Assange is Free!

For a man with a strong opinion on virtually everything, I'm not sure what I think about Julian Assange.

Part of the reason for that is because my views on the state of the world have evolved since the Wikileaks founder was imprisoned.

Back then, he faced charges in Sweden for sexual assault.

While the charges were accurate, (under Swedish law), many thought they were a Trojan Horse under which the United States would seek extradition.

In the United States, he could have faced a lifetime of incarceration for exposing illegal activities that the US government didn't want the world to know about.

At the time, I thought he should have faced the music in Sweden and that his decision to escape justice in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London was his own decision.

Hence, I felt no sympathy for the man.

He was eventually sentenced to 50 weeks in a British prison for breaching bail conditions and then was detained for another four years fighting extradition requests to the United States.

However, as my faith in government has declined to the point where it has now disintegrated, I also see the public service Assange did by exposing the material he did.

Where governments sanction illegal activities, there is a public interest in exposing those activities.