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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsI am sick and tired of seeing posts defending Snowden..so here is my side
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Edward Snowden, the NSA, leaker who betrayed the deepest secrets of the National Security Agency, is no hero and the attempts of some to make him one are only serving to undermine the cause of liberalism and the Democratic Party. Regardless of whether or not Snowden thought such spying was illegal it was not his job nor his right to reveal closely guarded secrets. In an ideal world the government would not engage in any spying, but this is not an ideal world. We are at war with terrorists who intend to destroy us and Snowden has weakened that effort. He obviously has friends in China and Russia and liberals that defend him remind me of liberals that defended “Uncle Joe Stalin” back in the 30s.
If Snowden had wanted to he could have revealed what he knew to some friendly congressman or woman. He could have released only outlines of the program but instead he released vital details that have jeopardized our security. Will his loyal fan base take responsibility for a successful terrorist attack on the US as they criticize the very programs that help insure their safety?
And how many “rights” will they have if there is a successful terrorist attack on the US which brings to power a radical right wing government?
This very disturbing to see some turning him into a hero, and to see some of the very same people who supported President Obama during the previous election now comparing his administration and NSA spying to North Korea and Nazi Germany. Maybe they think Glenn Beck and Michelle Bachmann are right. Perhaps, they think we can't trust Obama because he doesn't share our values??
In this very dangerous world, spying is a fact of life and I don't agree with making heroes of those that betray our country's deepest secrets.
Some insist any spying is an assault on their freedoms. How are these people any different from the extremists on the right who insist gun background checks or limits on high-capacity magazines is somehow assault on their constitutional freedoms?
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cantbeserious
(13,039 posts)eom
DCBob
(24,689 posts)
Thinkingabout
(30,058 posts)To be a problem, yet he left the US under false pretenses and apparently doesn't want to be truthful now.
pnwmom
(110,253 posts)if there is a successful terrorist attack on the US which brings to power a radical right wing government?"
Exactly. Another large scale attack would bring much stronger measures than collecting telephone meta-data.
tonybgood
(218 posts)pnwmom
(110,253 posts)
truedelphi
(32,324 posts)However anyone in the country who understands the meaning of the Fourth Amendment, and who understands what happens, when the governmental interests decide to spy on its own citizens, as demonstrated by many regimes back in the Twentieth Century, including a Reich my dad had to fight physically for several years of his life, feels differently. And we don't care one wya or the other about the popularity of opinions such as yours.
The last time I looked, the liberties and freedoms granted by our Constitution are ours. The liberties I hold as an American don't exist on account of a popularity contest.
If this nation goes down the road of accepting the idea that "War on terror means we tear up the Constitution, and give 1.2 million people over at Booz the ability to spy on American citizens" in part so that people like Richard Blum, (Di Feintein's husband,) can have a most profitable year, then democracy is officially over.
Fantastic Anarchist
(7,309 posts)In fact, I request that you make it an opening post so I could be most obliged to do so for at least one time.
Mojorabbit
(16,020 posts)Brilliant.
randome
(34,845 posts)In times past, umbrage was reserved for more important things. This 'horror' portrayed about metadata makes no sense to me. Of all the things to exert time and energy on, this?
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truedelphi
(32,324 posts)Although the data exists on the servers where it is stored as mere blips, once re-constituted, it can allow the government to listen in to any conversation, even those going back as far back as the government has been doing this. According to an interview that Snowden has given, the meta data has been being collected going back to the days of George Dubya. So at least five and half years of data.
Only people who totally accept every single thing that the Corporate Persons are doing to destroy our jobs, our food and our water and the natural environment can be that sanguine about the situation.
Just this week, the FBI let us know that people who protest against Monsanto are terrorists.
And that indicates that people who are against fracking and the Keystone XL are also likely to be considered terrorists.
randome
(34,845 posts)Right now, Verizon could be reconstituting your entire history without your knowledge.
Right now, the FBI could be going through your garbage.
Do you have any reason to think any of that's happening?
We have laws, rules, regulations, chain of command. Unless you -or Snowden- can provide any evidence that all this is being ignored just so the NSA can spy on anyone they damned well please, I don't see the point of running around with our hair on fire.
And yes, the FBI labeling of protesters as terrorists is bizarre and wrong.
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dkf
(37,305 posts)randome
(34,845 posts)He never had the access he claimed. I mean that's obvious since he wasn't able to get anything to support his claims.
There are neither 600,000 System Administrators nor 600,000 Intelligence Analysts. If you're talking about what category he was, as in 'Secret' or 'Top Secret' or whatever, maybe that number is correct. But that does not mean all 600,000 of that category have the same access to the same documents and private data.
Networks are not set up based on some arbitrary designation by the NSA.
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dkf
(37,305 posts)It was based on the honor system. Lol.
randome
(34,845 posts)And this was supposedly while he was in training! Someone at the NSA deserves a demotion. And Booz Allen needs to suffer for letting it happen, too. Their company arm that validates resumes either majorly fucked up or outright forged for him.
It's a good opportunity to review the entire agency from top to bottom.
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"It's a good opportunity to review the entire agency from top to bottom. " something good may come from Snowden's action do you think maybe that's what he wanted?
randome
(34,845 posts)He is acting like someone who is emotionally troubled from my viewpoint. The fact that even the Wikileaks attorneys have declined to represent him tells me he either has a screw loose or the remainder of the 'secrets' he claims to have are bogus.
Sure, some good may come of this entire sordid episode but I don't see that as being Snowden's intention. I think he badly wanted to be a hero and now he's faced with the reality that it isn't going to happen.
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nineteen50
(1,187 posts)checkbook out you maybe surprised by who helps and who doesn't
wtmusic
(39,166 posts)They're the ones who create accounts, passwords, debug, install security software, and encryption.
They have access to everything.
randome
(34,845 posts)Obviously he did not have that kind of access. And I'm betting the true personal data is kept on an entirely separate network from the ones he worked on.
It would make sense to me for the Intelligence Analyst Division (or whatever it's called) to have its own Sysadmin for its own network.
In fact, to keep the data truly safe, maybe it's not on a network at all. Maybe they work on standalone PCs. I don't know, I'm just guessing.
No, there's too much data. I doubt that's the case. But a separate network sounds possible.
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wtmusic
(39,166 posts)I believe Snowden's very prepared, and the NSA is shitting their pants right now.
He'll let information drip out until there are substantive changes in the country's security apparatus.
randome
(34,845 posts)He showed us the legal warrant for the metadata, which we already knew about.
He showed us that the NSA spies on other countries, which we already knew about.
He said he could personally capture the President's email. Why didn't he grab something to prove it?
He said the NSA has 'direct access' to the world's Internet providers. All the companies involved say that's bullshit.
He said the NSA is downloading the Internet on a daily basis. Evidence? No.
He said he "saw things" but he's never said what he saw.
So most of his claims are not validated. Not to me. I don't have 100% trust in any agency but I'm not going to get hot and bothered about something without evidence first.
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[font color="blue"][center]I'm always right. When I'm wrong I admit it.
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wtmusic
(39,166 posts)Not a big deal, right?
randome
(34,845 posts)...of documents, of course there's a need to be concerned. Snowden now says he has a database of secret agent info but I think he's lying about that in a vain attempt to get the U.S. to back off.
If he really had that info of names, identities and locations of secret agents, Russia would be welcoming him with open arms instead of letting him languish at the airport.
His efforts will result in more transparency and less secrecy at the NSA but he's going to end up spending some time behind bars for it. He put the world to a hell of a lot of trouble to make this point. An inadvertent point at that.
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[font color="blue"][center]I'm always right. When I'm wrong I admit it.
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liberal_at_heart
(12,081 posts)
Pale Blue Dot
(16,834 posts)We needed a competent president who took his security briefings seriously. President Obama, and you, fell for the right-wing narrative that we needed a huge new security apparatus and we needed to give up our rights in order to prevent terrorists attacks. The result is that we have lost so much while simultaneously pretending that Bush was more competent than he was.
Shame on all of you who have forgotten this.
Fantastic Anarchist
(7,309 posts)... don't fall for the red herrings.
wtmusic
(39,166 posts)And in the broader scheme of things, we needed a foreign policy that wasn't so blatantly exploitive.
pipoman
(16,038 posts)and like most other martyrs in history, he is loved by some, reviled by others and others watch with indifference.
Aerows
(39,961 posts)What in the name of hell was he doing having access to that type of intelligence? Of course it could put people in danger, but they outsourced it cheap, and here we are. Let's defend incompetence while we decry a person that exposed incompetence.
It's like dancing on a razor blade and thinking both sides won't cause bleeding.
DCBob
(24,689 posts)I seriously doubt he had legitimate clearance to access all that.
Aerows
(39,961 posts)So what is your point?
Exposing incompetence is exposing incompetence.
emulatorloo
(46,154 posts)He claimed he could wiretap Obama and read his email among other things. I just don't find a lot of what he says to be credible.
This does not mean I am a Nazi or "authoritarian" or what ever the epithet of today is. Nor do i share the harsh view some here have of Snowden, this traitor talk is ridiculous.
I would like to get to the bottom of what the NSA is actually doing, are there real safeguards in place to prevent abuse, and can it be scaled back. And contractors should be shut out totally.
However, I cannot take Snowden's claims at face value. Just does not add up.
Aerows
(39,961 posts)who secured the files that should have been appropriately tagged as inaccessible to Snowden? And who secures them against every spy that is seeking access to the US? It's rank incompetence.
Why would anyone think you are adept at protecting intelligence after this?
DCBob
(24,689 posts)that may be a much bigger issue than the surveillance.
Aerows
(39,961 posts)And both make the NSA look like a fraud that wastes tax payer money. LOT'S of it.
wtmusic
(39,166 posts)1) Maintain strict and unerring vigilance in the monitoring of hundreds of thousands of employees.
2) Stop doing so much sneaky shit.
Which makes more sense to you?
rhett o rick
(55,981 posts)to distract from the main issue. I can only guess one reason you would buy the Corp-Media propaganda. You dont want to know the truth. You trust your government to the point that you will lynch the whistle-blower. That is totally the mindset of the authoritarian state.
I hate to break it to you but the horses are out of the barn. Snowden opened the door. Killing him wont get the horses back. Your government will lie to you. But you are free to choose denial.
pipoman
(16,038 posts)except to add some reference of the secret courts reminiscent of the secret courts of great tyrannies, dictatorships, and other regimes the US is supposed to be the antithesis of..
Fantastic Anarchist
(7,309 posts)All excellent points, one and all.
Keep the issue about how this information can be used against us in the future. Any of us could be determined to be an enemy of the state, and with that ...
... well, I shouldn't have to explain it to those that have a fondness to be servile to power, only because they're root, root, rooting for the home team.
It boggles the mind that it needs any explaining at all.
a2liberal
(1,524 posts)Honestly, it's incredibly disturbing to me to see posts like the OP on DU. It's disturbing enough in the general public but especially here where people should know better (and do... none of these people would be saying these things if we had a Republican president)
99Forever
(14,524 posts)... is the ONLY issue of any significance.
Bravo.
kentuck
(115,390 posts)As for the war on terror, Steve Wozniak, co-founder of Apple, had this to say:
“I think he’s a hero,” said the 62-year-old Wozniak, who co-founded Apple Computer with Steve Jobs and invented the Apple I and Apple II personal computers that launched a technological revolution. “He’s a hero to my beliefs about how the Constitution should work. I don’t think the NSA has done one thing valuable for us, in this whole ‘Prism’ regard, that couldn’t have been done by following the Constitution and doing it the old way.”
Sitting down with me on Tuesday at the Ford Motor Co. campus in Dearborn, Michigan, during the “Go Further With Ford” 2013 Trend Conference, Wozniak added: “I don’t think terrorism is war. I think terrorism is a crime. And by using the word ‘war’ we’ve managed to use all these weird ways to say the Constitution doesn’t apply in the case of a war. And I think Edward Snowden is a hero because this came from his heart. And I really believe he was giving up his whole life because he just felt so deeply about honesty, about spying on Americans, and he wanted to tell us.”
Fantastic Anarchist
(7,309 posts)I hadn't read that.
quinnox
(20,600 posts)
You are the same guy who said we will have to answer for being pro-Snowdon if another attack occurs on the U.S.
You are quite the character, I must say.
Robb
(39,665 posts)However I'm naturally suspicious of anyone telling me how anyone else is "setting back the cause of liberalism."
Seriously. That sounds like the opening salvo to a predictable bunch of bullshit. As we say, this is not my first rodeo.
KT2000
(22,134 posts)He took it upon himself to cart classified material around the globe. He is incapable of protecting it if any host country wants it. He does not have concern that his revelations could affect international relations and increase tensions. Escalation of tension can lead to cold wars and hot wars. This idiot, whose resume is ridiculous to begin with, is not the person I want influencing foreign policy for this country.
He is on a nice little power trip with his "more information to come." He's a punk.
BlueCaliDem
(15,438 posts)Two enthusiastic thumbs up! 
Tarheel_Dem
(31,454 posts) 
naaman fletcher
(7,362 posts)So what? Why does a whistleblower need to be perfect and pure? Isn't the important thing that he or she blows the whistle?
whatchamacallit
(15,558 posts)to spew bullshit authoritarian talking points.
liberal_at_heart
(12,081 posts)Act was passed. I don't give a damn if you think I'm late to the party. I'm here now and the point is it is wrong. Whether this is old news or not, whether we knew about it or not, whether some of us are johnny come latelys it is wrong and needs to be stopped. So call me whatever name you want to call me. Bitch and wine and complain that I'm a johnny come lately. Call me a racist, a Ron and Rand Paul supporter, a tea partier, a johnny come lately. I don't give a shit. I'm here now and I'm not going to shut up.
Bluenorthwest
(45,319 posts)the comment is critical of the OP's authoritarian posturing and affectation.
Fantastic Anarchist
(7,309 posts)Talking about the opening post being "late" to the party and being an authoritarian.
Of course, I could be wrong.
liberal_at_heart
(12,081 posts)
cynzke
(1,254 posts)The Johnny-come-latelys have every right to express their opinions here.
elfin
(6,262 posts)Lots of avenues for him to use short of putting our whole system at risk.
Such a mountain of details readily available to be used by China, Russia and perhaps even Pakistan to assist them in both cyber wars and even terrorism.
No "hero" to me - the important national discussion of privacy/safety could have been started without such a sneaky and cowardly act.
Pale Blue Dot
(16,834 posts)People who share your opinion are refusing to answer that question.
Was Bush incompetent, or did he need all of these tools at his disposal?
I'll bet you don't bother to answer the question. You'll just deflect. And it will be telling.
elfin
(6,262 posts)Pale Blue Dot
(16,834 posts)If it could have been stopped, then why do we need the A)Department of Homeland Security, B)The Patriot Act, or C)ANYTHING that Snowden exposed?
Coccydynia
(198 posts)W already knew what Bin Laden intended. We already knew of individuals training to fly but not to take off or land.
We simply didn't ACT!
Pale Blue Dot
(16,834 posts)Those complaining about Snowden are making Bush a hero.
rhett o rick
(55,981 posts)Cheney got richer off the I-War. Billions were made by corporations at the expense of taxpayers. Get it thru your head, they dont want to stop terrorist attacks. They like terror attacks. Keeps people scared and under their control. The weak minded people that follow the authoritarian leaders and despise whistle-blowers. People that mimic the Corp-Media.
nineteen50
(1,187 posts)could you post them?
Fantastic Anarchist
(7,309 posts)This is not about Snowden.
It's about what he revealed. You and other authoritarians continue to sling the same smelly red herrings. You all are either being obtuse, or making excuses. Either of which, I've no use for.
MNBrewer
(8,462 posts)
would have been PERFECT for the end of your post.
Bluenorthwest
(45,319 posts)I can tell you this, everything about your rhetoric makes my ass twitch. The 'deepest secrets'? 'Undermine the cause of liberalism'?
And the basic fact that for you it is all about the pin up boy and other people, not about the issues at all makes your wailing seem shrill. Putting the word rights in quotation marks makes me ill.
Stalin seals the deal. Your post is a sack of stinking verbiage, defending nothing and indicating a drought of reason in the region of your keyboard.
grasswire
(50,130 posts)Thank you.
idwiyo
(5,113 posts)What is it with people who just can't stand opposing view, but are too scared to debate?
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AnotherMcIntosh
(11,064 posts)xiamiam
(4,906 posts)snowden leaked info. .some of us are happy about it because we are addressing it. I'm glad we are discussing it. What we should be discussing is why a company owned by the Carlyle group is private contracting to the NSA and profiting to the tune of about 40 billion yearly all the while illegally surveiling millions of us.. There is something very wrong with that for starters. Fourth amendment rights are violated, what are we gonna do about that? There are a lot of thing which this leak has set in motion. Some rethinking needs to happen here. In broad daylight. That's why he is a hero to some. He pulled the monster out from under the bed and now we're trying to figure out away to cage it.
Forget that Snowden didn't do things the way you wanted him to? Bottom line is that he did something which has us talking about things that we weren't talking about around the world and in this country in May. Sunlight is the best disinfectant.
orpupilofnature57
(15,472 posts)orpupilofnature57
(15,472 posts)Police State, and with a Hard dose of Fascism .
grasswire
(50,130 posts)....but Snowden thought it was his moral DUTY. Obviously.
Fantastic Anarchist
(7,309 posts)Nicely done.
grasswire
(50,130 posts)Some rebuttals just write themselves lately.
GeorgeGist
(25,570 posts)Oh Please.
jimlup
(8,010 posts)However, your point is less as a result of making ad hominim and strawman, and all or none statements. This is a complex issue and I would agree with you that Snowden violated the law and his sworn oath. However, that doesn't change the concern over NSA documents. As I often have to explain to my wife, even if she "trusts" Obama he will not always be president. Do we really trust a future "Bush-like" administration with this data on all of us at this level? I certainly don't.
grasswire
(50,130 posts)
The Straight Story
(48,121 posts)Wars, helping companies take advantage of the poor the world over through land grabs, making it easier for companies to profit on the misery of others and polluting the hell out of other countries, killing folks with drones in various countries where we are not even at war, starting wars and killing/injuring hundreds of thousands......
nadinbrzezinski
(154,021 posts)Just curious.
Now you did take an oath I presume...have you ever read the Bill of Rights?
Coccydynia
(198 posts)So glad your mind set didn't prevail in the 1770s or this great experiment that is America would not be.
Catherina
(35,568 posts)
Catherina
(35,568 posts)So much for the pretext of *defending freedoms* when ours are being taken away.
I'd give you a hug but solidarity is so much better. Shucks, here's a 
anyway.
wtmusic
(39,166 posts)Good one! 
flamingdem
(40,865 posts)I know it's been on your mind 
dkf
(37,305 posts)We can't give those rights up even if we wanted to. It's in the constitution.
pa28
(6,145 posts)You believe defending Snowden is comparable to defending Joe Stalin.
Then you point out in the next breath how disturbing and polarizing comparisons to totalitarian dictators on a Democratic discussion board are.
In the very next breath you try to tar and feather Obama's critics on the surveillance issue with Glenn Beck and Michelle Bachmann.
Sorry you are sick and tired of posts defending Snowden but this is a discussion board. You can always try Jet-Skiing, playing video games or building model ships in a bottle if you don't like listening to opposing points of view among Democrats. It seems to me your argument is contradicting itself in several places here.
Th1onein
(8,514 posts)It is not about Snowden. It is about surveillance. ILLEGAL. SURVEILLANCE. Capische?
BeyondGeography
(41,065 posts)as a political issue. Which is pretty amazing, given the history. I've been watching and reading about presidential campaigns since 1968, and last year was the first time a Democrat had a clear edge on national security. It's a huge advantage for our side, particularly when our domestic positions poll so much better than the opposition's and it's vital that it continue.
The other thing that is routinely minimized is the terrorist threat and the huge costs of an attack, which start with the victims and go all the way up to increased fear and hatred around the world. It has been 12 years since 9/11 and complacency sets in, which is normal. But it should be clear that this President, or any President, looks at keeping the nation safe as the top priority, so there's a natural gap between what the White House thinks it needs along those lines and what the average citizen is willing to give up in the way of privacy. There's a discussion to be had if we are to begin to bridge that gap, and there are the courts, where the notion of using state secret privilege to deny the open vetting of information requests is being challenged, and rightly so.
Snowden is/was almost wholly unnecessary to the process. As a symbol for transparency, he is a nightmare, having schemed from the get-go in his job at Booz and then running away to enemy territory and flipping secrets in exchange for who knows what. I don't know what kind of damage he has done to our security. As a hero, though, his 15 minutes are nearing an end, IMO.
wtmusic
(39,166 posts)and even indulge in some of it themselves (you have no idea whether he's flipped secrets for anything of value).
If you want to hide under your bed waiting for the next loud noise, try to understand that some of us are more concerned about the big picture.
BeyondGeography
(41,065 posts)You're willing to get blown up if it means your mundane cellphone calls can't be stored in a packet anymore, where the odds are infinitely in your favor that no one will ever care to listen to them. Okiedokie.
another_liberal
(8,821 posts)It's well past time we had a good look at what those secret budget spending, secret surveillance running NSA spooks are really up to. The entire organization is running wild, with no serious, independent oversight. They need to be controlled by the people of the United States. The people of the United States do not need to be controlled by them.
Snowden is an American hero for the truth he has provided to his fellow citizens. That is how history will remember him.
Daemonaquila
(1,712 posts)If it's not Snowden's business to do the patriotic thing for the citizens of this country, then it wasn't anyone's business to attempt to assassinate Hitler, pass on Russian secrets that may have prevented nuclear war, leak the Hutchinson letters to help kick off our Revolutionary war, or reveal that 400 African-Americans were infected with syphilis as an experiment.
There are hundreds of examples of heroic people who, like Snowden, took it upon themselves to expose government atrocities, corruption, and more. Screw this noise about "helping the terrorists." The people who are helping the terrorists most are the government agencies who are destroying our civil rights and civil liberties. Even in the worst case scenario - and I think it's a lie that this domestic spying is doing one damned thing to keep anyone safer - I'll take a few bombs over living in 1984, any day.
Dyedinthewoolliberal
(16,202 posts)is wrong and I thought, illegal. If not, it should be. If an American citizen is thought to be a threat then a court order or something to prove why spying is needed should be the minimum bar that has to be cleared.
To me that is what this is all about. The rest is a distraction. 
wtmusic
(39,166 posts)Taking the low road leads us nowhere.
I'm with Snowden - I don't want to live in a country that pulls this kind of shit. We're at least halfway to a corptocracy that watches what you say, what you do, and how you vote. That harrasses you if you dissent (it's already happening).
If Snowden's release of secrets enables a terrorist attack on the U.S. and I die that's fine with me...I'm not afraid of that. If you're afraid of that, please try to understand that others aren't.
I'm with Snowden. There are things that are worth dying for.
Vinnie From Indy
(10,820 posts)This is not about Snowden. I refuse to be distracted.
stupidicus
(2,570 posts)remind me of Hitler apologists.
Those that think this is all and only about catching intelligent terrorists that have long had a clue http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-06-23/u-s-surveillance-is-not-aimed-at-terrorists.html are either gulklible and/or ignorant to the point of being unworthy of being in the discussion or debate.
How are they any different from rightwingnut flat earthers that know nothing about climate science, but still think they have an opinion on the matter worth hearing?
alarimer
(17,146 posts)Do you really approve of your government having this kind of secret spying powers? Undemocratic and accountable to no one? I sure as hell don't.
I don't really care about this guy one way or another, but he is not a "traitor." OUR government is the traitor, if such as thing is possible. It is betraying us and democracy.
HardTimes99
(2,049 posts)maybe you'll appreciate, given your handle.
He sure ain't no lackey or lickspittle of the 1%.
paland99
(15 posts)I have worked with computers since around 1980. At that time, the Apple 2 came out and many people learned to program in BASIC. But if you were going to work in the field, you had to move beyond desktop computers. Soon after that, I started working with mainframes. Client/Servers weren't very common, maybe some Universities or such, so many connected to mainframes (And they charged a LOT for the time you were on.) Mainframes meant COBOL (JCL). FORTRAN, and if you worked in some classy game making company, C language. C++ came a few years later.
Through all of this, I always knew that data was kept. Not just by the NSA, but in obscured databases from other businesses as well, such as medical history from doctors offices, or some county gov health info on employees, or purchases made on some stores cards.
IT shops tend to keep backups often and sometimes long term data gets stored somewhere. Sometimes it is lost forever, sometimes it is found again. Sometimes the media gets so old that it cant be read, 5¼ floppies, or even punch-card ticker-tapes from way back when. Sometimes media gets too old to be recovered. But sometimes you find very old files that can be converted, and you would be surprised what you find sometimes. Careers can change sometimes with what you find.
But I have always assumed that everything I ever type online will be saved forever. I knew the CIA was farming MySpace and facebook. They don't have anything to do with either, they could just see the info everyone was spilling out online for free. People do that. They spill their guts online, then scream when they find some gov agency was saving their posts.. Really?
I do believe that he who holds the data, holds the power. IT shops now tell Human Resource what to do. It wasn't that way before 1995 or so. Data gets saved by EVERYONE! Your Safeway card is telling your habits to marketing folks. Cops are online all the time trying to trap frauds and child molesters and have been for a long time now.
So I wonder why everyone was surprised by this info?
Apophis
(1,407 posts)If this happened under Bush you wouldn't be bitching about it right now.
shenmue
(38,597 posts)I am so tired of there being only one side to this discussion.
emulatorloo
(46,154 posts)I have skepticism about Snowden's veracity and credibility. However the part about Stalin is not fair.
You are of course entitled to you opinion.
Bonobo
(29,257 posts)Got ya. Brilliant.
LibAsHell
(180 posts)Your argument was essentially that "governments are going to spy" and "the terrists!" Not only that you, linked the necessity of the former to the presence of the latter.
Come on.
And being worried of a radical right-wing government because of a terrorist attack is totally misguided as well.
Let's forget Snowden. Let's just look at the information he brought to light, because that's what is of real concern here. At least to me. You seem to have decided it's not a big deal because, well...the terrorists.
nineteen50
(1,187 posts)"deepest secrets of the National Security Agency" that were exposed?
azureblue
(2,724 posts)This is yet another in a series of attempts to distract from the contents of what a whistle blower leaked. It's the same tactics used on Manning and Assange, and goes way back as far as Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon papers. - get somebody to say they are somehow "reasonable" and "valid", have them say not one word about the content, just generalize the leak as damaging to the US, create a bunch of hypotheticals, refer to "State Secrets" make numerous attacks upon the character of the whistleblower, use a bunch of loaded terminology, in hopes of inciting anger, and hope that it will work to distract from the truth of the contents of the leaks - the US has done some illegal and immoral things, and does not want them to come to light. No matter what has to be done to prevent that.
This post, and other articles, all use the same formula. It's getting tiring in its repitition, especially when the contents of the leaks are examined, and it is found that the "Secret" and "Sensitive" data was not so secret after all, and the ballyhooed "Betrayals and traitorous acts, could not be proven and none actually happened. But what was found is concrete evidence of US atrocities, criminal acts and subterfuge. Oh, nevermind that, eh?
The worst part, is, i bet this diarist never said a word about when Cheney etc., exposed a US spy, Valerie Plame, and actually committed a textbook traitorous act, and, as far as we can tell, is spending exactly zero time trying to bring those who exposed Plame to trial for betraying the US.
Roland99
(53,345 posts)
naaman fletcher
(7,362 posts)This is the most embarassing thing I've ever read on this forum.
cherokeeprogressive
(24,853 posts)If he wanted the public to know what the government was doing, and he KNEW the public would go apeshit that their government had such capabilities, he should have gone to the government if he wanted the information released.
That's some comedy fucking GOLD right there.
Marrah_G
(28,581 posts)Trading freedom for security is a slope that leads to no place that I want to be. You think the data collected will never be used for nefarious purposes? How about with a teabagger administration in control? Still think it's wonderful? Remember that the correspondence being recorded and saved is also targeting lawmakers, present and future. Blackmail? not a stretch by any means.
Secret laws, secret courts, secret warrants, secret judges... That is not a democracy.
Herlong
(649 posts)I can't defend Snowden because I think he is kind of a dick for traveling to China and Russia with his knowledge and his computers. I think that this whole thing is a trial balloon to see how people will react to what we have become after 9/11 . This Snowden saga is one story I can not stand behind. On the other hand, give me some grease and a wrench and point me toward a wheel because I think we have lost what is fundamental to this nation.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_squeaky_wheel_gets_the_grease
http://idioms.thefreedictionary.com/throw+a+wrench+in+the+works
tblue
(16,350 posts)it's targeting. There is virtually no Congressional oversight and the FISA court is made of partisan appointees not impartial and not even necessarily judges! The dragnet is conducted by corporations that have their own agendas. And we won't always have a Democratic President and Senate, not that they are a guarantee of anything. ANYTHING can happen with this much data mining. I don't trust it.