Michael Moore has evidently pledged $20,000 for Julian Assange's bail. Honestly, my reaction when I read this item was to make a sour-face and blurt out an uncomfortable, "Ugh."
I think I've been pretty up-front about my ambivalence towards Assange and Wikileaks -- briefly, some information needs to remain secret. Not to deliberately deceive the people, but as a way to keep sensitive information from falling into enemy hands.
That said, some of the information about Iraq and so forth will go a long way towards writing the proper history of that debacle, which, in turn, will help to never let it happen again.
But I think the reason why I reacted to Moore's stunt with an "ugh," was because of this obvious hipster progressive rallying around Assange as the hero of the day. It feels a little like the surge of Hollywood support for Roman Polanski a few years ago. I don't know Moore's motivations here, but from what I have observed, there's quite a bit of canonizing going on, and we don't yet know Assange's full agenda yet.
Also, he wasn't arrested because of Wikileaks (that we know of). He was arrested on rape charges. Regardless of the Swedish definition of rape, they're still rape charges.
Ultimately, if I had $20,000 to spend on a cause, I could find a wide variety of causes to go with before landing on Assange's legal defense fund.
Besides, Wikileaks will continue on with or without Assange. Because at the end of the day, it's not about the man, it's about the mission.