Julian Assange is not in prison…but we are

The latest grim chapter of Julian Assange’s extradition hearing has revealed nothing if not that the founder and former head of Wikileaks continues to expose the base reality of Western liberal democracy when the mask of human rights and fair and equal treatment under the law is removed from its barbarous face.

This ongoing despicable farce, taking place this time round at the iconic Old Bailey in the heart of London (iconic, that is, depending on where you happen to be or have placed yourself in matters of class and class power), continues to debase the English legal system. For in a true sense, behind the ritualistic and arcane façade of wigs and gowns, this legal system is now, in the case of Assange, acting to all intents as a posse of upper class reprobates in the interests of a sheriff in Washington.

Denied proper access to his lawyers, being re-arrested and served with further multiple indictments while in his holding cell awaiting proceedings to begin at the start of the week, the unprecedented denial of access to the trial by Amnesty International and Reporters Without Borders, all this and more could be described as many things but legal and ethical propriety are not among them. Moreover, presiding judge Vanessa Baraitser has been conducting these proceedings with nary a hint of impartiality much less decency, wherein no account, none…