This Is Not About WikiLeaks
The US government is now using its considerable power to shape both foreign governments and corporations into tools for its unprecedented international persecution of a news gathering organization and its smarmy leader.
So far, WikiLeaks has been subjected to DDoS attacks, it's been booted off servers and DNS services both in the US and abroad, had its Swiss bank account frozen, its PayPal account suspended, Visa and Master Card have both decided to block donations to WikiLeaks, and both Facebook and Twitter have suspended WikiLeaks accounts. Hell, even some free data visualization site booted the WikiLeaks data.
This isn't conspiracy theory/behind the scenes/national security stuff. It's right out there in the public domain for all to see. The US government has abandoned any attempt to even appear as if its actions are guided by anything other than self interest, as well as any pretense that it does not view itself as above the law, federal and international, and is publicly resorting to brute force and bullying to achieve its goals without even attempting to cover its ass.
Now, Julian Assange seems to me like a smarmy self-aggrandizing creep and a shameless attention whore. I'm undecided about his organization, WikiLeaks, mostly because they're so fucking secretive I can't tell what they're doing or why. I certainly have no problem with Assange being extradited from the UK to Sweden to face criminal charges.
I do have a problem with American politicians publicly calling to assassinate Assange as a leader of a terrorist organization.
I have a problem with the State Department declaring publicly that Assange and WikiLeaks are criminals engaged in illegal activity, and using this supposed "fact" to intimidate organizations and companies into kicking them in the balls, when neither Assange nor WikiLeaks have even been charged with anything in any US court (let alone convicted - apparently the entire judicial system is superfluous). And the reason they haven't been charged with anything is that there is no statute (yet - Congress generously offered to rewrite some laws for this special occasion) that they are in clear violation of, and if the government did manage to find something that might stick, they'd have a huge problem with the 4th Amendment, and if they did manage to circumvent the constitution and create a dangerous precedent regarding the publication by a third party of leaked documents (in effect making journalism illegal in the US) it likely wouldn't be enforceable under most, if not all, current extradition treaties.
And so, I support Anonymous and Operation Payback and whatever loosely organized anarchic online groups that are doing the online equivalent of a sit-in, more commonly known as DDoS attacks, on those companies and organizations, governmental and otherwise, that chose to bow down to pressure and participate in this persecution, because the people have no power against attacks such as these unless we do something when the smarmy ones are being shat on. Also, they threw in an attack on Palin for free, which is just icing on the moose.
This isn't a comprehensive post. I've been reading stuff for several days now and I have a lot of OPINIONS (and almost as many bookmarks), but I really wanted to say something, even if no one's listening, because I think it's important; not because I agree with WikiLeaks, but because I find the US government's actions to be both despicable and really fucking scary.
Oh, and they even got Encyclopedia Dramatica to remove an entry about Operation Payback, which, WTF? Though, to be fair, as far as I could tell, at least there was a court order involved.
Also, in serious business, there's a legal analysis written by what the EFF says is an independent, non-partisan legal office that does research for Congress, which covers the legal options and issues relating to possible prosecution of WikiLeaks and/or Assange. I've read it and found it extraordinarily informative, so if you feel like it, it's here: http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/secrecy/R41404.pdf
So far, WikiLeaks has been subjected to DDoS attacks, it's been booted off servers and DNS services both in the US and abroad, had its Swiss bank account frozen, its PayPal account suspended, Visa and Master Card have both decided to block donations to WikiLeaks, and both Facebook and Twitter have suspended WikiLeaks accounts. Hell, even some free data visualization site booted the WikiLeaks data.
This isn't conspiracy theory/behind the scenes/national security stuff. It's right out there in the public domain for all to see. The US government has abandoned any attempt to even appear as if its actions are guided by anything other than self interest, as well as any pretense that it does not view itself as above the law, federal and international, and is publicly resorting to brute force and bullying to achieve its goals without even attempting to cover its ass.
Now, Julian Assange seems to me like a smarmy self-aggrandizing creep and a shameless attention whore. I'm undecided about his organization, WikiLeaks, mostly because they're so fucking secretive I can't tell what they're doing or why. I certainly have no problem with Assange being extradited from the UK to Sweden to face criminal charges.
I do have a problem with American politicians publicly calling to assassinate Assange as a leader of a terrorist organization.
I have a problem with the State Department declaring publicly that Assange and WikiLeaks are criminals engaged in illegal activity, and using this supposed "fact" to intimidate organizations and companies into kicking them in the balls, when neither Assange nor WikiLeaks have even been charged with anything in any US court (let alone convicted - apparently the entire judicial system is superfluous). And the reason they haven't been charged with anything is that there is no statute (yet - Congress generously offered to rewrite some laws for this special occasion) that they are in clear violation of, and if the government did manage to find something that might stick, they'd have a huge problem with the 4th Amendment, and if they did manage to circumvent the constitution and create a dangerous precedent regarding the publication by a third party of leaked documents (in effect making journalism illegal in the US) it likely wouldn't be enforceable under most, if not all, current extradition treaties.
And so, I support Anonymous and Operation Payback and whatever loosely organized anarchic online groups that are doing the online equivalent of a sit-in, more commonly known as DDoS attacks, on those companies and organizations, governmental and otherwise, that chose to bow down to pressure and participate in this persecution, because the people have no power against attacks such as these unless we do something when the smarmy ones are being shat on. Also, they threw in an attack on Palin for free, which is just icing on the moose.
This isn't a comprehensive post. I've been reading stuff for several days now and I have a lot of OPINIONS (and almost as many bookmarks), but I really wanted to say something, even if no one's listening, because I think it's important; not because I agree with WikiLeaks, but because I find the US government's actions to be both despicable and really fucking scary.
Oh, and they even got Encyclopedia Dramatica to remove an entry about Operation Payback, which, WTF? Though, to be fair, as far as I could tell, at least there was a court order involved.
Also, in serious business, there's a legal analysis written by what the EFF says is an independent, non-partisan legal office that does research for Congress, which covers the legal options and issues relating to possible prosecution of WikiLeaks and/or Assange. I've read it and found it extraordinarily informative, so if you feel like it, it's here: http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/secrecy/R41404.pdf