And that sets off the tone of what will probably be a very boring post from a person who lives in a very boring city 
In answer to yr first question: I really don't know. While I don't read even half of the posts at DU, I haven't spotted any DUers who aren't American posting aggressively defending the NSA or attacking Mr Snowden. I may have missed them, though, as I kind of work on the default here that unless someone says something to indicate otherwise, that they're American.
When it comes to what Australians (all I know of the Australian Chamber of Commerce is they whine a lot whenever workers get pay rises or better conditions or tax breaks and I'm not sure they'd have time to break away from that to be interested in the NSA or Snowden) think, I can just go on anecdotal stuff from family, friends and colleagues, and what the media says. Media first. There was lots and lots in the media when the story broke in the Guardian, the Australian govt apparently asked the US whether Australian facilities were being used to do that wholesale data mining, and there was a lot of stuff in the media on the involvement of Pine Gap and more surprising Australian bases like HMAS Harman. But it's died down over the past few weeks. When it comes to people I know, my daughter's been following it and feels the same as me about it. On the other end of the scale, we were talking about whistleblowing at work today and I rattled off some names like Mordechai Vanunu, Edward Snowden, Bradley Manning and Julian Assange. I got a resounding 'huh? who?' from most of my colleagues to all of them except Julian Assange, because of course he's one of our tribe so of course everyone knows about him...
My own views (and I find my own posts too boring to bookmark and link back to) and I've posted a few times saying this sort of thing, is that Mr Snowden's a whistle-blower and not a criminal, but that he's not what the focus should be on. It should be on what he disclosed and what the NSA is doing, which is incredibly wrong. The behaviour of the US in exerting all the bullying and temper-tantrumming to try to make other countries do its bidding would embarrass the hell out of me if I were American. Some of the stuff I saw written about South American leaders verged on racist and of a colonial mindset, imo. And all that while the US harbours war criminals and those who've taken intelligence from their own countries to the US. It's so hypocritical. So my hope is that the brakes are put on the powers of the NSA, and that Mr Snowden lives a long and happy life far out of the reach of the US....
If you want to see ANY of the issues I've discussed in my more than ten years at DU, I'm all over the old I/P forum at DU2 where I was called a terror apologist, Hamas lover, and all sorts of other things that make these inane Snowden related back and forths of 'Sock puppet!' 'Snowden apologist!' 'Paid shill!' and on and on look very mild. One thing I learnt in the rough and tumble I/P forum of the early years of DU was that while it might feel great to tell the opposing side what a bunch of wankers they are and how you'd get more value out of watching an episode of the X-Factor than reading their repeat-it-by-rote crap, people stop listening to you if all yr doing is flinging poo around. And as more than likely yr opposition aren't going to be swayed by anything you say when you do discuss whatever issue it is, it's people reading and not posting much that need to be the audience to keep in mind. I'm part of that audience, and the incessant insults and attacks I see seem to be the furthest thing possible from the actual issue of Snowden and the NSA. If the person I replied to originally hasn't nodded off of boredom before they get this far, I hope they keep that in mind when they post 
Edit history
Recommendations
0 members have recommended this reply (displayed in chronological order):
= new reply since forum marked as read