Daniel Ellsberg, Fidel Narvaez, John Kiriakou, Andrew Fowler, Mary Kostakidis, Alexander Mercouris discussed the Julian Assange hearing with a focus on spying at the Ecuador embassy and its possible consequences.
When the judge in Daniel Ellsberg’s 1972 trial threw his case out because of government misconduct, he said he acted because the government had “offended a sense of justice.” The Nixon administration desperately wanted to punish Ellsberg. Nixon’s “Plumbers” broke into Ellsberg’s psychiatrist’s office trying to steal his medical files; Nixon had Ellsberg illegally wiretapped; the government said it lost the wiretaps when asked to produce them at trial; and the government tried to bribe Ellsberg’s judge with the directorship of the FBI.
Compare that with U.S. intelligence contracting with the Spanish firm UC Global to spy 24/7 on Assange in the Ecuadorian embassy and especially on his privileged conversations with his attorneys; with his doctors and journalists visiting; stealing defense documents; as well as discussing plans to kidnap or poison him. “That’s essentially the same information that ended my case and confronted Nixon with impeachment, leading to his resignation!,” Ellsberg said in an email. “In other words, Julian may, miraculously, walk free on the basis of this (eventually), just as I did!”
Will it be enough to set Assange free as it did Ellsberg?
Please Contribute to Consortium News’
25th Anniversary Fall Fund Drive
Donate securely with
Click on ‘Return to PayPal’ here.
Or securely by credit card or check by clicking the red button:
Yeo-human service, CN & all your contributors.
Why is it so painful now to acknowledge what’s really happening which includes, in my book, the fact that those most in charge think that all they have to do to change reality is to create a new one for themselves and everyone one else will be bound to follow because, you know, hierarchy, fame, fortune, power, money, etc. puts us in first place, automatically, uncontested? So they think.
(I believe it’s part of a syndrome called Turd Blossom Affect, which can be observed to include symptoms such as displays of despicable greed or glee in causing pain & harm to others.)
What mostly calls out to me now from the persecution and long suffering of both Chelsea Manning & Julian Assange is how so easily powers of state are turned against those who would question the legitimacy of that secretly held power while those who have made their bargains with it (so they think) turn both eyes blindly. Be not assured. It will come just as easily for you & yours down the generations in a time of their own choosing, according to new, fake/real reasons, if you allow them to persist. This I feel in my bones.
So a cry goes up, as it does whenever the true heart of things is threatened. You can hear it now, maybe only faintly. At long last, is there no shred of humanity left in the bitter, cold hearts of those in the uppermost reaches of power to turn this cruel blow aside? Are they all totally drunk & deranged with their own power? Does that make it contagious?
It’s there to see with open eyes. Yes, in the suffering of the many in their millions from this contagion but also in the suffering of the one or two who bear a different, heavy burden now for the many more to come, once this channel of persecution is opened wider and, what’s the go-to expression nowadays, “normalized”.
Dear CN,
By preference I use a program (youtube-dl) to download videos from youtube, for various reasons. However, since the amazing UC global revelations videos hosted on your youtube channel cannot be dowloaded “properly”. The sound never works. I have not seen this on other channels (i.e their videos can be downloaded properly from youtube). Your videos can be played via the in-browser video player.
FYI.
So why are Julian’s current prospects so much worse than those faced by Dan Ellsberg 50 years ago? Well, here a few quick thoughts about that question.
The first reason “things are getting worse, “in my opinion, is because the neocon monsters [many dual-citizens working at the behest of Israel] many of whom were brought into office by G.W. Bush, are still entrenched in our government, especially in the State Dept. and various so-called “intelligence agencies,” first and foremost the CIA and NSA, and that capture of US government’s foreign policy was primarily facilitated, quite intentionally, by using the horrific events of 9-11, — themselves probably false-flags — to frighten the public so deeply that they seem to be willing to accept any form of “security,” however ultimately heinous, forgetting all their previous concern with “quaint” restrictions — the word ubiquitously used in the Bush administration –upon malicious and vengeful actions which are patently unconstitutional upon any plausible interpretation of that document.
Secondly, one should never discount the severe erosion of the due process of law and citizens’ most basic constitutional rights caused by decades of and egregiously extra-legal, and illegal, “War on Drugs,” which is often said to have established a “Drug War exception to the Bill of Rights” — a phrase used by many critics of that hugely harmful set of institutionalized criminal behaviors on the part of the state.
Thirdly, we have moved into a new stage of social life where the “will to punish” and a more general sadism seem to have captured one institution after another.
Best regards, and indeed, love, and greetings from Pittsburgh, to all of you very wonderful people fighting to liberate our hero, Julian, from the most outrageous, and truly Kafkaesque, decade long sustained and selective persecution by the vile “swamp” creatures with which Trump has, for somewhat mysterious reasons, populated his administration, especially thugs and outright torturers like Haspel, Pompeo, Abrams and who knows how many other lesser minions.
P.S: I have also been deeply impressed once again by the manner in which struggling for truth and justice invariably ennobles those engaged in it, even to the point of seemingly altering their very outward physical appearances for the better!
So please keep up your amazing work defending this most noble of defendants in what truly is the most important “trial of the century”! I have no doubt that all who are involved in supporting Julian now will eventually consider their work in this crucial matter to be among the most, if not indeed, the most, important activities of their lives!
So please keep the faith, folks! We will win this war soon I believe!
Bill Fusfield
My profound thanks to Consortium News for such thorough coverage and documentation of this monumentally important case.
It’s my theory that Adelson’s role in this case is the tip of an Israeli iceberg. Adelson has repeatedly said that Israel is his “one issue”. His massive funding of Trump has been openly on Israel’s behalf. And Trump has repeatedly acted like an Israeli puppet. Back in 2016 Trump stated that if Rubio took Adelson money and became president, then Rubio would be an Adelson puppet. That prediction became true for Trump himself. The puzzling silence of the American corporate media on the Assange case is explained by this theory. The corporate media (including the NYT) is notoriously silent about the crimes of Israel, despite they’re being blatant and well-documented. This implies Israel has the capacity to silence the corporate media on the Assange case. A functioning Wikileaks would pose the greatest threat of Israel’s secrets spilling into public view. In my view, those revelations would be so shocking to the public that Israel would lose all influence.