Comments

1
Prominent English people brought their own bail pledges to last week's hearing too: Pilcher, Khan, Ken Loach. It's a cool kind of bandwagon. And it's always interesting to see Bianca Jagger pop up.

The Guardian's legal affairs correspondent noted at the time that the judge wasn't likely to find it persuasive that the only locals willing to post bail were people who knew Assange only through the publicity over his arrest.

Veering a bit off topic, Bill Hader's Assange bit from Saturday Night Live was awfully nice:
http://www.hulu.com/watch/200114/saturda…
2
I loved the Assange bit.

Be afraid, Amazon.

Be very afraid.
3
dear god: could you please bless michael moore really, really hard? okthxbye.
4
It may turn out in the end that the biggest fallout from Assange's actions is the collapse of the European Arrest Warrant, which was designed to ease the extradition of terrorists and serious criminals between states with similarly decent legal systems, but has instead been used quite often and almost exclusively for exceedingly trivial matters. Not to say that Assange's charges are trivial, but it possible that they would not amount to a rape charge in Britain (though, if true, they certainly should).

I was surprised to read that three people a day are being extradited under a EAW from Britain, many of them to Poland, which has what seem to a Westerner to be insane and inefficient laws. The Guardian described the case of a man who was extradited to Poland for the "crime" of a temporary bank overdraft ten years before -- a crime I have committed more than once back when I still used to write checks.

I don't think they're treating Assange unusually harshly here; I think they are treating many, many people unnecessarily harshly, to a standard that doesn't exist in the country in which it is being applied. Sweden needs to get its act together and soon, and Britain needs to think seriously about whether these EAWs are an appropriate tool.
5
$20,000 is only 1/12 of his bail.
6
note the irony of Peter King complaining about terrorism, when he himself supported the IRA when they were actively killing people. http://www.tnr.com/blog/jonathan-chait/p…
7
It hasn't been posted on SLOG yet, but Assange's bail has gone through, to the tune of $310,000. He is now free on bail.
8
@7, um, no. The Slog item is correct. Bail was granted but the decision is being appealed by Sweden, which is what the Slog piece says. Assange is still in Wandsworth, or a transport van.
9
I think it would be really hilarious if Moore used PayPal to post his bail.
11
@8, Thanks. The version of the story I read made it seem like bail had been granted, AND Assange was free, but I either misread it, or that part of the story hadn't been reported on yet.
12
I'm getting really fucking sick of seeing the charges downplayed as "not rape" "sex by surprise" and "broken condom". Because they're really really not. Holding a woman down to insert your penis into her, or doing that while she is asleep is rape. The media should be reporting the accusations accurately, and they're not even trying to.

I'm not saying Assange's guilty or innocent, but it makes me sick to see Moore held up as a hero for his involvement despite his repeated dismissive and incorrect statements about the accusation. It would be nice if just once when a man people like is accused of rape, the story doesn't become an excuse to downplay the accused actions as being rape.

Please wait...

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