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Edward Snowden as the Symbol of Resistance to All-Powerful National Security State

News Corporatism Recommended Links Neoliberalism as a New Form of Corporatism Social Sites as intelligence collection tools American Exceptionalism
Nation under attack meme Predator state The Grand Chessboard Disaster capitalism Neocolonialism as Financial Imperialism The Tea Party
NSA Revelations Fallou British hypocrisy Media-Military-Industrial Complex Corporate Media: Journalism In the Service of the Powerful Few The Real War on Reality Manifactured consent
Totalitarian Decisionism & Human Rights: The Re-emergence of Nazi Law Neo-fashism National Socialism and Military Keysianism Damage to the US tech companies Humor Etc

While Snowden became a symbol of resistance to the total surveillance regime, after his Joe Rogan interview there are serious doubt about his authenticity.

First of all he comes out a  clear narcissistic person. I, me, myself.  He speaks more like a well trained journalist and for security specialist he talks way too much promoting his book. Also it looks like he was just  a Microsoft certified engender, he does not have certification in networking like Cisco, or Linux like Red Hat.  So doubt increase after that interview as for how he managed to collect information undetected.

Emergence of new  technologies after WWII reacted to the possibility of having powerful intelligence agencies by creating such agencies. When Truman when when the  train of total surveillance start rolling. It did not happened on 9/11.  All envelopes of a regular mail was at  least photographed and mail what toes to foreign countries probably selectively intercepted.

Switch to electronic communication put this process in overdrive.

The key issue is that the US elite willingly speed up the conversion of the USA into full blown national security state. 

His meteoric rise in CIA and later in NSA also raises several questions. How typical is for a former security guard at Maryland University NSA security facility was promoted to the level of diplomatic attaché in Switzerland?

The other suspicious thing about Snowden is his openly hostile attitude toward Russia.  The country which actually saved him from a long jail sentence.

Yet another very strange thing is his interpretation of 9/11 events. That might be CIA/NSA brainwashing, but still thinking man can't interpret 9/11 the way Snowden did.  What he did right is that 0/11 was a pretext to convert the USA into national security state. Everything else is in his views on 9/11 highly questionable.

In short he is not Manning, who risked everything, delivered material to WikiLeaks, where they were published and face the full rage on the national security state as the result.

Still be became  the symbol of resistance to the total surveillance regime and this was a positive development.

27 Edward Snowden Quotes About US Government Spying

27 Edward Snowden Quotes About U.S. Government Spying That Should Send A Chill Up Your Spine by Michael Snyder

06/11/2013 | Zero Hedge

Submitted by Michael Snyder via The Economic Collapse blog,

Would you be willing to give up what Edward Snowden has given up? He has given up his high paying job, his home, his girlfriend, his family, his future and his freedom just to expose the monolithic spy machinery that the U.S. government has been secretly building to the world. He says that he does not want to live in a world where there isn't any privacy. He says that he does not want to live in a world where everything that he says and does is recorded. Thanks to Snowden, we now know that the U.S. government has been spying on us to a degree that most people would have never even dared to imagine.

Up until now, the general public has known very little about the U.S. government spy grid that knows almost everything about us. But making this information public is going to cost Edward Snowden everything. Essentially, his previous life is now totally over. And if the U.S. government gets their hands on him, he will be very fortunate if he only has to spend the next several decades rotting in some horrible prison somewhere.

There is a reason why government whistleblowers are so rare. And most Americans are so apathetic that they wouldn't even give up watching their favorite television show for a single evening to do something good for society. Most Americans never even try to make a difference because they do not believe that it will benefit them personally. Meanwhile, our society continues to fall apart all around us. Hopefully the great sacrifice that Edward Snowden has made will not be in vain. Hopefully people will carefully consider what he has tried to share with the world.

The following are 27 quotes from Edward Snowden about U.S. government spying that should send a chill up your spine...

Would you make the same choice that Edward Snowden made? Most Americans would not. One CNN reporter says that he really admires Snowden because he has tried to get insiders to come forward with details about government spying for years, but none of them were ever willing to...

As a digital technology writer, I have had more than one former student and colleague tell me about digital switchers they have serviced through which calls and data are diverted to government servers or the big data algorithms they've written to be used on our e-mails by intelligence agencies. I always begged them to write about it or to let me do so while protecting their identities. They refused to come forward and believed my efforts to shield them would be futile. "I don't want to lose my security clearance. Or my freedom," one told me.

And if the U.S. government has anything to say about it, Snowden is most definitely going to pay for what he has done. In fact, according to the Daily Beast, a directorate known as "the Q Group" is already hunting Snowden down...

The people who began chasing Snowden work for the Associate Directorate for Security and Counterintelligence, according to former U.S. intelligence officers who spoke on condition of anonymity. The directorate, sometimes known as “the Q Group,” is continuing to track Snowden now that he’s outed himself as The Guardian’s source, according to the intelligence officers.

If Snowden is not already under the protection of some foreign government (such as China), it will just be a matter of time before U.S. government agents get him.

And how will they treat him once they find him? Well, one reporter overheard a group of U.S. intelligence officials talking about how Edward Snowden should be "disappeared". The following is from a Daily Mail article that was posted on Monday...

A group of intelligence officials were overheard yesterday discussing how the National Security Agency worker who leaked sensitive documents to a reporter last week should be 'disappeared.'

Foreign policy analyst and editor at large of The Atlantic, Steve Clemons, tweeted about the 'disturbing' conversation after listening in to four men who were sitting near him as he waited for a flight at Washington's Dulles airport.

'In Dulles UAL lounge listening to 4 US intel officials saying loudly leaker & reporter on #NSA stuff should be disappeared recorded a bit,' he tweeted at 8:42 a.m. on Saturday.

According to Clemons, the men had been attending an event hosted by the Intelligence and National Security Alliance.

As an American, I am deeply disturbed that the U.S. government is embarrassing itself in front of the rest of the world like this.

The fact that we are collecting trillions of pieces of information on people all over the planet is a massive embarrassment and the fact that our politicians are defending this practice now that it has been exposed is a massive embarrassment.

If the U.S. government continues to act like a Big Brother police state, then the rest of the world will eventually conclude that is exactly what we are. At that point we become the "bad guy" and we lose all credibility with the rest of the planet.


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"I don't want to live in a world where everything I say, everything I do, everyone I talk to, every expression of creativity and love or friendship is recorded."

~Edward Snowden

[Sep 06, 2020] Court Rules Against NSA And It s Metadata Collection Activity. by J

Sep 06, 2020 | turcopolier.typepad.com

Will we ever return to a time when USSID 18 was adhered to by NSA? Sadly, our politicians or those who quest for power and stroke won't let U.S. go back to that time of protections for all Americans.

9th Circuit Court of Appeals found the activity regarding NSA and its metadata collections, illegal.

https://www.rt.com/usa/499742-nsa-spying-illegal-snowden/

https://www.politico.com/f/?id=00000174-4f61-de4a-ad7d-ffeff5e80000

J.


Jack , 03 September 2020 at 07:23 PM

Rep. Matt Gaetz calling for the pardon of Snowden.

https://twitter.com/repmattgaetz/status/1301655722606891013?s=21

Jack , 05 September 2020 at 11:49 PM

Tulsi Gabbard calling for the pardon of Snowden.

https://twitter.com/tulsigabbard/status/1302451757369368576?s=21

Snowden should be pardoned.

He was a whistleblower who exposed an illegal unconstitutional mass surveillance program run by the NSA. And he was punished for doing so.

[Jan 02, 2020] Joe Rogan Experience #1368 - Edward Snowden

A very disappointing interview. I person that has no doubts about 9/11 doers not reserve our respect. He also might be a fake defector much like Oswald was. As simple as that. Snowden version of history is deeply wrong. He actually talk as a second rate journalist, not as a security specialist. If he thinks that bashing Russia and Putin will save him from being framed as a Russian agent, he is an idiot. It he things that 9/11 official story holds and can't be questioned he is iether a naive idiot or a Deep State stooge.
And repeating banalities about security risks in modern society do not bring you too far iether. That a very short summary of this two and a half hour narcissistic monolog, which for some reason is called interview.
In his interview Snowden mainly repeat things that became banalities and that you can learn for any other book on total surveillance.
What if this was yet another false flag operation? It looks like he was just certified Microsoft engineer, he was not Unix guy.
He views 9/11 disqualify his from providing the explanation of how the USA was converted into national security state.
His view of Putin are probably result of indoctrination in CIA and NSA, but that also means that he is not a deep thinker. Also it is strange after spending in the country several years and did not lean more about Russia and did not even try to learn the language.
BTW while his escape from the USA and attempt to provide materials did managed to focus attention of the public on total severance regime, almost nothing of Snowden materials were published. Almost everything died in the hand of selected journalists... Guardian published small fragments of one PRISM document. That's it. He is no Manning.
Snowden puts too much efforts in trying to justify his actions and at the end that became annoying and suspicious in its own right.
Notable quotes:
"... "patriotism isn't about the loyalty to government. Patriotism isn't a loyalty to anything. Patriotism is constant effort to do good for the people of your country" ..."
"... "I'd be working on umm economic takeover of Guatemala for example" Lol CIA's bread and butter ..."
"... While I'm not saying Snowden is wrong, it's important to realize that this is "his side of the story." ..."
"... Honestly don't know how so many can be shocked by these claims. Did you really think that your government sweetheart is trying to protect you? They collectively have an agenda to keep people asleep. ..."
"... Snowden is a D.S. Cutout. Period. Disinfo Personified. He didn't get out of Hong Kong W/O HELP ..."
"... Is anybody else kinda thrown off by how condescending and patronizing Snowden is towards Joe? ..."
"... I can't believe NSA and CIA hired someone that talks that much... ..."
"... So every politician I disagree with is a dictator or fascist. Seems someone hasn't learned much ..."
"... It was the Russian government that took him in, the alternative would be rotting in a dark off shore CIA prison. I would not bite the hand that saved me. Snowden is a good guy but i think he needs to learn gratitude. ..."
"... If this video is trending, this mean Snowden is a puppet to the NWO. NO WAY THEY WILL ALLOW A VIDEO LIKE THIS TO EVER TREND IN YOUTUBE OR ANY WHERE. ..."
"... there were numerous people warned not to fly/go to wtc on 911. Willie Brown, Salmon Rushdie, Israeli citizens, apparently the French knew as well... But Snowden says they didn't know ..."
"... With all do respect to snowden , 9 11 was an inside job The whole event was controlled. Controlled demolition , controlled airlines to launch them in to the towers. All orchestrated by elements of the CIA , FBI , and NSA ..."
Oct 25, 2019 | www.youtube.com

PDX LockPicker , 2 hours ago

"patriotism isn't about the loyalty to government. Patriotism isn't a loyalty to anything. Patriotism is constant effort to do good for the people of your country"

Forrest LeMay , 2 hours ago (edited)

"People talk about the deep state like it's a conspiracy theory of lizard people, it's not, its something much simpler, the deep state is the career government." - Edward Snowden

Free Ryder , 3 hours ago

"I'd be working on umm economic takeover of Guatemala for example" Lol CIA's bread and butter

Fuzzy Gaming , 2 hours ago

1:57:00 Snowden talks about how the Intelligence agencies can stonewall you and sabotage your presidency... Exactly what President Trump has been saying for years.

Khonh lo , 2 hours ago div class=

What I really got out of this episode is realization that companies and the government can now track where I have been on a particular date at a particular time forever. Its crazy what a time we live in.

Imagine kids born in 2006 or so until they expire. They government or companies can pull up data of their entire life timeline at any point in their lives. Example where were they on 2/15/2010 at 2:15 PM.

Someone born in 1965 can only recall memories of their pass experiences that only they know or the people around can remember whereas now days and beyond, they can pull that information out depending on how specific the query you want to obtain. This is not including all the other data such as relationship they have had, where they had lived, where they had eaten, what they had buy, etc...

postedhere9 , 1 hour ago

Pelosi's involvement in the impeachment sounds oddly familiar to her involvement in this scandal... hmm

Rasikh Ali , 3 hours ago

Mainstream media is only focusing on the alien comment. Scum of the earth.. smh 🤦🏽‍♂️

Mar Z , 1 hour ago

38:00 . CIA and FBI competing for clout . I'm sorry I know this is serious but just imagined them as annoying social media acc trying to get the most likes. But seriously, thanks Joe, you let your guest talk and it was so incredibly insightful!!

Christopher Mulvey , 1 hour ago

When this Edward Snowden thing first happened, the first thing I thought was wow this is a very very smart man but not smart enough to realize how stupid people are and how powerful mainstream media is when it comes to the general public's perception.

The general public doesn't realize that the mainstream news has nowhere near 5million views in 3 days but if it's not talked about on main stream news for a week or if the president does not acknowledge something then it does not exist. That's the truth.

M Somogyi , 2 hours ago

Snowden tries to advertise his book the whole time Rogan asks him a simple question.. Okay, I get it you go into details in the book... Just answer the question. "Oh yeah, let me give you a fast version....". 1 hr later - He still hasn't answered.

Joe Rogan is one patient ass man. Thanks for having such interesting and awesome content on your podcast! :)

Flash Harry , 4 hours ago

"> My obsevation is that if I was in charge of keeping our "They Live" clandestine alien government's secret, then I wouldn't allow that information wrote down on paper in a room with a computer even in it , let alone have it in a computer document.

Not many people should even be aware of the information and When they are they stick to analogue pens and paper other than when they are reverse engineering anything, When specialist use hardware/software it is in TOTAL contained environment .

And that dudes is how ya keeps a secret . Oh and the moon he is wrong with that and you can use the same reasoning, what did they do for example with all of the film tape recordings of all the footage of Apollo landing. Yes they taped over it, all of it. If you have ever seen moon landing footage it's a recording of a recording to hide multitudes of oversights. x

Wowbagger , 3 hours ago (edited)

09:45 Sounds more like escalating the surveillance of the general population was the main goal from the start. A slow subversion made palatable by a perceived threat.

JC Stuart , 1 day ago

"when we become fearful we become vulnerable, to anyone who promises to make things better, even if they will actively make things worse."

Tim Leniston , 2 hours ago

We need to stand up to this somehow. Just think of the chilling effect on anyone who might want to do a public service but fears exposure of some detail in their private life or their explorations or communications which could be used to silence or embarrass them. Bastards!

HyperActive7 , 3 hours ago

I can barely keep my eyes open with Snowden. You'd think to yourself, how come such a sleepy personality individual be so dangerous to the government elite?

Well, the proof is in what he's saying and it is the truth that 9/11 was a mass conspiracy aimed to change America and ruin The Will of The American people. I was his age when all this crap went down and I believed all of it like he and many of my generation did because we didn't have the Alex Jones of the world waking us up to this sick reality which is our government is treasonous against its own people.

Stacy Starnes , 3 hours ago

I guess that what Schumer meant when he said that the intelligence community has a million and one ways to get you. "Drain the swamp".

Benjamin Wright , 1 day ago

"The FBI has joined the chat"

GoogleSearch TheEsseneGospelOfPeace.#JesusGang , 1 day ago

Joe: Google searching "free proxy servers" before this interview

Reegan O'Hara , 4 hours ago

He was given the same speech training as Obama. Same cadence, same pauses, same use of "uhh", "right" and "Look...". The repeating of certain words quickly before finishing the main point is particularly noticeable, i.e. "th- the.." "th- that", "whe- when..."

Destinyxos , 4 hours ago

I feel like lack of communication is so the reason for a lot occupational struggles as well as in the government structures. It makes me sad to see that sharing and informing is just so hard for some people. And that negative energy rubs of on everyone else and I feel like it's a huge spiraling butterfly affect.

But I'm glad to see someone talking about the issues with our society so intensely and so carefully and so factually and I honestly love it. I feel included because of this video and for that, I am great full!

m1force , 1 hour ago

While I'm not saying Snowden is wrong, it's important to realize that this is "his side of the story." This is why fair trials are important.. He complains about the D.C. circuit and perhaps for good reason; I say fine, bring him to the 8th circuit and let's put all the cards on the table.

chilakil , 1 hour ago

I completely believe after following Rogan for a couple of Months that joe is complete controlled opposition

FatalFinality , 1 day ago

Well, this is definitely one of those mornings when being unemployed is convenient.

Tom Hol , 2 hours ago

Honestly don't know how so many can be shocked by these claims. Did you really think that your government sweetheart is trying to protect you? They collectively have an agenda to keep people asleep.

To keep them in their routines so that they don't ask questions. Also throw them a bone every now and then so that they feel as if they are getting rewarded while we extort them, spy on them and use them and then throw them away.

Raul Montes , 4 hours ago

This was longest plug for a book ever...

ck black , 33 minutes ago

Snowden is a D.S. Cutout. Period. Disinfo Personified. He didn't get out of Hong Kong W/O HELP This is pure Agregis B.S.

Mar Z , 35 minutes ago

"The public is not partnered with government. The public does not hold the leash to government. We are subject to them. Subordinate to government" " National security does not equal to public safety. National security is the safety of the state"

Guillermo Baltazar , 3 hours ago

44:20 he kinda dis Obama

Nicco Sanchez , 1 hour ago

Is anybody else kinda thrown off by how condescending and patronizing Snowden is towards Joe? He seems to be throwing low key shade/jabs about his preconceived notions about Joe based off his avatar.

I mean he could have spoken on his initial impression as a little anecdotal segway into how this interview came to fruition, but he seems arrogant to me. Like he feels the average layman is beneath him or of lessor intellectualism. Great interview nonetheless, but I just think Snowden comes off a little uppity (for lack of a better term)😒

Erma4ella Eu , 5 minutes ago

It wasn't Joe Rogan's podcast. It was a Snowden's podcast

Jakob , 1 day ago

Snowden made a "FBI has joined the chat" meme hahahaah

Carlo Anardu , 1 day ago

I can't believe NSA and CIA hired someone that talks that much...

Scott what , 2 hours ago

So every politician I disagree with is a dictator or fascist. Seems someone hasn't learned much

John B , 4 hours ago

It was the Russian government that took him in, the alternative would be rotting in a dark off shore CIA prison. I would not bite the hand that saved me. Snowden is a good guy but i think he needs to learn gratitude.

Scarack Truther , 4 hours ago

If this video is trending, this mean Snowden is a puppet to the NWO. NO WAY THEY WILL ALLOW A VIDEO LIKE THIS TO EVER TREND IN YOUTUBE OR ANY WHERE.

Szimba Zsununnu , 5 hours ago

Ed, you made one mistake: Americans are not "afraid"! US citizens did NOT vote for DT out of fear. They voted out of CONCERN. The average American? Goes to McD's once a month (they're lovin' it), buys their daughter an ice cream at Dairy Queen (or equivalent ice cream place in town), anticipates when is the most convenient day to schedule an oil change, etc. "Fear", "scared", "fearmonger"?

These are nonsensical words the other side likes to spew. Americans are c-o-n-c-e-r-n-e-d about their country. The British (and I speak on behalf of all Americans, British, and so forth - thank you, thank you) opted out of the EU because of CONCERN for their future. Not fear. You're a smart guy Ed, and this interview is very telling, (and we the people think you're gonna get your ass assassinated for speaking so freely like this), and although I only had the patience to sit through the first hour, this is a good video, and a memorable interview.

But just understand -- aside from North Koreans and maybe a Syrian here and there, citizens are not afraid. We are instead courageous. We CARE about the now. We care about the future. We support those that care as well. We're concerned, kiddo. Not fearful. Boris, Donald, Orban, that green-faced Putin opponent Alexei Navalny guy, Nigel, Milo, Geert, PJW, Brigitte Bardot, August Sabbe, Romas Kalanta, Joan of Arc (and countless others) - at risk of their safety / public standing / status quo / whatever - CARE.

Those are the leaders (ASS KICKERS) that we support and vote for. We are members of the human race. We are not afraid.

Grasshopper , 4 hours ago

#1 if people didn't realize this was going on before 2013, then I don't know where your brain was. #2 this guy may correct, but he's an opportunist.

He's spent a lot of time putting this story together. How can he say there are no bodies laying around when Obama was sending up drones that fired missles at cell phones? I worked in the telecom industry starting in the 90s... I was tracking calls on 9/11. I knew who was calling who, and the FBI didn't ask permission to see where the calls were going or coming from.

Z.A.C. , 1 day ago (edited)

He's had John McAfee, Rhonda Patrick, Mike Tyson, Graham Hancock, Neil Degrasse Tyson, Lance Armstrong, Sam Harris, Richard Dawkins, Jay Leno, Anthony Bourdain, David Goggins, Ron White, Jordan Peterson, Everlast, Immortal Technique, Bernie Sanders, Ben Shapiro, George St.Pierre, Elon Musk, Alex Jones, and now Edward Snowden. Just to name a few.

Reuben Handel , 4 hours ago (edited)

But there were numerous people warned not to fly/go to wtc on 911. Willie Brown, Salmon Rushdie, Israeli citizens, apparently the French knew as well... But Snowden says they didn't know

Trey Wilson , 1 minute ago div cl

"Give me one good reason the government would have committed 9/11." - steel beams don't melt jet fuel, also watch this podcast and you'll wish you still lived in the matrix

Invincible Osprey , 4 hours ago

Ed Snowden is creepily still playing his role for the same people behind 9/11 and other False Flags...

J. Copache , 34 minutes ago (edited)

Right now, Chile, my home country, is going through a very difficult and delicate process of civil unrest that has been met with relentless repression at the hands of a government that works in favor of private interests and has been confirmed to commit several and systematic human rights violations, including torture, murder, rape, state terrorism, and the list goes on. Listening to this podcast right now really puts in perspective the extent to wich a State can manipulate, hide and forge information in order to limit civil rights with the excuse of protecting the people.

We NEED guys like Snowden to come forth and show governments around the world that any measures taken to protect order and national interests should always be second to the well-being, civil and human rights of the people that constitute the very foundation of what a country is.

People from the US are lucky to have true patriots like Snowden, willing to go against the rotten systems so deeply ingrained in their institutional complexes in order to uphold the ideals that gave birth to their country in the first place. We need help, and we need clarity. If y'all can, please get informed and divulge what you learn about our situation right now. Get people talking and get people acting.

No government that - literally- fires against its people should be left unchecked. Information is a tool, the greatest one we've got in this day and age, and we the people are more capable than ever of using it in our advantage.

Alek Kelly , 22 minutes ago

At 14:15 , he says he went to journalists with the information and gave them conditions on how that information could be published. Was this a trust or legal based transaction? If it was trust, would Snowden still be as confident in doing it that way in today's media climate?

Joseph Edward , 5 hours ago (edited)

34:50 . Our founding fathers are turning in their graves.

Brian Houck , 6 hours ago

So James Clapper just straight-up lied to Congress under oath and there were no repercussions, yet they did their best to hunt down Ed Snowden and treat him like a dirty dog? What is wrong with this picture? Besides everything, I mean.

Joseph Edward , 6 hours ago

Around 30:00 Snowden said that the highest members of our government have the lowest loyalty. (The ones at the top are the ones selling us out.)

therealjoelsalazar , 6 hours ago

The scary thing is, is that while Snowden is telling us what happened in the past, the government is actively abusing powers while looking for new ways to violate our rights. We need to really look at ourselves as citizens and make sure the people we vote for are actually serving the public no matter what party or tak they're on.

words wpns , 7 hours ago

With all do respect to snowden , 9 11 was an inside job The whole event was controlled. Controlled demolition , controlled airlines to launch them in to the towers. All orchestrated by elements of the CIA , FBI , and NSA

[Nov 26, 2019] The problem with the loyalty of government employees in the state that strive to dominate the world

Notable quotes:
"... America was feared by many intellectuals, both in the United States and Britain of the 1940s and 1950s, and their fears were not unwarranted. ..."
"... Big, brawny America – its power establishment – very much was inclined towards dominating the world after WWII. The whole tone of the American press and speeches of major political figures in the period was actually quite frightening. Any highly intelligent, sensitive type would be concerned by it. ..."
"... America wanted a monopoly on nuclear weapons, so that it would be in an unassailable position as it built its imperial apparatus after WWII, the time effectively it "took over" as world imperial power with so many potential competitors flattened. ..."
"... Later, the Pentagon actually planned things like an all-out first strike on the Soviets – it did that more once as well as doing so later for China – so there were indeed plenty of dark intentions in Washington. ..."
"... Spies and ex-spies often put disinformation into their books. Sometimes officials even insist they do so. ..."
Nov 26, 2019 | www.unz.com

Comments below are from Was Robert Oppenheimer a Soviet Agent, by John Wear - The Unz Review


JOHN CHUCKMAN , says: Website November 25, 2019 at 8:59 am GMT

The motives for so many Western spies serving the Soviet Union – and in the 1940s and 1950s the Soviets had the best "humint" on earth – were rather idealistic. This was largely true for the Cambridge Circle in Britain. They were concerned that America was going to "lord it over" the Russians and everyone else.

America was feared by many intellectuals, both in the United States and Britain of the 1940s and 1950s, and their fears were not unwarranted.

Big, brawny America – its power establishment – very much was inclined towards dominating the world after WWII. The whole tone of the American press and speeches of major political figures in the period was actually quite frightening. Any highly intelligent, sensitive type would be concerned by it.

You certainly did not have to be a communist to feel that way, but being one assisted with access to important Soviet contacts. They sought you out.

America wanted a monopoly on nuclear weapons, so that it would be in an unassailable position as it built its imperial apparatus after WWII, the time effectively it "took over" as world imperial power with so many potential competitors flattened.

It made little secret of its desire to keep such a monopoly, so brilliant people like Oppenheimer would be well aware of something they might well regard as ominous.

Later, the Pentagon actually planned things like an all-out first strike on the Soviets – it did that more once as well as doing so later for China – so there were indeed plenty of dark intentions in Washington.

A hugely important general like MacArthur was unblinkingly ready in 1950 to use atomic weapons in the Korean War to destroy North Korea's connections with China.

I read several major biographies of Oppenheimer, and there is little to nothing concerning Soviet intelligence work. When I came across the Sudoplatov book with its straightforward declaration of Oppenheimer's assistance, it was difficult to know how to weigh the claim.

Spies and ex-spies often put disinformation into their books. Sometimes officials even insist they do so.

Judging by what is suggested here, if Oppenheimer did help, it was in subtle ways like letting Klaus Fuchs, a fellow scientist and a rather distinguished one (but a Soviet spy), look at certain papers. But the scientific community always has some considerable tendency to share information, a tendency having nothing to do with spying.

In general, it should be understood, that Oppenheimer, despite all his brilliance, was a rather disturbed man all his life. Quite early on, as just one example, he attempted to poison someone he did not like. Only pure luck prevented the man's eating a lethally-laced apple. There were other disturbing behaviors too.

He was subject to severe emotional breakdowns.

SolontoCroesus , says: November 25, 2019 at 12:10 pm GMT

"the[y] . . . saw themselves as a new breed of superstatesmen whose mandate transcended national boundaries"

Like Vindman

another anon , says: November 25, 2019 at 12:20 pm GMT

Later they believed that equality of superpower status for the Soviet Union would contribute to world peace.

How dumb were these "scientists". Everyone knows that once Soviet Union fell, peace and freedom and democracy are flowering all over the world and United States are not waging any wars anymore.

[Oct 27, 2019] Edward Snowden And Turnkey Tyranny

Oct 27, 2019 | www.zerohedge.com

My intent here is not to summarize Snowden's entire interview. I want to focus on some points he made that I found especially revealing, pertinent, and insightful.

Without further ado, here are 12 points I took from this interview:

1. People who reach the highest levels of government do so by being risk-averse. Their goal is never to screw-up in a major way. This mentality breeds cautiousness, mediocrity, and buck-passing. (I saw the same in my 20 years in the U.S. military.)

2. The American people are no longer partners of government. We are subjects. Our rights are routinely violated even as we become accustomed (or largely oblivious) to a form of turnkey tyranny.

3. Intelligence agencies in the U.S. used 9/11 to enlarge their power. They argued that 9/11 happened because there were "too many restrictions" on them. This led to the PATRIOT Act and unconstitutional global mass surveillance, disguised as the price of being kept "safe" from terrorism. Simultaneously, America's 17 intelligence agencies wanted most of all not to be blamed for 9/11. They wanted to ensure the buck stopped nowhere. This was a goal they achieved.

4. Every persuasive lie has a kernel of truth. Terrorism does exist - that's the kernel of truth. Illegal mass surveillance, facilitated by nearly unlimited government power, in the cause of "keeping us safe" is the persuasive lie.

5. The government uses classification ("Top Secret" and so on) primarily to hide things from the American people, who have no "need to know" in the view of government officials. Secrecy becomes a cloak for illegality. Government becomes unaccountable; the people don't know, therefore we are powerless to rein in government excesses or to prosecute for abuses of power.

6. Fear is the mind-killer (my expression here, quoting Frank Herbert's Dune ). Snowden spoke much about the use of fear by the government, using expressions like "they'll be blood on your hands" and "think of the children." Fear is the way to cloud people's minds. As Snowden put it, you lose the ability to act because you are afraid.

7. What is true patriotism? For Snowden, it's about a constant effort to do good for the people. It's not loyalty to government. Loyalty, Snowden notes, is only good in the service of something good.

8. National security and public safety are not synonymous. In fact, in the name of national security, our rights are being violated. We are "sweeping up the broken glass of our lost rights" in today's world of global mass surveillance, Snowden noted.

9. We live naked before power. Companies like Facebook and Google, together with the U.S. government, know everything about us; we know little about them. It's supposed to be the reverse (at least in a democracy).

10. "The system is built on lies." James Clapper, the director of national intelligence, lies under oath before Congress. And there are no consequences. He goes unpunished.

11. We own less and less of our own data. Data increasingly belongs to corporations and the government. It's become a commodity. Which means we are the commodity. We are being exploited and manipulated, we are being sold, and it's all legal, because the powerful make the policies and the laws, and they are unaccountable to the people.

12. Don't wait for a hero to save you. What matters is heroic decisions. You are never more than one decision away from making the world a better place.

In 2013, Edward Snowden made a heroic decision to reveal illegal mass surveillance by the U.S. government, among other governmental crimes. He has made the world a better place, but as he himself knows, the fight has only just begun against turnkey tyranny.


ohm , 14 minutes ago link

Governments using fear for control is nothing new.

The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.

H. L. Mencken

Ruler , 2 minutes ago link

People under stress spend money. Mostly on low cost frivolous things that have no return.

That's why doom **** and yellow journalism exist.

Gobble D. Goop , 14 minutes ago link

Sorry folks. In time you will see that Snowden was, is, and always will be CIA (black hat). The whistle blowing was a CIA attempt to shut down the NSA (white hat) leaving no one to watch over the black hats whilst they conduct thier drug running and regime changing, and MK ultra operations. Ask Kennedy. Oh wait CIA and daddy Bush blew his head off.

Youri Carma , 47 minutes ago link

Joe Rogan Experience – Edward Snowden
Oct 23, 2019 PowerfulJRE
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=efs3QRr8LWw

Wild Bill Steamcock , 56 minutes ago link

Snowden, in my opinion, is a limited hangout. Not necessarily aware of it, he could just be a convenient dupe.

If there's this much surveillance, how in the Hell did he exfiltrate that much data AND be able to leave the country? Why did it take so long to track him down and revoke his passport? It makes no sense. Why didn't he go to Wikileaks, who has a proven and reliable track record but instead went to MSM?

I think he is probably genuine in his beliefs, but still see him as a limited hangout.

He has made the world a better place

How? Uncle Scam still has all it's capabilities. That big *** data center in Utah. Nothing's changed except we were told about it- again. Remember Drake, Wiebe and Binney spilled the beans in 2004.

Wild Bill Steamcock , 51 minutes ago link

And even then it wasn't new or surprising. ECHELON and the five eyes was talked about in the '70s

Wild Bill Steamcock , 49 minutes ago link

And how does a guy go from CIA janitor to effectively an NSA systems admin? Seriously, not to **** on janitors, but how in the actual **** does that happen?

freedogger , 36 minutes ago link

All your questions are answered in his book. Wkileaks wasn't an option because they release en masse without any vetting. He didn't want people to die from release of some of the docs he had.

AlexanderHistoryX , 24 minutes ago link

They are just now getting to the point where they have the tech to effectively sort and search through all that data. Plus. He tapped it from the source.

The real shame is how little resulted from the exposure. Nothing changed, no one was held to account, and we the people did nothing. We are a nation of contented slaves, for now.

Sam Spayed , 1 hour ago link

"Intelligence agencies in the U.S. used 9/11 to enlarge their power. "

And their power was supposed to be limited to foreign actors. The skinny, jug-eared, gay guy and his acolytes thought up sinister illegal ways to extend that power to private US citizens and the gay guy's political enemies.

One-Hung-Lo , 1 hour ago link

Most of these problems were predicted centuries ago when the founders feared a standing army that could be turned against the people. Now we have standing armies, and civilian paramilitaries in every county and big city, local cops, city cops, state police. We have ATF, FBI, CIA, NSA, IRS, and dozens of other armed alphabet soup agencies.

With We THE People are gonna regain our country again and many people will die again, and with luck all the traitors will hang by the neck until dead.

The elites who think it is their birthright to lord over us need to be reminded that they serve us. All the communist democrats are in need of reminders and quick drop at the end of a rope.

ToSoft4Truth , 56 minutes ago link

You mention a lot of people. Some of them must be sitting across from us at Thanksgiving dinner.

Scipio Africanuz , 1 hour ago link

It's heartening to know Snowden is a martial alumni..

And speaking of tyranny, we came across a gem, a most enlightening gem thus..

"If you take me down, I'll come after you with everything I've got It will become my life's mission."

"These are the words of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to newspaper publisher Arnon Mozes in a recording that has become central evidence in a corruption case against Netanyahu, as revealed Saturday by Channel 13 journalist Raviv Drucker.."

So why have we brought this to your attention?

So you may understand that Liberty is not for the lily livered. If Jefferson and Co had been squeamish, Americans would still be serfs..

If MLK had been squeamish, negros would not be free today, to be in position to advocate for rights..

And if Cesar Chavez had adopted cowardice, then Latinos would have no mojo to advocate..

And if Hugo Chavez had not given his life to Venezuela, it's doubtful that Maduro would have had a leg to stand on..

And yet, Lula is imprisoned..just like Nelson Mandela, for the best years of his life..

My friends, mortality eventually ends, that's a certainty..what you do with yours, is consequential, for good or ill..

When the depraved hurl threats, it means they're afraid, and in that event, increase the artillery barrage of truth..cheers...

Edited:

Here's the link to the quote..

https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/.premium-netanyahu-recordings-revealed-i-ll-come-after-you-with-everything-i-ve-got-1.8029010

abgary1 , 1 hour ago link

The digital world has become disturbingly invasive and the source of the data the governments uses against us.

Abstain.

Get off of social media, limit net time, encrypt communications, leave our mobile devices at home and use cash.

Anything that leaves a digital footprint is being tracked.

The loss of our privacy is the loss of our freedom.

To return democracy to the people we need to do the following:

-Term limits of 8 years at any one level of government for the politicians, diplomats, bureaucrats and senior civil servants. If our legislators know they will spend the majority of their working lives in the private sector they will not pass laws that solely benefit the public sector.

-Recall legislation to hold our legislators accountable.

-Balance budget laws that require referendums to amend or repeal.

-Zero tax increase laws that require referendums to amend or repeal.

We need to return democracy to the people and we do that by demanding change at the grassroots levels.

elitist99percenter , 1 hour ago link

These days , The Shang Dynasty's moral decay quickly comes to mind, as outlined in The Art of War : lies, deceit and diffusion were the norm; unaccountable leaders immersed themselves in debauchery, orgies and lavish self-profiting (today's Epsteinism in full-swing); brutally-enforced high taxes & wage thefts levied on citizens; government's increased violence against state residents, particularly those brave enough to resist widespread tyranny; escalated harmful interference in the country's agricultural operations; and knee-jerked, violent responses with heavy-handed, inhuman punishments (like SWAT teams blowing away innocents -- women & children -- over minor, inconsequential infractions), especially violation of peoples' guaranteed civil liberties, as well as their sovereign dignities and property rights, under the guise of ridiculously concocted "boogeymen" nonsense.

Hmm, sounds familiar.

Lumberjack , 1 hour ago link

During the Rogan interview, Snowden said that all the corrupt creatures live in the suburbs within a 200 mile radius of DC. Just sayin...

Wolfbay , 37 minutes ago link

It's also interesting that this area has more millionaires per capita than anywhere else in America. It's not a high tech area, no manufacturing, and no big agriculture. Sucking the tit of our taxes.

Arising , 1 hour ago link

Snowden must be a ZHer.

All his points are pretty basic stuff for me and a large portion of the people here.

I learned very early in life, and I teach my kids today that Govt, Banks and Media are not, have never and will never be your friends.

If you understand this at an early age everything else becomes much less cloudy in life.

[Oct 24, 2019] Snowden behaviour toward Russia is highly suspecious: The Russian government has saved his bacon and has given him refuge with great freedoms he would not have in the USA -- or Airstrip One ... or, HK, or any South American backyard colony. And yet he makes no attempt to thank them and even virtually panders to the American anti-Russian meme

Is/was he a plant like Oswald in the past?
Notable quotes:
"... The main take away for me came towards the end where Snowden outlines the special legal conditions and laws that the US government enforces to control presentation of evidence in these cases. These same 'servant' thugs who are stepping into the now 3rd-world UK court system and pulling the strings on Australia's Assange. The same crew that Snowden worked with and blew the whistle on (apparently). ..."
"... Snowden makes great bravado about being willing to go back to the USA and face the music -- if only he could say in court why he did it (something the legal Act prohibits apparently). In this, and a few other matters of history, I find him less than genuine. Is/was he a plant? .... I'm still out with the jury on that. ..."
Oct 24, 2019 | www.moonofalabama.org

imo , Oct 24 2019 2:42 utc | 43

@8 Trailer Trash

Indeed Orwell's "1984" referred to the UK as "Airstrip One" and this Brexit fiasco surely proves that Outside Influences not only run the Judiciary when necessary, but also plant poison on doorknobs when it suits them.

The ever servile Australian government to the empire du jour does nothing to honor their passport pledge. We would have to assume it qualifies as Orwell's "Airstrip Two"

In contrast to Assange's predicament (and Manning I assume), the main point of this post is to mention the recent Joe Rogan interview of Edward Snowden (touting his book) -- http://podcasts.joerogan.net/podcasts/edward-snowden

Nearly three hours of mostly Snowden rambling on. I stayed with it to the end. A few items of interest but mostly just noise. I found him initially somewhat suspicious -- by the end I was more neutral. However, what a display of American arrogance and ingratitude. The Russian government has saved his bacon and has given him refuge with great freedoms he would not have in the USA -- or Airstrip One ... or, HK, or any South American backyard colony. And yet he makes no attempt to thank them and even virtually panders to the American anti-Russian meme. He has even dabbled in Russian opposition politics via local newspaper comments. What an ungrateful guest! (Or still an agent @ work?) I would entirely understand the Russians putting him on a plane back to the USA tomorrow. Ungrateful little character, imo. And says a lot about the way Americans treat the external world from inside their little fishbowl. Simply a doormat for convenience.

The main take away for me came towards the end where Snowden outlines the special legal conditions and laws that the US government enforces to control presentation of evidence in these cases. These same 'servant' thugs who are stepping into the now 3rd-world UK court system and pulling the strings on Australia's Assange. The same crew that Snowden worked with and blew the whistle on (apparently).

Snowden makes great bravado about being willing to go back to the USA and face the music -- if only he could say in court why he did it (something the legal Act prohibits apparently). In this, and a few other matters of history, I find him less than genuine. Is/was he a plant? .... I'm still out with the jury on that.

[Sep 23, 2019] Snowden: "I would like to return to the US"

Sep 23, 2019 | thenewkremlinstooge.wordpress.com

Northern Star September 16, 2019 at 1:32 pm

Snowden on CBS this morning worth watching .

https://www.cbsnews.com/video/edward-snowden-wants-to-come-home-but-says-u-s-wont-give-him-a-fair-trial/

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Jen September 16, 2019 at 5:57 pm
Taco Bell, please open an outlet in Moscow or near where Ed Snowden lives to keep him happy and stop him from getting homesick!

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Moscow Exile September 16, 2019 at 10:57 pm
Snowden: "I would like to return to the US"
Mark Chapman September 16, 2019 at 11:06 pm
I don't see how he could have handled it better. He was polite and well-spoken, never flustered or defensive, and the talking heads tumbled over one another in their eagerness to be properly judgmental, to talk over him and recite their own talking points, and ended up looking like buffoons. He will be a tough nut to crack, and so far the American regime has done nothing to convince ordinary people that he is a cowardly traitor. Putting him on television only makes him look more heroic.

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Moscow Exile September 17, 2019 at 1:29 am
Typical Yankee judgementalism:

Snowdon: "Russia has, shall we say, a problematic human rights record -- at a minimum "

Never had no negro slavery, though, did it, Edward?

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Moscow Exile September 17, 2019 at 1:31 am
"That's if we're being generous" ???

Who?

The USA????

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Moscow Exile September 17, 2019 at 1:43 am
And a US "talking" head, in reply to Snowdon's belief that he would not get a fair trial in the USA (a US human rights issue, is that not, Mr.Snowdon?) says that criminals and alleged criminals do not customarily get to determine the terms of their trial: they broke the law and they face the consequences "

Guilty before proven innocent?

Presumption of innocence: an international human right under the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Article 11.

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Mark Chapman September 17, 2019 at 6:59 am
An excellent point I wish he had immediately made.

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Mark Chapman September 17, 2019 at 7:06 am
Nor, to the best of my recollection, did it have an Abu Ghraib. The United States actually has a pretty shitty human-rights record if you consider it from the viewpoint of how it treas others than Americans, and – going further back – only white Americans. The west always tries to factor in the Holodomor, too, how Russia deliberately starved the Ukrainians to death, as an example of their horrible human rights record.

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yalensis September 17, 2019 at 1:10 pm
I cringed at that one too. But I forgive Edward, because I think he was trying to make a tactical debating point, namely:

I am not a Russia stooge, I have my criticisms of the Russian regime yada yada, and I agree with you talking heads that their human rights record is not well received in the West. And yet they scored a human-rights trifecta when they let me in, when not one single "democracy" would defend me or give me asylum.

In other words, he would concede, for argumentation purposes, that Russia is bad, only to stick it to them that Russia did well by him and scored propaganda points against the West. It's a particular debating tactic, whose Latin name I cannot recall.

Unfortunately, Edward never got to finish his point, because those bitches cut him off before he could even get to the punchline.

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Northern Star September 17, 2019 at 3:18 pm
Ahhh I see you will need more intense beatings at the cultural reeducation camp in consideration of your continued use of the 'negro' word.

However one should ignore Gayle she's a black moron, one of the TV progeny of the uber fat whale 'O'.

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Moscow Exile September 19, 2019 at 8:20 pm
Is it "wrong" to say "negro" now?

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[Sep 22, 2019] Snowden says he married his girlfriend Lindsay Mills in Russia -- Guardian

US authorities usually do not allow such staff for people why really want to hurt. They couple easily put his girlfriend on "nofly" list, if they wanted.
Sep 22, 2019 | tass.com

In the interview, timed to coincide with the release of his book titled Permanent Record, Snowden said he and Mills, who later moved to him in Russia, married two years ago at a private ceremony ... ... ... One of world's most beautiful countries

According to Snowden, people in the West often have no information about the beauty of Russian nature and hospitality of Russians.

"I've been to St. Petersburg, I've been to Sochi. I love travelling and I still do, even though I can't cross borders now," he said.

"One of the things that is lost in all the problematic politics of the Russian government is the fact this is one of the most beautiful countries in the world. The people are friendly. The people are warm," he continued. "And when I came here I did not understand any of this. I was terrified of this place because, of course, they were the great fortress of the enemy, which is the way a CIA agent looks at Russia."

According to Snowden, "What people don't realize about Russia is that basically you can get all the same things you can get in the United States." "The only thing they don't have in Russia is Taco Bell," he added.

He said it was never his plan to reside in Russia, but, "with time, with open eyes you can see that our presumptions of a place are almost always different from the reality."

Noble cause

According to Snowden, his book was intended not only to inform reader of his life in the US and Russia, but also to draw attention to serious challenges the modern society is now facing.

"We have moved into a time where people care much more deeply about feelings than they do about facts. And this is a dangerous moment for democracy, because people believe that once we have achieved and established a free and open society it will remain that way, it will always be there. But the reality is: things can backslide very quickly," Snowden said when asked how dangerous, in his opinion, Trump's rise to power was.

The whistleblower believes that people should be informed of infringements on their freedom and of acute problems, such as climate change or advanced mass surveillance technologies used by various governments.

"We need people to recognize these problems, to understand these problems and then to be willing to give something up to change that problem," he said. "But it's not enough to believe in something. You have to be ready to stand for something if you want it to change. And so that is what I hope this book will help people come to decide for themselves: are you ready to this change."

Snowden's case

In June 2013, Snowden leaked classified information to journalists Glenn Greenwald and Laura Poitras, which revealed global surveillance programs run by US and British intelligence agencies. He explained the move by saying that he wanted to tell the world the truth because he believed such large-scale surveillance on innocent citizens was unacceptable and the public needed to know about it.

The Guardian and The Washington Post published the first documents concerning the US intelligence agencies' spying on Internet users on June 6, 2013. According to the documents, major phone companies, including Verizon, AT&T and Sprint Nextel, handed records of their customers' phone conversations over to the NSA and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), who also had direct access to the servers of Microsoft, Yahoo, Google, Facebook, Skype, YouTube, Paltalk, AOL and Apple. In addition, Snowden's revelations showed that a secret program named PRISM was aimed at collecting audio and video recordings, photos, emails and information about users' connections to various websites.

After leaking classified information, Snowden flew to Hong Kong and then to Moscow, arriving in Russia on June 23, 2013. He applied for political asylum to more than 20 countries while staying in the transit zone at Moscow's Sheremetyevo airport. On July 16, he applied for a temporary asylum in Russia, accepting Moscow's condition to refrain from activities aimed against the US.

The NSA and the Pentagon claim that Snowden stole about 1.7 mln classified documents concerning the activities of US intelligence services and US military operations. He is charged with theft of government property, unauthorized communication of national defense information and willful communication of classified communications intelligence information to an unauthorized person. He is facing up to ten years in prison on each charge.

[Sep 22, 2019] The Snowden Conundrum by Yvonne Lorenzo

Highly recommended!
This article raises serious questions about Snowden's authenticity. Although the level of damage he has done make suggestion that he is apart of CIA operation against NSA much less plausible. He did some damage by publicizing operations like Prism. No question about it.
And it is diffuclt to treat Snowden like another variation of Lee Harvey Oswald defection to the USSR.
But it is true that several steps that he took after supposed exfiltration of the documents were highly suspicious: As author pointed out WaPo and Guardian are essentially intelligence agencies controlled outlets, so there is no chance that publication can't be completely blocked.
Another good point is that in any large corporation there is system of logs and they suppoedly are analysed, althout the level of qualification in doing so varies greatly.
And if reports are created automatically that not not mean that they are ver read. Another valid point is that even if you are system administrator, you have great powers over all your users. But at the same time your power is compartmentalized: you have access only to few selected computer that constitute the set of servers you manage. And you usually access then via special jumpserver, which logs everything you do. In no way you have access to any server and any database in the organization; you might not even know that some servers exist. Actually access to critical databases is very tightly controlled.
The author also pointed to an interesting question about difficulties of exfiltration of data on encrypted Windows computers. I think that copy to the UCB drive from encrypted drive to SD or USB drive might still be permitted for sysadmins, as it might be required for some operations. But SD accepted might be special, issued by NSA, not retai and they should be accounted for. Still the point that Yvonne Lorenzo raised is very interesting: how you bypass existing protections on you computer to copy information of SD card ?
On another issue, why did Snowden provide his files to known house organs of Intelligence Agencies, specifically the Washington Post and The Guardian, and not give them to Wikileaks?
Notable quotes:
"... How many reading my words work at a large entity, not necessarily government, let us say a Fortune 1000 or higher? Do you have the ability to copy data unimpeded onto any external device? Can you surf the Internet at will? Or is everything you do on the computer network under constant, real-time scrutiny? ..."
"... Edward Snowden would have us believe that the Eye of Sauron didn't notice he was looking at gigabytes of data unrelated to his job function and using his computer to copy the data to external devices over a lengthy period of time. Are his supporters alleging he is so clever he could disappear from the "Eye of Sauron's" view and be unnoticed? If you believe that, I have a bridge to sell you in Crimea. ZeroHedge reported " IRS Agent Charged In Leak Of Michael Cohen Transactions To Michael Avenatti ." ..."
"... However, don't believe it takes nine months to identify such an unauthorized intrusion. Don't think every keystroke isn't monitored in real-time. So my question is: would the NSA, which has much more sensitive data (especially compromising information on the governing class) than tax returns and financial transactions have inferior capabilities than the IRS as to maintaining data security? Are we to believe the NSA lacks a "digital trail" when it comes to classified documents? ..."
"... On another issue, why did Snowden provide his files to known house organs of Intelligence Agencies, specifically the Washington Post and The Guardian, and not give them to Wikileaks to allow a publicly available searchable database? ..."
"... While other outlets -- such as the Jeff Bezos-owned Washington Post and the New York Times -- also possess much (though not all) of the archive, the Intercept was the only outlet with the (full) archive that had continued to publish documents, albeit at a remarkably slow pace, in recent years. In total, fewer than 10 percent of the Snowden documents have been published since 2013. Thus, the closing of the publication's Snowden archive will likely mean the end of any future publications, unless Greenwald's promise of finding "the right partner that has the funds to robustly publish" is fulfilled ..."
"... Do you believe Putin's intelligence agencies don't communicate to him how Washington "organized crime" really operates, as Whitney Webb has disclosed, now on the pages of Unz.com ? What difference does any compromised President make to the policies and goals of the occupational government of the United States (obvious to any reader of this and similar websites)? ..."
"... Why is an alleged humanitarian such a Russophobe? ..."
"... Has Snowden ever challenged the September 11 narrative, ludicrous as it is, and him being an "engineer?" ..."
"... STO equals Special Technical Operations It's highly unlikely Mr. Snowden had any access to these. ..."
"... ECI = Exceptionally Controlled Information. I do not believe Mr. Snowden had any access to these ECI controlled networks). VRK = Very Restricted Knowledge. I do not believe Mr. Snowden had any access to these VRK controlled networks. ..."
"... So what they did, is they took a few documents and they downgraded [he classification level of the documents] – just a few – and gave them to them to placate this basic whitewash investigation. ..."
"... Journalist Margie Burns asked some good questions back in June that have not yet been answered. She wondered about the 29-year old Snowden who had been a U.S. Army Special Forces recruit, a covert CIA operative, and an NSA employee in various capacities, all in just a few, short years. Burns asked "How, exactly, did Snowden get his series of NSA jobs? Did he apply through regular channels? Was it through someone he knew? Who recommended him? Who were his references for a string of six-figure, high-level security jobs? Are there any safeguards in place so that red flags go up when a subcontractor jumps from job to job, especially in high-level clearance positions?" ..."
"... In December, whistleblower Sibel Edmonds broke the news that Omidyar's Paypal Corporation was implicated in the as-yet-unreleased NSA documents from Snowden. Moreover, Edmonds had allegedly been contacted by an NSA official who alleged that "a deal was made in early June, 2013 between the journalists involved in this recent NSA scandal and U.S. government officials, which was then sealed by secrecy and nondisclosure agreements by all parties involved." ..."
"... No, no one is accusing Wikileaks of conspiring with Russia, just Robert Mueller. I really appreciate Snowden calling Julian Assange a liar, for he has consistently denied there was a "state actor." ..."
"... "Terrorism is a real problem" Snowden said. Is it credible that Snowden, who presented himself as donating funds to Ron Paul, has never read any alternative news sites? Is it credible that Snowden believes that terrorists and this would include the good "moderate terrorists" in Syria are armed and act on their own initiative, and is ignorant of the role of the governments of America, Israel, and Saudi Arabia in using them to achieve their ends as proxy armies? ..."
"... Does Snowden then think this report, " America Created Al-Qaeda and the ISIS Terror Group" is false? Does that mindset make Snowden a champion for liberty or a tool for more control of the American population? For example, is it credible that this alleged genius supports the narrative of the September 11 attacks World Trade Center attacks? ..."
"... Tor lists on its own website sponsors that include Google, the U.S. Department of State Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor, ONR via Naval Research Laboratory (past sponsor) and DARPA. ..."
"... Perhaps Snowden is only a Soros and Hillary Clinton supporting liberal -- but then why would he have done what he did? His character is of any government employee of the "surface state" who swallows false narratives whole. ..."
"... The logging of user and information accessed is sure added to the file. But real time supervision? No. A eye of sauron? Please. The system isnt there to prevent crime, its to track down the criminal and deeds later. And yes everything takes a very long time on the public side. ..."
"... 'Edward Snowden' who first 'leaked' to the CIA's Washington Post, in fact to Bush VP Dick Cheney's biographer Bart Gellman then the Deep State realised that was too stupid, so they switched to Rothschild employee & ex-gay-pornography-seller Glenn Greenwald, former proprietor of 'hairystuds', at the Guardian, an intel-agency rag which lies about nearly everything ..."
"... NeonRevolt once floated the theory that Snowden was an FBI or CIA plant who whistleblew solely because he had the mission to undermine NSA operations by exposing their equipment/techniques and turning public opinion against them. ..."
"... inter-service rivalry and sabotage between spy agencies is absolutely a thing, and reviewing the inconsistencies of Snowden's stunt, its aftermath, and his personal views with that potential background in mind suddenly makes things make much more sense, in my mind at least. ..."
"... If we accept the later, that he's a plant, then it raises a further question: was the short term loss, associated with his revelations, ie highlighting the utterly disturbing degree of Gov surveillance over US citizens (etc) worth the long term profit of having an established, authoritive psy-op's agent able to influence/distort etc any debate or narrative concerning the US State /elites. On this side the author notes Snowmen's views on Tor, 9/11, Russia etc which clearly advantage the US State's own views on these subjects. ..."
"... Consider that nothing Snowden revealed was news. It was all old hat for anyone who'd been paying attention, and for up to ten years. Sure Snowden made it mainstream for what good it did but nothing he said was a secret anymore. In fact, I thought even at the time his actions were nothing less than a 'threat and warning' from the intel services that they had this much on everyone. Just imagine all those national leaders, politicians from all states being pout on notice. All your secrets are ours! What a powerful global message to deliver and in such a loud and clear fashion. ..."
"... The lack of deviation from official bullshit on 9/11 is on its own however reason enough to toss this guy out. ..."
"... To my mind "9/11, attitude to", is a sort of touch-stone for telling genuine dissidents from fake and both Snowden and Assange fail on that test ..."
"... Snowden is not a classic defector so it makes sense for him to keep his distance from Russian society so as not to be inadvertently compromised or used by their intelligence services. He's obviously under surveillance there, I know we all are but he's much more aware of it, so that doesn't make it easy for him but he's definitely safer there than he'd be in France or Germany. I just don't think he planned well ahead when he became a whistle-blower or was clear about what he was trying to achieve. He's not the top level type of spy we're accustomed to reading about who betray their country for money or to serve another they believe in more than their own. If he has been on active duty as a CIA asset all along I can't see that he has achieved much of use to them other than in some inter-agency rivalry game. But it's natural for Russians to be suspicious of him – they're suspicious by nature – and rightly so, but it doesn't make his life easy there. ..."
"... 9/11 is the "litmus test" and it appears that both Assange and Snowden have failed it. ..."
"... Snowden keeping "distance" to Russia, and not openly defending them seems reasonable to me. You can imagine the smear campaign back home if he would side with Russia against the U.S. on almost anything. "The Russians got to him" or "He was always their man". ..."
"... He is trying to keep his neutrality and credibility and his target audience isn't the average Unz reader, but rather some mainstream educated middle/upper class blokes. Easily scared away from his views if they become too controversial and too far from the established narrative. ..."
"... If I had been in the position like 'Snowden', after first having been granted asylum, my priority would have been to study the language. I would gtuess that he can order food or drink, do basic greetings, and not much else. ..."
"... I agree. Shilling for the Israelis regarding 911 is a deal breaker for me. They had me going about these 2 guys for a while, but when I heard that they had ridiculed 911 truthers I smelled a rat. And after this article I agree they are shills for the status quo. Reasonable people can not doubt that 911 was a false flag operation. There's just too much bullshit there. ..."
"... I think the idea Snowden is a "plant" is a bit far out there. If he is; the real purpose of the exercise is what exactly? ..."
"... I also don't get why some commenters think Julian Assange isn't who he claims to be. His Wikileaks has published great volume of highly embarrassing material for the U.S. The embassy cables come to mind – bringing to light evidence contrary to Washington narrative on many events. ..."
"... There is another thing; Just after he established Wikileaks he came to Iceland and met with journalists and few politicians. The result from that visit was he met one Kristinn Hrafnsson, long time journalist in Iceland with excellent track record and credibility. Since Assange got in trouble, accused of sexual harassment from Swedish woman and finally escaped into the Ecuador embassy in London, Hrafnsson has been spokesman for Wikileaks. ..."
"... "It all comes down to 9/11.Everything that has happened has happened based on a lie . Everyone in Government ; everyone in the media , in entertainment , in organized religion , in the public ,in the public eye who accepts and promotes the official story is either a traitor or a tool . Everyone who does not stand forth and speak truth to power is a coward , a liar and complicit in mass-murder . Everyone everywhere can be measured by this Litmus Test ." ..."
Sep 22, 2019 | www.unz.com

Have you ever had the pleasure of dealing with an agent of the Federal government? For example, have you been audited by the IRS? Did you notice what the "Agent" does to gain access to his (or her) computer -- by inserting a "Smart ID" into a slot? Did you ask how your personal information is protected from disclosure or theft? What is to prevent the Agent from copying files to a thumb drive and taking them home?

Regarding the Smart ID, the "HSPD-12" is discussed in this publicly available article ; please note the following:

HSPD-12, FIPS 201 and the PIV Card

Homeland Security Presidential Directive 12 (HSPD-12), issued by President George W. Bush on August 27, 2004, mandated the establishment of a standard for identification of Federal government employees and contractors. HSPD-12 requires the use of a common identification credential for both logical and physical access to federally controlled facilities and information systems. The Department of Commerce and National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) were tasked with producing a standard for secure and reliable forms of identification. In response, NIST published Federal Information Processing Standard Publication 201 (FIPS 201), Personal Identity Verification (PIV) of Federal Employees and Contractors, issued on February 25, 2005, and a number of special publications that provide more detail on the implementation of the standard.

Both Federal agencies and enterprises have implemented FIPS 201-compliant ID programs and have issued PIV cards. The FIPS 201 PIV card is a smart card with both contact and contactless interfaces that is now being issued to all Federal employees and contractors

Additional information about FIPS 201 can be found on the Government Identity/Credentialing Resources page, from NIST, and from the Secure Technology Alliance Access Control Council.

If you engage the IRS employee in conversation, remembering the adage you catch more flies with honey than with vinegar, you'll learn the computer cannot be compromised -- all data on the device are encrypted; the only access to it is via the Smart ID. Data can be copied to an external "thumb drive" but everything copied will be encrypted; any file on that thumb drive is only readable by that specific device. Wouldn't this be true of NSA devices as well? Why does Snowden never discuss dealing with such encryption: how would it be possible?

In the Oliver Stone movie Snowden , as well as in any of Snowden's descriptions of how he accessed the NSA computers, did you note either the depiction or reference to this universal Smart ID? How could Snowden be exempt from its requirement? Why wasn't its use, which is public knowledge, shown or discussed? Per the above, the Smart ID is deployed in all government agencies: there are no exceptions. And while the financial portion (think of all those Goldman Sachs alumni at the U.S. Department of the Treasury) is likely the most powerful part of the financial-military-industrial-media-congressional complex that is the central power of the federal government, do you think that IRS systems are different and superior in security to what was employed by a contractor working for Booze-Allen Hamilton at the NSA?

How many reading my words work at a large entity, not necessarily government, let us say a Fortune 1000 or higher? Do you have the ability to copy data unimpeded onto any external device? Can you surf the Internet at will? Or is everything you do on the computer network under constant, real-time scrutiny?

Did Edward Snowden, who has publicly criticized Google, mention Google is deployed as a search engine throughout the federal "intranet"? And can he catch a link to the Washington Post on the NSA homepage too? Or would he testify and can it be verified that NSA does not use Google (for example to obtain the PowerPoint he revealed) for searching for internal documents and procedures? Can anyone reading my words answer the questions I've posed so far and answer accurately and honestly with confirmatory evidence?

Edward Snowden would have us believe that the Eye of Sauron didn't notice he was looking at gigabytes of data unrelated to his job function and using his computer to copy the data to external devices over a lengthy period of time. Are his supporters alleging he is so clever he could disappear from the "Eye of Sauron's" view and be unnoticed? If you believe that, I have a bridge to sell you in Crimea. ZeroHedge reported " IRS Agent Charged In Leak Of Michael Cohen Transactions To Michael Avenatti ." From the article:

John C. Fry, an analyst in the San Francisco IRS office who had worked for the agency since 2008, was charged with disclosing Cohen's Suspicious Activity Reports (SARs) – nine months after we reported that it wouldn't be difficult to track down the leaker due to a digital trail left behind from accessing the system.

However, don't believe it takes nine months to identify such an unauthorized intrusion. Don't think every keystroke isn't monitored in real-time. So my question is: would the NSA, which has much more sensitive data (especially compromising information on the governing class) than tax returns and financial transactions have inferior capabilities than the IRS as to maintaining data security? Are we to believe the NSA lacks a "digital trail" when it comes to classified documents?

On another issue, why did Snowden provide his files to known house organs of Intelligence Agencies, specifically the Washington Post and The Guardian, and not give them to Wikileaks to allow a publicly available searchable database? As Roger Stone has noted, the odious Nixon was taken down principally by the CIA media front The Washington Post because he sought detente with Russia and another presidential assassination would have been too obvious. Notice the situation regarding the Snowden treasure trove as investigative journalist Whitney Webb writes about it here: " Silencing the Whistle: The Intercept Shutters Snowden Archive, Citing Cost ."

According to a timeline of events written by Poitras that was shared and published by journalist and former Intercept columnist Barrett Brown, both Scahill and Greenwald were intimately involved in the decision to close the Snowden archive.

While other outlets -- such as the Jeff Bezos-owned Washington Post and the New York Times -- also possess much (though not all) of the archive, the Intercept was the only outlet with the (full) archive that had continued to publish documents, albeit at a remarkably slow pace, in recent years. In total, fewer than 10 percent of the Snowden documents have been published since 2013. Thus, the closing of the publication's Snowden archive will likely mean the end of any future publications, unless Greenwald's promise of finding "the right partner that has the funds to robustly publish" is fulfilled

Yet, as Poitras pointed out, the research department accounted for a minuscule 1.5 percent of First Look Media's budget. Greenwald's claim that the archive was shuttered owing to its high cost to the company is also greatly undermined by the fact that he, along with several other Intercept employees -- Reed and Scahill among them -- receive massive salaries that dwarf those of journalists working for similar nonprofit publications.

Greenwald, for instance, received $1.6 million from First Look Media, of which Omidyar is the sole shareholder, from 2014 to 2017. His yearly salary peaked in 2015, when he made over $518,000. Reed and Scahill both earn well over $300,000 annually from First Look. According to journalist Mark Ames, Scahill made over $43,000 per article at the Intercept in 2014. Other writers at the site, by comparison, have a base salary of $50,000, which itself is higher than the national average for journalists.

And what about Snowden himself, the pontificator, the man who can speak on television or to the media with evidence of training? Practice yourself -- see how well you can answer questions and speak publicly to a TV camera. How did he get his training? Who trained him? Why? How is it that the legacy media, which applauds the slow, painful execution of Julian Assange , be in rapture over Snowden's new book tour and provide ample coverage? Is Assange being murdered in part to prevent his providing exculpatory evidence that Russia never hacked the DNC and it was a leak?

I have provided two videos below for the reader to consider and compare.

https://www.youtube.com/embed/F7J2DdiXM9Q?feature=oembed

https://www.youtube.com/embed/O4nFGOEeSP0?feature=oembed

Look at how Bill Binney, a true techno-nerd speaks and compare the difference between him with the polished interviews given by Snowden who borders on pomposity. Also, to his favor Binney is doing his best to debunk the Russia hacking narrative of the DNC; Snowden makes his thoughts about Russia and Russians clear in his latest interview with Der Spiegel promoting his new book about himself:

DER SPIEGEL: Do you have Russian friends?

Snowden: I try to keep a distance between myself and Russian society, and this is completely intentional. I live my life with basically the English-speaking community. I'm the president of the Freedom of the Press Foundation. And, you know, I'm an indoor cat. It doesn't matter where I am -- Moscow, Berlin, New York -- as long as I have a screen to look into.

DER SPIEGEL: Western authorities accuse the Russian government on a regular basis of being one of the biggest disrupters in the digital world. Are they right?

Snowden: Russia is responsible for a lot of negative activity in the world, you can say that right and fairly. Did Russia interfere with elections? Almost certainly. But do the United States interfere in elections? Of course. They've been doing it for the last 50 years. Any country bigger than Iceland is going to interfere in every crucial election, and they're going to deny it every time, because this is what intelligence services do. This is explicitly why covert operations and influence divisions are created, and their purpose as an instrument of national power is to ask: How can we influence the world in a direction that improves our standing relative to all the other countries?

I am pleased to have played a small role in getting Stephen F. Cohen's work published on Unz.com. He and others have effectively debunked Russian involvement in the manipulation of America elections and the conclusions of the Mueller report. To paraphrase a point Professor Cohen made in his most recent article posted here, which is simply common sense: We are to believe Trump is Putin's puppet yet Putin simultaneously encouraged the preparation of a dossier to destroy him. Does that make sense to any one with half a brain? Do you believe Putin's intelligence agencies don't communicate to him how Washington "organized crime" really operates, as Whitney Webb has disclosed, now on the pages of Unz.com ? What difference does any compromised President make to the policies and goals of the occupational government of the United States (obvious to any reader of this and similar websites)?

Do you notice how Snowden never challenges any government narrative, whether it's on Russia as a villain, and not as a victim of war initiated by Washington? Why is an alleged humanitarian such a Russophobe? Is this how he repays the nation that granted him asylum? Has he only compassion in the abstract, and is a genius but too stupid to consider the consequences of America going to war with Russia and in fact exacerbating the tension by his false and inflammatory statements about Russian conduct in the 2016 elections, for which there are no facts and evidence?

And then there's the destruction of the World Trade Center buildings. Of course Snowden at NSA had no access to information on how and why it was done, but as Dmitri Orlov has written:

I suppose I am a "conspiracy theorist" too. Whenever I write something that questions the veracity of some official narrative, someone (probably a troll) pops up and asks me what I think of 9/11. Here is what I typically reply:

I totally believe that it was possible to knock down three steel-framed buildings using two flying aluminum cans loaded with kerosene, luggage and meat. I have proven that this is possible by throwing two beer cans at three chain-link fences. All three fences were instantly swallowed up by holes in the ground that mysteriously opened up right under them and in which they were instantaneously incinerated into fine oxide powder that coated the entire neighborhood. Anybody who does not believe my experimental results is obviously a tin-foil-hat crackpot conspiracy theorist.

Lots of people read this and ran away bleating; a few people bust a gut laughing because this is (trust me on this!) actually quite funny. Some people took offense at someone ridiculing an event in which thousands of people died. (To protect their tender sensibilities they should consider emigrating to a country that isn't run by a bunch of war criminals.)

But if you do see the humor in this, then you may be up to the challenge, which is to pull out a useful signal (a typical experimentalist's task) out of a mess of unreliable and contradictory data. Only then would you be in a position to persuasively argue -- not prove, mind you! -- that the official story is complete and utter bullshit.

Note that everything beyond that point, such as arguing what "the real story" is, is strictly off-limits. If you move beyond that point you open yourself up to well-organized, well-funded debunking. But if all you produce is a very large and imposing question mark, then the only way to attack it is by producing certainty -- a very tall order! In conspiracy theory, as in guerrilla warfare, you don't have to win. You just have to not lose long enough for the enemy to give up.

Has Snowden ever challenged the September 11 narrative, ludicrous as it is, and him being an "engineer?" And this last point is the reason I'm writing these words: I don't have to come up with the "real story" on who Edward Snowden is and what his true motives are. I am asking questions that point out the discrepancies in Snowden's statements and conduct and his alleged sanctity. In this article, " EXCLUSIVE REPORT: NSA Whistleblower: Snowden Never Had Access to the JUICIEST Documents Far More Damning "

WASHINGTON'S BLOG: Glenn Greenwald – supposedly, in the next couple of days or weeks – is going to disclose, based on NSA documents leaked by Snowden, that the NSA is spying on all sorts of normal Americans and that the spying is really to crush dissent. [Background here, here and here.]

Does Snowden even have documents which contain the information which you've seen?

RUSSELL TICE: The answer is no.

WASHINGTON'S BLOG: So you saw handwritten notes. And what Snowden was seeing were electronic files ?

RUSSELL TICE: Think of it this way. Remember I told you about the NSA doing everything they could to make sure that the information from 40 years ago – from spying on Frank Church and Lord knows how many other Congressman that they were spying on – was hidden?

Now do you think they're going to put that information into PowerPoint slides that are easy to explain to everybody what they're doing?

They would not even put their own NSA designators on the reports [so that no one would know that] it came from the NSA. They made the reports look like they were Humint (human intelligence) reports. They did it to hide the fact that they were NSA and they were doing the collection. That's 40 years ago. [The NSA and other agencies are still doing "parallel construction", "laundering" information to hide the fact that the information is actually from mass NSA surveillance.]

Now, what NSA is doing right now is that they're taking the information and they're putting it in a much higher security level. It's called "ECI" – Exceptionally Controlled Information – and it's called the black program which I was a specialist in, by the way.

I specialized in black world – DOD and IC (Intelligence Community) – programs, operations and missions in "VRKs", "ECIs", and "SAPs", "STOs". SAP equals Special Access Program. It's highly unlikely Mr. Snowden had any access to these. STO equals Special Technical Operations It's highly unlikely Mr. Snowden had any access to these.

Now in that world – the ECI/VRK world – everything in that system is classified at a higher level and it has its own computer systems that house it. It's totally separate than the system which Mr. Snowden was privy to, which was called the "JWICS": Joint Worldwide Intelligence Communications System. The JWICS system is what everybody at NSA has access to. Mr Snowden had Sys Admin [systems administrator] authority for the JWICS.

And you still have to have TS/SCI clearance [i.e. Top Secret/ Sensitive Compartmented Information – also known as "code word" – clearance] to get on the JWICS. But the ECI/VRK systems are much higher [levels of special compartmentalized clearance] than the JWICS. And you have to be in the black world to get that [clearance].

ECI = Exceptionally Controlled Information. I do not believe Mr. Snowden had any access to these ECI controlled networks). VRK = Very Restricted Knowledge. I do not believe Mr. Snowden had any access to these VRK controlled networks.

These programs typically have, at the least, a requirement of 100 year or until death, 'till the person first being "read in" [i.e. sworn to secrecy as part of access to the higher classification program] can talk about them. [As an interesting sidenote, the Washington Times reported in 2006 that – when Tice offered to testify to Congress about this illegal spying – he was informed by the NSA that the Senate and House intelligence committees were not cleared to hear such information.]

It's very compartmentalized and – even with stuff that they had – you might have something at NSA, that there's literally 40 people at NSA that know that it's going on in the entire agency.

When the stuff came out in the New York Times [the first big spying story, which broke in 2005] – and I was a source of information for the New York Times – that's when President Bush made up that nonsense about the "terrorist surveillance program." By the way, that never existed. That was made up.

There was no such thing beforehand. It was made up to try to placate the American people.

The NSA IG (Inspector General) – who was not cleared for this – all of a sudden is told he has to do an investigation on this; something he has no information or knowledge of.

So what they did, is they took a few documents and they downgraded [he classification level of the documents] – just a few – and gave them to them to placate this basic whitewash investigation.

Snowden's Failure To Understand the Most Important Documents

RUSSELL TICE: Now, if Mr. Snowden were to find the crossover, it would be those documents that were downgraded to the NSA's IG.

The stuff that I saw looked like a bunch of alphanumeric gobbledygook. Unless you have an analyst to know what to look for – and believe me, I think that what Snowden's done is great – he's not an intelligence analyst. So he would see something like that, and he wouldn't know what he's looking at.

But that would be "the jewels". And the key is, you wouldn't know it's the jewels unless you were a diamond miner and you knew what to look for. Because otherwise, there's a big lump of rock and you don't know there's a diamond in there.

I worked special programs. And the way I found out is that I was working on a special operation, and I needed information from NSA from another unit. And when I went to that unit and I said "I need this information", and I dealt with [satellite spy operations], and I did that in the black world. I was a special operations officer. I would literally go do special missions that were in the black world where I would travel overseas and do spooky stuff.

Did we really need Snowden to have told us that the Internet, federally controlled, does not allow anyone a modicum of privacy and the government after implementing the Patriot Act considers ordinary Americans the enemy?

In " Inconsistencies and Unanswered Questions: The Risks of Trusting the Snowden Story " Kevin Ryan wrote:

Journalist Margie Burns asked some good questions back in June that have not yet been answered. She wondered about the 29-year old Snowden who had been a U.S. Army Special Forces recruit, a covert CIA operative, and an NSA employee in various capacities, all in just a few, short years. Burns asked "How, exactly, did Snowden get his series of NSA jobs? Did he apply through regular channels? Was it through someone he knew? Who recommended him? Who were his references for a string of six-figure, high-level security jobs? Are there any safeguards in place so that red flags go up when a subcontractor jumps from job to job, especially in high-level clearance positions?"

Five months later, journalists Mark Ames and Yasha Levine investigated some of the businesses in which Greenwald's benefactor Omidyar had invested. They found that the actual practices of those businesses were considerably less humanitarian than the outward appearance of Omidyar's ventures often portray. The result was that Omidyar took down references to at least one of those businesses from his website.

In December, whistleblower Sibel Edmonds broke the news that Omidyar's Paypal Corporation was implicated in the as-yet-unreleased NSA documents from Snowden. Moreover, Edmonds had allegedly been contacted by an NSA official who alleged that "a deal was made in early June, 2013 between the journalists involved in this recent NSA scandal and U.S. government officials, which was then sealed by secrecy and nondisclosure agreements by all parties involved."

It would appear that Snowden's whistleblowing has been co-opted by private corporate interests. Are those involved with privatization of the stolen documents also colluding with government agencies to frame and direct national discussions on domestic spying and other serious matters?

The possibilities are endless, it seems. Presenting documents at a measured rate could be a way to acclimate citizens to painful realities without stirring the public into a panic or a unified response that might actually threaten the status quo. And considering that the number of documents has somehow grown from only thousands to nearly two million, it seems possible that those in control could release practically anything, thereby controlling national dialogue on many topics.

Please read the final paragraph above twice and think about the points raised about acclimating citizens and controlling national dialog. Is Snowden as much of a "Pied Piper" as QAnon? How did Snowden describe the nature of the CIA and NSA in this earlier interview with Der Spiegel ?

DER SPIEGEL: But those people see you as their biggest enemy today.

Snowden: My personal battle was not to burn down the NSA or the CIA. I even think they actually do have a useful role in society when they limit themselves to the truly important threats that we face and when they use their least intrusive means.

**

Snowden: It wasn't that difficult. Everybody is currently pointing at the Russians.

DER SPIEGEL: Rightfully?

Snowden: I don't know. They probably did hack the systems of Hillary Clinton's Democratic Party, but we should have proof of that. In the case of the hacking attack on Sony, the FBI presented evidence that North Korea was behind it. In this case they didn't, although I am convinced that they do have evidence. The question is why?

DER SPIEGEL: Mike Pompeo, the new head of the CIA, has accused WikiLeaks, whose lawyers helped you, of being a mouthpiece for the Russians. Is that not harmful to your image as well?

Snowden: First, we should be fair about what the accusations are. I don't believe the U.S. government or anybody in the intelligence community is directly accusing Julian Assange or WikiLeaks of working directly for the Russian government. The allegations I understand are that they were used as a tool basically to wash documents that had been stolen by the Russian government. And, of course, that's a concern. I don't see that as directly affecting me because I'm not WikiLeaks and there is no question about the provenance of the documents that I dealt with.

DER SPIEGEL: Currently, there's another American guy out there who is accused of being too close to Putin.

Snowden: Oh (laughs).

DER SPIEGEL: Your president. Is he your president?

Snowden: The idea that half of American voters thought that Donald Trump was the best among us, is something that I struggle with. And I think we will all be struggling with it for decades to come.

DER SPIEGEL: But isn't there reason to fear terrorism?

Snowden: Sure there is. Terrorism is a real problem. But when we look at how many lives it has claimed in basically any country that is outside of war zones like Iraq or Afghanistan, it is so much less than, say, car accidents or heart attacks. Even if Sept. 11 were to happen every single year in the U.S., terrorism would be a much lower threat than so many other things.

No, no one is accusing Wikileaks of conspiring with Russia, just Robert Mueller. I really appreciate Snowden calling Julian Assange a liar, for he has consistently denied there was a "state actor."

"Terrorism is a real problem" Snowden said. Is it credible that Snowden, who presented himself as donating funds to Ron Paul, has never read any alternative news sites? Is it credible that Snowden believes that terrorists and this would include the good "moderate terrorists" in Syria are armed and act on their own initiative, and is ignorant of the role of the governments of America, Israel, and Saudi Arabia in using them to achieve their ends as proxy armies?

Does Snowden then think this report, " America Created Al-Qaeda and the ISIS Terror Group" is false? Does that mindset make Snowden a champion for liberty or a tool for more control of the American population? For example, is it credible that this alleged genius supports the narrative of the September 11 attacks World Trade Center attacks? Whom do you trust, the contributors to these very pages or Edward Snowden?

Snowden has promoted the use of the Tor Browser. ZeroHedge posted this article, " Tor Project 'Almost 100% Funded By The US Government': FOIA" which noted:

The Tor Project – a private nonprofit known as the "NSA-proof" gateway to the "dark web," turns out to be almost "100% funded by the US government" according to documents obtained by investigative journalist and author Yasha Levine.

In a recent blog post, Levine details how he was able to obtain roughly 2,500 pages of correspondence via FOIA requests while performing research for a book. The documents include strategy, contract, budgets and status updates between the Tor project and its primary source of funding; a CIA spinoff known as the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG), which "oversees America's foreign broadcasting operations like Radio Free Asia and Radio Free Europe."

By following the money, I discovered that Tor was not a grassroots. I was able to show that despite its indie radical cred and claims to help its users protect themselves from government surveillance online, Tor was almost 100% funded by three U.S. National Security agencies: the Navy, the State Department and the BBG. Following the money revealed that Tor was not a grassroots outfit, but a military contractor with its own government contractor number. In other words: it was a privatized extension of the very same government that it claimed to be fighting.

The documents conclusively showed that Tor is not independent at all. The organization did not have free reign to do whatever it wanted, but was kept on a very short leash and bound by contracts with strict contractual obligations. It was also required to file detailed monthly status reports that gave the U.S. government a clear picture of what Tor employees were developing, where they went and who they saw. -Yasha Levine

The FOIA documents also suggest that Tor's ability to shield users from government spying may be nothing more than hot air. While no evidence of a "backdoor" exists, the documents obtained by Levine reveal that Tor has "no qualms with privately tipping off the federal government to security vulnerabilities before alerting the public, a move that would give the feds an opportunity to exploit the security weakness long before informing Tor users."

Interestingly, Edward Snowden is a big fan of Tor – even throwing a "cryptoparty" while he was still an NSA contractor where he set up a Tor exit node to show off how cool they are.

In a 2015 interview with The Intercept's (Wikileaks hating) Micah Lee, Snowden said:

LEE: What do you think about Tor? Do you think that everyone should be familiar with it, or do you think that it's only a use-it-if-you-need-it thing?

SNOWDEN: I think Tor is the most important privacy-enhancing technology project being used today.

"Tor Browser is a great way to selectively use Tor to look something up and not leave a trace that you did it. It can also help bypass censorship when you're on a network where certain sites are blocked. If you want to get more involved, you can volunteer to run your own Tor node, as I do, and support the diversity of the Tor network."

Tor lists on its own website sponsors that include Google, the U.S. Department of State Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor, ONR via Naval Research Laboratory (past sponsor) and DARPA.

When Julian Assange was taken from the Ecuadoran embassy, he was carrying a copy of Gore Vidal: History of the National Security State & Vidal on America. As an older article on Vidal in The Guardian noted, " Gore Vidal claims 'Bush junta' complicit in 9/11 ."

Isn't it odd by doing what he did with Vidal's book Assange makes the point the legitimacy of Washington must be challenged, but Snowden never does, other than offering suggestions for tinkering at the margins, perhaps advising we use DuckDuckGo instead of Google to give us the illusion of privacy? Did Snowden, for someone who is in front of a computer screen for most of the day, make public the facts obtained by Whitney Webb in her piece " How the CIA, Mossad and 'the Epstein Network' Are Exploiting Mass Shootings to Create an Orwellian Nightmare " posted on Unz.com which goes in depth into the Orwellian hell we are facing, for as Webb concludes:

With companies like Carbyne -- with its ties to both the Trump administration and to Israeli intelligence -- and the Mossad-linked Gabriel also marketing themselves as "technological" solutions to mass shootings while also doubling as covert tools for mass data collection and extraction, the end result is a massive surveillance system so complete and so dystopian that even George Orwell himself could not have predicted it.

Following another catastrophic mass shooting or crisis event, aggressive efforts will likely follow to foist these "solutions" on a frightened American public by the very network connected, not only to Jeffrey Epstein, but to a litany of crimes and a frightening history of plans to crush internal dissent and would-be dissenters in the United States.

There is the concept of willful blindness that I think applies to much of what Snowden has done, if not something altogether more nefarious -- distorations, misrepresenations, and outright lies, in addition to hubris. What is the point I'm making? Perhaps Snowden is only a Soros and Hillary Clinton supporting liberal -- but then why would he have done what he did? His character is of any government employee of the "surface state" who swallows false narratives whole.

I only wish the reader fairly and intelligently consider the questions I have raised. For I am encouraging you to think very carefully before you trust the statements, purpose, motives, and truthfulness of the secular saint, Edward Snowden.

Yvonne Lorenzo makes her home in New England in a house full to bursting with books, including works on classical Greece. Her interests include gardening, mythology, ancient history, The Electric Universe, and classical music, especially the compositions of Handel, Mozart, Bach, Haydn, Tchaikovsky, Mahler, and the Bel Canto repertoire. She is the author of the novels the Son of Thunder and The Cloak of Freya and has contributed to LewRockwell.com and TheSaker.IS.


Nicolás Palacios Navarro , says: Website September 20, 2019 at 4:27 am GMT

Edward Snowden is a typical American fachidiot who, despite their protestations is a striver and bootlick for the Empire. I genuinely believe that he is puzzled as to why it has turned against him. He deserves his destiny of forever languishing in political purgatory.

Several years later, practically nobody remembers him here in the US, and possible elsewhere (save for when it is convenient for the media). Julian Assange was a far more daring, more insightful figure.

(As an aside, I am curious about the author's liking of bel canto . Lot of birdbrain music to my ears; I prefer Wagner, Strauss, Schreker, and Berg. Also, the older I get, the more I realize that Schoenberg was by far the greater genius than Mahler.)

ikki , says: September 20, 2019 at 4:56 am GMT
The logging of user and information accessed is sure added to the file. But real time supervision? No. A eye of sauron? Please. The system isnt there to prevent crime, its to track down the criminal and deeds later. And yes everything takes a very long time on the public side.

You know, 16:00 hours the mouse just drops dead from the hand. Public servants don't give a damn if a job is made fast or efficient, only that procedure if followed and that it is eventually done. Unless priorities are reassigned, stuff left halfway undone in disarray is no problem when reassigned.

Just as keeping secret private archives of more or less job related data is all standard procedure. That is keep a load of data in your personal folders and move those into whatever form desired. Security is not very tight. Only in the sense that eventually every person with hours and access point etc data can be recovered if so ordered to.

So stealing data out of that system shouldn't be terribly hard. Just email it to a private email. Or store on something else and transport out. For one Hillary was doing the same thing for ages. In that case though "what difference does it make"

Jonathan Revusky , says: Website September 20, 2019 at 5:26 am GMT
Why does the author distrust the Snowden story while taking the Assange saga at face value?
Horst G , says: September 20, 2019 at 6:41 am GMT
There was an interview with Edward in the German magazine Der Spiegel this month, Nr. 18. In it, we get the tale, he copied material on SD cards, and smugeled them in his mouth, or inside a "magic cube" out of the base on Hawaii, passing "guards". A cube, the occult symbol, how blatant, just mocking the profane.

On the technical side, I got a story from a German BMW factory. A bunch of guys on nightshift plugged a USB Harddisk into a PC to watch a movie. Minutes later they received a call from the IT, it had been recognized remotely. What a charade. It has the taste of Jewish tales, smuggling stuff, tricking guards of an evil system.

Tusk , says: September 20, 2019 at 6:49 am GMT
Great article, thanks Ron for publishing.
der einzige , says: Website September 20, 2019 at 7:00 am GMT
I recommend these articles from Jon Rappaport, unfortunately, wordpress deleted his blog.

and this

Russia gov report Snowden Greenwald are CIA frauds https://www.radios.cz/en/articles/russia-gov-report-snowden-greenwald-are-cia-frauds/

Brabantian , says: September 20, 2019 at 8:00 am GMT
Nice to have a piece helping point to the truth, that Glenn Greenwald & Edward Snowden are CIA frauds, as every major government knows

'Edward Snowden' who first 'leaked' to the CIA's Washington Post, in fact to Bush VP Dick Cheney's biographer Bart Gellman then the Deep State realised that was too stupid, so they switched to Rothschild employee & ex-gay-pornography-seller Glenn Greenwald, former proprietor of 'hairystuds', at the Guardian, an intel-agency rag which lies about nearly everything

Vladmir Putin himself hinting out loud he knows Snowden is fake, and 'Snowden asylum' is a game of back-door favours between Russia & the USA, few in the West pick up on it http://www.veteranstoday.com/2016/09/21/russia-govt-report-snowden-greenwald-are-cia-frauds/

Despite the Snowden-Assange mutual sniping in their media-star rivalry, Julian Assange is also a CIA-Mossad asset, as Bibi Netanyahu himself has boasted to Israeli media, regarding aggressively pro-Zionist, anti-Palestinian Julian, equally anti-9-11-truth along with Eddie Snowden

As loyal CIA assets, neither Assange and Snowden dare to mention USA Virginia fed judge bribery files that have blocked other extraditions, tho these files would make their own extraditions impossible, if these CIA fakers really cared about their own 'defence'

Zbigniew Brzezinski on 29 Nov 2010, on the US public television PBS News Hour, also admitted Assange was intel, his Wikileaks 'selected'

People trusting Assange are dead, Peter W Smith, Seth Rich; others jailed

Very darkly, it is unknown how many dissidents Snowden and also Julian Assange helped silence or even kill, both of them a 'rat trap' for trusting whistle-blowers
https://www.henrymakow.com/2018/11/assange-snowden-rat-traps.html

You will notice that Assange & Snowden both got famous via CIA – MI6 media, NY Times, UK Guardian, who are never interested in real dissidents

Assange shared lawyer with Rothschilds, Rothschild sister-in-law posted Assange bail, Assange has ties to George Soros too

Early on, Assange helped Rothschilds destroy rival bank Julius Baer that is 'progressive Wiki-leaking' for you

Assange had a weird childhood with Aussie mind-control cult 'the Family'

Things like 'Assange living at Ecuador Embassy' – 'now in Belmarsh prison' – easily faked, Assange moved in & out for photos by MI5 MI6, police under national security orders 'Snowden' is not necessarily in Russia either

Assange & Snowden de-legitimise real dissidents, because people say, 'Wikileaks – NY Times – UK Guardian would cover it if it was true'

Tree Watcher , says: September 20, 2019 at 8:10 am GMT
NeonRevolt once floated the theory that Snowden was an FBI or CIA plant who whistleblew solely because he had the mission to undermine NSA operations by exposing their equipment/techniques and turning public opinion against them.

I completely understand if people are leery of the theorycrafting of a Q tracker, but I do believe that this suggestion is plausible. Setting aside attempts at placing it in context of a Deep State war, inter-service rivalry and sabotage between spy agencies is absolutely a thing, and reviewing the inconsistencies of Snowden's stunt, its aftermath, and his personal views with that potential background in mind suddenly makes things make much more sense, in my mind at least.

animalogic , says: September 20, 2019 at 8:10 am GMT
Interesting, thought-provoking article. It asks us to balance up competing interests & advantages.

On the one hand we can assume Snowden is "real" or not. That is, he's a genuine whistle blower, or he's a government psy-op's plant.

If we accept the later, that he's a plant, then it raises a further question: was the short term loss, associated with his revelations, ie highlighting the utterly disturbing degree of Gov surveillance over US citizens (etc) worth the long term profit of having an established, authoritive psy-op's agent able to influence/distort etc any debate or narrative concerning the US State /elites. On this side the author notes Snowmen's views on Tor, 9/11, Russia etc which clearly advantage the US State's own views on these subjects.

I don't know the answer -- except that this article raises serious questions, suspicions , about Snowden's authenticity.

Franz , says: September 20, 2019 at 8:15 am GMT
Never for a moment considered Snowden any sort of secular saint.

Snowden for the most part only confirmed the downward trajectory of the formerly at least interesting filmmaker, Oliver Stone. If JFK was worth a laugh (and evidently did get a few people thinking about the phoniness of Dallas '63 for the first time), Snowden was total chloroform on screen. Sad to see Ollie hit such lows.

This bit is interesting:

When Julian Assange was taken from the Ecuadoran embassy, he was carrying a copy of Gore Vidal: History of the National Security State & Vidal on America. As an older article on Vidal in The Guardian noted, "Gore Vidal claims 'Bush junta' complicit in 9/11."

As batty as Vidal may have been, it is a fact he was the first American with any sort of national recognition to speak out against the National Security State, starting in the Eisenhower years. His fury was partly stoked by their meddling in Central America, but he stayed at it. Even gave it a mention in a movie he had a gag role in, Bob Roberts , 1992.

His favorite line (variously rendered) was "Harry Truman signed the United States of America into oblivion in February, 1949" which was when the NSA papers were drawn up, giving us the security state, the CIA and the whole shebang. Anytime before, any US citizen could demand accounting of any government project, no matter what. Afterward, the rule by secrecy applied.

Vidal had been a WWII veteran and deplored all that came about after. Credit is due for that.

wayfarer , says: September 20, 2019 at 8:30 am GMT

Even if you're not doing anything wrong, you are being watched and recorded. The NSA has built an infrastructure that allows it to intercept almost everything. With this capability, the vast majority of human communications are automatically ingested without targeting. If I wanted to see your emails or your wife's phone calls, all I have to do is use intercepts. I can get your emails, passwords, phone records, credit cards. – Edward Snowden

https://www.brainyquote.com/authors/edward-snowden-quotes

https://www.youtube.com/embed/e9yK1QndJSM?feature=oembed

Nik , says: September 20, 2019 at 9:05 am GMT
Both Assuange and Snowden are agent patsys
Oscar Peterson , says: September 20, 2019 at 9:14 am GMT
Who is this dizzy chick?

Snowden, exiled and isolated in Russia, is some sort of USG crypto-agent or something?

I suppose that if you're going to look for outside-the-box commentary and analysis, you're going to get some of this sort of nonsense. I guess you can't expect to hit a home run every time.

Oscar Peterson , says: September 20, 2019 at 9:20 am GMT
@Nicolás Palacios Navarro

"Edward Snowden is a typical American fachidiot who, despite their protestations is a striver and bootlick for the Empire. I genuinely believe that he is puzzled as to why it has turned against him. He deserves his destiny of forever languishing in political purgatory."

And yet this "striver and bootlick for the Empire" is exiled in Russia. So some guy sacrifices an enjoyable and secure life to go live in Russia and all you can say is that "he deserves his destiny?"

"Several years later, practically nobody remembers him here in the US"

And this is a reflection on him or on the rest of us?

anon [260] Disclaimer , says: September 20, 2019 at 9:42 am GMT
@Oscar Peterson She starts off with a falsehood:

> Edward Snowden would have us believe that the Eye of Sauron didn't notice

He states exactly the opposite. I quit reading her garbage after that.

AmRusDebate , says: Website September 20, 2019 at 10:18 am GMT
Comfortable living in Moscow, vs. Belmarsh, makes all the difference in the world.

You might be right about Snowden, you might not be, but were Assange living in a Russian city, far out of reach of NeoconiaDC, Bill Blaney would show him greater respect believe me.

anon [260] Disclaimer , says: September 20, 2019 at 10:21 am GMT
@Horst G Boy howdy, a Rubik's Cube is now magical, profane, occult, and eerily symbolic, because it's cubical! And geometry class is a satanic false flag op of oppressive propaganda taught by crypto-Jews! Who else could be interested in IRRATIONAL numbers like π? PYTHAGORAS WAS A MOSSAD AGENT!
Nicolás Palacios Navarro , says: Website September 20, 2019 at 10:57 am GMT
@Oscar Peterson

And yet this "striver and bootlick for the Empire" is exiled in Russia. So some guy sacrifices an enjoyable and secure life to go live in Russia and all you can say is that "he deserves his destiny?"

His "sacrifice" was inadvertent and involuntary. The fact that he seems not to appreciate the sanctuary offered to him by Russia -- has he not repeatedly expressed the desire to go elsewhere? -- says a lot. From everything I have read about him, it would appear that he regards his exile not as something to be borne with dignity, but as something to pout over as does a child who unexpectedly did not get his way.

Julian Assange, on the other hand, sacrificed much more and did so willingly and courageously. He had no illusions about the consequences that he would face for his beliefs and actions.

And this is a reflection on him or on the rest of us?

Both. Nobody remembers anything here in the US anyway, least of all people and events which do not flatter the national mythos. In the case of this would-be patriot -- the scion of a family that grew fat at the government teat, and who himself has made a tidy profit from his exile -- his unofficial damnatio memoriæ is deserved.

anon [260] Disclaimer , says: September 20, 2019 at 11:07 am GMT
@Franz > veteran Credit is due for that.

Maybe you ought to give Snowden some credit for his military service too. Fair is fair.

Snowden enlisted in the United States Army Reserve on May 7, 2004, and became a Special Forces candidate through its 18X enlistment option.[39] He did not complete the training.[12] After breaking both legs in a training accident,[40] he was discharged on September 28, 2004.[41]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Snowden#Career

9/11 Inside job , says: September 20, 2019 at 11:11 am GMT
@Brabantian Is Seth Rich dead ? OpDeepState.com : "The 'murder' of Seth Rich – Everything we thought we knew is wrong !" by Lisa Phillips . "The MOSSAD infiltrated Clinton's campaign with a Sayanim contractor – Seth Rich – this OP took Hillary right out of the race ."
anon [260] Disclaimer , says: September 20, 2019 at 11:19 am GMT
Tor is a great tool, if you know how to use it correctly. The US gov't know people don't know how to use it correctly, and sets up exit nodes to spy on idiots, like this:

In 2007 Egerstad set up just five Tor exit nodes and used them to intercept thousands of private emails, instant messages and email account credentials.

Amongst his unwitting victims were the Australia, Japanese, Iranian, India and Russia embassies, .

Dan Egerstad proved then that exit nodes were a fine place to spy on people and his research convinced him in 2007, long before Snowden, that governments were funding expensive, high bandwidth exit nodes for exactly that purpose.

Tor is a fine security project and an excellent component in a strategy of defence in depth but it isn't (sadly) a cloak of invisibility.

Exit nodes, just like fake Wi-Fi hotspots, are an easy and tempting way for attackers to silently insert themselves into a network.

By running an exit node they can sit there as an invisible man-in-the-middle on a system that people choose when they want extra privacy and security.

Can you trust Tor's exit nodes?
https://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2015/06/25/can-you-trust-tors-exit-nodes/

So just assume the US gov't is your exit node, thank them silently for paying for you to use it free, and keep your info encrypted.

Svevlad , says: September 20, 2019 at 11:30 am GMT
Both him and Assange are spooks
Rabbitnexus , says: September 20, 2019 at 11:50 am GMT
Well, this is refreshing. I agree wholeheartedly about Snowden and have the same reservations. My feelings about Assange, however, aren't much different. Julian has not challenged the 9/11 narrative either to be fair. I am inclined to see them both as limited hangouts. Snowden's 'revelations' were all old news to anyone who'd been paying attention for 10 years before his appearance. Even other whistleblowers, none of whom got any media coverage, had spoken of much of it previously. I see them both as pied pipers and nothing more. I think Russian intelligence services are perfectly well aware of what Snowden is and have kept him at arms length themselves. Not much they could do but play along but nothing suggests they ever saw him as any sort of 'coup'

Anyone who still plays along with the 9/11 bullshit narrative isn't worth a damn anyway.

Rabbitnexus , says: September 20, 2019 at 11:58 am GMT
@animalogic Consider that nothing Snowden revealed was news. It was all old hat for anyone who'd been paying attention, and for up to ten years. Sure Snowden made it mainstream for what good it did but nothing he said was a secret anymore. In fact, I thought even at the time his actions were nothing less than a 'threat and warning' from the intel services that they had this much on everyone. Just imagine all those national leaders, politicians from all states being pout on notice. All your secrets are ours! What a powerful global message to deliver and in such a loud and clear fashion.

The lack of deviation from official bullshit on 9/11 is on its own however reason enough to toss this guy out. Snowden NEVER impressed me for a moment and honestly, nor has Assange. I believe they're both working for the other side still. By the way, Julian Assange has actually denigrated 9/11 truthers a number of times.

Horst G , says: September 20, 2019 at 12:08 pm GMT
@anon It's in the magazine, page 82, quote "Zauberwürfel". Presented by me, for you to get the picture. Maybe you haven't seen enough cubes around, to get that humor. In real life, copying material on devices will be followed by arrest, no interview, no journey to some exile. This whole tale is not funny, it's evil on many levels. Your sarcasm is disturbing.
Realist , says: September 20, 2019 at 12:09 pm GMT
@Nicolás Palacios Navarro

Several years later, practically nobody remembers him here in the US, and possible elsewhere (save for when it is convenient for the media). Julian Assange was a far more daring, more insightful figure.

I disagree, there are plenty of people who remember him. The problem is they don't care, most Americans would rather watch America's Got Talent or Dancing With The Stars than do something about our corrupt political system.

Johnny Walker Read , says: September 20, 2019 at 12:16 pm GMT
Assange and Snowden are both shill's..

https://aanirfan.blogspot.com/search?q=assange

Johnny Walker Read , says: September 20, 2019 at 12:20 pm GMT
@Johnny Walker Read And

2013 Edward Snowden 'leaked stolen documents' (1) 'Leaked' to Dick Cheney friend at CIA WashPost, Rothschild employee Greenwald (2) Anti-9-11-truth (3) Nothing really new beyond more than 5+ previous NSA whistleblowers (4) Has CIA lawyers, worked with Brzezinski son, promoted by Brzezinski daughter, fake CV history (5) Known as fake to all major gov intel agencies

https://aanirfan.blogspot.com/search?q=snowden

Johnny Walker Read , says: September 20, 2019 at 12:31 pm GMT
@Johnny Walker Read This is absolutely dynamite material, it blows to smithereens any notion that Edward Snowden is anything other than a fraud, a CIA disinfo op.

So now we can place him alongside Julian Assange and Wikileaks in the rogue's gallery of professional liars. This report also exposes several other media outlets as being under CIA control, something we have known for some time

https://www.veteranstoday.com/2016/09/21/russia-govt-report-snowden-greenwald-are-cia-frauds/

foolisholdman , says: September 20, 2019 at 1:04 pm GMT
@animalogic

I don't know the answer -- except that this article raises serious questions, suspicions , about Snowden's authenticity.

To my mind "9/11, attitude to", is a sort of touch-stone for telling genuine dissidents from fake and both Snowden and Assange fail on that test. I don't have a reference for it, but I saw it in correspondence on this site. There was a video of a lecture given by Assange, where someone asked him about 9/11. He looked extremely embarrassed and then replied that he thought that it was "not very important" (Sic!) and changed the subject.

I am less sure of this but I think I saw something similar in an interview with Snowden. Perhaps someone else can remind me of exact references?

Amon , says: September 20, 2019 at 1:23 pm GMT
This is the same government whose leaders secure their laptops with the secret code "pas$word" and require the producers of computers to give them full access via day one exploits along with tailor fitted programs that are easier to hack.

That Snowden got away with what he did is not that shocking.

Justvisiting , says: September 20, 2019 at 1:23 pm GMT
These days Snowden has become a generic term for whistleblowing on the Deep State tech spying, like xerox for copying. I suppose someone here wants to remind us that this was _really_ the first copier, patented in 1879:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gestetner

The truth or falsity of the original "myth" becames moot at some point.

The Deep State is spying. They do have hardware and software and monkey in the middle hacks. They do trade intelligence with other spy agencies, domestic and foreign. They lie about it through the Mockingbird media.

_That_ is what is important.

Snowden's bona fides are "inside baseball", and minor league baseball at that.

.gov IT security is a joke–millions of pages of regulations, proclamations, millions of hours of management meetings, goals, powerpoint slides–ultimately easily outmatched by any determined hackers (whether in mom's basement or an intelligence agency's basement).

Multiple Fronts , says: September 20, 2019 at 1:32 pm GMT
CIA Edward Snowden? ...
Antiwar7 , says: September 20, 2019 at 1:34 pm GMT
If he was a sys admin, that probably meant he had the rights to install, remove, enable, and disable the various safety guards and security checks discussed in this article.
sally , says: September 20, 2019 at 1:48 pm GMT
@Jonathan Revusky Yvonne Lorenzo paper suggest suspect issues exist to support Snowden's story but finds Assange's saga to be based in epic, consistent, continued resistance to the organized forces at work in governments and high profile international corporations and agencies to keep secret things which expose officials as criminals.

<=the difference is consistency, scope and finger points. Assange has been consistent.. always seeking to make available as much as he could, always with as much clarity as possible; making the point where he could, that much of what he exposed seems to be in the domain of organized crime. Assange often exposes high profile persons and tags them with evidence to connect them to prior and current organized crime or obviously corrupt activities. Assange shows these persons or governments or agencies are involved in secret diplomatic activities, the secrecy of which seem always to be protected by judicial and legal processes

The Assange story paints a picture that suggest globally organized crime has come into possession and now manages and controls many well armed domestic governments and that selected agencies of government have been enabling selected private enterprises. Assange exposes intelligence services of many different nations to be a bank, corporation, and agency inter connects that coordinate infrastructure destruction, invasion, regime change, and war, and that these events are often followed by opportunistic privatization.

Snowden merely says a few things are wrong and should be corrected. in time the government will fix its own mistakes. I do not know if Snowden is a Trojan, but nothing Assange has done suggest he is and governments have treated Assange as anything but one of them. My opinion.

der einzige , says: Website September 20, 2019 at 2:04 pm GMT
@foolisholdman I think you meant that

https://www.youtube.com/embed/zG23AyiIObk?feature=oembed

Oscar Peterson , says: September 20, 2019 at 2:35 pm GMT
@Nicolás Palacios Navarro I agree that Assange has suffered much more than Snowden, but why hold that against the latter?

Snowden took a risk to publicize what he thought was important information indicating a dangerous trend in US policy. He wasn't willing to offer himself up as a lamb to the slaughter, so it's true that his sacrifice is not perhaps the ultimate one. He seems to have thought he could remain in Hong Kong but didn't realize that China was never going to compromise relations with the US to protect him. Putin wouldn't have either except that the US was so imperious in demanding his return that Putin really couldn't save face and give him up, and no doubt he was rankled by US hypocrisy, knowing that had Snowden been a Russian, the US would never have considered sending him back.

But Snowden DID take action which is more than most of us do. I find your complete lack of empathy kind of weird, to be honest. Even if Assange is the more virtuous or if one disagrees with Snowden's actions, he has paid a price for principle.

What does his family background have to do with anything?

I'm not inclined to sneer at him, and I don't see how you get to "he deserves what he gets."

Commentator Mike , says: September 20, 2019 at 2:44 pm GMT
@Brabantian Brabantian,

So Pamela Anderson lied about visiting Assange in the embassy? If they're faking it, wherever he is he isn't in the public eye walking down the street or sitting in a Starbucks, so he's leading a prison life anyway behind closed doors somewhere. I suppose a dedicated agent would do something like that for Queen and country or whatever, but I doubt he's the type. I gather veterans today are trying to cast Assange as a Mossad agent but then they're the Journal of the Clandestine Community, whatever that is.

Snowden is not a classic defector so it makes sense for him to keep his distance from Russian society so as not to be inadvertently compromised or used by their intelligence services. He's obviously under surveillance there, I know we all are but he's much more aware of it, so that doesn't make it easy for him but he's definitely safer there than he'd be in France or Germany. I just don't think he planned well ahead when he became a whistle-blower or was clear about what he was trying to achieve. He's not the top level type of spy we're accustomed to reading about who betray their country for money or to serve another they believe in more than their own. If he has been on active duty as a CIA asset all along I can't see that he has achieved much of use to them other than in some inter-agency rivalry game. But it's natural for Russians to be suspicious of him – they're suspicious by nature – and rightly so, but it doesn't make his life easy there.

Justvisiting , says: September 20, 2019 at 2:46 pm GMT
@der einzige Thanks for posting–Assange looked dazed and confused by the question itself.

It could be "rogue agents". A mind is a terrible thing to waste.

anon [260] Disclaimer , says: September 20, 2019 at 2:48 pm GMT
@Anonymous Snanonymous > Snowden, unlike Assange, largely suffered from pussy deprivation

You're projecting your own lack of success with females. Meanwhile, Snowden's squeeze Lindsay Mills lives with him in Moscow.

Snowden's lawyer Anatoly Kucherena confirmed the lovebirds' reunion and said they've been taking in Russian theaters and cultural sights together. "Love is love," he told AFP. "She lives with him when she comes here. Moral support is very important for Edward."
https://nypost.com/2014/10/11/snowdens-girlfriend-lives-with-him-in-moscow-documentary-reveals/

There's no way an envious gamma like you could tap this:

Anonymous [893] Disclaimer , says: September 20, 2019 at 2:51 pm GMT
Good stuff. Snowden was outed by Gordon Duff years ago. Although I'll have to come back to finish this article, it generally appears to agree with Duff's analysis that none of it adds up. If I may paraphrase Edward Bernays, To read the Washington Post and Guardian or watch TV news is to see America and Western Civilization through the eyes of its enemy.

The owners of the media own the public forum in America and through it the formation of men's attitudes and the outcome of elections. The left vs right, CNN vs Fox News, MAGA vs socialism and other contrived theater serves the interests of the media owners and no other.

TheJester , says: September 20, 2019 at 3:02 pm GMT
@Jonathan Revusky Try this:

Assange tried to destroy the "system", which would have furthered the conditions for completing the ongoing, global Cultural Marxist Revolution Mao Zedong on steroids.

Snowden, on the other hand, wanted something much less extreme. He wanted to fix and save the "system" by exposing its excesses in order to bring it back within a quasi-legal, democratic framework.

In response, the "system" was satisfied to teach Snowden a lesson. They were willing to slap Snowden's hand by exiling him to Western Russia, which is better than rotting in a Siberian labor camp or "max" prison in the United States.

Assange, on the other hand, is a reincarnated, digital version of Che Guevara. They want his scalp, recognizing that Assange (like Che Guevara) will brook no compromise in his revolutionary agitation.

Anonymous Snanonymous , says: September 20, 2019 at 3:22 pm GMT
@anon Thank you for the update I remain celibate out of consideration for those who are truly hard up.
Sparkon , says: September 20, 2019 at 3:29 pm GMT
Good article. Snowden and Assange are agents of disinformation

"I'm constantly annoyed that people are distracted by false conspiracies such as 9/11, when all around we provide evidence of real conspiracies, for war or mass financial fraud."

-- Julian Assange

http://911blogger.com/news/2010-07-22/wikileaks-founder-julian-assange-annoyed-911-truth

Assange's damming statement about 9/11 at the Belfast Telegraph is now behind a sign-up gatepost, which was not there in the fairly recent past.

9/11 Inside job , says: September 20, 2019 at 4:36 pm GMT
9/11 is the "litmus test" and it appears that both Assange and Snowden have failed it.
anon [260] Disclaimer , says: September 20, 2019 at 5:06 pm GMT
@9/11 Inside job Well, the Real Litmus Test ™ is eternal security vs. conditional salvation. Don't fail, or everything else you've ever said must be summarily dismissed. Answer well, friendo .

Splitting (also called black-and-white thinking or all-or-nothing thinking) is the failure in a person's thinking to bring together the dichotomy of both positive and negative qualities of the self and others into a cohesive, realistic whole. It is a common defense mechanism.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Splitting_(psychology)

Nicolás Palacios Navarro , says: Website September 20, 2019 at 6:09 pm GMT
@Realist

The problem is they don't care, most Americans would rather watch America's Got Talent or Dancing With The Stars than do something about our corrupt political system.

Also very true.

Outrage Beyond , says: September 20, 2019 at 6:43 pm GMT
It appears the author of this piece has not read Snowden's book, Permanent Record . If she had, she would not have asked questions which are answered, in detail, in Snowden's book. Here are some of the most obvious points.

1. "Why does Snowden never discuss dealing with such encryption: how would it be possible?"

Answer: In his book, Snowden describes the layers of encryption that he used when copying the files from NSA. He also describes the extraordinary level of access he had as a systems engineer. Further, he mentions his surprise at finding that the NSA did not practice widespread encryption, in contrast to his experience at CIA, where the hard drives were not only encrypted, but removed from the computers and placed in a safe each night.

2. "In the Oliver Stone movie Snowden, as well as in any of Snowden's descriptions of how he accessed the NSA computers, did you note either the depiction or reference to this universal Smart ID? How could Snowden be exempt from its requirement?"

Answer: Movies omit details. In his book, Snowden describes working in the one-person Information Sharing department. As part of that work, he brought an older, "obsolete" system to his office under the cover story of "compatibility testing" and used this older system to copy the data.

3. "Did Edward Snowden, who has publicly criticized Google, mention Google is deployed as a search engine throughout the federal "intranet"?"

Answer: Yes, as a matter of fact, in his book, Snowden does mention that Google provides a custom internal version of their search engine to the intelligence community.

4. "Edward Snowden would have us believe that the Eye of Sauron didn't notice he was looking at gigabytes of data unrelated to his job function and using his computer to copy the data to external devices over a lengthy period of time."

Answer: In his book, Snowden describes how he created a "readboard" that collected the documents as part of his work in the Information Sharing department. He also describes how another systems administrator did notice, and how he addressed this attention by providing access to his "readboard" to the other administrator, and explained its purpose and value to users. In other words, the "gigabytes of data" he was looking at were directly related to his job function.

5. "On another issue, why did Snowden provide his files to known house organs of Intelligence Agencies, specifically the Washington Post and The Guardian, and not give them to Wikileaks to allow a publicly available searchable database?"

Answer: Snowden also discusses this topic in his book. According to Snowden, he did not want to simply release the information, he wanted the media to remove anything that might cause harm.

6. "And what about Snowden himself, the pontificator, the man who can speak on television or to the media with evidence of training? Practice yourself -- see how well you can answer questions and speak publicly to a TV camera. How did he get his training? Who trained him? Why?"

Answer: After 6 years of media attention, it seems reasonable he would gain some expertise in dealing with the media.

My purpose in providing the answers above is not to defend or attack Snowden. Rather, these examples just show that the author of this piece is a sloppy amateur who did not do her homework. I suspect the author is also woefully ignorant of computer technology. Anyone curious about these topics should read Permanent Record and decide for themselves.

PetrOldSack , says: September 20, 2019 at 6:49 pm GMT
@sally

My opinion.

Your opinion stands. Snowden has de facto been compromised. Being in Russia, and not in control of his environment. Whether he was from the start, could be. The Tor browser bull- *** t speaks against him all the way. His conventional career start, and youth also. He is more Macron then a Galloway.

Assange was in for the long term, had thorough knowledge of affairs digital, his youth, his physical courage(there must be a point where selling out was a possibility) were exemplary all along the (long) and still ongoing slug.

Even his ego, fronting Wikileaks seems to be proportionate as compared to the conventional Jerks &, as Pompeo, Hillary, Trump, Obama. If one sees how many personnel is dedicated to steer elections and governance public opinion, he certainly looks like a lonely giant on the civil disobedience, organizational, knowledgeable, energy spent and resilience side. A true example of what White, and Western European descend stands for. Enlightenment, in system, style, and function. Relevancy, long term goals, dare, does not come better then that.

PetrOldSack , says: September 20, 2019 at 6:53 pm GMT
@Justvisiting Very to the point. True over the whole stretch digital communication is in existence.
Mark Hunter , says: Website September 20, 2019 at 6:59 pm GMT
@Oscar Peterson I don't have "Agree/Disagree/Etc" privileges so I say here that I agree with you.

Some of the pompous ingrates trashing Snowden for the flimsiest of reasons still seem to have a high opinion of Thomas Drake, William Binney, or Kirk Wiebe. They might read this: Three NSA Veterans Speak Out on Whistleblower

peterAUS , says: September 20, 2019 at 7:06 pm GMT
@ikki Pretty much.

The author, interestingly enough, isn't I.T. professional, but, has very definite opinions about IT security. Dumb.

Just email it to a private email.

Well, firewall logs could reveal your connection to some email server outside ..

Or store on something else and transport out.

Yep. Hehe the girl doesn't actually get how that "encryption" thing works. OSI layers etc.

And, what people really don't get: all security is as good as an average person using it. As hehe you pointed out:

Hillary was doing the same thing for ages.

Insider doesn't need to tackle technology. All he/she needs is to tackle is a dumb employee. Anyway .

I could make my home systems quite secure, even against Five Eyes. That would create another set of even worse problems, but let's leave it out for now.
The problem is my wife and her browsing/computer use habits. Hehe makes sense?

peterAUS , says: September 20, 2019 at 7:09 pm GMT
@Outrage Beyond A very good comment.

Especially

.a systems engineer .. the one-person Information Sharing department . .providing access to his "readboard" to the other administrator .

anon [260] Disclaimer , says: September 20, 2019 at 7:26 pm GMT
@Realist Snowden did "do something about our corrupt political system," not that anybody here cares.

And God Bless America.

https://www.youtube.com/embed/8kssysjyPl0?feature=oembed

niceland , says: September 20, 2019 at 8:46 pm GMT
Snowden keeping "distance" to Russia, and not openly defending them seems reasonable to me. You can imagine the smear campaign back home if he would side with Russia against the U.S. on almost anything. "The Russians got to him" or "He was always their man".

He is trying to keep his neutrality and credibility and his target audience isn't the average Unz reader, but rather some mainstream educated middle/upper class blokes. Easily scared away from his views if they become too controversial and too far from the established narrative.

Last but not least, he is playing very dangerous game, probably without much security from his host country. This probably limits what he can do, TPTB could probably get to him if they wanted it badly enough.

anon [260] Disclaimer , says: September 20, 2019 at 8:49 pm GMT
@Horst G Everybody with the slight familiarity about the story knows of Snowden's use of the Ernő Rubik's Cube to hide the SD card.

> In real life, copying material on devices will be followed by arrest, no interview, no journey to some exile.

Snowden proved you wrong, by the skin of his teeth.

> Your sarcasm is disturbing.

Yeah? How do you think folks feel about your black cape and a fiberglass helmet?

Republic , says: September 20, 2019 at 8:54 pm GMT
@anon Wasn't Ross William Ulbricht compromised by using Tor ?
anon [260] Disclaimer , says: September 20, 2019 at 9:12 pm GMT
@PetrOldSack > The Tor browser bull- *** t speaks against him all the way

No, your stupid bull- *** t lack of understanding about Tor speaks against you all the way. It's not encryption, like you probably think it is. It's simply a way to use another IP address without having to drive to the nearest Starbucks to use their wifi. You treat Tor just like any "free" wifi, assuming that your data is being sniffed and collected. If you're going to message, use Signal (or Telegram.) Always force HTTPS. Use encryption. All Tor does is obfuscate your IP location, which is exactly what Snowden states, "All Tor does is obfuscate your IP location .

"[Tor] allows you to disassociate your physical location ."

EDWARD SNOWDEN EXPLAINS HOW TO RECLAIM YOUR PRIVACY
https://theintercept.com/2015/11/12/edward-snowden-explains-how-to-reclaim-your-privacy/

And now Brave Browser has it built in! So easy. Try it. Just don't do anything on Tor that you wouldn't do with a Starbuck's free wifi in Foggy Bottom.

anon [260] Disclaimer , says: September 20, 2019 at 9:29 pm GMT
@Republic How he got taken down is here , and it started with the name-fag using his Real Name while e-begging for help to run illegal websites, and ended up with a half-dozen FBI agents tailing him at his arrest. Even then, Tor made it harder for the FBI to track him, just not impossible.

Tor only does one thing, obfuscate your physical location. That's it. It's not magic. It's a virtual way to sit at the Starbucks cafe and use their free wifi. Just assume the exit node is owned by the Feds, looking for criminal morons who don't understand it and think it's "secure" or "encrypted." It's not. Use encryption too.

Gg , says: September 20, 2019 at 10:09 pm GMT
Stuff like this just confirms Qanon. He said years ago Snowden was a CIA plant in the NSA to reveal this information about their mass surveillance on purpose. Why ? Maybe it relates to what Michael Hoffman describes as revelation of the method – a process of revealing the crimes being committed against us by "they" so it breeds apathy and despair in the population when nothing comes from
The revelation of the crimes
The Company , says: September 20, 2019 at 11:06 pm GMT
The Russian authorities are capable of asking the same perceptive questions – – and yet they continue to be gracious hosts.
Sean , says: September 20, 2019 at 11:10 pm GMT
An allegedly very high iq high school from a family with drop out Snowden's tried to join special forces and failed jump school, he failed a polygraph, got accepted to the CIA though not as a field agent despite his lack of a degree, and was bounced from the CIA and then got a job with Dell as an outside contractor on the basis of his still intact security clearance, the contractors were not compartmentalised in the way government employees were.

Then he went to work for defense contractor Booz Allen Hamilton, at an NSA facility in Hawaii. In subsequent interview with journalists, Snowden lied about his doing undercover work for the CIA, salary and seniority at Booz Allen, being able to spy on the the emails and phone calls of President Obama. Oh, and suffering broken bones in special forces jump school, he just had shin splints It is very clear how he got access, and why most of the people who gave him it did not own up.

https://nypost.com/2013/11/08/snowden-duped-coworkers-to-get-passwords/ Snowden duped co-workers to get passwords A handful of agency employees who gave their login details to Snowden were identified, questioned and removed from their assignments, said a source close to several U.S. government investigations into the damage caused by the leaks.

Snowden may have persuaded between 20 and 25 fellow workers at the NSA regional operations center in Hawaii to give him their logins and passwords by telling them they were needed for him to do his job as a computer systems administrator, a second source said.

Are we to believe the NSA lacks a "digital trail" when it comes to classified documents?

It's only difficult to believe if you think NASA (like the CIA and FBI once were) are only guarded in relation to external rather than internal security breaches

[A] frightening history of plans to crush internal dissent and would-be dissenters in the United States.

Why would they bother? Those dissenters cannot change anything, while they are whiling away their free time on the internet. Such activity cannot change anything at all, and so it is to be encouraged from the point of view of any establishment as open dissent on the net wards off the allegation of totalitarian state. Talk is cheap.

Johnny Walker Read , says: September 21, 2019 at 2:19 am GMT
Learn to recognize government dis-info. http://mileswmathis.com/glenn.pdf
ShermanFan , says: September 21, 2019 at 2:28 am GMT
I'm not going to comment on the person or their agenda, rather the process-broadly.

Can you copy encrypted files without knowledge and smuggle them out? Short answer: Yes, with a second device and some standard hardware stuff. They can see the second device if it is plugged in, but they have to look for it. There is no need to try and copy from the source, copy the output to a second machine that can interpret.

Franz , says: September 21, 2019 at 6:25 am GMT
@anon

ought to give Snowden some credit for his military service too.

Hell, I'd give the guy credit for his quick sprinting at the NSA. But we haven't established if he was a wiz kid or a plant.

Vidal went into the US Army after Pearl Harbor, at age 17. Even though he'd been his high school representative for the America First Committee, trying to keep the US out of the war. Due to hypothermia working on army transport ships in the Aleutians, he was initially misdiagnosed as arthritic and, not being caught in time, ended up first with a titanium leg replacement years later, then in a wheelchair.

I remain sort of impressed when a young man opposes a fight, then for patriotic reasons, serves anyway (and pays a steep price).

I'm sure we'll get the full story on Snowden sooner or later.

anon [260] Disclaimer , says: September 21, 2019 at 12:58 pm GMT
@Saggy A stupid girl who is completely unfamiliar with the Snowden history. For example, she asks this, "why did Snowden provide his files to The Guardian?"

Because he needed immediate press coverage. He didn't have weeks or even days, he had at most a few hours. His story had to be in the press the next morning. Both Greenwald and the Guardian reporter were with him at the hotel, worried that Snowden might even be assassinated if caught by US forces, and worked to get immediate press coverage of his plight to save his life. Plus, he was in constant contact with Wikileaks'Julian Assange, which she conveniently ignores to promote her lie-based conspiritard theory.

Without his story getting into the press within a few hours, and without Wikileaks' Julian Assange helping Snowden, he'd be in prison now, at best, possibly dead.

I say, give the guy a fair trial. He has asked for a fair trial. But the US Gov't has refused to allow his motive to be considered in the trial. Amazing, isn't it? Since when is motive to not be considered in a criminal trial?

For Snowden, a fair trial means allowing the jury to consider his motivations rather than simply deciding the case on whether a law was broken.

"They want the jury strictly to consider whether these actions were lawful or unlawful, not whether they were right or wrong," Snowden said. "And I'm sorry, but that defeats the purpose of a jury trial."

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2019/09/17/edward-snowden-releases-book-russia-wants-fair-trial-us/2349586001/

Che Guava , says: September 21, 2019 at 3:26 pm GMT
Tor may still be a good tool, it certainly was, I had great fun using it to troll and set off edit wars on English Wikipedia for a year or two mid-last decade. One of those edit wars lasted for about three days. I just watched after starting it (but I meant what I said in the comment that set it off, but not always in the trolling(^-^)v).

In any case, the English-language WP has been madly tracking Tor exit nodes and banning them since about early '07.

Fun while it lasted.

As for the wrong way to use it, that basically means making a connection to any other site, without Tor, while using Tor. I slipped up on that once or twice when slightly drunk.

I don't even know if using Tor is even legal in Japan now. I do love, however, how Wikipedia is aggressively supressing it.

Some politicians in ruling party were moving to make it illegal a couple of years ago, our polity is so nonsensical that I have to checck Japanese wiki to see the result.

Any fule knows that Tor original is a U.S.N. programme,

Yvonne Lorenzo , says: September 21, 2019 at 6:42 pm GMT
@der einzige

I recommend these articles from Jon Rappaport, unfortunately, wordpress deleted his blog.

Rappaport started my thinking and I bookmarked his pages long ago and to my horror found the site was taken down. I wonder why? Glad for this archive. Thank you.

Yvonne Lorenzo , says: September 21, 2019 at 6:57 pm GMT
@Outrage Beyond

It appears the author of this piece has not read Snowden's book, Permanent Record. If she had, she would not have asked questions which are answered, in detail, in Snowden's book. Here are some of the most obvious points.

1. "Why does Snowden never discuss dealing with such encryption: how would it be possible?"

Answer: In his book, Snowden describes the layers of encryption that he used when copying the files from NSA. He also describes the extraordinary level of access he had as a systems engineer. Further, he mentions his surprise at finding that the NSA did not practice widespread encryption, in contrast to his experience at CIA, where the hard drives were not only encrypted, but removed from the computers and placed in a safe each night.

2. "In the Oliver Stone movie Snowden, as well as in any of Snowden's descriptions of how he accessed the NSA computers, did you note either the depiction or reference to this universal Smart ID? How could Snowden be exempt from its requirement?"

Answer: Movies omit details. In his book, Snowden describes working in the one-person Information Sharing department. As part of that work, he brought an older, "obsolete" system to his office under the cover story of "compatibility testing" and used this older system to copy the data.

No, I haven't read the book–yet.

As part of a forensic analysis, which none of you were observant enough to understand, the subject is interviewed without knowledge of the questions in advance. His answers would be evaluated based on facts, for which a forensic IT team with no connections to government contractors would be part of and gain access to NSA systems. Thus, testimony is considered but it must be verified. Rand Paul might be one to open an investigation into the inadequacy of NSA security but government investigating itself is suspect. No such investigation will ever take place.

Note there has been no calls, that I am aware of, for any GAO study of NSA vulnerabilities.

Second, the critics miss the point: providing files to CIA-Five Eye fronts like Guardian and CIA Washington Post is suspect. As per what I wrote, no one now has access to this data.

I suspect Snowden leaked legitimate information to con the Russians to be on their soil and conduct malfeasance. Prior to Putin providing S-300s to Syria, Israel had better relations with Russia. I suspect Q is also coordinated by Intel agency friendly to Likud. Note his mention of John Perry Barlow before his death. He warned of Snowden being sent deliberately to Russia and hence my concern for CIA doing something stupid.

As to his comments on not supporting Russia, no support is necessary. If he were a decent human being he could simply have stated, "Election interference notwithstanding the U.S. should pursue non-aggressive posture against Russia. There was no 'Second Pearl Harbor.' The risk of nuclear war is great and I agree with President Trump to reduce tensions, although I disagree with his politics."

Instead, see his Tweets supporting the Pussy Hats and "We came, we saw, he died" Hillary Clinton.

In the event, Snowden is irrelevant. The end of Empire is imminent.

Read Martyanov's post on the recent threats America made to Russia here.

https://smoothiex12.blogspot.com/2019/09/why-would-you-ask.html

I have compassion for Snowden. His end will likely be as Skripals was: disappearance by Western IC which he supports and blame placed on Russia.

We are free to disagree with one another. I trust nothing a supporter of Empire says.

As to September 11 I wasn't aware of Assange's remarks. This is the touchstone as others have said. Snowden enlisted because of September 11 false flag. Yeah, right, he is an idiot savant.

Even Ed Asner who no longer wins Emmy awards and is blackballed had the courage to do this video. Trust Snowden? I think not.

Y. Lorenzo (this site will not allow me to post under my name)

p.s. Ron uses Gmail. The nearest military base is a long, long way from my location. A helicopter outfitted with surveillance bubbles overflew after I submitted this piece.. Coincidence, right?

I will fight for the truth. I receive no compensation for my work and expect none. I support the cause of peace and not Empire. Thanks for the intelligent supportive comments. Ad hominem attacks mean nothing. Thanks to Ron for posting though he disagrees.

Che Guava , says: September 21, 2019 at 7:17 pm GMT
...re. 'Smowden"when he was constantly whining about Russia, getting hhs pole-dancing gf to join him there must have been a major effort, but he has no gratitude for it.

Really strange. At the time, I thought that Putin's comment 'he is a strange young man' had to do only with questions of loyalty and betrayal, of course, it was lilekely deeper and more suspicious than that. If I had been in the position like 'Snowden', after first having been granted asylum, my priority would have been to study the language. I would gtuess that he can order food or drink, do basic greetings, and not much else.

Sean , says: September 21, 2019 at 7:22 pm GMT
@Republic Snowden's wife is a former pole dancer, those are for good for something, but its not marrying. Everything about him suggests immaturity, from his toying with the idea of being a model to his trying to go from frail civilian with a youth spent 24/7 gaming to passing jumps school. He stole vastly more than he could ever have read, much of it having no bearing on privacy so he has no idea what he might have compromised. Quoth he:

There is a secrecy agreement, but there is also an oath of service. An oath of service is to support and defend, not an agency, not even the president, it is to support and defend the Constitution of the United States of America against all enemies – direct quote – foreign and domestic. And this begs the question, what happens when our obligations come into conflict.

If you have meaningful values (ie those that do not charge to suit your personal aggrandisement) you resign, I but instead of doing that he deliberately got another job contracting with the NSA all the better to steal data.

peterAUS , says: September 21, 2019 at 7:56 pm GMT
@Yvonne Lorenzo

.In the event, Snowden is irrelevant. The end of Empire is imminent. Read Martyanov's post on the recent threats America made to Russia here .

That was fast, even for this pub.

Ad hominem attacks mean nothing.

You mean being positive about you UNABLE to visualize a byte from a "keypress" moving all the way to the LAN cable with each timer "click"? You know, buffers, busses, microcode/firmware, interrupts, stack/heap, closed source, encryption/decryption layer of the OSI stack etc. That's for technology. As for people, unaware of an average idiot user in any environment using IT, Governments in particular, and the role and power of sysadmins in such environments? But confident to write articles what can and can not be done re IT security? Yeah .

AB_Anonymous , says: September 21, 2019 at 8:05 pm GMT
@anon Not sure about Pythagoras, but there are (very unfortunately) people who might have fun from combining "Rubik's Cube and highly classified information". And not necessarily in reality.
Yvonne Lorenzo , says: September 21, 2019 at 8:08 pm GMT
@peterAUS

You mean being positive about you UNABLE to visualize a byte from a "keypress" moving all the way to the LAN cable with each timer "click"? You know, buffers, busses, microcode/firmware, interrupts, stack/heap, closed source, encryption/decryption layer of the OSI stack etc. That's for technology.

Butthurt you are, yes? Tell me how he defeats this, be specific. https://www.symantec.com/products/endpoint-encryption

White paper here. https://www.symantec.com/content/dam/symantec/docs/white-papers/keeping-your-private-data-secure-en.pdf

Y. Lorenzo

And I don't care; fine, he was a clever op, he hacked the NSA, whoo-hoo. My other comments still stand. Go wave your flag, you're done.

Sean , says: September 21, 2019 at 8:22 pm GMT
@Yvonne Lorenzo

Rand Paul might be one to open an investigation into the inadequacy of NSA security but government investigating itself is suspect. No such investigation will ever take place.

Yes, Rand Paul who while cutting his lawn provoked his own retired doctor neighbor in a gated community into a maddened vicious rib dislocating attack that cost Paul part of his lung What a brilliant choice to annoy the government.

His end will likely be as Skripals was: disappearance by Western IC which he supports and blame placed on Russia

Skirpal is in America. The British got Skirpal out of Russia, but Russia could have killed him any time because he was homesick and meeting people from the Russian Embassy. In my opinion the Russians were trying to kill Skirpal's daughter along with him. They knew she was coming and timed the nerve agent attack so as to 'accidentally' kill her along with the traitor. The knowledge that you will go after their families is the ultimate deterrent. Unless you are a narcissistic dick like Snowden, who hardly mentions anything his family did for him except getting a second phone line so he could play some stupid internet game. Snowden actually says in his book that the internet raised him. It did not get him a job in the CIA despite him having no degree, that was his mom's NSA and her father's Pentagon connections. Aldrich Ames's father worked for the CIA .

Art , says: September 21, 2019 at 9:12 pm GMT
Edward Snowden is a great man – a great American. (Will a Dem president pardon him?) I recently viewed a video on how a poor immigrant family hid Snowden before he secured a flight out of Hong Kong. (He is working to get them out of Hong Kong, to Canada.) I am curious as to how he got the flight out to Russia?????
Yvonne Lorenzo , says: September 21, 2019 at 9:14 pm GMT
This will be my final comment. My issue is one regarding Snowden's character and integrity, especially as the collapsing Empire under FUBAR Trump is waging war on the world. Come on, none of the CIA trolls here have read The Saker with Orlov on the fate of the mass murdering Empire?

http://www.unz.com/tsaker/placing-the-usa-on-a-collapse-continuum-with-dmitry-orlov/

At this point it is important to explain what exactly a "final collapse" looks like. Some people are under the very mistaken assumption that a collapsed society or country looks like a Mad Max world. This is not so. The Ukraine has been a failed state for several years already, but it still exists on the map. People live there, work, most people still have electricity (albeit not 24/7), a government exists, and, at least officially, law and order is maintained. This kind of collapsed society can go on for years, maybe decades, but it is in a state of collapse nonetheless, as it has reached all the 5 Stages of Collapse as defined by Dmitry Orlov in his seminal book "The Five Stages of Collapse: Survivors' Toolkit" where he mentions the following 5 stages of collapse:

Stage 1: Financial collapse. Faith in "business as usual" is lost.
Stage 2: Commercial collapse. Faith that "the market shall provide" is lost.
Stage 3: Political collapse. Faith that "the government will take care of you" is lost.
Stage 4: Social collapse. Faith that "your people will take care of you" is lost.
Stage 5: Cultural collapse. Faith in "the goodness of humanity" is lost.

Sound familiar? Read it and weep. Your pensions are toast.

Or read Chris Hedges America The Farewell Tour.

Snowden's character is proven by his interview with Brian Roberts.

Now, although only 14% of U.S. TLAMs got past Syrian air defenses, hear him was rhapsodic on the "beautiful missiles."

And Snowden is happy to talk to this creep? And asks Rothschild-Kravis puppet Macron to ex-filtrate him to France?

https://www.voltairenet.org/article204303.html

It was in this milieu that he met Henry and Marie-Josée Kravis, in their residence on Park Avenue in New York [1]. The Kravis couple, unfailing supporters of the US Republican Party, are among the great world fortunes who play politics out of sight of the Press. Their company, KKR, like Blackstone and the Carlyle Group, is one of the world's major investment funds.

" Emmanuel's curiosity for the 'can-do attitude' was fascinating – the capacity to tell yourself that you can do anything you set your mind to. He had a thirst for knowledge and a desire to understand how things work, but without imitating or copying anyone. In this, he remained entirely French ", declares Marie-Josée Drouin (Mrs. Kravis) today [2].

https://sputniknews.com/europe/201909141076804460-go-west-edward-snowden-hopes-frances-emmanuel-macron-will-approve-his-asylum-application/

Snowden's revelations about his aspirations for asylum outside of Russia come just days ahead of the upcoming release of his new memoir which is expected to hit the shelves on US Constitution Day.

Famous American whistleblower and former NSA contractor Edward Snowden, the man responsible for exposing a number of global surveillance programs run by the US agency, has recently revealed that he would like to obtain asylum in France.

Call it female intuition, Snowden creeps me out.

Those who want to bow before his altar, be my guest. You have free will.

peterAUS , says: September 21, 2019 at 11:21 pm GMT
@Yvonne Lorenzo

Butthurt

whoo-hoo..

Go wave your flag

.CIA trolls here

Read it and weep. Your pensions are toast.

From an author here?!

Whoah ..

My God, Unz .. really ? Coming to this?

Hahaha oh man.

peterAUS , says: September 21, 2019 at 11:48 pm GMT
Just realized, isn't this creature the only female author here? A female creature is writing, as an author, on alt-whatever site, about things she has never been professionally involved in. With certain hahaha style.

Hahaha ..oh my.

So, what have we got:
1. Unz finally collapsed under "diversity" pressure?
2. There is, sort of a hidden, message here.

I really hope it's the second.

Sean , says: September 22, 2019 at 12:35 am GMT peterAUS , says: September 22, 2019 at 2:31 am GMT
@Sean True true .mea culpa. Female stuff, that is, in general.

Style, though, is unique for the creature here.

Butthurt

whoo-hoo..

Go wave your flag

.CIA trolls here

Read it and weep. Your pensions are toast .

.creep .creeps me out

I mean hahaha .when reading those things it's, almost, as written by a certain type of commentators here. Almost as one of them, actually. Same "footprint". Especially the first two.

I mean, having that from an author here is, really, a new low for sure.

This is the first time I've seen something like that, and my attitude was mild in this thread compared to some in other threads. I mean, I was quite hard on some authors here, and never, so far that. "Butthurt" ."whoo-hoo"

I've quite offended a couple of authors here and they never replied with any rude word. And ..my God "whoo-hoo". Haha crazy.

New "quality" seeping here, apparently. Hehe getting with times, I guess. And program.
Understandable.

peterAUS , says: September 22, 2019 at 2:54 am GMT
@peterAUS O.K. I could be wrong.

I've been on this site for quite some time. Read, on average, 20 % of articles and similar number of comments in those articles.

I can't, really, recollect ONE case when an AUTHOR, here, in a comments exchange with a commentator, used the words "butthurt" and "whoo-hoo". Not once from the, say, authors from the West. Born and raised there, that is. Cultural thing, I guess.

Anyone could prove me senile/wrong? Please.

2stateshmustate , says: September 22, 2019 at 3:27 am GMT
@foolisholdman I agree. Shilling for the Israelis regarding 911 is a deal breaker for me. They had me going about these 2 guys for a while, but when I heard that they had ridiculed 911 truthers I smelled a rat. And after this article I agree they are shills for the status quo. Reasonable people can not doubt that 911 was a false flag operation. There's just too much bullshit there.
Commentator Mike , says: September 22, 2019 at 3:43 am GMT
@peterAUS

isn't this creature the only female author here?

Ilana Mercer is a woman who writes on UR.

niceland , says: September 22, 2019 at 4:55 am GMT
I think the idea Snowden is a "plant" is a bit far out there. If he is; the real purpose of the exercise is what exactly?

I also don't get why some commenters think Julian Assange isn't who he claims to be. His Wikileaks has published great volume of highly embarrassing material for the U.S. The embassy cables come to mind – bringing to light evidence contrary to Washington narrative on many events.

There is another thing; Just after he established Wikileaks he came to Iceland and met with journalists and few politicians. The result from that visit was he met one Kristinn Hrafnsson, long time journalist in Iceland with excellent track record and credibility. Since Assange got in trouble, accused of sexual harassment from Swedish woman and finally escaped into the Ecuador embassy in London, Hrafnsson has been spokesman for Wikileaks.

Since I am familiar with Hrafnsson work for decades, I would be very surprised if he worked with Assagne all this time, and even took over his job, so to speak, as head of Wikileaks if Assagne wasn't genuine. Hrafnsson has struck me as smart guy and honest and it's extremely unlikely he would continue if something didn't smell right at Wikileaks. I also want to point out Wikileaks has been working with, what I consider the few remaining NEWS outlets in Europe. (Including The Guardian before it was bought few years ago and became worthless).

To Assagne credit he booted Icelandic polititian, one Birgitta Jónsdóttir; who tried to visit him in U.K. prison – and wanted nothing to do with her. She has been trying to make international name for herself as fighter for human rights and peacemaker and against corruption and so forth. Unfortunately she is a bag full of hot air and thinks SHE is the center of the universe. It's all about her and therefore she is of no use for any cause. Julian was right to send her packing.

I can't imagine what the CIA or NSA or other tentacles of the Empire would gain by running Wikileaks. It makes absolutely no sense to me.

niceland , says: September 22, 2019 at 5:07 am GMT
@niceland Here you can view interview by Chris Hedges with Hrafnsson on RT. You decide if this guy is genuine or not. It seems he has basically been running Wikileaks for past several years. https://www.rt.com/shows/on-contact/461987-kristinn-hrafnsson-extradition-wikileaks/
Digital Samizdat , says: September 22, 2019 at 6:43 am GMT
@der einzige Wow. Thank you for posting that. Doesn't look too good for Assange.
anon [310] Disclaimer , says: September 22, 2019 at 8:52 am GMT
@Yvonne Lorenzo > Call it female intuition, Snowden creeps me out.

Can't refute that! #BelieveWomen

anon [310] Disclaimer , says: September 22, 2019 at 9:56 am GMT
@Yvonne Lorenzo > A helicopter outfitted with surveillance bubbles overflew after I submitted this piece.. Coincidence, right?

No coincidence, they're distributing corn sharks in a contract with ADM. Stay indoors and cover your head with tin foil.

9/11 Inside job , says: September 22, 2019 at 10:19 am GMT
@2stateshmustate "9/11 is the Litmus Test " By Smoking – Mirrors.Com :

"It all comes down to 9/11.Everything that has happened has happened based on a lie . Everyone in Government ; everyone in the media , in entertainment , in organized religion , in the public ,in the public eye who accepts and promotes the official story is either a traitor or a tool . Everyone who does not stand forth and speak truth to power is a coward , a liar and complicit in mass-murder . Everyone everywhere can be measured by this Litmus Test ."

[Sep 21, 2019] Edward Snowden On The NSA, His Book 'Permanent Record' And Life In Russia NPR

Sep 21, 2019 | www.npr.org

In 2013, Edward Snowden was an IT systems expert working under contract for the National Security Agency when he traveled to Hong Kong to provide three journalists with thousands of top-secret documents about U.S. intelligence agencies' surveillance of American citizens.

To Snowden, the classified information he shared with the journalists exposed privacy abuses by government intelligence agencies. He saw himself as a whistleblower. But the U.S. government considered him a traitor in violation of the Espionage Act .

After meeting with the journalists, Snowden intended to leave Hong Kong and travel -- via Russia -- to Ecuador, where he would seek asylum. But when his plane landed at Moscow's Sheremetyevo International Airport, things didn't go according to plan.

"What I wasn't expecting was that the United States government itself ... would cancel my passport," he says.

Snowden was directed to a room where Russian intelligence agents offered to assist him -- in return for access to any secrets he harbored. Snowden says he refused.

"I didn't cooperate with the Russian intelligence services -- I haven't and I won't," he says. "I destroyed my access to the archive. ... I had no material with me before I left Hong Kong, because I knew I was going to have to go through this complex multi-jurisdictional route."

Snowden spent 40 days in the Moscow airport, trying to negotiate asylum in various countries. After being denied asylum by 27 nations, he settled in Russia, where he remains today.

"People look at me now and they think I'm this crazy guy, I'm this extremist or whatever. Some people have a misconception that [I] set out to burn down the NSA," he says. "But that's not what this was about. In many ways, 2013 wasn't about surveillance at all. What it was about was a violation of the Constitution."

Snowden's 2013 revelations led to changes in the laws and standards governing American intelligence agencies and the practices of U.S. technology companies, which now encrypt much of their Web traffic for security. He reflects on his life and his experience in the intelligence community in the memoir Permanent Record.

On Sept. 17, the U.S. Justice Department filed suit to recover all proceeds from the book, alleging that Snowden violated nondisclosure agreements by not letting the government review the manuscript before publication; Snowden's attorney, Ben Wizner, said in a statement that the book contains no government secrets that have not been previously published by respected news organizations, and that the government's prepublication review system is under court challenge.

[Sep 18, 2019] US wants to seize all money Edward Snowden makes from new book - Reuters

Notable quotes:
"... The United States is seeking all proceeds earned by Snowden for the book, the Justice Department said. The lawsuit also names the "corporate entities" behind the book's publication as nominal defendants. ..."
"... Ben Wizner, an attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union who represents Snowden, said the lawsuit was without merit. "This book contains no government secrets that have not been previously published by respected news organizations," he said in a statement, adding that Snowden would have submitted it for review if he thought the government would review it in good faith. ..."
Sep 18, 2019 | uk.reuters.com

The United States filed a lawsuit on Tuesday against Edward Snowden, the former National Security Agency contractor who leaked secret documents about U.S. telephone and internet surveillance in 2013, saying his new book violates non-disclosure agreements.

The Justice Department said Snowden published his memoir, "Permanent Record," without submitting it to intelligence agencies for review, adding that speeches given by Snowden also violated nondisclosure agreements. In 2013, Snowden wrote "Everything You Know about the Constitution is Wrong."

The United States is seeking all proceeds earned by Snowden for the book, the Justice Department said. The lawsuit also names the "corporate entities" behind the book's publication as nominal defendants.

Ben Wizner, an attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union who represents Snowden, said the lawsuit was without merit. "This book contains no government secrets that have not been previously published by respected news organizations," he said in a statement, adding that Snowden would have submitted it for review if he thought the government would review it in good faith.

Representatives for the book's publisher, Macmillan Publishers, and its unit Henry Holt & Co, did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Snowden has lived in Russia since he revealed details of U.S. intelligence agencies' secret surveillance programs.

Though he is viewed by some as a hero, U.S. authorities want him to stand in a criminal trial over his disclosures of classified information.

Speaking by video link at an event in Berlin to promote the book, Snowden said that while he had signed a non-disclosure agreement to maintain secrecy, he had also sworn an oath to uphold the U.S. Constitution.

"You've told the government you're not going to talk to journalists. You've told them you're not going to write a book," Snowden said. "At the same time you have an oath to defend the Constitution. And the secret that you are asked to protect is that the government is violating that Constitution and the rights of people around the world."

Reporting by Makini Brice; Additional reporting by Mark Hosenball in Washington and Paul Carrell in Berlin; Editing by Marguerita Choy and Lisa Shumaker Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

[Sep 15, 2019] Snowden Spills Infamous Whistleblower Opines On Spycraft, AI, And Being Suicided

When the ideology collapses like neoliberalism collapsed in 2008 defections and leaks from the intelligence agencies became more prominent and higher level. Just before the USSR collapsed there were several high level officers of KGB that changed sides including at least one general of KGB.
We can probably view Snowden and Manning as signs of similar process which started in the USA after the collapse of neoliberalism. They suggest that loyalty to the USA in CIA or NSA is on low level not became of some external factors, but due to lack of conviction in the sanity of the current social system in the USA (aka neoliberal society). So "protest defections" will probably continues unabated.
Of course, dealing with intelligence agencies is tricky as Snowden revelation might just be a limited revenge of CIA to NSA. But in any case it is undisputable that while few Snowden files were published the mere fact of exfiltration of so much highly sensitive information did some damage to military industrial complex. That makes is less pausible that he operates as CIA mole, which several commenters below suggest.
At the same time in this interview Snowden sounds like a naive and disoriented person: " I try to keep a distance between myself and Russian society, and this is completely intentional. I live my life with basically the English-speaking community." English speaking community in Russia probably has highest in the world percentage of intelligence officers of Western countries including CIA officers.
Another somewhat suspicious fact is that very few files that Snowden files were released. So the whole story now looks like "Too much ado about nothing." Unlike Wikileaks that published Manning materials.
Notable quotes:
"... He describes the 18 years since the September 11 attacks as "a litany of American destruction by way of American self-destruction, with the promulgation of secret policies, secret laws, secret courts and secret wars". ..."
"... Snowden also said: " The greatest danger still lies ahead, with the refinement of artificial intelligence capabilities, such as facial and pattern recognition. ..."
"... " An AI-equipped surveillance camera would be not a mere recording device, but could be made into something closer to an automated police officer ." - The Guardian ..."
"... You have to remember, in the beginning I didn't even know mass surveillance was a thing because I worked for the CIA, which is a human intelligence organization. But when I was sent back to NSA headquarters and my very last position to directly work with a tool of mass surveillance, there was a guy who was supposed to be teaching me . And sometimes he would spin around in his chair, showing me nudes of whatever target's wife he's looking at. And he's like: "Bonus!" ..."
"... The most important part of the Rubik's cube was actually not as a concealment device, but a distraction device. I had to get things out of that building many times. I really gave Rubik's cubes to everyone in my office as gifts and guards saw me coming and going with this Rubik's cube all the time. So I was the Rubik's cube guy . ..."
"... When you're doing this for the first time, you're just going down the hallway and trying not to shake. And then, as you do it more times, you realize that it works. You realize that a metal detector won't detect an SD card because it has less metal in it than the brackets on your jeans. ..."
"... I try to keep a distance between myself and Russian society, and this is completely intentional. I live my life with basically the English-speaking community . I'm the president of the Freedom of the Press Foundation. And, you know, I'm an indoor cat. It doesn't matter where I am -- Moscow, Berlin, New York -- as long as I have a screen to look into. ..."
"... 16 June 2013 The revelations expand to include the UK, with news that GCHQ intercepted foreign politicians' communications during the 2009 G20 summit in London, and that the British spy agency has also tapped the fibre-optic cables carrying much of the internet's traffic. ..."
"... 3 July 2013 While en route from Moscow, Bolivia's president, Evo Morales, is forced to land in Vienna after European countries refuse his plane airspace, suspecting that Snowden was on board. It is held and searched for 12 hours. ..."
"... December 2016 Oliver Stone releases the movie Snowden featuring Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Melissa Leo, Tom Wilkinson, Zachary Quinto and a cameo by former Guardian editor Alan Rusbridger. ..."
"... When he originally contacted Glenn Greenwald, I was suspicious. I said then, nothing will come of this, and nothing did, because WE NEVER GOT TO SEE all the files he had and what was on them. ..."
"... Read in Reuters that he's requested asylum in France. ..."
"... It will be common knowledge soon that it was the NSA (Admiral Rogers) that first detected the coup against Trump and the illegal surveillance. Remember friends, the FISA warrants were a cover for the illegal spying the Obama administration was ALREADY doing on Trump, Cruz, and others. ..."
"... I try to keep a distance between myself and Russian society, and this is completely intentional. I live my life with basically the English-speaking community. ..."
"... What an ungrateful twat. Russia saved his bacon and yet he wants to know nothing of the country and its people and maybe begin to understand WHY they would offer to help him...even if he doesnt like the Russain government, he CHOOSES to know nothing of the Russian people. What a loser! ..."
"... Maybe he doesn't know how to speak Russian, seeing as how getting stuck in Russia was not exactly his original plan. He just happened to be in a Russian airport when the USA happened to revoke his passport, making it impossible for him to leave. ..."
"... There is also the other angle, that perhaps he might be working as a CIA agent even now, and that his predicament is actually all entirely pre-meditated by the USA. Russia might take his getting friendly with the locals as being a bit impolite if he is doing spy work for the USA while living in Russia. ..."
"... He doesnt need to be "palsy-walsy" with Russians, he has NO knowledge of the country he lives in and its people and doesn't want to. That is ungrateful to the nth degree. ..."
"... If Russia wanted to they could shut down his ability to give video-conferences etc. They don't, they continue to show him a hospitality that he seems willing to spit on! ..."
"... Serious damage? I fear Snowden and Assange wasted their lives upon the American people. Was Snowden wrong morally? He fought the totalitarian giant and for this the people sit back in their arm chairs and moralize whether it was right or wrong. We don't deserve to be "free.". ..."
"... Why and how has Greenwald been able to "sit on" countless info files but never released them? If that is true then why haven't US authorities gone after him as well? Way too many strange aspects to Snowden's cover story and how he's allowed by the Russian's to make public statements about their local political landscape. ..."
"... It's not just that. Greenwald lives full time in Brazil for a very good reason--Brazil has no extradition treaty with the US. He's relatively safe there, although his boyfriend was stupid enough to go to London briefly and nearly got the Assange treatment... ..."
"... What I hate is that Snowden gave all those documents to Greenwald who said he was going to publish them and once he went to the Intercept under Omadyar...nothing but silence on those files. To my mind he betrayed Snowden. ..."
"... Book tour, Docudrama and T-Shirt? ..."
"... That part of the narrative does seem a bit odd, doesn't it? She's allowed to come and go as she pleases in the USA, yet is married to this guy wanted by the US authorities? Hmm. Nothing suspicious about that. ..."
"... Can anybody name something that Snowfen revealed that wasn't common knowledge? ..."
Sep 15, 2019 | www.zerohedge.com

Meeting with both The Guardian and Spiegel Online in Moscow as part of its promotion, the infamous whistleblower spent nearly five hours with the two media outlets - offering a taste of what's in the book, details on his background, and his thoughts on artificial intelligence, facial recognition, and other intelligence gathering tools coming to a dystopia near you.

While The Guardian interview is 'okay,' scroll down for the far more interesting Spiegel interview, where Snowden goes way deeper into his cloak-and-dagger life, including thoughts on getting suicided.

First, The Guardian :

Snowden describes in detail for the first time his background, and what led him to leak details of the secret programms being run by the US National Security Agency (NSA) and the UK's secret communication headquarters, GCHQ .

He describes the 18 years since the September 11 attacks as "a litany of American destruction by way of American self-destruction, with the promulgation of secret policies, secret laws, secret courts and secret wars".

Snowden also said: " The greatest danger still lies ahead, with the refinement of artificial intelligence capabilities, such as facial and pattern recognition.

" An AI-equipped surveillance camera would be not a mere recording device, but could be made into something closer to an automated police officer ." - The Guardian

https://www.youtube.com/embed/EezWIxcinnw

Other notables from the Guardian interview:

The Der Spiegel interview, meanwhile, is way more interesting ... For example:

" If I Happen to Fall out of a Window, You Can Be Sure I Was Pushed. "

Meeting Edward Snwoden is pretty much exactly how children imagine the grand game of espionage is played.

But then, on Monday, there he was, standing in our room on the first floor of the Hotel Metropol, as pale and boyish-looking as the was when the world first saw him in June 2013 . For the last six years, he has been living in Russian exile. The U.S. has considered him to be an enemy of the state, right up there with Julian Assange, ever since he revealed, with the help of journalists, the full scope of the surveillance system operated by the National Security Agency (NSA).

For quite some time, though, he remained silent about how he smuggled the secrets out of the country and what his personal motivations were. - Spiegel Online

Select excerpts via Der Spiegel (emphasis ours):

***

DER SPIEGEL: Mr. Snowden, you always said: "I am not the story." But now you've written 432 pages about yourself. Why?

Edward Snowden: Because I think it's more important than ever to explain systems of mass surveillance and mass manipulation to the public. And I can't explain how these systems came to be without explaining my role in helping to build them.

DER SPIEGEL: Wasn't it just as important four or even six years ago?

Snowden: Four years ago, Barack Obama was president. Four years ago, Boris Johnson wasn't around and the AfD ( Germany's right-wing populist party Alternative for Germany ) was still kind of a joke. But now in 2019, no one is laughing. When you look around the world, when you look at the rising factionalization of society, when you see this new wave of authoritarianism sweeping over many countries: Everywhere political classes and commercial classes are realizing they can use technology to influence the world on a new scale that was not previously available. We are seeing our systems coming under attack.

DER SPIEGEL: What systems?

Snowden: The political system, the legal system, the social system. And we have the proclivity to think that if we get rid of the people we don't like, the problem is solved. We go: "Oh, it's Donald Trump. Oh, it's Boris Johnson. Oh, it's the Russians" But Donald Trump is not the problem. Donald Trump is the product of the problem.

***

DER SPIEGEL: While writing, did you discover any truths about yourself that you didn't like?

Snowden: The most unflattering thing is to realize just how naïve and credulous I was and how that could make me into a tool of systems that would use my skills for an act of global harm . The class of which I am a part of, the global technological community, was for the longest time apolitical. We have this history of thinking: "We're going to make the world better."

***

DER SPIEGEL: Was that your motivation when you entered the world of espionage?

Snowden: Entering the world of espionage sounds so grand. I just saw an enormous landscape of opportunities because the government in its post-9/11 spending blitz was desperate to hire anybody who had high-level technical skills and a clearance. And I happened to have both. It was weird to be just a kid and be brought into CIA headquarters, put in charge of the entire Washington metropolitan area's network .

DER SPIEGEL: Was it not also fascinating to be able to invade pretty much everybody's life via state-sponsored hacking?

Snowden: You have to remember, in the beginning I didn't even know mass surveillance was a thing because I worked for the CIA, which is a human intelligence organization. But when I was sent back to NSA headquarters and my very last position to directly work with a tool of mass surveillance, there was a guy who was supposed to be teaching me . And sometimes he would spin around in his chair, showing me nudes of whatever target's wife he's looking at. And he's like: "Bonus!"

***

DER SPIEGEL: You became seriously ill and fell into depression. Have you ever had suicidal thoughts?

Snowden: No! This is important for the record. I am not now, nor have I ever been suicidal. I have a philosophical objection to the idea of suicide, and if I happen to fall out of a window, you can be sure I was pushed.

***

DER SPIEGEL: You write that you sometimes smuggled SD memory cards inside a Rubik's cube .

Snowden: The most important part of the Rubik's cube was actually not as a concealment device, but a distraction device. I had to get things out of that building many times. I really gave Rubik's cubes to everyone in my office as gifts and guards saw me coming and going with this Rubik's cube all the time. So I was the Rubik's cube guy . And when I came out of the tunnel with my contraband and saw one of the bored guards, I sometimes tossed the cube to him. He's like, "Oh, man, I had one of these things when I was a kid, but you know, I could never solve it. So I just pulled the stickers off." That was exactly what I had done -- but for different reasons.

DER SPIEGEL: You even put the SD cards into your mouth.

Snowden: When you're doing this for the first time, you're just going down the hallway and trying not to shake. And then, as you do it more times, you realize that it works. You realize that a metal detector won't detect an SD card because it has less metal in it than the brackets on your jeans.

***

DER SPIEGEL: You describe your arrival in Moscow as a walk in the park. You say you refused to cooperate with the Russian intelligence agency FSB and they let you go. That sounds implausible to us.

Snowden: I think what explains the fact that the Russian government didn't hang me upside down my ankles and beat me with a shock prod until secrets came out was because everyone in the world was paying attention to it. And they didn't know what to do. They just didn't know how to handle it. I think their answer was: "Let's wait and see."

DER SPIEGEL: Do you have Russian friends?

Snowden: I try to keep a distance between myself and Russian society, and this is completely intentional. I live my life with basically the English-speaking community . I'm the president of the Freedom of the Press Foundation. And, you know, I'm an indoor cat. It doesn't matter where I am -- Moscow, Berlin, New York -- as long as I have a screen to look into.

***

Read the rest of Der Spiegel' s interview with Edward Snowden here .

Meanwhile, The Guardian provides an interesting 'Snowden Timeline':

Snowden's timeline

mrjinx007 , 18 minutes ago link

I'm an indoor cat. It doesn't matter where I am -- Moscow, Berlin, New York -- as long as I have a screen to look into.

Snowed-in.

headless blogger , 27 minutes ago link

There's really no way to know that for sure if this guy is legit. If he is part of an operation, let's hope it's for something good. When he originally contacted Glenn Greenwald, I was suspicious. I said then, nothing will come of this, and nothing did, because WE NEVER GOT TO SEE all the files he had and what was on them.

Just what this man is up to we will likely never know. These kinds of operations can take years to set up.

My guess is Snowden is the Decoy, the distraction. There is likely someone else or something else that all of this camouflages.

Decoherence , 35 minutes ago link

He met his pole dancer on hot or not and allowed her to shape his views on politics. That sounds like desperation or pretty bad judgment.

Equinox7 , 36 minutes ago link

Things go both ways in a surveillance environment. Snowden will be exposed in time as a CIA operative. The NSA has everything including Hillary's private emails. Obama and many in his regime were also using private email servers, and the NSA has them all.

Snowden was trying to destroy the NSA, when they are what was needed to take down the CIA, FBI, and the Deep State. I don't like the NSA being in existence, but this will help in prosecuting the criminals.

NiggaPleeze , 12 minutes ago link

So what is the NSA waiting for? The statute of limitations to expire? LOL. Snowden wasn't trying to do anything except educate people on what their government is doing. You obviously hate truth and knowledge. You work for the NSA?

BennyBoo , 37 minutes ago link

I don't believe a damned thing about anything published about any of the alphabet agencies - good, bad, neutral, doesn't matter it's all clown show bs.

VooDoo6Actual , 37 minutes ago link

Any other critical thinkers notice the CIA activated their asset again finally ? A predictable programmed book really ? Just imagine what kind of juicy already known statecraft he will reveal. Lol. America loves their confabulated mythical pseudo-hero's & cucked political demigods full of bovine scat don't they.

The UberMensch hero who somehow miraculously survived the 'enkryptonite' where other HVT can't. Amazing. Need to hurl makes me gag reflex & gut retch.

VooDoo6Actual , 26 minutes ago link

"Trump is the Anti-Mass Surveillance" ... LMAO -

TRUMP REQUESTS PERMANENT REAUTHORIZATION OF NSA MASS SURVEILLANCE https://www.commondreams.org/news/2019/08/16/alarm-trump-requests-permanent-reauthorization-nsa-mass-spying-program-exposed

vasilievich , 58 minutes ago link

Read in Reuters that he's requested asylum in France.

JBLight , 1 hour ago link

Snowden is still CIA and his mission was to throw the NSA under the bus.

It will be common knowledge soon that it was the NSA (Admiral Rogers) that first detected the coup against Trump and the illegal surveillance. Remember friends, the FISA warrants were a cover for the illegal spying the Obama administration was ALREADY doing on Trump, Cruz, and others.

Gonzogal , 1 hour ago link

I try to keep a distance between myself and Russian society, and this is completely intentional. I live my life with basically the English-speaking community.

What an ungrateful twat. Russia saved his bacon and yet he wants to know nothing of the country and its people and maybe begin to understand WHY they would offer to help him...even if he doesnt like the Russain government, he CHOOSES to know nothing of the Russian people. What a loser!

Pure Speculation , 24 minutes ago link

Just how is he to know who is undercover security services and who is just plain good and interesting?

Maybe he doesn't know how to speak Russian, seeing as how getting stuck in Russia was not exactly his original plan. He just happened to be in a Russian airport when the USA happened to revoke his passport, making it impossible for him to leave.

There is also the other angle, that perhaps he might be working as a CIA agent even now, and that his predicament is actually all entirely pre-meditated by the USA. Russia might take his getting friendly with the locals as being a bit impolite if he is doing spy work for the USA while living in Russia.

Gonzogal , 1 hour ago link

He doesnt need to be "palsy-walsy" with Russians, he has NO knowledge of the country he lives in and its people and doesn't want to. That is ungrateful to the nth degree.

If Russia wanted to they could shut down his ability to give video-conferences etc. They don't, they continue to show him a hospitality that he seems willing to spit on!

vasilievich , 56 minutes ago link

No, really, I met people there who were deep and friendly and sensitive. Lots critical of what's not right with their own society, and yet not traitors to their country.

Gonzogal , 49 minutes ago link

I agree with you vasilievich....I am looking forward to visiting Russia next spring in time for the V-Day and the Immortal Regiment, then spend a month visiting Russian and hopefully getting to interact with Russians "on the street".

One of the differences with Russia and the "West" is that Putins hours long live "conversations" with Russians and the way he gets his government to follow up up problems, which he himself follows up on to insure actions are taken, ensure that people have that freedom to be critical of their own society. Such an opposite to what happens to critics in the "west"

vasilievich , 1 hour ago link

Yes, that's inexplicable, at least to me. I lived there and liked Russians very much.

richsob , 1 hour ago link

My take on Snowden is he's basically a decent guy who did some serious damage. Was he wrong legally? Hell yes! Was he wrong morally? Possibly. Would I put the guy in prison if I could? Yeah for about 30 days because the bottom line of what he did was to expose **** that needed to be exposed.

It's complicated but occasionally a guy like this is needed to stir the pot.

NAV , 1 hour ago link

Serious damage? I fear Snowden and Assange wasted their lives upon the American people. Was Snowden wrong morally? He fought the totalitarian giant and for this the people sit back in their arm chairs and moralize whether it was right or wrong. We don't deserve to be "free.".

ISEEIT , 1 hour ago link

I personally consider Snowden to be a limited hangout operative.

Bingo Hammer , 1 hour ago link

There is still more and something very fishy about Snowden.....if he really did so much so called "damage" to the US why do US authorities never mention him? Why do they never pressure Russia to send him back?

Why and how has Greenwald been able to "sit on" countless info files but never released them? If that is true then why haven't US authorities gone after him as well? Way too many strange aspects to Snowden's cover story and how he's allowed by the Russian's to make public statements about their local political landscape.

puckles , 55 minutes ago link

It's not just that. Greenwald lives full time in Brazil for a very good reason--Brazil has no extradition treaty with the US. He's relatively safe there, although his boyfriend was stupid enough to go to London briefly and nearly got the Assange treatment...

Gonzogal , 1 hour ago link

What I hate is that Snowden gave all those documents to Greenwald who said he was going to publish them and once he went to the Intercept under Omadyar...nothing but silence on those files. To my mind he betrayed Snowden.

smacker , 1 hour ago link

I think Greenwald lives in Rio, Brazil and is partnered to a Brazilian guy, so Brazil would not extradite him.

5fingerdiscount , 2 hours ago link

Book tour, Docudrama and T-Shirt?

Jazzman , 2 hours ago link

The quality of low rank NSA employees is rapidly deteriorating since 2013... ^^

Pure Speculation , 2 hours ago link

That part of the narrative does seem a bit odd, doesn't it? She's allowed to come and go as she pleases in the USA, yet is married to this guy wanted by the US authorities? Hmm. Nothing suspicious about that.

cakesquid , 28 minutes ago link

strong suit you must mean..

How does what I wrote translate into an integrity issue?

Been married twice, fully faithful. But at his age particularly, would not recommend it to a guy who is in an unstable situation anyway. (not to mention the girl originally rejected him when the going got rough).

Live a little, enjoy your youth, and enjoy the infamy!

Bob_Sacamano , 2 hours ago link

Can anybody name something that Snowfen revealed that wasn't common knowledge?

[Jun 05, 2019] 'Unlimited reach, no safeguards' Snowden warns of greatest social control scheme in history

Jun 05, 2019 | www.rt.com

The US government has a tendency to hijack and weaponize revolutionary innovations, Edward Snowden said, noting that the natural human desire to communicate with others is now being exploited on an unprecedented scale. "Our utopian vision for the future is never guaranteed to be realized," Snowden told the audience in Dalhousie University in Halifax, Canada via live stream from Moscow this week, stressing that the US government "corrupted our knowledge... towards a military purpose."

They took our nuclear capability and transformed it into the most horrible weapon that the world had ever witnessed. And we're seeing an atomic moment of computer science... Its reach is unlimited... but its safeguards are not!

Also on rt.com You've been warned: Widespread US face surveillance is 'imminent reality', says tech privacy report

The whistleblower, who in 2013 leaked a trove of highly classified information about global spying operations by the National Security Agency, argued that, armed with modern technology and with the help of social media and tech giants, governments are becoming "all-powerful" in their ability to monitor, analyze, and influence behavior.

It's through the use of new platforms and algorithms that are built on and around these capabilities that they are able to shift our behavior. In some cases, they are able to predict our decisions and also nudge them to different outcomes.

Also on rt.com Privacy? What's that? Facebook lawyer argues users have none

The natural human need for "belonging" is being exploited and users voluntarily consent to surrender virtually all of their data by signing carefully drafted user agreements that no one bothers to read. "Everything has hundreds and hundreds of pages of legal jargon that we're not qualified to read and assess and yet they are considered binding upon us," Snowden said.

And now these institutions, which are both commercial and governmental... have structuralized and entrenched it to where it has become now the most effective means of social control in the history of our species.

WATCH Edward Snowden's full speech:

[Jun 02, 2019] Snowden Most Effective Means Of Social Control In The History Of Our Species Now In Place

He didn't mention Obama's "Hammer" database
Notable quotes:
"... Institutions can "monitor and record private activities of people on a scale that's broad enough that we can say it's close to all-powerful," said Snowden. They do this through "new platforms and algorithms," through which "they're able to shift our behavior. In some cases they're able to predict our decisions -- and also nudge them -- to different outcomes. And they do this by exploiting the human need for belonging ." ..."
"... "We don't sign up for this," he added, dismissing the notion that people know exactly what they are getting into with social media platforms like Facebook. ..."
"... That means that a company, community or country that uses Huawei technology is protecting itself from the US-led international system of surveillance and possible control. And the threats and demands that they stop using Huawei products is more about keeping US control, not so much about blocking Chinese control ..."
Jun 01, 2019 | www.zerohedge.com

NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden said Thursday that people in systems of power have exploited the human desire to connect in order to create systems of mass surveillance .

Snowden appeared at Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia via livestream from Moscow to give a keynote address for the Canadian university's Open Dialogue Series.

Right now, he said, humanity is in a sort of "atomic moment" in the field of computer science. "We're in the midst of the greatest redistribution of power since the Industrial Revolution, and this is happening because technology has provided a new capability," Snowden said.

"It's related to influence that reaches everyone in every place," he said. "It has no regard for borders. Its reach is unlimited, if you will, but its safeguards are not." Without such defenses, technology is able to affect human behavior.

Institutions can "monitor and record private activities of people on a scale that's broad enough that we can say it's close to all-powerful," said Snowden. They do this through "new platforms and algorithms," through which "they're able to shift our behavior. In some cases they're able to predict our decisions -- and also nudge them -- to different outcomes. And they do this by exploiting the human need for belonging ."

"We don't sign up for this," he added, dismissing the notion that people know exactly what they are getting into with social media platforms like Facebook.

... ... ...


mrliberty , 2 hours ago link

Snowden focuses on the common-knowledge stuff to keep our attention away from mass Signals Interference (spoofing and blocking messages, calls, and emails) and other shady programs.

cynicalskeptic , 6 hours ago link

Huxley's 'Ultimate Revolution' - a scientific dictatorship where the masses willingly submit to their own enslavement - is here.

His 1962 UC Berkeley speech sums it all up. Orwell's 1984 depended on terror and force to maintain control. Much easier with A Brave New World where the control is psychological and people 'know their place' in the world and willingly accept it.

NoBigDeal , 6 hours ago link

Mass surveillance is useless if you can't organise such a huge data set into meaningful information, and what's meaningful is always a matter of opinion. Those who paid the bazillions to build this thing must be starting to scratch their heads.

The real threat of a system like this is when some low level user with access exploits it for their personal advantage. Some neighbor or co-worker who doesn't like you.

AI has a long way to go and in this case it just sounds like a poor excuse to keep feeding the big white elephant.

Craven Moorehead , 7 hours ago link

10 to 15 yrs from now, security services and police will intercept any person walking in a public place without some form of smart device to identify who they are, and it is all being implemented by stealth, right before our eyes

Smart identification devices will become mandatory, everything in your life will be tracked, your travel, your spending, your political affiliations, people will willingly give up their freedoms to the illusory safety of the security state, call it slavery

Harry Lightning , 8 hours ago link

I don't know but at least as it pertains to me, I think all the scare tactics aboput Artificial Inteligence is way overblown.

I don't even read the ads on the internet, and if I do happen to spend more than a nanosecond viewing them, its usually only to getg the name of the company so I make sure NOTG to buy anything from them for invading my space.

SoI reallhydon't \care if some algorithm says I am likely to buy a certain kind of product, because they can bombard me with ads all day and all night and it won't make a rat's *** bit of difference in whagt I decide to do. Same with politics...there's nothing they can pipe intop my computer that will make me more or less likely to vote for a candidate. I have voted all over the ballot in any election I ever voted in, and my selections were based on reading what the candidates said at debates or in campaign speeches. Political advertising is a waste of money when itg comes to my voting.

In terms of spying, yes, I can understand how and why tech companies and the government engage in that kind of activity. I surely don't like it, but it really doesn't bother me because I would never portray anything I do to an internet full of anonymous people who may be collecting information. Most people are law abiding and the things they do that come close to criminal occur so infrequently and are for such a relatively small amount of money compared to a criminal enterprise that the government probably doesn't have time to bother with them. If you have nothing to hide than you have nothing to fear, and for the most part, most people have nothing to hide.

In terms of drones surveilling everyone, I think they are great target practice. How often do you get the chance to fire atga moving target outside of skeet shooting ? So if the government or some ahole company wants to spy on you with drones, have fun shooting them out of the air. If enough people take this route, the practice will end because the cost of all those shot up drones will be too expensive for the Peeping Toms to afford. And the government does not have the resources to prosecute a hundred million people all shooting at drones.

Another point : when it comes to election time, go to the local Meet The Candidate forums where you live and ask the candidates who has the balls to state they will vote against any government spying without warrants based on unimpeachable reasonable causes ? Only vote for the politicians who make such pledges, and if they break their promises vote them out of office the next time they try to get elected. Democracy works when the people are willing to use it. So use it.

brokebackbuck , 7 hours ago link

i disagree, democracy does not work because most people are too dumb to choose correctly. This negatively impacts the most intelligent

Karl Marxist , 7 hours ago link

Then get off your dead *** and work to save what power the people have left. Are you that lazy physically and intellectually? TV people own you enough to cave into deep apathy? The I hope you get FEMA camped in one form or another because that's where this **** is headed unless you take to heart the previous poster.

fackbankz , 5 hours ago link

I would have agreed with you 20 years ago. We're way past the point where voting matters. All politicians on both sides are the worst pieces of **** you can imagine. They all support mass surveillance, slavery through fake Fed money, war, GMOs, vaccines and any other evil **** their masters are trying to force on us.

I hope the voting rate in America goes under 10 percent so that 90 percent of us can say, "**** you! I didn't vote for that" and have it be true. Because when it comes to all the important stuff, you did vote for that if you voted for one of these vile wastes of protoplasm in DC.

reader2010 , 8 hours ago link

"As for freedom, it will soon cease to exist in any shape or form. Living will depend upon absolute obedience to a strict set of arrangements, which it will no longer be possible to transgress. The air traveler is not free. In the future, life's passengers will be even less so: they will travel through their lives fastened to their (corporate) seats."

- Jean Baudrillard, 1990

smacker , 8 hours ago link

I agree with Snowden's assessment of the human need to socially connect with others which is being exploited and morphed into mass surveillance.

But .gov cannot be trusted to take any effective action against the likes of Faceache or Goolag because these outfits are in bed with government (see recent ZH article on this very subject). Thus, government is a prime beneficiary of the mass surveillance data being collected.

Anonymous IX , 3 hours ago link

I actually disagree with Snowden. I think social media, from what people describe and what I observe, strokes people's egos and self-esteem. The tragedy here is that social connection becomes redefined rather narrowly within the confines of ego and self-esteem. I note, e.g., the strident and self-righteous tones in some of the posts throughout ZH here today. Along with the hyper-massaging of ego/self-esteem comes hyper-emotionalism. Everything is cataclysmic. You're the "good guy," and everybody and anybody who opposes you are the "bad guys." Stark, vivid black and white thinking propelled by emotions on steroids. Combine ego massage with steroidal emotions, and you get people wearing the equivalent of horse blinders. People who are easily duped.

WhyWait , 9 hours ago link

I was struck by Snowden's remarks about Huawei technology. He makes the claim that in the past 6 years our best minds with unlimited resources had been unable to find Huawei back doors or kill switches, because otherwise we would know, they would have announced it to the world

On the other hand we can assume that American servers and the software they use do have back doors and maybe kill switches

That means that a company, community or country that uses Huawei technology is protecting itself from the US-led international system of surveillance and possible control. And the threats and demands that they stop using Huawei products is more about keeping US control, not so much about blocking Chinese control

This reminds me of the urgency with which the US demands that countries buy Patriot missile systems, not S400's.

my new username , 9 hours ago link

STASI was privatized - now, people volunteer their information, and the CIA-funded ABC and FaceBook aggregate and sell the data back to Big Government.

Groundround , 9 hours ago link

He is right. When myspace, then facebook came out I thought, Cool, I can keep in touch with all these people. Then, when I became obvious that is was being used to spy on everyone and sell their info, I was pissed at myself for being so naive to think that an honest company could exist without stabbing everyone in the back and becoming a tool for for the same intelligence groups that have been standing on our necks for a couple hundred years now. Today it is too much to ask for an honest company and a government that does not victimize its citizens in about every way it can imagine. We can have a better world. It won't come by voting. They locked that **** down. It is time for the rope.

NiggaPleeze , 9 hours ago link

I get the surveillance part, but the social control part is still in the wings. China's social credit system and US' "terrorism" databases are all but inklings of what is to come: constant and ubiquitous 24/7 monitoring with AI drone "enforcement". So far the powers that be feel constrained in using all the data they collect in criminal court - in part because there are not enough prisons, and in part because they don't want a revolt. But: once AI, data collection and drone automation reach the tipping point (not far off), those constraints will be gone: there will be no ability to revolt as the drones will wipe out the "seditionists", and prison won't be a problem because they will use other means (no food, no transportation, or corporal punishment, all administered by integrated sales, transportation and drone systems).

Mr. Kwikky , 10 hours ago link

Watch the testimonies of high level former NSA employee William Binney on yt

https://youtu.be/KQpTofvZJWU

[Jun 02, 2019] Somer highlights of Snowden spreach at Dalhousie University

Highly recommended!
An interesting method of monitoring access to the particular WEB site or page by intercepting pages at the router and inserting reference to the "snooping" site for example one pixel image) which collects IPs of devices which accessed particular page. Does not require breaking into the particular Web site 00 just the control of provider router is is enough. That makes it more understandable the attack on Huawei.
Notable quotes:
"... Said Mr. Snowden was at risk for extra ordinary rendition.. qualified him for application under refuge law. Said to claim refugee status Art. 33 of the refugee humanitarian grounds application is Intl Refuge Law, that those in control of governments are working to eliminate this long standing intl understanding. ..."
"... said we are experiencing the greatest and fastest and most pervasive redistribution of power since the Industrial revolution.Highly concerned that very few are going to benefit. ..."
"... Talked about Conspiracy , a group called 5 eyes (USA, Canada, Australia, NZ, and UK) and prism.. explained how it worked. basically a collaboration between big corporations and government ..."
"... Explained how these corporations and government (mostly government) could intercept web page request between user at home or in office and the target server, and replace generate a blank page that has surveillance hidden in the page, then blend hidden with the legitimate page delivered by the innocent server to the unknowing user. said it goes beyond collaboration and moves to proactive surveillance. ..."
"... Said law is needed to criminalize companies and governments that make useful network devices that people buy, into evil spyware. mentioned the NSO group can remember why?. .. classified "trade in hidden exploits". as evil relayed story about how such devices were used in Mexico to defeat political opposition ..."
Jun 02, 2019 | www.moonofalabama.org

snake , Jun 2, 2019 3:41:49 PM | 8

https://www.rt.com/news/460854-snowden-surveillance-social-control/ <=Snowden at Dalhousie University..
Robert Thibault, Att, HK Canada, (I think) Snowden's lawyer explained the law protecting whistle blowers.

Describes the incredible pressure governments are applying on anyone who steps forward to help a whistle blower.

Said Mr. Snowden was at risk for extra ordinary rendition.. qualified him for application under refuge law. Said to claim refugee status Art. 33 of the refugee humanitarian grounds application is Intl Refuge Law, that those in control of governments are working to eliminate this long standing intl understanding.

Explained the constitution of Equador was the most complex constitution on planet its due process rights solid due process safeguard, has a very high threshold but. Morales decision was arbitrary to strip Mr. Assange of his asylum. Said HK angry at Germany over two whistle blowers

Snowden then speaks .. excellent talk..

1st point.. progress in science has been unprecedented, especially nuclear science, but the nation states are using that new knowledge to make nuclear weapons.. called the progress an "Atomic Moment" in Science evolution. .

said we are experiencing the greatest and fastest and most pervasive redistribution of power since the Industrial revolution.Highly concerned that very few are going to benefit.

2nd point Platforms and Algorithms are being used by those in power to "shift our behaviors" accomplished covertly by user contracts people are required to sign when joining something on line (<=he said no one reads these things, but they are dangerous

Talked about Conspiracy , a group called 5 eyes (USA, Canada, Australia, NZ, and UK) and prism.. explained how it worked. basically a collaboration between big corporations and government

Explained how these corporations and government (mostly government) could intercept web page request between user at home or in office and the target server, and replace generate a blank page that has surveillance hidden in the page, then blend hidden with the legitimate page delivered by the innocent server to the unknowing user. said it goes beyond collaboration and moves to proactive surveillance.

said the legal means to spy on the populations existed long before 9/11, but it could not find daylight to be adopted until 9/11. Basically the government and massive in size corporations have all of the data on every single person on the earth because they gather it everywhere all of the time. discussed warrant_less wire tap, explained why whistle blower fair trial in he USA not likely, Said everything single call or electronic communication made by citizens is captured suggested monitoring calls was a felony many corporations committed before the FISA Act was enacted to protect the listener.

Mentioned Signal by Open Whisper <= for encryption??

Said law is needed to criminalize companies and governments that make useful network devices that people buy, into evil spyware. mentioned the NSO group can remember why?. .. classified "trade in hidden exploits". as evil relayed story about how such devices were used in Mexico to defeat political opposition.

But the big thing I got out of it, was how website contract agreements are not innocent. Such agreements prey on human desire to [interact, connect, share and cooperate] these desires have been modelled into a platform that allows government or private commercial enterprises to manipulate, exploit and prey-on any human "interacting with a such websites.

Questions and answers.

[Apr 16, 2019] Andrew O'Hagan Ghosting Julian Assange LRB 6 March 2014

Apr 16, 2019 | lrb.co.uk

There were two last visits. During the first I was led in by a new young assistant, Ethan, who was keen to agree with everything being said. Our conversation was mainly about Edward Snowden. There are few subjects on which Julian would be reluctant to take what you might call a paternalistic position, but over Snowden, whom he's never met but has chatted with and feels largely responsible for, he expressed a kind of irritable admiration. 'Just how good is he?' I asked.

'He's number nine,' he said.

'In the world? Among computer hackers? And where are you?'

'I'm number three.' He went on to say that he wondered whether Snowden was calm enough, intelligent enough, and added that he should have come to them for advice before fleeing to Hong Kong.

A fair reading of the situation might conclude, without prejudice, that Assange, like an ageing movie star, was a little put out by the global superstardom of Snowden. He has always cared too much about the fame and too much about the credit, while real relationships and real action often fade to nothing. Snowden was now the central hub and Julian was keen to help him and keen to be seen to be helping him. It's how the ego works and the ego always comes first. Snowden, while grateful for the advice and the comradeship, was meanwhile playing a cannier game than Julian. He was eager for credit, too, but behaving more subtly, more amiably, and playing with bigger secrets. Julian said he hoped that others, I took him to mean the Guardian and Glenn Greenwald, didn't claim too much credit for the flow of secrets. He said he wanted me to help him get a film going, an account of what actually happened in Hong Kong, how he helped Snowden. He said he had all the inside information and connections and it would make a fantastic thriller. We discussed it at length and I told him the way to get movie interest in such a thing was to get behind a big piece in Vanity Fair . He agreed and said he would set aside time to get down to it. But I knew he wouldn't. It was odd the way he spoke about Snowden, almost jealously, as if the younger man didn't quite understand what he was about, needing much more from Julian than he knew how to ask for. I recognised the familiar anxiety about non-influence: 'Snowden should have been with us from the beginning,' he said. 'He's flailing.' But they were now making up for lost time. As we spoke, Sarah was in Moscow Airport, where Snowden was being held without a passport. 'I sent Sarah over,' said Julian in his favourite mode. All he needed at that point was a white cat to stroke.

Snowden was everywhere in the news the last time I decided to drop in on Julian after I'd been out in his neighbourhood. The embassy was quiet. I brought a couple of bottles of beer up from the street and we sat in the dark room. It was a Friday night and Julian had never seemed more alone. We laughed a lot and then he went very deeply into himself. He drank his beer and then lifted mine and drank that. 'We've got some really historic things going on,' he said. Then he opened his laptop and the blue screen lit his face and he hardly noticed me leaving.

[Apr 14, 2019] Edward Snowden: Surveillance Is About Power

Now a lot of unpleasant question arise for Trump administration. Assange case is rather difficult to handle without spilling the beans.
Apr 14, 2019 | www.unz.com

wayfarer , says: April 13, 2019 at 1:47 pm GMT

"Edward Snowden: Surveillance Is About Power."
https://www.youtube.com/embed/RSc_IlFBWkw?feature=oembed
jim jones , says: April 13, 2019 at 1:54 pm GMT
The Assange arrest has strengthened my resolve never to vote Conservative again
Agent76 , says: April 13, 2019 at 3:07 pm GMT
@wayfarer Good share wayfarer. January 10, 2014 *500* Years of History Shows that Mass Spying Is Always Aimed at Crushing Dissent *It's Never to Protect Us From Bad Guys*

No matter which government conducts mass surveillance, they also do it to crush dissent, and then give a false rationale for why they're doing it.

http://www.globalresearch.ca/500-years-of-history-shows-that-mass-spying-is-always-aimed-at-crushing-dissent/5364462

[Apr 12, 2019] Did Max Boot and Commentary Magazine Lie About Edward Snowden You Decide by Glenn Greenwald

Notable quotes:
"... It is literally the supreme act of projection for Max Boot to accuse anyone of lacking courage, as this particular think tank warmonger is the living, breathing personification of the unique strain of American neocon cowardice . Unlike Snowden -- who sacrificed his liberty and unraveled his life in pursuit of his beliefs -- the 45-year-old Boot has spent most of his adult life advocating for one war after the next, but always wanting to send his fellow citizens of his generation to die in them, while he hides in the comfort of Washington think tanks, never fighting them himself. ..."
"... All of that is just garden-variety neocon cowardice, and it's of course grotesque to watch someone like this call someone else a coward. ..."
"... It's not surprising that someone whose entire adult life is shaped by extreme cowardice would want to accuse others of lacking courage, as it distracts attention away from oneself and provides the comfort of company. Nor is it surprising that government-loyal journalists spew outright falsehoods to smear whistleblowers. But even neocon rags like Commentary shouldn't be able to get away with this level of blatant lying. ..."
"... Being a neocon coward means never having to admit error. ..."
Jun 05, 2015 | theintercept.com

In the neocon journal Commentary , Max Boot today complains that the New York Times published an op-ed by Edward Snowden . Boot's objection rests on his accusation that the NSA whistleblower is actually a "traitor." In objecting, Boot made these claims:

Oddly enough nowhere in his article -- which is datelined Moscow -- does he mention the surveillance apparatus of his host, Vladimir Putin , which far exceeds in scope anything created by any Western country. . . .That would be the same FSB that has taken Snowden into its bosom as it has previously done (in its earlier incarnation as the KGB) with previous turncoats such as Kim Philby. . . .

But of course Ed Snowden is not courageous enough, or stupid enough, to criticize the dictatorship that he has defected to. It's much easier and safer to criticize the country he betrayed from behind the protection provided by the FSB's thugs. The only mystery is why the Times is giving this traitor a platform.

It is literally the supreme act of projection for Max Boot to accuse anyone of lacking courage, as this particular think tank warmonger is the living, breathing personification of the unique strain of American neocon cowardice . Unlike Snowden -- who sacrificed his liberty and unraveled his life in pursuit of his beliefs -- the 45-year-old Boot has spent most of his adult life advocating for one war after the next, but always wanting to send his fellow citizens of his generation to die in them, while he hides in the comfort of Washington think tanks, never fighting them himself.

All of that is just garden-variety neocon cowardice, and it's of course grotesque to watch someone like this call someone else a coward. But it's so much worse if he lies when doing so. Did he do so here? You decide. From Snowden's NYT op-ed today:

Basic technical safeguards such as encryption -- once considered esoteric and unnecessary -- are now enabled by default in the products of pioneering companies like Apple, ensuring that even if your phone is stolen, your private life remains private. Such structural technological changes can ensure access to basic privacies beyond borders, insulating ordinary citizens from the arbitrary passage of anti­ privacy laws, such as those now descending upon Russia.

The meaning of that passage -- criticisms of Russia's attack on privacy -- is so clear and glaring that it caused even Time magazine to publish this today :

The first sentence of Time 's article: "Former CIA officer and NSA contractor Ed Snowden has taken a surprising swing at his new home, accusing Russia of 'arbitrarily passing' new anti-privacy laws ." In other words, in the very op-ed to which Boot objects, Snowden did exactly that which Boot accused him of lacking the courage to do: "criticize" the country that has given him asylum.

This is far from the first time Snowden has done exactly that which the Tough and Swaggering Think Tank Warrior proclaimed Snowden would never do. In April, 2014, Snowden wrote an op-ed in The Guardian under this headline:

With Max Boot's above-printed accusations in mind, just re-read that. Did Boot lie? To pose the question is to answer it. Here's part of what Snowden wrote in that op-ed:

On Thursday, I questioned Russia's involvement in mass surveillance on live television. . . . I went on to challenge whether, even if such a mass surveillance program were effective and technically legal, it could ever be morally justified. . . . In his response, Putin denied the first part of the question and dodged on the latter. There are serious inconsistencies in his denial.

In countless speeches, Snowden has said much the same thing: that Russian spying is a serious problem that needs investigation and reform, and that Putin's denials are not credible. Boot simply lied about Snowden.

It's not surprising that someone whose entire adult life is shaped by extreme cowardice would want to accuse others of lacking courage, as it distracts attention away from oneself and provides the comfort of company. Nor is it surprising that government-loyal journalists spew outright falsehoods to smear whistleblowers. But even neocon rags like Commentary shouldn't be able to get away with this level of blatant lying.

UPDATE : In typical neocon fashion, Boot first replies by minimizing his own error to a mere innocent oversight, and implying that only hysteria could cause anyone to find what he did to be problematic. Even then, the facts negate his self-justification. But then he says he was actually right all along and his "point stands":

Being a neocon coward means never having to admit error.

[Apr 12, 2019] Edward Snowden and Julian Assange Betrayed

Feb 24, 2014 | homment.com
Correspondence with Edward Snowden, and the key to freedom for Julian Assange

A member of our Belgian Jewish community is in touch with Edward Snowden in Russia, both sharing the role of being significant global dissidents who used to live in the USA.

We are publishing here a copy of some of that correspondence between those two figures, as it discusses the likelihood of how both Edward Snowden and Julian Assange are being betrayed and actively harmed by the American lawyers and US-UK media companies claiming to 'represent' them, including America's ACLU (America's Civil Liberties Union), the UK Guardian and New York Times newspapers, and Glenn Greenwald.

All these groups and journalists, are apparently hiding thousands of pages of legal files, about the corruption and bribery of US federal (national) judges who are the same judges who would put Julian Assange or Edward Snowden on trial ... even though these lawyers and journalists all know that exposing the crimes of the bribed US judges, is the quick key to releasing Julian Assange from threats that confine him to his refuge in the Ecuadorean Embassy in London, and key to more safety and freedom for Snowden as well.

US Attorney General Eric Holder is accused of sponsoring criminal acts of deception against the UK, Sweden, Russia and other countries, hiding 'smoking gun' evidence of US judge bribery, in order to harm and destroy both Julian Assange and Edward Snowden. Google Inc has agreed to censor and hoax the internet and hide dozens of web pages about this.

This bribery is said to be funded by Britain's Pearson plc, with the Guardian and New York Times accused of accepting Pearson-funded bribes to print fake 'news' to obstruct and pervert justice so that the UK will not prosecute Pearson's bribery of US high judges and government.

Mr Snowden is also facing the terrifying possibility that his name is being abused by these parties, New York Times, Guardian and Greenwald, for the sake of entrapping other dissidents and whistleblowers into 'trusting' these journalists, who might then convey dissident names to the US regime in order to silence and murder them. It seems possible the Guardian and New York Times have already given Snowden files back to the US regime.

The correspondence with Edward Snowden makes reference to the police file with several EU countries, who are beginning investigations and prosecutions, starting in Finland, of the CIA-tied Wikipedia website, for fundraising fraud ... that police file significantly discusses the evidence of bribery of US federal judges who are the same judges who would put Edward Snowden and Julian Assange on trial in America, and how Wikipedia, actually an American CIA-controlled 'Trojan horse' for inserting lies on targeted topics, has been used to plant lies about that judicial bribery - the police dossier text is here:

'CIA Wikipedia fraud Finland police report'
http://homment.com/FB3PjBQ2DF

Here is a screenshot of a Google Inc 'search results' page, with tiny text at the bottom admitting that Google is censoring a large number of search results, about Edward Snowden's correspondent, a major witness to the crimes involving the same US judges who would put Edward Snowden or Julian Assange on trial:

'Live Photo: Google Inc. Caught Censoring EU Search Results on US corruption'
http://www.flickr.com/photos/22325431@N05/6100668211/in/photostream

- Jewish Community of Flanders

[Aug 04, 2018] Edward Snowden 5 years in Russia and still relevant as ever

Aug 04, 2018 | theduran.com

TASS reported that August 1 was the five year anniversary of Edward Snowden's being granted temporary asylum in the Russian Federation. This happened after his release of an enormous trove of information showing clandestine and illegal practices being carried out by the US intelligence agencies to gather information on just about anyone in the world, for any – or no – reason at all.

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Edward Snowden, 35, is a computer security expert. In 2005-2008, he worked at the University of Maryland's Center for Advanced Study of Language sponsored by the National Security Agency (NSA) and at the global communications division at CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia. In 2007, Snowden was stationed with diplomatic cover at the US mission to the United Nations in Geneva, Switzerland. In 2009, he resigned from the CIA to join the Dell company that sent him to Hawaii to work for the NSA's information-sharing office. He was particularly employed with the Booz Allen Hamilton consulting firm.

In June 2013, Snowden leaked classified information to journalists Glenn Greenwald and Laura Poitras, which revealed global surveillance programs run by US and British intelligence agencies. He explained the move by saying that he wanted to tell the world the truth because he believed such large-scale surveillance on innocent citizens was unacceptable and the public needed to know about it.

The Guardian and The Washington Post published the first documents concerning the US intelligence agencies' spying on Internet users on June 6, 2013. According to the documents, major phone companies, including Verizon, AT&T and Sprint Nextel, handed records of their customers' phone conversations over to the NSA and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), who also had direct access to the servers of Microsoft, Yahoo, Google, Facebook, Skype, YouTube, Paltalk, AOL and Apple. In addition, Snowden's revelations showed that a secret program named PRISM was aimed at collecting audio and video recordings, photos, emails and information about users' connections to various websites.

The next portion of revelations , which was published by the leading newspapers such as The Guardian, Brazil's O Globo, Italy's L'Espresso, Germany's Der Spiegel and Suddeutsche Zeitung, concerned the US spying on politicians. In particular, it became known that the NSA and Great Britain's Government Communications Headquarters intercepted the phone calls that foreign politicians and officials made during the G20 summit in London in 2009. British intelligence agencies particularly tried to intercept then Russian President Dmitry Medvedev's phone calls. US intelligence monitored the phone calls of 35 world leaders, including German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

According to the disclosed information, the NSA regularly gathered intelligence at the New York and Washington offices of the European Union's mission. The agency also achieved access to the United Nations' internal video conferences and considers the Vienna headquarters of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) as one of its major targets for spying.

The leaks also uncovered details about the Blarney and Rampart-T secret surveillance programs. Blarney, which started in 1978, is used to collect information related to counter-terrorism, foreign diplomats and governments, as well as economic and military targets. Rampart-T has been used since 1991 to spy on foreign leaders. The program is focused on 20 countries, including Russia and China.

Snowden also let the world know that Germany's Federal Intelligence Service and Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution used the NSA's XKeyScore secret computer system to spy on Internet users, monitoring their web activities. In addition, the NSA and Great Britain's Government Communications Headquarters developed methods that allowed them to hack almost all the encryption systems currently used on the Internet. Besides, the leaked documents said that the NSA had secretly installed special software on about 100,000 computers around the globe that provided access to them and made cyber attacks easier. In particular, the NSA used a secret technology that made it possible to hack computers not connected to the Internet.

Portions of the information Snowden handed over to Greenwald and Poitras continue to be published on The Intercept website . According to edwardsnowden.com – a website commissioned by the Courage foundation (dedicated to building support for Snowden), a total of 2,176 documents from the archive have been published so far.

The NSA and the Pentagon claim that Snowden stole about 1.7 mln classified documents concerning the activities of US intelligence services and US military operations. He is charged with theft of government property, unauthorized communication of national defense information and willful communication of classified communications intelligence information to an unauthorized person. He is facing up to ten years in prison on each charge.

As can be seen, Mr. Snowden's work is of extreme importance now in the connected Internet age. But how is his life in Russia now?

According to Sputnik News, his life goes on . Reports say that he is continuing to learn the Russian language and to travel about the country:

Anatoly Kucherena, Edward Snowden's lawyer, has revealed some details of the renowned whistleblower's life to Sputnik. According to him, Snowden has found a job, is actively traveling around Russia and is continuing to learn the language.

Kucherena added that Snowden receives visits from his girlfriend, Lindsey Mills, and his parents. When asked about the whistleblower's favorite place in Russia, his lawyer said that he likes St Petersburg "a lot."

"He is doing alright: his girlfriend visits him, he has a good job and he's continuing to study Russian. His parents visit him occasionally. [They] have no problems with visas. At least they have never complained about having any trouble," the lawyer said.

After Snowden released classified NSA documents, he fled first to Hong Kong, then, on June 23, 2013, arrived in Moscow from Hong Kong. The whistleblower remained in the transit zone of Sheremetyevo Airport until he was granted temporary asylum in Russia, which was later prolonged to 2020.

[Feb 19, 2018] Fearless Adversarial Journalism Doesn't Work When You Are Funded By A Billionaire

Feb 19, 2018 | www.zerohedge.com

Via Disobedient Media

Disobedient Media previously opined on the dagger-in-the-back publication of a hit piece against Wikileaks' Julian Assange just one day after a UK magistrate, with blatant conflict of interest in the matter, shot down his legal representatives' attempt to finally free him from the confines of the Ecuadorian embassy.

What that article did not address was the patently obvious terminal illness suffered by The Intercept. That is, the outlet claims to publish "fearless, adversarial" reporting, while it is funded by a billionaire. Ken Silverstein , formerly employed at The Intercept and by Omidyar's First Look Media, has described endemic problems at the outlet that have risen directly out of Omidyar's leadership or lack thereof.

The fundamental problem facing The Intercept is not ultimately about how or why the outlet published a smear specifically timed to cut support away from Assange, even though that is in and of itself despicable. It's that doing so acts in support of the very deep state and moneyed, military interests that The Intercept purports to critique "fearlessly."

Adding to a sense of betrayal of The Intercept's principals in the wake of the outlet's hit-piece is the fact that a number of writers at the publication are by all accounts on good terms with Assange, and have worked with mutual supporters including the superb Italian journalist Stefania Maurizi. Maurizi collaborated with Wikileaks on the verification of documents for many years, and worked with Glenn Greenwald on preparation for the disclosure of the Snowden files.

Adding to the years of support Greenwald has shown Assange, the Wikileaks co-founder also sent Wikileaks' own Sarah Harrison to the aid of Snowden after he was marooned in Hong Kong in 2013, an act which Stefania Maurizi revealed very likely cost the publisher his freedom.

After the publication of the Snowden files, the UK ceased any attempt to create a legal process by which Assange might have been safely freed , and in the same year pressured Sweden to continue its investigation after the country's authorities expressed their intent to drop the matter. Likewise, in the wake of Assange's actions towards Snowden, the Obama White House changed its stance from a reluctant acceptance that prosecution of WikiLeaks for publishing might not be possible given that US publishers had also published the same material.

Snowden's revelations also provided much of the impetus for the launch of The Intercept as an outlet, after Glenn Greenwald departed from The Guardian . In this way, Assange's story and his fate in the Ecuadorian embassy is inextricably linked with the origin of The Intercept's rise on the back of the Snowden revelations.

Only a few months later, in October 2013 while Snowden was still stuck in a Moscow airport and out of reach of US authorities and The Intercept was gearing up for launch, the UK made it clear to the Swedish prosecutor that she should not drop her investigation and European Arrest Warrant for Assange, even though Sweden's law on proportionality required her to do so.

In the wake of Snowden's escape to Russia, Assange remained trapped in 30 square meters of an embassy and lost any hope that had existed earlier in 2013 that he would soon be released from that space, where we now know he cannot receive even the most basic medical care. Meanwhile, The Intercept has become what it set out to destroy.

The relationship between Assange and The intercept makes it impossible to see the organization's publication of an intrinsically flawed smear piece aimed at Assange as anything other than a deep betrayal.

Which brings us inevitably to Pierre Omidyar . That the multi-billionaire Ebay founder despises Trump and would have preferred former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to assume the mantle of the Presidency is an understatement, but to focus only on his political outlook also misses the point of the larger issue facing The Intercept.

The billionaire's incoherent vision of the First Amendment (disturbing for someone who funds journalistic endeavors) aside, the nature of The Intercept's fatal catch-22 would remain if Omidyar woke up tomorrow to become a MAGA-hat wearing, NRA-supporting conservative. That is, a media outlet cannot perform as an 'independent and adversarial' entity when it is birthed within and nurtured by the very establishment it must confront.

When USA Today reported that Omidyar would contribute $250 million to pursue "independent journalism," a genetic malfunction was written into the Intercept's DNA. One cannot operate in an adversarial manner when one is supported directly by the same moneyed interests that require the most scrutiny and transparency of all.

That the magnate's influence would seep, tide-like, into the reporting and editorial decisions of The Intercept seems difficult to ignore, but it is that inevitable creep itself and not the flavor of his beliefs which makes the situation so damning for The Intercept.

I've previously written at length in an effort to describe the chilling uniformity that ultimately pervades the plutocratic class. Being a billionaire makes Pierre Omidyar much more like one of the Koch Brothers than any liberal without access to the same magnitude of wealth and influence in the US political sphere. The fact that wealth translates to political influence was described in a Princeton University study, indicating that the United States operates as a plutocracy. In that light, it is the wealth that binds Omidyar, the Kochs and their ilk, as opposed to political outlook.

When Omidyar made use of Citizens' United to supply an anti-Trump super PAC with $100,000 in 2016, it's not the flavor of the political activism that he bought – it's that he bought it at all. Omidyar is a power-player within the same corrupt establishment that WikiLeaks and The Intercept – in principle – aim to critique regularly.

Omidyar has also provided funds to the Clinton Foundation. As indicated by Wikileaks via Twitter , the Freedom Of The Press Foundation recently made the controversial decision to terminate processing of Wikileaks donations. The move represented an end to the role that was a central cause for the Foundation's creation, according to a statement by Assange.

Ironically, the initial financial blockade that made the Freedom Of The Press necessary was in part initiated by Paypal, which was a spin-off from Ebay, a company that Omidyar founded. Omidyar served on the board of the company until last year.

Sarah Harisson expressed the conflict of interest that Omidyar's involvement with The Intercept represents to German Press , saying: " How can you take something seriously when the person behind this platform went along with the financial boycott against WikiLeaks?"

Here lies the gulf between an adversarial organization like WikiLeaks and a news outlet that purports to be fearless while subsisting on the payroll of a member of the plutocratic elite.

The issue here goes beyond Omidyar's politics and the petty, obsessively personal derangement of The Intercept's Micah Lee towards Julian Assange. The crux of the terminal illness suffered by The Intercept is that it cannot stand as an outlet that wishes to both participate in adversarial, anti-establishment reporting while it also relies on the funds of a billionaire – any billionaire.

The rough beast born of the marriage between Omidyar's funds and the yearning for freedom that surrounded the release of the Snowden Files cannot help but spiral towards its inevitable fate.

At The Intercept, the center cannot hold in the widening gyre between its best journalists and its worst impulses.

[Feb 18, 2018] Opinion Fearless Adversarial Journalism Doesn't Work When You Are Funded By A Billionaire Zero Hedge Zero Hedge

Feb 18, 2018 | www.zerohedge.com

Via Disobedient Media

Disobedient Media previously opined on the dagger-in-the-back publication of a hit piece against Wikileaks' Julian Assange just one day after a UK magistrate, with blatant conflict of interest in the matter, shot down his legal representatives' attempt to finally free him from the confines of the Ecuadorian embassy.

What that article did not address was the patently obvious terminal illness suffered by The Intercept. That is, the outlet claims to publish "fearless, adversarial" reporting, while it is funded by a billionaire. Ken Silverstein , formerly employed at The Intercept and by Omidyar's First Look Media, has described endemic problems at the outlet that have risen directly out of Omidyar's leadership or lack thereof.

The fundamental problem facing The Intercept is not ultimately about how or why the outlet published a smear specifically timed to cut support away from Assange, even though that is in and of itself despicable. It's that doing so acts in support of the very deep state and moneyed, military interests that The Intercept purports to critique "fearlessly."

Adding to a sense of betrayal of The Intercept's principals in the wake of the outlet's hit-piece is the fact that a number of writers at the publication are by all accounts on good terms with Assange, and have worked with mutual supporters including the superb Italian journalist Stefania Maurizi. Maurizi collaborated with Wikileaks on the verification of documents for many years, and worked with Glenn Greenwald on preparation for the disclosure of the Snowden files.

Adding to the years of support Greenwald has shown Assange, the Wikileaks co-founder also sent Wikileaks' own Sarah Harrison to the aid of Snowden after he was marooned in Hong Kong in 2013, an act which Stefania Maurizi revealed very likely cost the publisher his freedom.

After the publication of the Snowden files, the UK ceased any attempt to create a legal process by which Assange might have been safely freed , and in the same year pressured Sweden to continue its investigation after the country's authorities expressed their intent to drop the matter. Likewise, in the wake of Assange's actions towards Snowden, the Obama White House changed its stance from a reluctant acceptance that prosecution of WikiLeaks for publishing might not be possible given that US publishers had also published the same material.

Snowden's revelations also provided much of the impetus for the launch of The Intercept as an outlet, after Glenn Greenwald departed from The Guardian . In this way, Assange's story and his fate in the Ecuadorian embassy is inextricably linked with the origin of The Intercept's rise on the back of the Snowden revelations.

Only a few months later, in October 2013 while Snowden was still stuck in a Moscow airport and out of reach of US authorities and The Intercept was gearing up for launch, the UK made it clear to the Swedish prosecutor that she should not drop her investigation and European Arrest Warrant for Assange, even though Sweden's law on proportionality required her to do so.

In the wake of Snowden's escape to Russia, Assange remained trapped in 30 square meters of an embassy and lost any hope that had existed earlier in 2013 that he would soon be released from that space, where we now know he cannot receive even the most basic medical care. Meanwhile, The Intercept has become what it set out to destroy.

The relationship between Assange and The intercept makes it impossible to see the organization's publication of an intrinsically flawed smear piece aimed at Assange as anything other than a deep betrayal.

Which brings us inevitably to Pierre Omidyar . That the multi-billionaire Ebay founder despises Trump and would have preferred former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to assume the mantle of the Presidency is an understatement, but to focus only on his political outlook also misses the point of the larger issue facing The Intercept.

The billionaire's incoherent vision of the First Amendment (disturbing for someone who funds journalistic endeavors) aside, the nature of The Intercept's fatal catch-22 would remain if Omidyar woke up tomorrow to become a MAGA-hat wearing, NRA-supporting conservative. That is, a media outlet cannot perform as an 'independent and adversarial' entity when it is birthed within and nurtured by the very establishment it must confront.

When USA Today reported that Omidyar would contribute $250 million to pursue "independent journalism," a genetic malfunction was written into the Intercept's DNA. One cannot operate in an adversarial manner when one is supported directly by the same moneyed interests that require the most scrutiny and transparency of all.

That the magnate's influence would seep, tide-like, into the reporting and editorial decisions of The Intercept seems difficult to ignore, but it is that inevitable creep itself and not the flavor of his beliefs which makes the situation so damning for The Intercept.

I've previously written at length in an effort to describe the chilling uniformity that ultimately pervades the plutocratic class. Being a billionaire makes Pierre Omidyar much more like one of the Koch Brothers than any liberal without access to the same magnitude of wealth and influence in the US political sphere. The fact that wealth translates to political influence was described in a Princeton University study, indicating that the United States operates as a plutocracy. In that light, it is the wealth that binds Omidyar, the Kochs and their ilk, as opposed to political outlook.

When Omidyar made use of Citizens' United to supply an anti-Trump super PAC with $100,000 in 2016, it's not the flavor of the political activism that he bought – it's that he bought it at all. Omidyar is a power-player within the same corrupt establishment that WikiLeaks and The Intercept – in principle – aim to critique regularly.

Omidyar has also provided funds to the Clinton Foundation. As indicated by Wikileaks via Twitter , the Freedom Of The Press Foundation recently made the controversial decision to terminate processing of Wikileaks donations. The move represented an end to the role that was a central cause for the Foundation's creation, according to a statement by Assange.

Ironically, the initial financial blockade that made the Freedom Of The Press necessary was in part initiated by Paypal, which was a spin-off from Ebay, a company that Omidyar founded. Omidyar served on the board of the company until last year.

Sarah Harisson expressed the conflict of interest that Omidyar's involvement with The Intercept represents to German Press , saying: " How can you take something seriously when the person behind this platform went along with the financial boycott against WikiLeaks?"

Here lies the gulf between an adversarial organization like WikiLeaks and a news outlet that purports to be fearless while subsisting on the payroll of a member of the plutocratic elite.

The issue here goes beyond Omidyar's politics and the petty, obsessively personal derangement of The Intercept's Micah Lee towards Julian Assange. The crux of the terminal illness suffered by The Intercept is that it cannot stand as an outlet that wishes to both participate in adversarial, anti-establishment reporting while it also relies on the funds of a billionaire – any billionaire.

The rough beast born of the marriage between Omidyar's funds and the yearning for freedom that surrounded the release of the Snowden Files cannot help but spiral towards its inevitable fate.

At The Intercept, the center cannot hold in the widening gyre between its best journalists and its worst impulses.

[Dec 28, 2017] From Snowden To Russia-gate - The CIA And The Media

Highly recommended!
Notable quotes:
"... The promotion of the alleged Russian election hacking in certain media may have grown from the successful attempts of U.S. intelligence services to limit the publication of the NSA files obtained by Edward Snowden. ..."
"... In May 2013 Edward Snowden fled to Hongkong and handed internal documents from the National Security Agency (NSA) to four journalists, Glenn Greenwald, Laura Poitras, and Ewen MacAskill of the Guardian and separately to Barton Gellman who worked for the Washington Post . ..."
"... In July 2013 the Guardian was forced by the British government to destroy its copy of the Snowden archive. ..."
"... In August 2013 Jeff Bezos bought the Washington Post for some $250 million. In 2012 Bezos, the founder, largest share holder and CEO of Amazon, had already a cooperation with the CIA. Together they invested in a Canadian quantum computing company. In March 2013 Amazon signed a $600 million deal to provide computing services for the CIA. ..."
"... The motivation for the Bezos and Omidyar to do this is not clear. Bezos is estimated to own a shameful $90 billion. The Washington Post buy is chump-change for him. Omidyar has a net worth of some $9.3 billion. But the use of billionaires to mask what are in fact intelligence operations is not new. The Ford Foundation has for decades been a CIA front , George Soros' Open Society foundation is one of the premier "regime change" operations, well versed in instigating "color revolutions" ..."
"... It would have been reasonable if the cooperation between those billionaires and the intelligence agencies had stopped after the NSA leaks were secured. But it seems that strong cooperation of the Bezos and Omidyar outlets with the CIA and others continue. ..."
"... The Washington Post , which has a much bigger reach, is the prime outlet for "Russia-gate", the false claims by parts of the U.S. intelligence community and the Clinton campaign, that Russia attempted to influence U.S. elections or even "colluded" with Trump. ..."
"... The revelation that the sole Russiagate "evidence" was the so-called Steele Dossier - i.e. opposition research funded by the Clinton campaign - which was used by the intelligence community to not only begin the public assertions of Trump's perfidy but to then initiate FISA approved surveillance on the Trump campaign, that is truly astonishing. Instructive then that the NY Times, Washington Post, etc have yet to acknowledge these facts to their readers, and instead have effectively doubled down on the story, insisting that the Russiagate allegations are established fact and constitute "objective reality." That suggests this fake news story will continue indefinitely. ..."
"... What we see here is these bastions of establishment thinking in the USA promoting "objective reality" as partisan - i.e. there is a Clinton reality versus a Trump reality, or a Russian reality versus a "Western" reality, facts and documentation be damned. This divorce from objectivity is a symptom of the overall decline of American institutions, an indicate a future hard, rather than soft, landing near the end of the road. ..."
Dec 28, 2017 | www.moonofalabama.org

The promotion of the alleged Russian election hacking in certain media may have grown from the successful attempts of U.S. intelligence services to limit the publication of the NSA files obtained by Edward Snowden.

In May 2013 Edward Snowden fled to Hongkong and handed internal documents from the National Security Agency (NSA) to four journalists, Glenn Greenwald, Laura Poitras, and Ewen MacAskill of the Guardian and separately to Barton Gellman who worked for the Washington Post . Some of those documents were published by Glenn Greenwald in the Guardian , others by Barton Gellman in the Washington Post . Several other international news site published additional material though the mass of NSA papers that Snowden allegedly acquired never saw public daylight.

In July 2013 the Guardian was forced by the British government to destroy its copy of the Snowden archive.

In August 2013 Jeff Bezos bought the Washington Post for some $250 million. In 2012 Bezos, the founder, largest share holder and CEO of Amazon, had already a cooperation with the CIA. Together they invested in a Canadian quantum computing company. In March 2013 Amazon signed a $600 million deal to provide computing services for the CIA.

In October 2013 Pierre Omidyar, the owner of Ebay, founded First Look Media and hired Glenn Greenwald and Laura Poitras. The total planned investment was said to be $250 million. It took up to February 2014 until the new organization launched its first site, the Intercept . Only a few NSA stories appeared on it. The Intercept is a rather mediocre site. Its management is said to be chaotic . It publishes few stories of interests and one might ask if it ever was meant to be a serious outlet. Omidyar has worked, together with the U.S. government, to force regime change onto Ukraine. He had strong ties with the Obama administration.

Snowden had copies of some 20,000 to 58,000 NSA files . Only 1,182 have been published . Bezos and Omidyar obviously helped the NSA to keep more than 95% of the Snowden archive away from the public. The Snowden papers were practically privatized into trusted hands of Silicon Valley billionaires with ties to the various secret services and the Obama administration.

The motivation for the Bezos and Omidyar to do this is not clear. Bezos is estimated to own a shameful $90 billion. The Washington Post buy is chump-change for him. Omidyar has a net worth of some $9.3 billion. But the use of billionaires to mask what are in fact intelligence operations is not new. The Ford Foundation has for decades been a CIA front , George Soros' Open Society foundation is one of the premier "regime change" operations, well versed in instigating "color revolutions".

It would have been reasonable if the cooperation between those billionaires and the intelligence agencies had stopped after the NSA leaks were secured. But it seems that strong cooperation of the Bezos and Omidyar outlets with the CIA and others continue.

The Intercept burned a intelligence leaker, Realty Winner, who had trusted its journalists to keep her protected. It smeared the President of Syria as neo-nazi based on an (intentional?) mistranslation of one of his speeches. It additionally hired a Syrian supporter of the CIA's "regime change by Jihadis" in Syria. Despite its pretense of "fearless, adversarial journalism" it hardly deviates from U.S. policies.

The Washington Post , which has a much bigger reach, is the prime outlet for "Russia-gate", the false claims by parts of the U.S. intelligence community and the Clinton campaign, that Russia attempted to influence U.S. elections or even "colluded" with Trump.

Just today it provides two stories and one op-ed that lack any factual evidence for the anti-Russian claims made in them.

In Kremlin trolls burned across the Internet as Washington debated options the writers insinuate that some anonymous writer who published a few pieces on Counterpunch and elsewhere was part of a Russian operation. They provide zero evidence to back that claim up. Whatever that writer wrote (see list at end) was run of the mill stuff that had little to do with the U.S. election. The piece then dives into various cyber-operations against Russia that the Obama and Trump administration have discussed.

A second story in the paper today is based on "a classified GRU report obtained by The Washington Post." It claims that the Russian military intelligence service GRU started a social media operation one day after the Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych was illegally removed from his office in a U.S. regime change operation . What the story lists as alleged GRU puppet postings reads like normal internet talk of people opposed to the fascist regime change in Kiev. The Washington Post leaves completely unexplained who handed it an alleged GRU report from 2014, who classified it and how, if at all, it verified its veracity. To me the piece and the assertions therein have a strong odor of bovine excrement.

An op-ed in the very same Washington Post has a similar smell. It is written by the intelligence flunkies Michael Morell and Mike Rogers. Morell had hoped to become CIA boss under a President Hillary Clinton. The op-ed (which includes a serious misunderstanding of "deterrence") asserts that Russia never stopped its cyberattacks on the United States :

Russia's information operations tactics since the election are more numerous than can be listed here . But to get a sense of the breadth of Russian activity, consider the messaging spread by Kremlin-oriented accounts on Twitter, which cybersecurity and disinformation experts have tracked as part of the German Marshall Fund's Alliance for Securing Democracy.

The author link to this page which claims to list Twitter hashtags that are currently used by Russian influence agents. Apparently the top issue Russia's influence agents currently promote is "#merrychristmas".


bigger

When the authors claim Russian operations are "more numerous than can be listed here" they practically admit that they have not even one plausible operation they could cite. Its simply obfuscation to justify their call for more political and military measures against Russia. This again to distract from the real reasons Clinton lost the election and to introduce a new Cold War for the benefit of weapon producers and U.S. influence in Europe.

Cont. reading: From Snowden To Russia-gate - The CIA And The Media

11:53 AM | Comments (137)

G , Dec 26, 2017 12:10:03 PM | 1

If what you allege is true about Greenwald and the Intercept, then why hasn't Snowden spoken out about it yet? Surely he would have said something about the Intercept and Greenwald keeping important stories buried by now. Yet, as far as I can tell, he has a good relationship with Greenwald. I find it hard to believe hat a man who literally gave up everything he had in life to leak important docs would remain silent for so long about a publishing cover up. I don't really like the Intercept and I think your analysis of its content is accurate, but I do find it hard to believe that the NSA docs were "bought" back by the CIA.
Ort , Dec 26, 2017 1:41:21 PM | 16
@G | 1

If what you allege is true about Greenwald and the Intercept, then why hasn't Snowden spoken out about it yet?
_____________________________________________________

My understanding is that early on, Snowden placed his trove of documents in the exclusive care of Glenn Greenwald and his associates. Although Snowden has since become a public figure in his own right, and his opinions on state-security events and issues are solicited, as far as I know Snowden has no direct responsibility for managing the material he downloaded.

I haven't followed Snowden closely enough to know how familiar he may be with the contents of the reported "20,000 to 58,000 NSA files" turned over to GG/Omidyar. Snowden presumably took pains to acquire items of interest in his cache as he accumulated classified material, but even if he has extraordinary powers of recall he may not remember precisely what remains unreleased.

FWIW, I was troubled from the first by one of the mainstays of GG's defense, or rationale, when it became clear that he was the principal, and perhaps sole, executive "curator" of the Snowden material. In order to reassure and placate nervous "patriots"-- and GG calls himself a "patriot"-- he repeatedly emphasized that great care was being taken to vet the leaked information before releasing it.

GG's role as whistleblower Snowden's enabler and facilitator was generally hailed uncritically by progressive-liberals and civil-liberties advocates, to a point where public statements that should've raised skeptical doubts and questions were generally passively accepted by complacent admirers.

Specifically, my crap detectors signaled "red alert" early on, when Greenwald (still affiliated with "The Guardian", IIRC) took great pains to announce that his team was working closely with the US/UK governments to vet and screen Snowden's material before releasing any of it; GG repeatedly asserted that he was reviewing the material with the relevant state-security agencies to ensure that none of the released material would compromise or jeopardize government operatives and/or national security.

WTF? Bad enough that Greenwald was requiring the world to exclusively trust his judgment in deciding what should be released and what shouldn't. He was also making it clear that he wasn't exactly committed to disclosing "the worst" of the material "though the heavens fall".

In effect, as GG was telling the world that he could be trusted to manage the leaked information responsibly, he was also telling the world that it simply had to trust his judgment in this crucial role.

To me, there was clearly a subliminal message for both Western authorities and the public: don't worry, we're conscientious, patriotic leak-masters. We're not going to irresponsibly disclose anything too radical, or politically/socially destabilizing.

GG and the Omidyar Group have set themselves up as an independent "brand" in the new field of whistleblower/hacker impresario and leak-broker.

Like only buying NFL-approved merchandise, or fox-approved eggs, the public is being encouraged to only buy (into) Intercept-approved Snowden Leaks™. It's a going concern, which lends itself much more to the "modified limited hangout" approach than freely tossing all the biggest eggs out of the basket.

GG found an opportunity to augment his rising career as a self-made investigative journalist and civil-liberties advocate. Now he's sitting pretty, the celebrity point man for a lucrative modified limited hangout enterprise. What is wrong with this picture?

Bart Hansen , Dec 26, 2017 1:51:59 PM | 17
#1: I suspect that Snowden needs Glenn and Laura as liaisons to the outside world.
G , Dec 26, 2017 2:05:23 PM | 18
@16 I just see no evidence of that aside from fitting the narrative of people who are convinced of a cover up in leaked docs. Moreover, there is no way Russia would continue to offer Snowden asylum if he was gov agent. I'm sure Russian intelligence did a very thorough background check on him.

@17 that's simply not true. He regularly tweets, gives online talks and publishes on his own. He has not used either Poitras or Greenwald as a means of communication for years. And he has never dropped a single hint of being disappointed or frustrated with how documents and info was published.

It just seems so implausible given the total lack of any sign of Snowden's dissatisfaction.

jayc , Dec 26, 2017 2:31:15 PM | 22
The revelation that the sole Russiagate "evidence" was the so-called Steele Dossier - i.e. opposition research funded by the Clinton campaign - which was used by the intelligence community to not only begin the public assertions of Trump's perfidy but to then initiate FISA approved surveillance on the Trump campaign, that is truly astonishing. Instructive then that the NY Times, Washington Post, etc have yet to acknowledge these facts to their readers, and instead have effectively doubled down on the story, insisting that the Russiagate allegations are established fact and constitute "objective reality." That suggests this fake news story will continue indefinitely.

What we see here is these bastions of establishment thinking in the USA promoting "objective reality" as partisan - i.e. there is a Clinton reality versus a Trump reality, or a Russian reality versus a "Western" reality, facts and documentation be damned. This divorce from objectivity is a symptom of the overall decline of American institutions, an indicate a future hard, rather than soft, landing near the end of the road.

Jen , Dec 26, 2017 2:50:16 PM | 25
G @ 1 and 18: My understanding is that Edward Snowden has been advised (warned?) by the Russian government or his lawyer in Moscow not to reveal any more than he has said so far. The asylum Moscow has offered him may be dependent on his keeping discreet. That may include not saying much about The Intercept, in case his communications are followed by the NSA or any other of the various US intel agencies which could lead to their tracking his physical movements in Russia and enable any US-connected agent or agency (including one based in Russia) to trace him, arrest him or kill him, and cover up and frame the seizure or murder in such a way as to place suspicion or blame on the Russian government or on local criminal elements in Russia.

I believe that Snowden does have a job in Russia and possibly this job does not permit him the time to say any more than what he currently tweets or says online.

There is nothing in MoA's article to suggest that Glenn Greenwald is deliberately burying stories in The Intercept. B has said that its management is chaotic which could suggest among other things that Greenwald himself is dissatisfied with its current operation.

G , Dec 26, 2017 2:57:40 PM | 26
@21 I'm not disputing that moneyed interests might have been leaned on by the CIA to stop publishing sensitive info. What I'm disputing is the idea that people like Greenwald have deliberately with-held information that is in the public interest. I doubt that, regardless of the strength of the Intercept as a publication.

@25 What interest would the Russian gov have in helping protect NSA? I assume Russia loves the idea of the US Intel agencies being embarrassed. Snowden speaks his mind about plenty of domestic and international events in US. I have never seen him act like he's being censored.

Jen , Dec 26, 2017 3:46:44 PM | 31
G @ 25: Moscow would have no interest in helping protect the NSA or any other US intel agency. The Russians would have advised Snowden not to say more than he has said so far, not because they are interested in helping the NSA but because they can only protect him as long as he is discreet and does not try to say or publish any more that would jeopardise his safety or give Washington an excuse to pressure Moscow to extradite him back to the US. That would include placing more sanctions on Russia until Snowden is given up.

There is the possibility also that Snowden trusts (or trusted) Greenwald to know what to do with the NSA documents. Perhaps that trust was naively placed - we do not know.

Red Ryder , Dec 26, 2017 3:48:47 PM | 33
b, a big exposition of facts, rich in links to more facts.

This is important material for all to understand.

Snowden is "the squirrel over there!" A distraction turned into a hope.
Compared to Assange, who is being slow-martyred in captivity, Snowden is a boy playing with gadgets.

Why did not Snowden make certain a copy of his theft went to Wikileaks? That would have been insurance.
Since he did not, it all could be just a distraction.

What is known about the Snowden affair is we received proof of what we knew. Not much else. For those who didn't know, they received news.
And ever since, the shape of things from the Deep State/Shadow Government/IC has been lies and warmongering against American freedoms and world cooperation among nations.

Fascism is corporate + the police state. The US government is a pure fascist tyranny that also protects the Empire and Global Hegemony.

We connect the dots and it's always the same picture. It was this way in the 60s,70s,80s,90s, 00s, and this forlorn decade.
Fascism more bold each decade. Billionaires and millionaires have always been in the mix.

[Dec 28, 2017] When GG acquired apparently exclusive stewardship of the Snowden trove, one of my first thoughts was, "If there's anything in Snowden's documents that contradict or cast doubt upon the official 9/11 narrative, Glenn will be careful to put it on the bottom of the pile and keep it there." I still believe this

Dec 28, 2017 | www.moonofalabama.org

@ WJ | 110

119

Sorry I can't help with your questions, but I concur with your hunches about the creation of Intercept.

Your reference to Intercept being set up "to block the inquiry into or exposure of special access Intel operations during or prior to 9/11 which would blow up entirely the official narrative of that epochal event" touches a nerve.

I was a regular reader and commenter at Glenn Greenwald's (GG) "Unclaimed Territory" blog, which was absorbed into the progressive-liberal lite Salon site. I even had a few brief but cordial e-mail exchanges with GG, since I diligently sent him (requested) private e-mail alerts to grammatical and syntactic errors in his prolific posts.

I sympathized with GG's early attempts to deal fairly with aggressive 9/11 Truthers monopolizing the comments; he personally moderated, and participated in, his comments threads. At first, GG's stance was "agnostic" towards 9/11 "Truther" theories, but he reasonably insisted that 9/11-related comments not be allowed to hijack every discussion.

But GG himself was not much of a 9/11 skeptic, and I soured on GG when he proved to be what I call a "Trutherphobe".

Before long, he became openly censorious and began removing both comments and commenters who insisted on mentioning 9/11, even if the 9/11 reference was germane to the topic. (Not me; I knew better than to push his buttons.) Also, GG adopted, or independently reached, what I call the "Chomsky Bubble" stance-- essentially, a sophisticated rationalization that amounts to "nothing to see here, move along."

Eventually, despite his efforts to seem nominally open-minded towards 9/11 skeptics, it became clear that to GG, pursuing 9/11 truth was both a distraction and a nuisance. 9/11 truth is simply not part of GG's agenda.

When GG acquired apparently exclusive stewardship of the Snowden trove, one of my first thoughts was, "If there's anything in Snowden's documents that contradict or cast doubt upon the official 9/11 narrative, Glenn will be careful to put it on the bottom of the pile and keep it there." I still believe this.

It's too late to blithely conclude "In short...", but all this to say that if you're correct, GG is just the person to put in charge of a modified limited hangout operation that, in part, suppresses 9/11 inquiry and truth.

[Dec 28, 2017] Was Snowden a double agent or not

Notable quotes:
"... I have always been flabbergasted about the naivety of the general public in regards to the abilities, capabilities and determination of the so called 'establishment' - aka Plutocracy, when it comes to the choice of means to achieve their psychopathic goals. What is out of reach, or undoable to those that willingly accept the death of millions of innocent people in the ME and the world over? ..."
"... The utter destruction of sovereign Nations that don't fall in line? Organizing coup d'etats like local fundraisers for soup kitchens? Looking at the track record of the American establishment, nothing, absolutely nothing is ever off the table. ..."
"... I'm always wary of talk about limited hangouts. A case can usually be made that such talk is itself intended for the same purpose - to lull the recipient into despair and passivity. ..."
"... And it WAS a secret weapon. It took a long time for this to become obvious. We see the media all along has been completely mediocre, but since it has long given wall-to-wall coverage, it never had to get very good in order to send the daily propaganda message. Come the Internet, everyone sees how sloppy the media's work is. But does this raise the quality of the media lies? It seems not - the opposite in fact, the readers get far smarter than the writers. ..."
"... The greatest trick the Devil pulled was not convincing the world he didn't exist, it was convincing the world that evil was clever, when in fact it's very mediocre. Evil performs badly. It will continue to perform badly. It can be resisted and overcome. This takes time. ..."
Dec 28, 2017 | www.moonofalabama.org

Grieved , Dec 26, 2017 8:34:55 PM | 57

Snowden went to established journalists because he wanted the story to get out. He also wanted them to be cautious and conservative, to redact whatever seemed damaging to operations or his country.

In my opinion, what the journalists did worked. And Snowden destroyed his own access to the materials.

My guess - purely a guess - is that Snowden was, and remains, quite satisfied with what happened and what got published. He never wanted operational FACTS to get out so much as he wanted the SCALE of what the US was doing to get out. In this matter, I'd call his entire effort a tremendous success.

Snowden's face and story went around the world and shook things up. Paradigms came crashing down. In my own personal case, the Snowden material showed me the scale of US adventurism, and the vast audacity of its criminality. It made it clear, in philosophical terms rather than evidentiary terms, that 9/11 could easily be an inside job. It took a change in the paradigms of the scale of corruption to open up that possibility for me. I'm sure it's done similar things for millions of people. Snowden was one of the few events I can think of that actually played out in the mainstream before anyone figured out how to shut it down - and the genie was out of the bottle.

We don't know what we've lost by not having the missing pages released. But I find it hard to think they could change paradigms any more than has already happened. There's a diminishing return here. Wikileaks publishes troves of material, but what paradigms get changed unless it plays in the mainstream? Manning with the video of the mercs shooting the civilians was the last time this happened, I think.

When it comes to seeing what's behind the curtain - which is precisely what the information war is about - the words and the details of the stories matter far less than the way that people's thinking gets changed.

~~

At Christmas I socialized with ordinary people. I learned that they believe the Russians interfered in the US election, and planted Trump. Bummer, but on the other hand, I could talk to everyone about the NSA getting my Facebook feed or my phone data, and there's full agreement, or at least no disagreement.

Snowden went into the culture. Russiagate is still playing out, and we don't yet know who will be the big loser in the belief system of the culture. I'm still willing to bet it's the mainstream media.

~~

Putin has said that Snowden didn't reveal anything that Russian intelligence didn't already know. Russia didn't want to harbor Snowden, but the US State Department forced the issue by revoking his passport while he was in the air terminal in Russia. The current asylum granted is for a 3-year period. I see no reason to make any change in this. It will be reviewed when it expires, and if Snowden is still a stateless political refugee, which seems very likely, than I imagine it will be renewed. Russia is a nation of laws.

Russia has little to do with Snowden. And even less to do with the US elections. Russia doesn't want confrontation, between anyone. Russia wants a world of no conflict, and every action it takes pursues this end. Russia will easily forego a cheap victory in order to gain a valuable cessation of hostilities. I believe Putin when he says that who won the US election was of no great importance to Russia - they would deal with whomever was there.

It's always important to understand that Russia is not playing a zero-sum game, nor is she playing to "win" against any other nation in geopolitics. Russia wins when other nations stop fighting. The lat thing she wants to do is interfere with the internal order of other countries. But she is rooting for the orderliness of each country.

~~

Sorry such a long comment.

karlof1 , Dec 26, 2017 9:31:54 PM | 63
Grieved @57--

Thanks for your nice long comment and its excellent observations. And Happy Holidays since I haven't wished them on you yet this year!

For me, Snowden's revelations were nothing new as I had already learned about Project Echelon , which by the end of the 1980s was global girding and mostly intent on industrial espionage as this summary at the link informs:

"The ECHELON program was created in the late 1960s to monitor the military and diplomatic communications of the Soviet Union and its Eastern Bloc allies during the Cold War, and was formally established in 1971.[5][6]

"By the end of the 20th century, the system referred to as "ECHELON" had allegedly evolved beyond its military and diplomatic origins, to also become ' a global system for the interception of private and commercial communications' (mass surveillance and industrial espionage)."

Indeed, the extent of Echelon was available to the public--sort of--but there were very few publications about it, although that changed as the internet grew during the 1990s. So for me, Snowden's actions becoming headline news was more important than the content of his revelations as the slumbering public got slapped upside its collective head.

Another historical factoid of interest is FDR's meeting with media CEOs a few days prior to 7 Dec 1941, of which no transcript exists to my knowledge, although what was said can be inferred by subsequent actions by all the actors involved--there was no, zero, deviation from the official government line about the Day of Infamy, which was a prelude to media portrayal on 911.

Fundamentally, the bottom line is whenever interests between national governments diverge from those of their public, governments will lie every time--those two sets of policy HRC admitted she had for public versus private consumption. Although it's too soon to be certain, it appears that the leadership of Russia and China have learned the difficult lesson that the best policy is for the national government to be in sync with the interests of its citizenry, thus the philosophical adoption of Win/Win versus the Outlaw US Empire's Zero Sum game, which forms the basis for our ongoing Hybrid Third World War.

nottheonly1 , Dec 26, 2017 9:32:22 PM | 64
Pe entities at work that are not under the control of the Russian secret services. Here is a link to an article on RT.de about US Special Forces at the Russian Border
All we can do is assume.

@karlof1 #37

My favorite pet peeve is Bernays. Even those who are aware of his deplorable actions, seldom grasp just how devastating his selling out of the human psyche to corporations and the NSA/CIA really turned out to be. The man hated the masses and short of calling them 'useless eaters', he saw them solely as means to corporate profits.
His legacy is a citizen without any other rights than that to "go shopping".

Go Ask Alice tells us the latest story about how much the surveillance has advanced. The article is about some content provider with unknown identity. The core message though is about the NSA/FBI/CIA going after anybody that comments on the internet, provided certain keywords are triggered. While that has been known since Snowden, the masses suffer from short term memory loss. Any dissent to the establishment is noted. This proves that there is no more rule of common law and nothing resembling a democracy by a far shot. A Plutocratic dictatorship determined to destroy anybody that poses a threat to its existence.

Red Ryder , Dec 26, 2017 10:43:54 PM | 69
@66
"What would be the most sinister scenario in regards to Snowden and the NSA leak?"

That General Hayden gets his wish and kills Snowden. That's the most sinister.

If you meant, intrigue, double agent or useful idiot sort of thing, well, Snowden had no intention of running to China and definitely not to Russia.
The Intel Agencies would have loved if he ran straight to Moscow. But it didn't happen. So,we sort of know he wasn't "used". He was "allowed" because they had it covered when he handed off the purloined data.

What sort of encrypted communication did he use on that trip to Hong Kong? They knew what he was doing.
They tried for it to be an out-and-out treason case. Remember that they insisted the Chinese in Beijing had it all?
They they tried to generate the same with Russia and Putin when he landed in Moscow.

I find him to be a useful tool for everyone who wants something out of his adventure. People who think he's a hero have their hero. People who want him dead probably have some contract out on him. And others want him to be returned and prosecuted like Timothy McVeigh and executed.

Grieved indicated above @57, Snowden was in our culture now. He's an asterisk. Compare him to Daniel Ellsberg. You cannot. Ellsberg forced the country against the war machine, forced the NYTimes to grow a set of balls and publish the Papers, and he won against the Deep State who tried to destroy him. All the while he stood like a man of courage and didn't scurry around and lateral the papers off. They got published. He faced down the system and won a huge First Amendment battle.

I chalk up the differences as Snowden is a kid with a keyboard. Assange and Ellsberg are men. The latter really matter. Snowden is a very light symbol, at best. He embarrassed NSA and only exists today because of Putin and Russian values.

I guess Vietnam was the great Evil, and surveillance just doesn't match up against what that charnel house of napalm, carpet bombing, white phosphorus, Agent Orange and Agent Blue, Phoenix Program assassinations became.

Ellsberg was a true hero. I named my first son after him.

Penelope , Dec 26, 2017 11:46:12 PM | 76
The original 3 TV Networks were started by Intelligence figures. When the Church Committee documented that all 3 were controlled by the Rockefellers, Senator Nelson Rockefeller was able to limit the GPO printing of the report to less than 100 copies.
Time Warner was govt & military intelligence controlled since its founding in 1923 by Henry Luce, a Yale Skull & Bones guy from an intelligence family. His father was a spy in China pretending to be a missionary.

The German journalist Udo Ulfkotte wrote a book, Bought Journalists, in which he reported that every significant European journalist functions as a CIA asset.

It became even worse during the Clinton regime when six mega-media companies were permitted to acquire 90% of the US print, TV, radio, and entertainment media, a concentration that destroyed diversity and independence. Today the media throughout the Western world serves as a Propaganda Ministry for Washington. The Western media is Washington's Ministry of Truth.

At the top it isn't the case that the CIA controls the media; rather that the board of directors is named by the banksters and mega-rich. Like all the mega-corps, they are thoroughly controlled by the Usurpers. The CIA has always been their private police force for intell & enforcement at home and abroad.

To rule a world requires control of military force, of money, information, energy, and the elimination of private property. Everything else is distraction. Probably the end of net neutrality is important. The coming global digital money is catastrophic. Agenda 21 is the global dictatorship, and is already decreasing private property-- among other things. https://geopolitics.co/2015/04/09/the-true-purpose-of-agenda-21/ I recommend the video within it.

Grieved , Dec 27, 2017 1:08:11 AM | 77
@73 Mark - I cannot understand why Snowden doesn't have another copy to give to Wikileaks.

This is a crucial point. Edward Snowden chose not to possess the files after he had handed them off to the journalists. He wiped out his copy when they started to publish them. This was a deliberate choice, and part of an entire ethical view that Snowden held of the situation he was in, and the situation he had created.

If you can't understand why he held this view, then you have to ask him, or study his words. But rest assured that he didn't simply "fail" to have a backup copy in case his journalists chickened out or sold out their commitment. He was a geek. He wasn't a journalist. He wanted sensible journalists to handle the lifetime scoop that he was holding. In my view, he made an incredibly good choice.

Put yourself in his shoes. The path he had already walked just to get those files to those real-world journalists in Hong Kong was already a thousand times longer than anything that could possibly lie in front of him. All this talk about assets - like you can keep this kind of thing going: the man lived a lifetime in a few short years and did the best thing he could ever have conceived of.

He earned the space to delete the files and sit back for a while and watch things happen. He said he wanted the public to know, and the public to discuss - if he was wrong, so be it, but it was for the public to discuss, he always said.

Everything I've written here may not be true. But if it is true, then on the basis of this narrative of events, no one has any right to ask anything more of Snowden. He was the messenger who put his body in the circuit to complete the signal. We all gained. He gained nothing, except satisfaction of mission accomplished.

For me that's where his story ends. Greenwald, Intercept, oligarchs, slavery - these are all another story, and one that I'm focused on. But I choose to honor Snowden for the bravery of what he seems to have done, and if true that achievement scored so high that no amount of falling short can diminish it.

Peter AU 1 , Dec 27, 2017 1:38:17 AM | 79
78

Snowden confirmed the NSA files held by shadow brokers as genuine. How many years after destroying his copies? Snowden worked in US intelligence, perhaps just as a geek, but I don't see him destroying the only weapon he has against them.

psychohistorian , Dec 27, 2017 2:04:04 AM | 80
@ Grieved with recent support for Snowden

I agree and thank you for your words.

I haven't read here any discussion of the movie, SNOWDEN, produced by Oliver Stone. I saw it when it first came out. Is it on Netflix or other outlets yet? As movies go it fell short of a documentary. That said, it provides yet another potential thin-edge-of-a-wedge thought for the zombies that live among us.

The neurofeedback treatment that I am up to 132 session of has healed many people like Edward Snowden (with his reported epilepsy) and I hope he gets such soon in his life; us old folks are harder to heal. One of neurofeedback earliest successes was a woman with epilepsy who after being healed went out and got a drivers license.....can't find the source but this was 30-40 years ago

I consider Snowden to be a true American patriot. The American values that I was taught are in stark contrast to those exhibited by the God of Mammon cabal in control today. I don't believe that we are a bad species but sorely misdirected by something that can be "easily" changed. Look at the progress we have made as a species. Why do we let ourselves be limited in our development by centuries old conventions about who controls the tools of finance? How many wars would there be if money was a public utility?

Wake up zombies! It is time to change the world.

Thominus , Dec 27, 2017 2:52:00 AM | 81
What more revelations of Snowden's archive could possibly make any difference? It is already basically understood that the NSA, its contractors, and 5 eyes agencies "collect it all" illegally, with no meaningful oversight, to the degree that social media became their accomplice and extension, that they abuse this power and the constitution proudly and with impunity for any purposes and justifications they see fit, and so on, and the vast majority of citizens cower, or delude themselves with some comforting trust that it won't be used against them.

It has only proven that nothing will snap the majority ignorance from its coma.
No one with any voice - even those involved seem able to comprehend how vastly and deeply this will effect the free will of people, culture, and society - for that matter how it already has progressed to do so.

In the wake of the retroactive telcom immunity (which by definition is an admission of blatant criminality and conspiracy by and between both government and telcom corporations) The Snowden revalations couldn't have been more explicit, signifiacnt, or urgent. The people did nothing. Those minor percentage of us who bother to read and understand what is happening can chatter and pontificate all we want, because the ignorant majority hasn't the interest or energy to question the status quo. (they absoloutely have not the attention span to read a single Greenwald article) So really I can understand why there is no point releaseing the rest.

Snowden was the one upholding his oath to the constitution, against whose who systematically violated it, and he is called a traitor.

As far as RussiaGate being some sort of distraction from this - no more than a distraction from any other meaningful information that SHOULD be on people's minds.

brabantian , Dec 27, 2017 4:11:38 AM | 83
Regrettably, Moon of Alabama has not spotted what all major government intelligence agencies have known for a couple of years now ... European intel agency report - 'Edward Snowden & Glenn Greenwald are CIA frauds'
...
[copy of a Veterans Today nonsense piece deleted - b.]
V. Arnold , Dec 27, 2017 4:14:20 AM | 84
Peter AU 1 | Dec 27, 2017 1:38:17 AM | 80

Snowden didn't "destroy" anything. He gave it all to Greenwald in Hong Kong.
That way, nobody could coerce or otherwise intimidate him; as there were no files in his possesion.
Snowden himself clearly stated this fact.
That he landed in Russia is entirely the fault of the U.S. government (such as it is) by cancelling Snowden's passport enroute; this becomes ancient history in today's world...

Oh mercy; this is getting just too weird and woo, woo, for this one; later will be greater...

Posted by: V. Arnold , Dec 27, 2017 4:16:44 AM | 85

Oh mercy; this is getting just too weird and woo, woo, for this one; later will be greater...

Posted by: V. Arnold | Dec 27, 2017 4:16:44 AM | 85 /div

V. Arnold , Dec 27, 2017 6:20:14 AM | 86
So, it seems Pierre Omidyar sold out Greenwald; that's just peachy...
john , Dec 27, 2017 6:40:27 AM | 87
the Snowden('snowed in') saga is yet to be written, or perhaps, like much verity, will NEVER be written. eluding the intelligence hounds for a couple of weeks while shooting a nice HD video with a couple of prominent journalists never passed my smell test...

,,,

...and what might seem a minor quibble with Grieved's:

Manning with the video of the mercs shooting the civilians was the last time this happened, I think

those weren't mercs, dude, they were US Army.

John , Dec 27, 2017 9:50:53 AM | 90
Re#56 - Grieved

I agree that the Snowden info was the paradym changer that showed to me in unmistakable imagery,
that my country was an outlaw nation hellbent on economic empire and had shifted from liberty to total
Control mechanisms.

The Snowden info together with the missing 28 pages from the 911 committee findings sent me on a
truth mission; reading everything from "CIA Rouges Killed JFK, Russ Baker's book on the Bush
family, to Fahrenheit 911.

This former Neocon keeps trying to wash himself in the pure waters of the truth but cannot wash clean his guilt
for once voting for and defending such trash.

So I continue reading sites like MOA and others seeking the truth and speaking out to those in my life.

john , Dec 27, 2017 10:11:12 AM | 91
John says:

I agree that the Snowden info was the paradym changer that showed to me in unmistakable imagery,
that my country was an outlaw nation hellbent on economic empire and had shifted from liberty to total
Control mechanisms

"Earth-shattering!" Bah! Humbug!

Penelope , Dec 27, 2017 11:09:22 AM | 95
Brabantian @ 83, Yes, the huge amount of publicity given Snowden was an obvious tip-off that he is a hoax. All other whistleblowers get no publicity at all. Plus, everything that Snowden "disclosed" was already known. Perhaps he's out there to give credibility to lies as yet untold. Already his "asylum" promotes the fiction of East vs West opposition. It is a play and we are the audience, stuck in Plato's cave.
wendy davis , Dec 27, 2017 12:00:01 PM | 98
'Snowden says he took no secret files to russia', NYSlimes 10/13

He argued that he had helped American national security by prompting a badly needed public debate about the scope of the intelligence effort. "The secret continuance of these programs represents a far greater danger than their disclosure," he said. He added that he had been more concerned that Americans had not been told about the N.S.A.'s reach than he was about any specific surveillance operation.

" So long as there's broad support amongst a people, it can be argued there's a level of legitimacy even to the most invasive and morally wrong program, as it was an informed and willing decision," he said . "However, programs that are implemented in secret, out of public oversight, lack that legitimacy, and that's a problem. It also represents a dangerous normalization of 'governing in the dark,' where decisions with enormous public impact occur without any public input."
Pffffft.

Zo, will congress renew the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act Section 702 when they're back in town?

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/18/world/snowden-says-he-took-no-secret-files-to-russia.html

WJ , Dec 27, 2017 2:11:30 PM | 110
There's a lot going on in this post and comment thread. I have no strong opinion about the disputed status/role of either Snowden or Greenwald that are being discussed above, but I do think it very likely that the Intercept was originally started as what is often referred to (I believe following the Nixon tapes) as a "limited hangout" operation.

It was intended to "expose" certain truths the CIA/NSA knew were already implied by earlier revealed and published documents and by this means was to distract the public (as if) and journalists (all three of them) from probing more deeply into the history, scope, and current operations of these and related programs. I would not be surprised if it turned out somehow that the real objective of this was to block the inquiry into or exposure of special access Intel operations during or prior to 9/11 which would blow up entirely the official narrative of that epochal event.

But I would like to bring up one fact that bears on the ongoing discussion of Snowden and Greenwald but has not been mentioned yet (I believe) in this thread. That is the NSA's reported identification of (I believe) at least two other possible leakers or whistleblowers simultaneous with or just after Snowden. I recall there being several reports about the arrest or possible detainment of one possible leaker in particular whose identity has never (to my knowledge) come to light. Does anybody remember better than I do this intriguing but often forgot facet of the NSA / Snowden affair?

The existence, identity, and (unknown?) fate of this possible NSA leaker bears on the questions being asked above about Snowden and Greenwald in obvious ways. If there really was such a leaker or potential leaker who had at the time not yet been apprehended by the NSA, then it is at least certainly possible that Snowden's own leaks were co-opted (willingly or not) by the CIA/NSA to render the revelations of the other not-yet-identified leaker anticlimactic and redundant. In this way, it is possible that Snowden's leaks, as filtered through Greenwald, the Guardian, and the Post, were themselves a kind of limited hangout operation.

Note what they produced: Obama admitted a discussion was needed, Clapper was dutifully brought before Congress, lied to them, and was not punished at all for it, and some peripheral laws were tweaked (and then untweaked) to give the impression that something had been discovered, discussed, and addressed, with the hope that now everybody would stop thinking too much about the NSA etc. This is exactly what happened, and it's exactly what limited hangouts are designed to do.

I would be interested in hearing more information from others here about those one or two other unidentified NSA leakers. What ever happened with that story? Was the identity of both leakers ever revealed?

nottheonly1 , Dec 27, 2017 5:57:15 PM | 123
@Red Ryder #69
...

As many other here stated, what WAS revealed, to was already known to a large degree. What WAS revealed, did not stir up the public sentiment beyond a ripple. It is the absence of any whatsoever consequence to his revelations that does not make sense. For the first part, of his living here in Hawai'i and subcontractor work for the NSA via Booz Allen Hamilton, reads like a cheap version of a spy b-picture. Compared to the surrounding circumstances of Daniel Ellsberg, Snowden's story appeared to be staged - if only to me. The more became known, the less did people pay attention to Libya and Syria. The distractive value of the unfolding Snowden whistle blowing was enormous.

...

nottheonly1 , Dec 27, 2017 6:30:36 PM | 125
@Red Ryder #69
...

I have always been flabbergasted about the naivety of the general public in regards to the abilities, capabilities and determination of the so called 'establishment' - aka Plutocracy, when it comes to the choice of means to achieve their psychopathic goals. What is out of reach, or undoable to those that willingly accept the death of millions of innocent people in the ME and the world over?

The utter destruction of sovereign Nations that don't fall in line? Organizing coup d'etats like local fundraisers for soup kitchens? Looking at the track record of the American establishment, nothing, absolutely nothing is ever off the table.

A staged NSA leak story that turns out to become more inconceivable and more suspicious by the day. And it matters not. Not more than Assange spending his days in an Ecuadorian exile until the plot line demands to change.

Therefore, the most sinister scenario includes a wholly staged Snowden storyline, with the participation of Russia. This is not to say that this is the way it is, but not discounting the possibility that it could be. On more than one occasion, Russian behavior, be it either reactionary, or proactive has been inconclusive. A fool who would think that it is all just theater on the expense of millions of innocent people and humanity as a whole.

No one has ever been able to predict the future in detail. Mankind is left to make sense of the present and with constant misinformation and distraction, that appears to be impossible.

Thanks to You and the other knowledgeable commenters.

All the best for 2018.

fast freddy , Dec 27, 2017 6:44:05 PM | 126
There is a good case that both Snowjob and Assange are Limited Hangouts. Each has exposed little beyond that which was already known. Neither offers any criticism of Israel's occupation of Palestine and the Yinon Plan.

What they have done is to get the worlds' citizenry to understand that domestic surveillance is a normal condition which should be expected and accepted.

Grieved , Dec 27, 2017 7:45:07 PM | 132
@126 What they have done is to get the worlds' citizenry to understand that domestic surveillance is a normal condition which should be expected and accepted.

This could also be stated as, "What they have done is to get the worlds' citizenry to understand that domestic surveillance is a normal condition which should be expected and guarded against ."

I think the world has changed since Snowden. Within the IT community, the sense of security and its requirements has been changed. What's missing so far is a discernible response. Wait a few more short years, until Chinese computing oustrips western encryption by an order of magnitude, and sooner than that when Russian hardware and software made for the consumer market is invulnerable to NSA technology. There's no sense trying to protect oneself from NSA at present because it will only draw attention. But when the Russian kit is on the market, let's just see who in the west buys it. I predict large sales.

dh , Dec 27, 2017 7:52:50 PM | 133
@132 Didn't Kaspersky just get banned in the US?
Grieved , Dec 27, 2017 8:13:41 PM | 137
I'm always wary of talk about limited hangouts. A case can usually be made that such talk is itself intended for the same purpose - to lull the recipient into despair and passivity.

When we say that we've all been gamed by theater, it's another way of saying not to fight back. But the Devil doesn't get it all his way all the time. And the rulers of the Earth always have to work through agents, and they are so frigging human that plans often go slightly, or greatly, awry.

We see more botched conspiracy action than seems credible. So a case can be made that the carelessness itself is part of the subliminal message that resistance is futile. But is it really intentional, or is it simply making the best of a bad job? Was Kennedy really gunned down in daylight as a message to all of us that we'd better not resist, because the power was total? Or was it just the way the state criminals think, that the way to kill a president is the same playbook that always worked before, and still they botched the hit with all kinds of missed shots and clumsy actions? Their secret weapon was media complicity - this allowed a multitude of sins, and without it we'd have known 50 years ago who killed Kennedy.

And it WAS a secret weapon. It took a long time for this to become obvious. We see the media all along has been completely mediocre, but since it has long given wall-to-wall coverage, it never had to get very good in order to send the daily propaganda message. Come the Internet, everyone sees how sloppy the media's work is. But does this raise the quality of the media lies? It seems not - the opposite in fact, the readers get far smarter than the writers.

The greatest trick the Devil pulled was not convincing the world he didn't exist, it was convincing the world that evil was clever, when in fact it's very mediocre. Evil performs badly. It will continue to perform badly. It can be resisted and overcome. This takes time.

I always enjoy the words of fictional Lazarus Long: "Of course the game is rigged. But don't let that stop you playing. If you don't play, you can't win."

David Park , Dec 27, 2017 9:39:05 PM | 138
Here is my little experience with the surveillance state: I am a user of the Mathematica computer program developed and sold by Wolfram Research Inc. They have a web site for users to exchange information called Wolfram Community. It is mostly about asking and answering questions about the use of Mathematica or sharing Mathematica tricks. About a year ago a series of about half a dozen ads for programmers appeared which were clearly link to expanding the surveillance state. Here is one of them:

Programming Ad

I replied by quoting the U.S. Constitution 4th Amendment and saying "Yes it was relevant to the advertisement."

Within 10 minutes my reply was deleted. I received an email from Wolfram Research saying: "We work very hard to foster positive environment on Wolfram Community and cannot allow any discussions outside the Wolfram Community guidelines. This means discussions that stray way beyond Wolfram Technologies topics."

So what is positive about advertisements on a community forum for the surveillance state and what is negative about the 4th Amendment? And the advertisements had little direct relevance to Mathematica. But I suppose they had their reasons.

[Jul 30, 2017] Snowden dreams about better America

"Aaron Barlow: The Russian hacking nonsense is a tin foil hat conspiracy right up there with Reptilians and Aliens."
Notable quotes:
"... Snowden is a patriot. Only an individual that has integrity can do what Snowden did. He saw something that was wrong and blew the whistle on it, it was as simple as that, he knew the consequences very well. ..."
Feb 15, 2017 | www.youtube.com

walter white 3 weeks ago

poor bloke he speaks the truth and ends up in Russia and yet bush et al are free after killing all them people in 9/11 .

Binali Shareef 1 week ago

this guy is smart. well informed, super intellectual capacity. He chooses his words very wisely and well calculated. His interview is brain enlightening.

DMPKillaz 1 week ago

This right here.. is a fucking man... he gave up allllll the high life gave up allllll the money. all the BS to give the people what the fuck they needed to hear

Pyro Falcon 1 week ago

Mr Snowden is the MAN, a true American, and a HERO of the highest order. Thank you Ed.

patia55 2 weeks ago

Never trust Katie Curic

jeffv2074 1 week ago

Snowden is a patriot. Only an individual that has integrity can do what Snowden did. He saw something that was wrong and blew the whistle on it, it was as simple as that, he knew the consequences very well.

Pgs Penang 2 weeks ago

She is anti-trump. She is sent from the elite. She don't give a damn about him. 100% she is untrustworthy. Snowden is a threat to the deep state. Her questions clearly are from the democrats.

itsgoodbeingme 3 weeks ago

From a Brit: - Edward Snowden should be considered a national treasure and guard his liberty.

EarthWatch2014 3 days ago

The "journalist" who is interviewing Edward is a freedom hating, elitist worshipping mainstream media harlot.

Those who are ignorant of history are bound to repeat it. The people who founded this country left Britain due to a corrupt, tyrannical government. The US government is far more corrupt today then England was in the 1700s.

The 4th amendment has been butchered by the tyrannical, elitist dictators who are running this broken country. Today, the mainstream media is firmly controlled by a few, highly deranged elitists who are in league with the rancid, stinking pieces of fecal matter who run the US. The republic that was created by English "traitors" was supposed to be a sanctuary for freedom and human rights. The republic they created is dead and gone. It may look the same on the surface, but this country is much too far gone to ever recover. It never ceases to amaze me just how ignorant of history and the Constitution the average American is. The citizens are ignorant, bordering on stupid.

The evidence is everywhere, yet millions of weak-minded sheeple cannot see what lies directly in front of their eyes. The level of cognitive dissonance displayed by the average American is pitiful, and I will feel no pity when they realize that they were living in a country whose leaders were following the same game plan as Adolph Hitler... to the letter.

People believe that their political party, the party to which they give their allegiance, is the "good" party. Republicans and Democrats are one and the same. The two party system is simply a two headed snake that will lead the US into tyranny. The US is hated around the world because it has assumed the role of the world's arrogant, renegade cop. A country that was not to be "entangled in foreign affairs", now has military bases in nearly every corner of the earth. Those who open their mouths to defend the snakes in power will be taught a great lesson once the elitists' plans come to fruition. It's difficult to feel sorry for the people who believe the endless lies that are spoken by those in power.

These fools won't see the truth until their heads lie under the blade of the guillotine. Anyone who puts security before freedom and privacy deserves to be placed behind concrete walls and barbed wire, where they will remain "safe" from the fictitious enemies who cause them to pathetically cower in fear. The destiny of this country is that of Rome. Unfortunately, the masses do not know or understand the true history of this world. The putrid stench of ignorance covers the majority of the American populous. Snowden exposed the government's evil secrets, helping preserve freedom and liberty in the United States. Those who chastise Snowden deserve what is coming: The death of freedom under the hands of evil tyrants.

berretta9mm1 1 week ago (edited)

Watching Gen. Clapper state, UNDER OATH, that the NSA was not and is not indiscriminately reading, storing, and intercepting the private communications of every American citizen, made me feel physically ill.

The fact that he chose to tell a straight-out lie (in light of the information supplied to us by Edward Snowden, who exposed this illegal and unconstitutional internal spying program) - watching him choose to speak a brazen lie, spoken in complete disregard for his office, the NSA's mandate (and its limits), his military career leading to his appointment as head of the NSA, the Constitutional trust placed in him, and the laws which make a direct lie - under oath - to a Senate Intelligence Committee (composed of the people WE elected to represent us) a FELONY - mean that Gen. CLAPPER should be in prison for Perjury.

This is the applicable Constitutional U.S. Code, section 1621: "§ 1621. Perjury generally: Whoever! (1) having taken an oath before a competent tribunal, officer, or person, in any case in which a law of the United States authorizes an oath to be administered, that he will testify, declare, depose, or certify truly, or that any written testimony, declaration, deposition, or certificate by him subscribed, is true, willfully and contrary to such oath states or subscribes any material matter which he does not believe to be true; or (2) in any declaration, certificate, verification, or statement under penalty of perjury as permitted under section 1746 of title 28, United States Code, willfully subscribes as true any material matter which he does not believe to be true; - is guilty of perjury and shall, except as other-wise expressly provided by law, be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than five years, or both. This section is applicable whether the statement or subscription is made within or without the United States."

Five years in prison, for lying to Congress about your indiscriminate spying on innocent U.S. citizens, Gen. Clapper, and then your filthy, despicable use of the U.S. Constitution (and our rights to privacy within it), as toilet paper when you lied directly to Senator Ron Wyden @ 61:00 under oath, when he asked "Does the NSA collect ANY type of data - at all - on millions, or hundreds of millions of Americans?" and you answered, with no hesitation or remorse, "No sir," you committed Perjury, by any definition of the above U.S. code.

Attempting to clarify, senator Wyden asked, "It does not?," and you answered, "Not wittingly. There are cases where they might inadvertently collect, but NOT WITTINGLY."

Could the lie have been any more damning, or abhorrent in a supposed Democracy? Is it any wonder why people like Gen. Clapper want Snowden - who PROVED that this was a lie, and exposed a completely illegal and unconstitutional program which Clapper was then in charge of - thrown in prison, and silenced permanently? Trump speaks of "draining the swamp." He could start with the NSA, and all of it's illegal activities, and work his way through every Intelligence Agency and the Military/Industrial Organizations and Corporations which together, represent the greatest threat ever to our liberties and to the Constitution - which is just hanging by a thread because of people and programs like this, and work his way down.

But he won't. Why? Because he, like the rest of us, has seen the Zapruder film. It's much easier - and safer - to kill the messenger. This is what makes Snowden, in today's world, a hero who, unlike the rest of these cowards and traitors, will be remembered well by history - for whatever that is worth to the man now. Thank God there are still people willing to sacrifice "their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor" for the purpose of protecting what remains of the tattered remnants of our Constitutionally-protected freedoms from government, and tyranny.

bluedance lilly 2 weeks ago

The US probably still surveys innocent everyday Americans by the millions. Not to prevent terrorism, but to have political and economic control, as Snowden has said. Watch the movie Snowden. Very enlightening.

Dylan Stone 1 week ago

I really liked this interview, and have much love for my fellow American Edward Snowden. He did the right thing. Whoever posted this video under the title "EDWARD SNOWDEN EXPOSES DONALD TRUMP" is kind of a dumbass. One tiny opinion is not equivalent to an expose', and this had nothing to do with Trump. Quit making click bait asshole

Jamie Brady 1 week ago

have to say .... balls of steal. left his own life behind to let "us" know what its really like. we were not there he was.. i love my country but dont think U.S.A. is not doing these things. First time in my 45 years i question things like this...he makes an amazing point....if someone questions they go to jail. Thats BS. questions make us a better Democracy. A better country...god bless you Edward i hope it works out for you brother.

Jay Bee 1 week ago

SHOCKING - TRUELY SHOCKING HOW UNBELIEVABLE DUMB THIS WOMAN IS. Is she really the best American journalism could send? I have to critisize Snowden too - for once (excuse me Eddy!): Why did he agree to meet such a ridiculous dummy? The interview - at least this dumb gooses part . was bodering on being comical. If Snowden`s intellegence were given the factor 100 - nobody would be able to give this truely uneducated, superficial and naive woman a number higher than room-temperature. In Celsius, that is! Hard to watch and difficult to understand why Snowden agreed to meet a completely shallow elderly Mom!

Jay Bee 1 week ago

SHOCKING - TRUELY SHOCKING HOW UNBELIEVABLE DUMB THIS WOMAN IS. Is she really the best American journalism could send? I have to critisize Snowden too - for once (excuse me Eddy!): Why did he agree to meet such a ridiculous dummy? The interview - at least this dumb gooses part . was bodering on being comical. If Snowden`s intellegence were given the factor 100 - nobody would be able to give this truely uneducated, superficial and naive woman a number higher than room-temperature. In Celsius, that is! Hard to watch and difficult to understand why Snowden agreed to meet a completely shallow elderly Mom!

whitemannativemind 1 week ago

This is a very interesting interview to be sure, and I personally, have great admiration for this man, as I'm sure much of the world does, and all the more so after watching the movie concerning his life in which we see how the CIA made his life a living hell for many years if not a decade or so, and may have even, brought this condition with his seizures and everything, assuming this movie was an accurate portrayal of his life, but there is precious little here about trump.

I was hoping he had some juicy info he was going to share but that does not seem so. Regardless, the man should be pardoned and allowed to get on with his life.

Government must know that it can never be all powerful and do whatever it damn will pleases, at home or abroad either. So for that reason the man is a hero for sure. He says; "we will not torture you." Wow. Not sure if he's joking there or serious but if he's serious then that is extremely disturbing indeed. Respectfully. All My Best. Out.

Gil Rasmussen 2 weeks ago

I used to like Snowden until I heard from his own mouth that he gets money from George Soros

[Mar 13, 2016] Edward Snowden: The Contractor

Jan 26, 2016

Edward Snowden's activities beginning in June of 2013 are very well known-from the first leak of classified information to his stay in Russia. But his motivations, the system vulnerabilities that enabled him to access highly classified information, and his stated goals are continuing points of heated discussion.

Hailed as a hero or decried as a traitor, his actions have reopened the issue of privacy for people and for nations. Dr. Mary Manjikian, Associate Dean of the Robertson School of Government, Regent University, and author of Threat Talk: The Comparative Politics of Internet Addiction will reveal how her research into organizations offers a new way of looking at Snowden and all those leakers/whistleblowers/heroes/ traitors who came before.

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Website: http://www.spymuseum.org
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/IntlSpyMuseum
Twitter: https://twitter.com/intlspymuseum
NEW BLOG! http://blog.spymuseum.org

[Jun 26, 2015] France Could Offer Asylum To Assange, Snowden by timothy

June 26, 2015

HughPickens.com writes:

The Intercept reports that in the aftermath of the NSA's sweeping surveillance of three French presidents, French Justice Minister Christiane Taubira thinks National Security Agency whistleblower Edward Snowden and WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange might be allowed to settle in France. Taubira was asked about the NSA's surveillance of three French presidents, disclosed by WikiLeaks this week, and called it an "unspeakable practice."

Taubira's comments echoed those in an editorial in France's leftist newspaper Libération that France should respond to the U.S.'s "contempt" for its allies by giving Edward Snowden asylum.

France would send "a clear and useful message to Washington, by granting this bold whistleblower the asylum to which he is entitled," wrote editor Laurent Joffrin in an angry editorial titled "Un seul geste" - or "A single gesture." (google translate) If Paris offers Snowden asylum, it will be joining several other nations who have done so in the past, including Bolivia, Nicaragua and Venezuela.

However, Snowden is still waiting in Moscow to hear from almost two dozen other countries where he has requested asylum.

I have to work a lot harder in Russia than at NSA – Edward Snowden

May 16, 2015 | RT News

Whistleblower Edward Snowden says he has been working harder and doing more significant things while in exile in Russia than he did while being a contractor for the National Security Agency (NSA).

"The fact is I was getting paid an extraordinary amount of money for very little work [at the NSA] with very little in the way of qualifications," Snowden said via satellite link during an event at Stanford University on Friday.

In Russia, "that's changed significantly," the former NSA contractor, who revealed the agency's vast and controversial surveillance activities in the US and abroad, said.

"I have to work a lot harder to do the same thing. The difference is that, even though I've lost a lot, I have a tremendous sense of satisfaction," the whistleblower said, as cited by Business Insider.

However, he did not reveal exactly what he has been working on, saying that he is the type of person who believes in being judged on the final result.

Snowden also addressed the ethics of whistleblowing, reminding his audience that he never published a single document himself, but always worked alongside journalists.

The involvement of reporters also allowed the employment of a system of checks and balances while making the revelations, he said.

According to the whistleblower, there was no way for him to leak the files to the press anonymously as it could have led to a witch-hunt within the NSA, putting his former colleagues under threat.

"Whistleblowers are elected by circumstance. Nobody self-nominates to be a whistleblower because it's so painful. Your lives are destroyed whether you are right or wrong. This is not something people sign up for," he stressed.

Read more Snowden freed: NYPD releases illegally installed bust for art show

Snowden added that he is neither a hero nor a traitor, but only a man, who reached a critical moment, after which he just couldn't remain silent.

"We all have a limit of injustice, of incivility, of inhumanity in our daily life that we can kind of accept and ignore. We turn our eyes away from the beggar on the street. We also have a breaking point and when people find that, they act," he explained.

"You have to have a greater commitment to justice than a fear of the law," Snowden added.

The comments came a week after a US federal appeals court ruled that the NSA's bulk collection of American citizens' telephone records was illegal.

In a unanimous decision, the Second Circuit Court of Appeals in New York called the bulk phone records collection "unprecedented and unwarranted."

The ruling, which Snowden described as "extraordinarily encouraging," comes as Congress confronts a June 1 deadline to renew a section of the Patriot Act that allows the NSA's bulk data surveillance.

[May 08, 2015] Of Snowden and the NSA, only one has acted unlawfully – and it's not Snowden by James Ball

May 07, 2015 | The Guardian

With the NSA's bulk surveillance ruled illegal, the debate on the Patriot Act should be reinvigorated – with Edward Snowden free to join in

... ... ...

The final debate is one that is unlikely to happen, but should: the US needs to start considering the privacy and freedom of foreigners as well as its own citizens. The US public is rightly concerned about its government spying on them. But citizens of countries around the world, many of them US allies, are also rightly concerned about the US government spying on them.

Considering Americans and foreigners alike in these conversations would be a great moral stance – but pragmatically, it should also help Americans. If the US doesn't care about the privacy of other countries, it shouldn't expect foreign governments to care about US citizens. There's something in this for everyone.

These are the debates we could be having, and should be having. The judiciary has spoken. The legislature is deliberating. The public is debating. And all of it is enabled thanks to information provided by Edward Snowden.

He should be free to join the conversation, in person.

ekkaman -> Kitty Grimnirs 8 May 2015 19:07

Maybe I spoke too soon, funny how two show up to make comments and it is almost word for word the same thing. One takes the Russians are bad okay stance the other that it is real life and he should not mess with the big boys. You guys are so easy to see right through it would make for a good comedy, you can call it "the government troll squad".

GKJamesq -> Isadore Stumrumple 8 May 2015 16:34

If Snowden "did good this time" (albeit "accidentally"), what makes him a "traitor"? Who decides whether he's in fact a traitor? What "whole lot of damage" has he done? What's the evidence for the assertion that he begged China for asylum? And what, exactly, makes him an "apparatchik" as opposed to, say, an IT professional who did work for the US government as a contractor?

GKJamesq -> Isadore Stumrumple 8 May 2015 16:23

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-switch/wp/2014/03/07/snowden-i-raised-nsa-concerns-internally-over-10-times-before-going-rogue/

DrKropotkin -> Kitty Grimnirs 8 May 2015 16:13

Thomas Drake tried the official channels, please read his story. Also, Hong Kong is not an enemy of the US.

He only ended up in Russia as his passport was revoked while he was in transit.

Daniel Bird -> Isadore Stumrumple 8 May 2015 16:13

NO COUNTRY can have low level apparatchiki determining what is right or wrong in a countries security."

That's the job of other organs of the democracy e.g. Congress, right? Except that NSA director James Clapper lied under oath to congress that NSA weren't collecting data on millions of US citizens.


DrKropotkin -> Isadore Stumrumple 8 May 2015 16:08

The NSA and the politicians who support them have made a mockery of your constitution, they are the traitors. Mr. Snowden has given you the evidence and you turn on him. Please re-read your countries founding document and ask yourself again who needs to go to jail.

NYbill13 8 May 2015 15:36

Catch 22 Again And Again

"Catch 22 says they have a right to do anything we can't stop them from doing." That's how Joseph Heller puts it in his superb comic novel about World War II bomber crews.

And yes, it's a staggering coincidence that Snowden, a gunner on the main character's B-17, is the novel's premiere human sacrifice.

More pertinent to the real Snowden is the warning shouted to the main character, Yossarian, when he goes AWOL. To escape murderous lunatic commanders, Yossarian is prepared to row a rubber dinghy from Italy through the Strait of Gibraltar to Sweden.

As he runs for his raft, his pal cries out, "They'll bend heaven and earth to catch you."

Tragically, Mr. Edward Snowden, they will. Just as tragically, the rest of us probably won't be able to stop them.

Thank you again, Mr. Snowden. No kidding.

George Cantrell 8 May 2015 14:40

As a U$A citizen, I am proud of Edward Snowden and consider him to be a true patriot. I wish more whistle-blowers would come forward with details/proof of illegal/unconstitutional acts being committed by supposedly 'public servants' against private citizens.

Unfortunately, so many of my fellow countrymen have been reduced to fear-mongered bed-wetters who engage in the religion/idolatry of flag worship/ultra-nationalism to the point of where they are blind to the principles/rights our country was founded on.

Isadore Stumrumple -> libbyliberal 8 May 2015 12:57

Are you actually equating the present atmosphere and reality of living in the US as the equivalent of Nazi Germany? If so then you understand neither.

Isadore Stumrumple -> ekkaman 8 May 2015 12:56

Americans feel proud? Last time I checked not everyone approves of his brand of Lone Ranger moralism. He not only outed the NSA, but also stole and shared much more sensitive information with this countries enemies in order to get asylum. That is no hero to any thinking person that really cares about their countries security. Any "good" that he did is far overshadowed by the damage he caused up to and including the lives of agents and operatives throughout the world. This is no game of Risk or cheesy adventure movie, this is deadly serious business.

Isadore Stumrumple -> GKJamesq 8 May 2015 12:52

and what evidence do you have for your assertions?

Isadore Stumrumple 8 May 2015 12:49

I'm relieved to hear that what snowden did was okay. Now every other low level twerp that disagrees with the way that the US keeps itself safe can also defect to another country. That is if they bring loads of other sensitive data to sweeten the pot and ensure that they have a place to lay their heads. Snowden was a traitor, is a traitor and needs to pay for his act of espionage. NO COUNTRY can have low level apparatchiki determining what is right or wrong in a countries security. He accidentally did good this time but also a whole lot of damage. Putin would have had him shot if he was a Russian attempting the same thing and the Chinese, whom he first went begging to for asylum, would have done the same.

NYbill13 8 May 2015 12:03

Let The Experiment Continue, Please

Rule by brute force has been the norm for a long, long time. No quibble there, right?

But during the stifling summer of 1789, a few ex-British colonists met in Philadelphia to codify a new type of government, one run by the people it governed.

Grabbing ideas from Europeans and some long-dead Greeks, those studious, entirely serious young men made impressive progress.

When slavery and obdurate financial power threatened to derail discussion, they were set aside. The colonies had to unite; Great Britain wouldn't be fighting France forever.

I can't think of anything more antithetical to the principles of self-government extolled in that first constitutional convention than today's all-powerful spook agencies.

With limitless finances, impenetrable secrecy and de facto immunity from all laws, they are now high-tech baronies, autonomous, self-isolated and profoundly opposed to popular sovereignty.

If the NSA, CIA or any of America's other spy dynasties had been around in 1787, those brilliant men in buckled shoes and stockings would never have made it home alive.

kalbus -> Kitty Grimnirs 8 May 2015 10:47

Everyone with any kind of heart and soul cares deeply for a good outcome for Mr. Snowden who has risked his life to reveal our fascist-becoming government.

GKJamesq -> Kitty Grimnirs 8 May 2015 10:37

Snowden tried to get the issue raised through the standard channels, with predictable results. As for your allegation that he "headed straight for America's enemies and tried to bargain with them," what evidence do you have?

Lafcadio1944 -> mike miller 8 May 2015 10:08

Snowden will never be allowed back in the USA the Empire will hound him to his grave.

Strong verifiable end to end encryption individually installed and open source. Some methods of protection are already starting to appear and more will come.

libbyliberal -> libbyliberal 8 May 2015 05:33

When I was a little girl and I heard how horrible Hilter was, I asked why people didn't overtake him when he went to sleep.

I was so naive and thought Hitler alone was evil and doing evil things and did not appreciate the massive collusion with his evil of so very many.

All the CRONYISM OF EVIL OF HIS PATRIARCHAL MILITARY AND ENABLING FROM STOCKHOLM SYNDROMED CITIZENRY. Many of the German people were enthralled with him, and convinced themselves his regime of massive evil was serving "exceptional" them as his beloved children

libbyliberal 8 May 2015 05:28

Authoritarian followers insist unethical laws be followed, and conscientious objectors to unethical laws be punished. Too bad these lemmings can't seem to grow a conscience no matter what evidence is presented to them of institutionalized mass murder and criminality. Stockholm syndrome mass pathology.

Aryu Gaetu 8 May 2015 05:20

Based on the premise that everything in the US, especially with politicians, is based on personal greed, if the NSA has the phone records of people, it must have the records of corporations. If the business or any of its officers makes an international call, then they can legally monitor the content of the call. I wonder how many billion$ that is worth to a competitor and if there is just 1 person in the NSA that can't resist that potential windfall from that information.

But, this just scratches the surface of the "Patriot Act". It was a secret set of laws, withheld from the general public. Imagine if everyone knew what is really in it. See… http://pharocattle.com/extrastuff/Misc/Rights_and_Freedoms_Lost.pdf

Will the last person to drop the Constitution into the shredder, please, water the plants and turn out the lights before you leave. Thank you.

Littlemissv 8 May 2015 05:00

The court of appeals judges very deliberately chose not to consider the constitutionality of NSA bulk surveillance programs, as such questions are currently before Congress...

The court simply wimped out. It should ruled them to be unconstitutional and demanded their immediate cessation.

Since the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court appoints the judges on the secret (FISA) court, he is already an accessory before the fact in various constitutional felonies. The Supremes will rubber-stamp NSA, displaying all the wisdom and integrity that they did in Bush v. Gore (2000).

libbyliberal 8 May 2015 02:41

Excellent and inspiring article. Thank you!!

Jeffrey_Harrison -> David Edwards 8 May 2015 02:03

And your inane comment is exactly why governments must not be allowed to just make any old thing secret. They should not be able to make most of what they do make secret, secret.

Martin_C 8 May 2015 01:40

Laws that require the highest scrutiny of all are laws that benefit all politicians and government at the expense of the people they supposedly serve, because the intrinsic protections of the adversarial nature of politics breaks down. Normally, if a right-wing party tries to pass something overly right-wing, the left-wing party kicks up a stink and vice versa. The party opposing the legislation becomes the de facto advocate for the people being cheated, and the debate must then be carried on under the scrutiny of the people.

But when politicians pass legislation that enables all politicians to spy on all citizens, the citizens have no advocate. The pollies are all in on it. We can't even exercise our only faintly effective prerogative of changing our vote, because in this type of law change, all snouts are in the trough.

The Patriot Act was and is terrible legislation. Australia's recently passed East-German-style data retention bill: terrible legislation. Britain's pathetic attempts at forcing encryption keys to be yielded to the government: terrible legislation. No government should have tabula rasa permission to spy on its own citizens. These are our lives they are trying to spy on! We cannot throw that away for the 'safety' of living in a permanent mass surveillance state.

To prevent these dreadful laws being passed requires 1) principled lawmakers who can step away from the feeding trough; 2) vigorous, ethical and independent media; and 3) citizens willing to stand up and demand better from their elected representatives.

[Feb 24, 2015] Edward Snowden I laughed at Oscars 'treason' joke - Nick Gass

Feb 23, 2015 | POLITICO

Edward Snowden says he laughed at Oscar host Neil Patrick Harris' joke at his expense last night, adding that he didn't think it was meant as a political statement.

In a Reddit Ask Me Anything session with "Citizenfour" filmmaker Laura Poitras and journalist Glenn Greenwald, Snowden addressed questions about privacy, surveillance and the documentary's win at last night's Academy Awards ceremony.

"The subject of 'Citizenfour,' Edward Snowden, could not be here for some treason," Harris joked to a nearly silent audience after winners Poitras, Mathilde Bonnefoy and Dirk Wilutzky left the stage with Greenwald and Snowden's girlfriend Lindsay Mills.

"To be honest, I laughed at NPH," Snowden told Reddit users, using an acronym for Neil Patrick Harris. "I don't think it was meant as a political statement, but even if it was, that's not so bad. My perspective is if you're not willing to be called a few names to help out your country, you don't care enough."

[Feb 24, 2015] Edward Snowden Releases Statement Following 'Citizenfour' Oscars Win

The Edward Snowden documentary "Citizenfour" won Best Documentary at the Oscars on Sunday night. Director Laura Poitras accepted the award with Glenn Greenwald and Lindsay Mills, Snowden's girlfriend, by her side.

"The disclosures that Edward Snowden reveals don't only expose a threat to our privacy but to our democracy itself," Poitras said in her acceptance speech. "When the most important decisions being made, affecting all of us, are made in secret, we lose our ability to check the powers that control. Thank you to Edward Snowden, for his courage, and for the many other whistleblowers. I share this with Glenn Greenwald and other journalists who are exposing truth."

The film tells the story of Snowden's 2013 National Security Agency leaks. Poitras traveled to Hong Kong to meet with Snowden. "Citizenfour" analyzed the impact of the surveillance documents he revealed, as well as his role as a public figure threatening to eclipse the story he unmasked.

"When Laura Poitras asked me if she could film our encounters, I was extremely reluctant. I'm grateful that I allowed her to persuade me," Snowden said in a statement released by the American Civil Liberties Union. "The result is a brave and brilliant film that deserves the honor and recognition it has received. My hope is that this award will encourage more people to see the film and be inspired by its message that ordinary citizens, working together, can change the world."

"Citizenfour" beat out "The Salt of the Earth," "Last Days in Vietnam," "Virunga" and "Finding Vivian Maier" for the honor.

See a full list of Oscar winners here.

Makers of Snowden movie Citizenfour sued by ex-oil exec

The Register Forums

The makers of Citizenfour are being sued by a man who claims the Edward Snowden film constitutes a violation of US law and national security.

Destroy All Monsters

Re: This is one of those "Only in America thingies" isn't it?

I wish I could says "yes".

Unfortunately, in the USA, "Omnipotent State" is a Religion for some.

You also find this kind of individual in various other uniform-loving countries, sects, houses for the insane and government buildings.

Identity

Re: This is one of those "Only in America thingies" isn't it?

True that in these here Benighted States, anyone can sue anyone for anything. Often that means only extra stress, more crowded court calendars and richer lawyers. In this case, if this guy has standing, I'll eat my hat. (Fortunately, I don't wear one...)

Aproveofitspendingonspecificprojects

The case for Retroactive birth control

It isn't genetics. Certain people find a relatively simple man and use him as a puppet.

Rich people get used to deference -even servitude. It give them all an unfortunate sense of omnipotence. And every country suffers from the ideals of rich people. Take for example Lord Rothermere, part owner of the Daily Mail in the 1930's. Excusing Nazi treatment of Jews and Hitler and Mussolini's 'petty crimes' in favour of their overall usefulness. That same mind-set wanted the judgement of all those young men who had had to fight the bastards over-ruled when they voted for socialism in the 1940's and kicked out the incumbents.

I have banged this drum before but only because that man's company was salaciously determined to rule the Empire to protect Britain from the British. The USA has had similar devotees such as the cadre behind the Presidunce George the Thicketh. So it is perfectly clear that it isn't genes but money.

Power does indeed corrupt and absolute power has no absolution. It hurts everybody.

Anonymous Coward

Re: Ironic, given the furore over The Interview.

"If he stopped leaking"

AFAIAA Snowden gave *all* the info in one go. It is the journalists that are drip feeding the info to keep it in the headlines.

DiViDeD

Re: Ironic, given the furore over The Interview.

"the US kept tabs on the dictators Assad and Putin." And Angela Merkel, David Cameron, in fact, leading political figures in pretty much every country friendly to the US, as well as the citizens and corporations of those countries. So I guess your definition of 'dictator' is everyone except you?

Lars

Re: Traitor to the USA (not America)?

"Try criticizing the government, or get in a legal spat with an official while you're there. Because it seems as if you think you're being oppressed, living in the UK."

Sorry but that logic, as old as it is, doesn't work ever.

My headache is not smaller because somebody in Russia has a stronger one. If I am fat then I am not less fat even if somebody in Mexico is fatter. Tell a under payed Britt he is actually well payed as there are people who get less in China. That (lack) of logic is probably from the stone age if not older.

Anonymous Coward

Re: For profit?

> But if so, one wonders when dear Horace will sue Sony, current owners of the James Bond franchise.

If he succeeds in this lawsuit it sets a precedent whereby any film that depicts any form of crime could be considered profiteering from that crime.

Consider how many films that would effect...

Simon Lyon

That would be a little known suburb of Berlin known as "Hollywood" then?

The film was shot in Hong Kong, Western and Eastern Europe incl the UK, Brazil and a few other places. It was edited in, and released from, Berlin - where Laura Poitras now lives since she's gotten fed up with being harassed by US customs every time she flies back to her own country.

This long before she ever met Snowden - she's been targeted by the US government for years due to her habit of throwing light on their warlike activities in film. Which is of course why he chose to contact her.

I've liked every American I've ever met, truly, but it's a country of extremes. And that means that they unfortunately host some of the most idiotic twats on the planet. Case in point.

[Dec 12, 2014] Court rejects attempt to allow Edward Snowden into Germany

Dec 12, 2014 | The Guardian
Attempts by opposition parties in Germany to bring Edward Snowden to Berlin to give evidence about the NSA's operations have been thwarted by the country's highest court.

The Green and Left parties wanted the whistleblower to give evidence in person to a parliamentary committee investigating espionage by the US agency, but Germany's constitutional court ruled against them on Friday.

The government has argued that Snowden's presence in Germany could impair relations with the US and put it under pressure to extradite him.

It has suggested sending the committee – which consists of eight MPs – to interview him in Moscow, where Snowden is living in exile. Snowden has said through a lawyer that he is prepared to speak to the panel only if permitted to do so in Germany.

Opposition MPs have been vocal about their wish for Snowden to be granted asylum in Germany, where anger towards the NSA and sympathy for the whistleblower has been particularly high.

If Snowden were to be allowed to enter Germany, the clamour for him to be able to stay would be strong and resistance from the government would be likely to be met with civil unrest.

Support for Snowden in Germany reached a peak after allegations came to light that Angela Merkel's phone was bugged. But Germany's top public prosecutor announced this week that an investigation had so far failed to find any firm evidence for the claim.

Harald Range, who launched an investigation in June, did not rule out that it could be true, but said: "The document presented in public as proof of an authentic tapping of the mobile is not an authentic surveillance order by the NSA. There is no proof right now that could lead to charges that Chancellor Merkel's phone connection data was collected or her calls tapped."

Range said the investigation would continue. He said that neither Snowden, the reporter for Spiegel magazine who was in possession of a document that appeared to be evidence of tapping, nor Germany's foreign intelligence agency, the BND, had presented him with any other details.

The affair caused considerable tension between Berlin and Washington. German attempts to secure a no-spying agreement with the US were unsuccessful. Washington did not seek to deny the charges and assured Merkel that it would not tap her phone in future.

[Sep 24, 2014] Right Livelihood Award to Snowden

dw.de

Moscow-exiled US whistleblower Edward Snowden and British Guardian editor Alan Rusbridger are to receive the Right Livelihood Award. They're among five persons awarded Sweden's "alternative Nobel prize."

The Stockholm-based Right Livelihood Award Foundation on Wednesday praised Snowden, a former US intelligence agent, for "revealing the unprecedented extent of state surveillance."

It said Rusbridger, the editor in chief of Britain's The Guardian newspaper, also won the award for "responsible journalism in the public interest.

"None of them could have done what they did without the other, " said foundation director Ole von Uexkull.

The announcement, originally set for Thursday, was brought forward, after a leak by Swedish broadcaster SVT.

Foundation denied access

Von Uexkull, the nephew of Jacob von Uexkull who founded the prize in 1980, said all winners had been invited to a December 1 award ceremony in Stockholm.

Discussions on "potential" travel arrangements for Snowden, who remains exiled in Russia, would be held with the Swedish government, von Uexkull said.

He added that the foundation had been denied access to the Swedish foreign ministry's media room, where award ceremonies have been held since 1995.

Three other winners

Snowden, who is wanted by the US for exposing mass data collection by the US National Security Agency (NSA) and Rusbridger are honorary winners, meaning they will not receive the award's customary 500,000 kronor (54,500 euros).

The other three prize winners, named to receive the monetary award, are Pakistani human rights lawyer Asma Jahanger, Sri Lankan rights activist Basil Fernando and US environmentalist Bill McKibbben.

Jahanger is a human rights lawyer who has defended women, children, religious minorities and the poor in Pakistan, the award citation said.

Fernando, originally from Sri Lanka, led the Hong Kong-based Asian Human Rights Commission for nearly two decades and now serves as its director of policy and programs.

McKibben is founder of 350.org, a grass-roots environmental movement aimed at spurring action to fight climate change.

lpj/kms (dpa, AFP, AP)

[Sep 23, 2014] Edward Snowden Sfido il Grande Fratello

repubblica.it

Edward Snowden answers the questions of "L'Espresso" from his refuge in Russia, the country which has granted temporary asylum. It is easy to say "Do not give up". But it is an illusion. He does not think that it will be an easy path to put a brakes on the NSA spying: "The defenders of the state of surveillance in the Washington Congress will never give up on their own initiative a program if they believe that this gives them an advantage. They will not do so even if the program violates the Constitution"

... ... ...

The problem is how to defeat a technological Leviathan that now operates for more then a decade: how nuclear weapons systems for the global control can be dismantled and removed. A government will never give up such sophisticated instruments, in which it has invested colossal sums. Snowden agrees, but also thinks that "the surveillance is not like nuclear weapons, because it can be fought directly and even with modest financial resources, using technology which is completely free." He does not go into detail about exactly which technologies will help to overcome the mass surveillance, but most times he has spoken publicly about it is the encryption is the key to protect your privacy in the era of total control, the same technology which was entrusted to deliver his secrets.

Yet despite the scandal raised by his revelations, after a year still has not arrived to concrete reforms. "It's an important moment for reform," he replies, "but today it seems clear that the only court that has tried to tackle seriously the problem is that of European Court of Justice ." Which "invalidated" the EU directive requiring telecommunications companies to retain for two years the telephone traffic data and Internet for all citizens, without discrimination. This was an important ruling, but two months after the decision of the judges of Strasbourg, it is still unclear to what extent the European states will really appreciate it. Faced with this uncertainty and inaction, however, Snowden cautions that "if governments fail to protect the rights of citizens, they will lose much more than they earn." He adds: "When people lose trust in authority, they have a tendency to create their own solutions." How? Once again refers to the ability to protect privacy through encryption mechanisms, "strengthening our rights through the higher laws of science and technology."

How this situation can be challenged? Based on his experience in the most powerful intelligence apparatus in the world, he believes that in the future the network will become a tool to strengthen democracy or a system of absolutism, the enabler of new forms of tyranny

"It depends on us. Internet is an extraordinary power amplifier, but amplifies both the power of individuals and the States. Strengthening of the super-states, already-powerful and ultra-organized, has restricted the domain of our freedoms seriously, because such states already had much more power than any single individual, "he says," but if we consider the aggregate power of the community civilians that are formed on the Internet for solidarity with a cause, without national barriers - a digital community than never before had existed in history - there is reason for hope. The states are powerful, but this united community is even stronger and the potential energy of a global technical community, organized but without national borders, also makes even the most powerful States feel isolated and vulnerable. "

In the USA, something similar is happening. A nation has to face the strong mobilization of the entire world public opinion, outraged by the revelations of mass espionage : a spontaneous protest, which did not need the stimulus of political parties, lobby or traditional movements. And that has prompted governments such as Germany to take tougher positions against Washington. One of the issues advanced by the defenders global intelligence that has been repeated very often: the United States does neither more nor less then Russia and China. "The Russians, the Chinese, and every other nation that we consider in the "naughty list" can only dream about the capabilities of the NSA, unable to spend seventy-five billion dollars a year for intelligence programs," says Snowden, "I think it is reasonable to say that the United States is, in some key aspects, guided by the best intentions, but we Americans have lost our way in setting national policy.

Mass surveillance of entire countries and people who are not suspected of any crime or illegality is a clear violation of human rights and should never have been authorized. The government itself recognizes this, having freely signed up to Article 12 of the Declaration of Human Rights, which prohibits this type of arbitrary interference in our private lives. "

The interview with Snowden closes with a reflection on the organization that saved him: WikiLeaks. "They are absolutely fearless in putting principles above politics. WikiLeaks, by the mere fact of its existence, has hardened the backbone of institutions in many countries, because the editors of the newspaper knows that if you are intimidated and do not publish a story important but controversial, then you are likely to end up burned by a global alternative individual national newspapers (that is WikiLeaks, ed.) Our policies may be different, but their efforts to build a culture without boundaries of transparency and the protection of sources are extraordinary: they take the biggest risk. And in a time when government control on information can be ruthless, I think they represent a vital example of how to preserve the old freedoms in new age "

[Jun 21, 2014] Snowden gets German Fritz Bauer award for exposing US intelligence

RT News

Last summer, Snowden had already secured the recognition of the German advocates, receiving the 2013 Whistleblower Award. And in October, a group of US whistleblowers presented Snowden with the Sam Adams Award for 'Integrity in Intelligence' during a secret meetingin Moscow.

READ MORE: 'Courage is contagious': Whistleblowing Fantastic Four talk 'Snowden effect' on RT

The 31-year-old, who has been living in Russia for almost a year after being granted asylum from US prosecution, is a key figure in the ongoing German probe into NSA spy scandal that monitored millions of Germans and its Chancellor Angela Merkel.

Members of the German legislative committee, appointed to investigate the NSA's snooping of Chancellor Merkel's phone, were planning to visit Moscow to meet the whistleblower.

Snowden earlier claimed that he is ready to testify about American wrongdoings and has even sent a letter to the German authorities, requesting a meeting. However, he has reportedly turned down the offer to meet German MPs in Russia. His lawyer Wolfgang Kaleck said Snowden believes at this point there is "no room or need for an oral, 'informal' meeting in Moscow" and that substantial testimony would only be possible in Germany.

Recent reports suggest that Germany has become one of the National Security Agency's most important centers for data collection and surveillance operations in Europe.

The rejection may come as a temporary relief to the German government, which warned the committee that Snowden's testimony might cause "negative consequences" on Germany's relations and cooperation with the US.

[Jun 06, 2014] NSA Inside the FIVE-EYED VAMPIRE SQUID of the INTERNET

The Register Forums
Snowden Anniversary One year after The Guardian opened up the trove of top secret American and British documents leaked by former National Security Agency (NSA) sysadmin Edward J Snowden, the world of data security and personal information safety has been turned on its head.

Everything about the safety of the internet as a common communication medium has been shown to be broken. As with the banking disasters of 2008, the crisis and damage created - not by Snowden and his helpers, but by the unregulated and unrestrained conduct the leaked documents have exposed - will last for years if not decades.

Compounding the problem is the covert network of subornment and control that agencies and collaborators working with the NSA are now revealed to have created in communications and computer security organisations and companies around the globe.

The NSA's explicit objective is to weaken the security of the entire physical fabric of the net. One of its declared goals is to "shape the worldwide commercial cryptography market to make it more tractable to advanced cryptanalytic capabilities being developed by the NSA", according to top secret documents provided by Snowden.

Profiling the global machinations of merchant bank Goldman Sachs in Rolling Stone in 2009, journalist Matt Taibbi famously characterized them as operating "everywhere ... a great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity, relentlessly jamming its blood funnel into anything that smells like money".

The NSA, with its English-speaking "Five Eyes" partners (the relevant agencies of the UK, USA, Australia, New Zealand and Canada) and a hitherto unknown secret network of corporate and government partners, has been revealed to be a similar creature. The Snowden documents chart communications funnels, taps, probes, "collection systems" and malware "implants" everywhere, jammed into data networks and tapped into cables or onto satellites.

The evidence Snowden has provided, by the bucketload, has shown that no country, no network, no communications system, no type of communication has been too small or trivial or irrelevant to attract attention and the ingestion of data into huge and enduring archives - under construction at NSA headquarters and already in operation at its new Utah Data Center.

Operations have ranged from the systematic recording of every mobile telephone call in the tiny 380,000 population Bahamas, through Angry Birds, World of Warcraft, Second Life, intimate Yahoo webcam images and direct cyber attacks on the data centre networks of Google (carried out by British allies at GCHQ from bases in the UK). Under the covernames of WINDSTOP and MUSCULAR, GCHQ data from UK cable taps, including direct intercepts of US email providers and ISPs, is provided wholesale to NSA. NSA has also deployed two overseas Remote Operations centres for malware management at Menwith Hill Station in Yorkshire and at Misawa, Japan.

There are parallels to the banking world, too, in the pervasive and longstanding networks of influence that have been created with the aim of influencing and controlling policymakers, and which have assured minimal political change when damage is done. Merchant banks like Goldmans have long worked hard to have their alumni in positions of political power and influence, in control at vital times.

Last month, accompanying his new book Nowhere to Hide, journalist Glenn Greenwald has published 180 new Snowden documents that lay out the NSA's global reach - 33 "Third Party" countries, 20 major access "choke points" accessing optical fibre communications, 80 "strategic partner" commercial manufacturers, 52 US, UK and overseas satellite interception sites, more than 80 US Embassies and diplomatic sites hosting floors packed with surveillance and monitoring equipment, and over 50,000 "implants" - malware and tampered hardware that has rendered most commercial VPN systems and software transparent to the NSA and its partners.

In GCHQ and NSA Sigint (signals-intelligence) jargon, common or garden "hacking" is never talked about: the insider term for such activity is "CNE" - Computer Network Exploitation.

NSA's access to optical fibre cables worldwide can be "covert, clandestine or co-operative," according to one of the leaked slides. The covert operations described in the Snowden documents include secret taps on other companies' cables installed by employees of such firms as AT&T and BT.

The published Snowden documents have not yet described NSA's special activities to get into cables even their overseas and corporate partners cannot access. For more than ten years, an adapted nuclear submarine - the USS Jimmy Carter - has installed underwater taps on marine cables, "lifting them up", installing taps and then laying out "backhaul" fibres to interception sites, according to a former Sigint employee. Cable companies have speculated that the submarine tapping activity may be connected to a rash of unexplained cable cuts in recent times affecting fibre cables in the Middle East and South Asia; the cable breaks could serve to prevent operators noticing as taps were installed elsewhere on the same cable.

One previously unrevealed outstation of Britain's secret internet tapping programme has been operating for almost five years in the autocratic Persian gulf state of Oman, according to documents obtained by Snowden in Hawaii. The station, known as Overseas Processing Centre 1 (OPC-1) is part of GCHQ's massive £1bn project TEMPORA, which GCHQ wants to use to harvest all internet communications it can access and hold that data for up to 30 days.

This is not an Orwellian act (meaning, yes, of course, it is)

The damage created to IT security is deliberate, sustained and protected even inside the agencies' compartmented planning cells by arcane contrivances of language. Breaking the safety and value of crypto systems, in sigint speak, is "enabling". Deliberately sabotaging security, in the inverted Orwellian world of the sigint agencies is said to be "improving security".

According to the leaked, detailed current US intelligence budget provided by Snowden, NSA's "Sigint Enabling Project ... actively engages the US and Foreign IT industries to covertly influence and/or overtly leverage their commercial products' designs. These design changes make the systems in question exploitable through SIGINT collection ... with foreknowledge of the modification. To the consumer and other adversaries, however, the systems' security remains intact."

Despite apologists' denials, the language of this major US government document is unambiguous in describing broken crypto and hardware and software "backdoors" as a much-desired NSA goal.

NSA strategic partnerships

More than 80 companies supporting both missions

Tricking a company like RSA Security into promoting backdoored and sabotaged algorithms for default use in security products is "enabling". Physically sabotaging Cisco routers while they are being shipped out of the US to commercial customers - a serious crime when committed by anyone but the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the NSA - is "enabling".

Ensuring that communications security encryption chips "used in Virtual Private Networks and Web encryption devices" secretly ship with their security broken open, as specified in the current US "cryptologic capabilities plan", is "enabling". In the coming year, NSA's budget for such Sigint "enabling" is $255m.

Who plays in this corporate "enabling" game?

Since the days of Watergate in the 1970s, and the subsequent US Congressional investigations, AT&T - the world's 23rd largest company - has been identified as providing US government access to all its customers' communications passing in and out of the US. The intercepted communications passed on long ago included communications of 1960s US antiwar dissidents.

AT&T's secret role intercepting Americans' communications in a programme dubbed SHAMROCK was flushed out by Congressional enquiries in 1975, and largely stopped as illegal - for a few years. But it all began again in 1978 when a new US Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act was passed. SHAMROCK was reborn, the Snowden archive reveals, as BLARNEY. In the bizarre and boastful world of show-off Powerpoints that NSA geeks prepare for their colleagues, BLARNEY even has its own logo.

The identity of NSA's and GCHQ's corporate industrial and international partners are amongst the Sigint agencies' most closely guarded secrets. There are strict internal prohibitions in the US and the UK against revealing the true corporate identities behind covernames like FAIRVIEW or STORMBREW, both identified as providing "upstream" (meaning fibre cable tap) access to Microsoft, Yahoo, Google, and many other companies' internet communications.

More than once, the Snowden documents have revealed that siginters' NSA braggadocio can let cover slip. Among the new Snowden documents published last month by Greenwald is a potentially devastating slide listing NSA commercial "Strategic Partnerships".

The slide displays, with corporate logos, the names of major US IT companies who are listed under NSA's vaunted "alliances with over 80 Major Global Corporations". The companies identified are said to be "supporting both missions": that is, both Sigint attacks on global communications networks, and the more acceptable public face of collaboration - cyber defence activity.

The roll call of names and logos on the slide include most of the US's IT industry giants: Microsoft, HP, Cisco, IBM, Qualcomm, Intel, Motorola, Qwest, AT&T, Verizon, Oracle and EDS.

This document and many more like it shine a spotlight on the invidious position in which major US corporations have found themselves. Their trust has been compromised, with share valuations now tumbling to follow. Cisco, despite being reported as "supporting missions" in the classified slides, was reportedly devastated when last month Greenwald published photographs taken by NSA's hacking department of "interdicted" Cisco equipment, stolen in transit and then put back in the delivery system after being tampered with to open the kit up for NSA remote control.

The US corporations have also helped spy on their communications partners, both overtly and covertly, according to the documents. FAIRVIEW, a corporate partner "with access to int. cables, routers, switches", according to one recently published note "operates in the US, but has access to information that transits the nation and through its corporate relationships provides unique accesses to other telecoms and ISPs".

It is also "aggressively involved in shaping traffic to run signals of interest past our monitors". For these and other services, according to the classified US Intelligence budget leaked by Snowden to the Washington Post, FAIRVIEW will receive $95m from NSA in the current year.

Get paid to play: cash, technology - whadda you want?

According to another slide Greenwald has published this month, STORMBREW operates seven "choke points" on international communications on the US eastern and western seaboards, each covernamed for leading US ski resorts.

FAIRVIEW and STORMBREW are the covernames for the US's communications giants, AT&T and Verizon. In the UK, BT (GCHQ covername "REMEDY") and Verizon/Vodafone (GCHQ covername "GERONTIC") are described as actively intercepting their own and other companies' fibre networks, and linking them to GCHQ's processing sites at Cheltenham and Bude, Cornwall. BT and Verizon are also lavishly remunerated by GCHQ for their work in providing access to communications links in the UK, receiving payments of tens of millions of pounds annually, according to documents copied by Snowden.

In one of the most alarming slideshows, NSA's successes in smashing basic general internet cryptography security is described in classic style as "improving security". NSA's project BULLRUN was described thus:

For the past decade, NSA has led an aggressive, multipronged effort to break widely used Internet encryption technologies ... Cryptanalytic capabilities are now coming online. Vast amounts of encrypted Internet data which have up till now been discarded are now exploitable. Major new processing systems ... must be put in place to capitalise on this opportunity.

Listeners at this talk were also warned that the "groundbreaking capabilities" were "extremely fragile ... do not ask about or speculate on sources or methods". "Indoctrination" - special security briefings and signing new warnings - was required for access to information about how BULLRUN techniques work.

In the creation of such arcane rituals of access to sacred secrets that no-one may know and to the power they are believed to bestow, working life inside Sigint communities can seem to resemble nothing so much as the medieval churches. Like Latin chanted by medieval priests, NSA and GCHQ's extraordinary lexicons of "covernames" revealed by Snowden are all in fact unclassified - even BULLRUN. The ordinary mortal may hear them, but must never know their meanings, which are protected behind layers of secrecy beyond Top Secret: in the US, ECI for Extremely Compartmented Information, in the UK, STRAP 1, STRAP 2 or STRAP 3.

In another Snowden document prepared by NSA's Cryptanalysis and Exploitation Services unit in 2010, Project BULLRUN is described as involving "multiple sources, all of which are extremely sensitive. They include CNE [Computer Network Exploitation], interdiction, industry relationships, collaboration with other IC [Intelligence Community] entities, and advanced mathematical techniques".

The covert nature of NSA's relationships and their power to influence policy and compromise internet security technologies was unguardedly summarised in a chatty top secret blog provided by NSA's Foreign Affairs Directorate in 2009 and leaked by Snowden.

"What are we after with our third party relationships?" asked the spies.

In summary, the answer is that they get to wiretap their own countries and their neighbours, places to which NSA and GCHQ otherwise could not legally reach.

Approved SIGINT partners

Approved third parties with four of the Five Eyes and others

In return, collaborating allies may get high tech toys to impress their own masters - and better ones if they are willing to break rules or laws. According to the Foreign Affairs Directorate blog:

"NSA might be willing to share advanced technologies in return for that partner's willingness to do something politically risky."

The Third Party relationships with other nations' spooks and/or secret police are often kept secret even from the foreign governments in question, according to the blog:

"In many of our foreign partners' capitals, few senior officials outside of the defence-intelligence apparatuses are witting to any SIGINT connection to the USA/NSA."

Documents provided by Snowden show that GCHQ particularly prizes the data they get from Sweden, Israel and India.

A year past the first revelations, the US has begun a debate, as Snowden hoped, and changes and restrictions affecting American citizens' communications have started. But for foreigners, there is nothing. In the UK and across Europe, there has been much anger but little change. The new Snowden documents provide some of the answer, showing that virtually every EU member state has a covert surveillance "Sigint Exchange Agreement" with NSA. None of these agreements have been reported to or agreed by national parliaments.

The only European countries apparently not signed up to help break the internet are Luxembourg, Switzerland, Monaco, and Ireland. And Iceland.

That is the reach of the embrace of the internet's vampire squid. ®

hammarbtyp

> Anonymous Coward

Re: Simple Counter-Measure

YES, traffic dilution is one of the only available legal anti-5-eyes strategy (not that I'm completely anti 5-eyes, I'd just like to join-in the privacy/security balance debate, whilst that is still allowed)

So - DO: widely share implausible Main Stream Media stories about ex-MI6 5-eye activist having affair with ex-TV-glamour-lady such as [DailyMail] you couldn't make this up!

and DONT encrypt using FAIL'ed algo's safecurves.cr.yp.to

Anonymous Coward

Re: Simple Counter-Measure

A widespread smattering of TOR can't hurt either. Especially if used for those things you're not really interested in or trying to keep secret... like FB

"what sweden has to offer the US"

Which is the central plot point of the Larsson books - in which (spoiler alert) the Swedish security agency has one Russian defector whose information they can trade with the US, and proceed to commit a series of murders and illegal imprisonments in order to protect their source. I thought when I read it that it was rather far-fetched, but since then it's dawned on me that our "security services" are indeed mainly concerned with their own jobs and power, and any real involvement in actual national security is presumably just enough to persuade the politicians that they are getting value for money.
Anonymous Coward

Not just Russia.

Sizable chunks of European data are deliberately routed through Sweden giving plausible deniability to the the telcos in the originating countries.

Lapun Mankimasta

Re: "what sweden has to offer the US"

"the Swedish security agency has one Russian defector whose information they can trade with the US"

Every time I see the word "defector" I find myself substituting "defecator". It seems to fit with the sh*tload of garbage certain Iraqis fed everybody prior to the last imperial cockup in Iraq, of just a decade or so ago.

hammarbtyp

Bronze badge Lets not forget who is to blame

It is easy to characterize the NSA and GCHQ as some sort or Orwellian super power out of control targeting at removing our freedoms. But actually they are more an expression of our fears and anxieties. The reason these programs were setup in the 1st place was because we the people demanded it after events like 9/11 and 7/7 when it became clear that organisations like al-qaeda were using things like the internet to co-ordinate their followers. After 9/11 questions were asked why the CIA, NSA FBI etc did not see it coming and the answer was because they did not have the capabilities to monitor mass communication. So they built it.

Now you could argue that they went way over there brief, but that is fault with the oversight not the organisations themselves. Then again with the fear and paranoia following those events it would be a brave politician who would put their career on the line who would limit powers which might stop the next 9/11. We also would be clamoring to now why our security services had let us down if another event like that happened.

In a naive world populated by Edward Snowdens, the transgressions look inexcusable, but in the real world these organisations daily stop us getting killed or injured by the forces out there. The question therefore is not whether these powers should exist, but how they are overseen, the range of their use, and when they should be used.

Silver badge

People did not "demand" this

Politicians were (and still are) deathly afraid of getting blamed for making a wrong decision, and trying to make us safer is seen as the "safest" political choice, so they can claim they did something.

Look at the Benghazi situation, and how much worry (granted mostly partisan) there is over a handful of deaths (not to dismiss them, but it hardly compares to 9/11) Imagine what would have happened to Bush if there had been another big attack several years after 9/11, or to Obama if there had been/will be another during his administration?

They keep these programs secret because if there's a big attack, they can release some details and say "look at everything we've been doing, but even then the terrorists got around it, its not our fault!"

Lapun Mankimasta

Re: Lets not forget who is to blame

"It is easy to characterize the NSA and GCHQ as some sort or Orwellian super power out of control targeting at removing our freedoms."

Such as the right to anonymously support political parties, candidates, positions, etc, which are usually out-of-favour with the party in power? Unless of course you can buy the watchers off, in which case the only political and civil rights left belong to the rich.

"But actually they are more an expression of our fears and anxieties."

Fears and anxieties that have been deliberately fostered and developed over the past half-century, based as it happens on a set of fears and anxieties that have been fostered for over a millenium in Western Europe. I don't like being manipulated, sorry.

"The reason these programs were setup in the 1st place was because we the people demanded it after events like 9/11 and 7/7 when it became clear that organisations like al-qaeda were using things like the internet to co-ordinate their followers.:

Did we? I don't remember being asked, at any point. And I certainly didn't express any such wish to be surveilled a la the KGB, the Stasi, and the various forms of uselessness that permitted the likes of the French Revolution to occur.

"After 9/11 questions were asked why the CIA, NSA FBI etc did not see it coming and the answer was because they did not have the capabilities to monitor mass communication. So they built it."

When in truth they had been keeping an eye on Al Qaeda for a fair few years. They just did not have the elementary HUMINT to understand Al Qaeda. Which they still don't. The "non-intervening" intervention in Libya has spread Al Qaeda affiliates all across North Africa - someone everybody else at the time could see. Just not the doofuses in charge.

"Now you could argue that they went way over there brief, but that is fault with the oversight not the organisations themselves."

When you have an organization tasked with two completely self-contradictory tasks - the NSA - namely securing the networks, and breaking the networks, that line of reasoning shows up as just an empty excuse.

"Then again with the fear and paranoia following those events it would be a brave politician who would put their career on the line who would limit powers which might stop the next 9/11."

Why are we paranoid? Paranoia's a medical condition, in case you were unaware, and paranoid schizophrenia - where the brain disconnects from its environment and sees threats everywhere - is one of the more dangerous of the mental illnesses. If we as a group of people are paranoid enough, then we should undergo a medical examination and probably, undergo a course of medication.

"We also would be clamoring to now why our security services had let us down if another event like that happened."

We are clamouring to find out why our security services now consider everybody to be guilty. Or at least I am.

"In a naive world populated by Edward Snowdens, the transgressions look inexcusable, but in the real world these organisations daily stop us getting killed or injured by the forces out there."

Or rather, they set up policies and environments that we understand only too well, are precursors to repression.

"The question therefore is not whether these powers should exist, but how they are overseen, the range of their use, and when they should be used."

Let me tell you about the lady who rode a tiger. A very exciting ride, but she could never sleep and she could never dismount. The price of freedom is eternal vigilance. Evidently since we're not paying such a price, we don't have freedom, only a simulcra of it.

Anonymous Coward


Re: "Menwith Hill was being used to monitor trans-Atlantic traffic *decades* before 9/11"

Many thanks for the correction.

T_o_u_f_ma_n

Black Helicopters


Hilarious

Ah sure Ireland is safe from all that... If the country had strong trade ties with the UK, some form of historical dissidence within its population or was hosting several US IT multinationals then yeah I would be concerned.

Hang on...

Steeev

"The only European countries apparently not signed up to help break the internet are Luxembourg, Switzerland, Monaco, and Ireland. And Iceland."

Well I'd imagine Ireland has nothing to offer which the NSA can't already get from either the UK or a multinational. Otherwise we'd be eagerly bent over the desk with the rest of them.

JimmyPage

"Enabling"

A word that *so* desperately wants to be paired with "Act"

The third word :( -->

Anonymous Coward

Re: "Enabling"

Possibly tangential - but a certain "Enabling Act" was passed by a democratic political elite with the best of intentions. Purely intended as a precautionary contingency against extremists' disruption. The extremists then formed a minority in a coalition government - and their leader invoked the Enabling Act to rule by his dictatorial decree. The rest - as they say - is history. Very bloody history.

Jim 59

Outrage

Yes, it is a personal outrage that the NSA/GCHQ is spying on you.

Unfortunately, the techniques you and I use to keep our secrets (encryption) are the same techniques used by those who would plan your demise. So there is a problem - how to break one while respecting the other ? It can't be done. There is no way of intercepting (say) an email from Boko Haram giving the location of the Nigerian girls, without intercepting everybody else's email as well.

Can anybody suggest a way of spying on baddies while not looking over goodies' shoulders too ?

DropBear

Re: Lets not forget who is to blame

"...the transgressions look inexcusable..."

That's probably because they are.

Anonymous Coward

Re: Lets not forget who is to blame

Menwith Hill was being used to monitor trans-Atlantic traffic years before 9/11

James Micallef
Re: Simple Counter-Measure

"design bots to generate yottabytes of garbage for topics you're not really interested in"

So that explains all the cats, then!

Mike

Re: Outrage

Yes. Good old-fashioned human intel.

The alternative - what we have at present - is far, far too amenable to misuse, however benign the proclaimed intentions, however laudable the alleged purposes.

Intelligence work has to be based on capabilities - what your adversary CAN do to you, not what you think they WANT to do to you. And it's very clear, the security state has become the adversary here, and what they CAN do to ALL of us has gone so far over the line that the line is now a dot on the horizon.

"1984 was a WARNING, not a bloody INSTRUCTION MANUAL!"

Chris G

Re: Outrage

In 1973 I passed by the Old Bailey bomb about 15 minutes before it went off, I also worked for a Daily Newspaper in the early '70s that was outspoken against the IRA, we received bomb threats on an almost daily basis, some real some not.

Nobody I worked with was particularly fazed by them just took sensible precautions.

I also served with the British Army at a time when the Red Brigade and the Bader Meinhoff group were running around .

Not then nor at any time since would I agree to our government or any other having the carte blanche right to spy on all of us in the hope that they could thereby catch a few discontents. If the intelligence services (or you) really believe they can win the so called war against terrorism by such methods, they have become such lard arsed, lazy fools that the whole thing should be disbanded and started again.

Any serious terrorist is not going to be using any communications that can be hacked, tapped or otherwise easily intercepted, the old fashioned field craft practiced during the cold war using cells and dead letter boxes worked then and arguably ( given the ridiculous levels of electronic interception and the reliance thereupon) works as well or better now.

Benjamin Franklin wrote this in 1755, it still has as much value today:

They who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety.

[Jun 05, 2014] From 'Truth is coming' to 'Merkel Effect' Top 13 Snowden quotes on NSA

June 05, 2014 | RT News

rt.com

NSA leaks

While the files exposing limitless global NSA spying speak for themselves, the man behind the leaks has also had much to say. One year after his first leaks were published, RT picks some of the standout quotes from former NSA contractor Edward Snowden.

'The NSA has built an infrastructure that allows it to intercept almost everything'

In June 2013, Snowden revealed to the world that the US National Security Agency (NSA) has been using a sophisticated and warrantless web surveillance system to gather and analyze Americans' and foreign nationals' online and phone communications.

READ MORE: 10 things we didn't know before Snowden

"The NSA has built an infrastructure that allows it to intercept almost everything. With this capability, the vast majority of human communications are automatically ingested without targeting. 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 said.

Snowden painstakingly picked the NSA files from a trove of classified documents and distributed them among some of the trusted world journalists, making sure that the flow of explosive leaks would be unstoppable.

"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. Truth is coming, and it cannot be stopped," he said.

In his rare public addresses since fleeing the US for Hong Kong, and then finding temporary asylum in Russia, Snowden pointed out that the proverbial Orwellian state is "nothing compared to" the NSA's methods, urging the citizens of the world to fight for their right for privacy.

"A child born today will grow up with no conception of privacy at all. They'll never know what it means to have a private moment to themselves, an unrecorded, unanalyzed thought," the whistleblower said.

To US govt: 'The people will not be intimidated'

Snowden sent a strong message to the US government, saying he believes the people "will not be intimidated," and that one would not want to live in a world without a private space.

"I can't in good conscience allow the US government to destroy privacy, internet freedom and basic liberties for people around the world with this massive surveillance machine they're secretly building… I don't want to live in a world where there's no privacy and therefore no room for intellectual exploration and creativity," Snowden said.

While the US government and its media machine has immediately started painting a picture of Snowden as a traitor, some even suggesting he ended up "in the loving arms of FSB," the whistleblower stressed he had a much stronger motive for his actions – patriotism.

"I'm neither traitor nor hero. I'm an American" Snowden said. "I can do more good outside of prison… This country is worth dying for," he added.

'Made stateless & hounded for act of political expression'

Snowden has questioned why he was persecuted despite carefully avoiding materials posing a national security threat and revealing only those he was sure are in the public interest. The whistleblower believes that the US government annulled his passport and chased him for his "act of political expression."

"I took what I knew to the public, so what affects all of us can be discussed by all of us in the light of day, and I asked the world for justice,"
Snowden said, adding that he does not regret his decision. "While the US Constitution marks these programs as illegal, my government argues that secret court rulings, which the world is not permitted to see, somehow legitimize an illegal affair. These rulings simply corrupt the most basic notion of justice – that it must be seen to be done. The immoral cannot be made moral through the use of secret law."

'MSM doesn't challenge govt for fear of being seen as unpatriotic'

The former CIA employee said that White House-supportive strategy employed by the American media establishment had "ended up costing the public dearly."

"After 9/11, many of the most important news outlets in America abdicated their role as a check to power – the journalistic responsibility to challenge the excesses of government – for fear of being seen as unpatriotic and punished in the market during a period of heightened nationalism,"
Snowden said.

NSA presentation files leaked by Snowden contain a world heat map showing the scale of the US surveillance. According to the map, American communications are being monitored by the NSA even more actively than Russian ones.

"We watch our own people more closely than anyone else in the world," Snowden said via a video link to Washington as he was receiving the Ridenhour Award for 'Truth-Telling'.

"When Clapper raised his hand and lied to the American public, was anyone tried? Were any charges brought? Within 24 hours of going public, I had three charges against me," the whistleblower said, greeted by a standing ovation from the US audience.

'No question US is engaged in economic spying'

The American spying agency is not only responsible for national security, but also spies on foreign industrial entities in US business interests, Snowden revealed.

If an industrial giant like Siemens has something that the NSA believes "would be beneficial to the national interests, not the national security, of the United States, they will go after that information and they'll take it," the whistleblower said.

'Merkel Effect'

Following Snowden's leaks on US spying activities in Europe, German Chancellor Angela Merkel justified the surveillance – until she learned she was on NSA's radar herself. Snowden has viewed such stance as hypocrisy, even coining a phrase in honor of Merkel.

"It's clear the CIA was trying to play 'keep away' with documents relevant to an investigation by their overseers in Congress, and that's a serious constitutional concern. But it's equally if not more concerning that we're seeing another 'Merkel Effect,' where an elected official does not care at all that the rights of millions of ordinary citizens are violated by our spies, but suddenly it's a scandal when a politician finds out the same thing happens to them," Snowden said, referring to the statements of US Senator Dianne Feinstein.

Snowden said he was disillusioned with Obama who, instead of restricting the surveillance programs, has "closed the door on investigating systemic violations of law, deepened and expanded several abusive programs." However, he believes Obama has not yet reached the point of no return and "has plenty of time" to stop the warrantless surveillance of the NSA.

'NSA pressured EU into 'European bazaar' of spy networks'

"One of the foremost activities of the NSA's FAD, or Foreign Affairs Division, is to pressure or incentivize EU member states to change their laws to enable mass surveillance," Snowden said in a testimony delivered remotely from Russia. "Lawyers from the NSA, as well as the UK's GCHQ, work very hard to search for loopholes in laws and constitutional protections that they can use to justify indiscriminate, dragnet surveillance operations that were at best unwittingly authorized by lawmakers."

"The result is a European bazaar, where an EU member state like Denmark may give the NSA access to a tapping center on the [unenforceable] condition that the NSA doesn't search it for Danes, and Germany may give the NSA access to another on the condition that it doesn't search for Germans. Yet the two tapping sites may be two points on the same cable, so the NSA simply captures the communications of the German citizens as they transit Denmark, and the Danish citizens as they transit Germany, all the while considering it entirely in accordance with their agreements," Snowden said.

Snowden fears that with the help of the NSA, the US is turning into a "turnkey tyranny," justified by stories of the external threats that the people would swallow.

"The great fear that I have regarding the outcome for America of these disclosures is that nothing will change. [That people] won't be willing to take the risks necessary to stand up and fight to change things," Snowden shared.

'Encryption works'

Despite sophisticated programs and tactics employed by the NSA, former spy Snowden does not believe that end-to-end encrypted communication is "a lost cause." The problem is the endpoint security, which the people should be improving, he says.

"Encryption works. Properly implemented strong crypto systems are one of the few things that you can rely on,"
Snowden said.

"We need to think about encryption not as this sort of arcane, black art. It's a basic protection," Snowden added. "Let's put it this way. The United States government has assembled a massive investigation team into me personally, into my work with the journalists, and they still have no idea what documents were provided to the journalist, what they have, what they don't have, because encryption works."

READ MORE: Snowden speaks in support of #ResetTheNet online campaign

[May 24, 2014] No Place to Hide: Edward Snowden, the NSA and the Surveillance State by Glenn Greenwald

The Guardian

At the outset of Glenn Greenwald's communications with the "anonymous leaker" later identified as 29-year-old former NSA employee Edward Snowden, Greenwald – a journalist, blogger and former lawyer – and the film-maker Laura Poitras, with whom he is collaborating, are told to use a PGP ("pretty good privacy") encryption package. Only then will materials be sent to him since, as Snowden puts it, encryption is "not just for spies and philanderers". Eventually Greenwald receives word that a Federal Express package has been sent and will arrive in a couple of days. He doesn't know what it will contain – a computer program or the secret and incriminating US government documents themselves – but nothing comes on the scheduled day of delivery. FedEx says that the package is being held in customs for "reasons unknown". Ten days later it is finally delivered. "I tore open the envelope and found two USB thumb drives" and instructions for using the programs, Greenwald writes.

His account reminded me of the time, nearly a decade ago, when I was researching Britain's road to war in Iraq, and went through a similar experience. I was waiting for an overnight FedEx envelope to reach me in New York, sent from my London chambers; it contained materials that might relate to deliberations between George Bush and Tony Blair (materials of the kind that seem to be holding up the Chilcot inquiry). A day passed, then another, then two more. Eventually, I was told I could pick up the envelope at a FedEx office, but warned that it had been tampered with, which turned out to something of an understatement: there was no envelope for me to tear open, as the tearing had already occurred and all the contents had been removed. FedEx offered no explanation.

As Greenwald notes, experiences such as this, which signal that you may be being watched, can have a chilling effect, but you just find other ways to carry on. FedEx (and its like) are avoided, and steps are taken to make sure that anything significant or sensitive is communicated by other means. In any event, and no doubt like many others, I proceed on the basis that all my communications – personal and professional – are capable of being monitored by numerous governments, including my own. Whether they are is another matter, as is the question of what happens with material obtained by such surveillance – a point that this book touches on but never really addresses. Greenwald's argument is that it's not so much what happens with the material that matters, but the mere fact of its being gathered. Even so, his point is a powerful one.

This is the great importance of the astonishing revelations made by Snowden, as facilitated by Greenwald and Poitras, with help from various news media, including the Guardian. Not only does it confirm what many have suspected – that surveillance is happening – but it also makes clear that it's happening on an almost unimaginably vast scale. One might have expected a certain targeting of individuals and groups, but we now know that data is hovered up indiscriminately. We have learned that over the last decade the NSA has collected records on every phone call made by every American (it gathers the who, what and when of the calls, known as metadata, but not the content), as well as email data. We have learned that this happens with the cooperation of the private sector, with all that implies for their future as consorts in global surveillance. We have learned, too, that the NSA reviews the contents of the emails and internet communications of people outside the US, and has tapped the phones of foreign leaders (such as German chancellor Angel Merkel), and that it works with foreign intelligence services (including Britain's GCHQ), so as to be able to get around domestic legal difficulties. Our suspicions have been confirmed that the use of global surveillance is not limited to the "war on terror", but is marshalled towards the diplomatic and even economic advantage of the US, a point Greenwald teases out using the PowerPoint materials relied on by the agencies themselves. Such actions have been made possible thanks to creative and dodgy interpretations of legislation (not least the Patriot Act implemented just after 9/11). These activities began under President Bush, and they have been taken forward by President Obama. It would be a generous understatement to refer to British "cooperation" in these matters, although Greenwald's intended audience seems to be mostly in the US, and he goes light on the British until it comes to the treatment of his partner, David Miranda, who was detained in the UK under anti-terror legislation.

When the revelations first came out, in the summer of 2013, Snowden explained that he "had the capability without any warrant to search for, seize, and read your communications". That meant "anyone's communications at any time", he added, justifying the public disclosure on the grounds that this "power to change people's fates" was "a serious violation of the law". Snowden's actions, and the claims he has made, have catalysed an important debate in the US, within Congress (where views have not necessarily followed party lines) and among academics and commentators. Views are polarised among reasonable individuals, such as New Yorker legal writer Jeff Toobin ("no proof of any systematic, deliberate violations of law"), and the New York Review of Books's David Cole ("secret and legally dubious activities at home and abroad"), and in the US federal courts. In Britain, by contrast, the debate has been more limited, with most newspapers avoiding serious engagement and leaving the Guardian to address the detail, scale and significance of the revelations. Media enterprises that one might have expected to rail at the powers of Big Government have remained conspicuously restrained – behaviour that is likely, over the long term, to increase the power of the surveillance state over that of the individual. With the arrival of secret courts in Britain, drawing on the experience of the US, it feels as if we may be at a tipping point. Such reluctance on the part of our fourth estate has given the UK parliament a relatively free rein, leaving the Intelligence and Security Committee to plod along, a somewhat pitiful contrast to its US counterparts.

The big issue at stake here is privacy, and the relationship between the individual and the state, and it goes far beyond issues of legality (although Snowden's fear of arrest, and perhaps also Greenwald's, seems rather real). It is in the nature of government that information will be collected, and that some of it should remain confidential. "Privacy is a core condition of being a free person," Greenwald rightly proclaims, allowing us a realm "where we can act, think, speak, write, experiment and choose how to be away from the judgmental eyes of others".

Snowden's revelations challenge us to reflect on the ideal balance between the power of the state to know and the right of the individual to go about her or his business unencumbered, and this in turn raises fundamental questions about the power of the media, on which Greenwald has strong views, usually (but not always) fairly articulated. He makes the case for Snowden, and it's a compelling one. One concern with WikiLeaks acting independently was the apparently random nature of its disclosures, without any obvious filtering on the basis of public interest or the possible exposure to risk of certain individuals. What is striking about this story, and the complex interplay between Snowden, Greenwald, Poitras and the Guardian, is that the approach was different, as the justification for the leaks seems to have been at the forefront of all their minds. In his recent book Secrets and Leaks Rahul Sagar identified a set of necessary conditions for leaks. Is there clear evidence of abuse of authority? Will the release threaten public safety? Is the scale of the release limited? Many people, though not all, see these as having been met in the Snowden case.

Britain needs a proper debate about the power of the state to collect information of the kind that Snowden has told us about, including its purpose and limits. The technological revolution of the past two decades has left UK law stranded, with parliament seemingly unable (and perhaps unwilling) to get a proper grip on the legal framework that is needed to restrain our political governors and the intelligence services, not least in their dance with the US. "The greatest threat is that we shall become like those who seek to destroy us", the legendary US diplomat George Kennan warned in 1947. In response, revelations can be made, Greenwald's book published, and a Pulitzer prize awarded. Long may it go on.

• Philippe Sands QC is professor of law at University College London. To order No Place to Hide for £15 with free UK p&p call Guardian book service on 0330 333 6846 or go to guardianbookshop.co.uk

No Place to Hide: Edward Snowden, the NSA and the Surveillance State

by Glenn Greenwald

Tell us what you think: Star-rate and review this book

Imlessbiasedthanyou2, 23 May 2014 8:41am

Recommend: 81

Ed Snowden needs to be pardoned.

Glenn Greenwald and the Guardian have been the only source for this information in the UK, which is a disgusting state is affairs. The timidity of our media is striking, embarrassing and scary.

Information needs to be collected by security agencies within reason. Indiscriminate harvesting is information corrupts democracy indescribably.

Incumbent powers can, and will, use private information to quell legitimate protest and debate, and protect their own interests at the expense of justice for their own citizens, and the innocent citizens of foreign countries. They will use it to bribe public servants and corrupt democracy.

Innocent information can still be used against you. It is a failure of intellect and imagination to doubt this, and proclaim the old, untrue mantra, "nothing to hide, nothing to fear".

This cannot be disputed, and so those who continue to defend the actions of our governments are either blind, ignorant or working in tandem.

Thank you Ed Snowden, Glenn Greenwald and the Guardian.

Keep this story alive. It's almost the only one that matters.

mirageseekr, 23 May 2014 11:45am

While I agree that personal privacy is important and needed I think the bigger concern is what happens to democracy when people in authority can be blackmailed. The important thing about Snowden was that he confirmed what Tice and Binney have been saying all along and just lacked the actual evidence.

What I see with some of the rulings from the courts and laws from congress is puppets on a string. They know their argument fails to hold water and yet the feverishly stand by and defend it. The only reasonable answer for that is someone has the goods on them and is using it, just as Russ Tice has been saying for years. So the major question and one I hope Snowden and Greenwald have the answer to is, who is the puppet master?

Our societies have only the charade of democracy. Now the proverbial curtain has been pulled back and we must look to see the truth. Tice has said he saw the orders for surveillance of Obama and Supreme court justices as well as top brass. So who is it exactly that this very expensive system paid for by our tax dollars is used for. We know the "terrorism" is a lie or possibly a distraction for workers they may worry about having a conscious. They claim it is not for industrial espionage, but I am willing to bet some people have made lots of money from having access to information that was stolen. To me the tin foil hat club had it right all along. The people calling the shots are the Council on Foreign Relations, The Trilateral Commission, and Bilderbergs. And if that is true then we have a few global elite of un-elected people determining economies, wars, policy for us all and doing it in violation of sovereignty laws. I wish The Guardian would report more on the military state the USA has become, daily the police beat and kill people here. The DHS has been loading up on ammunition that is not used for target ranges and is against the Geneva convention, the TSA, just ordered weapons and ammunition. The State Department just got a few tons of explosives even the post office has a SWAT team. We have allowed them to build a standing army within our country in direct violation of our constitution. The FEMA camps are up and running and NDAA ensures you can be quietly taken away in the night with absolutely no rights and no charges and even gives them the right to kill Americans. This is not a partisan issue, the bill passed 84-15. So how much more will it take for Americans to realize that the only difference between the US right now and Nazi Germany is that they haven't started loading the trains yet. The US also learned from the Germans mistakes, they will most likely not go house to house with weapons at first. It will be some false flag to make the population willingly go. Maybe it will be like the drills they have had (one in Denver) where they took the schoolchildren to the football arena for a FEMA/DHS "drill" except they forgot to make any mention to the parents about it. The puppet masters need to be exposed now, there is not much more time to wait to see how this is going to work out.

MiltonWiltmellow, 23 May 2014 11:48am

Recommend: 52

Snowden's revelations challenge us to reflect on the ideal balance between the power of the state to know and the right of the individual to go about her or his business unencumbered, and this in turn raises fundamental questions about the power of the media, on which Greenwald has strong views, usually (but not always) fairly articulated.

These sorts of understatements represent a sort of passive acceptance. (e.g., "Let's debate about the tigers dragging our children to the jungle where it devours them. Tiger's have legitimate needs too. Maybe if we stake goats, the tigers will devour the goats instead of our children ... " )

The entire relationship between State and individual changes when the State takes it upon itself to monitor the everyday activities of its citizens.

This isn't an academic question which august authorities like yourself can debate among themselves for the next ten or twenty years.

This is a fucking tiger in the nursery.

Either the citizen has basic human rights (the right to freely interact with others) or the citizen turns into a subject -- a potential threat to State security and thus a suspect.

The question isn't "how much secret surveillance should be allowed" but rather "how can this secret surveillance be stopped?

AhBrightWings -> MiltonWiltmellow, 23 May 2014 12:41pm

Brilliant Milton. Couldn't agree more, and love your metaphor. Just because it's crouched under the dust-ruffle doesn't mean it isn't there. If you've watched footage of tigers hunting, they often freeze for long periods of time to lull their prey into a fall sense of well-being.

As you said so well: This is a fucking tiger in the nursery.

LostintheUSMiltonWiltmellow, 23 May 2014 1:26pm

Recommend: 16

And it is not just about reading our emails, etc. Or listening into phone calls. I mentioned an obscure book to my husband (in the same room) that has been out of print for 34 years one day while working on my computer and a short while later there was an ad for that book that popped up on gmail.

Think about that.

And NONE of this is about "protecting" us. The Boston Marathon bombers were all over the radar for their previous activities and the NSA was paying them no mind. This web is to protect the oligarchy from us peasants. We are living in 17th century France...the aristocracy pay no taxes and we are being taxed and worked to death.

Levi Genes -> LostintheUS, 24 May 2014 11:44am

The Boston Marathon bombers were all over the radar for their previous activities and the NSA was paying them no mind. This web is to protect the oligarchy from us peasants.

It's much more violently proactive than simple 'protections' from potential opposition. The reason they appear now on the 'radar' is because the so-called Boston 'bombers' were deeply run by the FBI for the same nefarious reasons as are all other patsies in the parade of US false flag operations: deflection from public investigation identifying the actual terrorist perpetrators / plausible deniability for the public to bite on to facilitate the desired effect of implemented programs of public terror. The evidence of state sponsored terror is there if one chooses to look.

The recent, violent murder in Florida of an associate / witness to that FBI operation by an FBI agent / interrogator, tasked with insuring that associate / witness's compliance to the prescriptive, government narrative of the Boston event as force fed to the public by compliant / co-opted mass media, is but yet another thinly but effectively veiled, social conditioning manipulation of public consciousness reinforcing the enabling myth of just who is the actual threat to public peace and safety.

Boston was an exercise in social conditioning to martial law where no civil rights exist. They shut the city down in contrived pretext and stormed through whatever private domain they chose as a show of force in exercise of police state power over all constitutionally based constraints. All on a desperate, audacious and unthinkable lie.

You will do exactly what you're told to do, when you're told to do it, by heavily armed masked men in black, storming through your house without your invitation, ostensibly in pursuit of and protecting you from the terrible phantoms created by their masters.

Bagdad, Boston, London, Kiev, no matter. Same game of violent control from the same power cabal while draining the hard earned wealth and civil power of the masses by the same boom/ bust / state terrorist means. All of it, an horrific extension of covert enablement by forced public pacification to Operation Gladio and its drive to global dominion.

NATO / NWO intent is defined by its break-away elitist culture of absolute authoritarianism by absolute systemic corruption in absolute secrecy. Snowden and his journalist associates are providing a glimpse of its all encompassing scope. Our individual response, or lack thereof, will determine our fate as either citizens with rights based in moral principles and economic equity, or as mere commodities for use as needed by hidden powers.

A stark choice, as the presumptive enemies of the state that we in fact are.

guest88888epinoa, 24 May 2014 3:29am

Baubles handed out - nothing changed.

Agreed. Ultimately, despite their good intentions, I feel as though both Greenwald and Snowden aren't pushing the case against dragnet surveillance hard enough. We don't need a debate. This is fascism pure and simple, and they are spying on us because they fear the day that we revolt against their putrid austerity and the general failure of capitalism.

The Grauniad of course possesses no perspective whatsoever. Seriously Mr. Sands, we need a debate? You find out the majority of the world is being spied on and violated, and you are actually think that a few cosmetic changes will make a difference?

There will be no debate, and you know it. But I suppose that while you are wealthy and safe from economic deprivation, who cares if the NSA tramples on the freedoms of common people, all in defense of the ultra-rich, right?

KilgoreTrout2012, 23 May 2014 12:14pm

"NSA has collected records on every phone call made by every American (it gathers the who, what and when of the calls, known as metadata, but not the content), as well as email data."

I don't buy it's just metadata, since the US and are allies have the technology to do so, the content is also being "saved". Most likely US "content" is collected in Great Britain to give the NSA plausible deniability that they are not collecting content. And the US probably has Great Britain's "content".

The NSA may not have the technology to truly read all that data today but someday it will all be collated, analyzed, and used to put each citizen into national security classifications. Your travel, jobs prospects, etc. will be limited based on where you fall in their assessments.

guest88888 -> KilgoreTrout2012, 24 May 2014 3:34am

I don't buy it's just metadata,

Of course I agree with you sentiment that the US and its cronies are lying through their teeth about everything, but I want to point out that metadata collection is far more intrusive than just regular wiretapping.

Greenwald gave a great example. To paraphrase:

If I call an AIDS clinic, and you monitor the content of my call, I may never bring up the actual disease in most of my conversations. I might say, let's meet at this time, or book an appointment, or make small talk etc.

But, if you have the metadata, you can know that I've been calling an AIDS clinic repeatedly. You can know where I'm calling from. You can find out where I've been getting meds (from the pharmacy).

In short, you can rapidly figure out if I have AIDS, what I'm doing about it, even how I may have got it. Much easier with metadata than simple wire-tappping.

Not that much analysis needed, since you need much less data.

AhBrightWings, 23 May 2014 12:35pm

Recommend: 16

Not sure I agree that the debate has been "more limited" in Great Britain. The Guardian is, after all, a British publication and it has had ten times (conservatively) more coverage than any other journal I know of, and continued congratulations for doing so.

The problem in the US is that we can't get any traction on the revelations that kicks over into judicial action to end this crime spree. Congress is ossified, the populace is mummified, and so we march on, becoming the United States of Zombieland, where the only signs of sentient life are in the MIC and its many tentacles and claws.

Snowden's sacrifice and Greenwald's work only have value if people wake up and use what we've learned. The mystery is what we are all waiting for. The trajectory from UPS hold-ups to being held-up in a cell is shorter--when things truly take a dire turn (and we may get lucky and they may not, I fully concede that)--than many want to concede. The rise of every despot and tyrant has illustrated that arc well. Why do we think we'll be the exception to that pattern?

Our exceptionalism appears to have blinded us in more ways than one.

Theodore McIntire, 23 May 2014 12:54pm

In addition to revealing how invasive and law/truth twisting big governments / organizations (of any orientation and denomination) are likely to behave, the Snowden revelations also showed how much the media and public are/were disengaged from reality and blindly trusting of big governments / organizations.

Except for those poor souls who live in fear or live off the fear of others... They are very afraid and angry about the Snowden revelations and any other disruptions to their fear based animal herd behavior.

CraigSummers, 23 May 2014 1:32pm

Mr. Sands

I find it interesting that you don't mention even once in your review the potential ramifications of compromising US intelligence. This is an extremely important consideration in the debate (at least to some concerned citizens). In addition, the released information goes far beyond civil liberties in many instances. One can certainly question the motives of Greenwald. Greenwald has a body of written work from Salon, the Guardian and others which indicate he was not motivated entirely by a debate about "privacy" and civil liberties.

The release of information that the NSA spied on universities in Hong Kong coincided with Snowden's arrival in the special administrative region of the People's Republic of China. This was hardly a coincidence - and shows the level of planning used by Snowden before illegally stealing tens of thousands of top secret documents.

".......The big issue at stake here is privacy, and the relationship between the individual and the state, and it goes far beyond issues of legality (although Snowden's fear of arrest.......seems rather real)...."

Jesus, ya think?

Leondeinos -> CraigSummers, 23 May 2014 4:26pm

The ramifications are simply that the NSA has been caught in its full incompetence and arrogance. Snowden did the world a great favor. Greenwald's book is a good read that does expose and explore those ramifications for the world.

The version of the Defense Intelligence Agency's assessment of damage done by Edward Snowden's leaks released by the US (here on the Guardian website) contains no information about the potential ramifications of compromising US intelligence. This "redacted" version consists 12 pages of blanks out of a total of 39 pages in the original. What you see is what you get. A year after Snowden's revelations, it is a pathetic, contemptible defence of a vast waste of money, people, and diplomatic reputation by the US government.

[Feb 08, 2014] Snowden Used Low-Cost Tool to Best N.S.A. By DAVID E. SANGER and ERIC SCHMITT

Breathtaking level of incompetence within NSA. Get some popcorn... Quote: "While the organization built enormously high electronic barriers to keep out foreign invaders, it had rudimentary protections against insiders."
Feb 08, 2014 | NYTimes.com

WASHINGTON - Intelligence officials investigating how Edward J. Snowden gained access to a huge trove of the country's most highly classified documents say they have determined that he used inexpensive and widely available software to "scrape" the National Security Agency's networks, and kept at it even after he was briefly challenged by agency officials.

Using "web crawler" software designed to search, index and back up a website, Mr. Snowden "scraped data out of our systems" while he went about his day job, according to a senior intelligence official. "We do not believe this was an individual sitting at a machine and downloading this much material in sequence," the official said. The process, he added, was "quite automated."

The findings are striking because the N.S.A.'s mission includes protecting the nation's most sensitive military and intelligence computer systems from cyberattacks, especially the sophisticated attacks that emanate from Russia and China. Mr. Snowden's "insider attack," by contrast, was hardly sophisticated and should have been easily detected, investigators found.

Moreover, Mr. Snowden succeeded nearly three years after the WikiLeaks disclosures, in which military and State Department files, of far less sensitivity, were taken using similar techniques.

Mr. Snowden had broad access to the N.S.A.'s complete files because he was working as a technology contractor for the agency in Hawaii, helping to manage the agency's computer systems in an outpost that focuses on China and North Korea. A web crawler, also called a spider, automatically moves from website to website, following links embedded in each document, and can be programmed to copy everything in its path.

Mr. Snowden appears to have set the parameters for the searches, including which subjects to look for and how deeply to follow links to documents and other data on the N.S.A.'s internal networks.

Among the materials prominent in the Snowden files are the agency's shared "wikis," databases to which intelligence analysts, operatives and others contributed their knowledge. Some of that material indicates that Mr. Snowden "accessed" the documents. But experts say they may well have been downloaded not by him but by the program acting on his behalf.

Agency officials insist that if Mr. Snowden had been working from N.S.A. headquarters at Fort Meade, Md., which was equipped with monitors designed to detect when a huge volume of data was being accessed and downloaded, he almost certainly would have been caught. But because he worked at an agency outpost that had not yet been upgraded with modern security measures, his copying of what the agency's newly appointed No. 2 officer, Rick Ledgett, recently called "the keys to the kingdom" raised few alarms.

"Some place had to be last" in getting the security upgrade, said one official familiar with Mr. Snowden's activities. But he added that Mr. Snowden's actions had been "challenged a few times."

In at least one instance when he was questioned, Mr. Snowden provided what were later described to investigators as legitimate-sounding explanations for his activities: As a systems administrator he was responsible for conducting routine network maintenance. That could include backing up the computer systems and moving information to local servers, investigators were told.

But from his first days working as a contractor inside the N.S.A.'s aging underground Oahu facility for Dell, the computer maker, and then at a modern office building on the island for Booz Allen Hamilton, the technology consulting firm that sells and operates computer security services used by the government, Mr. Snowden learned something critical about the N.S.A.'s culture: While the organization built enormously high electronic barriers to keep out foreign invaders, it had rudimentary protections against insiders.

"Once you are inside the assumption is that you are supposed to be there, like in most organizations," said Richard Bejtlich, the chief security strategist for FireEye, a Silicon Valley computer security firm, and a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. "But that doesn't explain why they weren't more vigilant about excessive activity in the system."

Investigators have yet to answer the question of whether Mr. Snowden happened into an ill-defended outpost of the N.S.A. or sought a job there because he knew it had yet to install the security upgrades that might have stopped him.

"He was either very lucky or very strategic," one intelligence official said. A new book, "The Snowden Files," by Luke Harding, a correspondent for The Guardian in London, reports that Mr. Snowden sought his job at Booz Allen because "to get access to a final tranche of documents" he needed "greater security privileges than he enjoyed in his position at Dell."

Through his lawyer at the American Civil Liberties Union, Mr. Snowden did not specifically address the government's theory of how he obtained the files, saying in a statement: "It's ironic that officials are giving classified information to journalists in an effort to discredit me for giving classified information to journalists. The difference is that I did so to inform the public about the government's actions, and they're doing so to misinform the public about mine."

The headquarters of Booz Allen Hamilton, one of Edward J. Snowden's former employers, in McLean, Va. He had broad access to National Security Agency files as a contractor in Hawaii. Michael Reynolds/European Pressphoto Agency

The N.S.A. declined to comment on its investigation or the security changes it has made since the Snowden disclosures. Other intelligence officials familiar with the findings of the investigations under way - there are at least four - were granted anonymity to discuss the investigations.

In interviews, officials declined to say which web crawler Mr. Snowden had used, or whether he had written some of the software himself. Officials said it functioned like Googlebot, a widely used web crawler that Google developed to find and index new pages on the web. What officials cannot explain is why the presence of such software in a highly classified system was not an obvious tip-off to unauthorized activity.

When inserted with Mr. Snowden's passwords, the web crawler became especially powerful. Investigators determined he probably had also made use of the passwords of some colleagues or supervisors.

But he was also aided by a culture within the N.S.A., officials say, that "compartmented" relatively little information. As a result, a 29-year-old computer engineer, working from a World War II-era tunnel oOahu and then from downtown Honolulu, had access to unencrypted files that dealt with information as varied as the bulk collection of domestic phone numbers and the intercepted communications of Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany and dozens of other leaders.

Officials say web crawlers are almost never used on the N.S.A.'s internal systems, making it all the more inexplicable that the one used by Mr. Snowden did not set off alarms as it copied intelligence and military documents stored in the N.S.A.'s systems and linked through the agency's internal equivalent of Wikipedia.

The answer, officials and outside experts say, is that no one was looking inside the system in Hawaii for hard-to-explain activity. "The N.S.A. had the solution to this problem in hand, but they simply didn't push it out fast enough," said James Lewis, a computer expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies who has talked extensively with intelligence officials about how the Snowden experience could have been avoided.

Nonetheless, the government had warning that it was vulnerable to such attacks. Similar techniques were used by Chelsea Manning, then known as Pfc. Bradley Manning, who was convicted of turning documents and videos over to WikiLeaks in 2010.

Evidence presented during Private Manning's court-martial for his role as the source for large archives of military and diplomatic files given to WikiLeaks revealed that he had used a program called "wget" to download the batches of files. That program automates the retrieval of large numbers of files, but it is considered less powerful than the tool Mr. Snowden used.

The program's use prompted changes in how secret information is handled at the State Department, the Pentagon and the intelligence agencies, but recent assessments suggest that those changes may not have gone far enough. For example, arguments have broken out about whether the N.S.A.'s data should all be encrypted "at rest" - when it is stored in servers - to make it harder to search and steal. But that would also make it harder to retrieve for legitimate purposes.

Investigators have found no evidence that Mr. Snowden's searches were directed by a foreign power, despite suggestions to that effect by the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, Representative Mike Rogers, Republican of Michigan, in recent television appearances and at a hearing last week.

But that leaves open the question of how Mr. Snowden chose the search terms to obtain his trove of documents, and why, according to James R. Clapper Jr., the director of national intelligence, they yielded a disproportionately large number of documents detailing American military movements, preparations and abilities around the world.

In his statement, Mr. Snowden denied any deliberate effort to gain access to any military information. "They rely on a baseless premise, which is that I was after military information," Mr. Snowden said.

The head of the Defense Intelligence Agency, Lt. Gen. Michael T. Flynn, told lawmakers last week that Mr. Snowden's disclosures could tip off adversaries to American military tactics and operations, and force the Pentagon to spend vast sums to safeguard against that. But he admitted a great deal of uncertainty about what Mr. Snowden possessed.

"Everything that he touched, we assume that he took," said General Flynn, including details of how the military tracks terrorists, of enemies' vulnerabilities and of American defenses against improvised explosive devices. He added, "We assume the worst case."

[Dec 24, 2013] Edward Snowden to broadcast Channel 4's alternative Christmas Day message

December 24, 2013 | www.theguardian.com

Edward Snowden, the whistleblower who prompted a worldwide debate when he leaked a cache of top secret documents about US and UK spying, has recorded a Christmas Day television message in which he calls for an end to the mass surveillance revealed by his disclosures.

The short film was recorded for Channel 4, which has 20-year history of providing unusual but relevant figures as an alternative to the Queen's Christmas message shown by other UK broadcasters. It will be Snowden's first television appearance since arriving in Moscow.

The address, to be broadcast at 4.15pm on Christmas Day, was filmed in Russia – where Snowden is living after being granted temporary asylum – by Laura Poitras, a film-maker who has closely collaborated with him on the NSA stories.

In excerpts from the address released by Channel 4, Snowden says George Orwell "warned us of the danger of this kind of information" in his dystopian novel, 1984.

Snowden says: "The types of collection in the book – microphones and video cameras, TVs that watch us – are nothing compared to what we have available today. We have sensors in our pockets that track us everywhere we go. Think about what this means for the privacy of the average person.

"A child born today will grow up with no conception of privacy at all. They'll never know what it means to have a private moment to themselves an unrecorded, unanalysed thought. And that's a problem because privacy matters; privacy is what allows us to determine who we are and who we want to be."

In the other extract of the address released, Snowden notes the political changes that have taken place since his leaked the cache documents to newspapers including the Guardian. He highlights a review of the NSA's power that recommended it be no longer permitted to collect phone records in bulk or undermine internet security, findings endorsed in part by Barack Obama, and a federal judge's ruling that bulk phone record collection is likely to violate the US constitution.

Snowden says: "The conversation occurring today will determine the amount of trust we can place both in the technology that surrounds us and the government that regulates it. Together we can find a better balance, end mass surveillance and remind the government that if it really wants to know how we feel, asking is always cheaper than spying."

The latter comment echoes a sentiment expressed by Snowden during a series of interviews in Moscow with the Washington Post, another paper that has carried revelations based on documents leaked by him. In this, Snowden said the effect of his actions had meant that "the mission's already accomplished".

In the newspaper interview, he added: "I already won. As soon as the journalists were able to work, everything that I had been trying to do was validated. Because, remember, I didn't want to change society. I wanted to give society a chance to determine if it should change itself.

"All I wanted was for the public to be able to have a say in how they are governed."

The alternative Christmas message, a counterpoint to the traditional festive broadcast by the Queen, began in 1993 with a broadcast from the writer and gay activist Quentin Crisp. Other notable participants include Iran's then-president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, in 2008, and a team of midwives two years later.

Morat -> SouthLodge

The bloke next door is a facist, granted, but was the only f***er to give a damn when Snowden was on the run.

Europe as one big block refused him asylum, a very shamefull event.

The only country with the courage to say b**ll**ks to the US and its undercover cronies, was Russia, like it or not.

Do you read at all?

hollywoodvine66 -> Morat

Think about the United States of America have military bases in 130 Nations around the world including almost every European country . The United States of America is a Empire and only China and Russia have the balls to stand up to them. I would love it if Europe offered Snowden asylum but that's not going to happen.

photosymbiont -> asilly

Snowden has no aspirations to hero-hood. In fact, people who rely on heroes are just too lazy or frightened to do the difficult work themselves. Basically, Snowden said the public deserved the right to an informed debate on what the NSA was actually up to, since he knew they were lying to the public about the true nature of their activities. So now we can have that debate, can't we?

Of course people who've been paying attention knew that the NSA was up to this kind of thing, look back at the Mark Klein revelations about the NARUS splitters installed at key fiber optic cables within the United States back in 2005, which allowed the NSA to collect all domestic traffic using "general warrants" in violation of the 4th amendment to the US Constitution.

Remember, everyone who works for the U.S. government takes an oath to uphold the Constitution first and foremost - so Snowden was just doing his job. That doesn't make him a hero - but does make all those who went along with the NSA program guilty of dereliction of duty.

The Constitution is not "just a piece of paper."

OurPlanet

Amazing how people go straight away for the ego button. Everybody has an ego , including those who have obviously abused theirs, like those who run the NSA , GHSQ , Cameron, Obama ad nauseum. People like Snowden do not seek any accolades like our so- called elected politicians who have their own self serving agendas.

IronCurtain

is the NSA paying people to come on these message boards and bang out the Party Line?

he's a traitor, hes a Republican, he's and ego maniac.

The guy has exposed the dangerous hypocrisy at the heart of the US & UK Governments, for all their pontificating about Freedom & Liberty they have created the most intrusive and all encompassing surveillance infrastructure in human history, all done in secrecy, without meaningful oversight and meant to give them the capability to spy on EVERYONE, the Guy is a fucking hero as far as im concerned,

RabidMale

Maybe because there is SO much electronic information flying about via voice, computer, Tv, Radio etc etc, by the very fact it CAN be monitored, it is. A strange logic, but the shear abundance of info spread real time and the speed that which reaction can be rallied into huge movements quickly is probably instilling huge paranoia. All states are probably fearful of others getting the upper hand and not having a finger on the zeitgeist. The more we spread, the more we will be listened to. Fight it? Get rid of mobiles, email, web usage and talk and use carrier pigeons!

John Nagel

Perhaps Snowden thinks that the mission is accomplished, but | beg to differ.

Because today, our entire bodies are SIGINT, with technological innovation meaning that even our brains are subject to unregulated monitoring, surveillance and manipulation using psychotronic weaponry (considered a WMD).

A human rights complaint will be filed in 2014 before the Organization of American States Human Rights Commission, alledging electronic torture and enslavement by the Obama administration of an American civilian due to his knowledge of the administration's organized crime ties.

We have not yet "won", Edward.

The struggle, Edward, is just beginning.

Thanks for doing your part.

http://www.scribd.com/doc/171852824/Obama-to-Face-OAS-Human-Rights-Complaint-Over-Electronic-WMD-Torture-of-US-Citizen

LidBlownOff

In a world increasingly jam-packed with walking dead or solely intent on consuming and being consumed by the frivolous, this man provides a breath of fresh air.

Those with their head in the sand and their arses in the air will no doubt have a Happy Christmas anyway, and in their own way.

It's hard work constantly distinguishing between the artificial and the vital, as far as human dignity is concerned, because the pressures of oppression are relentless.

Thanks Mr Snowden, and may the new year keep you out of harm's way.

Mmmoke -> veroniquksvackra

What the UK gendarmes did when they invaded the Guardian's offices with instructions from the NSA, and SMASHED Hard Drives, Laptops and other material is pure NAZISM. That is the New World Order. Thanks NSA.

PetrusAlazar

Snowden should never receive a Nobel Prize. It has been degraded since Obama had it.

Instead, I suggest the creation of a new prize, funded with donations from people on the internet.

The most suitable name would be: FRODO PRIZE.

Anyway, haven't the "Big Eye" and the "Palantiri" been exposed?

Only that the destruction of this "Sauronic" evil can only be carried out by the peoples of the world and not Snowden.

RaphNZ

Dear Edward,

I cannot thank you enough, honestly from the bottom of my heart, you have done a great service to humanity as a whole! Many of us have known for a long time where things were going but thanks to you now we know where they are already.

You are honestly & obviously the bravest man that has worked for the NSA. I hope you inspire generations of others to put the Constitution of the United States first when working for the US Government or military.

I too am away from my family at Christmas but could fly home tomorrow if I felt like it, however I feel a little of how you must also feel. I hope your family is as proud of your sacrifice as so many of us here are.

As the world celebrates and families meet together many will be talking of the revelations that have been released due to you having conscience, their thoughts will be varied and mixed but they will be talking of something they would not have otherwise. This is thanks to you.

Generations of thinkers will know your name, although I'm sure you did not want that, you deserve the thanks of all generations to come as we fight for what is right.

Again my thanks, peace and Merry Xmas!

Raph

PuWeiTa

Snowden has done his part. It is now up to the rest of us to decide what we want our society to be.

If we like it the way it has been, then silly Snowden for sticking his neck out and for nothing. But that was the chance he took.

If we like a change - oh well!!!!

We in the US wanted to vote those scumbags out for many many election cycles now. Yet the approval rating of Congress has been dropping election after election.

But "I like the scumbag in my district", "it is the scumbags elsewhere I want out".

You see, that's the way "they" got us!

Your next Christmas present will be dropped at your door step by a drone. Year after that? It will be dropped at your foot step - wherever you are, whatever you're doing! The person who gives you the gift has only to spend the money - "they" already know what you want, your size and your color preference. Neato! This doesn't even involve NSA!

The verdict is already out as to what we want collectively!

Btw, if you use RSA to email it only attracts attention.

AQuietNight

"A child born today will grow up with no conception of privacy at all."
.
Once people accepted big, centralized government into their lives... they gave up their privacy and that happened long, long ago.
.
I will quote a politician from 70 years ago:

No Socialist Government conducting the entire life and industry of the country could afford to allow free, sharp, or violently-worded expressions of public discontent. They would have to fall back on some form of Gestapo, no doubt very humanely directed in the first instance. And this would nip opinion in the bud; it would stop criticism as it reared its head, and it would gather all the power to the supreme party and the party leaders, rising like stately pinnacles above their vast bureaucracies of Civil servants, no longer servants and no longer civil. And where would the ordinary simple folk – the common people, as they like to call them in America – where would they be, once this mighty organism had got them in its grip?"

Need I identify the man who said this?
.
Snowden, you ran.

dleung

Ed Snowden, you are nothing short of a hero. No matter what may happen to you, no matter what people believe from propaganda, you have done the country, and the world, a huge service. Thank you for giving up everything and everyone you love in your life in order to give us the chance of claiming back the subtle parameters which define who we are.

banthem

The guy shows to the other world, what is great about America and Americans even now, besides science and technologies - personal freedom, not bombs.

PetrusAlazar

Those who blame Snowden cannot be aware of the kind of power involved in this.

Never has the world been closer to a form of absolute power than now. It means political, economical, social power. And more...

If you don't know how much absolute power corrupts, you know really little, but the first Roman Emperors can give you an idea.

Some will say: "But the western civilisation is a good one". Come off it! Do you really think that a Nixon, a Franco, a Salazar, a Hitler and the likes or worse are not possible? Not to mention eastern mass murderers, for if the techonology exists it is likely to spread and advance.

armado

How many companies are tracking us on this very website, please?

banthem armado

Everyone of them.

"Competition".

modreef

Welcome to the free West.

BigBear63

It's always amusing to read comments from the anti-whistlebower camp. One has to question their motives. What can be so wrong with revealing that our security services are spying on us, not because something terrible may happen, but because they simply can?

Are they apathetic? Resided to government intrusion for whatever reason a politician or civil servant deems appropriate.

Are they pro-intrusion? Believing surveillance of everyone is essential to protect everyone.

Are they content in their ignorance, which, when removed, increases their fear and anxiety, irrational or not?

Are they concerned about this particular case because there is a potential for some severe consequences. Agents in the field being killed, terrorists foiling our defences, our security networks being crippled?

Are they members of the establishment, political class, or security services, simply supporting what they do for a job, or countenance in our name?

I've no idea which of these motives predominates with the anti-Snowdon brigade. In my mind nothing justifies unfettered access to anyone's private life unless it can be justified. But who decides what is justified? We need to decide who we are happy to have that power. Do they need strong oversight? How can we be sure the information gathered will never be used nefariously or for illegal purposes? Until these questions are addressed, I for one, would rather have guys like Snowdon around than some, so called, patriotic zealots.

Ecuador 'seeks Snowden talks with Russia'

News.com.au

ECUADOR has asked the Kremlin for talks over the fate of fugitive US intelligence leaker Edward Snowden, a Russian state-owned broadcaster says.

Snowden, who is believed to be holed up in the transit zone of Moscow's Sheremetyevo airport, has applied for asylum in the South American country.

He flew to Russia from Hong Kong last Sunday.

Foreign Minister Ricardo Patino made the request, Rossiya 24 reported.

Ecuador has said Snowden would need to be on the country's territory to be granted refugee status.

But experts say this could also include the Ecuador embassy in Moscow.

To get there, the US citizen would have to pass through Russian border controls.

US authorities, however, have cancelled Snowden's passport and are demanding his extradition from Russia.

Russian parliamentary foreign affairs committee chairman Alexei Pushkov called the case "tragic".

"The idealist Snowden was apparently convinced that it would be like in a Hollywood movie: he would blow the whistle, and democracy would prevail," he wrote on Twitter. "But life and the US are harder."

Read more: http://www.news.com.au/breaking-news/world/ecuador-seeks-snowden-talks-with-russia/story-e6frfkui-1226671947894#ixzz2XjdPWly0

Ecuador Cancels US Trade Pact Over Repeated Threats

Antiwar.com

And just in case there were any doubts of what Ecuador was telling the Obama Administration, the nation's Communications Secretary, Fernando Alvarado, announced $23 million in Ecuadoran aid to the United States to provide "human rights training" to combat torture, illegal executions and "attacks on peoples' privacy."

Snowden Withdraws Russia Asylum Request, As Nine Countries Deny Application

Zero Hedge

bank guy in Brussels

Strange how Edward Snowden seems not to appreciate being safe, protected by Vladimir Putin from being jailed and tortured in America

Instead he is acting like a spoiled American kid, shopping for a different amusement park for himself ... he seems to be playing games with both the media and with governments

The financially-troubled UK Guardian is devious too ... Guardian desperate for funds and are trying to stretch out the Snowden story to sell more Google ads on their website

If real, Snowden should dump and publish everything he was intending to publish, so that is behind him and accomplished ... and then thank God and Putin for his safe refuge ... and start a new life, speaking Russian, drinking good vodka and meeting Russian girls

---

Guidelines for Edward Snowden and Anyone Escaping from the USA Seeking Asylum

(1) Recognise that it is basically difficult, and in general, no country wants any asylum seekers from anywhere, aside from

(2) There is nothing special about an oppressive country or a tinpot dictatorship. Maybe half the countries in the world or more, are oppressive to some groups, and there are at least a billion people who would like to escape to more freedom. Therefore, US oppressed people ... welcome to the club along with tens of millions of Africans etc. You are just like them now, not 'more special' than them because it is the US dictatorship oppressing you.

(3) Especially, almost no one desires asylum seekers from the US because of

(4) What is really crazy is to treat 'asylum' as if picking restaurants to visit. Countries do not want to go out of their way to 'invite' asylum candidates from 3rd countries who are 'shopping'. This goes double if you are from the USA.

(5) As an asylum seeker, you should take the attitude of some poor Asian or African ... you are lucky to be in a place where you are not imprisoned, tortured, or facing a fake political trial. Be grateful, and try to adjust to where you are. Do not be arrogant with your hosts or imagine you can be 'shopping' for a place you like better. Thank God you are not in US custody.

(6) A lot of traditional asylum avenues are secretly or openly closed to USA victims. Canada is now a US poodle, it is not like in Pierre Trudeau's day accepting Vietnam War objectors. They give asylum seekers back to the US. Ditto the UK. And organisations like Amnesty International have a secret deal with the US, to not help USA victims, so they can get CIA and US-based funding. There is little 'help' out there

(7) Countries have in fact accepted US asylum seekers who have already arrived in certain places, but basically quietly and without fanfare, trying to avoid openly provoking the US bully ... and the media and Google Inc also co-operate in hiding the fact these events are occurring. Papers are given using various 'cover' mechanisms (employment etc) rather than open direct political asylum. A big media storm changes the game, however, and makes this more difficult.

(8) The basic strategy for an American asylum seeker is to arrive and already be in a place where you will, in practice, be difficult to dislodge by legal means, because the local legal system has enough integrity and independence, to not ship you back to the USA. In retrospect, for Edward Snowden, France or Italy might actually have been the best choice - but only if Snowden was there already.

(9) The whole thing with Julian Assange in Britain, fearing extradition to the US from Sweden, never made any sense at all. Not because Sweden would not do it, but because Britain itself has a special 'easy extradition' treaty with the USA, requiring little or no evidence. When Assange was roaming around the UK, in fancy rich people's houses, before being in the Ecuador embassy, the US could have asked the UK to grab Assange and ship him out, easier than with any other country in the world. Something seems fishy.

(10) You are not even safe when you think you are safe - Refugee from US, wanted on criminal charges for 'illegally' playing chess in a country targeted by US sanctions (!), the anti-Zionist Jew Bobby Fischer, finally got refuge in Iceland after being jailed for a time in Japan. Shortly afterwards, Fischer was mysteriously dead, perhaps a victim of assassination by CIA-Mossad medical disease spray. Iceland is a Nato country where Nato and CIA agents can roam freely. The CIA has admitted that Western Europe is the only sector of the planet they hesitate to kill people - but they still do it here. A country like Russia or China or Cuba, where CIA agents cannot roam freely or hire assassins, is probably best from a securiy viewpoint

(11) Recommendations for Mr Snowden, if you are genuine: Be grateful for Russian hospitality, do not insult the only people who may be keeping you alive and out of prison. Be cautious about Assange and Wikileaks, and the sometimes highly-corrupt UK Guardian. Stop playing teasing media games with the Guardian, to draw out your leaks so they can sell Google Ads - the Guardian is desperate for cash. Instead, dump and publish everything you were going to publish, right now, leaving aside only your 'insurance' part to help keep you alive, and thus you can satisfy Mr Putin's condition about not causing more international problems for him. You are in Russia and Putin says you can stay. Thank him, profusely. Take a few quiet weeks, start learning Russian, maybe drink some Green Label Russian vodka with some attractive female Russian FSB agents. Calm down in safety. After a few weeks, as the media storm rolls over and dissipates, you will have wiser perspective, and can start your new life. You have a new home, treat it with respect. Many Russians are great people. Living there, working there, and still being free 5 years from now when maybe the US empire collapses, will be a great triumph.

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Tue, 07/02/2013 - 09:30 | 3713565 ziggy59

The inmates are truly running this asylum....

Lets_Eat_Ben

The Snowden revelations have not failed. If you were expecting the world to change the day the Telegraph published the disclosure, you may be disappointed with the lack of meaningful change. But, that's not how things work.

The world doesn't change in a day in drastic and obvious ways. Rather, it's a process that takes time. I like to think of applying a consistent and unrelenting pressure that weighs on a thing, and over some time, can truly change the world.

Snoweden didn't initiate the pressure, he simply increased it, just as all the attention and public outcry he sparked have done; just as all the other recent whistleblowers have done and all the future whistleblowers will do, and just as we do here.

Don't get discouraged. Keep applying pressure. As it continues to build, change will come. The established power will give, inch by inch (just as they incrementally take) like a pressure relief valve, so the whole machine doesn't explode. Either way we win, and the oppression of our age will be lifted.


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Tue, 07/02/2013 - 09:43 | 3713641 Temporalist

Pressure and Time

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9J7Z5BFAvoY
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Tue, 07/02/2013 - 09:33 | 3713589 TahoeBilly2012

Thr world sulks back into it Zionist slavery mindset...I am starting to think Russia isn't going to save Syria...

The "is he a hero or a traitor?" debate is indeed relevant

by Justin Raimondo, July 01, 2013

The debate provoked by Edward Snowden's revelations is drawing new battle lines in American politics, and redefining the image of the US in the eyes of the world. As Snowden's personal fate, and his dramatic hegira from a Hawaiian paradise to the world's drabbest airport, captures the narrative, we hear complaints from some of his defenders and sympathizers that all this is getting in the way of the revelations themselves. This is true in the very narrow sense that when we are discussing Snowden the person, we can't simultaneously discuss the system of globalized surveillance he unveiled. Yet this misses the point, one made by Glenn Greenwald, the Guardian reporter who broke the NSA story.

In a speech he gave the other day to a conference put on by the International Socialist Organization (ISO), Greenwald spoke for the first time in personal terms, and his account of how the story came to be and what Snowden is like as a human being is fascinating – and essential to understanding these events and the controversy they have provoked.

The process of interacting with and finally meeting Snowden in Hong Kong went on over months, and Greenwald tells us he began to visualize a mental picture of his source: older, a CIA officer nearing the end of his career and his life who'd had an attack of conscience as he prepared to meet his Maker. Greenwald was shocked to discover the most significant whistleblower in American history was a not yet 30-year-old who looked younger. Faced with a moral conundrum – should he break the biggest story of the decade at the price of irrevocably destroying someone's life? – Greenwald wanted to understand what motivated Snowden. They spent many hours together, with ex-litigator Greenwald grilling him not only about the documents in his possession and their significance but also about what motivated Snowden to end a near paradisiacal existence in Hawaii with his hot girlfriend making $122,000 a year:

"The more I spoke with him about it, the more I understood, and the more overwhelmed I became and the more of a formative experience it had for me and will have for the rest of my life because what he told me over and over in different ways – and it was so pure and passionate that I never doubted its authenticity for a moment – is that there is more to life than material comfort or career stability or trying to simply prolong your life as long possible. What he continuously told me is he judged his life not by the things he thought about himself but by the actions he took in pursuit of those beliefs."

Pundits left and right denounce the "traitor" Snowden as a "narcissist," yet people like David Brooks deliberately conflate narcissism with individualism, and "selfishness" with independence of mind. More to life than material comfort or career stability? No narcissist would ever say such a thing. A true narcissist is a moral nihilist for whom the existence of other people, let alone the principle enshrined by the Constitution, is irrelevant. Far from caring only about his own physical survival, here was somebody, as Greenwald points out, about "to throw all that away and become an instant fugitive and somebody who would probably spend the rest of their life in a cage." Why did he do it?

"When I asked him how he got himself to the point where he was willing to take the risk that he knew he was taking, he told me that he for a long time had been looking for a leader, somebody who would come and fix these problems. And then one day he realized there's no point in waiting for a leader, that leadership is about going first and setting and example for others. What he ultimately said was he simply didn't want to live in a world where the United States government was permitted to engage in these extraordinary invasions, to build a system that had as its goal the destruction of all individual privacy, that he didn't want to live in a world like that and that he could not in good conscience stand by and allow that to happen knowing that he had the power to help stop it."

This is why the new authoritarians embodied by this administration and its amen corner are in such a lather, not only over whistleblowers in general but about this one in particular: Snowden's example unlocks the realization that individual action can make a difference – a big difference. As the mighty American hegemon reels from the impact of his revelations, and pursues him without success over half the globe, Snowden's message is deadly dangerous to our rulers because it shows they are liars, they are vulnerable, and they can be beat.

Greenwald, clearly inspired by Snowden, has been a wonder to behold as he takes on the Powers That Be and brushes off a smear campaign aimed at him personally the way one would swat a gnat. It was, he explains, a life-transforming event not only to break this important story but to interact and learn from the person who made it possible. As he puts it:

"What I actually started to realize about all this is two things. Number one, courage is contagious. If you take a courageous step as an individual, you will literally change the world because you will affect all sorts of people in your immediate vicinity, who will then affect others and then affect others. You should never doubt your ability to change the world. The other thing that I realized is it doesn't matter who you are as an individual or how formidable or powerful the institutions that you want to challenge are. Mr. Snowden is a high school dropout. His parents work for the federal government. He grew up in a lower middle class environment in a military community in Virginia. He ended up enlisting in the United States Army because he thought the Iraq War at first was noble. He then did the same with the NSA and the CIA because he thought those institutions were noble. He's a person who has zero privilege, zero power, zero position and zero prestige and yet he by himself has literally changed the world."

What can one person do? This is the question that bedevils us all as we discover with a jolt how far along we are on the road to serfdom. After all, don't we have elected representatives to deal with this sort of thing, and judges, too, all of whom have sworn to uphold the Constitution?

Snowden has brought us face to face with the reality that these institutions have failed. Indeed, they are complicit in the de facto repeal of the Fourth Amendment, with the secret FISA "court" rubberstamping government demands for access to virtually all online content and telephony passing through the US, and Congress making this possible by amending the original legislation to legalize what the Bush administration had already been doing.

And these same people accuse Snowden of violating his "oath"!

Courage is contagious – and that accounts for the tremendous support Snowden has gotten, even in the face of an all-out government-media assault on him. That's why the White House petition to pardon him is the most successful petition in the entire history of that Obamaite publicity stunt, outdoing even the one demanding the deportation of Piers Morgan.

After the anti-Morgan effort reached the 25,000 signature threshold in a week, the White House quadrupled the number requiring a White House response. Yet the day after the NSA story broke, a White House petition acclaiming Snowden a "national hero" and demanding his pardon was posted and garnered a record number of signatures, breaking the 100,000 barrier in a little under a week. (Go here to see a graphical analysis.) With screams of "Traitor!" and calls not only for Snowden's prosecution but for the prosecution of Greenwald filling the airwaves – and coming from both sides of the political spectrum – this overwhelming show of support is unprecedented, and quite telling.

Because what it tells us is that the American people aren't mired in apathy and paralyzed by a sense of their own powerlessness: like Snowden, they don't want to live in a world in which the government has the power to watch their every move, chart their every thought, and control the very levers of their lives. They are contemptuous of the smear campaign being launched against Snowden and Greenwald, and they are demanding answers.

That the White House petition procedure was phony from the very beginning was obvious even to the most cynical Democratic party hack: the most "accessible," "inclusive," and "transparent" administration in our history is, in reality, the most arrogant, exclusive, opaque regime since the fall of the Soviet Union. But as the former community organizer who became President no doubt remembers, one of Saul Alinsky's "rules for radicals" is to turn the institutions and "democratic" pretenses of the Powers That Be against the very interests they are supposed to protect, and that is precisely what the anonymous person who started the White House petition has done quite successfully.

There, again, we see dramatized the lesson of not waiting for "leadership," of taking the initiative and using one's power as an individual to effect change – a principle that will be demonstrated again and again as this fight unfolds.

The White House petition passed 100,000 signatures over a week ago – yet still no response from the White House, where government officials are coming up with all kinds of excuses for the official silence. (See here, where, in a rare mention of the petition, the headline of an ABC News story says "Petition to Pardon Snowden to Receive White House Response," while the actual story says no such thing.) After being rebuffed by the Chinese and the Russians over Snowden's fate, and rebuked by our European allies for breaking into their computers, a Snowden-inspired popular rebellion on the home front is perhaps more than they can bear to acknowledge.

The breadth of this movement is impressive. For even as Greenwald spoke before a cheering crowd at a conference convoked in celebration of socialism, he was holding up as an exemplar of principled courage a man whose own politics are much closer to Ron Paul than Karl Marx. Snowden made two contributions totaling $500 to Paul's 2010 presidential campaign and, more significantly, his own rhetoric recalls Paul's libertarian imprecations against the Leviathan State. The lawyer retained by Snowden's father to represent his son's interests, Bruce Fein, a former associate deputy attorney general during the Reagan administration, is a prominent supporter of the Paul organization.

Whether this broad movement, which transcends the arbitrary limits of "left" and "right," has the depth to succeed, and mobilize millions behind its banner, remains to be see. But one thing I know is this: for the first time in a long time there's hope.

NOTES IN THE MARGIN

You can check out my Twitter feed by going here. But please note that my tweets are sometimes deliberately provocative, often made in jest, and largely consist of me thinking out loud.

I've written a couple of books, which you might want to peruse. Here is the link for buying the second edition of my 1993 book, Reclaiming the American Right: The Lost Legacy of the Conservative Movement, with an Introduction by Prof. George W. Carey, a Foreword by Patrick J. Buchanan, and critical essays by Scott Richert and David Gordon (ISI Books, 2008).

You can buy An Enemy of the State: The Life of Murray N. Rothbard (Prometheus Books, 2000), my biography of the great libertarian thinker, here.

Read more by Justin Raimondo

[Jun 30, 2013] Why Innocent People Should Fear the NSA's PRISM Program by Thomas R. Eddlem

2013/06/30 Antiwar.com

Why Innocent People Should Fear the NSA's PRISM Program

by Thomas R. Eddlem, July 01, 2013 The use of warrantless surveillance by the NSA has brought a wave of naïve statements from a segment of Americans who claim they have nothing to fear from NSA surveillance of their telephone calls and internet traffic because they've done nothing wrong.

Obviously, the NSA and its employees are capable of using any violation of law to intimidate or blackmail a voter or public official, such as the millions of Americans who have experimented with illegal drugs. In fact, the past three Presidents – Barack Obama, George W. Bush and Bill Clinton – would basically be ineligible for office on illegal drug use charges, based on their own published statements. And as Senator Rand Paul (R-KY) said in a June 24 op-ed for USA Today, the three would be "barely employable" under our current drug laws.

The NSA would also obviously be able to intimidate/blackmail anyone who has had an extra-marital affair, which could be a corrupting influence on a future Bill Clinton in office.

But what if you, like many who have said in recent weeks, have not broken the law or engaged in an extra-marital affair in recent years? What do you have to fear?

In fact, there's quite a bit to fear. Not everything embarrassing which can be used for blackmail or intimidation requires that a person have serious moral failings or to have committed crimes. In short, you have much to fear if you or anyone in your family have:

The list could go on much longer, but the point is that even innocent people have many things about their lives they do not want exposed.

And hundreds of thousands of people currently have access to this data. Consider that the NSA employs an estimated 40,000 people. Add a percentage of that number to the many officials in other federal security agencies (such as the CIA, FBI, DHS, U.S. Secret Service) and branches of the armed forces who would have access to the information. But that's only the tip of the iceberg. Consider that NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden didn't even work for the NSA; he was employed by Booz Allen Hamilton, one of many technology subcontractors hired by the NSA. Tens of thousands of people who don't even work for the federal government, who instead work for private contractors, also have access to the information.

Ultimately, hundreds of thousands of government officials and private citizens would have access to the private information on every American citizen, and have the potential to blackmail and intimidate both innocent and guilty. All it would take is one – just one – of those several hundreds of thousands of government employees and contractors to have a grudge against you, or against an organization or political party you support.

Edward Snowden's revelations were a warning in a way that perhaps he did not intend. The takeaway from the Snowden scandal is that the NSA is already incapable of keeping its data secret from wayward employees. Snowden exposed this terrible power to the public, though he did so as a public service. But suppose the next employee who leaks is not so publicly-minded. Suppose he sends the personal files of leading Republican politicians to dirty Democratic Party operatives (or he's a Republican ideologue who sends files on Democratic politicians to leading Tea Party organizations).

The potential for abuse of this private information is not limited to grand political conspiracies, though the IRS scandal targeting Tea Party organizations is more than ample evidence that government officials have and are doing this (as was Richard Nixon's "enemies list" and Watergate scandal). Access to this data is available to people in many communities across the nation. What if a neighbor has access to the data and bears a grudge against you, punishing you with a controlled leak of embarrassing information about you or a family member throughout the neighborhood or to your employer?

Some people would say – despite the IRS scandal – that the cost and risk is worth it for increased safety from the threat of terrorism. But is the United States really safer by searching the phone records of grandmothers and corn farmers? The Fourth Amendment – which bans warrantless searches of the type in which the NSA is engaging – should be seen as a guideline for effective police and intelligence work.

The Fourth Amendment bans "unreasonable searches and seizures," and then defines what is meant by unreasonable:

"The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized."

In essence, the Fourth Amendment requires that searches have 1. a warrant from a judge, 2. evidence of probable cause, 3. the warrant signed by an official under the penalties of perjury, and 4. the warrant describes what officials are looking for and where they expect to find it.

Searches without probable cause are – by definition – searches of people who are probably innocent. And that's a tremendous waste of law enforcement/intelligence manpower and resources.

Perhaps the best example of this is the case of the Boston Marathon Bombing. Alleged Boston Marathon Bombers Tamerlin and Dzhokar Tsarnaev had been under the watchful gaze of the FBI in the years before the bombing, but the FBI did not devote sufficient resources to surveillance of these brothers, despite Tamerlin's increasingly radical rhetoric on-line. FBI surveillance of these likely suspects, despite diplomatic communication from Russia that they could be Islamic terrorists, was met by the wall of limited resources … tens of billions of dollars in resources that had been diverted to watching hundreds of millions of Americans who are not terrorists. The FBI simply didn't have the manpower to watch likely suspects because the NSA was spending that money checking up on unlikely suspects, like cataloging and storing your mom's emails and GPS data about her trip to the grocery store.

The question for Americans is not whether the the government can check up on all possibilities; that kind of analysis could never happen in a world of limited resources. The question is where anti-terrorism resources are best directed. The Fourth Amendment at least guarantees that tax dollars for preventing terrorism will be spent effectively, i.e., toward people where there is "probable cause" of criminality, while at the same time preventing the horrific kind of surveillance state that once plagued East Germany.

6-20-13 Daniel Ellsberg The Scott Horton Show By Scott

June 20, 2013

Posted in: Uncategorized

Daniel Ellsberg, author of Secrets: A Memoir of Vietnam and the Pentagon Papers, discusses Bradley Manning's selective leaks that informed the public of criminal government behavior without endangering lives; Edward Snowden's bravery in the face of Obama's unprecedented crackdown on whistleblowers; why it's safe to assume the NSA records every single electronic communication; evidence that Robert McNamara kept LBJ in the dark about the true nature of the Gulf of Tonkin incident; why Obama persisted with an Afghan "surge" despite knowing it couldn't work; and the psychology of government secrecy.

Daniel Ellsberg The Scott Horton Show

June 20, 2013

Scott Horton Interviews Daniel Ellsberg

The Scott Horton Show

TRANSCRIPT (scroll all the way down for audio)

Scott Horton: All right, y'all. Welcome back to the show. It's the Scott Horton Show. I'm him. Scotthorton.org is my website. I keep all my interview archives there, more than 2800 of them now, going back to 2003. You can also follow me on Facebook, Twitter and YouTube at /scotthortonshow.

And our next guest on the show today is the American hero, Daniel Ellsberg, liberator of the Pentagon Papers, subject of the excellent documentary The Most Dangerous Man in America, author of the book Secrets: A Memoir of Vietnam and the Pentagon Papers, which is so important, and you can read Chapter One for free online if you just google around a little bit, all about his first day on the job at the Pentagon in a certain position anyway, the day of the Gulf of Tonkin incident and a very first-person account of what happened there. Incredible stuff. And then he writes all over the place including for Truthdig, where he did a great series on nuclear weapons, and he's an antiwar activist of many descriptions and in many very important ways, courageous whistleblower and defender of courageous whistleblowers, Daniel Ellsberg. Welcome back to the show, Dan. How are you?

Daniel Ellsberg: I'm fine. Thanks for such a warm introduction.

Scott Horton: Well, I love you. What am I going to do? Play it down? Come on.

Daniel Ellsberg: Right, okay. Now it's out in the open. Okay, great.

Scott Horton: Okay, good. So. Let's talk about the American hero, Bradley Manning. He's halfway through a military trial right now. I don't know if you want to talk at all about, you know, where we are in the court process so far, or just about Manning in general.

Daniel Ellsberg: You know, because of the Snowden revelations here I haven't kept up as I should have, and will shortly, on the daily transcripts of that trial, so I'm not up on the very latest stuff on that. Have you been following it closely?

Scott Horton: I admit I've basically been keeping track through Nathan Fuller and have not read the transcripts myself either, but – although I could say that it seems as though the government's case is not very strong and that the cross-examination by the defense attorney has been very effective at undermining quite a few of the government's claims and in basically setting up the informant Adrian Lamo to admit that there was nothing nefarious here, the kid really meant well. There's just no doubt about it.

Daniel Ellsberg: Okay. Very good. You know, it's the group that I'm associated with on the board, the Freedom of the Press Foundation, that gathered money, collected money in order for there to be a transcript so it wouldn't be in effect a secret trial. So the transcripts are there. Now it's up to me to make use of them. So thanks for that summary.

Scott Horton: Yeah. Well, and of course, thanks to bradleymanning.org, Nathan Fuller, and all those other guys. They're doing great work there attending the trial, and I'm sorry, I can't remember the young woman's name who's done such great work on this.

Daniel Ellsberg: Alexa O'Brien.

Scott Horton: Alexa, exactly.

Daniel Ellsberg: Yeah. Was making a transcript earlier which was all the press had to work with.

Scott Horton: All right, now. You know, something really bothered me the other day, and it was one of these TV jerks was interviewing Glenn Greenwald and he was saying, "Well, now, so would you make the case then that this Snowden guy is somehow different and better than Bradley Manning, who after all is considered a terrible villain by so many people." And so that is the conventional wisdom. That's the consensus that everyone agrees, is that Bradley Manning actually is just a no-goodnik, and even if he did mean well, just think of what a sin it was to indiscriminately dump so many documents. I mean, they don't really have anything. That's the best that they have on him, I guess, but they want us to all just really cheer for the state in its crusade against this young man. What's your position on all that, Dan?

Daniel Ellsberg: You know, you don't see many national security whistleblowers who are identified to the public. Most leakers of classified material are anonymous and stay anonymous. So it's really a very small set of people whose names are known at all, and when they stick their heads up, when they do make themselves known or become known, the media on the whole shows a very puzzling willingness or determination to join the government in deprecating them, you know, and helping smear them in many ways and focusing on their personal foibles or their sexual life, whatever. This happened certainly with me, not so much on the sex. It so happens that Pat Buchanan and the White House reached the conclusion that publicizing what they knew about my sex life would, quote, "only increase his numbers." I was a bachelor at the time. So they chose not to use any of that. And they don't seem to have anything on Snowden.

But, for example, I noticed, having just seen this I would say terrible film, We Steal Secrets by Alex Gibney – rather incomprehensible why he made such a what I would call a bad film – but I notice that no mention was made of – there was ample time given to the charges that were made that Manning and Assange, before Manning's name was known, but that the source and Assange and WikiLeaks might have blood on their hands, or did have blood on their hands. No mention made of the fact that the Pentagon has repeatedly announced that they have no evidence of any blood resulting from these revelations, which is kind of relevant to those charges.

You know the fact is that there was a problematic aspect, I would say – I don't call it a fact; subjective here – but there was a problematic aspect, even my view initially, about Manning putting out a lot of material that he hadn't read. That has a bad ring to it. How can he know whether it's damaging or not? But you know, three years later, I've seen a lot of benefit come out from the cables that might well not have been – that he might not have read, and that might well not have been published by any one source, like the New York Times. For example, the corruption in Tunisia, which led to Arab Spring, really, which led to the downfall of Ben Ali in Tunisia, led to the nonviolent uprising against Mubarak. It's not at all clear that that would have come out if he had limited himself to the relatively small fraction that he could have read. And on the other hand, no damage whatever. I think we have to – I've changed my opinion on that, in other words.

Scott Horton: Well, you know –

Daniel Ellsberg: He did discriminate between what he did put out, which was only – and I say this in his terms and mine, only Secret. It was not Top Secret, it was not communications intelligence, to both of which he had access. Almost no one seems to realize that his daily work involved communications intelligence higher than Top Secret and Top Secret material, none of which he put out. So whether he should have or not, he was very discriminating in what he put out, just as I was and just as Snowden is.

Scott Horton: Right.

Daniel Ellsberg: The public is – I don't know anyone who's made that simple point.

Scott Horton: Right. Well, you know, he has in his guilty plea to the facts on the lesser charges –

Daniel Ellsberg: – finally in court when he made his statement. And I believe, by the way, that to hear from him make a statement like that showing what he had put out and what he had not put out, was one of his reasons for making that guilty plea. It was not part of a bargain. It was puzzling to a lot of lawyers why you'd plead guilty to 10 out of 22 charges without any kind of plea bargain, without getting anything back, but I think one of the reasons was to make that point that he had selected what he had put out and felt that the material was only Secret, not even Limdis, Nodis, Exdis – those are distributional restrictions that are put on things – that he presumed that at most it would be embarrassing, and that it would not hurt security. That judgment seems to have been vindicated; after three years, no evidence of damage.

And meanwhile I think his other reason was to say very clearly he had not been induced to do this by WikiLeaks; the idea of a conspiracy there on the part of WikiLeaks was simply invalid and he wanted to say that under oath as clearly as he could. Just as I did when I submitted to arrest, I took public acknowledgement of all the facts that I had done, all the actions that I had done, so that I could say, "I did this on my own. I didn't tell anyone who might otherwise be suspected of helping me. They had no part in it." And that didn't relieve them of all suspicion, but it helped, I'm sure. At least that's what I wanted to do. And Snowden has done the same. Snowden has taken advantage of revealing himself to say that his partner, his girlfriend in Hawaii, did not know anything of what he was doing, to try to relieve the pressure on her and on his family.

Scott Horton: Okay, well, and we're going to get back to him here in a few. But let me ask you this. I've been making the case, and I guess I'm basically cribbing from Kevin Zeese, the lawyer, on this, that Manning's mistreatment at Quantico, his being held for three years before his court martial was even begun, and the fact that the president – I mean this to me is just the icing on the cake even more than the abuse in prison I think – the president, the Secretary of Defense, and the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the three highest ranking people in the military chain of command, all have pronounced Manning guilty. And it seems to me that any honest judge would have to admit that that is a direct order to his judge to convict, and how else is she to possibly interpret that? And so he must be set free, Dan. But, then again, I don't know. Am I going, you know, off the reservation here? What do you think?

Daniel Ellsberg: No, you're absolutely right. He should be free on both counts, just as my charges were dropped when it was revealed that Nixon's White House had taken steps against me that were criminal and impeachable actually and figured in his impeachment proceedings and, as the judge put it, "offends a sense of justice." Well, of course Manning's treatment has offended a sense of justice. But when you say "must be set free," well, that position has been raised, all of that has been raised, and the court, the judge decided that on the basis of his being held under conditions that the UN Rapporteur for Torture regarded as at least cruel, inhumane treatment and possibly torture, as a result of that they would take 112 days off of his sentence, which might be a life sentence. So I suppose, you know, he gets three months off when he's in terminal conditions of some kind.

But meanwhile, the treatment of him, and the pronouncements by everybody here, like – I'm talking about Snowden now – have convinced Snowden, and I think very realistically, that if he wanted to be able to tell the public what he had done and why he had done it and what his motives were and what the patterns of criminality were in the material that he was releasing, it had to be outside the United States. Otherwise he would be in perhaps the same cell that Bradley Manning was, and that's a military cell. The NDAA, National Defense Authorization Act, permits military custody indefinitely of an American citizen who's a civilian, and Snowden could very well find himself at Quantico, naked perhaps like Bradley was for a while, and be really incommunicado, as Bradley has been for three years with the single exception of being allowed to make a statement when he pled guilty to 10 charges. And that's the only chance he had to speak out. So I think Snowden has learned from that example.

When it comes to being pronounced guilty, the head of the intelligence committee here, Senator Dianne Feinstein, has said this is an act of treason, indicating that she has probably never read the definition of treason in the Constitution, in her Constitution, in our Constitution, which involves the element of adhering to an enemy of the United States, which no one is claiming that Snowden has done, or that Manning has done. He's not going to be charged with treason, as a matter of fact, but the word can be used as a smear, and of course the effect of that on a potential jury is very significant. Of course the word is being used very commonly about him and Manning, and me for that matter, by Cheney and others that you'd expect it from.

Scott Horton: Right. Okay, and now one more thing before we get too far into the Snowden thing, back to Manning here.

Daniel Ellsberg: Yeah.

Scott Horton: This is something that we've discussed in the past, but I think it's so important to get on the record, especially here in the middle of his military court martial and everything, and that was the final straw that made him do this, as he explained to the informant Adrian Lamo, was that he had been ordered not just to look at pieces of paper or watch videos and review war crimes committed by others, he had been ordered to participate in them. He had been ordered to help the Iraqi government imprison – capture – abduct people for the crime of writing op-ed pieces wondering specifically where did the money go, about corruption in downtown Baghdad.

Daniel Ellsberg: And he knew would be tortured by the people we were turning them over to.

Scott Horton: Right.

Daniel Ellsberg: No, not only was the action of turning them over to torturers illegal, criminal, but so was the order to not investigate it further, which was what he was asking for, not to stop the process but to continue to get more people to hand over more suspects. As he put it, summed it up, "I was actively participating in something I was totally against." And the challenge he makes to every person, really, on the planet, and every American citizen, everybody in the armed services or the government, but all of us really: Do we feel that what is happening, being done in our name and with our tax dollars, is something that is legal, moral, ethical, something that we should be doing, prudent? Or are you one of those like me who finds it reckless, immoral and in many cases criminal? The question then is, what do you do about it? And Manning put his life on the line. I think it was appropriate. The stakes justified that kind of personal risk, and the same is true of Snowden. The stakes – we're coming back to him I guess, but, I'm saying the stakes, as they were for me, were worth a person's life.

Scott Horton: Right. I mean this is the thing, and we've talked about this for years before anybody ever heard of Manning or Snowden. Obviously you've been talking about this since before I was born, but you've been talking about this with me since 2004 or 2005, something like that, and that is that when we're talking about these imperial wars of occupation, of aggressive war and invasion in other people's countries, that the soldiers have a duty to liberate this information and publish it and make sure that the Post or the Times or Greenwald or Julian Assange or somebody can get their hands on it, because the mission is wrong. What they're doing is wrong. The empire is wrong.

Daniel Ellsberg: The orders, they're expected to give the benefit of the doubt to an order that it's legal that they get, and they certainly do that, and that's understandable in a military context in particular and really pretty much everybody in government. But a lot of orders that have come down in my lifetime, and in the last 10 years and before that, are blatantly illegal, blatantly unconstitutional. The orders to torture, to hand over people for torture, to fail to investigate that, are blatantly illegal, and everybody obeyed that except Bradley Manning that we know of. If somebody else has refused any of those things –

Actually there have been, I would say, one or two people who have exposed it, so let me take that back. Joe Darby, of course, who had to go under a witness protection system for a while here, having exposed the torture at Abu Ghraib. Sam Provance, likewise, was demoted and threatened with court martial for doing that. So there have been a few people who spoke out. General Taguba, actually, his career was ended when he asserted that what we were doing was blatantly illegal, and that ended his career.

So the punishment is clear enough, but the stakes actually make that worthwhile. What are you here on earth for? What is your life for and what is it worth? For what will you risk and sacrifice? And many people ask themselves that. They can think, they should be able to think of a number of things. But giving up their career in order to save the Constitution or to save tens, hundreds of thousands of people from death in wrongful wars or needless wars would seem to me it should be one of those things. It doesn't seem – people just don't ask themselves the question. I think if more people asked the question posed by Manning or Snowden of what they ought to do in this situation, they wouldn't all do it, but some of them would.

Scott Horton: Right. I mean I think of it, you know, in terms of – and I don't know what the prison sentence really is, but would you rather have a couple of years patrolling in Afghanistan helping the Delta Force do night raids and maybe getting your legs blown off by a land mine when you've got no business there in the first place, or do a few years in the brig for doing the right thing and telling the people the truth, you know? Which is more courageous?

Daniel Ellsberg: Well, Manning was in a base that I just saw in the movie that was described as perhaps the safest in Iraq. It was far from any – there'd been no enemy action whatever, so he wasn't exactly risking his limbs there. And he's not risking just a few years of course. He's risking his life.

Scott Horton: Well, that's true.

Daniel Ellsberg: But you're right, though. Most people do not have information that poses them with that kind of risk and they don't take any risk at all. That seems to be the normal, ordinary thing. I think that's a human characteristic and one reason that we're on our way, in my belief, to extinction, with the threat of nuclear winter, nuclear war, still with us and the climate changes that are confronting us, and the population. And I think a species that has so much capability for destruction, for damage, and so constrained in ability to care about people outside our own group, ourselves, our family, our team, our organization or our nation – it's very clear, by the way, that Manning, and very particularly, was concerned about the non-Americans who were being harmed by all this. And that's in a way what people like Cheney and others mean when they say treason. To care at all about what we're doing to other people is in their minds a form of treason. And unfortunately too many people share that. But some people have awakened, and unless more wake up from that, to that kind of concern, we've had it. This species is going to go and take an awful lot of other species with it.

Scott Horton: Yeah. Well, you know, the thing is, it's in the dark times that, you know, there's always you find the silver lining too, right? For example, you've got this guy Snowden who certainly must have heard your call at some point. You know what I mean? He's not ignorant of Dan Ellsberg, this guy.

Daniel Ellsberg: Well he did – he said he admired Ellsberg and Manning.

Scott Horton: There you go.

Daniel Ellsberg: I was very glad to be in that company. But that sounded as though – unlike Manning who was probably too young to have heard my name at all, and Assange, who was born the week I was eluding the FBI actually back in 1971, though he heard about it from his mother, his antiwar mother. But I was glad to hear that probably the example had not deterred him, because both of us of course were put on trial, facing a life sentence, Manning and I. Manning is very likely to get it. I lucked out in many ways in that the crimes against me came out in time to spare me that life sentence. But Snowden was not deterred from that, and frankly that was something that was a surprise to me. I was just reading a book here, This Machine Kills Secrets by Andy Greenberg, which mentioned at the end of one chapter, well, given this digital era, there will be more Bradley Mannings. And having just read that, I have to admit I said to myself, "Yeah, don't hold your breath. When people see what's happened to Manning, people aren't going to rush to join him." And it didn't take long for Snowden to come along and expose himself to exactly the same risk as Manning. That gives me hope, more hope than I've had for a long time, that there will be others who show that kind of civil courage on which I keep saying – and it may sound like hyperbole but in my mind it's not – civil courage on which our species' survival depends.

Scott Horton: Well, you got to be pleased by some of these polls have, you know, give or take – I know they come back with different numbers but give or take half the country says that this Snowden guy obviously is siding with them against their government. Right? They don't believe for a minute this hokum that their government is them.

Daniel Ellsberg: I am encouraged by that. And by the way, just minutes before this call, here's what's easy to do now these days, I just signed a digital petition that Barbara Lee has put out for repealing the Authorization for the Use of Military Force that was signed without any – just by reflex, by everyone but her, Barbara Lee of Oakland, back in 2001, and she wants to repeal that since it's be used, as she says, to support torture, kidnapping, drone assassination, other invasions and whatnot ever since. She says it's time to cut that back. So there's a credoaction.com, I think it is, petition where Barbara Lee, to support her bill to repeal that.

But your point in general on the polls, there is an encouraging side to that, and I'll tell you something kind of funny in a way. People have drawn attention to the fact that whereas the overall polling on this has not changed on whether you believe in the government having all the data on the telephone calls of everyone (and I would say that includes the content as well though that hasn't been admitted yet) – what do you think about that? The polls are about the same as they were back when that was first revealed in 2005 by the New York Times, but the position, the relative position of Democrats and Republicans, has reversed almost in terms of the numbers, the relative proportion. Back in 2005 most Democrats opposed that under Bush and most Republicans supported it. Now most Republicans oppose this right now and most Democrats support it. So they reversed. Well, that looks on the first glance like simple partisan hypocrisy. But there's another way to see it. In a way they're both right. The Republicans correctly distrust those powers in the hands of a president that isn't of their own party, and they're right. And the Democrats don't trust these powers; they can see room for abuse, when it's a president of the other party, of the Republicans. Both right. Their only mistake is they're willing to trust it if it's in the hands of a president of their own party.

Scott Horton: Right.

Daniel Ellsberg: There they're wrong. And that's a naiveté that doesn't do them credit. But maybe they can wake up from that delusion.

Scott Horton: Right. Well, you know, I think that's still the margin, right? That's the swing voters in the middle. There are still a lot of people who hate this no matter who's in charge.

Daniel Ellsberg: That's true. Yes, that is true.

Scott Horton: Well, and I'm just having a good day today, I guess. I'm more optimistic than usual. I'm sounding like it anyway.

Daniel Ellsberg: Yeah. Well there I hate to tell you but there are also those people who trust whoever's in charge.

Scott Horton: Right. Yeah, exactly.

Daniel Ellsberg: Sorry to tell you that, but. No, actually, I am hopeful at the reaction to this, but we'll see how long it lasts. The administration I'm sure is counting on its going away. Even Frank Rich was predicting that this was an interest of the moment but it'll be over by August. Well, it's up to us to see in a way whether we keep this one burning or not. I think there's going to be a lot more revelations by Snowden, and that'll keep it going, I think. Given that he's not in the country.

Scott Horton: Right. I mean, according to Greenwald, he's got a dozen more stories coming, minimum, so.

Daniel Ellsberg: My strong guess is that what we're going to learn is that the recording of data, the storing of data, is not at all limited to, quote, metadata or to foreigners, with PRISM or anything like that. I think they're what I would call collecting, that is recording, listening, recording and storing everything, everything. What we're saying right now, of course. But for example William Binney, formerly of NSA for over 30 years, says the million-square-foot place they're building in Bluffdale, Utah, NSA is building, is – he's made some real calculations as to what that's meant to store. And he said if all they were storing was text, for example, or metadata, a small room would suffice for virtually the whole world with the storage capability they have now. He said when you want 100,000 square feet, 10% of that million square feet they're doing, he said that's clearly for video and audio. And that means everything.

And when they say, when the president says, "We're not listening to your calls," he speaks with forked tongue there because what he means is "We're not listening live" – obviously, it would take the whole population to be doing that, but he's not saying, "We're not storing it for later listening at our leisure with our feet up in front of the fire poring over whatever we want to of what you have." And I think when Keith Alexander and Hayden and these other people involved assure us that they're not collecting – oh, who was it? It was Clapper. Clapper said, "We're not collecting information on millions of Americans, which at first sounds like a simple lie in the face of what Snowden has revealed here; they are collecting data on hundreds of millions of Americans. But he explains, "Well, by collecting, I don't mean just recording it. Collecting to me is when you pull up the file and you analyze it and you transcribe it, you know, something that happens later. Well, as he said it was the least untruthful answer he could give to the question, are you collecting data on millions of Americans?, a less untruthful answer would have been – he said no, and a less untruthful answer would have been yes.

But that's the point I'm making here. I think they are still conning us into believing that the content of our e-mails and our phone calls and our chat logs and everything else is inaccessible to them where they're not recording it, they're not keeping it. I think that's simply false. They have everything.

Scott Horton: Right. Well you know, I think the part of that that sounds the most fantastic is that they could keep all the audio from all the phone calls, that kind of thing, but I was talking this over with James Bamford, and you know telephone, regular land line, copper land line telephone, that's only 14k, which is very low quality really. It's good enough for the human voice but you couldn't listen to a symphony orchestra over it, right? It doesn't sound very good really. But it sure is enough. And they could probably, you know, with all the different audio codecs in the world, they cold probably zip down the average telephone call to nothing almost, you know what I mean? And then they can, you know, as you said, the storage space required, they've got it.

Daniel Ellsberg: Well, maybe what they want is to assure that the best quality recording of all the symphonic music in the world will be in Bluffdale, Utah, so that I hope it's deep, deep underground so that after the nuclear winter, whoever succeeds us will have access to, you know, really good acoustics.

* * *

Scott Horton: Let me ask you this. I could go back and read the book again, but I got Dan Ellsberg on the phone. Did McNamara lie to LBJ about what happened the second so-called Gulf of Tonkin attack mistake, or did they both lie together?

Daniel Ellsberg: Why do you ask? I'm interested.

Scott Horton: Well, one of our favorite reporters tells me his interpretation is that McNamara got the message that you got, that "Oops, sorry, we were listening to our own propeller," but that McNamara fooled LBJ into, and basically didn't update him that oops it was all a mistake.

Daniel Ellsberg: Well, that is the conclusion of Gareth Porter –

Scott Horton: That's my friend, our friend I'm citing there, yeah. Now I'm asking you.

Daniel Ellsberg: – in his book, and frankly I was very resistant to that interpretation, having lived through the events. It just didn't, it sounded hardly possible to me, partly because I thought, well I read the cable that said "Hold everything," you know, "every previous report is in error, in question here," of the reports of torpedoes that were coming through. So I said, "If I read that, how could the president not know it?" And then, as he showed me the detail of what we now know [were] the president's phone calls between the Pentagon, where I was, and the White House, there's no actual indication that McNamara, who did have that cable along with me, did pass that information on to the president. And I was very struck by how careful his analysis was. And it did look possible that, as he put it, that the president did really want to be absolutely sure that there had been an attack and that McNamara was willing to go with a much lower level of evidence. In fact there was no attack, so the evidence they had was wrong, as in the case of WMDs in Iraq. But wrong or right, there was a certain degree of alleged evidence.

Certainly both of them – well, again, I don't know whether the president was fully aware here. Certainly McNamara did lie to the public when he said the evidence was unequivocal, just as when Rumsfeld said that the evidence of WMDs, "We know where they, here's where they are, these are facts," and Powell said the same. That was a clear-cut lie that the evidence was strong and unequivocal, you know, on the very face of it. It was extremely weak and very equivocal. That was true in both cases. So they certainly did lie. The president, I have to acknowledge now, may or may not have known, in which case McNamara really did have a lot more to bear on his conscience than I realized, which is perhaps why he absolutely refused to discuss Vietnam for some 30 years, and eventually did write, he said, "We were wrong about the war," in his book In Retrospect, but I was told by the publisher of that book that they had to force those words out of him. He was not willing to sign that – a little piece of inside gossip here, that Peter Osnos, his publisher, told me that they had told him they would not publish the book unless he was willing to say those words, and so he did. Which is to his credit that he finally did. He was the only person who said that, out of the administration. And we were all wrong, and that we includes me.

Scott Horton: Well, and LBJ, he was looking for an excuse anyway, right? He didn't have to escalate that war, even if –

Daniel Ellsberg: No, no –

Scott Horton: – McNamara did fool him.

Daniel Ellsberg: But I assumed. He was looking – he was expecting to expand the war, yes. Definitely. But he was a skeptic on the bombing. That is one of the things that brought me around in a way to Gareth Porter's point of view on Tonkin Gulf eventually, that McNamara, McNamara was openly pushing for the bombing. I knew that. I have never been clear why. And LBJ was saying, according to my boss, who would come back from meetings in the White House, LBJ would say "your bombing bullshit." And LBJ was properly skeptical on the bombing. The bombing was a crazy idea, basically. I think – just a conjecture – I think that McNamara thought the bombing would get us into negotiations in which we'd be able to make a deal. Which was unrealistic, but that's why he wanted it. But of course the military wanted the bombing because they wanted a much bigger program of bombing, so they wanted a foot in the door, which was all that LBJ gave them at first. But LBJ was not anxious to do the bombing. What he was anxious to do though was not to lose the war, and he was ready to put troops in, which McNamara was realistically resistant to. So the president was pushing for troops, McNamara was pushing for bombing, they compromised on both, and of course catastrophe followed.

Scott Horton: Right. Instead of doing neither, they did both, yeah exactly. That's the same way it always works. That's called "bipartisanship." Oh well.

Daniel Ellsberg: Yeah. I think that Obama likewise was very resistant to putting a surge into Afghanistan, the last 30 to 40,000 troops, but he did it. In other words, he could see that it wasn't going to accomplish anything, all of his personal military advisers told him that, but he did not want to get into a fight with Petraeus and McChrystal in the midst of his health insurance program and so he sent 30,000 more troops to kill and die in Afghanistan. That's the way it goes. And that's the kind of secrecy, and the obvious need for secrecy – the fact that his advice was not to do it had to be kept secret –

Scott Horton: Right.

Daniel Ellsberg: – his advice from people other than Petraeus and McChrystal –

Scott Horton: Yeah, you know, wait, I just want to interrupt you for –

Daniel Ellsberg: – and so his position was, "give the generals whatever they want." So that kind of internal controversy is the biggest secret because it raises questions as to whether this policy is really wise or necessary. And all presidents prefer the public to think, "I had no choice, don't blame me, there really was no alternative, all of my advisers agreed that I had to do this," and so forth. The fact that that's false is one of the greatest secrets, and that's the reason we need whistleblowers. It's not properly classified, but it is classified and that secrecy is kept to the death so tenaciously, so the only way we ever learn is when some future president decides that it's in his favor to give the leak to somebody. Actually it so happens that Bob Woodward did come out with all those top secrets eventually, having apparently been given a green light by Obama to show that he really hadn't wanted to do this but the military made him do it.

Scott Horton: Right. I was going to say, because it sounded at first as though, just the language you used, it sounded almost as though you were speculating, but I just wanted to point out that the publisher, Rothkopf, of foreignpolicy.com wrote an article just like that about how it was all about domestic politics and he [Obama] knew better, and there's a book Little America that was serialized in the Washington Post that says that he specifically refused to read a CIA report that he already knew said "Don't bother 'surging' because it's not going to work," and then there's one of Holbrooke's guys who talked all about how the political hacks in the White House ran the entire Afghan policy and the only policy was to just prolong the status quo forever and not actually work at doing anything, just surge, not to win but surge just to prolong.

Daniel Ellsberg: Look, that sounds – of course it is in line with my own understanding of it, but I didn't know any of those references, and I'm very interested in it, and so after the program could I ask you to send me links for those?

Scott Horton: Sure, and I guess now I got to read Bob Woodward, which I didn't want to do, Dan, thanks a lot.

Daniel Ellsberg: Well, whatever. But, no, the particular ones you just mentioned all sounded very interesting. I'll add one to that – well, by the way, Holbrooke's dying words, literally dying words, his last words, were said in one story to be, I don't have it exactly, something to the effect, "Get out of Afghanistan." But that's quite possible, because I knew Holbrooke when he was a young foreign service officer, one of the few who spoke Vietnamese, in Vietnam. And he had been all over Vietnam. He knew the score very well. I was certain that he had to perceive Afghanistan in exactly the same terms. The conditions – there were differences. The language we didn't speak was, you know, different from Vietnam. The terrain was different. The temperature was different. But the crucial aspects of it were so similar in terms of a hopeless war that I knew that Holbrooke had to see that. He couldn't have forgotten that. Well, when Obama's War comes out by Bob Woodward, he quotes, not directly but from somebody else, he quotes Holbrooke as saying of the surge, he says he was the most pessimistic, three words, "It can't work." And he was Obama's, in principle his top man, his plenipotentiary, on Iraq and Afghanistan. So Holbrooke of course doesn't tell the public that, ever, doesn't come out and say – because he's the president's man, he's an insider. He doesn't tell us that "I've given the president my opinion that this can't work." And he wasn't the only one. Nearly everybody inside said that. Even Rahm Emanuel, and definitely Biden for example. Everybody but Hillary and Gates actually, who were for it. So we don't hear that.

I'll tell you one other thing. Holbrooke, knowing Vietnam as well as he did and having worked on the Pentagon Papers, was the one person that I went to to try to persuade to make a united front, not to put out the papers but to come out publicly and from within the government and say, "The war is hopeless, we've got to end it, we've got to negotiate a deal here," various kinds. And I did present that to him. And he was at that point in the Peace Corps. He, because of his disillusionment with war, he had left the ranks of the foreign service officers in there and was working in the Peace Corps in Morocco. And he knew what I was saying, and we saw eye to eye on the war exactly, and he just clearly wasn't willing to do anything like that, make any public statement, take any public stance, because he wanted to be the president's plenipotentiary on Iraq and Afghanistan someday. And you cannot come out against your president's policy and get a job even under another president. You won't be trusted to keep your mouth shut, no matter what, no matter how disastrous the course is. That's the test of being reliable, faithful, trustworthy – namely, you may criticize inside but you won't tell an outsider, like Congress or the press or the public, that we're lying or that we're in a hopeless situation, no matter what it is. And I keep coming back to the point, even if nuclear war is at risk, as it wasn't in that particular case, but –

Scott Horton: Right. And you know, I got to say, that's one of the most important lessons that I remember out of your memoir of Vietnam, Secrets it's called, that really stuck with me is the psychology of being an insider and just waiting and hoping, "If I can influence my boss a little and he can influence his boss a little – and after all, all those little people out there," as you say, including Congress, "they don't have the Top Secret access. They don't know what we know. So we don't have any reason to listen to any outside open source type wisdom because none of those people have anything like the access we have, so it's up to us wise people on the inside to stay on the inside and do our very best." And you can, really, as you're saying, you can actually have the extinction of mankind in a thermonuclear war based on that kind of bureaucratic psychology of "We're the insiders, we know better, blah blah blah," just because they're bureaucrats, just executive branch bureaucrats, makes them the kings of the universe.

Daniel Ellsberg: Well, you know, just, and maybe I'll make this my last thought, if I may.

Scott Horton: Sure.

Daniel Ellsberg: Coming back to Manning and Snowden, and actually I was the same on this point. Snowden is called arrogant, for example, because he took it on himself to put out this information, and even the president makes that point. Well, Snowden explicitly makes the very point. "I'm an ordinary guy," he says. "I'm an ordinary guy. I'm an American. I'm not a traitor or a hero, I'm an American, I'm just another guy sitting at a desk reading this stuff." Obviously Manning did not have grandiose notions of himself, he was tormented in his personal life, but each of them looked at this and said, "Here I have this information and the public doesn't. Why should I, sitting at this desk, know all this stuff with these clearances that the public needs to know and senators need to know, and senators don't have it?" And by the way we know that because a number of senators have been saying since Snowden's revelation, "I've learned more in the last 10 days than in the last 10 years of what NSA is doing."

So the idea that, "Oh, we knew all this stuff, there's nothing unusual here, or hurry on folks, keep moving, there's nothing to see here," is one point, and then on the other point, a little contradictory, they say, "Super Top Secret, higher than Top Secret" – the latter is really true. They haven't been putting this out.

And Snowden was saying, "I don't think it's right that I can sit at this desk and task the system to get the e-mails with the entire record and all the details of anybody in the country from the president on down." He said, "It's not only a question of my knowing it and the other people not knowing it. My being able to do this and to know this is not right. And there's a thousand people like me who can do this. And that's not," he said, "that's not a country I want to live in." And Manning the same, saying, he says to Adrian Lamo, "This kind of information – horrible," he says, "criminal." He said, "Should it just be sitting in a safe here somewhere, in a dusty safe, or should it be out for the people to know?" And of course I felt the same back with the Pentagon Papers. Why should I at the Rand Corporation have this history when literally the Senate cannot get it? So, you know, that's not the way it should be.

And it turns out that when you make that perception of yourself, that you have the capability to tell a truth that will help save some lives or preserve our democracy – and you don't have to be in the government to have that feeling. Think of all the people who over the generations have contributed to cancer of hundreds of millions, in the tobacco industry, and never told about it. Or asbestos, or Vioxx, or all the other things that are going on. And the people in the government who knew about global warming and were sat on and muffled and so forth. It isn't that unusual to know a truth that would be of great benefit to some other people, that is to say would save them from torment or in terms of illness or keep us free, things like that, if you're willing to take a risk of your own life, of your own personal life. If more people – you're not going to get a lot of people willing to do it, but if you have more than we've had who follow like Snowden or Manning, on a lesser scale perhaps, we would be a lot safer and a lot freer than we are on the way to becoming.

Scott Horton: Thank you very much for your time today, Dan. I really appreciate it.

Daniel Ellsberg: Thank you, Scott, for the opportunity.

Scott Horton: Everybody, that is the great Daniel Ellsberg, liberator of the Pentagon Papers, author of Secrets: A Memoir of Vietnam and the Pentagon Papers, and his website of course is ellsberg.net, I might have forgot to mention that at the beginning, ellsberg.net. You can read Chapter One of Secrets, all about his big day, first day on the job in this new position at the Pentagon the day of the Gulf of Tonkin nonattack, the second so-called attack there. And follow him on Twitter.

That's it for the show. Thanks everybody for listening. We'll see you tomorrow here, 11 to 1 Texas time, scotthorton.org and noagendastream.com.

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