CITIZENFOUR link... great documentary about Ed Snowden

[pocketrockets]

[video]http://www.iwatchonline.to/play/2307181[/video]

Citzenfour is prosaic in its presentation and profoundly chilling in its details, and if you think Snowden is a traitor, you should probably see it. If you think he’s a hero, you should probably see it. If you haven’t made up your mind — well, you get the idea.

 

[MikeB]

Traitor

 

[ML Dog]

The only way you post "Traitor" is you somehow don't value your right to not having your life monitored by Big Brother.

If thats true Good Luck hope you never do anything BB considers "wrong" or express intent to vote (or God Forbid take action) against a thing BB wants.

You might change your mind though, if you ever learn whats involved, you might wake up to the fact that Snowden resembles the founding fathers of this country moreso than any one else amongst us. Guys who were literally willing to sacrifice everything to get out from under the Thumb of The Man, guys prepared to die for Freedom.

"The NSA has built an infrastructure that allows it to intercept almost everything. If I wanted to see your emails or your wife's phone, all I have to do is use intercepts. I can get your emails, passwords, phone records, credit cards." -Snowden

"All I wanted was for the public to be able to have a say in how they are governed. That is a milestone we left a long time ago." -Snowden
​

 

[pocketrockets]

The only way you post "Traitor" is you somehow don't value your right to not having your life monitored by Big Brother.

If thats true Good Luck hope you never do anything BB considers "wrong" or express intent to vote (or God Forbid take action) against a thing BB wants.

You might change your mind though, if you ever learn whats involved, you might wake up to the fact that Snowden resembles the founding fathers of this country moreso than any one else amongst us. Guys who were literally willing to sacrifice everything to get out from under the Thumb of The Man, guys prepared to die for Freedom.

"The NSA has built an infrastructure that allows it to intercept almost everything. If I wanted to see your emails or your wife's phone, all I have to do is use intercepts. I can get your emails, passwords, phone records, credit cards." -Snowden

"All I wanted was for the public to be able to have a say in how they are governed. That is a milestone we left a long time ago." -Snowden
​

Preach it brother.

I won't try to change anyone's mind over this but I ask you to see the film before posting hero or traitor. If you do watch you'll realize there's more to the story that what CNN, CBS or FOX told you about the whole issue.

It amazes me how all of us at this forum have been fucked by the US government taking our liberties away (Patriot Act, Unlawful Gambling Act, Black Friday, the closings of Neteller and Firepay) and yet we don't stand up for our rights not to be preyed upon by Big Brother or being told what we can do with our lives and money (as long as we don't hurt 3rd parties).

Are we really that brainwashed? Are we really so needy for someone's else's "protection"?

USA's funding fathers died for freedom, freedom of choice and freedom of action, freedom of speech and freedom of the shackles of the man (the man being British crown and banks back then).

 

[scottcarter]

watched it last night. The movie is super boring. 1/10

 

[ML Dog]

Are we really that brainwashed?

Yes we are. A Huge and totally necessary to be considered "stop along the way" on the path of one deciding how they feel about Snowden and Government Monitoring of the population is to grasp what the philosophy of "Determinism" has to say on the "Bigger Picture".

In a nutshell "Determinism", in some applications of this philosophy at least, says "things are gonna turn out how they would have anyways, regardless of the amount of bellyaching or other Revolutionary methods we undertake"

Determinism basically suggests (according to some folks translation of it anyway) that the eventual outcome can only be one thing.

And that, because there can be only one outcome, things are progressing as they should and regardless of what we do that only possible outcome will be.

For the USA, the outcome seems certain and Determinism will almost certainly prove tue.

Gamblers will appreciate this moreso than others, just like an ATS trend studys historical outcomes under similar conditions to predict what the outcome of a given event will be....

....every single OTHER political system like we see in USA today, throughout the History Of The World: The vast majority of wealth held by the upper 1%, Massive division between Rich and poor, the abolition of The Middle Class.

Theres been Chinese Examples in the past, Romans and others and the SU record for eventual total collapse of those Empires, that so resemble USA today is, like, 0-12 with the 0 being prosperity & survival and the 12 being total collapse amidst great suffering and calamity.

Theres no way to reach an intelligent conclusion on the escape Snowden proposes as important, no way to conclude how invested one wants to make oneself in joining this battle without considering the philosophy of Determinism and the question of whether we can really effect this (or any) outcome...

not unlike how cheering for a Side Live, yelling and screaming for them to "GO!" may or may not have an impact on the outcome of a game its entirely possible the Universe is unfolding as it should and the impact we can have on where all this winds up MIGHT be as much as the impact one yelling "GO!" at a TV set would be...as they watch the game unfold.

Maybe, maybe not. I am merely saying that this possibility must be considered...via an understanding of The Philosophy of Determinism and a determination of how that philosophy feels to each who chooses to think upon this matter.

 

[scottcarter]

this guy makes some good points I think.


Let Me Show You Why Edward Snowden is a Traitor and Not a Patriot

June 7, 2014 By Allen Clifton


Recently I wrote an article mocking Edward Snowden for claiming that the only reason he’s stuck in Russia is because the United States pulled his passport. I mocked that because Snowden would have to have been a complete buffoon to not know that after he publicly came out as the person who leaked these NSA documents, the first thing the United States was going to do was revoke his passport.

Did he really expect them to let him have an easy path to whatever non-extradition country he wanted?
And this guy claims he was a trained NSA spy?

If all the “spy training” you had was watching the movie Spies Like Us, you’d probably have enough common sense to know that once the United States government knew who it was that leaked these documents, one of the first things they were going to do was make it nearly impossible for that person to travel internationally.
But these people who call Snowden a “patriot” or a “hero,” believing that he should be completely free to come back to the United States without facing any kind of criminal charges, don’t seem to fully understand what they’re talking about.

For the sake of argument let’s say that everything Snowden stole pertaining to possible illegal activity by the NSA is 100% legit and every last bit of it is proven to be unconstitutional. Then yes, I would agree that he’s a patriot and a hero for risking everything to take that stand.
Except that’s not all he stole, nor is it all that he’s leaked.

Telling a newspaper in China that the United States government spied on Chinese computers isn’t “revealing unconstitutional surveillance of Americans” and leaking that classified information is illegal.

Writing an “open letter” trying to get Brazil to grant him political asylum by offering to help Brazil investigate United States surveillance, because Snowden leaked information about the U.S. spying on the Brazilian government, isn’t “standing up for the Constitutional rights of Americans.”

Saying that the NSA is “in bed” with Germany and other governments, working together on elaborate surveillance programs, isn’t “protecting the freedom of American citizens.”

Leaking documents showing that Sweden has helped the United States spy on Russia isn’t “being a patriot.”

Producing documents that reveal details on how the NSA gets some of its intelligence on the location of dangerous terrorists isn’t “being a passionate supporter of our Bill of Rights.”

Revealing that the United States uses cyber-attacks as an “intelligence weapon” for overseas targets has nothing to do with our Constitution.

Neither did producing documents that showed the British government set up surveillance of G20 delegates and phones during the G20 summit in 2009.

Last I checked, countries in Latin America weren’t protected by our Constitution either – yet Snowden still leaked information about how the NSA listens in on phone calls in many of those nations.

Can’t say I see any connection to our Constitution in Snowden’s leak of documents pertaining to al-Qaeda’s efforts to shoot down or hack our drones.
I’ll admit that I’m not a Constitutional scholar, but I’m pretty sure French citizens aren’t protected by our Constitution.
Neither are Norwegians.

And I have no idea what Canada’s intelligence gathering has to do with American rights.

Though I’m fairly certain revealing that the NSA helped the Dutch spy on Somalia has absolutely nothing to do with the Constitution.

I’ll go ahead and stop there. There were plenty of other examples (such as the United States government hacking the German chancellor’s phone and spying on the Mexican president) but I think I made my point.

So even if you’re on the side of believing that he’s a “patriot” for revealing that the NSA has been unconstitutionally and illegally spying on Americans – that doesn’t recuse him of being a traitor. The fact is that he illegally stole this information and much of what he took, and subsequently leaked, has nothing to do with our Constitution or the rights of Americans.

<center></center>
- See more at: http://www.forwardprogressives.com/...den-traitor-not-patriot/#sthash.WK8NZ1Xy.dpuf

 

[scottcarter]

<header id="a-headers" style="-webkit-padding-start: 0px; margin: -4px 0px 10px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; box-sizing: border-box; color: rgb(17, 17, 17); font-family: Arial, sans-serif; line-height: 21px; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">I agree with this guy's take on it.

Edward Snowden, traitor

The know-it-all Millennial arrogated to himself the right to determine what secrets, if any, our government should be allowed to keep

NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
Sunday, June 1, 2014, 4:05 AM
</header>
<article data-streamid="7.2145950" data-streamtags="["NYDN.Opinion.d"]" itemprop="articleBody" style="-webkit-padding-start: 0px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; box-sizing: border-box; position: relative; background: transparent;"><figure class="a-image h" style="-webkit-padding-start: 0px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; min-height: 40px; position: relative; width: 635px; box-sizing: border-box; background: transparent;">

</figure>
Edward Snowden represents the worst traits of the Millennial generation: self-entitlement, moral equivocation and no sense of loyalty to one’s country.
There was Snowden Wednesday, chatting it up with NBC News’ Brian Williams, who had traveled all the way to Moscow to meet with the fugitive National Security Agency leaker. Americans suspicious of how Snowden wound up there, of all places, after having divulged some 2 million secret U.S. government documents, are apparently paranoid to think that he is somehow working for our friends, the Russians.

“I have no relationship with the Russian government at all,” he protested, “I’m not supported by the Russian government.” This is exactly what Russian President Vladimir Putin uttered just a week before. Snowden “is not our agent, and gave up no secrets,” he said.
And those “little green men” in Crimea are not Russian troops.

It took Oleg Kalugin, a retired KGB Major General, to bring us back to earth. “The FSB are now his hosts, and they are taking care of him,” Kalugin told the site VentureBeat, referring to the Russian security agency.

Snowden insists he did not bring his digital documents to Moscow and that the Russians thus have no access to America’s national security secrets. But even if he didn’t carry the files with him, there remains plenty of classified information he could have provided his hosts by other means.

And Snowden either doesn’t care about, or is completely oblivious to, the propaganda victory he has handed the Russians by allowing them to portray themselves as gracious hosts to a courageous “whistleblower” exposing the ravages of America’s national security state. For the deleterious effects this has had on the United States, simply look at the conversation in countries like Brazil or Germany, where people talk as if America were the only country in the world that engages in espionage.

Ah, but Snowden told Williams, he never intended to settle in Moscow. No, he really wanted to land in Cuba or Venezuela, other paragons of free speech and individual rights. It was only after big, bad Uncle Sam revoked his passport that he found himself stranded in the transfer terminal at Sheremetyevo airport.

Unbelievable. Snowden breaks his oath, deceives his colleagues, filches top-secret documents, flees to Red China, and then whines about how the people whom he lied to and stole from tried to prevent him from getting away with it?

“The situation determined that this needed to be told to the public,” Snowden declared, in the smug tone of the undergraduate drunk for the first time on post-modernist theory. “Situations” do not determine the course of events. Individuals do.

And Snowden, the know-it-all Millennial, arrogated to himself the right to determine what secrets, if any, our government should be allowed to keep.
A Pew poll found 57% of Americans age 18-29 believe Snowden “served the public interest” — almost an exact inverse of Americans over 65. Trust in him is highest among those with no recollection of WWII or the Cold War.

Had Snowden limited his disclosures to the NSA’s domestic surveillance programs, which certainly deserve more scrutiny, we would be having an entirely different conversation. But the minute he decided to expose America’s foreign intelligence operations — operations that are not constrained by the Constitution he so claims to love — and abscond to the capital of an authoritarian adversary, Snowden lost any claim to the mantle of “whistleblower.”

At this point he became what Secretary of State John Kerry has now labeled him: a “traitor.”

Thankfully, not all us Millennials are like Snowden, as evidenced by the young men and women who have sacrificed so much over the past decade by serving their country in the armed services or, indeed, the NSA. It is these people, whom he betrayed, who indeed serve the public interest.

Kirchick is a fellow with the Foreign Policy Initiative
</article>

 

[The Guesser]

Says it all, IMO:

Edward Snowden is a patriot By: Trevor Timm August 10, 2013 09:45 PM EST

Does President Barack Obama think we’re stupid? That’s the only conclusion possible after watching Friday’s bravura performance in which the president announced a set of proposals meant to bring more transparency to the National Security Agency — and claimed he would have done it anyway, even if Edward Snowden had never decided to leak thousands of highly sensitive documents to The Guardian’s Glenn Greenwald. But even as he grudgingly admitted that the timing, at least, of his suggestions was a consequence of Snowden’s actions, the president declared, “I don’t think Mr. Snowden was a patriot.” When you look at what has changed over the past two months, though, it’s hard not to wonder, “What could be more patriotic than what Snowden did?” (PHOTOS: Pols react to Snowden on the run) First, the results: More than a dozen bills have already been introduced to put a stop to the NSA’s mass phone record collection program and to overhaul the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, which has reinterpreted the Fourth Amendment in secret, creating a body of privacy law that the public has never read. A half-dozen new privacy lawsuits have been filed against the NSA. The Pentagon is undergoing an unprecedented secrecy audit. U.S. officials have been caught deceiving or lying to Congress. The list goes on. These actions have been accompanied by a sea change in public opinion about surveillance. Poll after poll has shown that for the first time ever, Americans think the government has gone too far in violating their privacy, with vast majorities believing the NSA scooping up a record of every phone call made in the United States invades citizens’ privacy. While the administration certainly doesn’t believe Snowden is patriotic, Americans do. A Quinnipiac poll conducted this month found people agreed, 55 percent to 34 percent, that he is a whistleblower — a large margin that crossed party, gender and age lines. A recent Reuters poll showed only 31 percent of the public thought he should be prosecuted. Obama claimed in his press conference that Snowden stole his thunder, that he was one who tried to initiate a surveillance debate prior to Snowden’s leaks. But, he complained, “rather than an orderly and lawful process to debate these issues and come up with appropriate reforms, repeated leaks of classified information have initiated the debate in a very passionate but not always fully informed way.” That argument just doesn’t comport with reality. In his speech in May on national security, the president did indeed announce a review of surveillance policy. What he failed to mention, though, was that the very same speech was spurred by another leak — of the Justice Department white paper justifying drone strikes on Americans overseas. There’s been no change in transparency surrounding drone strikes since the speech, as Obama himself proved later in the press conference when he refused to confirm a drone strike took place in Yemen last week — there were several. The fact is Obama has had years to initiate a debate about surveillance but instead has actively stifled it. Although, as he acknowledged Friday, he was a huge critic of the PATRIOT Act as a senator, his administration actively opposed privacy and oversight amendments in 2011. Similarly, in December 2012 — just eight months ago — the administration opposed all oversight fixes to the FISA Amendments Act. It passed unchanged with little debate. The FISA Amendments Act is the law that, as The New York Times reported on its front page last week, the NSA has used to “search the contents of vast amounts of Americans’ email and text communications into and out of the country.” Obama didn’t say a word about the Times’ bombshell story Friday, nor did he mention the Guardian story from the same day explaining how another loophole in the FISA Amendments Act allows the NSA to search its databases for Americans without a warrant. Just how much has changed since Snowden went rogue? Two cases tell the tale: In litigation over the administration’s secret legal interpretation of the Section 215 of the PATRIOT Act a few months ago, the government wouldn’t even give a page count of its opinion, let alone what it said. Similarly, a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit for the 2011 FISA court opinion ruling NSA activities unconstitutional led to the release of 30 pages completely redacted. On Friday, the administration released a full white paper of its secret legal interpretation of Section 215 of the PATRIOT Act, which the NSA has used to vacuum up every domestic telephone record in the country without suspicion. The administration also announced that the 2011 FISA court opinion ruling some NSA surveillance unconstitutional will be released nine days after its Aug. 12 deadline. Obama said that if Snowden is truly patriotic, he would come back to the United States and make his arguments in court and leave it up to a jury to decide. Unfortunately, there’s no public interest exception to the Espionage Act. The administration has managed to convince courts in recent years that issues like a leaker’s intent to inform the public, the value of the leaks or the lack of damage that the leaks have caused to national security are inadmissible in court. Obama also boasted that he has enhanced protections for whistleblowers. But as the Center for Public Integrity reported after the speech, the president’s executive order “specifically excluded intelligence contractors like Snowden.” Whoops. As New York Times reporter James Risen — who knows a thing or two about whistleblowers — said on CNN recently, “We wouldn’t be having this discussion if it wasn’t for [Snowden]. That’s the thing I don’t understand about the climate in Washington these days is that people want to have debates on television and elsewhere, but then you want to throw the people who start the debates in jail.” But Risen made another, less publicized appearance this week at the annual National Press Club awards dinner. What he said there is even more poignant. “I don’t think there’s any personality that’s more American than a whistleblower,” he said. “The entire personality and DNA of America [is made up] of people who wanted to have their own kind of government and be free of oppression. And I think that is the heart of what a whistleblower is. It’s somebody who believes civil liberties or freedom or corruption are important issues that they need to talk about, and their right as an American is to talk about it with the press.” If Congress passes meaningful NSA reform, Snowden may go down in history as the most influential whistleblower in American history. What could be more patriotic than that? Trevor Timm is executive director of Freedom of the Press Foundation, a non-profit organization dedicated to supporting and defending public-interest, transparency journalism.

© 2015 POLITICO LLC

<tbody>
</tbody>

 

[pocketrockets]

Yes we are. A Huge and totally necessary to be considered "stop along the way" on the path of one deciding how they feel about Snowden and Government Monitoring of the population is to grasp what the philosophy of "Determinism" has to say on the "Bigger Picture".

In a nutshell "Determinism", in some applications of this philosophy at least, says "things are gonna turn out how they would have anyways, regardless of the amount of bellyaching or other Revolutionary methods we undertake"

Determinism basically suggests (according to some folks translation of it anyway) that the eventual outcome can only be one thing.

And that, because there can be only one outcome, things are progressing as they should and regardless of what we do that only possible outcome will be.

For the USA, the outcome seems certain and Determinism will almost certainly prove tue.

Gamblers will appreciate this moreso than others, just like an ATS trend studys historical outcomes under similar conditions to predict what the outcome of a given event will be....

....every single OTHER political system like we see in USA today, throughout the History Of The World: The vast majority of wealth held by the upper 1%, Massive division between Rich and poor, the abolition of The Middle Class.

Theres been Chinese Examples in the past, Romans and others and the SU record for eventual total collapse of those Empires, that so resemble USA today is, like, 0-12 with the 0 being prosperity & survival and the 12 being total collapse amidst great suffering and calamity.

Theres no way to reach an intelligent conclusion on the escape Snowden proposes as important, no way to conclude how invested one wants to make oneself in joining this battle without considering the philosophy of Determinism and the question of whether we can really effect this (or any) outcome...

not unlike how cheering for a Side Live, yelling and screaming for them to "GO!" may or may not have an impact on the outcome of a game its entirely possible the Universe is unfolding as it should and the impact we can have on where all this winds up MIGHT be as much as the impact one yelling "GO!" at a TV set would be...as they watch the game unfold.

Maybe, maybe not. I am merely saying that this possibility must be considered...via an understanding of The Philosophy of Determinism and a determination of how that philosophy feels to each who chooses to think upon this matter.

Great fucking post brother!

 

[pocketrockets]

Says it all, IMO:

Edward Snowden is a patriot By: Trevor Timm August 10, 2013 09:45 PM EST

Does President Barack Obama think we’re stupid? That’s the only conclusion possible after watching Friday’s bravura performance in which the president announced a set of proposals meant to bring more transparency to the National Security Agency — and claimed he would have done it anyway, even if Edward Snowden had never decided to leak thousands of highly sensitive documents to The Guardian’s Glenn Greenwald. But even as he grudgingly admitted that the timing, at least, of his suggestions was a consequence of Snowden’s actions, the president declared, “I don’t think Mr. Snowden was a patriot.” When you look at what has changed over the past two months, though, it’s hard not to wonder, “What could be more patriotic than what Snowden did?” (PHOTOS: Pols react to Snowden on the run) First, the results: More than a dozen bills have already been introduced to put a stop to the NSA’s mass phone record collection program and to overhaul the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, which has reinterpreted the Fourth Amendment in secret, creating a body of privacy law that the public has never read. A half-dozen new privacy lawsuits have been filed against the NSA. The Pentagon is undergoing an unprecedented secrecy audit. U.S. officials have been caught deceiving or lying to Congress. The list goes on. These actions have been accompanied by a sea change in public opinion about surveillance. Poll after poll has shown that for the first time ever, Americans think the government has gone too far in violating their privacy, with vast majorities believing the NSA scooping up a record of every phone call made in the United States invades citizens’ privacy. While the administration certainly doesn’t believe Snowden is patriotic, Americans do. A Quinnipiac poll conducted this month found people agreed, 55 percent to 34 percent, that he is a whistleblower — a large margin that crossed party, gender and age lines. A recent Reuters poll showed only 31 percent of the public thought he should be prosecuted. Obama claimed in his press conference that Snowden stole his thunder, that he was one who tried to initiate a surveillance debate prior to Snowden’s leaks. But, he complained, “rather than an orderly and lawful process to debate these issues and come up with appropriate reforms, repeated leaks of classified information have initiated the debate in a very passionate but not always fully informed way.” That argument just doesn’t comport with reality. In his speech in May on national security, the president did indeed announce a review of surveillance policy. What he failed to mention, though, was that the very same speech was spurred by another leak — of the Justice Department white paper justifying drone strikes on Americans overseas. There’s been no change in transparency surrounding drone strikes since the speech, as Obama himself proved later in the press conference when he refused to confirm a drone strike took place in Yemen last week — there were several. The fact is Obama has had years to initiate a debate about surveillance but instead has actively stifled it. Although, as he acknowledged Friday, he was a huge critic of the PATRIOT Act as a senator, his administration actively opposed privacy and oversight amendments in 2011. Similarly, in December 2012 — just eight months ago — the administration opposed all oversight fixes to the FISA Amendments Act. It passed unchanged with little debate. The FISA Amendments Act is the law that, as The New York Times reported on its front page last week, the NSA has used to “search the contents of vast amounts of Americans’ email and text communications into and out of the country.” Obama didn’t say a word about the Times’ bombshell story Friday, nor did he mention the Guardian story from the same day explaining how another loophole in the FISA Amendments Act allows the NSA to search its databases for Americans without a warrant. Just how much has changed since Snowden went rogue? Two cases tell the tale: In litigation over the administration’s secret legal interpretation of the Section 215 of the PATRIOT Act a few months ago, the government wouldn’t even give a page count of its opinion, let alone what it said. Similarly, a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit for the 2011 FISA court opinion ruling NSA activities unconstitutional led to the release of 30 pages completely redacted. On Friday, the administration released a full white paper of its secret legal interpretation of Section 215 of the PATRIOT Act, which the NSA has used to vacuum up every domestic telephone record in the country without suspicion. The administration also announced that the 2011 FISA court opinion ruling some NSA surveillance unconstitutional will be released nine days after its Aug. 12 deadline. Obama said that if Snowden is truly patriotic, he would come back to the United States and make his arguments in court and leave it up to a jury to decide. Unfortunately, there’s no public interest exception to the Espionage Act. The administration has managed to convince courts in recent years that issues like a leaker’s intent to inform the public, the value of the leaks or the lack of damage that the leaks have caused to national security are inadmissible in court. Obama also boasted that he has enhanced protections for whistleblowers. But as the Center for Public Integrity reported after the speech, the president’s executive order “specifically excluded intelligence contractors like Snowden.” Whoops. As New York Times reporter James Risen — who knows a thing or two about whistleblowers — said on CNN recently, “We wouldn’t be having this discussion if it wasn’t for [Snowden]. That’s the thing I don’t understand about the climate in Washington these days is that people want to have debates on television and elsewhere, but then you want to throw the people who start the debates in jail.” But Risen made another, less publicized appearance this week at the annual National Press Club awards dinner. What he said there is even more poignant. “I don’t think there’s any personality that’s more American than a whistleblower,” he said. “The entire personality and DNA of America [is made up] of people who wanted to have their own kind of government and be free of oppression. And I think that is the heart of what a whistleblower is. It’s somebody who believes civil liberties or freedom or corruption are important issues that they need to talk about, and their right as an American is to talk about it with the press.” If Congress passes meaningful NSA reform, Snowden may go down in history as the most influential whistleblower in American history. What could be more patriotic than that? Trevor Timm is executive director of Freedom of the Press Foundation, a non-profit organization dedicated to supporting and defending public-interest, transparency journalism.

© 2015 POLITICO LLC

<tbody>
</tbody>

Yep, hard to call him a traitor when the government is guilty of treachery in the 1st place.

 

[pocketrockets]

this guy makes some good points I think.


Let Me Show You Why Edward Snowden is a Traitor and Not a Patriot

June 7, 2014 By Allen Clifton


Recently I wrote an article mocking Edward Snowden for claiming that the only reason he’s stuck in Russia is because the United States pulled his passport. I mocked that because Snowden would have to have been a complete buffoon to not know that after he publicly came out as the person who leaked these NSA documents, the first thing the United States was going to do was revoke his passport.

Did he really expect them to let him have an easy path to whatever non-extradition country he wanted?
And this guy claims he was a trained NSA spy?

If all the “spy training” you had was watching the movie Spies Like Us, you’d probably have enough common sense to know that once the United States government knew who it was that leaked these documents, one of the first things they were going to do was make it nearly impossible for that person to travel internationally.
But these people who call Snowden a “patriot” or a “hero,” believing that he should be completely free to come back to the United States without facing any kind of criminal charges, don’t seem to fully understand what they’re talking about.

For the sake of argument let’s say that everything Snowden stole pertaining to possible illegal activity by the NSA is 100% legit and every last bit of it is proven to be unconstitutional. Then yes, I would agree that he’s a patriot and a hero for risking everything to take that stand.
Except that’s not all he stole, nor is it all that he’s leaked.

Telling a newspaper in China that the United States government spied on Chinese computers isn’t “revealing unconstitutional surveillance of Americans” and leaking that classified information is illegal.

Writing an “open letter” trying to get Brazil to grant him political asylum by offering to help Brazil investigate United States surveillance, because Snowden leaked information about the U.S. spying on the Brazilian government, isn’t “standing up for the Constitutional rights of Americans.”

Saying that the NSA is “in bed” with Germany and other governments, working together on elaborate surveillance programs, isn’t “protecting the freedom of American citizens.”

Leaking documents showing that Sweden has helped the United States spy on Russia isn’t “being a patriot.”

Producing documents that reveal details on how the NSA gets some of its intelligence on the location of dangerous terrorists isn’t “being a passionate supporter of our Bill of Rights.”

Revealing that the United States uses cyber-attacks as an “intelligence weapon” for overseas targets has nothing to do with our Constitution.

Neither did producing documents that showed the British government set up surveillance of G20 delegates and phones during the G20 summit in 2009.

Last I checked, countries in Latin America weren’t protected by our Constitution either – yet Snowden still leaked information about how the NSA listens in on phone calls in many of those nations.

Can’t say I see any connection to our Constitution in Snowden’s leak of documents pertaining to al-Qaeda’s efforts to shoot down or hack our drones.
I’ll admit that I’m not a Constitutional scholar, but I’m pretty sure French citizens aren’t protected by our Constitution.
Neither are Norwegians.

And I have no idea what Canada’s intelligence gathering has to do with American rights.

Though I’m fairly certain revealing that the NSA helped the Dutch spy on Somalia has absolutely nothing to do with the Constitution.

I’ll go ahead and stop there. There were plenty of other examples (such as the United States government hacking the German chancellor’s phone and spying on the Mexican president) but I think I made my point.

So even if you’re on the side of believing that he’s a “patriot” for revealing that the NSA has been unconstitutionally and illegally spying on Americans – that doesn’t recuse him of being a traitor. The fact is that he illegally stole this information and much of what he took, and subsequently leaked, has nothing to do with our Constitution or the rights of Americans.

<center></center>
- See more at: http://www.forwardprogressives.com/...den-traitor-not-patriot/#sthash.WK8NZ1Xy.dpuf

I cant take this article seriously, first of all because of it's reduced analysis of what the NSA is doing and what it means to people all over the world. Secondly, because it fails to be impartial and it throws insults commonly used by people who cannot argue the matter profusely.

3RD. The article mainly focuses on the Snowden character and how he is a traitor, instead of focusing on the issue itself and how it affects American citizens and liberties.

Scott... I know you are a smart cat... your opinion is your opinion and is as valid as any.

 

[The Guesser]

Yep, hard to call him a traitor when the government is guilty of treachery in the 1st place.

Bringing Traitorous activity by our Gov't to the light of scrutiny is about as Patriotic an act as one can do, IMO. History will look back on Snowden as a hero by the objective chroniclers of history.

 

[scottcarter]

I cant take this article seriously, first of all because of it's reduced analysis of what the NSA is doing and what it means to people all over the world. Secondly, because it fails to be impartial and it throws insults commonly used by people who cannot argue the matter profusely.

3RD. The article mainly focuses on the Snowden character and how he is a traitor, instead of focusing on the issue itself and how it affects American citizens and liberties.

Scott... I know you are a smart cat... your opinion is your opinion and is as valid as any.

I get why some people view him as some kind of hero but you can't dismiss the solid points made in both those articles I posted. We will obviously agree to disagree but what he did makes him a traitor. No question in my mind.

I felt sorry for him in that movie at how naive he seemed to be.. A young man who had his whole life ahead of him and decided to betray his country and ruined his entire life rather than travel, drink, fuck, eat, spend time with his family and who knows what else. Instead, he is a fugitive of the United States, he will end up in prison one day and no one will remember him just like Bradley Manning. Its a sad story to me. A wasted life.

 

[ML Dog]

Bringing Traitorous activity by our Gov't to the light of scrutiny is about as Patriotic an act as one can do, IMO. History will look back on Snowden as a hero by the objective chroniclers of history.

If one properly factors in that "Determinism" I spoke of above they very clearly see, with regards to the USA at least, that their decision must be the same as those who founded USA.

There was little hope of changing The British Empire so the only real hope...to live in the type of World they wanted, a world free of oppressive Government...

was to gtfo and construct a whole new Nation.

In today's terms that = tracing where your roots are located, where your ancestors came from whether that be Ireland, Italy, Norway or wherever...

Who are you?

Who can You be?

Who/What are you borne of????

....then returning to that country and playing a part in building that world....free of oppressive Government. There.

Or Americans can remain in USA to battle an enemy so massive (US Government/Military Infrastructure combined with the Ignorance, Placidity of the Populus) that it may very well be completely un-defeatable.

 

[pocketrockets]

I get why some people view him as some kind of hero but you can't dismiss the solid points made in both those articles I posted. We will obviously agree to disagree but what he did makes him a traitor. No question in my mind.

I felt sorry for him in that movie at how naive he seemed to be.. A young man who had his whole life ahead of him and decided to betray his country and ruined his entire life rather than travel, drink, fuck, eat, spend time with his family and who knows what else. Instead, he is a fugitive of the United States, he will end up in prison one day and no one will remember him just like Bradley Manning. Its a sad story to me. A wasted life.

It is a sad story not only for him but for all Americans... the future will be more gracious to him than the present, that's for sure. You hit a point in your statement, do you really think he has a better life now than before? Why would he sacrifice himself, his family, his wife, his loved ones, his house and his HIGH earning job if not for a cause he thought to be moral and honorable? Is not like the commies around the world were gonna give him royalty status and riches... hell, the guy is not living a great life right now, not as if he kept his mouth shut.

http://www.alternet.org/news-amp-po...spyware-lets-govts-monitor-unsuspecting-users

http://www.bostonglobe.com/business...acy-harvard/7S0HX1SaCO1MlZL70JC2mK/story.html

 

[scottcarter]

Why would he sacrifice himself, his family, his wife, his loved ones, his house and his HIGH earning job if not for a cause he thought to be moral and honorable? Is not like the commies around the world were gonna give him royalty status and riches... hell, the guy is not living a great life right now, not as if he kept his mouth shut.

http://www.alternet.org/news-amp-po...spyware-lets-govts-monitor-unsuspecting-users

http://www.bostonglobe.com/business...acy-harvard/7S0HX1SaCO1MlZL70JC2mK/story.html

Are you sure he did it to be moral and honorable? I'm not sure that is the case.

why did Bradley Manning betray his country? Many considered him a hero also but it turned out he wanted a sex change and prison is the only place he could afford to get it done.

 

[pocketrockets]

Are you sure he did it to be moral and honorable? I'm not sure that is the case.

why did Bradley Manning betray his country? Many considered him a hero also but it turned out he wanted a sex change and prison is the only place he could afford to get it done.

Well, Manning and Snowden are apples and oranges mate. Not the same scenario AT ALL. We can't really compare them.

In CitizenFour Snowden claimed he didn't do it for honor... he did it because he couldn't stand himself and the guilt the whole situation made him feel... and also because it made him feel good to feel he was defying the government surveillance program he himself aided to build. In a way, he did a selfish act out of self appreciation but lacking self awareness and how royally fucked his life would be (and the life of his whole family).

 

[ML Dog]

I get why some people view him as some kind of hero but you can't dismiss the solid points made in both those articles I posted. We will obviously agree to disagree but what he did makes him a traitor. No question in my mind.

I felt sorry for him in that movie at how naive he seemed to be.. A young man who had his whole life ahead of him and decided to betray his country and ruined his entire life rather than travel, drink, fuck, eat, spend time with his family and who knows what else. Instead, he is a fugitive of the United States, he will end up in prison one day and no one will remember him just like Bradley Manning. Its a sad story to me. A wasted life.

There are some who will never forgive any person who leaked info that jeopardized the lives of 19 year old kids in the Military who were just trying to patriotically serve their country and I personally will never take issue with them feeling that way.

Portraying Snowden and others who'd reveal unacceptable (and illegal) Gov't Tactics that violate our Constitution as Traitors guilty of that would be the very first and chief argument however of ANY GOV'T though so ya gotta "take it with a grain of salt" or, in the case of our US Gov't. take it with multiple grains of salts cuz seriously...

We are more surrounded by Liars, Powerless Puppets to those who really have the power than our forefathers were or would have ever been able to imagine possible.

Big Business/Christian Conservatives rent out The White House at their pleasure. Congress is a wholly owned subsidiary of General Dynamics and other Military Contractors. That is simple Reality whether you like it or not. Any politician who is not also their Prostitute is a politician that gets killed, is felled by Scandal or just does not get elected in the first place.

This thread has already plopped more than enough keyword combinations to see it being monitored by NSA as you read this.

Hi Guy.



Hope you're doing well and you're able to watch the game this weekend.

No need to add me to any watchlist, I ain't no threat. The extent of my Revolutionary Activity will be moving to a beach somewhere and battling waves. I am no threat to you.
​

 

[pocketrockets]

There are some who will never forgive any person who leaked info that jeopardized the lives of 19 year old kids in the Military who were just trying to patriotically serve their country and I personally will never take issue with them feeling that way.

Portraying Snowden and others who'd reveal unacceptable (and illegal) Gov't Tactics that violate our Constitution as Traitors guilty of that would be the very first and chief argument however of ANY GOV'T though so ya gotta "take it with a grain of salt" or, in the case of our US Gov't. take it with multiple grains of salts cuz seriously...

We are more surrounded by Liars, Powerless Puppets to those who really have the power than our forefathers were or would have ever been able to imagine possible.

Big Business/Christian Conservatives rent out The White House at their pleasure. Congress is a wholly owned subsidiary of General Dynamics and other Military Contractors. That is simple Reality whether you like it or not. Any politician who is not also their Prostitute is a politician that gets killed, is felled by Scandal or just does not get elected in the first place.

This thread has already plopped more than enough keyword combinations to see it being monitored by NSA as you read this.

Hi Guy.



Hope you're doing well and you're able to watch the game this weekend.

No need to add me to any watchlist, I ain't no threat. The extent of my Revolutionary Activity will be moving to a beach somewhere and battling waves. I am no threat to you.
​

+1

Me too... I'm not a threat whatsoever I'm just a looney toon who wears tin foiled hats and blue sunglasses.