Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2019/04/04/waiting-for-assange-a-tragico.html
An oddly epic tweet thread by a reporter who stakes out Julian Assange of Wikileaks for promised news, and nothing happens.
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and nothing happens.
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Hey, spoilers!
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I had not realized that the Ecuadorian Embassy was a straight up gingerbread mansion. Neat.
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London can be pretty intense if you know the right spots.
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Republicans were talking like there was some conspiracy that CNN was there when Roger Stone was arrested. The reality is most assuredly as mundane as this. They probably had people staked out for a while (Stone himself was saying he expected to be arrested any day) and if he wasn’t arrested that day, their story would have been much more like this one.
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I was in Harrods in 2016. If I had known I was so close, I would have gone around to have a balcony chat with The Julian.
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A touch of irony here (if Assange ends up in prison):
In 1957, the San Francisco Actors’ Workshop performed Waiting for Godot in San Quentin Penitentiary. Surprisingly (given the bewilderment of some of the general public), the inmates understood the play and (per critic/dramatist Martin Esslin) immediately so.
Perhaps WfG could serve as a manual for Assange… later.
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The Ecuadorian Embassy is one flat (apartment) inside the building
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I’m pretty sure I’d have tossed the little shit out when it became readily apparent he didn’t give a shit about “spreading truth”. What a tosser.
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Obligatory reminder that Assange is not being pursued due to whatever he supposedly may have done with Russia; he’s being pursued by the USA because he exposed American war crimes.
He’s a douche, yes. But if you’re cheering for his persecution, consider what side you’re taking.
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Except, of course, for the fact he penetrated a sleeping woman (among other self-admitted grosseries), and then skipped bail to avoid being physically sent to a trial about specifically that.
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Do you actually believe that the no-longer-active Swedish investigation has anything at all to do with why there are current US charges against him?
As I said:
- Julian is a douche.
- That is not why he is being persecuted.
IMO, “douche” will never be quite adequate for an accusation of “forcible rape”.
He wasn’t accused of being “handsy”.
I think his bail jumping had a lot to do with where he is today. YMMV.
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I’d love it if the years-long international pursuit of Assange was a reflection of how seriously we take allegations of rape. But I’m left with the sense that if you want a rape complaint to be taken seriously you still need:
- At least five others who have been raped by the same person; or
- For the offender to be a political enemy of the government or one of it’s allies
Obviously (1) is not so much a sure thing.
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I also think that if Assange had been a hypothetical black immigrant in Sweden, accused under the same conditions, he wouldn’t have had walking-around privileges, easy bail, the ability to stall and reschedule police interview requests, possession of his passport, etc. etc.
He was “persecuted” under an amazingly loose leash.
What he’s had all along is the ability to aggressively spin his story from the Wikileaks twitter account, and that’s why there’s a press scrum around the embassy today, waiting for something to happen solely and completely because “Wikileaks said it would”.
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Vladimir: What do we do now?
Estragon: Wait.
Vladimir: Yes, but while waiting.
Estragon: What about hanging ourselves?
Vladimir: Hmm. It’d give us an erection.
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Yeah, but the cat can stay.
(well, actually I’m more of a dog person, but still, has the cat done anything to deserve being made homeless, and probably put into “the system” (which for full grown pets is frequently “you have a week or two to score a new owner, otherwise big sleep time”)…and yeah, I’m almost of a mind to say “yeah, being a cat”, but I’m not quite that heartless…so…Assange goes, the cat can hang out)
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