{"id":51978,"date":"2012-08-23T12:42:02","date_gmt":"2012-08-23T12:42:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/?p=51978"},"modified":"2012-08-23T12:42:02","modified_gmt":"2012-08-23T12:42:02","slug":"in-their-worship-of-julian-assange-the-standard-bearers-of-the-left-are-destroying-everything-they-once-held-dear","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/in-their-worship-of-julian-assange-the-standard-bearers-of-the-left-are-destroying-everything-they-once-held-dear\/","title":{"rendered":"In Their Worship Of Julian Assange, The Standard-Bearers Of The Left Are Destroying Everything They Once Held Dear"},"content":{"rendered":"

By\u00a0Dan Hodges<\/a>\u00a0–<\/strong><\/p>\n

They just can\u2019t help themselves. Today it\u2019s John Pilger in the New Statesman:\u00a0\u201cThe pursuit of Julian Assange is an assault on freedom and a mockery of journalism\u201d<\/a>.<\/p>\n

One by one the cream of the intellectual left (and George Galloway<\/a>) are lining up, in well-disciplined rows, to hurl themselves lemming-like onto the rocks of WikiLeaks<\/a><\/span>.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Julian Christ surrounded by His disciples: St Tony, St George, St Craig and St Seumas<\/p><\/div>\n

Tony Benn:\u00a0\u201cthe charges are that it was a non-consensual relationship. Well that’s very different from rape\u201d<\/a>. Galloway: “Even taken at its worst, if the allegations made by these two women were true, 100 per cent true, and even if a camera in the room captured them, they don’t constitute rape\u201d. Pilger: \u201cSwedish case documents, including the text messages of the women involved, demonstrated to any fair minded person the absurdity of the sex allegations\u201d.<\/p>\n

I haven\u2019t been privy to all the Swedish case documents: documents which, let\u2019s not forget, are the basis of an approved extradition request. But I have read\u00a0the High Court ruling<\/a>, in particular the following section which is from one of Assange\u2019s accusers, a women identified only as AA: \u201cMr Assange wanted to insert his penis into her vagina, but she did not want him to do that as he was not using a condom. She therefore squeezed her legs together in order to avoid him penetrating her. She tried to reach several times for a condom which Mr Assange had stopped her from doing by holding her arms and bending her legs open and trying to penetrate her with his penis without a condom\u201d.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s for a Swedish court to decide whether what is described above represent a true description of the events, and whether they in turn constitute a crime. But to my mind they go beyond what George Galloway described as nothing more than \u201cbad sexual etiquette\u201d. Nor can I see any \u201cabsurdity\u201d in the allegations. Or the difference between what is alleged and the \u201cthe seizure by force of a woman for gratification of a man\u2019s need\u201d, which is Tony Benn\u2019s preferred definition of rape.<\/p>\n

But perhaps that\u2019s because I\u2019m not looking at this issue through the same warped prism as Assange\u2019s supporters.\u00a0People like Craig Murray who went on Newsnight and named one of Assange\u2019s alleged victims<\/a>. Or\u00a0Seumas Milne, who this week stated<\/a>\u00a0that it was \u201chardly surprising that sceptics have raised the links with US-funded anti-Cuban opposition groups of one of those [women] making the accusations\u201d; though to be fair to Milne, he does at least have the good grace to acknowledge \u201cNone of that should detract from the seriousness of the rape allegations made against Assange, for which he should clearly answer.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sadly, their hero is unlikely to be answering anything at the moment, given that he has opted to lock himself away in the Ecuadorean embassy. But that doesn\u2019t bother the Assange apologists. They believe that by publishing a series of leaked US government cables, their man has made himself above the law. Never mind that the request for his extradition had been affirmed, confirmed and reaffirmed by three independent UK courts. Never mind that it is Sweden, regularly and religiously worshipped as the cradle of liberal social democracy, that has made the request for that extradition. It\u2019s about WikiLeaks. And WikiLeaks supersedes all.<\/p>\n

Belittling the crime of rape. Smearing the alleged victims of rape. Naming them. This isn\u2019t coming from the pages or voices of the far Right. This is from the self-styled standard-bearers of the Left. Have they lost their minds?<\/p>\n

In a word, yes. They have become infected by some form of ideological virus; a sickness. Blinded by their hatred of the United States, the establishment in general and their almost juvenile excitement at \u201cthe biggest leak of secret government documents in history\u201d, they are greedily hurling everything they once professed to hold dear onto a bonfire of their own vanity.<\/p>\n

Remember, these are not Twitter warriors we\u2019re talking about. It\u2019s Members of Parliament; award-winning journalists; a former ambassador.<\/p>\n

It is a staggering, sickening spectacle. I\u2019m so transfixed with morbid curiosity I don\u2019t know where to look. Do we point to the sheer hypocrisy of those who have spent years banging on about the need for “war criminals” like Tony Blair to be brought to book, but now so casually discard the validity of an international extradition warrant? Should we focus on the way this clique of supposed “internationalists” has become so tiny that they are now deaf even to the cries of the dwindling band of fellow travellers who are begging them to see the damage they are doing to the Great Cause? Or should we instead simply concentrate on the absence of basic humanity that prevents the Assange booster-club from even entertaining the possibility that two women could have been sexually violated, and that they at least deserve to have their claims investigated via due judicial process?<\/p>\n

Maybe none of those things. Perhaps we should just stand back and reflect on the greatest irony of the Julian Assange and WikiLeaks affair. His supporters told us this was the moment a bright light would be shone into the darkest recesses of global power politics. When we would finally peer deep into the blackened souls of our global rulers.<\/p>\n

But in fact it isn\u2019t the Tony Blairs<\/a><\/span> and George Bush<\/a><\/span>es who have been exposed by this whole squalid business. It\u2019s the Pilgers and the Murrays and the Galloways and the Milnes. It\u2019s their values and character that are now on trial. And unlike their hero Assange, they have nowhere to run or hide.<\/p>\n

New York Times<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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