December 18, 2012

An intellectually honest constitutional originalist would need to grapple with the true context of

the second amendment, which is the Founders' hatred of standing armies. This is codified somewhat in the original document, at Article I, Section 8:

... The Congress shall have Power ... To raise and support Armies, but no Appropriation of Money to that Use shall be for a longer Term than two Years ...

The citizen militia, referenced in the second amendment, was the Founders' answer to the lack of a standing army: it was at once the answer to the threat of external invasion and the answer to the threat of a tyrannical usurper

Until WWII, the US had no significant standing army. However, the experience of the world wars, and the rise of the modern totalitarian states, as well as the national security doctrines associated with atomic weapons, were widely understood as forcing America to rethink traditions against permanent military readiness and to establishment a permanent armaments industry

If, therefore, we really want to talk about the second amendment, it may make sense, as a long-term project, to try to recall the Founders' concern about a standing army and the post-WWII development of a massively-armed America, as part of the puzzle

The Chance for Peace, Dwight D. Eisenhower, 1953
... Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed. This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children. The cost of one modern heavy bomber is this: a modern brick school in more than 30 cities. It is two electric power plants, each serving a town of 60,000 population. It is two fine, fully equipped hospitals. It is some fifty miles of concrete pavement. We pay for a single fighter plane with a half million bushels of wheat. We pay for a single destroyer with new homes that could have housed more than 8,000 people. This is, I repeat, the best way of life to be found on the road the world has been taking. This is not a way of life at all, in any true sense. Under the cloud of threatening war, it is humanity hanging from a cross of iron ...
http://www.edchange.org/multicultural/speeches/ike_chance_for_peace.html


Military-Industrial Complex Speech, Dwight D. Eisenhower, 1961
... A huge increase in newer elements of our defense; development of unrealistic programs to cure every ill in agriculture; a dramatic expansion in basic and applied research -- these and many other possibilities, each possibly promising in itself, may be suggested as the only way to the road we wish to travel ... Good judgment seeks balance and progress; lack of it eventually finds imbalance and frustration ... Our military organization today bears little relation to that known by any of my predecessors in peacetime, or indeed by the fighting men of World War II or Korea ... But now we can no longer risk emergency improvisation of national defense; we have been compelled to create a permanent armaments industry of vast proportions ... This conjunction of an immense military establishment and a large arms industry is new in the American experience. The total influence -- economic, political, even spiritual -- is felt in every city, every State house, every office of the Federal government. We recognize the imperative need for this development. Yet we must not fail to comprehend its grave implications ...
http://coursesa.matrix.msu.edu/~hst306/documents/indust.html

December 15, 2012

IIRC the elements of the crime require merely that Manning engaged

in activities that he knew, or should have known, could provide intelligence to an enemy, either directly or indirectly, whether or not the enemy actually benefited

A spokesman for the Taliban told Britain’s Channel 4 News on Thursday that the insurgent group is scouring classified American military documents posted online by the group WikiLeaks for information to help them find and “punish” Afghan informers ...

July 30, 2010, 11:58 am
Updated | 12:36 p.m.
Taliban Study WikiLeaks to Hunt Informants
By ROBERT MACKEY
http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/07/30/taliban-study-wikileaks-to-hunt-informants/

A torrent of leaked U.S. diplomatic cables obtained by the anti-secrecy group WikiLeaks has been published in the last few days, with at least 170 of them naming sources whose identity was meant to be protected, according to an analysis of the documents by CNN ...

Flood of WikiLeaks cables includes identities of dozens of informants
By Tim Lister and Emily Smith
August 31, 2011 8:33 a.m. EDT
http://www.cnn.com/2011/US/08/31/wikileaks.sources/index.html

... A reporter worried that Assange would risk killing Afghans who had co-operated with American forces if he put US secrets online without taking the basic precaution of removing their names. "Well, they're informants," Assange replied. "So, if they get killed, they've got it coming to them. They deserve it." ...

The treachery of Julian Assange
The WikiLeaks founder, far from being a champion of freedom, is an active danger to the real seekers of truth
Nick Cohen
The Observer, Saturday 17 September 2011
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/sep/18/julian-assange-wikileaks-nick-cohen

... I talked to Assange by phone a few times and heard out his complaints. He was angry that we declined to link our online coverage of the War Logs to the WikiLeaks Web site, a decision we made because we feared — rightly, as it turned out — that its trove would contain the names of low-level informants and make them Taliban targets ...

Dealing With Assange and the WikiLeaks Secrets
By BILL KELLER
Published: January 26, 2011
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/30/magazine/30Wikileaks-t.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

December 8, 2012

Julian Assange autobiography: why he didn't want it published

Memoir looked set to make the WikiLeaks founder and publisher Canongate a fortune – then the arguments started
David Leigh, James Ball and Esther Addley
Thursday 22 September 2011 16.47 EDT

... To complete the picture of acrimony, Assange went on to publicly denounce his former lawyers, claiming they were sitting on his publishers' advance of £412,000, which they were holding to cover their legal fees. Assange's allegations of "extreme overcharging" were rapidly denied by the London media firm of Finers, Stephens, Innocent (FSI) ...

A book deal was drawn up and clinched by the London literary agent Caroline Michel, under which Canongate, the innovative Scottish firm run by Jamie Byng, and the US publishers Knopf agreed to pay £600,000 and $800,000 respectively for the rights, with Knopf paying $250,000 (£162,000) in advance. Canongate also agreed to pay upfront O'Hagan's ghostwriting fee, believed to exceed £100,000.

Assange already seemed to have the possibility in mind that he might withdraw from the deal. Sources close to the Canongate negotiations say he demanded a deal that he could keep £125,000 of the advance whatever happened. Byng laughed this out of court, responding according to correspondence seen by the Guardian: "We cannot accept … the idea that regardless of whether Julian delivers (or regardless of what he delivers or regardless of when he delivers), he will keep £125,000."

Canongate also negotiated a crucial loophole in the contract, which it was eventually to invoke ... "If … the manuscript has not been delivered by the prescribed date or its final form is not acceptable to the Publisher, the Publisher has the right to decide whether to continue to publish the Work. If the Publisher decides to continue to publish the Work the Proprietor agrees that all typescript or notes relevant to the said Work shall belong to the Publisher" ...

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2011/sep/22/julian-assange-memoir-argument

December 8, 2012

The Assange-Canongate saga is really quite informative

Canongate seems to have advanced Assange perhaps half a million pounds to produce an autobiography, after which Assange began to work with their ghostwriter and sat for the cover photo. But then Assange changed his mind, though he never returned the advance, as he had transferred to his lawyers, who had already spent it fighting his extradition to Sweden. So Canongate published anyway, which produced vintage fulmination from Assange: "Canongate owes me money. I have not seen a single cent from this book. Canongate owes me hundreds of thousands of pounds." In the end, the saga ruined Canongate's bottom line that year. Sadly, this flexibly shifty behavior is not usual for Assange, as the book witnesses also: for example, in the book we are told that W accused Assange of rape because he didn't call her from his train: "it has already turned out to be the most expensive call I didn't make."

Here are some links:

On 20 December 2010, Julian Assange signed a contract with Canongate Books to write a book – part memoir, part manifesto – for publication in 2011. At the time, Julian said, ‘I hope this book will become one of the unifying documents of our generation. In this highly personal work, I explain our global struggle to force a new relationship between the people and their governments’ ... After reading the first draft of the book that was delivered at the end of March, Julian declared, ‘All memoir is prostitution’. On 7 June 2011, with 38 publishing houses around the world committed to releasing the book, Julian told us he wanted to cancel his contract. However, he had already signed his advance over to his lawyers to settle his legal bills. We have decided to honour that contract and to publish. Once the advance has been earned out, we will continue to honour the contract and pay Julian royalties ...

Statement from Canongate Books <21 September 2011>
link to pdf: http://www.canongate.tv/media/pdf/Statement%20from%20Canongate%20Books.pdf
hattip: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/foreign-affairs-defense/wikisecrets/unauthorized-assange-autobiography-leaked-by-publisher/

... In late December Mr Assange accepted an advance – reportedly worth hundreds of thousands of pounds – from Canongate and New York publisher Alfred A Knopf ... Canongate went on to sell the rights to a further 38 publishing houses around the world ... But the relationship soured soon after the first draft of the manuscript was delivered to him in late March ... Only a week earlier he had posed for a photo shoot and cleared the portrait that now graces the book's front cover ... Mr Assange's decision to renege on his contract plunged Canongate into a crisis ... He was given two months to work on the manuscript but deadlines went by without any further work ...

Assange: The truth will out
How did Julian Assange's autobiography become unauthorised? To introduce exclusive extracts from the WikiLeaks figurehead's memoir, Jerome Taylor recounts the behind-the-scenes battle for publication
JEROME TAYLOR
THURSDAY 22 SEPTEMBER 2011
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/assange-the-truth-will-out-2358651.html

... I met a woman called W—— at a press conference. I remember she was wearing a nice pink sweater. After an awards party, I met up with W—— and went back with her to her house in Enkopping ... My behaviour sounds cold, and no doubt was, which is a failing of mine, but not a crime. I'd spent long enough at A——'s and could see that it would be a bad idea to stay longer. Remember, I was feeling especially paranoid ... The thing with W—— was going nowhere, either. She was a little vague, but the night in Enkopping was fun and I thought we'd had a perfectly nice time, albeit one that probably wouldn't be repeated. She didn't seem too fussed herself, as we had breakfast together the next morning and then rode together on her bicycle to the railway station. She kindly paid for my ticket – my bank card was still on the blink, though I'm always skint – and she kissed me goodbye and asked me to call her from the train. I didn't do that, and it has already turned out to be the most expensive call I didn't make. At one point, I did have a short conversation with W——, when she called me, but the phone was low on charge and it ran out while we were still talking ... After a strange few days of contact with the women, one of whom said she wanted me to do an STD test, I needed some time and space to myself ...

Julian Assange: 'I did not rape those women'
In the first extract from the book, Julian Assange gives his version of the background to accusations of sexual assault that have led to his battle against extradition to Sweden
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/julian-assange-i-did-not-rape-those-women-2358652.html

... The company made an operating loss of £368,367 compared with a profit of more than £1m in 2010 ... In a report, the company's chairman Sir Christopher Bland said the loss was "largely attributable to Julian Assange's failure to deliver the book he had contracted to produce, and we were unable to obtain repayment from him of Canongate's substantial advance, which had to be written off". The advance is said to be more than £500,000 although Canongate gave no details in its financial statement ...

5 October 2012
Canongate Books blames Assange for loss
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-scotland-business-19841184

December 8, 2012

Julian Assange: the fugitive

Julian Assange has been holed up in the Ecuadorian embassy for six months. In a rare interview, we ask the WikiLeaks founder about reports of illness, paranoia – and if he'll ever come out
Decca Aitkenhead
Friday 7 December 2012 17.58 EST

... Assange talks in the manner of a man who has worked out that the Earth is round, while everyone else is lumbering on under the impression that it is flat. It makes you sit up and listen, but raises two doubts about how to judge his thesis. There's no debate that Assange knows more about the subject than almost anyone alive, and the case he makes is both compelling and scary. But there's a question mark over his own credentials as a crusader against abuses of power, and another over his frame of mind. After all the dramas of the last two and a half years, it's hard to read his book without wondering, is Assange a hypocrite – and is he a reliable witness?

Prodigiously gifted, he is often described as a genius, but he has the autodidact's tendency to come across as simultaneously credulous and a bit slapdash. He can leap from one country to another when characterising surveillance practices, as if all nations were analogous, and refers to the communications data bill currently before the UK parliament in such alarmist terms that I didn't even recognise the legislation and thought he must be talking about a bill I'd never heard of. "A bill promulgated by the Queen, no less!" he emphasises, as if the government could propose any other variety, before implying that it will give the state the right to read every email and listen in on every mobile phone call, which is simply not the case. It's the age-old dilemma: are we being warned by a uniquely clear-sighted Cassandra, or by a paranoid conspiracy theorist whose current circumstances only confirm all his suspicions of sinister secret state forces at work? ...

I try twice to ask how a campaigner for free speech can condone Ecuador's record on press controls, but I'm not sure he hears, because he is off into a coldly furious tirade against the Guardian. The details of the dispute are of doubtful interest to a wider audience, but in brief: WikiLeaks worked closely with both the Guardian and the New York Times in 2010 to publish huge caches of confidential documents, before falling out very badly with both. He maintains that the Guardian broke its word and behaved disgracefully, but he seems to have a habit of falling out with erstwhile allies. Leaving aside the two women in Sweden who were once his admirers and now allege rape and sexual assault, things also ended badly with Canongate, a small publisher that paid a large advance for his ghosted autobiography, only to have Assange pull out of the project after reading the first draft. It went ahead and published anyway, but lost an awful lot of money. Several staff walked out of WikiLeaks in 2010, including a close colleague, Daniel Domscheit-Berg, who complained that Assange was behaving "like some kind of emperor or slave trader" ...

"Oh my God!" he interrupts angrily, raising his voice. "These people, we told them not to do that. They were wrong to do it, to violate the author's copyright like that." Did he ever consider giving his advance back? "Canongate owes me money. I have not seen a single cent from this book. Canongate owes me hundreds of thousands of pounds." But if he hasn't seen any money, it's because the advance was deposited in Assange's lawyers' bank account, to go towards paying their fees. Then the lawyers complained that the advance didn't cover the fees, and Assange fell out with them, too ...

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2012/dec/07/julian-assange-fugitive-interview

December 3, 2012

Top EU official tells Julian Assange: 'Just go to Sweden and answer the questions'

... Cecilia Malmström, the European Commissioner for Home Affairs, said Mr Assange, 41, who is sheltering in the Ecuadorean embassy in London, should “answer the questions” about his alleged attacks on two women.

She also dismissed his claim that he would be extradited to the US, saying that she did not “believe for a minute” that it would happen and that it was only a “purely theoretical” risk.

“I’m not engaged in this, I know there are talks. But he’s accused of rape, of sexual harassment and if he’s innocent, which he might be — I don’t know — why doesn’t he just go and answer the questions? ..." ...

... Ms Malmström, who comes from Sweden, dismissed his claims about the threat from American prosecutors. “He is asked to come to Sweden because he’s accused of some crimes. He stays in the embassy. For the moment there is no solution. Whether Sweden would extradite him to the US or not, that is up to the Swedish authorities to decide. I don’t think that would happen. That’s purely theoretical” ...

http://www.standard.co.uk/news/uk/top-eu-official-tells-julian-assange-just-go-to-sweden-and-answer-the-questions-8375231.html

December 1, 2012

Wikileaks suspect Bradley Manning chokes up at hearing

... Manning’s state of mind when he was transferred from Kuwait to Quantico in July, 2010 had a major impact on the rest of his detention there. Required to fill out a questionnaire when he arrived at Quantico, Manning said he sarcastically wrote, “always planning, never acting,” when asked if he ever had suicidal thoughts.

He said he’d forgotten about the entry when brig staff raised it with him at a meeting on Jan. 21, 2011, when he was seeking a downgrade from the Prevention of Injury status he had been in since arriving from Kuwait.

But Fein asked how that could be possible given that three days before he had openly spoken about the written comments with brig officials during an incident that led to his being placed on suicide risk watch ...

A sheepish Manning told Fein, “I’d forgotten about that” ...

http://www.wlsam.com/Article.asp?id=2584986&spid=