Disclaimer: I've not kept up with Assange goings on so if there's any dirty laundry there, I'm not aware of it. The below is purely about the WikiLeaks stuff.

Seconding the Snowden reaction sadly, except it was Julian Assange... I actually have a memory of that that makes me cringe incredibly hard. I was at a birthday party at a friend's house and someone there was so drunk that they went full mask off and were openly sieg heiling and saying Nazi shit (really unpleasant 4chan loser type who my friends subsequently downplayed the actions of, but that's another story)...

Anyway, I got into a number of political arguments with them and the topic of Assange came up and I said something along the lines of: "Why shouldn't he be arrested? He's a criminal." The Nazi guy just looked so frustrated and said "aaaaargh, mainstream media!!!"

It was only a few years later that I realised, oh shit, he was right about that one. I was just parroting what the news was saying about Assange. I was so lib that I allowed a Nazi to have a more informed position than me. That's a hard one to live down.

Watching the rat fucking of Bernie in real time followed by the pandemic response turned me into an ML that wonders if the Soviets shouldn't have stopped at Berlin.

oh wow! me too!