Cenk Uygur, host of The Young Turks was filling in on The Dylan Ratigan Show yesterday and scored an interview with Wikileaks founder Julian Assange. Uygur of course asked about the calls for the journalist’s assassination by U.S. presidential hopefuls. Something that should send chills down the back of every person who’s name has even been a byline.
Keith Olbermann and Michael Moore recently found themselves at the center of a controversy over statements made about the sexual assault charges against Wikileaks founder Julian Assange. Last week on MSNBC’s Countdown with Keith Olbermann, Moore dismissed the sexual assault charges against Assange as “a bunch of hooey” and suggested Assange was the victim of a politically motivated smear campaign. Moore said, inaccurately, that the charge against Assange was that “his condom broke during consensual sex.”
The charges are a bit more serious than that, as you can read here. That respected media professionals would perpetuate misinformation and dismiss rape allegations got under some people’s skin. And so, a Twitter activist campaign was born. Using the hashtag #MooreandMe, twitterers expressed their frustration with Moore and Olbermann.
So Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg is Time‘s “Person of the Year“, huh? Let’s be honest: Zuckerberg was the “Person of the Year” because Hollywood made a cool, largely fictional film about him. Facebook hasn’t changed much since 2009. And as powerful and important as Facebook has become, its growth in the past year is nowhere near as interesting or important as what WikiLeaks has accomplished over the same time.
Julian Assange was, however, a “runner-up” to Zuckerberg. Here’s how Time’s Barton Gellman describes the man:
[A] great deal can be said about Assange, much of it unpleasant. He is inclined to the grandiose. Contempt for nearly every authority drives his work, and unguarded e-mails — leaked, naturally — reveal hopes that transparency will bring “total annihilation of the current U.S. regime.” In London, he is fighting extradition to face allegations in Sweden that he sexually assaulted two WikiLeaks supporters.
Michael Moore went on Keith Olbermann‘s show last night to explain why he put up $20,000 in bail money for WikiLeak’s Julian Assange–who’s currently in custody in London on sexual assault allegations. Moore dismissed the allegations against Assange, noting “there are no charges, they only want to talk to him.”
Cenk Uygur and your favorite FBLA editor Tina Dupuy talked about Julian Assange of Wikileaks last night on The Young Turks. Sarah Palin and others have called for his assassination. Such a measured and reasonable response…
The Australian who Sarah Palin keeps on unironically calling “un-American,” WikiLeaks editor Julian Assange penned an op-ed describing what his passion for disclosure and truth.
In it he coins what he calls “Scientific journalism:”
WikiLeaks coined a new type of journalism: scientific journalism. We work with other media outlets to bring people the news, but also to prove it is true. Scientific journalism allows you to read a news story, then to click online to see the original document it is based on. That way you can judge for yourself: Is the story true? Did the journalist report it accurately?
Democratic societies need a strong media and WikiLeaks is part of that media. The media helps keep government honest. WikiLeaks has revealed some hard truths about the Iraq and Afghan wars, and broken stories about corporate corruption.
We think “scientific journalism” sounds a lot like crowdsourcing and citizen journalism.
Discuss.
Read the whole piece here.
Richard Horgan
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Matthew Fleischer
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Pandora Young
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