Doesn’t Matter Who Wins the K Race; We’re All the Same

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

If a fetus has rights at six weeks, that includes the right to be an American citizen, yes?

When you post your twiddle it might help to link the blog post that put the thought in your fevered brain in the first place so we can understand what the original writer meant?

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

You and your logic... That’s a state’s rights issue, son! If Mississippi don’t want a kid to be a US citizen, it’s got the right say he ain’t one. And we don’t have no business in tellin illegals what they can and can’t do with coat hangers.

I know you are joking, but the North won the Civil War.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally Posted by Hank Chinaski

When you post your twiddle it might help to link the blog post that put the thought in your fevered brain in the first place so we can understand what the original writer meant?

"Blog post"! Ha! Oh, Hank, you're so droll.

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

Doesn't the indictment allege that Assange helped Manning break into government systems? That's not something the press usually does, and it is criminal, no?

Wasn’t the intel about where Osama might be (that we knew and were following his messenger) part of what was leaked? Fry the guy.

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

"Blog post"! Ha! Oh, Hank, you're so droll.

Explain what you meant then. You thought the post stood on its own?

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

Doesn't the indictment allege that Assange helped Manning break into government systems? That's not something the press usually does, and it is criminal, no?

Any claims related to Assange working to hack a password in the system, in real time, are valid. That’s electronic b&e. Tutoring Manning on how generally to hack and cover tracks strikes me as weak basis to charge. One could prosecute the author of the Anarchist’s Cookbook using that logic.

But it’s no crime to coax a source. That’s an outrageous charge. And publishing that which you cajole someone into giving cannot be a crime, for if it is, most top flight journalists are criminals.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

I know you are joking, but the North won the Civil War.

Really? Because it isn’t looking like the lesson exactly stuck.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally Posted by Hank Chinaski

Wasn’t the intel about where Osama might be (that we knew and were following his messenger) part of what was leaked? Fry the guy.

He’s not a US citizen! How fucking appalling is it that we can pervert law to drag people with no duty to us into our system and jail them for exposing our dirty laundry. Who the fuck do we think we are?

Oh, right... The most powerful nation in a world in which the only real law is power.

In a world with karma, England would extradite him to Sweden, and Putin would intercept his plane and divert it to Moscow. What could Donald say about that? Nothing.

[LessinSF]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

If a fetus has rights at six weeks, that includes the right to be an American citizen, yes?

And be counted in the census. More (likely) Dems.

[LessinSF]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

Any claims related to Assange working to hack a password in the system, in real time, are valid. That’s electronic b&e. Tutoring Manning on how generally to hack and cover tracks strikes me as weak basis to charge. One could prosecute the author of the Anarchist’s Cookbook using that logic.

But it’s no crime to coax a source. That’s an outrageous charge. And publishing that which you cajole someone into giving cannot be a crime, for if it is, most top flight journalists are criminals.

I look forward to his trial. He will get phenomenal pro bono counsel. And it will present the Pentagon Papers question to a new generation.

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally Posted by LessinSF

And be counted in the census. More (likely) Dems.

I bet the % of women getting abortions isn’t that different R v. D. Except most red states don’t even have a clinic anymore?

[LessinSF]

Originally Posted by Hank Chinaski

I bet the % of women getting abortions isn’t that different R v. D. Except most red states don’t even have a clinic anymore?

I bet the % of women who are prevented from getting abortions will raise pro-choice children. You want the opposite side of that bet?

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally Posted by LessinSF

I bet the % of women who are prevented from getting abortions will raise pro-choice children. You want the opposite side of that bet?

You're not taking into account the % of women who have little to do with raising the kids, so sure. You do have a source of money to cover the bet? I don't take Euros.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally Posted by Hank Chinaski

Explain what you meant then. You thought the post stood on its own?

In the context of abortion, conservatives argue that a fetus is a person with rights. But conservatives generally are not sympathetic to the fact that a child born in the US is a citizen with commensurate rights, even if born to parents who are not citizens. It seems to me that the logic of arguing for fetal personhood rights suggests that US citizenship attaches even before birth, which is what I getting at.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally Posted by LessinSF

I look forward to his trial. He will get phenomenal pro bono counsel. And it will present the Pentagon Papers question to a new generation.

The deck will be so stacked against him, however, that I highly doubt he'll succeed. I see a very cynical and biased court finding a variety of ways to assert he's not a journalist, in a ruling jammed full of shoddy reasoning, because they know that ultimately, SCOTUS will bless their work 5-4. (Unless Clarence Thomas finds his brain, as he occasionally does in matters of prosecutorial abuse.)

But I doubt this trial will be much of a spectacle because we are not the country we were in the days of Ellsberg. People on both the right and the left aren't very much interested in negative rights anymore. And they're certainly not interested in somewhat abstract ones like freedom of speech. On top of that, Assange has no friends, having frustrated the Right and Left.

There was a notion that freedom of speech was absolute and the press had a duty to dredge up everything it could in the years around Vietnam. Since 9/11, there's been a cowardice creeping in -- a thinking among a lot of the public that security is more important than transparency.

And positive rights are far more important these days. With this thinking goes the strange belief one has the right not to be offended. And with that goes the notion that controlling speech is actually a good thing. Under the general proposition that "Certain things ought not to be said," there's a huge bucket, and it includes both minor impolitic statements and national security secrets one receives lawfully, by cajoling sources.

All of this is because, let's face it, the Right and the Left aren't as interested in freedom as they were in the time of Ellsberg. They're more interested in control. They want the freedoms that their side cherishes, and to monitor and control the behaviors they don't favor. This is how you wind up with the Right prosecuting a guy like Assange and the Left shrugging at what ought to incense it. The man picked fights with everybody and has no friends but people who believe strongly in negative rights, which freedom of speech essentially is. There are fewer and fewer of us around these days.

The most depressing response to Assange will be the one you hear most: "He took a huge risk fucking with us, and now he pays the price." Again, an admission that the only real law is power. Freedom of speech? Fuck that. Assange can be prosecuted for poor judgment, for running a terrible cost-benefit analysis before his actions. And that's good enough for most here who will tune out his trial and its dire implications, while arguing about which candidate in 2020 will give them the ever expanding positive rights to which they think they're entitled... because they're Americans, dammit!