More on Assange

And the fuckery continues. A British court granted Assange bail pending his hearing on extradition to Sweden. The bail decision was appealed and he had to spend 2 more days in jail awaiting the appeal hearing. The appeal was overturned and the original bail ruling was held.

Where is the fuckery you ask? Well, according to CTV reports this morning the Crown says they didn't appeal the bail decision it was the Swedish. The Swedish are now saying they didn't appeal it, it was the British. Evidently phantom prosecutors can put forward anonymous appeals in the British courts. Appeals that actually get heard.

Julian Assange

A reader sent me a link to a Huffington Post article written by Naomi Wolf. It concerns what is going on with Julian Assange and the rape charges. Wold set the tone for her article perfectly in her opening statement.

How do I know that Interpol, Britain and Sweden's treatment of Julian Assange is a form of theater? Because I know what happens in rape accusations against men that don't involve the embarrassing of powerful governments.

She cites her experience dealing with women's issues world wide and makes a strong case for what an insult the handling of this is to the victims of rape world wide.

Keep Assange in prison without bail until he is questioned, by all means, if we are suddenly in a real feminist worldwide epiphany about the seriousness of the issue of sex crime: but Interpol, Britain and Sweden must, if they are not to be guilty of hateful manipulation of a serious women's issue for cynical political purposes, imprison as well -- at once -- the hundreds of thousands of men in Britain, Sweden and around the world world who are accused in far less ambiguous terms of far graver forms of assault.

The charges should be investigated, and if guilty he should be punished. However, it is easy to see why he is being dealt with so harshly when others who have done the same or worse never even got investigated. Politics and the fact he embarrassed the US. I just have to think of Roman Polanski and how he is being dealt with to see the rank hypocrisy in what is happening with Assange.

Interpol's Most Wanted

Reading the South Korea Times, aka An Idiot's Tale, talking about Julian Assange made me think of something.

As I type, Assange is now on Interpol's Most Wanted list for a rape charge in Sweden. Strangely enough, there is no photo on Interpol's site but it does say he is wanted for sex crimes and that if you have any information you should contact your local or national police.

Then you have someone like Roman Polanski. He raped and sodomized a 13 year old girl. Then he fled the US to avoid his sentence. He is NOT on the most wanted list. He is on Interpol's site, and a photo is included. The picture is from decades ago, not a current one. There is NO mention of his crime. He doesn't even have a Red Notice.

According to INTERPOL's website a Red Notice is issued in order "to seek the arrest or provisional arrest of wanted persons with a view to extradition."

I won't argue that Assange doesn't fit the criteria to have a Red Notice. He does,and he should have to answer to the charges and if guilty. Let's just say I have a dim view of rapists and if he did it I hope they throw the book at him. But Polanski, who some European countries have HELPED hide, who the US has been seeking to extradite for decades, does NOT even have a Red Notice?

Mr. Assange quickly made the Most Wanted list but someone like Polanski who has avoided extradition for decades isn't? I am not saying there is a conspiracy but something doesn't smell right.

Wikileaks

I am torn over the recent wikileaks.

On the one hand they are private communiques. Would I like it if my emails, IM's, or text messages were made public? No. Who would.

Yes, they were from the government not an individual but why should that be any different? Hell, think of what we tell others about friends, family, co-workers, people we have interacted with. Would you want everything you said made public? Of course not.

On the other hand some of them are damn interesting as is the damage control. As are the people getting pissy about some of the leaked documents. :)

When it comes to the stuff released/mentioned about Canada so far is ... laughable. The comments about "knee-jerk anti-Americanism" by Canadians was made by ... a Canadian. Former CSIS head Jim Judd when talking with a US State Department official. The yanks didn't say it.

The other Canada related one floating around that makes me laugh hasn't even been released yet. There is a lot of speculation, or warning, that some of the as yet unreleased ones will contain talk about the "inferiority complex" of Canadians. Why not wait and see what it actually says and in what context before getting excited? Oh wait, that is a sign of an inferiority complex.

I am a Canadian and BOTH of those statements are TRUE to a degree. Canadians often have a knee jerk reaction about things that can be anti-American. Why that happens would be more interesting to look into than the fact that is appears in a US diplomatic cable. Also, many of us do have an inferiority complex when it comes to the US. Hell many Canadians actually define themselves as Canadian by saying it means they aren't American. Neither statement is a surprise.

If those are the worst things to be found related to Canada in the wikileaks then the US has nothing to worry about vis-a-vis the US and Canada.