Here is a photo of Julian Assange after he was dragged from the Ecuadorian embassy in London a few weeks ago:
Excuse me, but why is this man smiling? He is under indictment in the US for publishing the stolen emails of Hillary Clinton and John Podesta, and the UK has an extradition treaty with the US. It’s a convoluted story, but I choose to interpret the Assange saga this way:
Trump’s attorneys filed a motion in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia on Dec. 29, 2017, in the case Roy Cockrum vs. Donald J. Trump for President. Trump’s attorneys said that the Trump campaign (and by inference anyone, including Julian Assange at WikiLeaks) had a right under the First Amendment to publish the DNC and John Podesta emails, even if the emails were stolen. (See
http://www.kingpin.cc/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/dcd-1.17-cv-01370-42-0.pdf
When Assange heard about this, he posted his famous tweet on December 31, 2017, showing a hash, and a video to a song called “Paper Planes” by M.I.A.
Assange uses hashes to unlock and make public any information given to him by whistleblowers around the world, so this hash was recognizable to anyone who knows Assange. The lyrics of the Paper Planes song say, “If you catch me at the border I got visas in my name…and…I've got more records than the KGB…So, uh, no funny business.” This was a thinly veiled message that if anything happened to Assange, he was going to do a data dump. Why did Assange respond in this way? Because he found out about the offer from Trump – essentially forgiving him for his leaks of stolen info – and responded positively.
This is how people sometimes communicate at high levels – in code. That’s why he’s smiling, IMHO. His 9-year ordeal may finally be coming to a close.
After a lot of other stuff happened, some of which is too conspiratorial even for me, on April 11, 2019, British police forces in London announced that Assange had been “arrested on behalf of the United States authorities.”
(See “U.S. Extradites Julian Assange for ‘Conspiracy with Chelsea Manning in 2010,’” Allum Bokhari, Breitbart, April 11, 2019. https://www.breitbart.com/tech/2019/04/11/u-s-extradition-request-forced-assange-arrest/)
This was another move on the chessboard by Trump against the deep state, because Assange has a treasure trove of data he hasn’t released yet. The counter move by the deep state? On May 13, 2019, the Swedish government announced that it was re-opening the rape case against Assange. (See “Sweden Reopens Rape Case Against Julian Assange,” Megan Specia, May 13, 2019, the New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/13/world/europe/wikileaks-julian-assange.html)
Remember that (from the Times article) “The [Assange] investigation stems from an accusation in August 2010 made by a Swedish woman who said Mr. Assange had sexually assaulted her.”
Now, Britain has a choice: Either extradite Assange to Sweden, where he will face trial for the rape case, or be sent to the US, where he will be in the hands of Trump. Since Assange has already accepted Trump’s offer to come to the US, I have to assume that he is ready to spill some deep state secrets. Assange knows where a lot of bodies are buried, and can answer the question of, “Where did Wikileaks get the stolen/hacked DNC emails from?”
The answer to this question will silence a lot of conspiracy theories, among them, that Russia stole the emails, that DNC staffer Seth Rich stole the emails, that KimDotCom stole them, etc.
It is interesting that the Special Counsel, Robert Mueller, could have interviewed Assange but didn’t. If Assange got the stolen emails from Russia, Mueller could have taken his testimony and the 2-year investigation would have been over pretty quick. Trump’s involvement (or non-involvement) would have been confirmed. If he was involved, impeachment proceedings could have quickly moved forward, with evidence for it. So why Didn’t Mueller ever talk to Assange?
That’s what I can’t figure out.
Will the UK extradite J.A. to Sweden or to the US? The answer to that will be interesting.
Postscript: The Two "Coups"
What is interesting is that the (alleged) Democratic attempt to overthrow Donald Trump is eerily similar to the one the Republicans used to try to overthrow FDR (allegedly). The first one was organized in 1933 by wealthy Republican businessmen and was called the “Business Plot.” Roosevelt's election was upsetting for many conservative businessmen at that time. From Wikipedia:
Some writers have said concerns over the gold standard were also involved [FDR took the US off the gold standard in 1933]; Jules Archer, in The Plot to Seize the White House, wrote that with the end of the gold standard, ‘conservative financiers were horrified. They viewed a currency not solidly backed by gold as inflationary, undermining both private and business fortunes and leading to national bankruptcy. Roosevelt was damned as a socialist or Communist out to destroy private enterprise by sapping the gold backing of wealth in order to subsidize the poor.’
During the McCormack–Dickstein Committee hearings General Smedley Butler testified that Gerald C. MacGuire attempted to recruit him to lead a coup, promising him an army of 500,000 men for a march on Washington, DC, and financial backing. Butler testified that the pretext for the coup would be that the president's health was failing. Despite Butler's support for Roosevelt in the election and his reputation as a strong critic of capitalism, Butler said the plotters felt his good reputation and popularity were vital in attracting support amongst the general public and saw him as easier to manipulate than others. Given a successful coup, Butler said that the plan was for him to have held near-absolute power in the newly created position of ‘Secretary of General Affairs’, while Roosevelt would have assumed a figurehead role.”
The (alleged) spying campaign on Donald Trump (Republicans call it no less than a coup – an attempt to overthrow an elected president) – has been organized by Democrats, former CIA director John Brennan and former DNI James Clapper, with the cooperation of officials who served in the Obama administration.
In 1933 it was conservatives concerned about the rise of socialism and Communism. In 2018, it was liberals concerned about the rise of fascism. In 1933 the pretext for the coup was FDR’s failing health. In 2018 the pretext was about Trump’s supposed mental instability. In 1933 Gen. Smedley Butler refused to cooperate with the Republican coup plotters. In 2016 Admiral Mike Rogers, Obama’s head of the NSA, refused to go along with coup plotters in his party who were tapping Trump’s campaign. Rogers, on his own time, went to the Trump Tower in New York to inform the incoming president that he was being spied on. (Trump immediately moved his campaign staff to Florida).
History repeats itself in odd ways!
A lot more will be coming out about the “coup” against Trump in the run-up to the 2020 elections, which will be, in my opinion, the most important election in the history of the United States.