Call for openness after Wikileaks

Newsweek's Julian Assange Christmas Photos Are Really Quite Magical
One of the many faces of possibly being extradited, via Robert King/Newsweek ​Did anyone ever watch the sentimental, autobiographical Truman Capote short called "A Christmas Memory"? In it, an orphaned boy lives with a group of elderly relatives, one of whom is his best friend, an eccentric, childlike old woman known as "Sook." They gallivant through the hills and dales together, buying whiskey and making fruitcase and chopping down their very own Christmas Tree. That kind of sums up how...

Wise up to WikiLeaks, British govt warned
Britain's freedom of information Watchdog has warned government ministers that the Wikileaks revelations mean they can no longer assume they are operating in private. Information Commissioner Christopher Graham said that rather than "clamming up", ministers needed to "wise up" to the fact that almost any official communication could potentially be made public. "We are strongly of the view that things should be published," he said, according to The Guardian newspaper on Friday. "Where you're open...

"Many Arab officials are US spies in their own countries"
"... Top Officials in several Arab countries have close links with the CIA, and many officials keep visiting US embassies in their respective countries voluntarily to establish links with this key US intelligence agency, says Julian Assange, founder of the whistle-blowing website, Wikileaks. “These officials are spies for the US in their countries,” Assange told Al Jazeera Arabic channel in an interview yesterday. The interviewer, Ahmed Mansour, said at the start of the interview wh...

WikiLeaks backers say Zimbabwe websites shut down
President Robert Mugabe's wife Grace is suing a private newspaper for $15 million for publishing details from U.S. cables on Wikileaks saying she gained "tremendous profits" from illicit diamonds. The Activists, acting under the name Anonymous, said in a statement on their website: "We are targeting Mugabe and his regime in the ZANU-PF who have outlawed the free press and threaten to sue anyone publishing WikiLeaks." The Zimbabwean government web portal www.gta.gov.zw was unreachable on Thursda...

A WikiLeaks Christmas: Julian Assange gets festive
He may be under virtual House Arrest, but Wikileaks founder Julian Assange managed to enjoy a very Merry Christmas all the same....

Government-Secret Celebutante Julian Assange Poses For Weird X-Mas Photos
Here is a super cool action-shot of Julian Assange jumping over a fence at the Tower of London after feeding some cornish hens, or whatever, for some reason. Yes, Julian Assange has nothing better to do than pose for some cute photos in a Santa costume for Newsweek while he celebrated the birth of the original hater of secrets, the Baby Jesus, at the ol’ Rape mansion. At least he’s having fun with this Rape thing! You’ve got to. Here’s to this guy hopefully not leaking t...

Dave Winer: America's Tienanmen and Blogger of the Year 2010
First, previous Blogger of the Years. In 2001, I chose a BOTY by nominating several people and letting the readers vote. That year, the choice was Joel Spolsky, who went on to do many great things, such as the Joel on Software books and the Stack Overflow website. Then in 2007, I named NakedJen as the BOTY. To Jen, being a blogger means being vulnerable, exposing who you are, and standing by yourself. A blogger is a sole practitioner, who sticks his or her neck out, but does it with conviction...

TSA Harassment!!! (Comedy)
Please read our About Page, our Disclaimer, and our Comments Policy. Please note: InformationLiberation is neither liberal or conservative. When one takes the time to research the "liberal elite," whom the Conservatives oppose, and the "conservative elite," whom the liberals oppose, one finds both "elite" are one and the same. "Liberal" or "Conservative" is not a substantive choice, it is only the carefully crafted illusion of a choice, for both parties come together when they are instructed to....

Manning chat logs contain no smoking gun, Wired editors claim
Wired editors claim"> Stumble This! Editors with Wired Magazine have finally come forward to say that the chat logs in their possession contain no further evidence of a Conspiracy between Wikileaks founder Julian Assange and the soldier accused of leaking 250,000 US State Department cables. In his Monday column, Salon's Glenn Greenwald suggested that Wired Senior Editor Kevin Poulsen committed "one of the worst journalistic disgraces of the year" by withholding the majority of chat logs that co...

Montana's "Inquisition" and Wikileaks
So you are a little girl in grammar school in 1917. Your name is Christine Shupp and you live near Melville in Sweet Grass County. Every morning after the pledge of allegiance to the flag, the teacher makes you, alone, kneel down on the floor and kiss the flag. It is because you are German. You are a rancher in Rosebud County and you call WWI "a Millionaire's war" and you are dragged off by neighbors to jail. You're in a saloon and call war time food regulations "a big joke" and you are sentence...

More Assange
Nick Davies of The Guardian: Jagger also insists that she has a right to know who leaked the file to the Guardian and says that the leak was part of “an obvious effort to conduct a smear campaign” against Assange. Setting aside for a moment the head-splitting hypocrisy that a supporter of Wikileaks wants to hunt down the source of a leak, there are two similar problems with this claim. First, Jagger has no idea who leaked that file (and made no attempt to find out). Second, if she ...

Poll: Assange 2010's 'Most Intriguing'
Published: Dec. 31, 2010 at 3:30 AM Atlanta-based CNN.com said Wikileaks founder Julian Assange was chosen by visitors as the "Most Intriguing Person" of 2010. UPI/Hugo Philpott ATLANTA, Dec. 31 (UPI) -- Atlanta-based CNN.com said Wikileaks founder Julian Assange was chosen by visitors as the "Most Intriguing Person" of 2010. The news organization said Assange received 25 percent of the votes in the online poll, with runners-up including President Barack Obama, Facebook mastermind Mark...

Your pick for Most Intriguing Person of 2010 is ...
He's been called a criminal, a spy and a champion of the First Amendment. Some think he’s a villain. Some see him as a hero. The only thing that’s beyond debate: Julian Assange has more intrigue than the pulp section of a bookstore. Wikileaks' mastermind, the guy who everyone loved to hate or loved to defend, got the most first-place votes (25%) on CNN.com's “Most Intriguing Person” poll for 2010. Following Assange were: 10. Antoine Dodson, whose thoughts a...

Julian Assange Case Is Being Driven by a Tangled Web in Sweden
* The Accusers--The women who have alleged that Assange committed sexual crimes, under Swedish law, are Anna Ardin and Sofia Wilen. Our source says Ardin has a background in the Foreign Service and has spent time at the U.S. Embassy in Washington, D.C., and worked as a spy in Cuba. She has ties to the Swedish media and apparently has left the country for the Palestinian West Bank. Little is known about Wilen, other than that she is an aspiring photographer. Numerous Web sites have reported tha...

WikiLeaks backers say Zimbabwe websites shut down
LONDON | Thu Dec 30, 2010 3:10pm EST LONDON (Reuters) - Cyber Activists say they have brought down Zimbabwean government websites after the president's wife sued a newspaper for publishing a Wikileaks cable linking her with illicit diamond trading. President Robert Mugabe's wife Grace is suing a private newspaper for $15 million for publishing details from U.S. cables on Wikileaks saying she gained "tremendous profits" from illicit diamonds. The activists, acting under the name Anonymous, sai...

Persistent listener gets NPR to run WikiLeaks correction
For over a month, the radio network has repeatedly referred to the release of “thousands” of confidential State Department cables, when in fact only 1,947 are publicly available. Ombud Alicia Shepard writes: “Here’s a hat tip to Henry Norr, a San Francisco listener who frequently complains about NPR’s news coverage” and forced the Wikileaks correction. Romenesko Archives: SF Chronicle suspends Norr over war Protest. (March 27, 2003/summary only; links are de...

Many Arab officials have close CIA links: Assange
DOHA: Top Officials in several Arab countries have close links with the CIA, and many officials keep visiting US embassies in their respective countries voluntarily to establish links with this key US intelligence agency, says Julian Assange, founder of the whistle-blowing website, Wikileaks. “These officials are spies for the US in their countries,” Assange told Al Jazeera Arabic channel in an interview yesterday. The interviewer, Ahmed Mansour, said at the start of the interview whic...

The American Government Enables Worldwide Sharia
This has its advantages and disadvantages. One of the disadvantages is that we have been dismissed as “Euro-Trash”, and are therefore not worth reading in the USA. Furthermore, we’d have a much larger audience if we focused more on American politics. On the plus side: we can look at our own country from a slightly different perspective. By perching on a virtual Atlantic Wall and peering westward, sometimes we get to see American Foreign Policy from the standpoint of its benefic...

Naomi Wolf Anti-Feminist of the year
Her eyes are blue because she's a quart low Just when you think she’s plumbed the depths of stupidity, she grabs a shovel and starts digging: Why is Rape Different? As Swedish prosecutors’ sex-crime allegations against Wikileaks founder Julian Assange play out in the international media, one convention of the coverage merits serious scrutiny. We know Assange by name. But his accusers - the two Swedish women who have brought the complaints against him - are consistently identif

Polish court sentences Swede over Auschwitz theft
KRAKOW, Poland | Thu Dec 30, 2010 9:52am EST KRAKOW, Poland (Reuters) - A Polish court sentenced a Swedish man Thursday to nearly three years in Prison for masterminding the theft of the infamous "Arbeit macht frei" sign from the entry gate of the former Nazi death camp of Auschwitz. The sign -- an enduring symbol of the Holocaust whose English meaning is "Work sets you free" -- was stolen last December, triggering international outrage, especially in Israel and among Jewish groups, but was s...

Swede jailed for Auschwitz sign theft
Source: Reuters A Polish court has sentenced a Swedish man to nearly three years in Prison for organising the theft of the "Arbeit macht frei" sign from the entry gate of the former Nazi death camp of Auschwitz. The sign was stolen last December but was soon recovered. The court in Krakow jailed Anders Högström, 34, for two years and eight months. When the court announced its decision, Högström said calmly: "Yes, I accept the verdict." Högström, caught in Sweden in February, wi

Polish court sentences Swede over Auschwitz theft
KRAKOW, Poland | Thu Dec 30, 2010 12:33pm EST KRAKOW, Poland (Reuters) - A Swedish man was sentenced to nearly three years in Prison Thursday for masterminding the theft of the infamous "Arbeit macht frei" sign from the entry gate of the former Nazi death camp of Auschwitz. The enduring symbol of the Holocaust whose English meaning is "Work sets you free," was stolen last December. The act triggered international outrage, especially in Israel and among Jewish groups, but the metal sign was so...

"Swedish prison. Like, I could live there, like it's nice ..."
We join the inane chatter about Julian Assange somewhere near the end of the 50th minute: "... just because he's a rapist doesn't mean I'm saying he's some some sort of violent... It's such a loaded term...." There's much more, of course, but that gives you a feeling for the discussion. Continue at your own risk. ...

Karzai Keeps Minister Considered Corrupt by US
Source: Associated Press WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. officials pressured Afghan President Hamid Karzai to remove a former warlord from atop the energy and water ministry a year ago because they considered him corrupt and ineffective, and threatened to end aid unless he went. Karzai rebuffed the request, according to secret diplomatic records, and the minister — privately termed "the worst" by U.S. officials — kept his perch at an agency that controls $2 billion in U.S. and allied projects. U.S.

WikiLeaks reveals flaws of State Dept.'s information-sharing tool
WASHINGTON -- Before the infamous leak, the 250,000 State Department cables acquired by anti-secrecy Activists resided in a database so obscure that few Diplomats had heard of it. It had a bureaucratic name, Net-Centric Diplomacy, and served an important mission: the rapid sharing of information that could help uncover threats against the United States. But like many bureaucratic inventions, it expanded beyond what its creators had imagined. It also contained risks that no one foresaw. Million...