digging the roots

Julian Assange, the founder of Wikileaks, is changing his tactics. Over the past few years he has concentrated his efforts on revealing U.S. government, and especially the Pentagons' and Security Agencies' documented abuses of power. All indications are that in 2011 he is planning to attack the powers behind the government, the plutocrat puppeteers who use their fortunes to pull the strings of our elected and appointed officials.

Even while he was fighting to get out of jail in England at the end of 2010, Assange announced he was preparing a major dump of documents drawn from the hard drive of a top executive in "one of the largest U.S. banks." While he hasn't named the institution, most informed observers believe it's Bank of America, and that we can expect to see hard evidence of massive illegalities perpetrated by B of A and other institutions prior to and during the mortgage-and-derivatives meltdown of 2007-08 and beyond. We might even get a look at the kinds of shennanigans and pressures the banks brought to bear on the government when they were shaking us down for the TARP heists, as well as the details of other, more secret payouts.

In addition, Assange recently was publicly given documents by a disgruntled former Swiss bank employee which contain detailed information about offshore bank accounts owned by superrich individuals and corporations. Most of these accounts are set up for tax avoidance. Rudolf Elmer, according to the Reuters coverage, "headed the office of Julius Baer in the Cayman Islands until he was fired by the bank in 2002. He is scheduled to go on trial in Switzerland on Wednesday for breaching bank secrecy."

"Swiss national Elmer handed Assange the data at a news conference at a media club in London. The two yellow and blue discs contain information on around 2,000 banking clients, both individuals and companies, he said, declining to reveal further details on the data," the Reuters coverage said.

Assange's new emphasis on revealing the secrets of the international ruling class is the next logical step in the ongoing awakening of the working and impoverished classes in America and elsewhere. My gut feeling is that once they learn how blatantly they've been robbed and abused, people will demand changes, and will refuse to be stalled or put off with panaceas, lame answers, or the usual Fox News and CNN lies and evasions.