The Assange Problem: Either Set Him Free or Go Full Fascism.

Unf*cking The Republic

UNFTR Media

Government, News, Politics

4.9 • 683 Ratings

🗓️ 7 May 2021

⏱️ 53 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Assange is a complicated figure personally and historically. And he evokes pretty strong reactions on both sides. Mostly though we don’t think about him at all. With the exception of occasional reports whenever there’s an update on his charges or extradition attempts, Assange has been sort of back burnered. Considering the stakes at play for the U.S. media, this should be surprising or even troubling. Today we’re going to review the story of WikiLeaks and put the debate over the fate of Assange in the only context it should be - to answer the question of just how serious we are about our concept of democracy, free speech and the role of the fourth estate.

Pod Love

Intercepted with Jeremy Scahill- Joe Biden's War Powers: https://spoti.fi/3hb95oM

Media Roots Radio with Abby & Robbie Martin- Assange Trial: Torture, Trumped Up Charges & A Warning to Us All w/ Kevin Gosztola: https://spoti.fi/3f4bMGg

News Beat- Chelsea Manning: Collateral Murder Cover-Up: https://spoti.fi/3nVIEVu

News Beat- Espionage Act & The Battle For The Free Press: https://spoti.fi/2R6rt7E

Book Love

Glenn Greenwald- No Place to Hide: Edward Snowden, the NSA, and the U.S. Surveillance State: https://bookshop.org/a/23377/9781250062581

Tariq Ali + Margaret Kunstler- In Defense of Julian Assange: https://bookshop.org/a/23377/9781682192214

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Unf*cking the Republic is produced and engineered by Manny Faces Media, Original music by Tom McGovern. The show is written and hosted by Immodest Max and distributed by the dark fantasies of Empire.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Well, unfuckers, it's safe to say that you've made our little show a bit of a thing.
0:05.8	Over the past couple of weeks since the New York Times featured UNFTR and we connected
0:09.4	with even more amazing people coming to us from Best of the Left and David Packman,
0:13.6	we've seen a substantial increase in downloads, emails, substacks, subscribers, you name it.
0:18.5	Your messages are funny, thoughtful, encouraging, and sometimes pretty fucking deep.
0:22.9	This is one of those things you always kind of dream about, but you're making it a reality.
0:28.0	Connecting the ever-growing network of unfuckers and sub-fuckers is top of mind for us, and we have some ideas on how best to do this.
0:33.8	But for the next couple of months, we're super focused on some important episodes and something
0:37.9	special that we're pretty excited to announce.
0:40.2	You're leaving Milton Friedman alone?
0:42.3	Ha! Ha! As if! Let's just say that we've been putting your donations to the show to good
0:46.7	use, and we're close to launching something that we're pretty sure on fuckers are going to be all in on.
0:51.7	Group therapy? Knock it off.
0:55.8	During show notes and listener shoutouts,
0:57.4	we're going to address some insightful questions and emails that came in after the two-part series on corporations.
1:00.7	We'll give some book love and pod love as usual,
1:02.7	do some listener call-outs,
1:03.8	and give a little teaser on our special product announcement coming in June.
1:07.3	And in the coming weeks,
1:08.2	we have some great episodes planned on the Chicago School,
1:10.6	Cuba, Canada, Cuba,
1:11.1	Canada, immigration, and more. And we have our May Quickey coming up, which will hopefully be a lot of fun.
	...

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