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06 Dec 2010 20:48

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World: Julian Assange works with authorities, keeps them at arm’s length

  • yeah … Julian Assange, currently in the U.K., agreed to meet with British police about his legal situation in Sweden, which wants to extradite him. He has not been arrested and his people are the moment cooperating with the authorities.
  • … but Our boy’s lawyers have been fighting tooth-and-nail for him, trying to get him as sweetheart a deal as they possibly can. It might be hard with rape charges, though. (His lawyers deny that Sweden has actually charged him.) source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

30 Nov 2010 20:01

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Biz: Julian Assange dropped a HUGE hint a freaking year ago

  • At the moment, for example, we are sitting on 5GB from Bank of America, one of the executive’s hard drive. Now how do we present that? It’s a difficult problem. … To have impact, it needs to be easy for people to dive in and search it and get something out of it.
  • Wikileaks’ Julian Assange • Explaining how they leak material to the press, but dropping the fact that they have a bunch of stuff from Bank of America ready to leak. This was completely ignored by the press (and even we didn’t make much of it when we posted about it a few months back). But then our boy Julian talked to Forbes, people put two and two together, and all of a sudden Bank of America’s stock went down today. The difference? Assange wasn’t seen as a threat when he made this interview a year ago. Now … he’s a threat. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

29 Nov 2010 20:31

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Politics: Could Wikileaks’ collateral damage be Hillary Clinton?

  • She’s become the issue. She’ll never be an effective negotiator with diplomats who refuse to forgive her exuberances, and even foreign diplomats who do forgive her will still regard her as the symbol of an overreaching United States. Diplomacy is about face, and the only way for other nations to save face will be to give them Clinton’s scalp.
  • Slate’s Jack Shafer • Arguing that the Wikileaks report on the diplomatic cables may be enough to do her in as Secretary of State. Why? Because, according to Wikileaks documents, she ordered her diplomats to spy on the people they were talking to. Even if she did nothing illegal, it’s going to be tough for other countries to trust someone they think is spying on them. If it does kill her career as Secretary of State, though, we don’t think it kills her political career. She’s too good to go away that quickly. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

29 Nov 2010 00:19

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U.S., World: Five random facts from Wikileaks’ diplomatic cable leak

  • one China was behind the hack attack that led Google to temporarily withdraw from the country. (Duh.)
  • two Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah wants the U.S. to attack Iran to kill off its nuclear program. (Hmm.)
  • three The Afghan vice-president came a-knockin’ in the UAE with $52 million dollars in his luggage.
  • four The U.S. worries about Silvio Berlusconi’s tight friendship with Vladimir Putin, but not Leo’s.
  • five Obama would only meet with Slovenia if they took a Gitmo detainee from the U.S. Wow. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

28 Nov 2010 13:39

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World: Well, Wikileaks’ Cablegate pretty much sucks for the U.S.

  • At the start of a series of daily extracts from the US embassy cables – many of which are designated ‘secret’ – the Guardian can disclose that Arab leaders are privately urging an air strike on Iran and that US officials have been instructed to spy on the UN’s leadership.
  • A sentence at the start of the Guardian’s package on Wikileaks’ “Cablegate” • Which kind of says it all. The U.S. is going to have a lot of fun cleaning up this mess. Also worth reading: The New York Times’ package. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink
 
 
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