So now the fate of Julian Assange rests in the hands of the United Kingdom's court system. They will make a decision whether to extradite him to Sweden, where he faces no pending charges. That's right, the police in Sweden haven't charged him with a crime.
They just want to talk to him about allegations. These allegations put him on Interpol's most wanted list.
This is of course the same court system that released a convicted terrorist to Libya on humanitarian grounds.
Over the next few weeks, Assange's character will be destroyed in the media establishment. He will become nothing more than a digital terrorist and rapist. His supporters will be marginalized as anarchists.
So it goes, as Kurt Vonnegut said.
After all, there is no greater crime than to question the merit of centralized power operating without transparency. Noam Chomsky went from one of the world's foremost linguists to a radical leftist for the same crime.
Sure some in the American left will be sympathetic, but only in an unofficial capacity. The Democratic Party's official position will be one of protecting state secrets. Dkos or moveon.org are not about to step out on a limb on this one.
There will be libertarians, who stand with Assange, but don't expect the CATO Institute or Ron Paul to decry unchecked power.
For my entire political life, I've found myself with only one foot in the Democratic Party. I've constantly had to justify the oligarchical connections as a means to an end. Just the compromise necessary to advance greater equity in policy.
But in truth, the illusion of equity is the compromise they make with us.