WikiLeaks founder charged with rape and molestation?

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Caliburn

Caliburn

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I don't know how many of you are familiar with Wikileaks or what your viewpoints are on it, but something very interesting is just now making news. Apparently, the founder of Wikileaks is being accused by Swedish authorities of raping a woman and molesting another.

To me, this reeks of something politically motivated and here's why. The United States is rather ticked off with Wikileaks right now over the release of 70,000+ classified documents (and other assorted material) which they claim damage national security. Furthermore, Wikileaks is promising another 15,000+ documents in the near future. I personally support Wikileaks releasing this material. We need a good look into these wars and these documents are providing that much needed look. I guess the encryption key for the 'insurance.aes256' file Wikileaks posted some time back may actually get released after-all.

Anyhow, the Untied States has been exploring possible legal options against Julian Assange since the release. They have stated they want to 'limit his travel' at the very least because Julian is a pure nomad, country hopping as it were. To me, this reeks of something politically motivated. The charges are of the worst possible kind, the kind that haunt you even if you are proven innocent. This reeks of character assassination and I believe is one method they're currently employing to discredit Wikileaks as a whole.

What do you guys think about this whole situation? :confused:
 
I tend to agree with your view of the situation. It smells a lot like planting drugs on rock stars when the government doesn't like their war vs peace activities (i.e., John Lennon...)
 
CBI Web said:
I tend to agree with your view of the situation. It smells a lot like planting rugs on rock stars when the government doesn't like their war vs peace activities (i.e., John Lennon...)
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Maybe I'm wrong. Anything is possible, you know? That said, the timing and nature of these charges given the current situation is extremely suspicious from my viewpoint.

I mean, if the physical evidence supports the charges (I'm talking at least seminal DNA here and not just some woman's word), then he deserves to be punished under the law. His past isn't exactly clean (he is/was a renowned hacker). We'll have to see. My original opinion stands until it's proven otherwise.
 
It really wouldn't surprise me if the U.S. was behind this. They've long been out for his blood and their usual way of dealing with things (pressuring other countries) makes this whole thing highly suspect. Maybe we'll find out what Wikileak's insurance file was, after all. I sure hope so.

On the subject of Wikileaks, the Pentagon has already been caught lying (or at least providing misleading statements) about Wikileaks seeking help to redact some of the documents. Glenn Greenwald wrote a good piece about that yesterday http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2010/08/20/wikileaks

Basically, Wikileaks asked for help in redacting some documents, D.O.D denied the request, then made misleading statements, essentially stating Wikileaks didn't ask for help. Directly or indirectly, they did ask for help, but it goes to show just how low the U.S. Government is willing to stoop to discredit and damage Wikileaks.

If they catch him, I eagerly await hard evidence or a whitewash, most like the latter. I suspect even locking Assange up for a while (awaiting trial) will be good enough for the U.S. Unfortunately for them, those documents and probably a hell of a lot more are going to be released regardless.
 
Very, very strange. From rapist and molester to innocent in a day. One hell of a ding on that man's character though. Maybe they're just throwing everything at him, in the hope that something sticks.
 
Poor fellow to have that accusation levelled at him. He's putting his neck on the line in the pursuit of truth and that's what he gets. Very low, I don't know how some human beings sleep at night I really don't.
 
Booth said:
Poor fellow to have that accusation levelled at him. He's putting his neck on the line in the pursuit of truth and that's what he gets. Very low, I don't know how some human beings sleep at night I really don't.
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I'd say he's "putting his neck on the line" for reasons that hardly have anything to do with the pursuit of truth. I wonder how he sleeps at night putting all the lives at risk he's put there for his "pursuit of truth" :rolleyes:
 
What's his reason for creating the site then?

I ask because I may have got my wires crossed.
 
John said:
I'd say he's "putting his neck on the line" for reasons that hardly have anything to do with the pursuit of truth. I wonder how he sleeps at night putting all the lives at risk he's put there for his "pursuit of truth"
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I guess you are referring to the Afghan War Diary. AFAIK they are still holding back 15,000 reports to minimize harm. The reports that have been published reveal the killing of hundreds of civilians in unreported incidents. I think the public deserves to know that.
 
mlx said:


I guess you are referring to the Afghan War Diary. AFAIK they are still holding back 15,000 reports to minimize harm. The reports that have been published reveal the killing of hundreds of civilians in unreported incidents. I think the public deserves to know that.
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I would certainly like to know.

The government knows they can't do anything in other countries right? He could always release it on other websites, there are always people on the internet willing to do that needs to be done, even some guy in the arctic with a 10 KB/S uplink.
 
Well the Swedish police are doing a massive backpedal on this at the moment so we'll see what comes of it.
 
It's interesting that some people condemn him for releasing the truth, and not actually condemn those who killed innocent civilians and took their lives.

As for the "putting lives at risk", could you please provide me with some solid evidence to support that? or is it that you believe statements such as "there are weapons of mass destruction in Iraq"?
Just saying...

I wonder how many innocent people did the Wikileaks founder kill so far with the release of those documents? oh right...zero, and how many did die in this ongoing war? hmm...no one is complaining here, "lets just focus on the Wikileaks founder, and hope he doesn't show up more secrets."
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The internet is an amazing tool.
 
Photon said:
It's interesting that some people condemn him for releasing the truth, and not actually condemn those who killed innocent civilians and took their lives.

As for the "putting lives at risk", could you please provide me with some solid evidence to support that? or is it that you believe statements such as "there are weapons of mass destruction in Iraq"?
Just saying...

I wonder how many innocent people did the Wikileaks founder kill so far with the release of those documents? oh right...zero, and how many did die in this ongoing war? hmm...no one is complaining here, "lets just focus on the Wikileaks founder, and hope he doesn't show up more secrets." :rolleyes:
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Why can't people just use the default font? :confused:

That said, I've been pouring through these documents on my 3rd and 4th monitors since the release. I'm at about 32,000 so far. Anyhow, I have found some interesting stuff in there. There ARE names in these documents, most informant names, but there are names. These names should have been purged. So are there some lives at risk by these documents being revealed? Quite possibly.

One interesting thing to note is that the United States (according to these documents) intercepted some information in 07' that Osama Bin Laden died of natural causes but so far have not yet confirmed it. Anyhow, these documents are giving us a good and much needed look into these wars and how they're being conducted. Regardless of the consequences, I support their release.
 
I don't feel like getting into this much but I will say the main issue here isn't the fact that the documents were released, but the fact they were leaked in the first place. That's a much bigger issue than the fact they were made available for the public to view.
 
Onimua said:
I don't feel like getting into this much but I will say the main issue here isn't the fact that the documents were released, but the fact they were leaked in the first place. That's a much bigger issue than the fact they were made available for the public to view.
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I don't see the issue here. Leaks such as this are necessary from time to time.
 
Caliburn said:
I don't see the issue here. Leaks such as this are necessary from time to time.
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I didn't say they weren't and I agree that there are times where it would be necessary for the greater good (or however you like to see it). I'm just saying that the fact that it happened at all is a bigger problem to higher ups because there's people below them who aren't respecting protocols around the information they handle.
 
Onimua said:
I didn't say they weren't and I agree that there are times where it would be necessary for the greater good (or however you like to see it). I'm just saying that the fact that it happened at all is a bigger problem to higher ups because there's people below them who aren't respecting protocols around the information they handle.
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And yet they're capable of have some form of effective leak prevention. The fact that the truth about Roswell hasn't come out yet is proof of that. Yes, I'm referring to aliens here.
 
You know what's really interesting btw
As a matter of fact, Barack Obama has now, with the prosecution of Bradley Manning, indicted as many people for whistleblowing or leaks as all previous presidents put together.
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