https://www.intelligence.senate.gov/publications/report-sele...
Assange has been paying the long price for his affronts to American Royalty.
For context, the articles are written from the perspective of the DNC as a victim despite their illegal collusion in support of a pre-decided candidate. There is also a conspicuous absence of any language implying HRC's direct involvement in these events, as well as no assertion of Sanders' dominance in the primaries prior to DNC interference.
Sure today Jullian Assange. Tomorrow a future-Watergate journalist. And after that anyone that dissents.
The slippery slope fallacy is a fallacy for a reason.
What are your counter points it won't be a precedent?
See https://www.theguardian.com/media/2020/jan/28/julian-assange...
Slippery slope fallacy isn't a fallacy, if and only if it is demonstrated again and again as modus operandi.
Tell me if this sounds familiar. A law is made that targets heinous individuals. Then that law is broadened. Eventually everyone that law is used to target ordinary people or critics.
E.g. civil forfeiture laws. Designed to seize organized crime assests. Eventually used to shake down innocent people.
Was it used first to shakedown an innocent man? Nah. I'm pretty sure along the way it's use was broadened bit by bit.
That the US has extradited people from the UK for over 100 years.
>Slippery slope fallacy isn't a fallacy, if and only if it is demonstrated again and again as modus operandi.
I don't even know how to respond - maybe see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slippery_slope ?
If you cherry pick examples - that is not how evidence works. The proper way is to take all laws, not just a few you think supports your case, and see how many have done what you claim is "modus operandi".
If the majority have not done what you claim, then more likely to not do what you claim.
Also, if laws are going to go where you claim they are, then Assange is not going to be the brick in the wall stopping it.
You mean UK extraditing Australian national for treason to US?
> I don't even know how to respond
Double check it.
> slippery slope arguments can be good ones if the slope is real—that is, if there is good evidence that the consequences of the initial action are highly likely to occur
Is it highly likely American lawmakers are corrupt? Is it highly likely American government would expand its power? Is it highly likely American politicians would use laws to quell dissent?
Assange is not is being extradited for treason.
The US has extradited non-UK people from the UK (and elsewhere) to the US for all sorts of criminal activity. And so have many other countries. That is pretty much the point of something like an INTERPOL Red Notice. Do you think moving from country to country should make arrest warrants invalid? He had his day in court there - they decided extradition was warranted. He'll have his day in court in the US.
Here's a list of 14 people extradited from the UK, some of which are not UK citizens [1]. There is very little anything in this case that is ground-breaking precedent.
Of course, if you want to keep refining and refining your claims, you can eventually claim this situation is unique, but it's not setting precedent in any legal sense. Everything so far ruled is already under current case law.
>Is it highly likely American lawmakers are corrupt? Is it highly likely American government would expand its power? Is it highly likely American politicians would use laws to quell dissent?
If you think all these things, then Assange being extradited is a non-issue, since the slippery slope you think Assange starts would happen with or without him. Which is it?
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:People_extradited_fro...
Sure. I might misremember the exact law, although I believe the Espionage act falls under the category of treason.
> If you think all these things, then Assange being extradited is a non-issue, since the slippery slope you think Assange starts would happen with or without him. Which is it?
See my previous messages. He is a heinous enough that people won't jump that eagerly to his defense. That makes him a perfect scapegoat. From that you expand until you end up in authoritarian state. Remember that saying:
First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a socialist.
Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out— because I was not a trade unionist.
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.
But hey time may prove me wrong. I hope so, but I don't expect it. I think he will rot in prison as an example to future whistleblowers, while US slides further into authoritarianism.
You know you can look stuff up instead of forming world views on so much misunderstanding.
>Remember that saying:
Yes, people have been making the slippery slope fallacy for millennia with all sorts of catchphrases. And for millennia the extreme end is extremely rarely ever reached. People invoke such hand wavy feel good stuff when they don't have an actual argument based on evidence.
"It's just common sense!"
"Think of this children"
"First they came for..."
Assange is charged not with being a journalist, or publishing classified materials, but with actively recruiting and convincing people to break laws so he could get such materials. If true, he deserves jail. If you believe in journalism, then should support prosecuting those that violate journalistic ethics and laws, otherwise you are helping weaken protections for journalists.
Here's [1] the original indictment. It's pretty damning if true. Among other things, it claims Assange helped crack password on SIPRNET, which I suspect they have solid evidence for, otherwise any lawyer in a trial will get that thrown out. If true, that is worth prison for pretty much anyone, especially a foreign national that is cracking passwords to obtain classified material so he can publish it.
There are at least two superseding indictments you can also read on the internet, but the first is still the main reason he is being extradited. One of the superseding indictments claims Assange directed hacker groups which places to hack for Assange (CIA and NSA and even the New York Times). If this part is true, Assange is not a journalist - he is directing hackers to attack government and journalists. Again, if the govt does not have solid evidence of these claims, it will get tossed in court. If they have evidence, Assange should stand trial.
The way to have this play out is a trial - jurors and judges and lawyers can see the evidence and decide. Plus the content of the trial will be public record (unless there's classified stuff, in which case judges still oversee those details).
All this hand waving silly slippery slope nonsense, to protect someone who seems quite likely to have violated reasonable laws, is hanging your hat on the wrong case.
So keep using extreme claims and arguments that don't stand up to scrutiny - people will simply dismiss you and your arguments. Or understand the nuance and make more defensible, fact supported arguments - then you may persuade someone.
[1] https://www.justice.gov/opa/press-release/file/1153486/downl...
They then went full slippery slope fallacy jumping from Assange to a mythical future (appealing to emotion) Watergate journalist.
Watergate type journalists were and are explicitly protected in the US. So the US trying to extradite a journalist for something akin to Watergate is purely nonsense.
"And after that, anyone who dissents" - that is full on FUD. Assange is not some gatekeeper between current judicial systems and fantasy dystopian extremes. So this as an endpoint for a slippery slope fallacy is a perfect example.
The slippery slope fallacy, to not be a fallacy, needs not only the ends of the slope (which this poster failed at both ends), but an explained or obvious causal mechanism to move from one to the other (also not present - despite going from today to a fantastical extreme).
So I don't think I ignored any valid points.
Now I'm sure if someone used the above arguments with a "think of the children" to move from one claim to another, you'd rightfully call the argument crap. That Assange's case likely is important to you does not make the above argument any more correct.
Feel free to tell me which points were valid.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/01/12/world/europe/harry-dunn-a...
Trump and Biden are not in the same team, in the sense that they represent opposing parties, who benefit (and their members) from holding the power.
Beyond that, they are both just presidents, e.g. when it comes to foreign affairs mostly figureheads for the long term American foreign policy, which is dictated by national "interests", the state department, and long term (career) washington personel, not by who happens to be the president now or then.
From that aspects, they're just mascots for different teams, playing the same sport, where others are calling the shots.
>But if they're the same team, then why did Trump mind losing the election
Because parties like winning.
>why the big lie
Nt such a big lie. Even if not widespread election fraud, the whole game was rigged against him, regarding press coverage, assosiates investigated (for the same kind of deals and BS that's daily business on from both sides for decades, but nobody bats an eye), supposedly neutral organizations standing against the president, double standard reporting as "unprecedented" for the same shit Obama, Clinton, Bush and co pulled, and so on.
>why attempt a coup?
A couple thousand rag-tag fans got in the capitol, with no plan, no leadership, no endorsement, and no prospects. It was just a BS protest attempt from idiots. But of course it got played to death as some kind of evil coup plan - from the same press that hailed an equally incompetent senile bland long-term insider as the second coming of Lincoln.
It's a lot of work, isn't it? Why is this a more reasonable theory to you than simply: Assange is being extradited because the lawyers convinced a judge to agree to it - see how my theory involves no puppets, no deep state, no invisble powers...
> no plan, no leadership, no endorsement,
That's not the impression I've been taking away from the three congressional hearing so far. But there's not much point me talking about real world evidence to someone who believes in an imaginary world of deep state puppeting foreign judges to get a website operator extradited
You make it sound like a believe in aliens and illuminati too.
Whereas what I believe is that the president is a figurehead, and the foreign policy show is run by party figures, long term Washington political careerists, big lobbies, and, long term State Department (and Pentagon) staffers and strategies. How is that a controversial take?
>The president, both Trump and Biden, were puppeting the ... UK establishment. And the UK establishment were puppeting the judge who is formalising the extradition of Assange.
The US has UK on a leash as a client state since WWII. That's what happens to empires when they fade and a new top dog takes over. No special need for Trump and Biden to "puppet" the UK establishment: in the usual course of things, unless there's some unprecedented harm to it's own interests (where it might take a stance), the US says jump and UK says "how high?".
>Assange is being extradited because the lawyers convinced a judge to agree to it - see how my theory involves no puppets, no deep state, no invisble powers...
Yes, just "Mr Smith goes to Washington" starry-eyed naivety, and an ignorance of a century of similar political maneuvering.
>That's not the impression I've been taking away from the three congressional hearing so far.
That's because those are dog and pony shows for the faithful.
They still haven't gone back into the JCPOA, for instance.
The UK government doesn't like Assange, and on top of that, they don't want to upset the Americans.
The people in the U.S government who want him silenced for this, or even dead, should take his place, and he should be set free.