Edward Snowden NSA whistleblower

[Mr.United_Nations]

Russia says that he has not applied for Asylum and i think Russia does not care about him

[Clarakore]

Russia and the US have more to gain by working with each other in every avenue possible except for the few areas left where their national interests are at odds with Syria being an example.

Snowden is no Syria. Russia has no vested interest in Snowden.

It is the Russia Human Rights agencies which are interested in Snowden.

These same Human Rights people are a thorn on Russia's government. There is no love between the Russian government and the Human Right's agencies which often accuse them of human rights violations.

On the other hand Russia has nothing to gain by telling Snowden he can enter the country then arresting him and extraditing him to us.

Russia probably realizes that Snowden has information or has passed on information which would show American spying on Russia too and that there would be some information there that Russia might not want revealed.

Russia definitely has nothing to gain by accepting Snowden temporarily then allowing him to flee further only to release information that would harm Russia itself. If they rush in and arrest him and send him to us then Snowden's friends will just release that information.

Seems Russia just wants nothing to do with Snowden.

In any case what is most curious is the involvement of both Russian and international Human Rights agencies such as Amnesty International.

Snowden is not a human rights victim. He never was. He chose to reveal state secrets that he also swore to protect. That makes him a criminal here. No one's human rights are being violated by Prism.

[Yamato]

We took care of Britain with fire and iron in the 18th century and her "Writs of Assistance" were a major reason why. Now that we've thrown off the shackles of the British, after 230 years of govt growth we have the same oppression to deal with from our own government. Breaking lesser laws of secrecy that government grants to itself to follow the greater law protecting the rights of every American that the government can't take away should be exculpatory. Ultimately, if the people decide that they won't tolerate this kind of unconstitutional spying on their persons papers and effects, the government won't get away with it. The legal question remaining is how many people have to go to jail for their civil disobedience and suffer physically in order to make that change happen? Letting our liberty fall into a hole like this where we can't even recognize the Bill of Rights as relevant to our society anymore is a great way to ensure that Osama bin Laden wins.

[Clarakore]

We took care of Britain with fire and iron in the 18th century and her "Writs of Assistance" were a major reason why. Now that we've thrown off the shackles of the British, after 230 years of govt growth we have the same oppression to deal with from our own government. Breaking lesser laws of secrecy that government grants to itself to follow the greater law protecting the rights of every American that the government can't take away should be exculpatory. Ultimately, if the people decide that they won't tolerate this kind of unconstitutional spying on their persons papers and effects, the government won't get away with it. The legal question remaining is how many people have to go to jail for their civil disobedience and suffer physically in order to make that change happen? Letting our liberty fall into a hole like this where we can't even recognize the Bill of Rights as relevant to our society anymore is a great way to ensure that Osama bin Laden wins.

Rhetorical exaggeration combined with alarmist platitudes of "letting the terrorists win" if we don't have a revolution and overturn our government?

Edited July 15, 2013 by The world needs you

[Clarakore]

"Snowden has enough information to cause more harm to the U.S. government in a single minute than any other person has ever had in the history of the United States," Guardian blogger and columnist Glenn Greenwald told the Argentinean daily La Nacion in an interview published Saturday. "But that is not his objective."

*snip*

"The U.S. government should be on its knees every day praying that nothing happens to Snowden, because if something happens to him, all the information would be revealed and that would be its worst nightmare," he added.

http://worldnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/07/13/19458776-snowden-has-information-that-could-be-the-uss-worst-nightmare-journalist-says?lite

So if any country hates us, if any terrorist groups hates us, all they have to do is go after Snowden, make it look like we did it, and voila our "worst nightmare" comes true?

Is this a bluff or blackmail?

Doesn't he realize Snowden is now an open target by our enemies, not by us? We want him in court not in a coffin. Those who want our government in a coffin, who want our nation to face instability, who want to Syrianize our streets, now just have to wish Snowden is killed and by which hand does not matter.

Perhaps we should be praying that Putin guards our little Faberge egg. Our little nesting doll which has one secret inside another inside another...

Glenn Greenwald, a columnist with The Guardian newspaper who closely communicates with Snowden and first reported on his intelligence leaks, told The Associated Press that the former NSA systems analyst has "literally thousands of documents" that constitute "basically the instruction manual for how the NSA is built."

"In order to take documents with him that proved that what he was saying was true he had to take ones that included very sensitive, detailed blueprints of how the NSA does what they do," Greenwald said in Brazil, adding that the interview was taking place about four hours after his last interaction with Snowden.

*snip*

Greenwald told The AP that Snowden has insisted the information from those documents not be made public. The journalist said it "would allow somebody who read them to know exactly how the NSA does what it does, which would in turn allow them to evade that surveillance or replicate it."

Despite their sensitivity, Greenwald said he didn't think that disclosure of the documents would prove harmful to Americans or their national security.

*snip*

Asked about a so-called dead man's pact, which Greenwald has said would allow several people to access Snowden's trove of documents were anything to happen to him, Greenwald replied that "media descriptions of it have been overly simplistic.

"It's not just a matter of, if he dies, things get released, it's more nuanced than that," he said. "It's really just a way to protect himself against extremely rogue behavior on the part of the United States, by which I mean violent actions toward him, designed to end his life, and it's just a way to ensure that nobody feels incentivized to do that."

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/07/14/glenn-greenwald-nsa-blueprints_n_3596435.html

So basically Greenwald and Snowden are blackmailing the US by claiming if anything happens to him more leaks will be revealed? While also claiming he has "blueprints" for the NSA which would allow others to evade or replicate the NSA? Replicate the NSA? So open-source spying where we all get to do it? And somehow Greenwald still claims this would not hurt our national security....

[Yamato]

Rhetorical exaggeration combined with alarmist platitudes of "letting the terrorist win" if we don't have a revolution and overturn our government?

I didn't invent that platitude. The politicians who passed bills like the Patriot Act are who coined it. The same policymakers that Snowden just blew the whistle on are who came up with that exaggeration to cow the American people into supporting giving up their rights, so you're confused on this issue.

[Mr.United_Nations]

Am I the only one who thinks this is one huge publicity stunt by the NSA in what will happen if someone does leak information?

[Yamato]

Even the words we use are disingenuous. Government secrecy is what's contained so that's what's being leaked? The rhetoric used by the media favors government secrecy over individual privacy. It's our voice and internet communications that are "leaking". Snowden isn't a "leaker", he's a whistleblower who exercised civil disobedience to plug a leak in the higher law.

[jugoso]

Even the words we use are disingenuous. Government secrecy is what's contained so that's what's being leaked? The rhetoric used by the media favors government secrecy over individual privacy. It's our voice and internet communications that are "leaking". Snowden isn't a "leaker", he's a whistleblower who exercised civil disobedience to plug a leak in the higher law.

You are not alone in this opinion:

Former two-term GOP Senator Gordon Humphrey of New Hampshire emailed Edward Snowden yesterday

Mr. Snowden,

Provided you have not leaked information that would put in harms way any intelligence agent, I believe you have done the right thing in exposing what I regard as massive violation of the United States Constitution.

Having served in the United States Senate for twelve years as a member of the Foreign Relations Committee, the Armed Services Committee and the Judiciary Committee, I think I have a good grounding to reach my conclusion.

To my knowledge, Mr. Snowden has disclosed only the existence of a program and not details that would place any person in harm's way. I regard him as a courageous whistle-blower.

I object to the monumentally disproportionate campaign being waged by the U.S. Government against Edward Snowden, while no effort is being made to identify, remove from office and bring to justice those officials who have abused power, seriously and repeatedly violating the Constitution of the United States and the rights of millions of unsuspecting citizens.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/jul/16/gordon-humphrey-email-edward-snowden

[Kowalski]

To my knowledge, Mr. Snowden has disclosed only the existence of a program and not details that would place any person in harm's way. I regard him as a courageous whistle-blower.

I object to the monumentally disproportionate campaign being waged by the U.S. Government against Edward Snowden, while no effort is being made to identify, remove from office and bring to justice those officials who have abused power, seriously and repeatedly violating the Constitution of the United States and the rights of millions of unsuspecting citizens.

Finally! We need more Senators thinking like this!

[Raptor Witness]

Privacy is the most basic and fundamental human right that we had. When Snowden revealed that the NSA could actually watch us form our thoughts as we type, he wasn't revealing information about data collection, he was revealing a weapon.

Of all the weapons that men have created, I think this is the most evil. The reason is simple, it threatens our spiritual relationships. When you attempt to use a man's own thoughts against him, you aren't just attacking him, you are attacking the Spirit inside him.

The NSA may get away with attacking some vessels, but they will find unexpected surprises in a handful. The separation of church and state cannot separate a man's body from his spirit, without permission of the Guardian, and I'm not talking about the newspaper.

Myths and legends hold many "hidden truths," but the NSA won't find any blueprint for dealing with those. All they will find is desolation without remedy, and revelation without remorse.

Edited July 17, 2013 by Raptor Witness

[Frank Merton]

In the end I think loyalty to one's nation, especially if one has taken an oath to that effect, should take priority, and I see nothing in the information we have gotten that we didn't know already. Just some embarrassment. We cannot each of us on our own make decisions of this sort that could effect history, although in this case it seems to be more a case of a minor figure thinking he was not being given enough attention.

[preacherman76]

In the end I think loyalty to one's nation, especially if one has taken an oath to that effect, should take priority, and I see nothing in the information we have gotten that we didn't know already. Just some embarrassment. We cannot each of us on our own make decisions of this sort that could effect history, although in this case it seems to be more a case of a minor figure thinking he was not being given enough attention.

The NSA lied before congress over this exact information. We didnt already know this on record. Bottom line is the NSA is breaking the law. That is a fact.

[Frank Merton]

Everyone lies and everyone knows that everyone is lying. You just want to get upset so you can be angry?

[preacherman76]

I dont know what personal feelings have to do with it. The law is broken, openly. If that doesnt have repercusions then we are being ruled by lawless tyrants. They would toss you in a cage for life for far less.

[Frank Merton]

Naive citizens make for naive fools governing them and naive nations. Go ahead and have your investigations and put a few people in jail and then have a nuclear weapon destroy a major US city and see how you feel.

[Raptor Witness]

Naive citizens make for naive fools governing them and naive nations. Go ahead and have your investigations and put a few people in jail and then have a nuclear weapon destroy a major US city and see how you feel.

The ability to stop that kind of attack won't come from the NSA. They won't be given that satisfaction, because the same underlying power built the first one.

[RabidCat]

Naive citizens make for naive fools governing them and naive nations. Go ahead and have your investigations and put a few people in jail and then have a nuclear weapon destroy a major US city and see how you feel.

It's hard for me to believe I'm actually going to waste the time answering the above.

If you think it's naive to stand up and make oneself heard against the sort of secrecy the gov has installed everywhere, then it's you who is the epitome of naivety. If you are foolish enough to believe the fed gov has your interests at heart and are willing to allow that bunch of goons to do whatever they want, it becomes easy to say 'Welcome to the Soviet Union' or 'Welcome to the Corporate State', whichever suits your fancy, since without checks and balances, that's where we are headed.

It always makes me sad to see how the cows are willing to give up their self-determination for a little security. As a parable, in my younger days, I spent some time riding line at a large ranch. One time, during a fierce snowstorm, temperatures plummeted and I holed up in a line shack. When the blizzard was over, I came out and continued riding the line. I found one of those cows who thought security was paramount frozen solid, hiding behind a steel fencepost. That sort of security, sir, is exactly what you want.

Edited July 17, 2013 by RabidCat

[jugoso]

In the end I think loyalty to one's nation, especially if one has taken an oath to that effect,

Bingo! Don´t elected officials take some sort of oath to uphold the constitution? And if the elected officials aren´t aware of the program, just who exactly is driving the bus?

I see nothing in the information we have gotten that we didn't know already.

Perhaps some suspected that the US government was involved in illegal "data-gathering", but until Snowden provided the "smoking gun" it was just speculation. If I had posted in the conspiracy thread what Snowden disclosed a couple of months ago, I´m sure some would have called me paranoid and laughed at my post. Not so anymore. Snowden is as much of a traitor to the US as are those that were secretly involved in such a vast network of data-collection IMO.

[spartan max2]

Wanted to post this somewhere lol

[Raptor Witness]

Wanted to post this somewhere lol

It's worse than that ...

What's worse, lying to the American people about a private affair in the Oval Office, or lying about the government sucking the private affairs out of every American?

How can one white lie under oath lead to an impeachment hearing for a sitting President, while a giant black lie under oath is ignored as if it's nothing to worry about?

Can the private affairs of hundreds of millions be valued so much less than for one man?

How can the spirit of the law be tilted so greatly, as to not to be viewed as an example of tyranny?

If we will allow this disparity in our judgment, without so much as a whimper, then what will keep us safe from another great liar, like Hitler?

Tyranny

noun

1. arbitrary or unrestrained exercise of power; despotic abuse of authority. Synonyms: despotism, absolutism, dictatorship.

2. the government or rule of a tyrant or absolute ruler.

3. a state ruled by a tyrant or absolute ruler.

4. oppressive or unjustly severe government on the part of any ruler.

5. undue severity or harshness.

[No Censorship]

have a nuclear weapon destroy a major US city and see how you feel

That sounds like Cheney justifying the second Iraq War. You might as well say that "it's for the children".

[Raptor Witness]

It looks like Mr. Snowden will be leaving for Russian soil soon, possibly by Wednesday, according to his attorney.

I wonder if that means the Guardian Newspaper has to keep its mouth shut, and will they be willing to do this to help accommodate Mr. Snowden's temporary asylum request in Russia?

That might give the NSA time to get back on its broomstick.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NrZn4GOFtG8

[Yamato]

His attorney even referenced the fact that the US government tortures people. Like we never said that one wasn't going to come back around and bite us on the ass! Who wants to boil to death in an iron cauldron in Uzbekistan after all? Not me either.

[Clarakore]

Edward Snowden if anything like past defectors will live to regret his decisions.

Snowden May Wish He Went To Jail In America If He Accepts Putin’s Offer Of Russian Exile

Six months after the Soviet Union ceased to exist, the American defector Victor Norris Hamilton surfaced in a Russian mental hospital. He had been missing for more than 20 years. The 75-year-old former cryptologist for the National Security Agency had defected to the Soviet Union in 1963. His family was shocked to learn of his whereabouts, noting that they had last had contact with him in 1973. They were equally surprised to learn that Hamilton was committed to hospital in a Moscow suburb in 1971 where he disappeared for 20 years.

*snip*

FP details the stories of agents like William Martin and Bernon Mitchell; NSA cryptologists who defected to Moscow in the 1960s where they married and worked for a time, but had trouble adjusting. “According to the NSA’s in-house report on the incident, both men asked to leave Russia within a year of their defection, ‘but no country would accept them,’” writes FP’s J. Dana Stuster. “Mitchell died in Moscow, but in time Martin made it as far as Tijuana, where he died in 1987.”

The story of CIA defector Edward Lee Howard, as told by the KGB agent who knew him before his death, described a similar inability to adjust. In spite of the Soviet Union’s efforts to provide Howard with a comfortable life in exile, the KGB agent told the New York Times after his death that “life was not sweet for him here.”

Glenn Michael Souther, a U.S. Navy photographer, disappeared from the United States in 1986 and resurfaced in the Soviet Union in 1988. It was soon discovered that Souther was immediately embraced by Soviet military authorities and made a counter-intelligence agent. Initially suspected of being a CIA double agent sent to Russia to spy for the Americans, he was later determined to be a genuine defector and earned the rank of Major in the KGB. Souther settled down near Moscow and married a Russian woman who taught English at a Moscow University. They had a child together. The outwardly comfortable appearance of the life that Souther built for himself in the Soviet Union made the news that the 32-year-old suffocated himself in 1989 with his own car’s exhaust even more difficult to accept.

“His nervous system could not stand the pressure” of life in the U.S.S.R.,”KGB chief Vladimir Kryuchkov told People Magazine. “The Soviets “probably took away the only thing that made him really special—his crazy free spirit,” a college friend of Souther’s recalled.

*snip*

http://www.mediaite....-russian-exile/

Edward Snowden Risks Sharing Fate of Kim Philby, Guy Burgess & More

What kind of future does the NSA leaker face if he gets asylum in Russia or another country? If the experience of past defectors—alcoholism, suicide attempts, mental illness—is any guide, it looks grim.

Kim Philby might have told him so, if Philby ever told anyone the truth about anything. One of the Cambridge Five, a communist spy ring of upper-crust Englishmen that included Guy Burgess, Anthony Blunt, Donald Maclean, and a possible fifth person never identified, Philby spied for the Russians throughout World War II and for years thereafter.

*snip*

By the time the public learned of the details that prompted Philby’s defection to the Soviet Union, he’d been ensconced in Moscow for almost five years, where he lived until his death in 1988. He claimed to be unrepentant, saying he missed only some friends, Colman’s mustard, and Lea & Perrins Worcestershire sauce. In fact, he was kept under virtual house arrest, as the Russians were afraid he might try to return to England. He also drank heavily and attempted suicide at least once. He had gone to Moscow with the assumption that he would be named a colonel in the KGB, a promise that, if indeed made, was never kept.

At least Philby wanted to defect. Evidence suggests that Guy Burgess believed he was only helping Donald Maclean escape when they disappeared in 1951, but the KGB had no intention of ever letting Burgess fall back into English hands. Upon surfacing in the Soviet Union in 1956, he spent the rest of his short life—he died in 1963 at 52—descending ever deeper into alcoholism.

*snip*

George Koval, an American scientist posthumously honored by Vladimir Putin for his work in penetrating the Manhattan Project and ferrying secrets to the Russians that sped their development of the atomic bomb by years, was perhaps the most realistic defector of all. But then, Koval had been to Russia already. He was born in the U.S. to Russian-Jewish parents, and in 1924, when he was 10, the family returned to the Soviet Union as part of the development known as the “Jewish Autonomous Region,” a Soviet settlement project that supposedly mirrored the Zionist movement in Palestine. By the time Koval returned to the U.S. in 1940, he was a communist spy. And a good one. He was never caught. After World War II he returned to Russia, where he got a low-level teaching job. He never lived well or saw honors in his lifetime, but he was thankful, he said, “that I did not find myself in a Gulag, as might have happened.” A realist defector—who knew?

A handful of American soldiers defected to North Korea during the Korean War, and nearly all lived to regret it. Forced to live together, the men were made to spend hours memorizing and reciting speeches by Kim Il Sung. In propaganda films, they were made to play dumb, evil Americans.

*snip*

http://www.thedailyb...rgess-more.html

Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.

—George Santayana

Edited July 23, 2013 by The world needs you