To kill a reputation

I have never been much of a conspiracy theorist. Sure, I´ve seen my share of Oliver Stone movies and naturally I question the lone gunman in the book depository, but when I hear the news of Julian Assanges arrest-it really gives me pause.

Swedish tabloids are not the best and brightest, we all know that. They find most of their international news stories by reading HuffPost, not even realizing the irony of recycling the already recycled. So why in the world are they now breaking a major news story at this convenient time? Who handed them this golden nugget,  and why?

Waging a war is costly, money is drained from the US government and whenever money goes out of someones pocket, it naturally trickles into someone elses. Long story short: waging a war is as much a business as it is a humanitarian catastrophy.

There are so many people that have so much to lose from documentation being released by WikiLeaks, that it is borderline criminal not to question why the news of Julian Assanges arrest just happened to land in the lap of a run-of-the-mill swedish reporter. Also, one has to consider that this story broke after several attempts had been made by the US government to make WikiLeaks sease and disist, attempts that failed miserably.

When you run out of legal ways to silence WikiLeaks, it is natural to start attacking Julian Assange- the (disturbingly pale) face of the operation. His repuation has been immaculate up to this, and if it is tarnished- well, so is WikiLeaks. Destroying Julian Assange is the quickest and cheapest way to desarme the bomb that is WikiLeaks.

It scares me to find the lead reporter boasting about the scoop on twitter, but not mentioning in a single sentence the democratic ramifications of this supposed breaking story. WikiLeaks are to the Afghan war what the Pentagon Papers were to the Vietnam war, and their work has the ability to blow the lid off the entire operation, a historical perspective I doubt bothers Expressen in the age of the almighty buck.

So why report the story so blindly? I know that  Niklas Svensson thinks that he just made his bones, but does he even stop to wonder who would have an interest in him reporting on this, and why?

History has taught us that no war can survive the loss of public support, and WikiLeaks were about to drop yet another bombshell on the american public, promising many more where they came from. While Julian Assange sits in a holding cell, there is a possibility that this story will take on a life of its own, as many have before it.

This very story may change the way history sees the Afghan war, it may determine the future of many soldiers, civilians, government workers and defense contractors. It scares me that it is now in the hands of a man more conserned the possibility of winning a prize than of finding the truth.

I am not a journalist, but I know for a fact that whenever a reporter places himself in the center of the story somenthing is terribly wrong. I also know that this story is way to important to be left in the hands of main stream media , and that history depends on our actions.

Right now.