Assange stands 'real chance' of election in Australia | Hacker News Reader

Assange stands 'real chance' of election in Australia

france24.com

111 pointsnextstep33 comments

Here's hoping. Under the Westminster parliamentary system you can say anything in parliament and not be held liable. Everything said is then transcribed and made available as a public record. It's the ideal soapbox.

I, too, wish him luck.

Not quite "anything" - parliamentary privilege doesn't extend to anything deemed to be "unparliamentary language". For example, you can't call a fellow member of parliament a liar:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parliamentary_privilege

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unparliamentary_language

I'm all for Assange's senate bid, but given he doesn't seem to have declared/decided which state/territory he will be running for the Senate in, I'm curious as to how these data can be considered accurate/representative of any actual electoral outcome.

True - the closest analog I'd see is Nick Xenophon who won a senate seat in 2007 as an independent, with 15% of the primary vote.

If Assange did get 25% of the primary, then he'd be a shoe-in, probably at the expense of a Green.

However, the article is a bit woolly. "25% would vote for" does not necessarily mean the primary vote.

It's pretty easy for a minor party (well, 'one of the', not 'a') to pick up the last senate seat in a state, given the way they're allocated. It all depends on which way the preferences flow.

Yeah, you're probably right -- I went and had a look back at 2007. Xenophon won, but a Green also picked up a Senate seat (in SA). The Greens polled just 6.5% and picked it up off preferences.

I was figuring his vote would come at the expense of the Greens, but even in that case the major parties were marginal enough on the 6th seat to get the Greens in.

(Plus the DLP won a seat in Vic in 2010, off just 2.3% of the primary).

I expect the next election will be quite a shake-up, especially in the Senate - certainly can't see the major parties gaining. So, you're probably right that preferences will dominate the 5/6th seats.

Given the current political climate I think his seat might come at the expense of a Labor senator.

Th government is on the nose at the moment. So is the opposition! A dead fish has a good chance of being elected right now, if they aren't a member of the major Liberal or Labor parties...

Running for the Senate would be an interesting move, to say the least, and would probably create a headache for the Australian government that they don't want.

I imagine Assange's lawyers have done their homework and have established that from being on house arrest in the UK he could run for the Senate (contrary to what 1-2 commenters here have said).

There's probably few better elections to run in than the next one. It looks like the current Labor government will be decimated in the next election (in some ways history is repeating itself from the Hawke-Keating years, which is interesting).

Yet the population seems disillusioned with the opposition too. My biggest problem with the opposition is their pointless continued opposition to the NBN.

Anyway, the big potential headache for the Australian government here is Assange would go from being a citizen possibly being extradited to the Sweden (and potentially the US) to being a sitting Senator being extradited. While he wouldn't be a head of state and enjoy those protections, I'm not sure if there's any real precedent for extradition of someone in the government like this.

Australia should be standing up to the US over this however so it's a headache I would invite and welcome upon our government.

That all being said, I'm not sure I buy the theory that Assange's extradition to Sweden is to get his extradited to the US. I seem to remember reading something saying it was just as easy to extradite him from Britain so who knows.

I think the theory is that with the current displeasure British citizens have with their government, extraditing Assange at te behest of the US wouldn't go down so well. On the flip side, Sweden has shown that they are willing to cooperate with US interests.

Essentially it's possible to extradite him from both countries, it would be a PR nightmare to do it from Britian

There's also the chance of a Double Dissolution Election. Assuming that the Liberal Party don't get a majority in the Senate, they may decide to call one to pass legislation repealing the Carbon ETS/Tax which Labor are about to introduce. If that happens -- then the requirement for a Senate Seat goes from 16.6% of the Vote to 8.33% of the Vote.

Fun times ahead.

Should Assange win it would not make him part of the government. Senators are only part of the Government if their party is in power.

I'm not sure what the legal issues surrounding extradition of a senator would be though.

Assange's main power would be through participating on Senate committees where he can ask questions of government. He would also be able use parliament as a soap box.

I don't think the Government (regardless of which party is in power) would be that worried about it through - unless he somehow ends up with the balance of power (unlikely).

The Greens will probably lose a spot due to his running.

How many times does Turnbull have to say he isn't going to rip up the NBN?

He has two main problems: He doesn't want labour getting credit for something liberal can. He doesn't believe labour is managing the project in with best financial interest of the public and feels up to $10 billion could be saved.

This is the BS that is ticking him off: http://news.smh.com.au/breaking-news-national/new-homes-dudd...

35,000 new homes built last year had fresh new copper laid by Telstra instead of fibre.

That copper isn't old, damaged, and incapable of fast speeds. It is brand new and was a complete waste of money. Except for Telstra shareholders who get to profit even more off the labour government once tax payers buy it all back to replace with fibre.

You are right about it being just as easy to extradite from Britain. However, the U.S is not likely to serve him until all current cases are resolved. His legal defence is concentrated on making it as hard as possible to attack Wikileaks or anyone involved. It's basically showing that he will fight everything, at every point, all the way.

It would certainly make it a lot more interesting to see how the US Government deals with him.

I would love to see a wikileaks alternative leaking assange classified documents.

Would this get him some form of immunity from civil/criminal prosecution? Would it apply internationally? (diplomatic or consular immunity)

Despite what the movies tell you there is no such thing as true immunity.

If you commit a crime in another country under "diplomatic immunity", your host country must decide to waive your immunity and allow you to be prosecuted, or have you expelled back to your native country. The receiving country could then request extradition for a criminal trial (so you essentially get kicked out as a diplomat, and drug back as a citizen).

In the specific case of Assange, professional activity outside official functions isn't protected at all. So if Australia did come to his defense and claimed he was acting in a professional capacity for doing something like leaking US military secrets, it would be an act of state sponsored terrorism.

>it would be an act of state sponsored terrorism.

How would that be, in any way, shape or form, terrorism? If anything, it might be espionage or something in that vein. Calling whistle-blowing terrorism is disingenuous at best.

Terrorism is loosely defined as actions by an individual or organized group against people or property with the intention of intimidating or coercing societies or governments, often for ideological or political reasons.

Almost word for word the mission statement of Wikileaks.

That's the stupidest definition of terrorism I have ever seen. You could call pretty much ANYTHING slightly subversive terrorism under this definition.

Movements for social change? Terrorism.

Peaceful demonstrations against government policy? Terrorism.

Any sort of activism? Terrorism.

I stand by my opinion: calling whistle-blowing terrorism is a ridiculous appeal to emotion, and anyone who even dares to attempt it should be laughed out of the building.

He has no chance. He needs to be in Australia to be elected or he will be charged with electoral fraud.

Good luck to him but by the time he has dealt with his current legal "issues" most people would have forgotten about him.

"He has no chance. He needs to be in Australia to be elected or he will be charged with electoral fraud."

I don't think this is news to anyone, let alone him.

"Good luck to him but by the time he has dealt with his current legal "issues" most people would have forgotten about him."

Nope. If and when he makes it back to Australia, he'll get a tonne of free publicity, without any effort at all.

It's simply untrue. There is no such requirement.

The requirement that does exist that will be problematic for Assange is that a Senator can lose their position if they are absent without leave of the Senate.

Can you provide a source for this?

As far as I know (from an interview with Geoffrey Robertson, Assange's lawyer, but also known as a respected senior lawyer and public figure in both the UK and Australia) this is incorrect. It is possible to be elected when overseas, however there seems to be a grey area as to what would happen to his seat if he was unable to return to the country to occupy it in parliament.

the grey areas will be clarified with either attorney general opinion or new legislation before the election, you can bet on that.

It's not really a grey area. There have been politicians who have failed to be present enough days in their electorates in the past and suffered the wrath of the electoral commission.

such as?

'in their electorates'? Do you mean he has to be in a particular state or territory if elected to senate?

This is quite simply untrue. There is no requirement to live in an electorate to represent that electorate in Parliament, and in fact in the past it was very common for country electorates to be represented by city politicians. Antony Green has a great post debunking this myth:

http://blogs.abc.net.au/antonygreen/2012/02/local-seats-for-...

(and Senators don't even represent electorates).

Could you be thinking of housing allowance scandals? This is where elected politicians claim rent from the government for rent for houses they're not really living in.

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