Randy Credico Interviews Julian Assange (08/25/2016)

Supplemental document for: "Theory that Roger Stone's go-between for Wikileaks was Randy Credico", link: https://wakelet.com/wake/2d352ae9-febe-44a1-a7bb-51674a2e4bf5

Interview of Julian Assange by Randy Credico transcript, broadcast date: August 25, 2016. Evening edition (broadcast at 6pm) of "You're Crazy, If You're Up This Early".

Link to file:
https://www.mediafire.com/?czyzct594qtw46w

[theme from "The Third Man" by Anton Karas]

RANDY CREDICO
Alright, that's Anton Karas, from "The Third Man". By Sir Carol Reed. Uh, alright. I gotta read this statement, that I just got this text message from my good buddy, Cornel West, who I was arrested with and spent the day in jail. I got some pictures of us in jail together, they didn't take my camera. But it says: "Please tell brother Assange, I send my love and respect, for his courage and determination. I shall never forget our interview in the embassy in London. He will be free soon." He's talking about Julian Assange. We, I hope, have him on the phone right now. Julian, are you there? Hello? We got him here? How's that? Always a little technical problems here at WBAI. We got you there Julian? I can hear him a little bit- We got the- Listen, it's- Just bear with us, we have Julian Assange, from London, from the Ecuadorian embassy, and we are very happy and pleased, and honored that he is here at WBAI. Julian is a- Alright, alright. Julian, can you hear us now, Julian?

JULIAN ASSANGE
Yes.

CREDICO
Alright, I'm sorry. These things happen, here at WBAI. We've been around, independent radio. You've been on the station many times, mostly on Democracy Now!, and you were at the studio on 120 Wall Street, like twenty years ago, somone told me, fifteen twenty years ago. So-

ASSANGE
It was about six or seven years ago. It feels like twenty.

CREDICO
Yeah. [laughs] Does it? It's six or seven years ago, 120 Wall Street. Well, they've moved around since then, they're now in Brooklyn on Atlantic Avenue, we wish you were in the room with us, at this point. Just want to thank you. So many people are listening, they know that you're on the phone. Now, _I am not_ Mike Wallace. I'm not one of those hardcore, I'm not an interrogator here. Some people are going to think this is an infommercial for Wikileaks, and for Julian Assange. But this is a progressive radio station, and I must tell you that everybody here is thrilled that you're on, and we all consider you to be a hero, which you are. And we thank you for the great work you've done throughout your life, on behalf of spreading information out there. You've been a beacon of truth, you've been a messenger of truth, and we apologize that our government has been hounding you for so long.

ASSANGE
Well, I don't know what I can say about that. But...I'm struck by this philosophical position of "I am not Mike Wallace."

CREDICO
Well, I'm not Mike Wallace. Do you remember Mike Wallace?

ASSANGE
That's a thing for anyone but Mike Wallace to say.

CREDICO
Yes, but Mike Wallace would put- They're all interrogators. I'm watching you, even a comedian I started out with, Bill Maher, you know, I wasn't comfortable watching you on that show with Bill Maher. I think he was a little tough on you.

ASSANGE
Well, it's- I don't mind interrogations, actually. I think there are times when that type of approach is called for, for example, when you're dealing with very slimy politicians that are extremely skilled at dodging questions.

CREDICO
Right. No. I agree.

ASSANGE
My experience, my rather limited experience interviewing people, uh, actually, I think it's more interesting to give them enough rope-

CREDICO
Right.

ASSANGE
To kindof hear their arguments at what they feel is their best, and then you can contrast them with someone else.

CREDICO
Right. I see. We'd like for you to be at the station, when you get out of London, and have your own show here, and you can do that with politicians. Didn't you once- you were going to run for office in Austrlia, for Senate?

ASSANGE
I did. I found something quite unusual, which is, in Australia, if you can submit a postal vote, then you are also entitled to run for election. Provided you haven't been convicted of a serious crime, which I haven't. So...and there's a whole precedent of a governor in the UK running in the 1900s in Australia. So, we tried to do that. We didn't think there was much chance, but I thought we'd draw some attention.

CREDICO
Well, I think it's a good idea. I ran for Senate against Chuck Schumer-

ASSANGE
Yeah.

CREDICO
-who makes Hillary Clinton look like a progressive. I mean, he may be the next leader of the Senate. And I know he's no fan of yours. And I don't think-

ASSANGE
I ran for the senate as well. Australian senate.

CREDICO
From 2010, I ran against Schumer. And he had me thrown off the ballot. But you know, I was doing it as performance art. Were you doing it as performance art, or were you seriously-

ASSANGE
Not as performance art. A bit too...because, you know, during election period, as you get close to the election, all the other issues close over, and it's just what the two major parties are talking about. In order to-

CREDICO
That's what I meant, though.

ASSANGE
Yeah.

CREDICO
You're basically trying to shine some light on the two party system. You didn't run in one of the two major parties, you ran as an independent?

ASSANGE
We ran with the Wikileaks party. We created a party-

CREDICO
You created a party-

ASSANGE
Basically, just because on the voting forms, if it's a party, you appear high up, if it's individuals, you don't-

CREDICO
I see.

ASSANGE
-you're kindof buried among sixty seven others.

CREDICO
Did you- you didn't hit the road, campaigning with the posters and bunting and all that?

ASSANGE
Well- There was a team of people in Australia, of volunteers, I got about a hundred and fifty thousand votes.

CREDICO
Wow.

ASSANGE
The state I was in.

CREDICO
That's amazing. I got twenty nine thousand. In New York state. So, you did a lot better than I did. But uh, I ran against Governor Cuomo in 2014, but you know, I was totally hammered by the press, if they did any coverage at all. The New York Times didn't do a thing on me in 2014, basically helped out Andrew Cuomo, as they have with Hillary Clinton, as they have with Chuck Schumer, and sitting in that room there, looking at this election, in the United States, what is your overview of this election, in the United States? If I may just get away [inaudible]

ASSANGE
Well, in some ways, it's super interesting, in other ways, it's very boring. Uh, you've got two candidates, uh, deeply disliked by both the population, by both groups of the population. Hillary Clinton is kindof predictable, boring, uh, liberal warhawk. Although probably now, you have to question whether she's a liberal warhawk because she's brought all the neo-cons onto her side as well.

CREDICO
She's close to Henry Kissinger, you know.

ASSANGE
Well, it's much worse than that. She's got Robert Kagan, and...his wife, who's Victoria Nuland? One of the best buddies of the State Department, behind a lot of the problems with Ukraine has palled up with her...is fundraising dinners for her. William, uh, Kristol...

CREDICO
Right.

ASSANGE
...has also...

CREDICO
...endorsed her.

ASSANGE
...has told everyone to vote- endorsed her, vote for Hillary. There's about thirty now.

CREDICO
Do you-

ASSANGE
-all that neo-con, nearly all the neo-cons who were behind the Iraq War, have now backed Hillary.

CREDICO
So you-

ASSANGE
-that tells you something very interesting, it tells you something about Hillary. Clinton. But it also tells you something about Donald Trump. And it tells you something about how the neo-cons...so, the neo-cons' sense of identity and their interests, are not strongly co-aligned with the Republican Party.

CREDICO
Right.

ASSANGE
Because I believed, naively, that the neo-cons were deeply Republican. And if their interests differed to the candidate, Donald Trump, for reasons, they might not aggressively push him. That's very different to crossing the floor, and, if you like, backing the enemy as far as the Republicans are concerned. All along the neo-cons were not really Republicans. They were something else, and they had a different agenda.

CREDICO
You uh think that if she wins, she's going to continue the warmongering policies...that basically have been going on for about the last forty years, you know, she's...

ASSANGE
Unfortunately, I think she'll accelerate it. They'll be a moderately significant uptick compared to...under the Obama administration. Remember this period from 2009 to 2012, of Hillary Clinton as Secretary of State in the Obama administration, produced a lot of conflict...Hillary Clinton got out in the end, and so John Kerry had to deal with it. But if you look at the successes, by John Kerry, diplomatic successes, his term in office compared to Hillary Clinton's, there's a world of difference. To be fair to her, you could say some of the reasons for this is Obama's trying to move into his legacy phase. And after having satisfied the, broadly speaking, military industrial complex in the United States, and a bunch of other powerful actors, he's now moving into a position to shore up his historical reputation. _After_...he leaves office. So, John Kerry may have been given little more rein, than Hillary Clinton was. But, yeah, there's significant diplomatic successes under John Kerry in terms of peace-making, deal-making, reduction of tensions. But Hillary Clinton's time in office saw the opposite.

CREDICO
Right. Well, so you think going forward, going forward, it's going to be- even though she's in a weakened-

[cross talk]

ASSANGE
-that's just analysis of results in office...but, there's a lot of other indicators, what she's said in her emails, the types of people she chooses to associate, the types of people that endorse her, her positions on legislation and on war, with her being the leading...with her not only being the leading voice in the administration to bring about the bombing of Libya, the destruction of the Libyan state, but being, towards the end of 2011...so proud of that effort, that within, inside the State Department, she produced, or had her staff produce a, what we call, um, a "Libya brag sheet". It's what they call a "ticktock". It's a chronological description of how she was the central figure bringing about the destruction of the Libyan state.

CREDICO
I'm trying to think, is there anything that she did...that was good? During her tenure as Secretary of State? I can't think of anything.

ASSANGE
Mmmmmmmm....

CREDICO
What about Honduras?

ASSANGE
There must be something. I'm sure there must be something. Politicians sell themselves, and the State Department sells itself. So there's already an oversupply of an institution bringing out her good points. So, of course, your investigative journos concentrate on the negatives.

CREDICO
You know, I've been a critic-

ASSANGE
-none come to mind, I'm sure there must be some.

CREDICO
Well, I can't think of anything. I've read articles about her...she was running for Senate here in 2000, and now she pushes herself as this big progressive, when it comes to civil rights, Black Lives Matter...you know, she lives just a mile away from two prisons, female prisons, Bedford Hills [Bedford Hills Correctional Facility for Women] and Taconic Prisons [Taconic Correctional Facility], she never once drropped by. Not one time, did she drop by to say hello to the prisoners, and they're ninety four percent Black and Latino. In both of those prisons. Maximum security prisons. Just a mile away.

ASSANGE
Yeah.

CREDICO
And so, I get a lot of heat that by attacking Hillary, which I do here, whenever I have a chance, at this radio station...I get a lot of heat, that I'm actually helping out Donald Trump. By attacking Hillary Clinton. This is the Democratic Party's problem. That they chose a very weak candidate, with a real sordid background. I mean, you are getting a lot of heat...you know, people are saying Julian's basically going to help Donald Trump. Is there really a difference between these two?

ASSANGE
Yes. There are differences between them.

CREDICO
In your mind.

ASSANGE
There are significant differences between them as individuals. I think, I could speak in both directions. The issue, I think, is more the Republican Party, and how much...how...look: individual presidents once they are in office, and they're established, don't really do much. Most of their time, they are just taking the briefing sheets that are given to them, reading them to teleprompters...the briefing sheets that are given to meetings. Or sometimes, they're given two or three alternatives, by the secretaries and members of cabinet. And asked to choose between them. So, you know, it's not like these...the alternatives that are presented to them are diametrically opposed. So, there are alternatives plucked from a very narrow pond. And where are they produced from? They're produced from the major U.S. corporations. And their ability to inject proposals, to go into governmental decision making, and lobby for particular ones to be selected...and from the bureaucracies. The CIA, Department of Homeland Security, Army, Pentagon, Veterans Affairs, etc. So, there's just one point the candidate makes a difference. And that is, in the appointment phase. So, there's about three thousand five hundred positions that are appointed in the months of the government coming into office. And, so, Hillary Clinton will select certain cronies, who she owes favors, etc. And those people will be appointed to various positions, and they in turn will recommend to her other appointments. And similarly, with Donald Trump, he will be appointing a whole bunch of people, from out of his real estate network, people in the entertainment industry, new friends he's made in his campaign. And where there are gaps in his own personal network of trust, he will be feeding from what the Republican Party offers him.

CREDICO
Do you think he's really trying to win? Or do you think he's tanking it?

ASSANGE
I think it's a very interesting question. Whether it was a serious campaign in the beginning. Whether there are allegations, I don't have any evidence. To speculate whether...Hillary Clinton and Bill Clinton, who allegedly spoke to him about whether he should run, given that they have a close association in the past...the Clintons might have thought it would be helpful to have Donald Trump in there. I think it is clear now, given the amount of effort that's he putting into things, the time that it's consuming, that he's either was genuinely, always intending to run as far as possible, or he has become trapped into it.

CREDICO
Right, well, I have, I'm not like a big conspiracy person, but I gotta tell you, here it feels like, watching this, that he's part of the team. He's about the only person that she could possibly beat, with her record.

ASSANGE
Yeah. I think that's...pretty true, although amongst the seventeen Republican candidates, there was a lot of chaff, there were also some-

CREDICO
Maybe Rand Paul.

ASSANGE
-poor candidates, not in terms of saying so much, very inflammatory devices, things that Trump says that alienates whole groups of populations-

CREDICO
I mean, some of the people around him, Rudy Giuliani...

ASSANGE
Yeah.

CREDICO
...Chris Christie, this sheriff from Arizona, this nutcase, racist sheriff Arpaio. It's very difficult [laughs] to like him. But there are other candidates. There's Gary Johnson and there's Jill Stein. Jill Stein called you a hero. What do you think of her campaign?

ASSANGE
Well, I think she's clearly a brave woman. And the Greens' bravest selection, by sticking up for Wikileaks, its right to publish, present sources and so on...obviously, we here see that as something important. It's actually a really good signal that is possible in the U.S. political debate. I mean, of course, whether it's possible for someone like Jill Stein to be elected, is another matter.

CREDICO
It's almost impossible for her to be elected.

ASSANGE
She has said these things...there is some reportage. It's not being smashed in everyone's face, like the Trump and Clinton campaign coverage, but there is a little bit.

CREDICO
One of Trump's, one of Trump's supporters [laughs] Roger Stone, who I know, I actually know Roger Stone...he was on this show. Go figure. A couple of weeks back. [No, this is either a mis-statement or a flat out lie. He was on Credico's show two days earlier, August 23, 2016. Transcript of show: https://pastebin.com/cWMqnZ6a] But, he bandied your name, of course, he backtracked, and said no, he didn't have any communication with you, but uh...you know, he does toss things around.

ASSANGE
Roger Stone is a rather canny spinmaster.

CREDICO
[sotto voce] Yes. To say the least.

ASSANGE
We haven't had any communication with him. Whatsoever.

CREDICO
[sotto voce] Yes.

ASSANGE
I do imagine his position, he wants to...I mean, he has said nice things about us, I think he said that I was a hero, okay, that's nice, we appreciate that kind of thing. Um, so I'm not minding to criticize him too much for doing something that any kind of political operative would do. Which is basically to try to get in on the, uh, the...get in on our publications, in some way, by suggesting he has something to do with it. Uh, but actually...no, it's all our...hard work. And the hard work of our sources.

CREDICO
Right. And you are doing-

ASSANGE
Republicans have not helped us at all. If they want to donate money, like anyone else-

CREDICO
Yes! That's a thing!

ASSANGE
-they can do that. We welcome that.

CREDICO
Well, before-

ASSANGE
-give us accurate documents, which we will check. From the Clinton campaign. We welcome that. And similarly, we welcome the Clintons, or Stein, or whoever.

CREDICO
Maybe you'll get some money from the CGI, the Clinton Global Initiative. Have you-

ASSANGE
Yeah, I doubt it.

CREDICO
Have you applied- Let me say, while we're there, people who want to- We're talking to Julian Assange, of Wikileaks, out of the Ecuador embassy in London...it's eleven o'clock there? Is it ten o'clock, ten thirty?

ASSANGE
It's the hottest August in London, ever.

CREDICO
It's the hottest? What do we have Celsius? Thirty three?

ASSANGE
There's no air conditioning in the embassy.

CREDICO
You have no air conditioning? I gotta tell you, you look great. I see you on television, with Jake Tapper the other day...how do you maintain your energy, and your health? I mean, you work out of the embassy?

ASSANGE
Well, it's...I have an exercise regime, you have to do these types of things. But it's...I like...I'm in love with understanding the world. And sharing that understanding with other people. It's hard to describe how much I'm in love with that. And have been for many years. And then, at the same time, when you're in a conflict, where people are trying to malign your work, or engage in blockades, or as they're doing, send me and other people to prison...yeah, it's very stimulating. And so...if you feel energetic under these circumstances.

CREDICO
I'm sure you do, I'm sure you do. I'm sure it must be an impossible situation day in and day out, but you've done an incredible job...you're just a remarkable example of strength and hope. And I know...you've taken a huge sacrifice, when you got into this business, you knew it was possible that something like this would happen, eventually. Right?

ASSANGE
Sure. I actually expected, not exactly this, but something close to this. Yeah, a couple of years earlier. Actually, I thought it would happen...

CREDICO
Well, here, I just saw the U.N. has formally found, actually it was in February, that you were unlawfully detained, by Sweden and the U.K.  Can you expand on that?

ASSANGE
Yes, on February 5, the United Nations formally found that I am being illegally detained by Sweden and the U.K., and must be immediately released and compensated. Um, so that's obviously a hugely significant win for us. Uh, the U.K. is, and Sweden, have actively defied that ruling. And they have paid some diplomatic consequences for it. Hopefully those consequences will increase over time...we have various lega mechanisms that we have tried to put in place. That we are putting in place, to try and enforce those decisions. And you can go to justice4assange.com, with the numeral four in the middle, justice4assange.com-

CREDICO
Justice four Assange dot com. They can go there.

ASSANGE
And you can see the U.N.-

CREDICO
I see it right here. I'm right there now. So people can go there...how can people help out with the legal bills? Is there a-

ASSANGE
If you go to justice4assange.com, there's a donate thing on the right hand side, and that goes to our general staff defense fund. To protect me, to protect the rest of our staff.

CREDICO
And how- That is one way, are there other ways?

ASSANGE
It is quite expensive.

CREDICO
I know it is!

ASSANGE
We have a hundred and fifty four lawyers. That have...on our legal team, on our staff, or have advised, the majority have advised at some stage...during those last few years. All of them working either pro bono, or at highly reduced rates, some just for costs. But, none the less, that's a big team.

CREDICO
A big blow was the loss of Michael Ratner. I know that was a-

ASSANGE
Yes. Enormous-

CREDICO
I know that was a huge blow.

ASSANGE
Enormous blow for us in the United States. He was our chief counsel. It was a blow to a number of other groups-

CREDICO
Oh yes.

ASSANGE
-but the primary cases being, he spent his time on in the last couple of years, were our various legal cases.

CREDICO
He worked very hard on that case. And I know people associated with him, who still are. So, that's one way people can donate...they go to justice4assange.com. And is there any other way people can-

ASSANGE
Yes. They can go to wikileaks.org and donate there, we're tax deductible in the United States, and also in Europe. I was just joking with one of my lawyers, who was visitng yesterday, that it's absurd, Biden calling me a high-tech terrorist, Hillary's called out for my assassination, and yes yes, high-tech terrorist, you know assassinate, shoot the son-of-a-bitch, which is what Bob Beckel, this Democratic-

CREDICO
Bob Beckel said that?

[cross talk]

ASSANGE
Let me quote it to you exactly. Bob Beckel said: "I'm not for the death penalty...but..." Sorry, can you hear me?

CREDICO
Tell me about Beckel, I'm sorry. [laughs]

ASSANGE
So, Bob Beckel said...

CREDICO
Yeah, he's a windbag.

ASSANGE
...should be assassinated. Assange. Should be assassinated. And: "I'm not for the death penalty...if I'm not for the death penalty, there's only way to do it, legally shoot the son-of-a-bitch."

CREDICO
That's what Bob Beckel said.

ASSANGE
Yeah.

CREDICO
I'm embarrassed.

ASSANGE
That's what Bob Beckel said. So anyway, we joke, yeah yeah yeah, "Wikileaks, they're a high-tech terrorist publishing organization, that is tax deductible in the United States and Europe." [laughs]

CREDICO
Well, it's my favorite-

ASSANGE
Somehow it doesn't work, right? You can't have tax deductions in the United States and Europe, and somehow be a high-tech-

CREDICO
You're on his terror list. Basically, on his hit list. And I know the guy. I worked at a comedy club on Upper- I forget who it was for, but he was in the audience, and came up to me completely wacked out, on like nine shots of tequila, and he gave me a-, said "You were great!" And that was the only time I ever had _any any any_ association with Bob Beckel. I can't stand CNN, Jake Tapper, I thought was rude to you, I know Megyn Kelly, you'll be on today with Megyn Kelly on Fox, you were on last night, part two is tonight?

ASSANGE
Yeah.

CREDICO
Megyn Kelly? And how did that go?

ASSANGE
Tapper I didn't think was so- Tapper I didn't think was so rude, I thought he was relatively-

CREDICO
Well, I'm prejudiced.

ASSANGE
-polite. I say relatively, you have to understand that these guys are the mainstream media, and so, just in order to justify the way in which they behave, they have to make certain nasty questions. But you can often read if they're enthusiastically into the attack, or whether they feel they just have to go through some of the motions, it's expected of them...so, for Jake Tapper, and for the Fox woman, Megyn Kelly, they were not, the heart was not in the attack. I'll tell you whose heart was in it: Chuck Todd.

CREDICO
OH! THE WORST! Chuck Todd! I call him Chuck Fraud! Chuck Fraud is the worst, he doesn't like you, because of that leak. And the DNC-

ASSANGE
Well, we revealed in the DNC emails that he was being called up by Debbie Wasserman Schultz and her crew, "what the hell is going on?" There's speaking about Sanders in a particular way, and, you know, shut that down.

CREDICO
Well, thank god she's gone. And I wish...I would make the trade, I wish he were gone and Wasserman Schultz was still there. I'd prefer to get rid of him, because he's a horror show at MSNBC, at NBC, and he's not really a journalist. Jeremy Scahill called him out on the Mahrer show, four or five years ago, and he freaked out. Chuck Todd.

ASSANGE
Well, he's close to the Clintons, and you see, how "Meet The Press" works...

CREDICO
Supported by Boeing, Boeing underwrites that-

ASSANGE
It's a Sunday show, so they sortof set up what the White House wants the discussion to be, in the first part of the week.

CREDICO
I think it's all of MSNBC, I think they should just move- [cross talk] They should just move right into the White House.

ASSANGE
Right. It's interesting question, whether MSNBC is effectively, socially, in terms of its structure and proprietors and so on, a White House outfit, or whether it is a center of power for the Democratic Party outfit. I think that's quite an interesting question, I don't know what the answer is.

CREDICO
Have you been interviewed by Chris Hayes?

ASSANGE
Uh, I think I might've been, years ago. But on Twitter at least, he's been slandering us, constantly.

CREDICO
He's been slandering you? He's- It's amazing...you know, I thought the guy did a pretty good job, Keith Olbermann, Keith Olbermann was okay, they got rid of him, you know, because he was too far out there, and they bring in Rachel Maddow, and they bring in Chris Hayes, and they both become attack dogs for the administration.

ASSANGE
Yeah...he has, Chris Hayes...there's also a middle aged Black woman, can't recall her name.

CREDICO
Uh, Joy Reid?

ASSANGE
Joy Reid, yeah. And she has been particularly bad.

CREDICO
Well, we caught MSNBC...if you watch them around the clock, half of the programming there is a show called "Lock Up". "Lock Up", it's all about this sick, disgusting, rancid, voyeuristic display of prisoners. And one of our-

ASSANGE
Is it? I haven't seen it.

CREDICO
"Lock Up", and I asked one of the guys, Howard Fineman, at the New Hampshire primary...I was there, and I asked Fineman, "How on earth could you be on a show that's underwritten-" He said, "It's cheap! It doesn't cost much money, and-" with the money that they make, it helps pay for Chris Hayes and Rachel Maddow. [ASSANGE laughs] That's what he said! That was the answer! You gotta check out "Lock Up". On MSNBC. Just look it up on-line, it's their flagship show. Because everything else loses money. Remember: she does not have a big audience. Three hundred thousand people watch MSNBC. But three hundred and thirty million Americans don't watch her. So we shouldn't take it too seriously.

ASSANGE
Yeah, I think they're not really using it to influence- they're using it to influence influencers, right? That's the point, to help get out, get out stories, and particular angles, get Chuck Todd to set the narrative drum for the week, or to present a defense-

CREDICO
Well, I'm sorry to see- Yeah-

ASSANGE
-or to present an attack that will then be picked up and spread. Because if you look at the numbers, the numbers are not, what seems to me in a back of the envelope analysis, the numbers are not enough to, uh, to justify the payment.

CREDICO
Absolutely, the numbers are very low...and CNN is okay, how is Wolf Blitzer treated you [sic]? Have you been on with Wolf Blitzer?

ASSANGE
I think I might've [sounds fatigued by this area of questioning]...I don't think so, actually. He has definitely covered our material. I recall distinctly when we released "Collateral Murder", uh, which was about a thirty minute tape of Apache gun camera footage, the first such footage in high resolution was released. Showing an Apache helicopter mowing down eighteen people in the suburb of New Baghdad, Baghdad, including two Reuters journalists. And Wolf Blitzer, uh, yeah, even though this was a journalistic effort by us, which in some ways was made for TV, because it was very dramatic, visual images, he made sure to spin it, and only take one segment, which wasn't bad as the majority segment. I mean, if you look at Wolf Blitzer's connections to Clinton, and the sortof angles he tries to push, it's not a surprising- I think most people in the media industry understand Wolf Blitzer is quite a partisan figure.

CREDICO
Takes him a long time to say anything. Have you ever noticed that about Wolf Blitzer? Takes him about two weeks, you know, to get out a one sentence question. Wolf Blitzer. Takes a lot of time. He could do one two hour show with one sentence. Wolf Blitzer. But uh-

ASSANGE
Yeaaaaah. [sounds really sick and tired of this angle] It's a shitty job, I mean...

CREDICO
Oh we're going to have to...oh, it's okay...we don't care...this is...We're talking with Julian Assange, the most wanted person by Bob Beckel. [ASSANGE laughs] Bob Beckel. What a great guy. With the suspenders. What a joke he is. And so, we don't have-

ASSANGE
-not the only one, there are quite a lot of those [journalists who want Assange killed].

CREDICO
[does Bill Clinton voice] You think Bill Clinton's happy?

ASSANGE
O'Reilly...

CREDICO
What about O'Reilly?

ASSANGE
O'Reilly said I should be assassinated by a drone...Mike Grunwald of Time magazine, not so long ago actually, said he couldn't wait to write the defense of the Obama administration for killing me with a drone.

CREDICO
Wow.

ASSANGE
He is kindof Obama haigographer.

CREDICO
Well, if you-

ASSANGE
He's now moved to Politico. It's not just me, they've also gone for our other staff and organization, and of course, some of our sources they've said should be executed. What I find a bit disturbing, you think, journalists, whatever their associations are, everyone has associations and friends that they make on the job, whoever they interview...you think, at their core, their number one self-interest is being able to practice journalism.

CREDICO
Right.

ASSANGE
Okay, maybe they're a bit compromised around the edges, but in the end they need an audience. To listen to them, and they have to be able to say things. So, you think that would be their core interest. Unfortunately it's not true. Actually, they defer to these other interests. They defer, what you think would be their core interest, to speak freely, to encourage assassin campaigns against publishers and so on...they'll easily sweep that aside, in order to pander to the interests in the Democratic establishment, the Republican establishment, the arms complex, banking establishment, etc.

CREDICO
I think of, when I think of you, I think of, in this country, going back to the 1840s, Elijah Lovejoy, you know who Elijah Lovejoy was, the abolitionist?

ASSANGE
No, I don't.

CREDICO
Well, you should look him up, because that was you in 1840. He was telling the truth way back. 1840. Elijah Lovejoy. He was in Missouri. Part of the Missouri Compromise, he was anti-slavery, and ruffians came in, and they shut him down...he set up shop again, and they said, "Enough of this noise," and they killed him, threw him in the Missouri river, and destroyed his printing press. And his brother went on, Owen Lovejoy, to be one of the leaders in the House of Representatives that supported Abe Lincoln...Elijah Lovejoy, that's you. You're under siege there, Julian Assange. You're a courageous man, and I hope that we can get you back on this show, you have an open invitation to be on this show and other shows, we here at WBAI are huge fans...of Julian Assange. I can tell you that. And we got your back here. I can tell you.

ASSANGE
Okay. Great. I'll be very happy to be back on.

CREDICO
Once again, just give- If people want to donate, they go to justice four julian dot

ASSANGE
Justice four Assange-

CREDICO
-dot com. Or they can go to Wikileaks-

ASSANGE
-or they can go to Wikileaks. That goes to the publisher.

CREDICO
Geez, I gotta tell you something. I could have you on for four or five hours, I really appreciate you being on this show. And, we'll be in touch, and..._any time_. Julian Assange, folks. The one and only, the great great great great, there you go. That's him. We're going to play this out for you, Julian. We're going to play this out for you. This is Johnny Cash.

[Johnny Cash's cover of Tom Petty's "Won't Back Down" comes on]