There will be a post later today or tomorrow morning on the last day of the Assange hearing, and a few concluding thoughts. Meantime this is very interesting.
Allowed HTML - you can use:
<a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <s> <strike> <strong>
Professor Fear.
How appropriate.
Long time, Suhayl – I hope you are well. Best wishes to you and your family!
Chris Hedges interviews Craig on RT On Contact Question More. On You Tube if someone can do the link please
—
[ Mod: Certainly:- ]
RT America – Assange Extradition Hearing – YouTube (26m 43s)
On the show this week, Chris Hedges discusses with Craig Murray (a former British Ambassador) the hearing underway in London to extradite Julian Assange (the founder of WikiLeaks) to the United States.
Nice interview. Hard to disagree with the closing observation that people like Craig and Chris are now the conservatives by insisting on the rule of law.
I would like to have heard some speculation though as to WHY publications like the New York Times and Washington Post do not even have lawyers present given the huge 1st amendment implications.
It is the blithe attitude of so called progressive media I find most concerning in all this .Maybe their professed adversarialism and liberal ideals really are bogus. But why not at least maintain the pretence in order to preserve the faith of true believers?
How many true believers in the NYT and WP even know the Assange trial is going on?
Thanks for the link, Wikikettle, shared it on my social media.
May I please ask a, well, perhaps an off-topic question, I’m sorry. This man Chris Hedges speaks English very clearly, I can understand his speech easily without subtitles. Does his manner of pronunciation have a name? A certain accent? Or is it due to good public speaking skills?
I understarstand most of Mr. Murray’s speech too, except for some specific words. Do Mr. Murray and Chris Hedges have the same accent?
Tatyana, although Chris Hedges is American, and Craig English/Scottish, with different accents, they are both men who had establishment jobs and spoke out at great personal cost. I think it’s Craig is exhausted with covering the Hearing, his style is also soft and as we say, well spoken. Chris trained as a Minister, I can just see him delivering a castigating sermon. Craig can also raise his passion and deliver fire and brimstone, but as I said, its best if he looks after himself, which is very difficult despite his health in these critical times.
Minister not as Minister of Defense, but as a clergyman? Well then that makes everything clear 🙂 Many popular singers started out with a church choir, and it seems that the church gives an excellent vocal education!
I love the movie “Sister Act” with Whoopi Goldberg, it makes my eyes wet every time. And I do adore gospel music! «The Gospel People» visited Russia and sang «O Happy Day» for russian radio
https://youtu.be/MzSdVx81QSM
I have just looked on Wikipedia for Chris Hedges. An interesting character! And one of his commendations is from Noam Chomsky ~ 1988 , that he was one of,
“The few US journalists in Central America who merit the title”
Good. I’ll remember the name and I’ll try to follow his programmes. Seems like Mr. Hedges might have a kitten, and this is my personal criterion for good people 🙂
That would seem to be a good criteria, then you remember Ernst Stavro Blofeld!
ah, that is fictional character, unlike Mr. Hedges 🙂
Unlike Craig, Chris Hedges is American. He’s from New England, but I’d say he speaks with a neutral U.S. accent.
Tatyana. To my ear, as an English man, Mr Hedges speaks with an American accent, perhaps mid western, but I’m not sure about that. Craig speaks with what could be called a Southern accent. There used to be a thing known as RP, which stands for “received pronunciation”, that was used across the broadcast media, a sort of uniformity that enabled the spoken word to be clearly understood everywhere across the Country. I understand, these days it isn’t as widely adopted as it was in the early decades of broadcasting, and regional accents are more common. It has been my observation, that here in Britain, accents change slightly over fairly small distances, perhaps 10 – 20 miles, and can change totally over 40 – 50 miles. We do have a lot of them, and some are unintelligible until you gain some familiarity.
Thank you!
Mr. Hedges has a very good accent to understand. And also an excellent command of the voice, I mean that he pronounces sounds distinctly, so the words are easy to understand. He also maintains the volume of the voice throughout and avoids reducing the endings of words. The intonation in his phrases makes it easy to follow the thought, distinguishing between the theme and the main idea. I think he is a professional speaker and probably had a training similar to vocal exercises.
We often talk on this blog that there are obstacles to spreading the word, like those barriers from Internet providers, shadow banning, denied access for certain countries visitors etc. Those are hard to fight.
But there are also obstacles easily avoided, such as a speech that is difficult to understand or the abscence of video subtitles.
You might not be the only one to notice intonation and accent in speech being confusing. I had an Edwardian great-aunt who came from Edinburgh and she regularly confused me, as an Englishman, when she referred to sex as being containers for coal.
Hedges got a degree from divinity school (i.e. training for the clergy) before becoming a NY Times foreign correspondent. That may be an educational environment that values the persuasive power of the spoken word, and perhaps taught him to speak in an accessible and clear way.
As an Australian, (and totally unqualified at that!) I would say Mr Murray has a very educated, British accent. I wouldn’t say English accent, as I think he is Scottish, and the Scottish accent peeps through every now and then ;-), but very precisely British.
Mr Hedges has a US accent, also educated and I agree with others that both gentlemen have had long practise in speech.
In USA, people do tend to speak slowly and clearly, compared to most of the rest of the world. They’ve developed very long vowel sounds, which makes Australians in particular sound like they’ve just put down their clubs and discovered fire in comparison!!
Mr Murray, I discovered your blog from an Australian website, and have binge read your account and it doesn’t look good for anyone, let alone Julian Assange…
Thank you for your dedication and perseverance in this case.
Thanks for the interview link, Wiki/mods., have just written a letter to the Indy pointing out the sordid relationship we still keep with a carceral society governed and ruled by incarcerating, pushing its inequalities on to an underclass African American society and hiding journalists who expose global war crimes from the public in supermax prisons. See whether they have the guts to print it.
Nevermind. The Indy has both Robert Fisk and Patrick Cockburn. Wouldn’t Craig be another welcome voice !
The Independent used to be great but now tends to be a hot bed of liberal, woke, middle class bias. Although, it’s the only MSM rag that gives a voice to the outstanding Fisk and Cockburn their contributions tend to be hidden quite often behind a pay wall. I personally wouldn’t want Craig to disappear in that way.
Stevie Boy, I agree, though a Craig would have a regular salary and be up there with the likes of Fisk and Cockburn where he already belongs.
Excellent interview, thanks.
I’ve shared it.
Thank you, Wikikettle, Craig.
We have also embedded the interview in “Assange Extradition Hearing mistrial – Interview with Craig Murray, former British Ambassador, in daily attendance” (4/10/2020) at https://candobetter.net/node/6040 .
Judge Vanessa Barraister and the prosecution apparently don’t care that the proceedings don’t remotely resemble a trial. In a trial, the accused is presumed innocent until proven guilty, is allowed to call upon witnesses to give evidence and to have witnesses for the prosecution cross-examination.
Given how Barraitser’s makes no effort to conceal her hostility to Julian Assange and her outrageous rulings against Julian’s defence team, surely it must be possible to demand that Barraitser be removed from this case though popular protest, another legal challenge or both.
And as for that ‘secret policeman’ who banged on Craigs hotel room door late into the night demanding information. Well they knew Craigs movements and plans already. He was sent by his masters to intimidate Craig. But be rest assured, when the play, book and film are written about this affair, he will be forever remembered in that scene.
Then again, propaganda isn’t there to convince you of anything so much as to tell you what your allowed to say.
A few days ago, Peter Hitchins of the Daily Mail, wrote an article in support of Julian Assange (despite detesting him). He was critical of the media’s silence over the hearing. The same Peter Hitchins has just been reviewing the news on BBC Radio 4’s Broadcasting House program. What an opportunity to castigate the BBC over its silence. Yet the hypocrite said nothing about JA, the trial or the awful absence of due process. Instead talked about James Bond! What a hypocrite. Whatever integrity he appeared to have, has disappeared.
That doesn’t surprise me. I don’t think Hitchins can be relied upon to support Julian. His narcissistic tendencies over-ride any thing of use he might say. About anything.
HitchEns btw.
He was opposed to our wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Hitchens
However, he did not accept that Dr Kelly was murdered.
His late brother, Christopher, held views that were completely opposite. For instance he supported the Bush and Blair ‘War on Terror’.
Yes that is very very disappointing. Do you suppose the BBC asked him what points he was intending to make and vetoed any mention of Assange? Or do you think he just knew this was a subject he could not mention if he was ever to be asked to comment on the BBC again? Either way it is a significant missed opportunity.
Anyone who both writes an article for Daily Mail and follows it up with an appearance on BBC -(in whatever guise) speaks volumes about said person, has no integrity whatsoever to disappear.
I noted that there was a comment yesterday evening, referring to the Pilger interview on RT. It’s still available online and worth watching:
https://www.rt.com/shows/going-underground/502339-pilger-assange-extradition-us/
…………………..
Key Assange Prosecution Witness Part of Academic Cluster That Has Received Millions from UK & US Militaries
Matt Kennard and Mark Curtis provide post-trial revelations about Dr. Nigel Blackwood, who claimed that Assange’s risk of suicide is “manageable” if extradited.
One of the U.S. prosecution’s key medical witnesses in the Julian Assange hearing, who claimed that Assange’s risk of suicide is “manageable” if extradited to the U.S., works for an academic institute that is funded by the U.K. Ministry of Defence and linked to the U.S. Department of Defense, it can be revealed.
Dr. Nigel Blackwood, a reader in forensic psychiatry at King’s College London (KCL), told the extradition hearing in London last week that Julian Assange was suffering only “moderate” depression.
U.S. prosecution witness works at Institute of Psychiatry funded by U.K. military although is not personally funded by it.
Witness leads research group which works “in collaboration” with centre set up with U.S. Department of Defense funding.
He co-leads the group with academic whose work is often funded by U.K. military.
Institute’s partner department is closely linked to the Anglo-American military and intelligence communities and created a course for British intelligence officers on behalf of the U.K. government.
Responding to Declassified, witness says: “I had no conflicts [of interest] to declare.”
Revelations come following end of Old Bailey hearing on Assange’s U.S. extradition.
…………………………….FOLLOW THE MONEY TRAIL
How strange that a prosecution key witness in the trial of Julian Assange exposure of American WAR CRIMES is being funded by the same sources who promote wars………..
Even stranger is how Judge Ratbraiser ever allowed this military funded glove puppet near a Court room?
…………………….NO CONFLICT OF INTEREST???
..
Dr Nigel Blackwood has only one role while giving advice about mental impairments of soldiers in combat…..
………..to hide everything so that the Ministry of Defense pay no compensation to our brave service personnel injured in the theatre of war.
Just take a look at all the Freedom of Information requests from the injured parties to the MOD on the pages of WHAT DO THEY KNOW.
According to the MOD each and every case of mental and physical damage has nothing to do with them and people like Blackwood supply the twisted advice they use to deny claims….
From the cocktail of dodgy drugs injected into our bravest right back till the nuclear tests that our veterans were exposed to, the MOD is light years ahead in dodging claims.
This comment was hidden away by Twitter on Craig’s latest Twitter thread about the Marr Show on the grounds that it might offend our sensibilities!
Wendy Wood
@MissWendyWood
3h
Replying to @CraigMurrayOrg
Marr is a dreadful wee shit.
🙂
Apart from Marr being a dreadful wee shite, he’s a MI6 asset.
Marr an asset?
Only at the BBC.- trousering 250k for what?
I much prefer Noel Edmonds on Swapshop.
Much more in depth interviewing technique had Noel and that was with the kids.
Marr’s terrible at interviewing anyone.
See Chomsky for details vis Marr and what he may be.
No wonder Andrew Neil is setting up a new (right wing) political show.
Neil’s a rank Thatcherite but in his favour he doesn’t like politicians taking the piss.
One matter that has surprised me is the absence of discussion of the Guantanamo Bay detention centre. Here is a place full of kidnapped persons, detained without charge or trial and subject to various forms of torture. A place in which it is fairly certain that at least three prisoners have been secretly executed.
And the prosecution is telling us that US prison conditions are satisfactory.
There should be no question of extradition, in any case, so long as the regime at Guantanamo- set up, remember, as an ’emergency measure” continues.
The United States makes it crystal clear that it does not even pretend to adhere to law, either its own or that established internationally, and yet we blithely allow its advocates to insist-despite all evidence- that it does.
Yes that is a very good point. Guantanamo Bay is never mentioned any more is it?
Yes, and Obama was going to close down Guantanamo Bay, that worked out well. And apparently, Obama was also instrumental in killing the latest attempt by Bernie Sanders to inject some small degree of caring socialism into the USA.
And, let’s not forget the head of the CIA,Gina Haspel, was heavily involved in a black site involved in torture and rendition in Thailand, destruction of evidence of torture and “Chief of Base” of a clandestine CIA detention site at Guantanamo Bay.
Land of the free ?
“Assange Hearing”, that’s almost wry and amusing, as if this bizarre ritual is anything at all, it’s certainly not being “heard” by very many people at all! Looking back at this “episode” people will wonder how Assange, someone who used to be so incredibly and publicly well-known, could be tried for what amounts to his life, with virtually no media coverage or even interest, even though what’s at stake, apart from his life, is of such fundamental, central and undoubted importance to the very future and character of the media that’s chosen to ignore the revelations and events unfolding at the Old Bailey.
I’m still having difficulty facing up to the shocking level of complicity to destroy Assange and Wikileaks that characterises the media non-coverage of what’s going on. I sometimes wonder if I’m just imagining it. Surely, I ask myself, they all can’t be so blind and so stupid, so easily manipulated by the anti-Assange propaganda designed to undermine his credibility and the truth? Or is it that the journalists are afraid?
I think a lot of it is linked to the very structure of the media and how journalists are trained and chosen for their roles within it. It’s become incredibly competitive, at the same time as the top journalists believe themselves to be part of an elite layer in society with special abilities and functions. The priests of the Truth. What this means in practice is that the process of socialisation within journalism controls the type of people who get the best and most influential jobs and controls how they think, observe and understand the world, by carefully eliminating people think and look at things critically or differently. So, rather than promoting real originality and talent, (like John Pilger for example… who didn’t become the editor of a major daily newspaper, but was marginalised), it’s uniformity that’s encouraged and rewarded instead. Journalism has become the exact opposite of what most journalists think it is. This is, of course, incredibly difficult to get people to understand or accept.
It really is an indictment of journalism that it’s been left up to Craig Murray and a handful others, to do what the rest of the media, with all there resources, should be doing. In all of this, it’s the role of the “liberal/left” Guardian that’s the absolute worst imaginable and the most damaging for Assange and the things he stands for. The Guardian now looks like a part of the UK’s security services. Their preferred mouthpiece where they can speak directly to the educated middle class and nudge them in the right direction, helped by group of high-profile journalists at the Guardian who profit professionally and financially by this cosy and perfidious relationship.
Right on!
As Bevin says Right On, to write on. The Guardian, New York Times, Washington Post and the rest of them have dwindling readership. Take heart, Craig readership increases. It only takes one brave person to speak out and one to hear. The old guard will soon all be on welfare from the tax payer via the “Integrity” Initiative.
Kudos to Writeon & Wikikettle, and most herein that noticeably recognize and appreciate the importance and seriousness of the ongoing inquisition and persecution of Julian Assange; to those who choose to seed discussion of this topic with idle speculations regarding vocal accents and silly digressions regarding the choice of pets, please subsist and “go quietly into the night”. For the former cadre, this discussion, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7uo4Es7ozKg#action=share provided by ConsortiumNews, a site that features the coverage by Craig Murray and many others active in Julian Assange’s support, deserves to be ‘bookmarked’.
As Usual,
EA
Ethan Allen, I watched the link you provided of the discussion involving Daniel Ellsberg and others about key legal points in Julian’s hearing. I was struck how Daniel gave an historical overview, viewing Trump as potentially being much more dangerous and not just a moron as many view him. This was echoed by Noam Chomsky, who warned that Trump was far more dangerous than Biden. At the time I thought that was odd, as I did when Tulsi Gabbard withdrew her candidacy. After hearing his perspective I take very seriously the points he and Chomsky make. This will not be understandable to progressive supporters of Bernie Sanders who felt betrayed by the Democratic establishment and didn’t vote for Clinton, or vote for Biden now or some Tulsi suporters who felt let down. I urge folk to hear both their arguments on the subject.
With all due respect, Mr. Allen, clear speech is incredibly important to non-native speakers of English. Whether the message will be delivered at all – depends on this.
I know I create a lot of off-topic, and I believe it’s up to moderators to delete any inapropriate postings. Anyway, nice to get feedback from commentors, too. Thanks for yor assesment.
Your comment made me feel ashamed and regretful and feeling that I am not worthy to be here. As if it’s the place for certain people only and I’m not passing through face control and dress code.
If you had a cat, Mr. Allen, you’d be more kind to people around you, perhaps.
Your thoughtful, informative, and witty posts are always worth reading, Tatyana, so don’t be too troubled by the occasional critic.
Your fluent command of the English language speaks, or writes, for itself. You don’t need English lessons. But perhaps the unwarranted criticism will give you an opportunity to familiarize yourself with terms like “self-righteous”, “bumptious”, and “prig”.
I look forward to your future comments.
Writeon, whilst I agree wholeheartedly with the vast majority of your excellent post, I have to take exception to “Their preferred mouthpiece where they can speak directly to the educated middle class”: anyone who can now still buy and read that rag, might well be middle class, but educated, I can assure you, they are not.
There’s another aspect to this grooming of the MSM, to my mind – the comfort of being inside the establishment tent is tempered by the threat towards any bad apple who dares to go too spectacularly off piste, being “Assange’d”. If a group did that en masse, things might change but as long as the carrot/stick ratio is sufficiently discouraging, any individual “journalist” is unlikely to take a punt.
Then again, the extent of JA’s revelations might have been previously thought “unlikely”.
After a quick read of your comments, I mostly agree with your line of thinking but think you still have not gotten the essence of US media neglect of the Assange trial. I will attempt to sketch a more robust theory on the initial sign in space.
It was fitting testament to Craigs work, that Clive Ponting, who recently passed away sadly, wrote in and supported Craig.
………………..is there any wonder that umpteen thousands of mugs have decided to ditch the BBC?
This explains the exodus……………………….or should do.
A recent freedom of information request to the BBC.
Sue Evans 28 September 2020
Delivered
Dear British Broadcasting Corporation,
Can you explain to me please why the most important trial of our lifetime – the hearing on whether Julian Assange can be extradited to the United States – which threatens the freedom of the press itself, is being ignored or skewed on a negative bias, by yourselves?
Yours faithfully,
Sue Evans
https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/bbc_news_reporting#incoming-1647565
When i worked at the IoP I saw some military involvement, senior visits in person, though in that case appeared to be for just helping military family psych problems, particularly if stationed abroad where no NHS I suppose.
John Pilger on Arena Online picked up by ZH.
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/eyewitness-agony-assange
https://dissenter.substack.com/p/fbi-seized-legally-privileged-materials
Kevin Gostola latest report so I believe
At last I’ve seen an article in the Independent about Julian.
Why have we turned our backs on sacred outcast Julian Assange?
Nothing about his case is fair: his crime was simply to expose corruption. The press loved him, then abandoned him. We need to understand his banishment before it is too late, urges Patrick Lawrence
Craig,
Your Assange reports taken as a whole are of significant commercial value so perhaps you should be putting some sort of caveat on their use. I can see a blockbuster movie being produced given the right production team. For a bit of spice the Swedish segment wouldn’t hurt ratings!!
see in end-notes to William Pepper’s book on the involvement of every level of US government execution of Martin Luther King, jr.,
An Act of State, Pepper’s response to Oliver Stone’s proposed contract for a movie
Hi Craig and everyone else,
I just read through the very detailed and interesting coverage of the Alex Salmond trial provided by Craig and otheres who had better access to the “public ” hearings that, of course, were anything but public, with admission being almost as difficult, even for well-regarded and well-known journalists, like Craig himself, as they were at the Assange extradition hearings.
And that brings me to my first point, for while there is also much important to comment upon in the proceedings of the Salmond case itself, I was repeatedly struck by similarities with the far less disinterested proceeding at Old Bailey, and, a fortiori, the still more Kafkaesque allegations that Craig must now defend himself from in a court of law, which, just like the Salmond and Assange trials are nothing but a fairly transparent — to those still left with eyes and ears anyway — use and abuse of the legal system for blatantly political ends, and, in both the Salmond and Murray cases, ends which are even “political” in the narrowest meaning of the term related to electoral party politics!
But please allow me to cut to my primary point: What all three of these trials, and dozens like them in both the UK and US point to is that, for reasons which are well worth analyzing in detail, — albeit well beyond my task here — we are now living in an age where, at least in the UK, US, and, I believe, in many other Anglophone nations as well, the criminal justice systems are allowing remonstrations, sometimes no more than inchoate feelings, all manner of things which are supported by nothing but hearsay evidence, innuendo, questionable, even “fake news” journalistic claims, and, especially, anonymous allegations, to go forward to extensive, expensive and often deeply onerous and permanently harmful trial hearings, which, by the way, by their very nature tend to be prejudiced in favor of the plaintiffs [however “anonymous” they are now allowed to remain] and against the defendant. This kind of malicious, invariably personally or politically motivated attempt to convict one’s enemies upon the basis of what amounts to little more than endlessly reiterated and perhaps slightly embellished, but invariably vapid, accusations alone, of the type with which, say, the recent profoundly and nearly ubiquitously damaging Mueller “Russian collusion” trial was truly replete, seems to be spreading faster than the Cornoa virus.
[Say what? the Russians hacked the DNC and then in a special covert operation handed them over to Assange to publish? I mean, really, how smart does one need to be to do about a half-hours research to determine that the emails were hand delivered to Assange on a flash drive almost certainly by Aaron or Seth Rich and that any claims that “the Russians,” or more risibly, the phony “Gucifer 2” who may well be purely a CIA construct being involved in any way at all simply will not stand up to such a half-hour’s preliminary investigation? Is it really so difficult to screw up the courage to read Bill Binney’s report or even just listen to a five or ten minute interview with him on YouTube? Evidently, for the US Congress and corporate MSM propaganda industry it is!]
And thus it is that the criminal justice systems are being increasingly clogged with bogus patently malicious cases, like the three mentioned here, brought with the worst of motives, and upon the basis of what amounts to little more than glorified gossip and hot air, in order to damage someone perceived to be an enemy.
[One also sees this same phenomenon, in spades as it were, in many, although of course not all, of the hundreds of “me too” trials, many of them quite successful, brought against otherwise upstanding elderly men upon the basis of vague recollections of what the anonymous defendant may possibly have done — “I don’t know for sure, your honor, I was very drunk at the time” — forty years earlier.]
Liberate Minnesota!: Free Al Franken and Garrison Keillor!
Please allow me to say one more thing apropos the upcoming Murray trial. It seems to be the primary contention of the prosecution that Craig published something in his online blog post which could “possibly” have been read by a juror and hence prejudicial to the Salmond case. Note first that he is hardly being accused of having posting anything that ACTUALLY DID prejudice the jury, as would certainly have been required in any legal proceedings, say fifty years ago. This move from the realm of the actual to the merely fantastic realm of the “possible” is deeply pernicious and constitutes a cancer in the Scottish, as well as the American, and many other, criminal justice systems today. As my father used to like to say, “ANYTHING is possible.” It is possible, for example, that a large meteorite might have crashed through the courthouse and traumatized, or even killed, many of the witnesses to the point that they could no longer adjudicate the matter at hand disinterestedly. Possible, indeed, but not very damn likely! Similarly, it is “possible” that one of the jurors might have caught, probably third-hand at best, some stale whiff of what was in Craig’s blog, something which, come to think of it, is only a tad more likely than the previous example. But, of course, even assuming that such a juror did in deed have such vague and cryptic Murrayan information, who is to say that they might not well simply have ignored it, for one reason or another, and hence hardly have been “prejudiced” by it?
In any healthy criminal justice system such speculative fantasies about “possible” violations of some law must indeed be scrupulously proscribed. The cost of not proscribing such nonsense is very high. Not only are the innocent likely to be sentenced to an onerous sentence, like the one hanging over Craig’s head now, while the actually guilty may well be left off on the basis of a defense that is also naught but glorified gossip. Meanwhile, as I said before, the entire system is likely to be backlogged with dozens of cases which lack all merit of being adjudicated at all and little justice administered anywhere in such a diseased institution.
Funny as hell that the only world leader even talking about Assange and his possible “raw deal” is the evil orange man…..
Meanwhile all the “right thinking people” continue to condemn him and his knuckle dragging minions…..
And of course, zero comprehension of just how deep the contempt for “right thinking people” has become with this bunch……
I’d LOVE to see MSM lackeys subjected to the sustained punishment Assange has endured. Then just to rub it in – provide them with an out via a suicide vest – which you know none of these clowns would use.
MSM “journalists” are NOTHING.
Efforts to get the Kings Press office, the Kings Principal Ed Byrne, or his predecessor Sir Rick Trainor, the US citizen who invited Panetta, to comment have been met with silence. I hope others may get a response, and alert Kings alumni.
Note that the Principal of Kings London has got his knighthood, no doubt for his support for all this.
Hi Craig, what happened to your final report Julian’s trial? If you don’t mind me asking.
Update?
I just entered the tent and heard this comment “How many true believers in the NYT and WP even know the Assange trial is going on?”
I confess. 1 I do not know what a true believer is or who a true believer might be or what it is a true believer actually believes 2) I m not sure where the crowd is on this issue. Is everyone here a true-believer? Or is everybody here a Non believer?
Other than what I gleaned in passing over the past several years, I do not know what the “gravaman” is. Is there a corpus delecti to inspect? I confess I do not know International Law with respect to extradition rules and regulations, and I certainly do not know what British law is on this topic.
As an outsider though I was struck by an urgent appeal for help sent out to select twitter group, audience # for such a distribution is not known. Did this “Help Julian!” tweet go to 10,000? 100,00, 1000,000 twitter accounts? More? That is important to know.
For example Maddow Show on any given night might reach >800,00 audience – sometimes up over 1 m.
Specificaly, audience size of key major network hosts are as follows:
Hannity 4.2 M
Tucker Carlson 4.2M
The Ingraham – ?
Rachael Maddow Show (MSNBC – top rated show in the evening lineup) _ 1 million
Fox & Friends. 1.8 M. > CNN “New Day” and “Morning Joe”. ~ 400k
Bill Mahrer – ~ 1.5 M
Now, the Sunday morning news programs, with their extensive wall-to-wall coverage of the pandemic, have also been attracting a larger audience. Indeed over the past six weeks, Face the Nation on CBS has averaged nearly 4.5 million viewers, ( an increase of 51% over 2019.) The March 22 telecast of Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan averaged 5.14 million viewers, (the highest audience since 1991.)
NBC’s Meet the Press with Chuck Todd has averaged 4.4 million viewers on Sunday morning, a year-over-year increase of 33%.
ABC’s This Week with George Stephanopoulos has averaged 3.7 million viewers, ( an increase of 36%).
Fox News Sunday with Chris Wallace has averaged 1.8 million viewers,( an increase of 39%.)
Obviously FoxNews dwarfs any individual non Trump network viewership numbers. This fact illustrates the deep bifurcation of worldview now prevalent in American landscape. America is now Red v Blue. The Red v Blue divide applies to nearly everything in mundane life. This hyper-partisanship has been increasing and evolving for well over 30 years but has become a fait d accomplii at the advent of Trump (2016) and since then much more acute and pervasive.
Fox broadcasts to the Red team – % 40- 45& of voters. Non Non Fox outlets broadcasts to the Blue team. “True believer / true Blue voters/citizens number ~ 30+ million people. Blue inclined people – another 10 -20 million people – disinterested “don’t give a shit” people -> another 10–20 million people. In 2016 Clinton got 65 million votes; Trump received ~ 63 million votes . The 2020 election has generated vastly more attention and interest. Voters are alerted, interested and motivated to vote – especially among the Blue team ( the out party) Biden may garner > 70 million votes in Nov. As is suggested by pollsters Trump lags behind. Trump, it is said, stands at the pinnacle of the Trump Cult. Trump purportedly has ~ 40 million twitter followers – some say > 60 million.
You now get the size and contours of the populations that drive public opinion, the very public opinion that governs network and cable station ratings. Ratings ~ advertisement profits. Ratings = $$$$$.
Hannity and Limbaugh speak to the Trumpists in the USA. Hannity pulls > 4 million viewers. That population constitutes the Trump true believers – the Red MAGA hat wearers; “THE BASE”. Rachel Maddow, by comparison, preaches to a chorus of blues- numbering about a 1 million.
Twitter distribution and networking are sideshows. A small population in the USA play twitter. Those that do are highly motivated, “high intensity partisans” are found on both sides of the aisle. There is a Blue twittersphere and a Redtwittersphere. Maybe a million or 2 in both camps.
OK Now the question of ASSANGE AND THE MAINSTREAM MEDIA
People below have mentioned and criticized the NY Times – meant to be the avatar of “mainstream media” . NYTimes circulation used to be about 1 million but it’s now about 500k. US Today is twice (or more) as large > 1 million closer to 2 million. Obviously there are vastly more watchers than readers! Which is easy to explain.
Now back to Assange and the neglect of mainstream media. If Assange placed high on the “get my attention” scale and were placed 1st place on a Maddow or Last Word news shows as part of an MSNBC broadcast – the Assange message would get (via TV images) – to about a couple of million Americans. If Assange rated a first page story in NYTimes – a “one shot” exposure – maybe 200,000 people would become conversant about Julian Assange, but of those none would become particularly more informed about the sundry complex issues at play. Maybe 50,000 people would read more and dig into the Assangian issues. However, make no mistake : 50,000 Assange alarmists are not going to alter (much) public opinion or light any fires. This is especially TRUE when every man woman and child in the USA , as of today, spends sleepless nights and sweat profusely during the days in anticipation of a Blue- Red Civil war scheduled to erupt sometime after Nov 3 2020. Trump dominates the news cycle – 24/7. The Trump crisis feels like the run up to WWII. The clouds of civil war roil over the skies. Assange, if Assange pops up in the news cycle, would be a mere hiccough; forgotten in a nanosecond. And if Assange did rate a long second look, it would be from an arcane collection of nerds fascinated in national security and 1st amendment rights/ jurisprudence. About equal to those interested in medieval latrine engineering in Islamic Cordova 1400 AD.
INTERMISSION***