Assange seeks asylum in Ecuador

[Gustaf]

I understand you were born the way you are. But what prevents you from moving to one of the socialist paradises on Earth? I'm sure they'd be delighted to have you and I'm sure you would have no problem being a lackey to a proper dictator.

It'd also help your rebellious message, since most of their people want to move here. It'd be very alternative to not just support oppression and misery in theory (for other people) but actually for yourself. 

this inane point has been brought up multiple times, so I'll address it -- the fact as I see it is I am more able to change the course (or destroy the breadth) of US power from within than I would be from without.  this is my motivation and I seek broadly to make my living out of doing so -- in the tradition of Kunstler, Ramsay Clark, etc.

Lol. How convenient for you. I'll extend you the same respect that I expect you extend to really rich people who support low taxes, not because they benefit from it, but because it is best for society.

Now, the society I support has led to the best standard of living ever seen in human history for poor people. Your preferred society (the USSR) was one of mass starvation and genocide. But all your beloved countries (Belarus, Venezuela, North Korea and so on) have ruling classes that live in splendour.

So, please, prove your point. If you can.

I'm not sure what point I'm supposed to prove -- your interjection here didn't have anything to do with what you've quoted, and I'm not about to start repeatedly playing on your home turf.

My home turf being reality?

You accused me of supporting the ruling classes. So I pointed out that I support an order that has led to the best standard of living the poor have ever seen, while you support one that lead to misery for the poor and abundance for the ruling class. So I thought you might want to back up your assertion with something a bit more substantive (or, since we both know you can't, you can just retract your statement and admit that it was baseless).

It's interesting how supposedly collectivist thinker tend to be so megalomaniac that they place themselves outside even of their own intellectual constructs (if one may call them that - but I'm  in a generous mood). "People should live in the best places on Earth, like Belarus - except for me, I'll endure the hardships of the US"

[opebo]

I support an order that has led to the best standard of living the poor have ever seen, while you support one that lead to misery for the poor and abundance for the ruling class.

Misery is an emotional state, Gustaf.  Better stick to the numbers of microwaves and I-pads and things like that.

[© tweed]

a few general points.


-there are plenty of places under still US dominion that have similar or worse living standards than the countries we've been talking about.  and the move away from a US-dominated Latin America has been accompanied by an increase in living standards for the majority of the population.  the typical model has been a Europeanized elite ruling over a morass of the destitute and indigenous.  the reason that Chavez and Castro* and the rest are so hated by the Western media is because they actually invest in and rely on their own populations for support instead of taking US dollars to fund a military dictatorship, allow for foreign capital "investment" to exploit cheap labor and natural resources and then expatriate the profits, etc.  the people who pay for mass media (and run economics schools) hate this sh**t and back coups whenever they can in the name of stability (Chile, Honduras, Cuba, Venezuela, Haiti have all been subjected to at least one US-backed coup attempt in the past fifty years, three of them in the last ten years).


-even assuming that Gustaf's statement is true, "I support an order that has led to the best standard of living the poor have ever seen", what does it prove?  it does not prove that this order should persist.  surely he is aware of the most elemental Marxist-Leninist doctrine, that of "stages of history", when the agrarian pre-capitalist gives way to the capitalist which gives way to the socialist.

two sub-points are instructive here.  a) the evidence is that the time for this transition is beyond ripe.  in the US the wage rate per unit of productivity has hit the absolute toilet since the 1970s, meaning the charms of growth have ceased to be dispersed around the society at all -- now this phenomenon is expanding beyond the underclass and through the middle class, as even the top 20% 'political class' has been smashed here in the late neoliberal era.  Gustaf will retort that, even as wages and wealth are falling, quality-of-life is increasing... I don't see how this is true?  sure the underclass can now dilly time away on their iPhone that they bought on a credit card at 30% APY, but they're also working 80 hours per week and can't afford to take advantage of that beautiful new medical technology... where's the quality of life if there's no time?  this phenomenon has hit the middle classes as well... I could go on forever, but one more thing.  6-year-olds now have 50% less lingustic capacity than 6-year-olds did in the 1950s.  why?  people their parents are always working and there are 34 kids for one teacher in their first grade class, so they never interact with adults, only with each other, and development is stunted.

the second sub-point is an old point, that all of the economics models in your textbooks treat natural resources as infinite, the "dirty secret" (Wallerstein) that is externalization of costs... yes, in the perfect fictional world the government then legislates to take care of the externalization, but in the real world economic power is political power, capital captures the democratic process with ease, leading to a vicious cycle (in the midst of an environmental crisis the US is not discussing new, tougher standards but instead wants to eliminate the EPA).


*using Castro mostly in past tense here.  the old Castro that had the USSR to rely on.

[© tweed]

"People should live in the best places on Earth, like Belarus - except for me, I'll endure the hardships of the US"

this is the total straw man that opebo was speaking of a few days ago.

[© tweed]

back on the original topic, Chomsky weighs in.

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/home/opinion/interviews/Noam-Chomsky-Julian-Assange-deserves-applause/articleshow/15621507.cms

The accusations should be taken quite seriously, just as all such accusations should. Independent of that, no decent country would permit a person to be sent to a country where the chances of his receiving a fair trial are very limited. The apparent conflict can be easily resolved. Sweden claims only that they want to interrogate Assange. They have been invited to do that in England, or in the Ecuadoran Embassy in London. They refuse. They could also issue a statement that they will not extradite Assange to the United States. They refuse.

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

Chomsky is flat-out wrong about the way the Swedish justice system works.

[opebo]

Chomsky is flat-out wrong about the way the Swedish justice system works.

You're arguing the letter of the law, Nathan, which really has nothing to do with what everybody's talking about.

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

Chomsky is flat-out wrong about the way the Swedish justice system works.

You're arguing the letter of the law, Nathan, which really has nothing to do with what everybody's talking about.

I'm trying (to no apparent avail because most people have already made up their minds on whether or not they want to spend their political energies fellating this tiresome person) to explain why the Swedish authorities could not, in fact, have done what people like Chomsky are arguing they ought to have done.

[© tweed]

Chomsky is flat-out wrong about the way the Swedish justice system works.

You're arguing the letter of the law, Nathan, which really has nothing to do with what everybody's talking about.

I'm trying (to no apparent avail because most people have already made up their minds on whether or not they want to spend their political energies fellating this tiresome person) to explain why the Swedish authorities could not, in fact, have done what people like Chomsky are arguing they ought to have done.

you either 'get it' or you don't, my buddy.  you're naive and idealistic and live largely inside your own head -- submission to anything but that which is imaginary eludes you.

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

Chomsky is flat-out wrong about the way the Swedish justice system works.

You're arguing the letter of the law, Nathan, which really has nothing to do with what everybody's talking about.

I'm trying (to no apparent avail because most people have already made up their minds on whether or not they want to spend their political energies fellating this tiresome person) to explain why the Swedish authorities could not, in fact, have done what people like Chomsky are arguing they ought to have done.

you either 'get it' or you don't, my buddy.  you're naive and idealistic and live largely inside your own head -- submission to anything but that which is imaginary eludes you.

I can't stop laughing. You sure you want to be the one in the firing chamber telling others that they live in their own heads, Tweed? You think I consider 'naive' and 'idealistic' insults? Seriously? Do you know me at all? I own The Little Prince in three different languages and have watched Simoun five times, for God's sake. What is it exactly that you want me to 'submit' to, the idea that one can and should get away with sex crimes if one has enough brain-dead college students with blown-out septa and news-hungry aging activists convinced that one is somehow individually essential for The Revolution? Because the world would be a hell of a lot better off if that way of thinking were imaginary, buster.

Anything that befalls Julian Assange he has brought upon himself with his execrable and cowardly behavior. It's not even so much about the fact that he's a sleazy pervert any more as it about his belief that he is above the law and above anybody's moral standards but his own, which seem to run to 'that which gets my dick wet and/or my face in the newspapers'--such theatrically, giving speeches from balconies! Oh, he's a regular Wallenberg. But that isn't what reality is, is it? That's not the reality of the streets or the reality of the Cross or the reality of anything at all except the pathological need to have some sort of hipster messiah to sublimate fantasies of escape that people are too stupid and uncreative to deal with in any way that's actually constructive or does anybody except Julian Assange's penis which can do no wrong any lick of good. This is exactly why I hate the New Left. It's why my own political attitudes have become more, shall we say, antipositivist and, dare I say, YES! in some ways crypto-theocratic over the years, and whatever one may think that that's worth I'm proud of not being a bog standard Chomskyite or Occupy-type if legitimizing this sort of megalomania and obsession with the sad odysseys of entirely justly persecuted slimeballs is what that leads to.

Rafael Correa should know better and I'm disappointed in him. I'm saying this about a man who even before this was probably my least favorite South American leader who isn't dear Sebastian down in Valparaiso.

[© tweed]

if I provoke, I hit a nerve -- I succeed.

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

if I provoke, I hit a nerve -- I succeed.

I'm honestly and deeply pissed off and I'm quite proud of my resulting post in terms of English composition. Well done.

[The Mikado]

Anything that befalls Julian Assange he has brought upon himself with his execrable and cowardly behavior. It's not even so much about the fact that he's a sleazy pervert any more as it about his belief that he is above the law and above anybody's moral standards but his own, which seem to run to 'that which gets my dick wet and/or my face in the newspapers'--such theatrically, giving speeches from balconies! Oh, he's a regular Wallenberg. But that isn't what reality is, is it? That's not the reality of the streets or the reality of the Cross or the reality of anything at all except the pathological need to have some sort of hipster messiah to sublimate fantasies of escape that people are too stupid and uncreative to deal with in any way that's actually constructive or does anybody except Julian Assange's penis which can do no wrong any lick of good. This is exactly why I hate the New Left. It's why my own political attitudes have become more, shall we say, antipositivist and, dare I say, YES! in some ways crypto-theocratic over the years, and whatever one may think that that's worth I'm proud of not being a bog standard Chomskyite or Occupy-type if legitimizing this sort of megalomania and obsession with the sad odysseys of entirely justly persecuted slimeballs is what that leads to.

This is truth.  The Left has this horrible infantile tendency to lionize and venerate anyone who fights the same people they dislike, turning that figure into a hero, a saint, and, inevitably and always, a martyr.  The modern hard Left has more hagiography going on than the Venerable Bede published in a lifetime, and you can tell they're hungering for Assange to die a horrible death so they can pin him up with Trotsky and Che Guevara on their "martyrs in the heroic struggle" Tumblr background while continuing to not actually do anything other than talk about their masturbatory fantasies of life "after the revolution," when suddenly scarcity, hunger, and unemployment will magically disappear.  Assange's sins will, nay, must be pardoned, just like the Trotskyites have forgotten the Kronstadt Mutiny when Trotsky murdered the sailors who helped make the Revolution a reality in the first place, because the idea of Assange is more important to them than Assange the man is.

[Gustaf]

a few general points.


-there are plenty of places under still US dominion that have similar or worse living standards than the countries we've been talking about.  and the move away from a US-dominated Latin America has been accompanied by an increase in living standards for the majority of the population.  the typical model has been a Europeanized elite ruling over a morass of the destitute and indigenous.  the reason that Chavez and Castro* and the rest are so hated by the Western media is because they actually invest in and rely on their own populations for support instead of taking US dollars to fund a military dictatorship, allow for foreign capital "investment" to exploit cheap labor and natural resources and then expatriate the profits, etc.  the people who pay for mass media (and run economics schools) hate this sh**t and back coups whenever they can in the name of stability (Chile, Honduras, Cuba, Venezuela, Haiti have all been subjected to at least one US-backed coup attempt in the past fifty years, three of them in the last ten years).


-even assuming that Gustaf's statement is true, "I support an order that has led to the best standard of living the poor have ever seen", what does it prove?  it does not prove that this order should persist.  surely he is aware of the most elemental Marxist-Leninist doctrine, that of "stages of history", when the agrarian pre-capitalist gives way to the capitalist which gives way to the socialist.

two sub-points are instructive here.  a) the evidence is that the time for this transition is beyond ripe.  in the US the wage rate per unit of productivity has hit the absolute toilet since the 1970s, meaning the charms of growth have ceased to be dispersed around the society at all -- now this phenomenon is expanding beyond the underclass and through the middle class, as even the top 20% 'political class' has been smashed here in the late neoliberal era.  Gustaf will retort that, even as wages and wealth are falling, quality-of-life is increasing... I don't see how this is true?  sure the underclass can now dilly time away on their iPhone that they bought on a credit card at 30% APY, but they're also working 80 hours per week and can't afford to take advantage of that beautiful new medical technology... where's the quality of life if there's no time?  this phenomenon has hit the middle classes as well... I could go on forever, but one more thing.  6-year-olds now have 50% less lingustic capacity than 6-year-olds did in the 1950s.  why?  people their parents are always working and there are 34 kids for one teacher in their first grade class, so they never interact with adults, only with each other, and development is stunted.

the second sub-point is an old point, that all of the economics models in your textbooks treat natural resources as infinite, the "dirty secret" (Wallerstein) that is externalization of costs... yes, in the perfect fictional world the government then legislates to take care of the externalization, but in the real world economic power is political power, capital captures the democratic process with ease, leading to a vicious cycle (in the midst of an environmental crisis the US is not discussing new, tougher standards but instead wants to eliminate the EPA).


*using Castro mostly in past tense here.  the old Castro that had the USSR to rely on.

if I provoke, I hit a nerve -- I succeed.

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

Anything that befalls Julian Assange he has brought upon himself with his execrable and cowardly behavior. It's not even so much about the fact that he's a sleazy pervert any more as it about his belief that he is above the law and above anybody's moral standards but his own, which seem to run to 'that which gets my dick wet and/or my face in the newspapers'--such theatrically, giving speeches from balconies! Oh, he's a regular Wallenberg. But that isn't what reality is, is it? That's not the reality of the streets or the reality of the Cross or the reality of anything at all except the pathological need to have some sort of hipster messiah to sublimate fantasies of escape that people are too stupid and uncreative to deal with in any way that's actually constructive or does anybody except Julian Assange's penis which can do no wrong any lick of good. This is exactly why I hate the New Left. It's why my own political attitudes have become more, shall we say, antipositivist and, dare I say, YES! in some ways crypto-theocratic over the years, and whatever one may think that that's worth I'm proud of not being a bog standard Chomskyite or Occupy-type if legitimizing this sort of megalomania and obsession with the sad odysseys of entirely justly persecuted slimeballs is what that leads to.

This is truth.  The Left has this horrible infantile tendency to lionize and venerate anyone who fights the same people they dislike, turning that figure into a hero, a saint, and, inevitably and always, a martyr.  The modern hard Left has more hagiography going on than the Venerable Bede published in a lifetime, and you can tell they're hungering for Assange to die a horrible death so they can pin him up with Trotsky and Che Guevara on their "martyrs in the heroic struggle" Tumblr background while continuing to not actually do anything other than talk about their masturbatory fantasies of life "after the revolution," when suddenly scarcity, hunger, and unemployment will magically disappear.  Assange's sins will, nay, must be pardoned, just like the Trotskyites have forgotten the Kronstadt Mutiny when Trotsky murdered the sailors who helped make the Revolution a reality in the first place, because the idea of Assange is more important to them than Assange the man is.

Oh, believe me, I as a Christian am far from universally opposed to the idea of using perceived exemplars from a half-remembered past as symbols. It's partially what the study of history is inherently about; I've become convinced, for instance, of my inability to completely 'reconstruct' and 'know' the writer I'm studying, who's only been dead for about half as long as she was alive in the first place.

What I think is perverse is when this is applied to every aspect of a person in a whitewashing manner. Augustine and Patrick and Julian (the late-medieval English one!) and all the other saints, and Bodhidharma and the other teachers and patriarchs, were idealized partially through of a narrative of recognizing and working with or through flaws. That may not always come across in popular piety but it was always part of the received understanding. I don't think the modern process of secular canonization (from the Left or otherwise, but I'm more familiar with it from the Left because I'm, broadly speaking, on the Left) has the same capacity to accommodate that recognition of flaws, and I also think it lacks the discernment to separate the flawed but admirable (I'd include for instance Victor Jara in this category, although I'd be hesitant to include certain elements of the government he supported) from those who are just personally godawful, no matter whose uncomfortable secrets they're publishing on the Internet.

[© tweed]

I attempt to address some of these issues here.  https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=158043.0

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

Thank you, Tweed. I doubt it'll staunch my key concerns but I'll make sure to peruse it at some point this evening.

[Antonio the Sixth]

Anything that befalls Julian Assange he has brought upon himself with his execrable and cowardly behavior. It's not even so much about the fact that he's a sleazy pervert any more as it about his belief that he is above the law and above anybody's moral standards but his own, which seem to run to 'that which gets my dick wet and/or my face in the newspapers'--such theatrically, giving speeches from balconies! Oh, he's a regular Wallenberg. But that isn't what reality is, is it? That's not the reality of the streets or the reality of the Cross or the reality of anything at all except the pathological need to have some sort of hipster messiah to sublimate fantasies of escape that people are too stupid and uncreative to deal with in any way that's actually constructive or does anybody except Julian Assange's penis which can do no wrong any lick of good. This is exactly why I hate the New Left. It's why my own political attitudes have become more, shall we say, antipositivist and, dare I say, YES! in some ways crypto-theocratic over the years, and whatever one may think that that's worth I'm proud of not being a bog standard Chomskyite or Occupy-type if legitimizing this sort of megalomania and obsession with the sad odysseys of entirely justly persecuted slimeballs is what that leads to.

This is truth.  The Left has this horrible infantile tendency to lionize and venerate anyone who fights the same people they dislike, turning that figure into a hero, a saint, and, inevitably and always, a martyr.  The modern hard Left has more hagiography going on than the Venerable Bede published in a lifetime, and you can tell they're hungering for Assange to die a horrible death so they can pin him up with Trotsky and Che Guevara on their "martyrs in the heroic struggle" Tumblr background while continuing to not actually do anything other than talk about their masturbatory fantasies of life "after the revolution," when suddenly scarcity, hunger, and unemployment will magically disappear.  Assange's sins will, nay, must be pardoned, just like the Trotskyites have forgotten the Kronstadt Mutiny when Trotsky murdered the sailors who helped make the Revolution a reality in the first place, because the idea of Assange is more important to them than Assange the man is.

Please avoid generalizations like this.

Other than that, I entirely agree.

[Kaine for Senate '18]

This is truth.  The Left has this horrible infantile tendency to lionize and venerate anyone who fights the same people they dislike, turning that figure into a hero, a saint, and, inevitably and always, a martyr.  The modern hard Left has more hagiography going on than the Venerable Bede published in a lifetime, and you can tell they're hungering for Assange to die a horrible death so they can pin him up with Trotsky and Che Guevara on their "martyrs in the heroic struggle" Tumblr background while continuing to not actually do anything other than talk about their masturbatory fantasies of life "after the revolution," when suddenly scarcity, hunger, and unemployment will magically disappear.  Assange's sins will, nay, must be pardoned, just like the Trotskyites have forgotten the Kronstadt Mutiny when Trotsky murdered the sailors who helped make the Revolution a reality in the first place, because the idea of Assange is more important to them than Assange the man is.

Quoted for truth

[© tweed]

as if I'm incapable of fallibility?  there's a double standard, I don't care to flesh it out here, but it's so easy for you, you Obama voters, and everyone else in between... there's such a sence of self-worship that comes with the flag!  and yet we on the real left, the left-of-liberal, express one opinion, say one silly thing, and what do you do?  no surprise, you take it as evidence of your own righteousness.  all I say is, how easy it is to convince yourself your righteousness when every media stream, every College Board, every 101 professor, every parent at a Memorial Day parade will assent, will commend you for your feigned courage.


there's a sad fact for you sad fckers.  there is another life!  and it's understood!  it's understood by men like William Kuntsler, Ramsay Clark, Aaron Burr if we go back far enough.  they understood the flip side of this fcking dumb ass coin that you worship.  oh man, you treat me like a joke, but there's a light here, brilliant people have seen it.  if you want to see that light, come to me, come to us!  and if you don't, don't!  don't convince yourselves of some superiority, all you'll be left with is a moment, at age 50, when you stare at the wall, thinking, well, what if the road had forked in Tweed's direction...?

[Gustaf]

as if I'm incapable of fallibility?  there's a double standard, I don't care to flesh it out here, but it's so easy for you, you Obama voters, and everyone else in between... there's such a sence of self-worship that comes with the flag!  and yet we on the real left, the left-of-liberal, express one opinion, say one silly thing, and what do you do?  no surprise, you take it as evidence of your own righteousness.  all I say is, how easy it is to convince yourself your righteousness when every media stream, every College Board, every 101 professor, every parent at a Memorial Day parade will assent, will commend you for your feigned courage.


there's a sad fact for you sad fckers.  there is another life!  and it's understood!  it's understood by men like William Kuntsler, Ramsay Clark, Aaron Burr if we go back far enough.  they understood the flip side of this fcking dumb ass coin that you worship.  oh man, you treat me like a joke, but there's a light here, brilliant people have seen it.  if you want to see that light, come to me, come to us!  and if you don't, don't!  don't convince yourselves of some superiority, all you'll be left with is a moment, at age 50, when you stare at the wall, thinking, well, what if the road had forked in Tweed's direction...?

Aw. I'm afraid this crossed into sadness now. It's still funny, but it's one of those guilty laughters where you know you should really feel pity.

[MASHED POTATOES. VOTE!]

What the f**k is this?

[opebo]

... his execrable and cowardly behavior. ...he's a sleazy pervert any more as it about his belief that he is above the law and above anybody's moral standards but his own, which seem to run to 'that which gets my dick wet and/or my face in the newspapers'

But Nathan, a desire to have sex is commonplace and normal, not 'perverse', as is a desire for some form of affirmation in the real world - sometimes called 'success', and typified by being seen the media.

I don't really understand your extreme emotional response, Nathan.  Your opponents have no such passion here - I have no idea that Assange is perfect or a saint, I suppose I just consider all of us, including myself, to be real people.  Perhaps you would understand better if you enjoyed life more - had sexual desires and so forth.  

However it is in the nature of power that it does create martyrs, however flawed they are: everyone in prison at this moment is in some sense a martyr to our system of social control, however unpleasant they may appear to be on the (largely imaginary and irrelevant) 'personal level'.  The flaws are created by power just as much as the martyrdom is, and to despise the poor b*stard for his flaws is just as unreasonable as to saint him.

(this is directed, with respect, to you as well Mikado)

[dead0man]

What the f**k is this?

It's the "real" left showing their true colors.

[Gustaf]

... his execrable and cowardly behavior. ...he's a sleazy pervert any more as it about his belief that he is above the law and above anybody's moral standards but his own, which seem to run to 'that which gets my dick wet and/or my face in the newspapers'

But Nathan, a desire to have sex is commonplace and normal, not 'perverse', as is a desire for some form of affirmation in the real world - sometimes called 'success', and typified by being seen the media.

I don't really understand your extreme emotional response, Nathan.  Your opponents have no such passion here - I have no idea that Assange is perfect or a saint, I suppose I just consider all of us, including myself, to be real people.  Perhaps you would understand better if you enjoyed life more - had sexual desires and so forth.  

However it is in the nature of power that it does create martyrs, however flawed they are: everyone in prison at this moment is in some sense a martyr to our system of social control, however unpleasant they may appear to be on the (largely imaginary and irrelevant) 'personal level'.  The flaws are created by power just as much as the martyrdom is, and to despise the poor b*stard for his flaws is just as unreasonable as to saint him.

(this is directed, with respect, to you as well Mikado)

Why this obsession with normality, opebo? Why do you feel the need to impose your set of values on Nathan or anyone else? Most people are actually not that fixated on sex.