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He has agreed to plead guilty to violating the Espionage Act, it's no longer an argument, he's admitting it in court. He's going to go to a US court in one of o

He has agreed to plead guilty to violating the Espionage Act, it's no longer an argument, he's admitting it in court. He's going to go to a US court in one of our tiny pacific island territories to plead. He directly participated in stealing a bunch of classified information with Manning.

vidarh 2y ago
A guilty plea faced with the choice of continued imprisonment in inhumane conditions or the risk of extradition to a country that might jail him for life or execute him does not end the argument of whether or not he is guilty of anything. It's a coerced plea. It only ends the argument of whether or not there is still a legal case against him.
- jonhohle 2y ago
  I really would hope more people would understand this. Faced with indefinite detention and infinite legal cost would you admit to something you didn’t do to walk free? I’m pretty sure most people would. It’s a difficult area of research, but there are various law schools[0] and charities[1] trying to help people who took pleas because they feared a harsher sentence if they couldn’t adequately defend themselves. 0 - https://www.law.umich.edu/special/exoneration/Documents/NRE.Guilty.Plea.Article1.pdf https://www.law.umich.edu/special/exoneration/Documents/NRE.... 1 - https://innocenceproject.org/ https://innocenceproject.org/
- pdabbadabba 2y ago
  > a country that might jail him for life or execute him I've always found this claim to be extremely shrill — and doubly so now. This is the same country that just agreed to let him plead guilty in exchange for, essentially, time served (~5 years). It's also the same country whose president commuted Chelsea Manning's sentence down to 7 years. Your basic claim is not an unreasonable one: people plead guilty because they'd rather take the deal than face the possibility of a worse outcome at trial. But what will it take to stop the rhetoric about the U.S. wanting to lock him up and throw away the key?
  - vidarh 2y ago
    It's also the same country that agreed to it only after it became clear that there was a real chance they might suffer the embarrassment of not getting an extradition and/or have to deal with a government after the election come the July 4 election that might - despite how I dislike Starmer - be at least somewhat less receptive to US pressure. > It's also the same country whose president commuted Chelsea Manning's sentence down to 7 years. The same country who may have a different president come November with a history of calling the Assange case a priority. Why would anyone feel safe relying on the luck of the draw of the president at any given time to get out of what was an initial utterly extreme sentence? > But what will it take to stop the rhetoric about the U.S. wanting to lock him up and throw away the key? When the US stops sentencing people to 35 years like with Chelsea Manning's initial sentence, and there's been a long period without e.g. illegal rendition flights, when Guantanamo Bay has been closed for a few decades and no new camps have taken it's place etc. Maybe when a couple of generations have passed, in other words.
  - tremon 2y ago
    But what will it take to stop the rhetoric about the U.S. wanting to lock him up and throw away the key? Actually acknowledging and prosecuting the war crimes that were exposed would be a good start.
- CalChris 2y ago
  If you are going to call his guilty plea an expedient choice then Assange should have taken Trump's more expedient offer of a pardon 7 years ago: less time, no felony.
  - vidarh 2y ago
    I didn't call it an expedient choice. And it's easy to say 7 years later that it would have been better for him to have taken it than after years of imprisonment in inhuman conditions to soften him up. People have breaking points.
ahf8Aithaex7Nai 2y ago
I am really glad that your government is gradually losing influence and power. I wouldn't have expected it 20 years ago, but I will probably live to see you completely lose your global hegemony and your fantasies of power become nothing more than embarrassing, self-castrating nostalgia, just like in the former colonial powers of Europe.
- dctoedt 2y ago
  > will probably live to see you completely lose your global hegemony and your fantasies of power become nothing more than embarrassing, self-castrating nostalgia And then you'll enjoy more experiences of aggressively-expansionist governments, Houthi-like groups, and the equivalent of Haitian gangs and Sudanese militias, all over the world, fighting to advance their leaders' own narrow parochial desires wherever they think they can get away with it. They'll be using WhatsApp, Starlink, and cheap drones in their efforts, and enlisting like-minded allies. You'll find yourself looking back wistfully on the days of the Pax Americana, which for nearly 80 years has maintained a flawed but workable rules-based international order. That's even granting that the U.S. has done some bad things — on occasion, very bad things — in furtherance of its own perceived interests and those of some of its powerful interest groups.
  - WanderPanda 2y ago
    This! The US hegemony is flawed but: 1. There is no other country (not even close) that could be trusted with that amount of power (especially considering size) 2. Held up the (illusion of) “neutral” international institutions like the UN. They barely worked in the presence of a “benevolent” power, and will probably completely lose relevance to anarchy and the “right of the stronger” (on local levels), shall the US hegemony subside. Then on the other hand the US has started undermining their own most important principles: 1. 1971: Removing the gold convertability from the $ 2. 9/11: Starting to spy on each and everyone, eastern germany/soviet-style 3. Removing personal freedoms during COVID (not as severe as other countries, though) If it weren’t for silicon valley, the us would already look like a stagnating state where the economy is mainly driven by government spending. The problem is larping EU socialism will only yield even worse results in the US, since the government seems to be even less efficient. On the other hand the US is also one of the few countries that have turned around non-violently in the past. Attractiveness for international talent is still immense. So with a few adjustments I’m pretty sure it could be turned around
insane_dreamer 2y ago
> He directly participated in stealing a bunch of classified information with Manning. and a good thing that was too, exposing our government's wrongdoing and lies
- colechristensen 2y ago
  >and a good thing that was too, exposing our government's wrongdoing and lies What exactly of value was exposed?

vidarh 2y ago

A guilty plea faced with the choice of continued imprisonment in inhumane conditions or the risk of extradition to a country that might jail him for life or execute him does not end the argument of whether or not he is guilty of anything. It's a coerced plea. It only ends the argument of whether or not there is still a legal case against him.

jonhohle 2y ago
I really would hope more people would understand this. Faced with indefinite detention and infinite legal cost would you admit to something you didn’t do to walk free? I’m pretty sure most people would. It’s a difficult area of research, but there are various law schools[0] and charities[1] trying to help people who took pleas because they feared a harsher sentence if they couldn’t adequately defend themselves. 0 - https://www.law.umich.edu/special/exoneration/Documents/NRE.Guilty.Plea.Article1.pdf https://www.law.umich.edu/special/exoneration/Documents/NRE.... 1 - https://innocenceproject.org/ https://innocenceproject.org/
pdabbadabba 2y ago
> a country that might jail him for life or execute him I've always found this claim to be extremely shrill — and doubly so now. This is the same country that just agreed to let him plead guilty in exchange for, essentially, time served (~5 years). It's also the same country whose president commuted Chelsea Manning's sentence down to 7 years. Your basic claim is not an unreasonable one: people plead guilty because they'd rather take the deal than face the possibility of a worse outcome at trial. But what will it take to stop the rhetoric about the U.S. wanting to lock him up and throw away the key?
- vidarh 2y ago
  It's also the same country that agreed to it only after it became clear that there was a real chance they might suffer the embarrassment of not getting an extradition and/or have to deal with a government after the election come the July 4 election that might - despite how I dislike Starmer - be at least somewhat less receptive to US pressure. > It's also the same country whose president commuted Chelsea Manning's sentence down to 7 years. The same country who may have a different president come November with a history of calling the Assange case a priority. Why would anyone feel safe relying on the luck of the draw of the president at any given time to get out of what was an initial utterly extreme sentence? > But what will it take to stop the rhetoric about the U.S. wanting to lock him up and throw away the key? When the US stops sentencing people to 35 years like with Chelsea Manning's initial sentence, and there's been a long period without e.g. illegal rendition flights, when Guantanamo Bay has been closed for a few decades and no new camps have taken it's place etc. Maybe when a couple of generations have passed, in other words.
- tremon 2y ago
  But what will it take to stop the rhetoric about the U.S. wanting to lock him up and throw away the key? Actually acknowledging and prosecuting the war crimes that were exposed would be a good start.
CalChris 2y ago
If you are going to call his guilty plea an expedient choice then Assange should have taken Trump's more expedient offer of a pardon 7 years ago: less time, no felony.
- vidarh 2y ago
  I didn't call it an expedient choice. And it's easy to say 7 years later that it would have been better for him to have taken it than after years of imprisonment in inhuman conditions to soften him up. People have breaking points.

ahf8Aithaex7Nai 2y ago

I am really glad that your government is gradually losing influence and power. I wouldn't have expected it 20 years ago, but I will probably live to see you completely lose your global hegemony and your fantasies of power become nothing more than embarrassing, self-castrating nostalgia, just like in the former colonial powers of Europe.

dctoedt 2y ago
> will probably live to see you completely lose your global hegemony and your fantasies of power become nothing more than embarrassing, self-castrating nostalgia And then you'll enjoy more experiences of aggressively-expansionist governments, Houthi-like groups, and the equivalent of Haitian gangs and Sudanese militias, all over the world, fighting to advance their leaders' own narrow parochial desires wherever they think they can get away with it. They'll be using WhatsApp, Starlink, and cheap drones in their efforts, and enlisting like-minded allies. You'll find yourself looking back wistfully on the days of the Pax Americana, which for nearly 80 years has maintained a flawed but workable rules-based international order. That's even granting that the U.S. has done some bad things — on occasion, very bad things — in furtherance of its own perceived interests and those of some of its powerful interest groups.
- WanderPanda 2y ago
  This! The US hegemony is flawed but: 1. There is no other country (not even close) that could be trusted with that amount of power (especially considering size) 2. Held up the (illusion of) “neutral” international institutions like the UN. They barely worked in the presence of a “benevolent” power, and will probably completely lose relevance to anarchy and the “right of the stronger” (on local levels), shall the US hegemony subside. Then on the other hand the US has started undermining their own most important principles: 1. 1971: Removing the gold convertability from the $ 2. 9/11: Starting to spy on each and everyone, eastern germany/soviet-style 3. Removing personal freedoms during COVID (not as severe as other countries, though) If it weren’t for silicon valley, the us would already look like a stagnating state where the economy is mainly driven by government spending. The problem is larping EU socialism will only yield even worse results in the US, since the government seems to be even less efficient. On the other hand the US is also one of the few countries that have turned around non-violently in the past. Attractiveness for international talent is still immense. So with a few adjustments I’m pretty sure it could be turned around

insane_dreamer 2y ago

> He directly participated in stealing a bunch of classified information with Manning. and a good thing that was too, exposing our government's wrongdoing and lies

colechristensen 2y ago
>and a good thing that was too, exposing our government's wrongdoing and lies What exactly of value was exposed?