The Lord of Flies nestled within America's intelligence establishment sent lead bees to sting Martin Luther King, Che Guevara, and Malcolm X when each was only 39.
Julian Assange, the founder of WikiLeaks, is now 39.
A real-life Robin Hood, a Neo from The Matrix, Assange follows the path of Geronimo and H. Rap Brown. He fights for us, by revealing in black and white U.S. complicity in the torture and murder of innocents. Saving Assange may be the first decisive battle of the internet.
I have felt for years that the last defenders of our freedom would be the cyber-anarchists. We are not at freedom's end yet, but cameras capture the average Briton 300 times daily. The Lord of Flies even wishes to invade our minds, to determine when we are lying to him.
There is hope. Mathematical results with practical significance may enable us at least to transmit encrypted messages in such a way that no one unintended can decrypt them. This comes from the fact that it seems to be time-consuming to factor the product of two large prime numbers. For this reason, the Lord of Flies seeks to limit in essence the size of the prime numbers one can use for encryption.
There are two ways we can protect Assange. First, we can complete the mission. The Lord of Flies wishes to shut down WikiLeaks. The world now sees the sham of the neutrality of Switzerland, a country the civilized world should have invaded years ago for giving aid to druglords, dictators, and the people who make those insufferable clocks. Interpol is now illegitimate. Sweden's servility to the United States would make Tony Blair blush.
The way to prevent an epidemic is to make sure that 1 is greater than the reproductive ratio, the average number of people an infected person makes sick. Let's spread the dis-ease. Already there are 200 mirrors of the WikiLeaks site. For every site the Lord of Flies pulls down, let's put two up.
A second way to protect Assange is with the Golden "Mean": Do unto others as they would do unto you. American cowards have threatened Assange and his associates, and their families, and myself, with death. Right-wing politicians and pundits have called for the execution of the people behind WikiLeaks.
Nothing stops the Left from doing the same, except the will, which is lacking, because American liberals often want to make friends with the Enemy. For example, in Oakland, California, local police illegally spied on a black church because it was engaged at that time in anti-apartheid activities. After apartheid ended, I asked a senior pastor of the church what had happened to the guilty police. He didn't know. He hadn't followed it up.
U.S. President Barack Obama, who said, of the war criminals in his predecessor's administration, "This is a time for reflection, not retribution," now says through his attorney general that he wants to "hold people accountable"--meaning Assange.
Let's make an example, just as the Lord of Flies wishes to make an example of Assange. Pick any individual who has called for Assange's death. Shut down that individual's website with denial-of-service attacks. Publically accuse that individual of treason--feel free to invent a reason why, as the gnats of America's right-wing media have no qualms about using this word improperly -- explicitly pointing out that treason carries the death penalty. Put that individual's contact information, along with that of his associates, on a website, on Facebook, on everything. The correctness of this approach stems from ideas in evolutionary game theory, "Tit-for-Tat." It is logical, ethical, and legal -- although naturally it would make sense to set up these non-lethal internet SWAT teams outside the United States.
Very soon the cowards will become quiet.
And, in the quiet that kills hysteria, we may eventually succeed in saving the man who kicked the hornets' nest.
The trouble with these vast secret 'security' apparatuses is they exist, by their nature, underneath that shell. That's where they operate: in an immoral, hateful darkness in which there can only be enemies and victims. None can be innocent. Otherwise the operators must acknowledge they serve only the reptile instincts of fear and predation.
Assange has cast light into those dark places. If he survives all of this, it will only be because the light is too intense for these shadow-dwellers to tolerate.
For those who care about background here's some info (partially copied from Wikipedia - partially mine) about the game theory references:
Tit for Tat:
Tit for tat is a highly effective strategy in game theory for the iterated "prisoner's dilemma." An agent using this strategy will initially cooperate, then respond in kind to an opponent's previous action. If the opponent previously was cooperative, the agent is cooperative. If not, the agent is not."
Prisoner's Dilemma:
Two suspects are arrested by the police. The police have insufficient evidence for a conviction, and, having separated the prisoners, visit each of them to offer the same deal. If one testifies for the prosecution against the other (defects) and the other remains silent (cooperates), the defector goes free and the silent accomplice receives the full 10-year sentence. If both remain silent, both prisoners are sentenced to only six months in jail for a minor charge. If each betrays the other, each receives a five-year sentence. Each prisoner must choose to betray the other or to remain silent. Each one is assured that the other would not know about the betrayal before the end of the investigation.
Many situations which deal with opportunities to display loyalty or treachery have the same properties as the "prisoner's dilemma" without the criminal overtones.
Even with this knowledge, the Government cannot be reformed. This is because of the smokescreen of disinformation that dilutes the effect of real information. This is because of the distractions of consumerism that keep people from actively engaging with the political realities. This is because of the forces of reaction that work to destroy anyone who presents a threat to their ongoing ability to deceive and lie.
I agree that there needs to be attacks in kind against the corporate fascists who run the American Government and media. What would be helpful though is if the main thrust of attacks used truth, and demonstrated real emotional commitment to the value of truth, equity, and justice.
We should expect our representatives "not" to to fall into the trap of playing the same game as the Republicans. They should reject the degradation of the public discourse. Above all, they should state real beliefs, hold to those beliefs, show emotional commitment to those beliefs, and fight against the forces that are inimical to those beliefs.
At all costs, they need to avoid getting caught up in the propagandist wedge politics of the failing Republicans.
We talk about freedom of speech and the press, transparency, and being the land of the free and home of the brave.
We as a nation need to decide what we believe in before someone decides for us.
Do we want to support government contractors that have s.ex with children?
Do we want to support torture?
Do we want to support letting rich criminals go free?
Do we want to support rendition?
What do we value?
We say that we want transparency, well, Wikileaks is transparency… and it doesn’t look pretty.
There are some folks that believe that once you know the truth of the matter, you are required to object, otherwise silence is consent, then complacency (remember Haiti??? they are still suffering), then complicit.
Frankly, I'm surprised to see HuffPo post it - it's certainly incendiary and bound to stir the pot!
Speaking of resolute condemnation, here's what folks in England are up to about tuition hikes:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-11954333