rationalskepticism.org

Well, I think a lot of this comes down to the fact that they see Julian Assange - by this "they" I mean a lot of the mainstream media, the broadcast outlets - as a partisan figure. And it's really sad because the most dangerous thing about the charges against Julian Assange is: if they extradite Julian Assange, if Julian Assange is convicted, he's charged under the Espionage Act, the same act that I'm charged under, the same act that all these whistleblowers are charged under. But he is not a source.

The way, as abusive as these Espionage Act charges, have run in the last 50 years is the government had sort of this quiet agreement: they never charged the press outlets. [...] They don't charge the journalists. They charge their sources. They charge the Chelsea Mannings, right? They charge the Edward Snowdens. They charge the Thomas Drakes, the Daniel Ellsbergs. But the press... they're left alone. They are breaking that agreement with the Julian Assange case. Assange is not the source. He is merely a publisher. He runs a press organization.

People are like "Ah, Julian Assange is not a journalist, he's not" whatever - there is no way you can make that argument in court, in a way that will be defensible, particularly given what we've talked about, with the government, and how careful they are to avoid prior court precedent, and work around it, and create obscure legal theories that are legal fictions. Everyone knows they're a lie. Everyone knows these theories are false. [...] You cannot convict Julian Assange, the chief editor and publisher of WikiLeaks, under the Espionage Act without exposing The New York Times, The Washington Post, CBS, ABC, NBC, CNN, Fox, whoever, to the same kind of charges, under this president, and every coming president.

And I think people don't think about that.