Fascinating Ed Snowden interview
- Thread starter Rudolph
- Start date
Maybe if he had followed the same procedures "The Whistleblower" had followed, I wouldn't consider him a traitor.
There are generally 2 camps and very few people in between on Snowden. He's either a hero or a traitor.
I'm in the hero camp, even though it may be small. I hate the fact the US government is spying on US citizens with no real oversight or repercussions. There is an enormous amount of information that is gathered in the name of "national security" that has virtually no effect on the security of the nation, whatever that means.
I'm in the hero camp, even though it may be small. I hate the fact the US government is spying on US citizens with no real oversight or repercussions. There is an enormous amount of information that is gathered in the name of "national security" that has virtually no effect on the security of the nation, whatever that means.
I don't disagree. However, he released a LOT of stuff that shouldn't have seen the light of day along with actual crimes he was trying to expose. If he had made an attempt to parse it out and only make crimes visible, I might have more sympathy. If he had even attempted to use proper procedures, I might have more sympathy.
However, he didn't do either, then he ran to an adversarial country and allowed them to use the info he released. He's a traitor.
Take some time and watch the interview. Interesting stuff.
Nobody is asking anybody to be sympathetic to Snowden. Just watch the interview.
Damn I wish this taking sides bullshit wasn't so knee-jerky.
I didn't start the thread so people could immediately delve into whether Snowden is good or bad or whatever. If that's what I was out for, I could have started a poll, "Is Snowden good or bad?" or, "Are you sympathetic to Snowden? Y/N?"
Nope. He had the opportunity to do things the right way and he chose to intentionally release everything he could get his hands on. I mean, people try to sell him, and he has tried to sell himself, as a whistleblower. He's not. He's a traitor.
I get it, he exposed crimes. He also released a lot of classified things that weren't crimes and weakened US national security. He's probably worse that Trump in that regard. Trump has no clue how what he's doing will affect national security, Snowden did. It was intentional.
How, exactly, did Snowden weaken "national security". What act resulting from Snowden's actions has harmed anyone? Is there a single person who has died because of Snowden?
This is the problem I have with him. He could have been a whistleblower without doing the damage he did. He made that decision. It's on him.
This is the behavior of those we all disfavor. You're mirroring that which we all ridicule.
Aw fück it. Snowflaking all around. Dumb of me to think people would choose intellectual curiosity over emotional snowflaking.
He reminds me of Ned Isacov, Elaine's commie boyfriend she got blacklisted at Hop Sing's. She named names.
“I had reported these clearly problematic programs to more than ten distinct officials, none of whom took any action to address them. As an employee of a private company rather than a direct employee of the US government, I was not protected by US whistleblower laws, and wouldn’t have been protected from retaliation and legal sanction for revealing classified information about lawbreaking in accordance with the recommended process.”
Snowden betrayed the liars like Clapper who said they weren’t spying on all Americans.
This is an unpardonable sin.
This is an unpardonable sin.
Snowden is a hero to me. He is opening light to how the people in power on treat whistleblowers which is trash. This isn’t a right vs left thing like SSG made it but it is holding the powerful in check. Without the Edward Snowden’s of the world our public would be more blind from the wrongs our government and powerful are doing that we aren’t aware of.
I understand SSGT having an emotional response (especially SSGT) but get frustrated when emotion gets completely in the way of learning and, you know, intellectual curiosity.
HE IS A HERO...DAMN YOU, POLITICS, ARGGHHHHH!
I'll watch it when I get home from work.
This is largely wrong.
Educate yourself.
He gave the data to journalists. Those journalist are responsible for what was released.
He did not run to an adversarial country. He was trying to get to a neutral nation and was trapped during a stopover in Russia when the US invalidated his passport and he couldn't board his next connection. He's been stuck there ever since.
Yeah this, too.
guy goes to China and Russia and spills our deepest secrets. That's the act of a coward. If he would have stayed here, been a whistleblower and taken whatever consequences, he would then be a hero
Yikes. Strong opinions based on falsehoods are not good.
Moreover, Biden and Kerry
EDWARD SNOWDEN: Well, this is not an actively seeking, this is not a new thing. And this is important history, especially for those people who don't like me. For those people who doubt me, who have heard terrible things about me. It was never my intention to end up in Russia.
I was going to Latin America and my final destination was hopefully going to be Ecuador. I applied for asylum in 27 different countries around the world. Places like France and Germany, places like Norway, that I felt the U.S. government and the American public could be comfortable, that was fine for a whistleblower to be in, and yet every time one of these governments got close to opening their doors, the phone would ring in their foreign ministries and on the other end of the line would be a very senior American official.
It was one of two people. Then-Secretary of State John Kerry or then vice president Joe Biden. And they would say, look, we don't know what the law is, we don't care if you can do this or not, we understand that protecting whistleblowers is a matter of human rights and you could do this if you want to. But if you protect this man, if you let this guy out of Russia, there will be consequences. We're not going to say what they're going to be, but there will be a response.
I continue, to this day, to say, look, if the United States government, if these countries, are willing to open the door, that is not a hostile act. That is the act of a friend. If anything, if the United States continue is so concerned about Russia, right, shouldn't they be happy for me to leave? And yet we see they're trying so hard to prevent me from leaving. I would ask you, why is that?
Link to interview:
https://www.realclearpolitics.com/v...m_source=mixi&utm_campaign=realclearpolitics\
He released the data and ran, eventually getting stuck in Russia. To me, a hero would have stayed and faced the music. You think if he had stayed and faced trial, it would have turned into a spectacle? I’d bet anything that if he had gone to prison, he wouldn’t have been released by now?
as opposed to staying in Putin’s Russia. He did a bad thing for the right reasons. That doesn’t warrant free pass to me.
FIFY
Breaking the law is not necessarily a bad thing when it's done for the right reasons.
America has lots of heroes - sung and unsung - who broke the law for good reasons and didn't necessarily stick around to be punished.
Snowden previously said he would return and even be willing to serve time, if that's what courts decided. I have no idea if that was an honest offer. But frankly, if I were advising him, I'd advise against that. In today's climate I think he'd be harshly treated.
Maybe if a Dem was president he'd get his sentence (probably life) shortened or commuted. Probably not.
What evidence do you have of that?
Guaranteed - not merely "almost" guaranteed - that people died as a result of the corruption and abuses of power that had been covered up in the materials Snowden released.
Not saying that I approve of any hypothetical harm done as a result of Snowden's revelations, but they pale in comparison.
He probably would have caught the dead.
I agree. To many people, it doesn't seem to matter that Snowden exposed the US government breaking the law, on a grand scale.
I don't think for a moment that it was an honest offer, I think he made it knowing it wouldn't be accepted, he was just trying to play the public on it.
My problem with all this, is that intelligence-gathering is an ugly business. I don't believe for a second that some of the stuff he leaked is stuff that other countries do all the time. I don't object to him leaking about the stuff we were doing to our own citizens. Where he went too far was to expose our intelligence operations abroad. That's the part that will have long-term damage to the US.
This is what he talked about in the video. People who went through the "proper channels" still had their lives ruined.
He also talked about this in the video. No one wants to talk about the content whistleblown, just the source of the content. The national narrative is always pushed back to "snowden" instead of what he leaked.
Yeah! Like that time I gave that hamburger meat to my dog to hold for me. It's the dog's fault for eating it...even though its only purpose on earth is to eat and shit. It's not my fault he did the only thing he ever does. Much like Snowden giving classified information to people whose survival relies on passing out exclusive information to as many people as possible. Not Snowden's fault the journalists journalisted.
People forget that these members of the Permanent State are eavesdropping on everyone, Senators included. I know Merkel was wiretapped. But, I believe Barbara Boxer or Dianne Feinstein was as well. When they can get away with this, they are then able to gather dirty information on them and blackmail them. Many have skeletons . This is the end of our democracy.
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