'I Have Been to the Darkest Corners of Government, and What They Fear Is Light'

[ProSense]

144. "I say, you are traitors to this country and to it's citizens"

"To Greenwald's and Snowden's detractors and propaganists I say, you are traitors to this country and to it's citizens -- all in the name of cheerleading for your guy and blind devotion to a political party that has been ideologically dead for 25 years. History will not be kind to you. "

So if you don't approve of Greenwald and Snowden, you're "traitors"?

The OP e-mail is gobbledygook. Sounds like a line from a cheesy novel.

Snowden: U.S. Is ‘Not Going To Be Able To Cover This Up By Jailing Or Murdering Me’

Edward Snowden, the self-proclaimed source of recently leaked top secret National Security Agency documents, has answered the first questions asked to him on Monday in an open-to-the-public live chat on The Guardian's website.

The second question, from The Guardian's Glenn Greenwald, read as follows: "How many sets of the documents you disclosed did you make, and how many different people have them? If anything happens to you, do they still exist?"

Snowden stopped short of answering the question directly.

"All I can say right now is the US Government is not going to be able to cover this up by jailing or murdering me," he wrote. "Truth is coming, and it cannot be stopped."

http://livewire.talkingpointsmemo.com/entry/snowden-us-is-not-going-to-be-able

Snowden is the one who seems preoccupied with spying on other countries, which is why he's in the predicament he is today.

More fundamentally, the "US Persons" protection in general is a distraction from the power and danger of this system. Suspicionless surveillance does not become okay simply because it's only victimizing 95% of the world instead of 100%. Our founders did not write that "We hold these Truths to be self-evident, that all US Persons are created equal."

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/jun/17/edward-snowden-nsa-files-whistleblower#block-51bf317be4b0d3c14258337b

The Constitution is an American document.

“If I have time to go through this information, I would like to make it available to journalists in each country to make their own assessment, independent of my bias, as to whether or not the knowledge of US network operations against their people should be published.”

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023084875

Greenwald said that some journalists’ accounts of the Snowden leaks scandal, the impression many get is that America would turn to extraordinary methods to eliminate the threat posed by Snowden if he decided to turn over to a foreign government the information at his disposal.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023035095

"Snowden has enough information to cause harm to the U.S. government in a single minute than any other person has ever had," Greenwald said in an interview in Rio de Janeiro with the Argentinean daily La Nacion.

"The U.S. government should be on its knees every day begging that nothing happen to Snowden, because if something does happen to him, all the information will be revealed and it could be its worst nightmare."

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023242606

More "traitors" who believe Snowden should be prosecuted:

Carter: Snowden's leaks 'good for Americans to know'

Susan Page

NEW YORK -- Former president Jimmy Carter defended the disclosures by fugitive NSA contractor Edward Snowden on Monday, saying revelations that U.S. intelligence agencies were collecting meta-data of Americans' phone calls and e-mails have been "probably constructive in the long run."

<...>

Does he view Snowden, now granted asylum in Russia, as a hero or a traitor?

"There's no doubt that he broke the law and that he would be susceptible, in my opinion, to prosecution if he came back here under the law," he said. "But I think it's good for Americans to know the kinds of things that have been revealed by him and others -- and that is that since 9/11 we've gone too far in intrusion on the privacy that Americans ought to enjoy as a right of citizenship."

Carter cautioned that he didn't have information about whether some of the disclosures "may have hurt our security or individuals that work in security," adding, "If I knew that, then I may feel differently." And he said Snowden shouldn't be immune from prosecution for his actions.

"I think it's inevitable that he should be prosecuted and I think he would be prosecuted" if he returned to the United States, the former president said. "But I don't think he ought to be executed as a traitor or any kind of extreme punishment like that."

- more -

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2014/03/24/usa-today-capital-download-jimmy-carter-edward-snowden-probably-constructive/6822425/

I stand with anyone who recognizes that one doesn't have defend Snowden playing Putin's tool to be on the "right side of history."

<...>

BLITZER: What about Snowden? Do you think that he committed a crime or he was simply a well-intentioned whistle-blower?

SANDERS: Well, I think what you have to look at is -- I think there is no question that he committed a crime, obviously. He violated his oath and he leaked information.

On the other hand, what you have to weigh that against is the fact that he has gone a very long way in educating the people of our country and the people of the world about the power of private agency in terms of their surveillance over people of this country, over foreign leaders, and what they are doing.

So, I think you got to weigh the two. My own belief is that I think, I would hope that the United States government could kind of negotiate some plea bargain with him, some form of clemency. I think it wouldn't be a good idea or fair to him to have to spend his entire remaining life abroad, not being able to come back to his country.

So I would hope that there's a price that he has to pay, but I hope it is not a long prison sentence or exile from his country.

BLITZER: You wouldn't give him clemency, though, and let him off scot-free?

SANDERS: No. BLITZER: All right, Senator, thanks very much for joining us.

<...>

http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/1401/06/sitroom.02.html

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10024292659

Senator Blumenthal: prosecute Snowden, overhaul FISA courts.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023425884

Rep. John Lewis: "NO PRAISE FOR SNOWDEN-Reports about my interview with The Guardian are misleading"
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023427908

“What Mr. Snowden did is treason, was high crimes, and there is nothing in what we say that justifies what he did,” said Richard Clarke, a former White House counter-terrorism advisor and current ABC News contributor. “Whether or not this panel would have been created anyway, I don’t know, but I don’t think anything that I’ve learned justifies the treasonous acts of Mr. Snowden.”

From the beginning, it was clear that Snowden broke the law (http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023439290). There was a point where even Snowden supporters accepted that he knew he broke the law. Snowden said it himself.

Fleeing the country and releasing state secrets did not help his case.

His actions since then have only made the situation worse.

Whistleblowers have been making that point, some in subtle ways.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023236549

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023035550

Of course, this is dimissed because they're also critical of the NSA. It's as if some think that you can't be against NSA overreach (http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023002358) unless you support Snowden.

What's that line thrown out whenever Greenwald is criticized: Were you against Clarke when he went after Bush? Were you for Scooter Libby when he leaked Plame's identity?