Team Biden eventually considered it expedient to offer Assange a filthy plea deal. Do I thank them? Certainly not, though like everyone else, I’m relieved that the barbaric mistreatment of Assange has come to an end. So are, I suspect, Biden’s few remaining supporters.
Please note that even Associated Press (AP) comments the public’s distrust of their rulers in the USA and the UK. As we have seen in the recent “European elections”, such distrust is widely shared throughout much of Europe. Why? Well, the media are full of confounding explanations – naturally – that’s what the media do for a living: confound us. I prefer the explanation given by the comedian George Carlin back in 2005. Some things never change.
I put to you that “a constitutional state” is one in which governmental power is firmly and consistently constrained by the law. The Assange case has patently demonstrated the subservience of the British judiciary (i.e. Law) to Government. This is all the more striking since the latter (Government) is that of a foreign country, the USA. In short, the case has effectively demonstrated that the US and the UK are not constitutional states, and the UK is hardly even an independent one.
That US presidents and their teams care naught for “rule of law”, except as a tool to subjugate other nations, should come as no surprise to anyone. That concepts such as “justice”, “fairness” and “due process” are secondary, in the USA, to personal ambitions was clearly demonstrated in the aftermath of the 2008 financial crash, which rewarded those who had made the crash happen with impunity and struck down the millions of victims in poverty and despair.
What is relatively new to some of us is the incestuous relationship between government and the corporate media. Even AP has noticed: “Nearly three-quarters of American adults blame the news media for dividing the nation.” Just so. Perhaps US citizens have grown wise to the collusion between e.g. the N.Y. Times and the currently ruling set. Will Times loyalties shift when a new master enters the White House?
In Norway, middle-aged people still subscribe to and read daily papers. The rising cost of living has not yet strangled their budgets or their confidence in the authorities. Younger people however, are wading in deeper water. Heavily indebted, they are so fearful of the future that they are reluctant to make babies. The suicide rate is rising.
My favourite news outlet was the Guardian. I repeat: was. I pretty abruptly stopped following the Guardian at about the time Assange was kidnapped by the British police. Why? Because the Guardian had been subtly vilifying Assange, suggesting this, that and the other. I ascribed the character assassination to shame: The Guardian had disclosed Cablegate encryption passwords and was thus the direct root of the US claim that Assange had jeopardised lives. So the paper had to imply that Assange was not worth any tears. That is what I thought back then.
Now, however, I see there may be another source of depravity in the above-mentioned incestuous relationship between governments (in plural) and the media: Keir Starmer. Yes, he is my villain for today: It is very likely that he plotted with the US authorities to destroy Assange’s life and his reputation.
We don’t know, of course, exactly what went on during the meetings between the Starmer delegations and their US counterparts during his visits to the USA in 2009–2013, because the relevant minutes – from all four trips – were allegedly destroyed, which in itself is pretty damning (admittedly circumstantial) evidence. But there is no doubt that Starmer was Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) from 2008-13. And we do know that Starmer is not a “gentleman” when he feels like, for instance, getting rid of a political competitor. Moreover, Starmer was then, and is still, masquerading as a “Labour” politician.
So yes, I believe Starmer is a villain. And he will no doubt be the next PM of the UK. He will presumably treat the Guardian kindly for past and future services.
As for the hero, need I tell you?