It’s a very disturbing precedent. If we allow this to happen, where do we go from here?
But we've already allowed it to happen. He's been in jail for years now. For something he may or may not have done. He's on the verge of being deported to the US, where he will most likely be imprisoned for journalism. Something he shouldn't have had to think about. If we wouldn't have allowed this to happen in the first place, he could have stand trial for the other things he's been accused of.
So it's already happened. It's why Snowden is in Russia, instead of living his life in the US.
Assange does no such thing and leaks for political reasons.
“I would only add that the attempt to punish Assange for exposing the truth is an attack on journalism itself.
I notice that none of those mainstream collaborators who published his material – the New York Times, the Guardian, and Der Spiegel – are being pursued, which demonstrates that a generational bias against internet-based journalism is at the heart of the case ...
If Julian goes to the US, Britain will have failed to protect one of the first principles of democracy.”
The US put more people at risk by their sudden exit out of Afghanistan than Assange and WikiLeaks did.
Snowden released some information which was within the realm of reasonable activities for the organisations he worked with, an he was in fact American, so was not quite loyal.
Meanwhile, everything Assange did was appropriate. He has no duties to the US, not being a US citizen or permanent resident, and political bias is very common with journalists. Maybe there is one or two unbiased journalist in all of America, probably people with very extreme pro-truth and consequences-can't-be-allowed-to-matter mindsets, but there's not going to be many of them.
As i remember from American movies: _You have a right_: to remain silent.