I am only saying that the result of the trial does not have to dictate my personal opinion on the matter of his guilt. I am not saying that it is rigged. I am not saying that there is a better system out there.
Which of course is how it should be. The evidence and legal logic presented at the trial should be the factors that dictate your opinions on the matter of his guilt. Anyway, he'll likely be sitting in prison for more than a year until the trial takes place. Will you choose to reserve any judgement until the trial is finished?
A guy who made his whole life about finding and revealing the abuse and corruption of government is obviously not going to trust the government to treat him fairly even if he was innocent.
True, but so far the government has not made public any proof that would show he is guilty. (Well, at least according to some people's opinion)
You think he read all of those thousands of files looking for abuse and corruption? No way. He just dumped the whole thing out there not caring who might be killed over it.
how did this work out for him, he looks awful, mentally ill if you ask me... plenty of "others" agencies, media propagandists, benefitted from his sacrifice, his life is ruined. Snowden too... living his life remotely... it's not worth it. NSA is still recording everyone and other countries are now also doing the same... he made the problem worse for everyone, his own country, his people and for himself. Whistleblowers never come out winning, used and discarded
I wouldnt be against changing him for manslaughter for everyone who died because of what he did. Other that, government transparency is essential to our freedom.
I'm less worried about Assange than I am the people who gave him the information. THEY are the ones who should be punished the most extreme. Obviously Obama sympathizes with the people that gave Assange that information. America doesn't.
When it comes to recording everyone, I'm more concerned about what Amazon and Google get up to with their new smart speakers. They're selling people spy devices that they knowingly and willingly install in their own homes. People also knowingly and willingly carry devices that track their every move. That stuff is creepy as hell, but no one cares because, as far as anyone is aware, governments aren't involved in it.
This post could not be more accurate. I completely agree. It takes open source intel to a whole new level.
This world is not a paradise of peace and goodwill. There is a constant competition going on, a global chess game for very high stakes. Too much transparency is foolish. We certainly don't want people like Assange deciding for us how much transparency we should have.
Assange definitely ran away and hid...sorta...in the Ecuadorian embassy in London. No need to reserve judgement on that. It was widely reported in the world press.
Correction - it was widely reported in the western press. See the difference? If you can't, think 'fake news'?
You won't find many conservatives that will disagree with you on that either. Scarily it might be "common ground"
Are you saying there is a "fat chance" of them being returned to the US...or are you saying there is a fat chance of them getting a fair trial? I think there is a good chance that Snowden will eventually return to the US...and I think there is an excellent chance that Assange will get here. I think both will get fair trials.
It was widely reported in the world's press...that Assange had taken refuge in the Ecuadorian embassy.
It is not a generational thing with me. I am 82...and I do not care if I a "spied" on. Fact is, personal privacy in any meaningful form...is no more. If you use a computer and connect to the Internet...for all intents and purposes, it is all gone. Not necessarily a bad thing. Walk down the street in a decent sized town...go into a store...it is all gone. CCTV everywhere. Fight it if you must. Canute demanded the waves not break on his kingdom.
Eh, no. Obviously there are different degrees of surveillance subject to different restraints and available to different audiences. The creeps building databases of consumer activity don't have access to CCTV (but it sounds like you would give them that if they tried to get it). Privacy on the internet is also a complicated matter, as most of the loss of privacy comes in the form of an ISP having the ability to monitor your connection to some extent (it helps, I'm sure, not to use their DNS server) and trackers placed on just about every website you visit by Facebook, Twitter, Google and others, which can often be blocked by a savvy user. You can also take it a step further by using additional software, up and including a VPN, of course, or even Tor. But sadly, the default position is to be wide open to these private entities that start spying on you for that precious revenue-generating & otherwise useful data (and there are times when other human beings have access to your personal information through these entities), now even including audio recordings thanks to these smart speakers, without even asking for your consent in any direct way. You blast through any EULA you're presented with because, well, you can't use the thing if you don't agree. But then, NONE OF US even agrees to a EULA before being spied on by Google and these other entities online. We aren't even afforded that. Now, it's mostly a matter of principle, since most of the time the data is simply used to make a company some money and allow advertisers to target you. Thus, how the data is used is typically not offensive enough to get anyone too upset. At most, they get annoyed when they start getting weird ads because they searched for something out of the ordinary once. All the same, on principle, I don't want to be profiled and tracked, and I take measures to prevent it. I sure as hell won't have a speaker in my home listening to me :/ I won't carry a tracking device (although I think even my car might be doing something of the sort now thanks to OnStar). On principle, I don't want corporations having Big Brother level ability to surveil me, no matter their motive and how it is actually used, any more than I would want my government doing it.
Assange is the complete new animal in the world I guess he's a combination of a journalist and a terrorist