They thought Navalny's 45th birthday was news.

They'd probably have thought a key witness who turned out to be a liar and a rapist of underage boys who was given immunity was a little bit newsworthy if it happened during the trial to, say, lock Navalny up.

Just not when it's Assange, I suppose.

Sometimes media outlets have an agenda.

> Sometimes media outlets have an agenda.

No. They always have an agenda. And that agenda, overwhelmingly, is pro status quo. Not left, not right, not up or down. Just "things are basically OK except for a few problems here and there which we'll tell you about, though not in much depth".

Looking at the media, it's hard to agree with your claim that it's pro status quo. See any incendiary topic where the media can take opposing sides. Surely two diametrically opposed opinions can't be status quo biased.

Chomsky once said that the way to keep a population passive and obedient was to place strict limits on the range of acceptable debate but encourage very lively debate within that range.

Just focusing on Assange alone, it's not pertinent, sure. But Assange (and wikileaks, and anything behind it) in this (my?) frame of reference is not an individual, but serves as a pars pro toto for the freedom of press and the judicial system as a whole.

To me, the coverage he gets in the far-reaching magazines is a little bit underrepresented, to stay polite. This includes U.S. press, UK press and german press.

The world's most powerful country that constantly trumpets freedom and free speech, and regularly trashes China and other places for lack of press freedoms locks up a journalist for exposing US corruption.

This is hugely important and not a pet agenda.