Declan McCullagh and prosecutions

[James A. Donald]

     --
Seth Finkelstein:
 > > >      You appear to think I'm saying "Hey everyone, Declan's a
 > > >      collaborator". No. Rather, I'm asking "Why doesn't Declan
 > > >      get flamingly denounced as a collaborator?". Not because I
 > > >      want to imply you should be. Rather, because I'm trying to
 > > >      understand why it isn't happening.

James A. Donald wrote:
 > > Probably because his testimony is not very exciting, and making
 > > him testify seems more like an act of harassment against him, than
 > > anything very useful to the prosecution.

Seth Finkelstein:
 > I'm fascinated that you view it that way. Isn't it clear why his
 > testimony is useful to the prosecution? It's a key part of the
 > Federal Complaint.

In that case the charges are completely without substance -- but then we 
already knew that was the case.

 > I was going to ask if you think the prosecution got a subpoena
 > signed by the Attorney General himself just for giggles,

No, it was to cause cost and inconvenience to Declan, to deter people from 
reporting the kind of stuff than Declan reports.

It deterred me.  I have avoided mentioning the name of the person charged, 
in this list and in another place, for fear that someone might churn out 
subpoenas on the basis of a groups.google.com search.

 > Again, that is just basic stuff as to how the system functions. If
 > we didn't have Sixth Amendment protections in it, none of this would
 > be happening!

Declan's news articles contain nothing that is not better attested by the 
defendant's own postings.  The subpoena is just routine harassment of 
political enemies, same as in the PGP grand jury, and some of the hearings 
on the communist conspiracy.  Repression as usual.

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          James A. Donald
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