Hands Off Wikileaks.
international |
anti-capitalism |
opinion/analysis
Sunday December 05, 2010 20:14
by john throne - Facts for Working People
loughfinn at aol dot com
Capitalism uses secrets and lying diplomacy to conduct its economic exploitation and wars.
Capitalism is in never ending conflict with the working class and with its capitalist rivals. This is the objective reality and why it has to have secret diplomacy. It cannot be honest or its system would spin out of control. The wikileaks have dealt an important blow to capitalism's needs in this area. As a result capitalism is going after wikileaks in a very serious way. This assault has to be opposed. Let us build a Hands Off Wikileaks campaign. See more proposals below.
Wikileaks.
Wikileaks is not an inconsequential detail for capitalism. And not totally unrelated to the crisis of the euro in the sense that it relates to relations between the different capitalist powers also. Trotsky said that diplomacy is the lubrication of the revolutionary movement. This is important. But there is revolutionary diplomacy and capitalist diplomacy. We cannot build a revolutionary organization without relating to each other in a diplomatic way. However this is not the essence of the issue. We are not dealing here with some kind of sneaky way of talking that hides reality, some kind of superficiality. On the contrary we are talking about a way of relating to each other that brings out the reality. And the reality is that the objective international interests of the working class are one, the objective international interests of the revolutionary movement are one, and the task of revolutionary socialist diplomacy is to make this clear, to bring out this objective unity.
However bourgeois diplomacy is a different ball game all together. The international interests of capitalism are continually in conflict, continually objectively in conflict. They are irreconcilable. They are at all times trying to steal each others markets and resources and behind this lies the threat of war of one kind or another. The task of bourgeois diplomacy therefore is to hide the objective reality, to hide the reality that the essence of their relationship is one of continual conflict. They meet and smile, and wine and dine, and pretend to be such good friends and colleagues. But behind this is the vicious conflict, the dirty nasty continual attempt to get over on their rivals, to have victory over their rivals. But the problem is they cannot always say this as it would leave their world in non stop conflict and also it would open up opportunities for the working class and the revolutionary movement to challenge their rule. So capitalism speaks with its slick sneaky dirty lies, its "diplomacy", its fancy dinners. Bourgeois diplomacy therefore is a way to hide the reality behind the irreconcilable conflicting interests of the different capitalist powers.
This is where Wikileaks comes in. By exposing the real words of the capitalist diplomats from all the different countries it has helped expose the real nature of the relationships between the capitalist powers. It has helped expose the continual conflict between them. By publishing these conversations Wikileaks has done a service to the working class movement. It is positive that the working class see this conflict. It raises working class consciousness and it also complicates the relations between the capitalist powers and so weakens them and their system as a whole. If only the union and labor leaders would take advantage of the situation we could make make some real steps forward. Missed opportunities abound again due to the policies and role of the union and labor leaders.
The capitalists and their hacks scream that the leaks are threatening lives. Think about this. In the 1960's the Gulf of Tonkin incident was used to justify the Viet Nam war which cost up to three million lives. What really happened was kept totally secret. If it had been exposed and acted upon by the working class movement internationally the Viet nam war could have been prevented and millions of lives saved. So secret diplomacy was responsible for millions of deaths. More recently we have had the lies of capitalist diplomacy about Iraq's so called weapons of mass destruction which did not exist. These lies were used to justify the war and invasion of iraq and the Middle East and have resulted in hundreds of thousands of deaths and counting. The record of secret capitalist diplomacy in saving lives is not great.
The union and labor leaders should be leading on this issue. We must persist in demanding that they do. However we must also remember that there are many many left and anti capitalist activists in this country and also tens of thousands of internet users. We must demand and organize to work together on this, that is to take a stand against the attacks on wikileaks.
What are we doing about the attacks on wikileaks. ? We have to look at the moat in our own eye. We have to take on our left sectarianism and ultra leftism, move to build a united front on a fight to win basis and begin to move working class people into action on this issue and also on the attacks on living standards that are taking place. It is of interest and could be very useful if accurate that Assange says that he has similar secret documents of Bank Of America. Let us see if we can get the secret internal documents of the financial institutions as well as the diplomatic and military institutions of capitalism.
#Build a Hands Off Wikileaks Campaign. End the pursuit of Assange, Release the US soldier accused of providing the documents and drop all charges.
#Boycott Amazon and Paypal and any other service that has moved against wikileaks.
#Open all diplomatic agreements and documents.
#Open all financial and corporate agreements.
John. Throne.
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Comments (16 of 16)
Jump To Comment: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16wikileaks wants you to download this "insurance" file to be used in case anything happens to the wikileaks website or assange
here is the torrent address.
http://torcache.com/torrent/76A36F1D11C72EB5663EEB4CF31...rrent
you need a bittorrent client to download and share it
http://www.utorrent.com/
more info here
http://wlcentral.org/action-items
"Julian Assange: Wanted by the Empire, Dead or Alive"
- By Alexander Cockburn:
http://www.counterpunch.org/cockburn12032010.html
worth a read
..look like another honeytrap similar to the operation to extract Vanunu for his 'treason' agin nuclear zion.
Julian Assange has turned himself into a UK court at 9.30 am today. He is in court now.
al jazeera report here:
http://english.aljazeera.net/news/europe/2010/12/201012....html
Two high profile figures John Pilger and Ken Loach have entered the court in support of Assange
Caption: Video Id: 9WsN1KXCkEo Type: Youtube Video
al jazeera news report
Caption: Video Id: cSFLfre8Zts Type: Youtube Video
some background
Up to date info here:
http://wlcentral.org/
Update:
----------
Bail refused on spurious grounds. .
Next court appearance set for Dec.14th...
Julian Assange remanded in custody for 1 week...
Mastercard withdraw donation facility..
Swiss bank freeze assets on a "technicality"...
[ Clearly they are all out to get him. I mean, how many other VERY dubious swiss accounts could be frozen on a technicality but aren't!! Fuckin' banksters again!! Always acting in our "best interests" eh folks?? Join the dots and lets default on these fuckers.]
This is From SriLanka Guardian:
-------------------------------------------------
PRESS RELEASE
Tue 7 Dec 15.55 GMT
Julian Assange Defense Fund frozen.
(December 07, London, Sri Lanka Guardian) The Swiss Bank Post Finance today issues a press release stating that it had frozen Julian Assange's defense fund and personal assets (31K EUR) after reviewing him as a "high profile" individual.
The technicality used to seize the defense fund was that Mr. Assange, as a homeless refugee attempting to gain residency in Switzerland, had used his lawyers address in Geneva for the bank's correspondence.
Late last week, the internet payment giant PayPal, froze 60Keur of donations to the German charity the Wau Holland Foundation, which were targeted to promote the sharing of knowledge via WikiLeaks.
WikiLeaks and Julian have lost 100Keur in assets this week.
One of the most fascinating aspects of the Cablegate exposure is how it is throwing into relief the power dynamics between supposedly independent states like Switzerland, Sweden and Australia.
WikiLeaks also has public bank accounts in Iceland (preferred) and Germany.
Please help cover our expenditures while we fight to get our assets back.
http://wikileaks.ch/support.html
Visa became today the fifth financial institution to suspend payments to WikiLeaks, after Moneybookers, PayPal, Mastercard, and PostFinance. A spokesman said: "Visa Europe has taken action to suspend Visa payment acceptance on WikiLeaks' website pending further investigation into the nature of its business and whether it contravenes Visa operating rules," reports the Press Association.
The Guardian wrote: "Charles Arthur, the Guardian's technology editor, points out that while MasterCard and Visa have cut WikiLeaks off you can still use those cards to donate to overtly racist organisations such as the Knights Party, which is supported by the Ku Klux Klan.
The Ku Klux Klan website directs users to a site called Christian Concepts. It takes Visa and MasterCard donations for users willing to state that they are 'white and not of racially mixed descent. I am not married to a non-white. I do not date non-whites nor do I have non-white dependents. I believe in the ideals of western Christian civilisation and profess my belief in Jesus Christ as the son of God.'"
Probably no further comment is needed. (You can still donate to WikiLeaks via other methods.)
A better source than Anne:
http://genevalunch.com/blog/2010/12/06/swiss-postfinanc...date/
QUOTE:
Postfinance, the Swiss post office’s banking system, late Monday afternoon 6 December issued a statement saying it is closing an account opened by Julian Assange for WikiLeaks, the group’s “defense fund”, citing false information supplied by Assange about his domicile, or permanent address, when he applied to open the account. Assange lists his address as Geneva, but Swiss Post says “Assange cannot provide proof of residence in Switzerland.”
The statement makes no mention of what happens to the funds, although Swiss news agency ats quotes spokesperson Marc Andrey as saying that Postfinance will now attempt to reach the fugitive, wanted by Swedish police, to ask where the funds that have been deposited should be transferred. If the money cannot be transferred legally, it will be placed in a frozen account until someone with the legal right to access the funds steps forward.
Here is a link to the actual press release from postfinance:
http://www.postfinance.ch/en/about/media/press/pressrel....html
Hopefully Post finance will not freeze the money for too long with red tape and Julian can get the money back soon to help pay for his defense from these trumped up charges.
One of the ladies in question, Anna Ardin, amongst other things, worked as an anti cuban activist
see the articles on counterpunch for more info:
http://www.counterpunch.org/cockburn12032010.html
http://www.counterpunch.org/shamir09142010.html
QUOTE:
Anna Ardin has, according to Israel Shamir, writing on this CounterPunch site, "ties to the US-financed anti-Castro and anti-communist groups. She published her anti-Castro diatribes in the Swedish-language publication Revista de Asignaturas Cubanas put out by Misceláneas de Cuba…Note that Ardin was deported from Cuba for subversive activities."
It's certainly not conspiracism to suspect that the CIA has been at work in fomenting these Swedish accusations. As Shamir reports, "The moment Julian sought the protection of Swedish media law, the CIA immediately threatened to discontinue intelligence sharing with SEPO, the Swedish Secret Service."
Don't try to tell me that something doesn't stink about all this!!!
Considering Assange has said he will be releasing banking information, what a coincidence all this behaviour from finance companies is.
if I can transfer it...
www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=22278
looks right.Interesting overview.
good link to some interesting analysis there opus. Thanks for that.
Here is a recent RT video dealing with arrest
Caption: Video Id: 56HNn9iSvL0 Type: Youtube Video
RT talks to ex cia and others about arrest of Assange
heres two more might be relevant, on the happy marriage of NATO/EU
http://euobserver.com/7/31444
http://www.defensenews.com/story.php?i=5188472&c=EUR&s=TOP
hope I got that right
if you hit al jazeera and go to the IN DEPTH feed you'll find an article on Israel's upping the ante in the media-wars, by Ali Abunimah of the Electronic Intafada.
The beat goes on. Might as well read this shit before they pull the plug altogether.
just hit the guardian to find a wee story about wiki exposure of , guess who's infiltration of Nigerian government.
Yep, our oul friends from Shellmullet keeping true to their oily form. Smell of Raymbo Burke and the greasy till coalitions.
No wonder they want this man closed down. Our whole moral syphilisation depends on it.
http://anonymouspayback.wordpress.com/2010/12/09/how-to...tion/
http://pastebin.com/NWcysTVQ
http://antikryptos.wordpress.com/2010/12/09/twitter-str...back/
*cough* JSLoic *cough* Internet cafe *cough* Public / college computers *cough*
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LOIC
http://files.hl2forums.com.nyud.net/uploads/e6a25c9_JS_...1.htm
plenty of NVDA online possibilities for this approach, even on the auld sod
Think of all those jobless highly educated computer literate angry students Hmmmm??
now what was the IP address for motor tax / aib / boi / CAO / FF / GP / FG / RTE / etc ???
Mousy polite marches may be a waste of time but who says we are powerless?
Rousing Assange Op Ed in "The Australian" Dec 07
:
QUOTE:
Every time WikiLeaks publishes the truth about abuses committed by US agencies, Australian politicians chant a provably false chorus with the State Department: “You’ll risk lives! National security! You’ll endanger troops!” Then they say there is nothing of importance in what WikiLeaks publishes. It can’t be both. Which is it?
It is neither. WikiLeaks has a four-year publishing history. During that time we have changed whole governments, but not a single person, as far as anyone is aware, has been harmed. But the US , with Australian government connivance, has killed thousands in the past few months alone.
US Secretary of Defence Robert Gates admitted in a letter to the US congress that no sensitive intelligence sources or methods had been compromised by the Afghan war logs disclosure. The Pentagon stated there was no evidence the WikiLeaks reports had led to anyone being harmed in Afghanistan . NATO in Kabul told CNN it couldn’t find a single person who needed protecting. The Australian Department of Defence said the same. No Australian troops or sources have been hurt by anything we have published.
But our publications have been far from unimportant. The US diplomatic cables reveal some startling facts:
The US asked its diplomats to steal personal human material and information from UN officials and human rights groups, including DNA, fingerprints, iris scans, credit card numbers, internet passwords and ID photos, in violation of international treaties. Presumably Australian UN diplomats may be targeted, too.
King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia asked the US Officials in Jordan and Bahrain want Iran ‘s nuclear program stopped by any means available.
Britain’s Iraq inquiry was fixed to protect “US interests”.
Sweden is a covert member of NATO and US intelligence sharing is kept from parliament.
The US is playing hardball to get other countries to take freed detainees from Guantanamo Bay . Barack Obama agreed to meet the Slovenian President only if Slovenia took a prisoner. Our Pacific neighbour Kiribati was offered millions of dollars to accept detainees.
In its landmark ruling in the Pentagon Papers case, the US Supreme Court said “only a free and unrestrained press can effectively expose deception in government”. The swirling storm around WikiLeaks today reinforces the need to defend the right of all media to reveal the truth.
Rest of article:
http://blogs.theaustralian.news.com.au/mediadiary/index...ian1/
According to the New Scientist:
"Oddly, Wikia - the parent company of Wikipedia - owns the domain names wikileaks.net, wikileaks.com and wikileaks.us - for reasons not yet clear. They expire in January."
http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn19816-info-pirate....html