All of the attempts at character assassination have led many to suggest Assange needs to relinquish his position as a leader of WikiLeaks. But, Assange may be doing WikiLeaks a favor: so long as he is the one being smeared others in WikiLeaks are not and that gives WikiLeaks breathing room to continue to operate. But, more importantly, the organization will always need a spokesperson and, regardless of who it is, it seems reasonable that the nature of this organization will always invite people to try to attach labels to its leaders.
Is Julian Assange a sleazy anti-Semitic control freak who cannot take criticism and hates America and would like to do lasting damage to the US without regard for humanity, a philanderer who deserves the ire of the Humane Society for how he has treated animals and needs to take more showers and take care of his hygiene because he sometimes smells like a "bag lady"? A debate on an answer to that loaded question is as ridiculous and asinine as any discussion about UFO messages being transmitted by Julian Assange and yet the world can count on news organizations to continue to reprint attacks even as they use cables to inform their news reports on events unfolding in the Middle East and North Africa and rehash such gossip.
The media has exploited WikiLeaks and Assange, using them to produce material worthy of investigative news awards while at the same time engaging in near slander. The only way to insert
sanity into discussion of WikiLeaks and reduce the impact of tabloid gossip
bandied about my news media is to overlook it, have wide-ranging conversations
about how WikiLeaks is changing media and society and really dig into the
information it has released.
Update
Listen to episode four of a podcast I host called "This Week in WikiLeaks." Kevin Zeese, who is mentioned in this article, was the episode's guest.
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