Julian Assange – The Wikileaks Founder and America’s Enemy Number One

06-28-22

Episode Transcription

Made by robots, for robots. Only read if you're weird.

Amen. I have. Have you ever heard of Julian Assange? Oh, yes, yeah, that's that. They serve the it's like dairy queen's Little Mall thing, right. They're g Julius SMOOTHIES, stuff that's really good. Oh my God, people, we just love the theater. No whole atmosphere, you know, we just love going and if you don't get popcorn, you don't get the experience. I can't say most words and I feel like I just ex tradition very well. Yeah, I mean it's not a word, but go ahead. Yeah, we need to rest that guy. We hate this guy. Things I learned last night. Not Orange Julius, Julian Assang. It's pretty close. Have you ever heard of them? Sorry, is that the French is version of it? As what they call it over there? Just Orange Julius, but over there they call it Julius like this, and it's going through Julius, and that sounds legitimately like what they've done out. I mean, you got me there. Yeah, no, I know who this guy is. Let's just go on, do you? Yeah, he's the the the wikileaks Guy. Oh, I don't know. Ay, they beyond that though. Okay, he's got a bad haircut. Yeah, he does have a pretty rough hair yeah, he, and I mean he's had a few haircut Julie says, and the owner of the now Las Vegas Raiders. They go to the same barber. I'll tell you what. Have you seen the owner of the raiders? Why don't you just Google raiders owner? Yeah, let me grab a picture of him. Sure, I'll get a picture of him and I'll get your an audio listeners on our imagine. Imagine like a puppets hair. Yeah, you know I'm talking about. It's pretty bad. That's probably the best description. Like hair. Yeah, I have a doll ever, like a little puppet, you know, and that's what the hair on this human being looks like. You gotta pulled up. Yeah, yeah, hol on, I'm loading it in the propres right now. So cool, two seconds. Yeah, cut this part out also, never mind, leave it in. So here is the owner of the raiders, as I'm saying, is here. Looks like, looks like, it's looks like. Yeah, it is made. Is Worth so much money. Yeah, and he gives his barber none of it. I bet he does this himself. He's got a cut of the cuts his on air. Yeah, for sure, yeah, for sure. Different picture. Worries outside because the sun reflects off of it differently. Yeah, this is a he's got like some ginger hairs. is like a good picture. This is the best picture that exists at this man. This is a good picture of this guy. You know I'm saying pretty no, I say this about him though, joyful. He's a happy man for some such bad hand. Look at the wrinkles on his face. You can tell that he smiles like this a lot. You don't smile like that unless you're genuinely happy. And but Julian Assange, she has a picture of Julian assage, very similar haircut. You can tell they go to the same place. That was fun. I like it. audio listener. He just put a picture of John Christ up there. Orange Julius. Yeah, you know, cut that John Chris joke out. Yeah, see, he looks like okay, so Julia's assage looks like now here's. I don't know how fast you can do this. Okay, okay, but if you can pull up a picture of the Oakland raiders owner and Malfoy from Harry Potter I the best way I can describe Julie Sage is that he looks like he plays the clarinet. Do you say Julia sosage? Whatever, his name is, Julian, Julian asy? I know I'm stuck on Orange Julius. Now, Julian assage. He looks like he plays the clarinets. Got The best, best description of anybody I've ever heard. Yes, he plays the clarinet. Here's DRACO, Yep, here's Mark Davis, the owner of the raiders, and you're telling me that these two put together together equals this person, sage. That's pretty accurate. That's a pretty good yeah, that's a pretty obvious a squared plus B squared equal. See squared. Yeah, that's death. Yeah, anyway, tell me about them. Yeah, so Julian Sage. He's famous for starting wiki leaks once. You probably heard of because they've they started wikipedia. They didn't. They didn't do that. They're different thing. Why don't you tell us what Wiki leaks is? Okay, are you going to in this? I mean now, it's a good time. Yeah, give the listener an idea. Wiki leaks is a website where, if you have something that you wanted to, I don't know, leak to the public, you could log in there and you could have no anonymously give all your information and then what Wiki leaks would do is they would review it and determine whether or not it was legitimate and then they would publish it for you anonymously. And so they weren't actually going out and getting any of this stuff on their own. This is sourced in a space source information. How are they verifying it? How do we know? They read it and they say they go this might he's real. Yeah, that's why last week I went on there and I typed my friend Timothy J stone, is the count or Saint Germain. Submit, submit, and it worked. Yeah, it's on there. I think you have to include like documents. I think there has to be, though. I did. Yeah, I have blooded a whole folder. I'm just it's been my dad. I've been collecting on you for decades. I'm look how old this guy looks. I there's like images that you've doctored and like all these like documents from the FBI that you photoshopped. Yeah, about me being okay, that's great. Well, this picture of him, we're in FBI. Had He knows about the FBI. He must be a part of it. So it's a site that you could leak information through? Yeah, if you had something about they would what really kind of based on a feeling? Did they have fact checkers? Do they have any kind of I think they did, like I don't think it was just like Oh, this feels real, like you had to release your documents, this feels real. There's someone who goes, HMM, I don't get a good feeling about this one. They printed it out and they had two. They have like for Manila folders laying on the table all closed, and then someone just goes getting a good feeling from this one. Good about this? They had this one feels like scientology, but this one, this one, feels real. Now they put it they had scales and their office, like old fashioned scales, and then they had a document that they owned, that they had purchased. This is true. That was real. They would put that on one side and they put it on the other side and if it balanced, then it was true. That's how they did it. I've this one's on make them up. So they would publish these documents and there they've gotten pretty famtasy because there's been a lot of very majoracify things that they published that have come from directly from wiki leaks, and Julian assange is the founder of what key links? He was born in one thousand nine hundred and twenty one and Australia, to parents who were theater people. They watched a lot of movies. Oh my gosh, people, we just love the theater. No whole atmosphere, you know, we just love going and if you don't get popcorn, you don't get the experience. They were. They traveled around Australia and they would put on these productions, okay, and they were they like I mean they acted sometimes, but more than acting they like produced these plays and musicals and things like that. And so by the time Julian graduated high school he had lived in thirty different cities, Oh and gone to thirty different schools and met thirty different people. Just one personal he's school. I'm only allowed to be one of you. WHO WILL IT BE? With the pointings society? Hello, class, we have a new student today. He Hasher's the teacher. I've got a good feeling about that one. Meet me outside at reesis. Tell me everything you know about the Australian government. The kid is just like it's a first grade. Yeah, he's like Hey, I'm like eight, no, sir, I am young. It's as I'm glad you picked me because, man, I am very old. Yeah, but what if he finds like the kid who does know a lot about the government? You know, he's like, okay, I got you, brother. Think children are conspiracy theorist? You think there's like conspiracy theories kids out there? Oh, for sure, I was one of them. Go ahead. Then Julian is size. So He's gone it. He's got a he's a diverse life. Yeah, just think he's experienced a lot of things all over us, the Australian outback and front, back. All right, what if if out back is wouldn't be out front in Oh yeah, out front, I was gonna say in back. He knows the outback, the outfront, the in back and the infront. been to them all. So Julian's got a wide array of experiences and he gets really into computers when he's in high school. So much show that. By the reason, high school, this is like the S. Yeah, this is the s somewhere. So that in the in the s he joined an ethical hacking group which, if you don't know, there's such a thing as ethical hacking, basically what it is is you and all your hacker buddies. You find organizations, whether their companies or governments or crime sent the Kates sure, are doing illegal things and you hack them and you make it to where you change their passwords and stuff. I don't know. Yeah, are you? You Find You just stumble across one of their computers, still logged into facebook, and you post in their status and you go, I got hacked back. They're so embarrassed, so they reveal all their secrets. They stop being a bad person. Oh my gosh, I'm so embarrassed. I have to change my ways. You embarrassed me in the purity that was you group in the well, you know. Yeah, yeah, it's not peer pressure, it's for your pressure. Oh Man, yeah, you're really letting that will wash over you terrible. So, so, yeah, so he got into ethical hacking. Yeah, in the S. and there are some, some ethical hacking groups still. Yeah, there's plenty of them, and in fact it's a huge thing. Like governments have ethical hacking squadrons, okay, that are ethnically hacking their enemies, which, at that point the word ethical comes into question. I was gonna say yeah, I mean anything is ethical. Anything is ethical as long as you are convinced that what you were doing is good. But even if what you're doing is good, is evil, if you have decided that it's good, it's ethical. Yep, Yep. We could get into a whole thing here, you know, but we're not professors, we're not ethics and one of us has a degree. Great. So there is allegedly he was involved, and the major in one thousand nine hundred and eighty nine there was a major hack against the NASA, Nassa. It was a worm virus which were popular in the S. basically it was a bug that went into the computer just broke everything, known as wink, which was worms against nuclear killers, which I don't think the NASA built nukes ever, sure, but they did build rockets which were would be strapp propelling to new nukes. anyways, there's there's allegedly he was a part of that and either a part of developing the wink virus or did develop it and shirts and which is the type of thing. It does fall in line with the type of thing that you're told us. Part of the step very slowly, just so you know. Sorry, really speaking, developed a if that was too slow, for you. Allegedly change it to double spat. Go back, change to the maybe play again. was used against NASA and I don't think that NASA. Okay, whatever, fine thinking. I'll talk faster. Okay, Geez, okay, you're ready. He may or may not have they. Do you set think it's like the friend. Do you feel crazy you're sounding right now, do you there? Are you annoyed that I'm talking like that? Yeah, and we all see it too. Yeah, of us, all of us, every all three of us that listen to this episode. I get that. I get it. You can't. You could have just said hey, so fast, talk with your Mug. What are you doing? Put the Mug down holding them. I Ken't I'm so distracted. But the fact that you're just like anyway, so here you, you're talking with it. You're talking with it like it's Bel Crow to your hand, right, you're just like, all right, anyway. We velcrowed this to my hand before the shoot. We super lute of velcristripped to the pom of my hand. Yeah, it's great. Two options. We could have super gluted the cup to your hand, but that would damage the cup. Yeah, you're right. We needed to super go vell crow to your hand. We don't let that dry. Then we had to put Vlkar on the Mug. What she said? bickly? Yes, obviously. And then now we have and you just ripped your skin off. Hurt a lot. You can't put that mug down for the rest of the episode. Got It. Deal, deal, very funny, SA. Okay, so we should quick. We can't do this. It's we made it. We made it some time, all right, but we should give up. So Julian, he was allegedly par backing group, a part of a mythical hacken group. They did some things that maybe people knew about. Yeah, this wink thing was very much in line with the type of stuff that he's doing. He was really big on he was very antiwar Proslos. So what I knew? As soon as I told you, as soon as you're going to talk real fast, I was like, I'm gonna M Er joke. All Right, his dad was a big antiwar guy, okay, for years before this. And so it seems like Julian picks. All their plays were like Ati war plays. Yeah, okay. They would roll into town and they'd be like invite everyone, this is war crimes. The musical. It was like, okay, Heaven's Gate, the Hell's flames kind of thing, but it was about war. was about war. I love that for them. Yeah, so he was always very day anti aware of what was happening in the world. Vary easy, yes, yes, his or his parents. Would you call his parents activists or not? I would call him activists, okay. And so he got into a little bit of activism and himself mostly through hacking, the activism, if you will, write. And so he had a lot of stuff. And then in this is fun. Where's the types of them? I saw your brain. Try to figure it out outside your brain. Look at the keyboard and then look at the Mug. You can put them like down the type. No, I can't. It's about good to my hand. I figured it out. So in the late s he again working on this project that would eventually become wiki leaks. But she released in October of two thousand and six, okay, which wikipedia very nicely told me is fifteen years ago. Incorrectly. It's actually sixteen years ago. Yeah, hasn't been updated. So anyways, wiki leaks comes out and almost immediately becomes a worldwide firestorm because they started leaking things. Yeah, but like how do you build a leaking website? You know how, like what is the first thing? Like you're like, I want to build a place where people leak things. And then you just go where. You just like be like hey, is there anything they were to leak? Like what do you? How do you? Yeah, I think, I think. And then someone in it, in a cubicle with your office is like I've been waiting for this day, I've got something. I think it's similar to like, like I sure it was just a contact form. You would upload all your stuff and then, I mean, I understand how a website works. I'm saying, how do you eat the word out? Well, marketing. Oh, they started a big billion dollar ad campaign, had a super bowl add okay, there's like got a big secret about the Gout, the state's government. Oh, I was thinking, like exposed the secrets, you know, and then use get people being like my neighbor's cheating on his wife and they put like put that on wiki leaks, but that on wiki leaks? No, they were more concerned with war. Okay. Well, they released this file that has since been dubbed the collateral murder footage. Oh, from a air strike in Baghdad, and this was obviously the middle of the opera war on terror. Yeah, and in this video is the videos pretty horrible. There's a there's a group of what the the pilots of this helicopter seemed to think our militants, right, but there it's just a group of like locals walking through the town and they saw they thought they were holding guns. They're actually reporters from Reuters reporting on the war. They had big cameras with long lenses that they were capturing things with, and so they were talking back and forth with base, with the local forward base, and basically trying to get permission to fire them. Eventually I got it, and then engage them, kill them all. But there's kids there. And the horrible part about the videos you can hear the pilots and the gunners like laughing and cracking jokes while they're shooting these people. Oh yeah, and then at the end of it you hear one of them says, well, that's what you get from bringing your kids to a gunfight, and the other guys like yeah, yeah, and so like it was it was a very like very supvideo roootage that comes out that gets that hits the news and it becomes a giant media firestorm. Right. That was like their first big leak. Yeah, okay, I mean they had leaked other stuff, but this was, yeah, this is the first thing that like they put the story out about the neighbor's wife and all that stuff. They did the small ones, but they did a lot of this is their big one. This is their big one, and this was almost overnight, instant worldwide news. Oh, for sure, everyone's talking about it and covering it. Well, I mean like, and do you think that shape Internet culture now? Because Internet culture now is just like you can just put stuff. I see twitter videos that are just like, you know, exposing people on Online. Maybe maybe, because I don't know if I remember a time before that. I mean to be fair, before that, before two thousand and six, there wasn't a lot of opportunity. It wasn't a lot of Internet for you to put your own stuff on the Internet. That's true. Yeah, like Youtube didn't exist. You would have to have any resource to put things out. For sure, was my space. There was place is where you could post off, but it was a lot less than anyway. The Internet definitely more us than it is someone else. Now anyways, it's an interesting idea. Hey, thanks for checking out this episode. If you like our show, make sure to leave a podcast review in whatever platform you use or, if you're on Youtube, drop a comment if you want to listen to another episode. My favorite right now is Jose can SACO. It's this guy in the MLB who really brought steroids mainstream for the sport and did a lot of other just absolutely insane stuff, and there might be a little bit of aliens in it. So check that episode out. It's one of my favorites. But thanks for being here. But along with this, this video, this was the explosive thing that got all the media attention. But along this video there was about, and you're not going to believe this, seven hundred fiftyzero documents from the war in Iraq. And how are they? How are someone leaving this kind of stuff? So the way this happened, this specific leak came from a woman named Chelsea Manning O ye, Yep, yeah, and she was a at the time. She hasn't translation to Chelsea, I don't know. I don't remember what her name was before then, but she was a soldier in the Iraq war and she was like traumatized by the experience and realize there was a lot of corruption and a lot of just terrible things happening there, and realized, above all else, that the numbers of deaths and civilian casualties were severely morder reported. Reported, yeah, they oh yeah, we were severely under reporting them. And so she, with the help of Julian Assange, she kind of got in touch with him at wikileaks, got kind of some tips on how to hack into their computers and at the like forward land base, like, she was able to get into, oh my gosh, one of the computers and she just downloaded everything on to, yeah, jump drive and that had later, when she made it back to the states, she uploaded that to wiki leaks in the videos included in that upload. Got It. There's other viciously I obviously the video is what takes, you know. That's that's clearly like a that was one of the the strongest because it's a video and yeah, you could hear the way the lighter as it was just a horrible, horrible video. It plays well in the news, yeah, you know. Yeah, yeah, not the type of thing that the news is going to pay to run right, right, and a lost reported numbers horrible, Does News, but you had a video that shows soldiers with they're just ampathetic response. What was wild was along with those in those documents there was stuff about about the numbers, about how how much higher the real numbers were, right about a lot of air strikes and how so many of those air strikes there was no come to details, were straight up war crimes. Yeah, and and a lot of like backdoor deals with different countries to secure resources. While they're they're like, you're crazy. Just it was a very, very bad release for the US government. Yeah, and so it was when people realize, Oh, the government still sketchy. Yeah, and needless to say, when this comes out, the United States was like that Julian Assan Guy, we don't like them. And they really, really wanted to arrest him at this point. But for what? For telling all their secrets, but it could. Here's what's interesting to me. He's an Australian born, yeah, human at this point he was living in the UK, not an American citizen, not involved at all, and at the end of the day, all he did was publish a bunch of docuts. What I'm thinking? Yeah, the issue was these documents were classified documents that were stolen. Yeah, but he didn't steal. But he didn't. He did helped, he did aid in a bet, got it. Got It. So he was a part of it. But they're still it feels like they want to make an example out of them. Oh, yeah, for sure, they're like, Hey, don't do this. Yeah, and so they immediately began. Is exactly why I think that all conspiracy theorists on youtube are all wrong, because if they were right, the government would be like, don't do that. Yeah, you know, but they're not. They're so wrong that it's just like whatever's don't care. Go. Oh, yeah, who you can? Made A little Youtube Channel? Great, yeah, yeah, what are you doing? Well, I's thin, good, I it's it's it's a tangent. It's too yeah, yeah, we don't have much time for this. Okay, so just get to the point. So dolissage, he's he's a guy. You Guy, you know any mate. Website is stuff came out of the website and he's still a guy. got a loss. So jelsee me and he gets arrested. She serves I think it's severallyking seven years in prison. Yep, they begin to build their case against Julian Assag and Julian assaje becomes en. I mean number public. I don't even number one. I bet they use they were like, Hey, you can reduce your time if you like. They were probably working that angle hard problem for her for her prison sentence, I'm sure. Meanwhile, GID right, she's not in the United States anymore. I'm not certain. Okay, that okay, it's a different tangent. But Julian, meanwhile, had become almost like a hero pretty much everyhe else in the more. Yeah, pretty much ever else in the world. They're like that was really cool, which it sounds like. It's like vigilante justice. Yeah, yeah, and so he was doing these almost ted talk type events all over the world talking about well, this is also this. One of the scariest things about the Internet was that, oh, we don't have the ability to cover things up anymore. MMM, like, you know, that's why they were to make an example of it. was like, Hey, you can't use the Internet. This is fairly new thing that is still out here. You're not allowed to use it to do this. Yep, Yep, you know. And so it's of course. That was what was interesting is the United State it's was really mad, but pretty much every other country was. I was like, that was really cool because it wasn't about them. Yeah, and then they had to come out with a PR that was like yeah, we love they, you know, because we have nothing to hide. We are so we love what you're doing. We love what you're doing. Yeah, don't look at us, rules, don't look at us. Yeah. So pretty much every country loved him and he did up. He did like this book Torque type thing. Yeah, what he was doing these speaking engagements and doing these talk shows and stuff like that. Talking. Yes, I really didn't write this book. He just released a seven hundred fiftyzero classified documents about the university sign. People are bringing it there. He's signing the least document. He's like, you guys know, I didn't write this, right. No, yeah, no, but in a way you did. But in a way you did. You wrote it in the anals of his bringing the their home computer for him to sign. They're standing in line with a giant monitor. Out of the well is Dell's. Yeah, dude, or joy's gonna sign my computer. He could I get a large banana, mamma, and also, could you suck my computer banana Mamma, is that you were for? Yeah, I don't remember what the drinks were there matter either. Daughter Orange Julia, still around? Yeah, I haven't seen in Orange Julius in years, because even have been all right, exactly. Actually, we went on my birthday all pretty bought me a bunch of new clothes. Oh, I'm glad you're you're you had super defensive when you said that too. I was like to the Malt Bree bomb, me a bunch of clothes. I love that your sugar mom has taken care of you. Dude. She was like, she's like for your birthday, here's what happened. Here's there's a couple of things that have happened. Oh, besactly. We're gonna go of the past couple of years. I used to work at a church and now I don't, which mean I'm going to take the jewelry of my words. You can just dress how you want to. The majority of my wardrobe was church mark, which church March, which I'm not like, I'm not mad about it, but it's also like wow. I was also like why every shirt I wears that's your previous and from previous. Yeah, which is a little it be like if you got fired from pizza, hug around thing on the top of the car and so so she took you keep that. They'll let you, but you can't. Did PICKMAN'S HAVE ONE? Did you have a? Never put it on my car because because those things, that these super power magnus, they dent your car. They dent the roof of your car. Do they really? Yeah, they do. Every time you put them on and pull them off, they dented. It was so annoying and they would get really mad whenever you cared, whenever I did, because I have you nice car then. The car you had then is objectively better from the car you have now. Yes, absolutely, and corporate would come they be like you got to use that ady. You don't pay me enough for me to use that. I'd go out and I just go anyways. This is not important. So brie took me to the mall, be to the ZOOMI's. Take to Zoomi's and all the stores that I rap a, Zumi's, Weeah, I went to all those things. It was his eyes got so embarrassed when he said that because his eyes were like yeah, that's exactly what he's what's frustrating. Yeah, he's stating. Grown up, I was a pack Soun, Zoomi's hot topic, Van's journeys, all of those stores. They don't know. They don't pander to me anymore. They have lowered their standards and now, Oh, oh, hold on, hold on, you're saying they you had high standards before. Now when you go in, you're like these I'm saying, I want to go into a zoom he's and by black tshirts with skulls on them, but now all they have is like tidye stuff with rappers. Oh yeah, they're like, they're like they're in bucket hats. Yeah, and they're they're appealing to I don't know, the audience that they want to sell stuff too, and it makes me feel like my place in the world is shrinking. And you, you look at the girl behind the counter a Zumi's and you said, ma'am, I'm really old. But all this to say, being in them all was a surreal experience, because it's seriously, has been like a decade since I've been super weird. There was the oddest or sketchy. It was very odd. Yeah, it genuinely felt like walking into a time machine, yeah, or alternate reality. Like it was odd. They're not good. Yeah, anyways, back to Joli massage. I don't remember why we start talking about malls or what. I brought up on juice again. It was a joke. They're signing, their signing, that he's doing his little booktory, speaking of yet he's betther countries are like this guy is a lazy guys. Great. Well, then he started releasing stuff about other country. Yeah, and they really said of being like we don't like this. Go. It's kind of like that. Um, it's kind of like when you become friends of the person is really funny and they make fun of everybody else. You know, you'll talk about like that person you're high school who was just like a jerked everybody, but it was, yeah, funny. So you're like, you're like friends with them. Yep, you're trying to be buddy, buddy, Yep, all out of I don't want you to make fun of me. Yep, you know, and then they turn on you anyway. And that seemed like what they were doing with Julian Assas, where they're like hey, buddy, yeah, thank you for releasing that about the United States, those horrible monsters. Yeah, but because we would never do anything. Why are you telling us? We were friends made were friends, Bro. But it wasn't just governments. He was also exposing. He individuals, corporations. Yeah, corporations. There was in two thousand and eight. He exposed a lot of the thanks that about what was going on. Yeah, that led to the housing crisis. I ahould say he, because at this point what he leaks was a large group. There're people that were involved in I think he takes the flack because I struggled it. He's the operator of the in the butt end of the day, he puts his hand on Manilla folder and says, I feel that this one was right. Feel. So did he did wiki leaks expose the housing crisis stuff before after the crash? It was after the crap. Well, I mean I guess was in the middle of them during the crash, or a little anglic crowd. Yeah, and so by this point the US has put their tase together and they basically put out this order to have him extradited to us so he can be tried for his crimes. And so he is like kind of avoiding while they don't get tried for the years. I mean, that's accurate. He's trying to avoid his extradition and I just want to take a note for a second. I can't say most words and I feel like I just extradition. Very well, yeah, I mean it's not a word, but go ahead. So he's avoiding his extra dice. Anything has some extra dice in here. I forgot my go ahead. Keep going. So he he's trying to avoid this. And then this in two thousand and ten. Yeah, while he was in Sweden, or well before, he wasn't sweeten a little while before that, and then he was back in the UK and then now Sweden it's like, Hey, this stuff has come out. Basically he had some sexual abuse allegations come out about him. So my weekly were him. Yeah, they were trying to actually die him back to Sweem to try him for you see the look at my eye for a second there. I was like yeah, sweet to Swed you. They're trying to get him actually out of back to Swedens. Now he's got two countries that are like hey, hey, we need you to come here so we can arrest you and you want you come hang out over here. Yeah, all of his reason, all of his facebook ads are occasions vacation. Had vacation this sweets take a sweet break. anyways. So he's in the UK and the UK takes a stance and they basically were like, we're with the Swedes and the United on and if we see him, were arresting them and shipping them out to one of you guys. Oh well, because I don't know, they were trying to play pology. Oh yeah, they got stuff hidden to them. Yeah, they're like, we need to take we gotta get this guy off the street. This guy's gotta go away. So where is he now? Well's what happened. In two thousand and ten. He walked into the Ecuadorian embassy and pleaded asylum and had all his paperwork together and they're like okay, and so he camped out in like a off a a back office apartment thing that they set up for him. Yeah, and immediately upon arriving, so he dressed up like a delivery driver. Okay, well, Waltston, with a box and inside the box was his papers, papers to to plead for asylum. And so then almost immediately after he pleaded that asylum, where it got out and then from that point forward, so the ytre Wiki leaks so you use driver just went into the Ecuadorian Ecuadorian equird, Equord, whatever, a equator? No, they went to the impleaded asylum sinnd from that day forward, for roughly ten years, there were ten British police officers outside that door at all times, ready to arrest him if he walked out the door. And he literally didn't leave the building. So he's effectively under arrest. Yeah, they've got him under house arrest in the Ecuadorian embassy and the British parliament. That's what they're called, right, the British government? Yeah, parliament. They're like, if he walks out these doors, he's arrested. Word we're sending off to we can they do that at the embassy? What do you mean? Can they do that? Like that's that's technically that a good are. Yes, they can't go in there, the police can't go in there and they can't take them. But okay, if he walks out the doors, then they can arrest him. Okay, so they're literally just hanging out, but he's got a yard and stuff. Well, I mean, this is this is in like the city, and so I got a plan. Which Embassy you go to? You know, you have to pick an embassy with a backyard. Yeah, you can't just go to a small embassy. I. You need a big embassy, this embassy. You need to look for an embassy. Sweets you needed, and you need to find like a like a realtor for embassies, and help you find an embassy that fits your needs. Actually, love the HGTV show embassy hunters, right, and so you tour three different bassies. Yeah, but you're like this one. Really, there's three, I don't know, and they always choose the one that you don't want to shoot. You're always upset about it. They always choose the middle one. But, yeah, the ones like middle of the road. Yeah, it's almost like they're actors. But you know these people, they did commit international crimes and they've got world powers coming after them. So allegedly, allegedly. So, Julian is in in this embassy and while they're Ecuador was treating really well. They wired new Internet connection to the embassy. You ever? YOU RUN A website? Right, all right, we're gonna get you faster Internet because you want to keep running that. We don't want to keep you from your want to keep you from what you do. Yeah, they're basically like hey, will help you do this. Imagine you're a person who works in an embassy. Yeah, here's going to work every day. Yeah, there's there at your job. Yeah, and some dude rolls in and now he lives there. Your boss comes in for ten years. Hey Mike, so last week. Hey Mike, so last week this is Australi. Yeah, oh well, this is the Ecuadorian embassy too. But he comes in. He's like, Hey Mike, so last week. I know, but they did. They we gave you that promotion. Are they all from Ecuardor you got that new office and need that offense and bad got back because this guy who runs this website, this ups driver. Yeah, he needs to live in year office. As far as it is a couple weeks? Yeah, probably nine years. I'm five hundred and twenty weeks. Try to put a number on it. That's my that's my ballpark. So they did. They they hired a new security agency to make sure that nobody like hired like a strike force to come and get them or stuff like that. Like like they were protecting the embassy, but they're also protecting him. Yeah, but he makes it a threat to the embassy. Yeah, because he's there and because now there's two, one of arguably the most powerful country in the world and then another pretty weedon relatively powerful country. That's the most American thing we've ever said the Swedes. Yeah, what was the most powerful culture the world? It was Sweden. So it's like, wouldn't that be cool, though, they pulled it off and they were the ones you got of. Wouldn't that be the underdog story? So so he's in there and he's running wiki leaks from the embassy, never leaving. His family comes every Christmas years. It go in two, two thousand and ten in November. Every Christmas. Family comes and celebrates Christmas with him in the embassy. But we're here to visit. Yeah, we're just visiting. You bring your passport to embassy? I don't know, maybe because it's technically Ecuador right. anyways, so he world traveler. You are about on a plane, but I've been to every country. Yeah, they've got a little and in Great Britain write down one of the words them g the historian Atlanta here when its avenue? I don't know, like Google maps. I tricked him on that one. The look on your face, it's fun, man. I Miss Spell that. Can we fight like that? I don't know. I just I don't understand embassies work. But we can fire that all later. I guess it is. Wait, would be weird if it was just like an Indiana. Now this is the US embassy and Equador. I don't yeah, anyway, we can later. Hey, thank you again for listening to this episode. Making sure that you don't miss one in the future. Go ahead and subscribe to this podcast, whether that be on apple podcast, spotify, Youtube. You'll get it alert when we drop a new episode. And if you want more, if you want something a week early, you want to be part of our discord, more access to us as creators, you can support this show on patreon. Helps us go a long way. Nothing that we're doing is possible without our patreon supporters. If you want more information about that, please text tilling to six six, eight hundred and sixty six. Thank you so much for being here. But he's there for ten years. He's in there running wiki leaks from within the walls of the Equadorian Embassy. Yeah, and while he's doing this he does something pretty significant that you might remember. He leaks all of Hillary Clinton's emails. Yeah, during the two thousand and sixteen campaign. And now Hillary Clinton is a huge enemy of wiki leaks and very vocally. It's like glad's very dangerous. Yeah, very vocally talking about him. Yeah, and Donald Trump is very vocally talking about how much he loves wikileaks is. Yeah, yeah, he's like, I love wiki leaks, they're great, they're one of the best things about America. And it's like it's anyways, that's a credit for you don't know how the election happens. Well, literally days after the election ends, trump claims he doesn't know who Julie Osange's or wiki leaks is. Yeah, he's like, what, I don't know. There been to a mall, you know? I just I don't have mall money. I'm richer than most. Go to the ZOOMI's and were tea shirt for skulls on them. What is what is the lowest income you could have to still be a mall shopper? Or, wait, highest income you could have? Well, I don't show so somewhere between you and me, I'm not a mall shoppers. The first time I've been in years. But you shopped at them all, didn't you guess? I'm a mall shopper, so so pretty quickly and Charles Presidency, the dialog shifts and then the trump administration, early in the presidency, very sharply begins to pursue Juliana's yeah, they're like, Um, do you know exactly what happened to is he? Because president, they're like, you know, he can find out stuff, right. He's like, I would like you kind of like well, I mean like he knows, here's some stuff you can find out, and they're like yeah, yeah, we need arrest that guy. We hate this guy. So anyways, so he does that leak and he's back in the news and he's doing these sounds like he's do for another one. He's doing these press conferences from the embassy. But what he's doing and then it's the most I don't know what to call it, like World War One movie type of thing, where he literally is in the middle of London or somewhere. I'm pretty sure it's London, and he's walking out on the balcony of this embassy to the streets with all the police below, these all these reporters that are just constantly filming this embassy now and he comes and just got walks out and does this speech about his leaks, yeah, and then walks back in the apartment and everyone on the streets like Ah, is Julian from the balcony. So years go by of this and then in the late ten I believe it was twenty eight, two thousand and seventeen, Ecuador's president his term ends and so new president is elected and takes present. Is like, and then Mike needs his office back. The new president is like, you know, what would be cool if we weren't opposing, you know, the United States and they in Sweden. He's more fraid to Sweden. And so they started trying to find a reason to be able to kick him out of the embassy. They they under their law. They did asn't flush the toilet, you know, real bad roommate. So they they fired their security agency, hired a new security agency, which is a little sketchy, and then they planted cameras throughout the whole embassy and his suite and like like secret. Can't these aren't like like they set up a Webcam. So little gardenomes with cameras for yeah, say, while they were putting cameras inside the fire extinguishers. Yeah, in the restrooms and cameras and they were watching everything assage was doing, trying to find reason they could kick him out, and then eventually they just did. They were just like all right, there go. They took away they took away his razors so he couldn't shave. But really they were like it's a weapon. That's what they said. But I think when they eventually, when it happened, he got he got he got kicked out. They pushed him out the door and then the British police for standing there and they arrested him and they shipped them off to Sweden and while I was in Sweden he was serving his sentence. It was a fifty week sentence and he serving a sentence and they had him psychlot evaluated and they said that he was exhibiting signs of people who had been mentally tortured for a long period of time, which is it makes sense because he died living in this embassy, lived in this this single rapping on the outside, not going outside and not having any personal contact really. There was his his dad at the beginning. He had a lot of family that was coming out and seeing him. His wife ended up leaving. He's essentially on house or rest yeah, yeah, and his wife, his wife left him. She got custody of the kids. Yeah, and so he stopped seeing his family and his dad was the only person who would come visit him, but his dad lived back in Australia, so his dad was coming back ultra occasionally to see him. And so the guy had basically no connection. And then when the president switch, he started to have not only a couple world powers wanting to come down on him, but now the one place where he was actually safe was turning on him as well. And so he was it seemed like he was genuinely going insane. And on top of all that, he was running a website that was dealing with some of the darkest things people are doing in this world, right, and so he's knowing about all these guys, which could not be good for your psyche. So his behavior, that's that's what they cited for when they kicked him out. The Ecuadorian government said that his behavior had become erradict and they sure seemed that he was dangerous for the people and God an embassy, because he was kind of the kind of being erratic crazy. While he goes to Sweden, he goes through his trial, and at this moment, where we're sitting right now, he has not been sent back to the US yet, but he's going to be sent to the US. There is a chance. It seems like the juries tell out on whether or not he's going to leave or not. Okay, whether or not they're going to they're going to send them back out after after this sense or not, but they're it's it's it's an interesting thing because there is a there's this big discourse where there's one side of the map says, Hey, this information deserves to be public, the world deserves to know about bad things that are happened behind closed or sure from people in power. But then there's this other camp that it that thinks that these are things that compromise security through and they are confidential for a reason and releasing them is bad to the safety of everybody involved within those nations right and so it is a moral gray area he's operating in, for sure. What's what's the most troubling about the scenario is, at the end of the day, what Julian assange is doing is he's publishing articles from other people, from other sources. He is he hisself isn't the one doing all the things now and he's not going out and stealing these. There is in the case of Chelsea Manny. He did walk her through how to steal it, sure, but he's basically just a vessel. Yeah, at the end of the day, he's a reporter. He is like any news source that has a source that told them something anominous anonymously and he published it. And so the precedent that's being said here is genuinely a very nerve racking situation because if the US does go try him want, he's not even American citizen. Yeah, and so for them to try him on the grounds of anything close to treason doesn't make a any sense because he's not. He's not an American citizen. But then to it calls it a question the entire thing of journalism, because if you're not safe to publish something that a source comes from, you no matter who it's going to harm. That puts us in a really weird shot. Sure, forward, but if he's helping gain access to classified information, then that itself is a crime. That itself is a crime, but that is the lowest in or not, that's the lowest sentence he's facing. I think that's a seven year sentence. I'm saying the space same for that. That seems fair to me. Yeah, I would know. They're not trying that. I know that it's not what really going for, you know. So out of he's facing, I think in the US is a hundred and twenty years sence. He's the helping eight legos at at home. That is like that's like five hundred. That's five thousand two hundred something weeks. That's that's a hundred years right. And then says he's looking at like, you know, it's a lot of weeks. Is there an over six thousand weeks? Thanks, in Mike's Office. Thanks for bringing that. He can you, Mike. I know you just got this fancy office and stuff, but this guy's going to live here for the next six thousand dozen weeks, two hundred weeks. So he's really been a crew in that PTO. Yeah, so I think the aiding a bend, aiding in a bedding chesse mating is a seven year since. Sure the rest of that is a hundred twenty years and that is all just you told our secrets. Yeah, and that to me is sketchy because, yeah, because at the end of the day. Let's be honest. What he did is no different than what all was. The board does all these other all these other news sources that are talking about what's happening for crane. He's Donna do anything different. They he had a source who told him about war crimes that a world power is committing somewhere else in the world. Right, and, but I didn't make the word probably look good. So here's what I think about classified documents. Right, there are some classified documents. There's probably documents within that seven hundred forty thousand dollar pig, like seven heard fifty thou seven her fetes, thousand pages. Yeah, that it's not the the bad pr pieces that they would be worried about as much of it is. There's included in that would be strategy and important things that are needed to be keep quiet, because if they're using it in this tap coal procedure, they're probably using it another tagical produders, and if that's out of they can't do that anymore in dangers or soldiers. Right. So there are pieces that that I understand as far as classified, absolute leaking classified things. Yeah, so, but what I don't like is whenever that just becomes Oh, the government's hiding stuff because the government sketchy, and it's like, well, no, but sometimes, in order to negotiate, you don't have, you don't want to have all your cards on table, and it's be like okay, how do we do this? When you're negotiating deals with countries with that have bad motives, yeah, or when you're going to the table with China or Russia or Korea or whatever it might be in powers, yeah, other other powers that you've got, you've got to have some stuff absolutely to either offer or to say okay, and you can't just have all those things out. So I'm not saying there because there's something that would have the attitude that just by having classified information, that is sketchy and it's a No. Yeah, that's how politics works, that's how life works. We that's how Wifi doctments. Sure, but if you're going to go out for somebody, for and that's where I go, it makes sense that they're going out. If going after them for the documents that release, that would then endanger either future relations with other superpowers, yeah, or whatever. Right, but if you're going laughter them for the PR bad you know, then that's a whole other, which is what it I mean, that's what it feels like. It feels like it's always gonna be frame that way, though. Yeah, you know, yeah, that's fair. It's always so so that way. I think the question is, the major issue is, what precedent will this set? Sure, because you need we need a society where publishers and reporters have the ability to shine a light on terrible things happening in the world. But if it, if something like this is where to happen and he were to be arrested and face the centure, I think it, I think it could very severely hamper someone's desire to do something like that for sure future and and and I think it opens the door to allow those sorts of receiving and I'm on the side of like, yeah, we should definitely, you know, encourage free press. Yeah, but at the same time we can't just vilify a government for half a secrets. Yeah, yeah, you know, we can. I think it's I think, I think the thing is a secret. Seciacy has a bad commedation. Yeah, for sure. Yeah, yeah, should the government operate with more transparency when it comes to bad image things? Yeah, for sure, I think. I think when you look at things like and and I mean I don't know if we would ever see a day or the government or to act like this, but I think the best way to behave when someone within your organization makes mistake, you have to acknowledge that publicly and you have to talk about what you're doing, even just government. This goes to churches, this goes to businesses, this goes to personal relationships. The same way of like, if you hurt somebody, you have to acknowledge that. No up and we're governments and corporations and individuals get in trouble is when they just go had it. Well, they come. You know, Oh, can you believe that that girl told you that I was sleeping with her on the side. I can't believe her for doing that. It's yeah, but you were cheating on your wife with her. Yeah, it's like, well, yeah, but she's crazy and does she shouldn't have said that. You know, you're like what? Yeah, I think there has. There has to be a knowledgement and there will be consequences for that. But but yeah, putting it in the dark and leaving in the shadows is why there are so many people who don't trust government. And that's the other thing I'm saying is that, you know, there's a lot to get swept under it because it's classified. Yeah, there's also people who were like, oh well, if it's classified, that must mean that is bad. She yeah, right, and it's like, well, that's not how anything works. Nothing works in a black and white way like that. That's all I'm saying. Yeah, which I think it's fair. I think it's fair. Yeah, so basically, where we're landing is, instead of a hundred, twenty years or six thousand weeks, it should be sixty years or the three thousand weeks. Yes, yeah, and I would love for it to be. I here's what I think is punishment should be. I think this man should have to spend ten years managing an Orange Julius in them all. You know, and I mean ten years, whether that mall is open or knees. If that mall closes in three years old navy moves out, you know, and it's just the lights on anymore. It's just him every day with a blender, just he's make a smoothies for rats and he's named him all. Some bears say of Julie Guliano. July, you went with Juliano first, Julia, Julia, Julianne, Guliano, and Juliano is the first one you went with. All right, I made just smoothie. All right. Are we done? Yeah, I guess we can be okay. Yeah, he's in there making smoothies. Yeah, and the playlist still works, but it's just fiddle music in things of the last night is a production of space tim media, produced by Christian Taylor. Audio is edited by Alice Garnett, video by Connor beat social media is run by Caleb Walker and graphic designed by Caleb Goldberg. Our hoster, Jeremyers and Tim Stone. Please follow us on social media at tilling podcast. That's Tillo in podcast. Leave a review, comment, subscribe wherever you are. Thank you for listening to things on the last night.


The early days of the internet were truly the wild west. Anyone with the means to post to the world wide web could upload whatever they wanted and leave it out there to the world. That is precisely what inspired Julian Assange to create Wikileaks. The now infamous site was envisioned to be a place where whistleblowers could anonymously leak sensitive information into a platform that would verify and publicize the information. The website gained notoriety for leaking a few very significant sets of documents that were particularly bad for the United States government. Since then Assange has lived a rather precarious life and now faces extradition to the US for trial. The precedent being set in this case could be significant.

Things I Learned Last Night is an educational comedy podcast where best friends Jaron Myers and Tim Stone talk about random topics and have fun all along the way. If you like learning and laughing a lot while you do, you’ll love TILLN. Watch or listen to this episode right now!

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Julian Assange – Wikipedia


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