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.
As I’ve mentioned before this whole show is seen from the wrong perspective...until people at least understand the Global Agenda, and it’s movements, their opinions are at best limited to only seeing the affects and not the real plans in motions.
The Borders will remain opened....and for a time yet be unsecured....later they will “build” but not to keep people out...but control who leaves IMO.
The leak is real, I’m just pointing out how government uses one thing to justify another.
In this case, if we had a secure border and rational immigration policies we wouldn’t need all this domestic spying.
I haven’t heard anything new except an acronym from this guy, PRISM. What new information did this guy release. Did he release any data at all? We knew they were tracking phone calls. Phone company has kept records like this for years. We knew they watched e-mails. The goverment claims they were only tracking calls being made to and from foreign countries. Did he give us any information that they were doing anything else?
“The CIA is spying on people because that’s what we pay them to do.”
Not within CONUS. Title 50 specifically prohibits spying on “US Persons” except in VERY limited circumstances, or within the United States.
This seems more like a schoolyard taunt than a well-reasoned article.
I have my concerns too. The US government, as it appears today, looks horrible to the rest of the world. This is terrible PR.
I have a serious problem that he was in Hong Kong.....
Especially in light of the movements on the World Stage by China now.
The guy simply isn’t important enough....and who really knows what the guy actually knows...he’s not said with any particulars.
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.
My take is that the older you get, the MORE this matters. You gain wisdom and realize why it is important.
Then again, with age comes wisdom. But sometimes age comes alone...
unlikely he was on the take. he was making too much and had a cushy job. his libertarian voting/donating records is a clear indication that he is doing this just for the reasons he has stated. However, as we already see, the media, elites (dems and Rinos) are going to paint him as a chinese spy so they can light of world war three and erase the debt they have dumped on all of us. Don’t fall for it - don’t fall for the elitist lies anymore!
I am in the cattle buisness. We are moving to identify eartags to track cattle from the time it leaves the ranch to the feedlots to the rendering house (slaughter) to the boxed carcasses then on to the end user (the one who eats the cattle). Now, can we improve on this process? It would never sell to put eartags on everyone. But that little microprocessor chip built into that eartage....could we take just that functional part of the eartag and...say....imlant it into everyone. Under Obamacare religious organizations are being forced to pay for abortifacients...they capitulated rather than take to the streets by the millions. It would be just a little implant. It would hardly be physically discernable.
That would streamline the whole process. We would not have to follow the various numbers...just the specific number. It could be run out of the west wing of the white house. It would be cheaper. Not to worry that those numbers might be identified with a justice of the supreme court, or the leadership of the House and Senate. They would never do that....would they?
If I were a lawyer, I would be salivating to take this case.
Everyone must decide for themselves what is legal and ethical. The bottom line is whether or not what the NSA was Constitutional or not. If it was, Snowden will end up spending life behind bars. If it’s not, then he was doing his duty to support, protect and defend the Constitution.
The question is whether or not they will prosecute him. If they do and he can make a prima facia case that the NSA action was unconstitutional, his ability to subpoena evidence will scare the NSA to death. Eric Holder already wants to keep secret a District Court decision declaring some program unconstitutional.
It should be interesting.
Have you seen his W-2?
NSA’s job is to keep track of every FOREIGN transaction, includisg financial originating in the US. Of course the way the Internet routes messages makes the definition of foreign a little blurry at times.
The need is there because the US’s immigration policy itsists on permitting persons from foreign countries that have groups hostile to us to enter this country.
Just wait til Townhall’s personal emails and crap are put out for all to see and there will be a 180 on this so fast your head will spin.
we had all the spy capabilities we needed - and then obama turned them on us, U.S. Citizens, in a massive wave of disgusting attacks. Such a system must be dismantled for there is no “reset button”.
Hey, earth to Rich Galen.
If I see treason, I’m gonna call it out.
Not just quietly quit and let it continue.
I used to work for Stalin doing record keeping of a lot people’s names, addresses and political leanings. He was murdering people by the tens of thousands that were on the lists that I maintained. Made me sick. So I transferred to a different department where I didn’t have to think about it. After enough vodka, I’m fine.
Of course, one couldn’t “speak out” against Stalin. Well, maybe once.
See, Mr. Galen, we’re trying to undo the police state that globalists are turning America into.
Next !
Zing!
<....”unlikely he was on the take. he was making too much and had a cushy job”....>
The guy was one of the new World Citizens....and he may very well have been offered considerable more than the he had.
He’s had International Correspondence since he was a kid....chatting with people around the world. So this guy could go anywhere and be comfortable.
I don’t see him as a spy...hardly so...rather an opportunist.
I guarantee you every single person currently defending the NSA's misdeeds is also a staunch supporter of "comprehensive immigration reform".
In the middle of all of this, all of our Constitutional protections, those checks that balance, are being or have been removed.
We have lost control of our elections, border, currency, treasure and almost all of our media are little more than mouth pieces for approved speech only.
But, Mr. Galen, in the face of that, we are to believe this guy is a traitor? To what? In the face of the obvious, dude, how much longer before we are all traitors?
Rich, you might want to adjust that Mark of the Beast you're wearing? It's a little crooked.
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