Time's Michael Grunwald tweets for Assange's death The reporter's aggressive comment caused a Twitter storm

I'm not alone in having little personal love for Julian Assange. That said, I decry any efforts by the U.S. or any government to persecute the publisher for his work with WikiLeaks.

Time's Michael Grunwald, however, with a lack of both professionalism and humanity (and seeming self-awareness) sent out a nasty Tweet Saturday night, essentially calling for Assange's extrajudicial murder. "I can't wait to write a defense of the drone strike that takes out Julian Assange," the reporter wrote (in a since-deleted Tweet that was none the less captured for posterity by shocked Twitter users:)

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Other reporters, particularly Glenn Greenwald, responded with ire and disgust at Grunwald's comment:

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As HuffPo noted, this Tweet (which, in fact Grunwald only reportedly deleted so as not fuel Assange supporters) is not the Time reporter's first crass and blunt expression of support for extra judicial drone killings. Earlier this year, he welcomed the drone strike that "iced" U.S. citizen Anwar al-Awlaki (whose teenage son was also killed by a U.S. drone.)

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Following the incident, Time put out the following statement: