TightWind is written by Kyle Baxter. Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.

Julian Assange wrote an op-ed for the Australian. He wrote:

His observation perhaps reflected his father Keith Murdoch’s expose that Australian troops were being needlessly sacrificed by incompetent British commanders on the shores of Gallipoli. The British tried to shut him up but Keith Murdoch would not be silenced and his efforts led to the termination of the disastrous Gallipoli campaign.

Nearly a century later, WikiLeaks is also fearlessly publishing facts that need to be made public.

I grew up in a Queensland country town where people spoke their minds bluntly. They distrusted big government as something that could be corrupted if not watched carefully. The dark days of corruption in the Queensland government before the Fitzgerald inquiry are testimony to what happens when the politicians gag the media from reporting the truth.

It’s good to know that Assange thinks so highly of himself.

For someone who claims that he is just a truth-teller, though, he puts out conflicting statements. He says above he’s just telling the truth, but in other places, his motivation is a little different. He’s stated that his goal is to weaken the government’s ability to act:

Or as Mr. Assange told Time magazine last week, “It is not our goal to achieve a more transparent society; it’s our goal to achieve a more just society.” If leaks cause U.S. officials to “lock down internally and to balkanize,” they will “cease to be as efficient as they were.”

That’s not the goal of someone who’s just telling the truth, trying to get information out to the public—that’s the goal of someone who’s declared himself the enemy of the U.S. government.

Assange wants it both ways; he wants to use the Western world’s individual rights to protect himself from persecution while also trying to bring down the very governments he claims the right of protection from. In other words, he’s not only waging war against the government, but he’s too much of a coward to admit it. Someone who not only plays outside of the normal rules, but tries to destroy that very system altogether, should not be surprised when the system sets aside those rules for him.

That doesn’t mean, of course, that Assange’s rights should be suspended to stop him. That would very much be immoral. If he’s violated laws, then he should be brought to justice; if he hasn’t, then he should be free.