Washington critical of everyone but itself in Snowden affair [View all]

[Catherina]

Op-Ed: Washington critical of everyone but itself in Snowden affair
By Craig Boehman
Jul 12, 2013 in Politics

Washington continues to shirk its own responsibility in its mishandling of state secrets. Criticizing China for letting Snowden go is like blaming the fireman for the smoke detector without batteries.

When governments like the US place high emphasis on state secrets and intelligence agencies to safeguard them, there's an understanding inherent to the business that leaks of a highly classified nature are to be safeguarded against at all costs. Why? Because state secrets conceal ties between government officials and their explicit approval and/or knowledge of highly immoral and typically illegal activities carried out in the dubious name of national security. This surmisal is key to understanding why the US government behaves the way it does diplomatically when it's caught with its pants down in a global scandal.

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Edward Snowden has not revealed state secrets of this nature. He's not even in the same league as individuals who leaked information to the Soviet Union, not by a long shot. He has not, as it has been asserted by Republicans and Democrats, divulged information that will tip off terrorists to how they're being monitored by US intelligence. It's a straw man argument at best. What Snowden has revealed is who has been complicit in working with the government to monitor the citizens of the United States and of its allies.

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Emphatically, the American government is chock-full of politicians defending state violence as a matter of policy and discourse. These same representatives continue to sponsor Wall Street practices that crashed our economy. They routinely harbor the real criminals of government and in board rooms who jeopardize our national security in many profound ways. The real patriots, those groups and individuals who stand up against these existential threats to our livelihoods and personal liberties, by way of protest risk the harshest and most unjust reprisals from a nation that prides itself on human rights. This is why Snowden fled the country. There is not one institution or mechanism left in the public domain to stick up for the little guy when it's a matter of national importance.

http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/354217