On Sat, Jul 3, 2021 at 2:50 PM Karl <[1]gmkarl@gmail.com> wrote:

   I'm sorry, I'm not intentionally ignoring it, I just don't know which
   you are referring to.  Please repeat the point so I don't miss it.
   Thanks!

   Did you get the email at this link containing a reference to the
   bombing of
   MOVE? [2]https://lists.cpunks.org/pipermail/cypherpunks/2021-June/08867
   7.html

   Yes, in the past 250 years, our nation -- which was founded on slavery,
   fought countless wars over the globe, is the only country to use
   nuclear arms in battle, etc, etc -- has done terrible things.  There
   have probably been *billions* of individual court cases, and maybe a
   trillion interactions between law enforcement and the general public.
   Yes, yes, a thousand times yes, there are countless examples of
   horrible atrocities to point to and select out.
   But that would be to cherrypick the evidence to suit your needs.  The
   overwhelming number of court cases are completely boring, mundane, and
   non-controversial.  We are choosing to select the most politically
   charged, complicated cases and shine a light on them -- and yes, if you
   are suspected, accusted, and convicted of the most deadly, damaging, or
   complicated cases the world has ever seen, yes, the system is not
   optimized for those.
   But to claim that those are somehow representative of the normal course
   of justice is not reasonable.
   I remember recently going on a date with a woman that spent her whole
   life trying to move to the US, talking in horrifying detail of the
   vastly, vastly more common problems experienced elsewhere in the world
   *on a daily, mundane basis*.  It's easy to criticize the US for
   imperfection, or lament that the real world hasn't lived up to your
   dreams.  But what is the point?
   The US exists.  You can either change that, through revolution, or
   improve it through voting.  Those are your choices.  It doesn't matter
   if you like them.  That's just physics; if you don't like it, find a
   new dimension.

   To repeat my point, I'm merely saying the US has done precisely nothing
   to punish Assange yet: he hasn't been on US soil, in US

   Stundin article?  Did you see the Stundin article?

   About one of the witnesses maybe falsifying testimony?  Sounds great, I
   can't wait for Assange's lawyer to mention that, if he eventually shows
   up in court.

   courts, or really touched by the US at all.  The US has *attempted* to
   extradite him for trial, but so far has been unsuccessful.  Assange has
   been accused of breaking a variety of laws in different countries
   (sexual abuse, immigration violations, etc) , and has done

   It is obvious that those are not the accusations that governments are
   concerned with.

   So to confirm, you think that Sweden doesn't care about sexual
   assault?  Or are you saying that you are so personally convinced of
   Assange's innocence that you have no interest in seeing him go to trial
   for it -- his accusers are beneath your notice and have no right to
   justice?  Or are you saying that it's ok that he sexually
   assaulted others, because of the righteousness of his cause?  Saying
   "it's obvious" doesn't make it so.  There seems truly nothing at all
   obvious about Assange's potential crimes... precisely because he has
   refused to stand trial.
   It's entirely possible that Assange is a small footnote in history that
   is being magnified out of proportion, who the grinding, faceless,
   mundane bureaucracy of justice is just trying to run through the
   system.  He's just a guy, who is refusing to show up in court for a
   variety of cases, whose life will be defined not for what information
   he supposedly brought to life, but how he spent his entire life in
   hiding from justice for his actions -- actions that only a tiny,
   shrinking set of people can even remember.
   He's not some grand hero, he's just a dude who is refusing to show up
   in court to answer for his actions.

   his best to run from all of them -- going so far as effectively
   imprisoning himself in an embassy for nearly a decade -- all to avoid
   showing up in *any* court for *any* of these.

   So, the Stundin article reported that the USA had actually gone to
   great efforts to _frame_ Assange.  This was very difficult to learn.
   It was the person doing it who shared it, and they may have put
   themselves at great risk.
   If it is a government that is trying to frame you, is attending court
   in their country a good idea?

   Who is "the government"?  It's literally a million separate employees.
   That's why there are separation of powers; the court system has
   literally never spoken to this witness, *because there has never been
   an actual trial*.  Furthermore, the article makes it sound like the
   witness lied, not that the evidence was fabricated or the government
   was trying to frame anyone.  Regardless, unless you truly believe that
   Stundin is somehow an absolute arbiter of truth -- and their reporting
   is so pristine that it should be taken as gospel without any formal
   process -- then you should agree with me that this is great reporting,
   that will be made available to the defense.

    To a very large degree, nearly all of Assange's suffering has been
   entirely self-imposed hardships caused by running from the long arm of
   the law.

   ==> People run because they are in danger <==
   Let me find and paste a quote for you.
   [3]https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7316471/
   The ongoing torture and medical neglect of Julian Assange
   On Feb 17, 2020, Doctors for Assange demanded an end to the torture and
   medical neglect of Julian Assange.[1] Yet no responsible authority has
   acted. Nils Melzer, the UN Special Rapporteur on Torture and other
   Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, and two medical
   experts visited Mr Assange in prison in May, 2019, concluding that his
   treatment constituted psychological torture, a form of torture aimed at
   destroying the personality of an individual.[2] The situation has
   deteriorated since then, with continued abuses of Mr Assange's
   fundamental rights and the medical risks posed by COVID-19.

   Just to confirm, he is in a UK prison right now -- one that is *denying
   extradition to the US*, right?  Can you elaborate on how this is the
   US's fault?  The US would gladly take Assange into prison here if
   Assange would allow it, and then I think you would have a more credible
   complaint against the US court system.
   Additionally, just to confirm, is this the torture you are referring to
   that you feel justifies him running from the law (including isolating
   himself for 7 years in an embassy), and that you feel is so shocking
   that he should (presumably -- I'm not sure what you are proposing) be
   let free without any trial?
   "He has been held in a bulletproof enclosure unable to fully hear
   proceedings and denied meetings with his lawyers. He was
   strip-searched, handcuffed 11 times, moved to five different holding
   cells, and had privileged client–lawyer communications seized."
   I don't know how many times a typical person is handcuffed, but 11
   doesn't really sound like a lot to me.  And yes, being unable to hear
   well does sound bad, they should definitely improve the audio.  ... but
   torture?  You feel this treatment, as bad as it is, is so bad as to
   justify (presumably) just letting him off the hook without any trial
   for any of his accused crimes?

   "This of course rarely happens" -- are you sure?  There's something
   like 400 thousand federal trials every year; and *millions* of state
   trials.  Are you saying that it is *rare* for people to get justice?
   My sense is that the

   Well, I'm mostly exposed to political convictions.  Everyone I know who
   has gone behind bars (aside from the people I met when I was behind
   them myself) was in there politically.  (At my trial I was released,
   but I was influenced to accept a needless guilty-plea for charges
   unrelated to why I was jailed.)
   Political convictions can go reasonably nicely or severely inhumanly
   poorly.

   So just to confirm, everyone you've met that was convicted, told you
   they were wrongly convicted?  And you feel they are the most reliable
   source of truth, and are so reliable that on your first hand experience
   and the word of your fellow convicts, you are rejecting the justice of
   the entire government?

   I'd love to learn more about this; I'm not familiar with mediation as
   an alternative to trial for criminal cases (I thought that was only an
   option for civil suits).  Can you link me to some good resources you
   recommend to read more?  Thanks!

   I likely conflated civil and criminal.  But if you can figure out who
   your accuser is, you can mediate with them to resolve the reason
   they're accusing you (or alternatively so that you turn yourself in),
   humanly.

   That's not true.  Civil suits are disagreements between people, but no
   law was broken -- this is why you can mediate them, because "justice"
   is "the two parties have found an agreement out of court".  There is no
   equivalent of that for criminal law.  When you break a law, punishment
   is determined by the court system.
   -david

References

   1. mailto:gmkarl@gmail.com
   2. https://lists.cpunks.org/pipermail/cypherpunks/2021-June/088677.html
   3. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7316471/