As a public figure, his income should be public knowledge. Assange has called on the US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to resign. She may have some faults, but lack of transparency is not one of them: she has fully disclosed her financial interests upon entering public life and her annual income is in the public domain. 

Who funds your lifestyle? Before his arrest, Assange told the media that he lived in airports — a romantic notion, especially after Tom Hanks's touching portrayal of a stranded foreigner in the movie The Terminal. Anyone who travels as much as Assange does, often at short notice, also knows the more mundane trivia of that lifestyle: it costs money to buy plane tickets; pay currency fees; eat out frequently; and rely on taxis, dry-cleaners and hotels. Who pays for all of this? The organisation? Or Assange, out of his pocket? If the former, is that a salary? If the latter, who supports Assange's cash flow?

Wikileaks' mission statement would be far less risible if the organisation practised what it preached. The fact of the matter is that its members and its supporters do not believe that the rules apply to them. The wave of cyber-attacks launched against PayPal, Visa, Mastercard and Amazon offered further proof of the kind of lawless mindset behind Wikileaks. After all, the denial of their services to Wikileaks is the result of its violation of the terms of use. Breaking the rules in the name of a cause may be justifiable in a world of tyranny, but not within the framework of open, democratic societies. That the Wikileaks crowd thinks so is proof of their real goals — not to force governments to be more transparent for accountability's sake, but to undermine the US and its allies.

As the Wikileaks site opines: "Public scrutiny of otherwise unaccountable and secretive institutions forces them to consider the ethical implications of their actions." The above suggests that Julian Assange has for too long avoided public scrutiny of the kind he wishes to apply to others. Answering my questions truthfully would allay concerns that Assange does not practise what he preaches. And who knows, it might even induce him to "consider the ethical implications" of his actions as well.