JFK:
The very word "secrecy" is repugnant in a free and open society; and we are as a people inherently and historically opposed to secret societies, to secret oaths and to secret proceedings. We decided long ago that the dangers of excessive and unwarranted concealment of pertinent facts far outweighed the dangers which are cited to justify it.
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And there is very grave danger that an announced need for increased security will be seized upon by those anxious to expand its meaning to the very limits of official censorship and concealment.
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And no official of my Administration, whether his rank is high or low, civilian or military, should interpret my words here tonight as an excuse to censor the news, to stifle dissent, to cover up our mistakes or to withhold from the press and the public the facts they deserve to know.
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No President should fear public scrutiny of his program. For from that scrutiny comes understanding; and from that understanding comes support or opposition. And both are necessary.
Notice he did not say NOTHING should be classified. He said secrecy is repugnant. Yes, some things are classified for um, good reasons. But to classify everything is dangerous to our country.
Daniel Ellsberg:
Many, if not most, covert operations deserve to be disclosed by a free press. They are often covert not only because they are illegal but because they are wildly ill-conceived and reckless. "Sensitive" and "covert" are often synonyms for "half-assed," "idiotic," and "dangerous to national security," as well as "criminal."
GOP Sen. Minority Leader Mitch McConnell:
"I think the man is a high-tech terrorist. He’s done an enormous damage to our country, and I think he needs to be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. And if that becomes a problem, we need to change the law."
Chris Matthews:
"How dangerous is this guy, this rapist? I mean, how dangerous is this uh, alleged rapist?"
I could pull thousands of quotes to show our media playing along nicely with the government and the corporations to try and smear and take down Wikileaks. Not to mention Assange.
But, a stranger thing is happening here:
Mastercard
Amazon drops WikiLeaks
Lieberman:
I wish that Amazon had taken this action earlier based on Wikileaks' previous publication of classified material. The company's decision to cut off Wikileaks now is the right decision and should set the standard for other companies Wikileaks is using to distribute its illegally seized material. I call on any other company or organization that is hosting WikiLeaks to immediately terminate its relationship with them."
Swiss bank Freezes Wikileaks founders legal defense fund:
"Assange cannot provide proof of residence in Switzerland and thus does not meet the criteria for a customer relationship with PostFinance," the bank said. "For this reason, PostFinance is entitled to close his account."
hmmmmmm.....
Last week, Internet payment leader PayPal also froze a WikiLeaks-linked account containing over $60,000, the site added.
WikiLeaks has in recent days been under a deluge of cyber-attacks that led to its DNS registration for its .org URL being taken down, but by mid-Monday the site had reappeared on over 500 different domains.
Read Wikileaks and you are out of a job
Experts agree: You no can touch wikileaks
"They’re not going to be able to threaten or touch Julian Assange," said Gabriel Schoenfeld of the Hudson Institute and author of "Necessary Secrets." Besides problems extraditing him, he added, "there’s the inherent First Amendment problems in the Espionage Act."
And that leads us to "teh rape." Or, Sex By
Surprise!!!:
On Nov. 18, Swedish judicial officials approved a prosecutorial request that Assange be detained for questioning for alleged sex crimes, and on Nov. 30 Interpol issued a "red notice" against Assange for alleged sex crimes in Sweden. Despite what has happened, the woman who organized the event and had Assange stay at her apartment told Aftonbladet that she never intended that Assange be charged with rape.
But.....but....but.....:
Assange's London attorney, Mark Stephens, told AOL News today that Swedish prosecutors told him that Assange is wanted not for allegations of rape, as previously reported, but for something called "sex by surprise," which he said involves a fine of 5,000 kronor or about $715.
In fact, the current prosecutor, Marianne Ny, who re-opened the case against Assange, has been active in the proposed reforms of Swedish rape laws that would, if passed, involve an investigation of whether an imbalance in power between two people could void one person's insistence that the sex was consensual.
Swedish tabloids and the country's blogosphere have been rife since August with stories and speculation about Assange's accusers, the flip-flopping prosecutors and just what, if any, crime was committed by Assange during sex with the two women.
Soooooo....anyhoo....A crime on balance with jaywalking leads to an international manhunt(even though they knew where he was at all times) and freezing of his defense fund. Ok. I'll just allow these two to have the last say:
Although greater transparency has some bad consequences, Singer concludes that "a climate of openness makes it more likely that governments and corporations will act more ethically."
"In a world in which terrorists have committed atrocities and threaten to commit more, to seek complete government transparency is utopian," Singer wrote at Project Syndicate in August. "Sometimes it is possible to do good only in secret. Yet on the whole, a more transparent community is likely to be a better one – and the same applies to a more transparent world."
Longtime feminist activist Naomi Wolf also mocked Interpol's warrant for Assange, satirically 'thanking' the organization for "engaging in global manhunts to arrest and prosecute men who behave like narcissistic jerks to women they are dating."
"Thank you again, Interpol," she wrote at the Huffington Post. I know you will now prioritize the global manhunt for 1.3 million guys I have heard similar complaints about personally in the US alone -- there is an entire fraternity at the University of Texas you need to arrest immediately."
Update1:
WikiLeaks faces increasing problems continuing to operate. Today, Visa said it had suspended all payments to the organisation "pending further investigation", while MasterCard said it was "taking action to ensure that WikiLeaks can no longer accept MasterCard-branded products".
Update2:
Earlier today, Robert Gates, the US defence secretary, welcomed Assange's arrest. Speaking to reporters on a visit to US troops in Afghanistan, Gates said: "I hadn't heard that, but that sounds like good news to me."
So if this is about sexual shit, why is Gates saying it's "good news" to him?! Wake the fuck up!!!!
Update3
Now this one is just a show of how far government will go.
Yesterday, as details of his efforts to persuade Niazi to blow up buildings became public, leading US Muslim organisations said they have suspended all contact with the FBI in protest against the excesses of agents who are secretly, and in some cases illegally, monitoring mosques.
"The community feels betrayed," Shakeel Syed, executive director of the Islamic Shura Council of Southern California, an umbrella group of more than 75 mosques, told The Washington Post. "They got a guy, a bona fide criminal, and obviously trained him and sent him to infiltrate mosques... It's like a soap opera, for God's sake."
But, come on!!! Nothing like that could possibly happen to Assange!
Update5:
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