny the same ability to  gather further intelligence. Perhaps costing lives.

I have struggled with this topic before here at Bunkerville. And there is a strangeness about all of it.

Why anyone who is anyone wants Julian Assange dead

May 15, 2019

“Everyone” in this case includes every major newspaper that published and received awards for publishing Wikileaks material; all major U.S. televised media outlets; and all “respectable” U.S. politicians — including, of course, Hillary Clinton, who was rumored (though unverifiably) to have said, “Can’t we just drone this guy?”

Mustang who posts here from time to time gave it a shot as well. He offers his take:

Julian Assange – About the Law

April 13, 2019 

How about Snowden?

Will the real Edward Snowden please stand up and who are your handlers?

September 20, 2016

Among the questions is how a contract employee at a distant NSA satellite office was able to obtain a copy of an order from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, a highly classified document that would presumably be sealed from most employees and of little use to someone in his position.

A former senior NSA official said that the number of agency officials with access to such court orders is “maybe 30 or maybe 40. Not large numbers.”…

And not us forget Reality Winner. Sentenced to about 5, did about 3 years.

Ms Reality Winner faces ‘longest sentence’ for leaking NSA Classified Docs to Media

August 16, 2018

This is an odd thing. Cue up the conspiracy theories.

On a strange and bizarre note, why did the contractor she was employed by just since Feb 2017, for the most part only hire ex military women in their 20’s?

Interesting to note also that she gave the info to The Intercept who is run by the same guy that Snowden gave stuff to. Maybe Chelsea Manning can explain it. Better yet, in just four short months on the job she just happened to come upon and leak the story that The Intercept published about Russia’s so called interference in last year’s presidential election. Her bailiwick was Afghanistan intelligence. Just two cute by twice.

Staring to see this whole thing as a bit strange?

Now enter the latest leaker. One Jack Teixeira, 21-year-old member of the Massachusetts Air National Guard.

Rolling Stone: Their take on the happening:

Aric Toler, a researcher for investigative news outlet Bellingcat, first discovered that the Discord “Thug Shaker Central,” a home for fans of the YouTube influencer “Oxide,” had originally hosted the leaks. One member of the server told Bellingcat that the original poster of the classified material took on a role as an administrator at the server, where users freely posted racist content and discussed conservative politics.

Many young members of the Thug Shaker Central server held the leaker, dubbed “OG,” in high regard and viewed him as a father figure, according to The Washington Post. Former members of the server told the Post that OG had posted a trove of classified documents for months and that Thug Shaker had played host not just to Americans but users from Russia and Ukraine. 

Source Rolling Stone

Martha MacCallum’s take with questioning – she ends with “it’s a very very strange story.”

Fox News host Martha MacCallum has the latest on a newly surfaced picture of 21-year-old guardsman Jack Teixeira and footage of his arrest in the leak of classified documents on ‘The Story.

 

Saint? Tucker gives it his best and leaves many of us in an uncomfortable state of mind. Truth that comes at great cost or is it better to remain ignorant of the truth of the matter.

What is your take? The very best of the swamp.

Posted in Deep State. Tags: , , , . 22 Comments »

Julian Assange – About the Law

April 13, 2019 — bunkerville

 

Julian Assange – About the law.

  by Mustang – Our man on the beat in the U.K.

 

The law must be applied equally no matter how rich or poor, who they know, or how influential they may be in national or state politics.

Julian Assange

Julian Assange has been charged with ONE count of violating the laws of the United States.  This one count is broken down into several elements or sections of Title 18, United States Code.

The specifics allege (not yet proved) are that Mr. Assange illegally obtained records of the United States government, that he conspired to obtain these records, and that he knowingly and willfully received these records from computers and data bases under the exclusive jurisdiction of the United States.

He may have in fact done exactly that.

Initially, I thought there may be a similarity in what Assange is accused of doing, and the publication of classified material by the New York Times in 1971.  This could still be true if a court of competent jurisdiction treats Mr. Assange as a publisher of news, but there does remain one glaring distinction.

In 1971, the New York Times obtained classified material, notified the government that the paper was in possession of the material, informed the government that they intended to publish a story relating to the contents of that information, and offered the government an opportunity to comment on it before publication.

The government responded by going to court to SUPPRESS the New York Times.  Suppression of the press is what that issue was all about.  The Supreme Court ruled that the government may not suppress the news media simply because it had obtained information that the government did not want known.

Bradley Manning

If the government can prove a conspiracy between Assange and Bradley-Chelsea Manning to unlawfully obtain classified information, which is to say that Mr. Assange was a participant in the theft, then he’ll be spending a few seconds in federal prison, as did Bradley-Chelsea Manning.  It won’t matter whether Assange is a citizen of the United States.

Federal attorneys obtain convictions on foreign persons all the time.  But there is still a hurdle: the United States government does not have possession of Mr. Assange.  Mr. Assange is not currently within the jurisdiction of the United States.

So, the first hurdle is his extradition to United States jurisdiction.  Assange has two things going for him right now: (1) he has top ranked attorneys in the UK representing him, and (2) A British judge will hear the case for extradition.  This means that there is no guarantee that the US will be granted extradition in this case, particularly if the London court decides that Assange is a news media publisher or outlet.

All that aside, without any in-depth knowledge of the information he obtained, or its actual effects (as opposed to what the government may allege), we should perhaps acknowledge that were it not for Mr. Assange, the American people would not know that:

  1. Hillary Clinton’s violated federal law in her mishandling of classified information.  This did not appear to be a concern to the Department of Justice and to this date, Ms. Clinton has not been charged for violating federal law in the handling of classified material, or her attempt to obstruct justice by bleaching her hard drives.
  2. Hillary Clinton (who at the time was the de facto chairman of the Democratic National Party) conspired to derail the candidacy of presidential hopeful Bernie Stalin.
  3. Hillary Clinton diverted money from the DNC into her own campaign account.
  4. The murder of DNC staffer Seth Rich was probably an inside job.
  5. Hillary Clinton conspired with others to manufacture and produce a phony dossier on presidential hopeful Donald J. Trump.
  6. Hillary Clinton was deeply entrenched with US finance interests in pursuit of her own net worth.
  7. The DNC claim that Assange hacked their computer with the assistance of Russian secret intelligence operatives amazingly mirrors similar allegations Clinton and the DNC made about President Trump.
  8. James Clapper is a liar on the issue of collecting information (data mining) (without warrant) on citizens of the United States.

On the question of whether Assange is a de factor journalist, he has been the recipient of numerous news media awards in 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, and a 2019 nominee for a Nobel Peace Prize.

Summation:

I believe the federal government is obligated to pursue extradition.  If he is extradited, he will not be granted bail.  He will have his day in court—which is far more than anyone can say about Hillary Clinton.

Primary responsibility for safeguarding classified material rests with the United States government.  Apparently, the federal government has been inept in doing this.  We should not hold Assange responsible for the failings of federal authorities to safeguard sensitive material.  If Mr. Assange is held to account for violations of law, so be it.  Has anyone in the government been held to account for their criminal negligence safeguarding our country’s secrets?

 

Mustang has other great reads over at his two blogs – Thoughts from Afar

with Old West Tales and Fix Bayonets

Posted in Military. Tags: , , , , . 11 Comments »

Huckabee – Something Happened To FBI Director Comey, Needs To Resign

March 10, 2017 — bunkerville

The presser by Assange yesterday was chilling for those who heard it in its entirety. For that matter for anyone that even caught a smidgen of it since the media and even bloggers have shown or posted little of it. So our T.V, phones and microwave are portals into the ether. But we really knew it…. those of us wearing tin foil have posted on the fact previously. Setting that aside, where do we go from here? One thing is for sure, FBI Comey and the NSA, CIA will not go quietly into that dark night. Earlier posts: Comey: Citizens Should Have No Secrets That The Government Can’t Access, and FBI James Comey, the ultimate chameleon who sold his soul?

Huckabee made some excellent points yesterday on Fox… worth consideration. Here are partial notes from the clip:

Huckabee’s comments are much less measured and much more honest than those of General Hayden. “There are some things that we need to know about as American citizens, particularly if it potentially violates every constitutional right that Americans have. If our government is spying on us, if our government is holding back secrets about us and stealing things from us in the way of information, then something is rotten, not just in Denmark. It’s rotten in DC and we’ve got to get to the bottom of it because otherwise we don’t have this great republic that most of us believe that we have.”

Huckabee says, “That’s why Shannon, this is terrible. I think this thing stinks bigger than the hog barn at the Iowa State Fair. And even when Michael Hayden talks, he doesn’t say that the Russians did it. He says, ‘I think they might have.’ Here’s what we do know. There was information being shared by the Obama administration to the Clinton campaign. Robbie Mook said that on Tuesday on Fox and Friends.

Posted in Government. Tags: , , , , , . 15 Comments »

Assange: Hacked Emails show Clinton Arming of Jihadists, Including ISIS, in Syria

August 1, 2016 — bunkerville

Ho hum no doubt. It is what we thought anyway, and no doubt had much to do with the death of those in Libya. Yet nothing in the news today about it yet. More concern over Trump’s latest misstep. Donald, why don’t you focus on this instead of yourself? Hmm?? Let’s put this down “just for the record.” Am I the only one that is concerned about the potential for blackmail once she gets elected? These Emails are just to let her know that she has much to be concerned about. Here tis:

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton knew that the US was sending arms from Libya to Syria back in 2011, a year before the Benghazi consulate attacks.

Hillary Clinton denied she knew about the weapons shipments during public testimony (under oath) in early 2013 after the Benghazi terrorist attack.

On Tuesday Julian Assange told Democracy Now that the Wikileaks DNC emails contains information on the weapons shipments to Syria.

Julian Assange: “So, those Hillary Clinton emails, they connect together with the cables that we have published of Hillary Clinton, creating a rich picture of how Hillary Clinton performs in office, but, more broadly, how the U.S. Department of State operates. So, for example, the disastrous, absolutely disastrous intervention in Libya, the destruction of the Gaddafi government, which led to the occupation of ISIS of large segments of that country, weapons flows going over to Syria, being pushed by Hillary Clinton, into jihadists within Syria, including ISIS, that’s there in those emails.There’s more than 1,700 emails in Hillary Clinton’s collection, that we have released, just about Libya alone.”

H/T:The Gateway Pundit 

 

Posted in election. Tags: , , , , . 20 Comments »

WikiLeaks Assange – Getting to Know You

July 28, 2010 — bunkerville

Julian Assange

Julian Assange

A good story over at Frontpagemag on this fine fellow. We keep giving hackers and others of his ilk a free pass. They cost companies and governments millions of dollars in expenses. It’s time to take these fellows seriously. Lives are at stake. What’s with the pasty white, dude? You need to get some rays once in awhile.

Shortly after getting WikiLeaks off the ground, Assange flew to Kenya to attend the World Social Forum — a yearly symposium dedicated to the redistribution of wealth and the eradication of capitalism — where he delivered a presentation about his new website. (Tempting for me to do my Kenyan-Obama rant but will spare my regulars!) Newbies- its here! Obama Kenya thingy story

Hacking remained an obsession for Assange throughout his late teens; the excitement he derived from it was only amplified by his knowledge that federal authorities were doggedly trying to catch him and his fellow “Subversives.” This self-dramatization continues today, as Assange constantly moves from place to place, maintaining no real home, because he fears that international governmental agencies, particularly those in the U.S., may have targeted him for reprisal for the leaks he has orchestrated.

At his final sentencing, the judge went easy on him: “There is just no evidence that there was anything other than sort of intelligent inquisitiveness and the pleasure of being able to—what’s the expression—surf through these various computers.” Thus Assange escaped with the lightest of penalties — the payment of a small fine.

Much more here at Front PAge MAg

Posted in Liberal Loonies. Tags: , , . 2 Comments »