Posted on 06/10/2013 9:31:15 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
Edward Snowden is not a hero. He's a 29-year-old former security guard at the National Security Agency who ended up knowing way too much about what goes on at the NSA, CIA and the rest of the intelligence community. In case you missed it over the weekend, he is the kid who spilled the beans about the NSA's PRISM program.
Snowden is now in Hong Kong, probably awaiting a fairly severe knock on his hotel room door by some Chinese cop who will ask him nicely to put his hands behind his back and provide the story line for next season's "Locked Up Abroad."
There is a serious flaw in Edward Snowden's and Bradley Manning's (the U.S. soldier who copied and sent miles of secret messages to Wikileaks) claims that they were looking out for you and me.
As a taxpayer, I'm not paying you to look out after my Fourth Amendment rights. I'm paying you to do whatever job you were hired to do, and if you find that job too ethically distasteful, then you should quit.
But keep your mouth shut.
If everyone is allowed to decide for themselves what is legal and ethical and what is not, then society - not just American society - will collapse. I happen to hate bicycle riders who run stop signs. I think that America would be far better off if bicycle riders who run stop signs are rendered incapable of riding a bicycle at all.
You disagree? Too bad. Under the Snowden/Bradley Rule, I get to pick and choose which laws I obey and which I violate. You can decide to rat out the barrista at your local Starbucks who gives the cute girl from down the block a Grande every day when she only pays for a Tall.
Or you can decide to use your get-out-of-jail-free card to inform on that guy on the fifth floor who is always bragging about his landscapers being from Mars and thus are Little Green Men without Little Green Cards.
If you read or watch the Guardian's interview with Snowden, the first thing that comes to mind is this: Who is in charge of H.R. at the CIA, the NSA and Booz Allen Hamilton - all of whom Snowden has worked over the past four years?
The NSA is tracking phone calls and Google searches because that's what it's in business to do. The only reason the NSA exists is to track phone calls and Google searches - or some facsimile of those things. The CIA is spying on people because that's what we pay them to do.
It is a little hard to swallow the notion that this kid can be smart enough to go from security guard to CIA covert operative and Booz Allen consultant and yet look like the main character in an Edvard Munch painting when he finds out that the NSA and CIA are snooping on people.
I have an advantage over most of you in that I've finally grown into being a curmudgeon. I'm 66-years-old, cranky most of the time, and if the government wants to track who I call and what I download, then have at it.
However, if you are 28 and think you have a future in the government that might include a job requiring Senate confirmation, you probably should be worried.
Edward Snowden should be extradited from Hong Kong and tried in the United States. If he is found guilty - and given his public interviews it won't take Rudy Giuliani or Chris Christy to get a conviction - he should go to federal prison for a long time.
While he's there, I hope that the U.S. Government's security services will continue to do what they are paid to do.
I hope.
Look at Sandy Berger. He stole classified documents and destroyed them to protect a democrat president and he got probation.
This article is crap. Snowden did exactly the right thing. He swore an oath to protect the Constitution from ALL enemies, be they foreign OR DOMESTIC.
Lefties and RINOs had better get right on this, quick.
What about simply PROFILING certain suspected people living in the USA and secretly tracking their phone calls here and to and from overseas, , albeit WITH A WARRANT, ? Is that a violation of the fourth amendment?
What happened to the Constitution, the Rule of Law, a government of/by/for the People??
If you see something (un-Constitutional), SAY SOMETHING!!
<....”I am starting to think and believe this is all a effort not only to snoop on innocent Americans, but to undermine American’s spying abilities and national security capability”....>
Indeed....get the American people riled up via the press...and even the BO media is having a say on this...pushing the story along.
The “script” seems to tight and neat.
If they really cared about security they would start with securing our borders and refrain from importing terrorists.
However if they did those things they would have even more trouble justifying their domestic spying.
I know nothinnnggg, nothinnnggg.
Signed, Sergeant Schultz.
He hasn’t really given up anything we didn’t already know in terms of capability. We already knew that the Feds can access all this stuff pretty easily given they have a warrant. All he’s told us that’s new, is that the Obama admin is tapping all of us without bothering with the warrant part.
Guy gave up a $200K/yr. job, his family, girl friend, freedom, and everything else to out a despot corrupt gone amok government. Yeah, he is a hero in my book.
How do you even begin to confront this level of stupidity and arrogance? These programs are wrapped in deep layers of secrecy. There is no effective oversight by entities with track records of usurping power. The DOJ is corrupt. The US media is complicit. Who the heck else can turn on the lights so the taxpayers can see the roaches scurry?
I read that sentence and stopped reading.
<....”The silence from the GOP is deafening”....>
Well some are “talking” but no action....and I don’t anticipate there will be...just enough to to appease the media and the public outcry...par for the course.
As a taxpayer I sure the heck do not appreciate paying for my government to violate the U.S. Constitution at every step.
As a Verizon shareholder I also do not appreciate Verizon being forced to waste resources to provide this information to an overreaching (Constitution violating) government.
This was the trajectory of what happens to a “whistleblower” when he (or she) comes up against the Current Regime. In-your-face, smash-mouth, brass knuckled, sucker-punch, no holds barred, a coup has happened in the territory once known as “the United States of America”. The enemies of the Current Occupant now squatting in the White Hut are hounded and cornered, in the sights of a Predator drone wherever they may flee, or subject to arrest and detention by other regimes elsewhere in the world.
If you are going to take a shot at the king, by all means, do not miss. Vengeance is never a pretty thing, and is not subject to the rules of common decency.
Galen appears to agree with Warren Burger, a dissenter in NYT vs. US:
“the imperative of a free and unfettered press comes into collision with another imperative, the effective functioning of a complex modern government”
You know, Warren Burger, that great champion of the Constitution and individual liberty. (/sarc)
He’s right; it’s not some NSA programmer’s job to watchdog unconstitutional activities at our spy agencies. That is a job for our elected representatives. The question is when our elected representatives completely fail are we supposed to just submit gracefully to tyranny?
21 See how the faithful city
has become a prostitute!
She once was full of justice;
righteousness used to dwell in her—
but now murderers!
22 Your silver has become dross,
your choice wine is diluted with water.
23 Your rulers are rebels,
partners with thieves;
they all love bribes
and chase after gifts.
They do not defend the cause of the fatherless;
the widow’s case does not come before them.
Isaiah 1
DING DING DING - WINNER
This is a fake leak. The goal is intimidating the public to prevent opposition to open borders and endless printing of money. Both DC parties are in it together.
Uh...is it me, or is there nothing wrong with either of those two examples? A manager at Starbucks SHOULD put a stop to special favors for customers by employees. And it is a GOOD thing to report the hiring of illegal aliens to ICE.
This is a rediculously short sighted, and dangerous attitude, Rich. One which I fundamentally disagree with.
Our people serving in such posituion take an oath, first and foremost, to "protect and defend the Constitution from all enemies foreign and domestic, and to bear TRUE FAITH AND ALLEGIANCE TO THE SAME."
So, Rich, we actually do hire them to watch out for the constitution.
And thank God we do.
Otherwise you end up with mindless robots who end up giving their allegaince to the leader, and not to the underlying principles. We are dangerously close to that stage now, and attitudes like this almost ensure that we will go over that cliff.
As I see it, as to upholding the oath and ensuring that he did not do things contrary to the constitution, that is precisely what this individual did, he kept his oath to the Constitution and disopbeyed orders he felt violated that oath and told us all about it.
Therefore, in my estimation, it is the people asking him to break THAT OATH who are the traitors. Who are fundamentally violating very specific and clear provisions and amendments to the Constitution because it they think they are smarter and have a higher morality than the people whom they serve.
Kudos to this man for having the strength to stand up to the criminal kabal that has infected our government. God bless and protect him for so doing...and may tens of thousands more stand up and do the same.
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