Notes from the Julian Assange Saga

Does the American public have a right to know what its own government is up to and has been up to these past many decades? Apparently not, when you look at how the government stomps down any reporter who strives to shine a light on what our veiled government entities--FBI, CIA, NSC, Homeland Security--are doing under cover of darkness. 

This week, Wikileaks founder Julian Assange was put on trial in England after having taken refuge for a number of years in the Ecuadorian embassy. What follows here are some quotes that I extracted from Wikiquotes and Twitter yesterday.

“It is impossible to correct abuses unless we know that they’re going on.”
—Julian Assange

"That's what a journalists job is, to hold those in power, elected politicians and everyone else to account, we have got to protect journalists"  
--Jeremy Corbyn speaks to @SkyNews On Assange

"The goal is to use Afghanistan to wash money out of the tax bases of the US and Europe through Afghanistan and back into the hands of a transnational security elite. The goal is an endless war, not a successful war.”  
--Julian Assange speaking in 2011

"He should be given a medal -- he is contributing to democracy.”
--Noam Chomsky on Julian Assange

"To every political leader and journalist making and writing speeches: You can't save Navalny. You *can* still save Assange. If you're silent here, when and where you can actually influence the outcome, you were never standing up for principles—you were just hoping for applause. x.com/Snowden/status…"
--Edward Snowden

“Their fear of Assange and malice toward him tells us that the WikiLeaks documents were real. Anyone who read them had their world view changed forever. Guessing and knowing are two different things.”

"As they lecture us endlessly about human rights in other countries, the Biden administration is trying to kill journalist Julian Assange for the crime of embarrassing the CIA. His wife Stella joins us from his extradition hearing", sad but very true!”

“It's crucial to untangle facts from politics in the Assange case. Yes, there were allegations that the CIA discussed actions against him, but that shouldn't overshadow the debate on press freedom. Assange's actions have raised complex questions about journalism and national security. While he may have broken the law by aiding hackers, the severity of his penalty should be assessed fairly. We need to consider the impact on freedom of expression and media accountability.”
--Quantica

The contradiction of people screaming of the  treatment of Alexei Navalny say nothing over the treatment of Julian Assange. Wonder why that is?

--Eric Pistey

Why punish julian assange who is only the messenger of truth, he is not the perpetrator of the crimes committed by the USA who is trying to cover up their crimes by attempting to shoot down the messenger to sweep their crimes under the carpet and out of view.

--Sweet Jennet

“This is not justice; never could this be justice, the verdict was ordained long ago. Its function is not to determine questions such as guilt or innocence, or truth or falsehood. It is a public relations exercise, designed to provide the government with an alibi for posterity. It is a show of wasteful vengeance; a theatrical warning to people of conscience.”

—J. Assange

“A Society that prohibits the capacity to speak in truth extinguishes the capacity to live in justice.”

—Chris Hedges

“The New York Times reported that Assange’s lawyers contend that the U.S. is prosecuting him for political reasons. That is correct. Assange very publicly shamed the U.S. government. And the U.S. government does not stand for humiliation. (Just witness its treatment of Iran for over 40 years because of the hostage crisis.) For that, Assange has been hounded, falsely accused, tortured, prosecuted and threatened with 175 years in prison. The same fate awaited whistleblower Edward Snowden, had he not had the sense to flee to a place the U.S. could not follow, namely Russia.... Had Assange died in Belmarsh prison, or should he, that would be fine with the United States, because there’s one thing the U.S. military and national security state will not tolerate and that is publication of their crimes abroad, in other words, the truth.“
—The Atrocious Prosecution of Julian Assange, by Eve Ottenberg, CounterPunch, (19 February 2021)

WikiLeaks and Assange have done more to expose the dark machinations and crimes of the American Empire than any other news organization. Assange, in addition to exposing atrocities and crimes committed by the United States military in our endless wars and revealing the inner workings of the Clinton campaign, made public the hacking tools used by the CIA and the National Security Agency. their surveillance programs and their interference in foreign elections... And WikiLeaks worked swiftly to save Edward Snowden, who exposed the wholesale surveillance of the American public by the government, from extradition to the United States by helping him flee from Hong Kong to Moscow...

—Chris Hedges

Related Links

How Much Did WikiLeaks Damage U.S. National Security?

The Beginning of America's Imperialist Ambitions

"I was in a lineup with Donald Blom" -- A True Crime Anecdote

On May 26, 1999, 19-year-old Katie Elizabeth Poirier went missing from D. J.'s Expressway Conoco convenience store in Moose Lake, Minnesota, where she worked nights as a clerk. Donald Albin Blom is now serving life in prison without the possibility of parole for her murder in 1999. A registered sex offender involved in five cases of kidnapping and sexual assault prior to Poirier's murder, he was suspected of being a serial killer by case investigators. 

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I was making music with a group of musicians this summer when one of the guitar players, John Hyde, told us about how he ended up in a police lineup with Donald Blom, the convicted murderer of Katie Poirier. The story intrigued me because I can't recall ever meeting someone who was in a police lineup. 

John Hyde, far right. Donald Blom, second from left.

"It was late in the day when I got a call about the lineup from Sgt. Dannon Bauer," Hyde said. "He is the guy next to me in the lineup. He said he was looking for someone blonde with a mustache."

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In 1978, John Hyde worked with the Duluth Police Department for a year, not as an officer but as a tech guy. This became a career stepping stone. Hyde had an opportunity to work in this field in exchange for an FCC license and he took it. He returned to the DPD in 1992 and worked there till 2020.  

One day, Dannon Bauer, a department seargent, said, "Report to Moose Lake." When he arrived Hyde was told to dress in prison garb so that he could be placed in a police lineup with four other officers and Donald Blom at the Carlton County jail. Blom had been accused and later convicted of the abduction and murder of Katie Poirier, a high profile case in our region.

When Hyde reported to jail he was escorted to a break room where he and the others would wait for Blom to be delivered to the station for the lineup. "I picked up a magazine to read," Hyde said.

The video surveillance footage showed that the man who abducted Poirier was wearing a baseball jersey, so each of the men would take turns being dressed in a #23 New York Yankees jersey, then ushered into the small room with a two-way mirror. Each was then instructed to read a statement.

Because Blom was late in arriving, it became a late night for all involved. 

"I wasn't intimidated by him (Blom)," Hyde said. "I didn't talk to him. He did talk to one person in the room."

There were three FBI guys involved in this case, Hyde believed. Hyde had interactions with two of them, but not the supervisor they reported to. One of the FBI guys was a jokester, ribbing Hyde by saying, "They picked you out of the lineup." 

Hyde later had to go to court to have his identity verified. Afterwards he went to lunch with the FBI guys.

In an interesting twist, John's 15-year-old son Andrew Hyde also got involved in the case. There was a call for volunteers to go out and search the woods to find evidence regarding where the body might have been buried or disposed of. More than 100 National Guardsmen and an equal number of volunteers participated in the evidence quest. Sadly, the search yielded results. Dental remains were found in a fire pit on Blom's 20-acre property. 

Photo courtesy John Hyde

A Big Black Eye for the FBI -- Richard Jewell Is A "Must See"

Paul Walter Hauser and Sam Rockwell with director Clint Eastwood. 

This Clint Eastwood film is an absolute powerhouse. Eastwood has a history of creating compelling stories and in recent years some especially important ones. With Richard Jewell he's done it again.

The screenwriting was superb. In the first six minutes we have a series of scenes that show us who Richard Jewell was, revealing facets of his character and introducing us to the film's key players in a non-forced manner. Jewell was a good-hearted, but quirky, young man who wanted to do good, but who didn't have a clean sense of boundaries in that regard.

For those unfamiliar with the story, it is about a bomb that exploded in Centennial Park during the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta. Jewell, a security guard at the event, found the backpack containing three large pipe bombs packed with nails and immediately reported it to authorities who called in the bomb squad. Though he did everything in his power to clear the area so that people would be safe, the bomb exploded before it could be defused. Despite his efforts, there were one or two killed and more than a hundred casualties. (Had he not been there it would have certainly done far more damage.)

Sam Rockwell, the other hero.

The media immediately recognized him as a hero, but the FBI placed him on a suspect list, perhaps because they had no other suspects. Instead of using all their powers to find the guilty, they used deceit and every kind of devious means to crucify this innocent man who had no motivation other than to do what was right.

Another real hero in this film is the attorney who stepped in and did everything within his power to protect a vulnerable man.

The real villains? Mainstream media and the irresponsible actions of the FBI.

In addition to an amazing story we see top-notch acting, and superb story-telling in this film. The tension is palpable as we watch the insidious actions of our lawmen trampling Jewell's rights, using bugging equipment and people wearing recording devices to get Jewell to admit he did it. It was literally unbelievable how far they were willing to go.

Jewell made one especially good move. When the FBI set him up and pretended to be making a movie of him as a hero, they gave him a clipboard and asked him to sign a document, on film, of him confessing to the crime. Richard Jewell knew right then he needed to call a lawyer. If he'd not made that call he probably would have received the death penalty and this film would never have been made. Instead he got his life back.

Do you have an attorney whom you could call were you suddenly accused of a crime you didn't commit? That was my own first thought upon watching this film.

Naturally the line from Dylan's "Hurricane" jumps to mind. "It makes you feel ashamed to live in a land where justice is a game."

Afterwards I looked through the movie reviews at imdb.com and thought these noteworthy.

Excellent portrayal of the sleaziness of law enforcement
I have experience dealing with the Feds and found this movie incredibly compelling. So much about this movie hit home for me. Just a few examples, when the Feds came to talk to Jewell and tried to make him sign shady documents, bugging his home, the slick self-righteous agent who thinks he decides who is right and wrong, cleaning out his home supposedly looking for evidence, wasting time on easy, harmless suspects instead of finding the real criminals to boost their career. It's sad. All that time spent looking at Richard Jewell as a suspect while the real terrorist got away. They knew he was innocent, all they had to do was actually do some actual investigative, science-based investigative work instead of using confirmation bias.

Watch a man get mauled by overzealous FBI and frantic media
Jewell becomes a "person of interest" and the frantic media jump on the story. It is frankly incredibly frightening when you put it all into context and see how a man's life gets mauled. Per the usual, Eastwood does a great job to keep the movie going forward. The all- star ensemble cast is incredible: Paul Walter Hauser IS Richard Jewell, and Sam Rockwell, Kathy Bates, Jon Hamm and Olivia Wilde are equally outstanding. This movie was filmed in the Spring of this year, and now barely 6 months later, it is already in theaters.

Clint Eastwood, now 89 going on 90, called security guard Richard Jewell's story "a great American tragedy," and said it's a story he's been trying to tell for five years. I, for one, was gratified to have seen him finish what he started.

Rockwell, Bates and Hauser were pitch perfect.

There was a special moment in the film in which Kenny Rogers was performing the evening before the bomb blast. Rogers just passed away earlier this spring, so he very likely had a chance to see this film when it was released last year. He may even have received some royalties from the song's inclusion in the film. "You gotta know when to hold 'em, know when to fold 'em."

The media bloodhounds did not fare well in this film. Shrill, intrusive, careless. Not too unlike today, actually.

Richard Jewell was played by Paul Walter Hauser, a relatively unknown whom you may recall from the film I, Tonya, about another Olympics-related crime. Mad Men's Dan Draper was the lead FBI agent whose odious behavior really makes your gut churn. Kathy Bates as Richard's mother is likewise stellar as she sees the cruel way her son is maligned by the press and can't comprehend how this could be happening. And Sam Rockwell was pitch perfect as Watson Bryant, the attorney who rescued Richard from a fate worse than death, the permanent public indignity of being branded a terrorist bomber.

When it was over, another Eastwood film with a similar theme came to mind about a hero who gets treated like a criminal, the film Sully, starring Tom Hanks. Films like these and others--like Just Mercy, The Oxbow Incident, 12 Angry Men--show how Hollywood can serve a redemptive role in society. Who is stepping up to be the next Clint Eastwood with the courage and commitment to shed light on these kinds of stories?

* * * *
Related Links
A Kenny Rogers Memory
A Photo Gallery from the film
Richard Jewell, the man and the aftermath

Pros and Cons of the Storytelling Epidemic

If you're in marketing and advertising, you can't help but to have noticed how big the word  "storytelling" has become. It's almost as if it were the word of the year.

There's no question stories have power. Stories connect with people. And you've got to admit that reading the story of Jacob and Esau in Genesis is far more interesting than reading all those lists in the Book of Leviticus.

In the marketing world you might even find people who say that without a good story you can't succeed.

This is one of the reasons so many marketers love the new opportunities generated by social media. You get verbal stories, video stories, visual stories (Infographics) and personal stories. It's in your face everywhere you look these. In fact, "Stories" is the latest technique Facebook is using to keep people engaged. It's not enough to tell stories on your Wall. Now you can almost effortlessly keep "adding" to "your story" in that Stories box.

This past week I brought home a book from the library called The Art of Immersion by Frank Rose. I picked it up because the cover design looked interesting and the title intriguing. When I got home I noticed the subtitle: How the digital generation is remaking Hollywood, Madison Avenue, and the way we tell stories.

The prologue begins by noting how anthropologists have observed that storytelling is a fundamental part of being human. He writes, "Just as the brain perceives patterns in the visual forms of nature--a face, a figure, a flower--and in sound, so it detects patterns in sound."

Then he goes on to share the results of a 1944 study in which 34 college students were shown a short film and asked what was happening. Essentially it was two triangles and a circle moving on a two dimensional surface. There was also a stationary rectangle partially open on one side.

What was striking is how nearly every student began creating a narrative about what they imagined was going on. Two men fighting for a woman? All kinds of storylines emerged, including the emotions of these "characters."

How strange.

So it is that our brain is constantly connecting dots to create narratives.

Another book that I brought home from the library this week is also about stories. It's titled Republic of Lies by Anna Merlan. The subtitle is American Conspiracy Theories and Their Surprising Rise To Power.

The Amazon blurb calls it "riveting tour through the landscape and meaning of modern conspiracy theories, exploring the causes and tenacity of this American malady, from Birthers to Pizzagate and beyond."

I've only just started this one, but the Prologue certainly sets you up to want to read more. Author Anna Merlan begins by telling readers about a Caribbean cruise she went on. The ship's passengers were all members of various conspiracy groups. Because she was not a member of a conspiracy group, some passengers thought she was possibly FBI. Once an idea like that gets planted, it can be hard to dislodge.

Three quarters of the reviews are 5 star, but the one star reviewers are out there, one calling it nothing more than a a rant.

I only mention the book because of the previous illustration above which shows how our minds create stories. How many conspiracy theories are based on connections between events and how many are simply a mental construct in which disparate pieces seem to fit the story?

I think of the constellations in our night sky. Here's a cluster of stars, three of them serving to be the belt, and very lightly a knife sheath. At some point in human history he was given a name, The Hunter, or Orion. There are several stories about Orion in Greek Mythology. How this batch of stars came to be a basket of stories is itself quite intriguing. (You can read more about Orion here.)

The trigger for this blog post, though, was a blog post by Ad Contrarian Bob Hoffman. Hoffman acknowledges the power of stories, noting that a good story is memorable. What concerns him, however, is when marketing decisions are made on anecdotal evidence instead of actual data. 

That's a point directed toward the marketers in my audience. Check out Bob Hoffman's The Danger In Storytelling.

* * * *
And with that, I bid adieu.