Snowden Says His Mission Is Accomplished 312
Hugh Pickens DOT Com writes "Edward Snowden met with reporters from the Washington Post for fourteen hours and in his first interview since June reflected at length about surveillance, democracy and the meaning of the documents he exposed. 'For me, in terms of personal satisfaction, the mission's already accomplished. I already won,' says Snowden. 'All I wanted was for the public to be able to have a say in how they are governed. That is a milestone we left a long time ago. Right now, all we are looking at are stretch goals.' Snowden says that the NSA's business is 'information dominance,' the use of other people's secrets to shape events. But Snowden upended the agency on its own turf. 'You recognize that you're going in blind, that there's no model,' says Snowden, acknowledging that he had no way to know whether the public would share his views. 'But when you weigh that against the alternative, which is not to act, you realize that some analysis is better than no analysis. Because even if your analysis proves to be wrong, the marketplace of ideas will bear that out.' Snowden succeeded because the NSA, accustomed to watching without being watched, faces scrutiny it has not endured since the 1970s, or perhaps ever, and says people who accuse him of disloyalty mistake his purpose. 'I am not trying to bring down the NSA, I am working to improve the NSA. I am still working for the NSA right now. They are the only ones who don't realize it.'"
Well, at least (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Well, at least (Score:5, Funny)
He's not wearing a jumpsuit and standing on an aircraft carrier with a banner behind him.
Damn, I was about to say the complete opposite: Until I see pics of Snowden in a jumpsuit on an aircraft carrier with a banner behind him, I don't buy it.
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It's probably closer to say that Snowden works with carrier waves, not carriers on the waves.
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In Soviet Russia aircraft carrier lands on YOU
and since its that time of year
(to the tune of Chritmas is a coming)
Noun verbs you
Gentlemen
Noun verbs you
In Soviet Russia
Noun verbs YOU
Re:Well, at least (Score:5, Insightful)
He's not wearing an orange jumpsuit in a stress position with razor wire in front of him either.
Avoiding this indefinitely is probably one of the 'stretch goals' he mentions.
Re:Well, at least (Score:4, Funny)
He actually is in a stressful position behind razor wire, but fashion choices available in Russia have expanded since the fall of the Soviet Union.
Old Soviet fashion show. [youtube.com]
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Snowden isn't the only person who took a risk, the person stuffing that jumpsuit had to put some contents under pressure -- they risked losing their face. Much less the satellite based death beams cued to their DNA that will destroy them if they ever divulge secrets about "operation cod piece."
Right On (Score:5, Insightful)
Snowden is a real hero. I am sorry he can't be home for the holidays this year because of his sacrifice.
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How is this flamebait? NSA voting again?
Of course not! (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Of course not! (Score:5, Interesting)
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It wasn't really Slashdot they were interested in.
Bullshit! (Score:5, Insightful)
How quickly we forget things like this [slashdot.org] right?
To claim that it does not happen, when we have evidence that it does happen is beyond idiotic. It is complete and utter bullshit (either intentional or from ignorance.
Re:Of course not! (Score:5, Insightful)
Do you really think the NSA has time to waste on Slashdot? We have much more pressing issues to take care of.
Like trolling WoW.
Re:Of course not! (Score:5, Funny)
Hey, I'm not trolling, I've got a level 27 minotaur that's... umm... trying to recruit me into his terrorist cell. Yeah, that's it. I've got to put in a good 8 hours today.. umm... cultivating my contact. Maybe 20. Sure that's a lot of overtime, but my country is worth it!
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Re:Right On (Score:5, Insightful)
giving the shallow-thinking right-wing a scapegoat.
Yea, amazing how short-sighted and narcissistic the typical American voter is, huh?
Like, when Bush II was in charge, setting up all these bullshit draconian laws, the self-proclaimed "liberals" wouldn't shut up about how horrible America would become if we allowed said policies to go into place. Flash forward 7 years - now it's the "liberal" guy in office, and suddenly all those horrible policies aren't considered so horrible after all... Unless, of course, you're a self-proclaimed "conservative," in which case letting "your guy's" laws fall into the hands of the "other guy" is the worst fucking thing to happen in American history.
Land of the free, alright - free of the ability to form cogent fucking thoughts.
Re:Right On (Score:4, Insightful)
Land of the free, alright - free of the ability to form cogent fucking thoughts.
There are plenty of smart people here who can form cogent thoughts. However we do seem to be free of the ambition to do so.
Re:Right On (Score:5, Informative)
This drove me so crazy. The most perfect example of how rotten Democrats are, is Marty Lederman, who excoriated the Bush administration for using secret legal memos to authorize due process free detention, but who upon admittance to the Obama team, began writing the secret legal memos to justify due process free execution.
This is why I'm not a Democrat anymore --- evil is evil no matter who does it. The Democratic party's silence on the fact that Obama has embraced and extended every GWB policy they once complained about, has made me understand that GOP and DNC are purely tribal organizations with absolutely no basis in rationality, morality, or even a consistent kind of crazy. They're just teams working toward the same neo-con goals. I will never vote for anyone who is a member of either party.
Re: Right On (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
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I will never vote for anyone who is a member of either party.
Unfortunately, this position constitutes opting out of the political process. Duverger's Law means that it's vanishingly unlikely that any third party candidate will achieve any notable political power. If you really want to change things you have to work within the two-party system, which means you need to pick a party and get involved with it, working to push its policies in the right direction.
Re:Right On (Score:5, Interesting)
I vote third party and if no third party candidate is available, for my cat. There is no other way to lodge a protest vote because we don't have a "none of the above" and not voting simply lumps you in with the apathetic.
I'm not so focused on picking a victor, because when the choice of Victor A (R) v. Victor B (D) results in exactly the same policies, I don't care which one wins and won't let my vote be seen as comprising some mandate for the asshole. Secondly, you simply cannot create change in a party by saying "I disagree with you, but I'll vote for you anyway." That's a sort of insanity. And as for creating some change within a party, look at how that worked out for the Kucinich people in the DNC or the Ron Paul people in the GOP. It simply doesn't work.
The deepest rot in American politics, is the voters' reluctance to vote their conscience and instead, feel like they need to be on a winning side. This is the sure fire way to lose in the end.
Re:Right On (Score:5, Insightful)
What you don't get, is that you can't have an impact by voting major parties. They are totally fungible.
Secondly, the parties are immutable -- the notion that you can change them from within is belied by all the evidence that you can't. Look at the 2008 election -- Obama lied (to get elected) and people died. Again, it is a form of insanity to say "I hate what you are doing, but I'll vote for you anyway" and expect change.
Third parties bring topics that the GOP and DNC won't touch due to the bipartisan consensus on so many issues. Supporting third parties is the only way to get those issues debated. Of course, what has been a real problem since Ross Perot, is that the parties simply won't allow others into the debates.
Finally, Obama is the poster child of New Boss Same as the Old Boss. One can only hope that eventually, enough people will get it. And when that happens, change will occur. But by working inside the DNC? That's useless and will just continue our slow rightward slide with every "you suck, but I still vote for you" decision.
Re:Right On (Score:5, Insightful)
Secondly, the parties are immutable -- the notion that you can change them from within is belied by all the evidence that you can't.
If you think the parties haven't changed drastically over the last 20 or 30 years, you haven't been paying attetion. The Republican party has become far, far, far more radical. Good god.. Palin was questioning whether the great god Ronald Reagan was conservative enough just recently! And it's not as if she's not correct. Reagan was a freaking liberal compared to where the tea party wants the Republicans to go.
Now we could have an interesting discussion on exactly WHAT causes the parties to change. But if you don't even acknowledge they've changed drastically, there's not much point in a further discussion.
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The only place a Westminster party normally offers it's mem
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You are correct, they are not immutable -- they simply keep sliding rightward because lesser-evil voters are too afraid to lose one election for a larger overall victory. As a result, the DNC is the New GOP and the GOP is a parody of itself. Or otherwise stated, it is the function of the GOP to push us radically rightward, and the function of the DNC to make each such shift the new normal.
Re:Right On (Score:4, Insightful)
When you vote D or R, you are voting for the policies they *currently* have. The best way to push them is vote for a third party that has what you want. D and R are constantly trying to court the independent vote, party line voters are already in the bag, they don't need to care about them. Think about it, if people in favor of a stance on issue X held by a Libertarian vote Lib enough that the Rs lose important elections, they will incorporate issue X to win back those voters.
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Re:Right On (Score:4, Insightful)
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How am I reading too much? GWB did evil shit. Obama does the same evil shit and more. I don't care _why_ the parties do what they do, I only care _that_ they do it.
To put this in a bad slashdot car analogy, I wouldn't care why a driver totally blitzed on vodka and blow plowed into a crosswalk full of people, I'd only care that he did, and I'd want to see him punished -- even if his mother died the night before, that would be completely beside the point.
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"They got scared and decided the Bush policies were just the ticket to prevent the backlash because then they can say they did everything they could."
So, in other words, you're saying they did what the Bush administration did because they're spineless wimps who can't handle the responsibilities of the office. Responsibilities means making the decisions and taking actions for the US public (American people) instead of their careers, taking the heat for both being good and bad, an
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I won't support people who are part of the corruption -- they could Jesus/Ghandi/Portman rolled into one, and I wouldn't care for a couple reasons:
1) supporting the good people in the corrupt org gives that organization some credence.
2) even good people cannot avoid being tainted.
3) supporting the org perpetuates its ability to be corrupt.
Re:Right On (Score:5, Insightful)
"Flash forward 7 years - now it's the "liberal" guy in office, and suddenly all those horrible policies aren't considered so horrible after all..."
>> Liberal voter here. Nope -- I'm still pissed. I'm surprised the "Liberal media" wasn't informing you how troubled we are with Obama doing these things as well.
I held my nose and voted for Obama. What was my option here? Gordon Gecko? You think whichever boob we put in office isn't going to have these policies?
The reason Domestic spying is so bad is that they can use it to extort politicians, leaders and the media into compliance. Not that they need that with the way politicos have to thank zero interest loans from banks for affording office, and media personalities being titillating rather than educational.
So I don't think anyone is "OK" with this, other than people who say; "I'm OK with this -- thank you for defending my freedom!" And I think those people are idiots. I happen to know quite a few Liberals and Democrats and not many idiots. I've seen more conservatives "OK" with this domestic spying from my anecdotal experience. Not that it is productive getting in a tit-for-tat spat.
If impeaching Obama would end this -- I'd be for it. But really we need what we've always needed; campaign finance reform. Most corruption starts and ends with that.
Re:Right On (Score:4, Insightful)
The first past the post voting system in America will always reinforce the two party setup we have. Third party voting can send a message in a lopsided election but in anything close, it's dangerous. It is arguably the reason we even had GWB in the first place. Gore probably would have won had he not lost so many votes to the Green party.
Of course, the ones in power are the ones benefiting most from this arrangement, so it's unlikely to change.
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We have a serious problem with critical thinking in this country. If there is a good way to test for it, they should add it to these standardized tests that they teach to.
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Yes we do. I'm rather frightened by the idea of teaching to the government's idea of optimal critical thinking though. What if it were to succeed?
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It's better than teaching to the government's idea of ignorance.
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Nothing like knowing half the facts to back a half a thought.
It's easy to blame the American voter, but not so easy to zoom out and look at the bigger picture. Let us gander at what has changed in the last 30 years, and how has that impacted our ability to discuss and debate issues?
1. Media Monopolization - 30 years ago, it was possible to see alternative views. Milton Friedman was on numerous TV shows, and it gained those media outlets ratings and money. Today, you will hear no such alternative views o
Re:Right On (Score:5, Insightful)
He's a criminal, not a hero. The ends do NOT justify the means. He should be in a US prison for the rest of his life.
Let's extrapolate that to a different, historical scenario, shall we?
[George Washington]'s a criminal, not a hero. The ends do NOT justify the means. He should be in a [British Imperial] prison for the rest of his life.
Do you still feel the same way? Keep in mind, many people actually died as a result of Gen. Washington's decision to commit treason against the crown.
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Whether or not his actions were worth it largely depends on how we view him NOW. If we dismiss him as a criminal, nothing will change and his efforts were for naught. If we treat him as a hero by recognizing the unconstitutional actions of the NSA as wrong, we can force a change to happen.
Re:Right On (Score:4, Insightful)
You've forgotten one important thing: even if we dismiss him as a criminal, he's satisfied his own conscience. It might not be worth anything to the rest of us, but he'll be able to die at peace with himself. Even one man's inner peace is worth something.
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There are proper procedures to follow if he suspected wrong doing.
I do not consider those procedures to be proper, and it's due to the fact that they result in the American people remaining ignorant of the crimes their government is committing.
I disagree (Score:5, Funny)
The NSA should be dismantled....
Hang on, someone's at the door.
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I agree with Snowden that the NSA can serve a useful purpose. We do need a way to protect the country's lines of communications. We don't need them snooping on people without just cause.
Re:I disagree (Score:5, Insightful)
I disagree because your statement is blatantly false. The NSA can not serve a useful purpose. Simple application of the mathematics of information disparity proves you can't prove your statement to the contrary. As a scientist, I don't believe things without evidence, especially not statements lacking disprovability.
You're aware Omnivore, Carnivore, ECHELON, and PRISM's room 641A existed before 9/11. [wikipedia.org] They failed to prevent 9/11, and every terrorist attack since the 70's. The NIST helps secure our encryption systems. By what amazing feat of mental gymnastics do you arrive at the conclusion that a secret research group can be proven to be helping secure our communications? No, that's asinine. I require evidence. The government secrecy is directly opposed to both freedom and security.
Especially since we've got an army of hubble-esque telescopes zipping around the earth providing total global situation awareness. You don't need warrantless wiretaps with that kind of spy power. [youtube.com]
Bonus, the NRO helps with natural disasters, weather, and space sciences. [space.com] Defund, NSA, DHS, etc., spit the funding between NASA and the NRO. [nro.gov] The folks benefiting from domestic spying could instead make their money selling space wares... Ah, but then they wouldn't be able to do insider trading quite so well at all.
You can't be serious, right? By what logical misstep do you propose we trust again a spy who has proven to be a double agent? The same goes for an OS compromised by malware, there is no "removal" of malware, you nuke it from orbit, because it's the only way to be sure.
They want to have their cake and eat it too. We should either have no privacy indoors & in our communication between indoor areas while having expectation to not be spied on outdoors, or have zero protection of privacy outdoors & assurances that our communications are not compromised. Look, if you want to spy on my conversations you can just stand next to me, or aim a laser microphone at my windows or glasses. You don't need to tap the coms lines because folks can buy a burner phone and install their own encrypted voice and text applications. It'll be to late to do anything by the time it's deciphered. The domestic spying and wiretaps only prevent legitimate use of the technology.
Unfortunately, information theory tells us we can not have assurances that our communications are not spied on unless we eliminate the secret spying operation. We have a chance to eliminate secrets and stand brave among the most powerful nations who have mutually assured nuclear peace, and against which no terrorist can pose a threat. Scaremongers would have you believe the terrorists are nothing to sneeze at, yet every year the flu claims SIX TIMES the lives as a 9/11 scale attack. [cdc.gov] Cars and Cheeseburgers are 400 times more deadly every year than 9/11. Even the most devastating of terrorist threats is not even a flesh wound. We need proportional protection: If you're so scared of 1/400th the threat a Happy Meal poses, then allocate 1/400th of the taxes we spend on heart disease and accident prevention to the NSA and DHS. We need no secrets. Without secrets no spy can harm us.
As a rational human being: If you, Snowden or anyone would say that the NSA can serve a useful purpose then the burden of proof is on you to provide evidence to support your unproven claim. Don't forget to prove your hypothesis you will need to more significantly disprove the null hypo
Re:I disagree (Score:5, Insightful)
You're aware Omnivore, Carnivore, ECHELON, and PRISM's room 641A existed before 9/11. [wikipedia.org] They failed to prevent 9/11, and every terrorist attack since the 70's.
Failure to stop terrorist attacks doesn't indicate lack of utility, it just indicates lack of utility against terrorists. The utility of the NSA is primarily against other nation states; the NSA was very useful during the Cold War, and its predecessor was astoundingly useful during WWII. You can argue that there is no current threat against which the NSA is a valuable tool, but that's a separate argument, which you didn't try to make.
The NIST helps secure our encryption systems.
Actually, it doesn't. NIST is a standards organization. It has run the selection processes for standard cryptographic algorithms lately, but it has always relied heavily on the NSA for technical expertise in the process. This was more visible during the DES standardization process, but you can be sure the NSA was advising for AES and SHA3.
By what amazing feat of mental gymnastics do you arrive at the conclusion that a secret research group can be proven to be helping secure our communications? No, that's asinine. I require evidence.
There is ample evidence in the development of many security technologies. I experienced it personally when I was building a key management system for smart card credit card issuance. The NSA exercised oversight over the design and implementation process, and made some really excellent suggestions that substantially improved the system.
I find it very, very disturbing that in recent years the NSA has apparently abandoned that part of their mission, and has been actively working to subvert strong security. I stop short of saying this means the NSA should be destroyed, but it definitely means it needs new management with the right mandate and proper oversight. And it should probably be pared down to a fraction of its current size.
Unfortunately, information theory tells us we can not have assurances that our communications are not spied on unless we eliminate the secret spying operation.
Actually, we cannot have any such assurances at all, because we can never know that we've eliminated all of the secret spying operations... because they're secret. By definition we can only eliminate the non-secret spying operations.
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Don't be ridiculous.
Have you seen the traffic? We'll need at least half an hour to reach you. Please stay put.
Secretly yours,
NSA.
NSA christmas greeting (Score:2)
We don't want a lot for Christmas
We know almost everything we need
We don't care about the peasants
They give their information for free
We just want you for our own
You are ours Edward Snow'n
Make our wish come true oh
All we want for Christmas is you
They could have listened to him... (Score:5, Interesting)
... when he was working there. According to Forbes, his coworkers report that he would wear a Electronic Frontier Foundation hoodie to work and have a copy of the constitution on his desk to argue when he was asked to do something against the constitution.
They just had to emulate him and he would still be in Hawai with his girlfriend and working for the NSA.
Re:They could have listened to him... (Score:4, Interesting)
... when he was working there. According to Forbes, his coworkers report that he would wear a Electronic Frontier Foundation hoodie to work and have a copy of the constitution on his desk to argue when he was asked to do something against the constitution.
Oh my goodness, they really were clueless then. Even though I agree he's a hero, from a commonsense standpoint, I'm not kidding - they had someone working in a spook agency literally wearing his feelings about freedom on his sleeve, arguing using THE CONSTITUTION, and they didn't watch him closely?
Whether you think the NSA is the devil, on the side of the angels, or somewhere in between, their inaction in the face of these clear signals an employee disagreed with how they conduct their business is extraordinarily incompetent.
Re:They could have listened to him... (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:They could have listened to him... (Score:4)
...or they secretly agreed with him and hoped he'd do something about it.
That's actually a fair point, since it's unlikely that a lowly contractor would be working in the same facility as the higher-ups who would stand to lose from such a disclosure...
His fellow 'agents' may very well have encouraged him to expose the materials.
Re:They could have listened to him... (Score:5, Funny)
Heck, with a copy of the constitution on his desk, his surprising he wasn't charged with possessing terrorist literature.
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What he said in the interview (Score:2, Insightful)
It's pretty obvious from what he says in the interview that he was well coached ahead of time on what message to get out. But despite that, he comes across as essentially saying that he's smarter and more moral than anyone in the executive, judicial, or legislative branches of government.
There are ways to address concerns about abuses of government power, he chose the nuclear route. Whether exposing the abuses of power that were happening is worth the side effects remains to be seen.
Re:What he said in the interview (Score:5, Insightful)
It is incredibly easy to be smarter and more moral than anyone in the executive, judicial, and legislative branches of the government.
Sometimes you need to detonate the on-site warhead.
Re:What he said in the interview (Score:5, Funny)
It is incredibly easy to be smarter and more moral than anyone in the executive, judicial, and legislative branches of the government.
General opinion is that even used-car salesman can do as much.
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It is incredibly easy to be smarter and more moral than anyone in the executive, judicial, and legislative branches of the government.
General opinion is that even used-car salesman can do as much.
When I was a kid, we had one really, really smart chicken.
I'd bet on ol' Roy the Rooster in a battle of wits with damn near any politician.
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There are ways to address concerns about abuses of government power, he chose the nuclear route.
Well, of course. Do you honestly believe that the government would self-regulate? All those governments abusing powers throughout history must be a figment of my imagination, because there's no way that governments aren't composed of perfect beings! And I don't see any reason why the people shouldn't be aware of the abuses of power.
I'm glad he took what you call "the nuclear route."
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he comes across as essentially saying that he's smarter and more moral than anyone in the executive, judicial, or legislative branches of government.
Those two bars are not especially hard to cross.
Re:What he said in the interview (Score:5, Insightful)
Better crypto for all the internet and less junk software is always a good thing
Re:What he said in the interview (Score:5, Informative)
You are correct -- in Snowden's case, it is actually impossible for him to mount a defense at trial:
https://pressfreedomfoundation.org/blog/2013/12/if-snowden-returned-us-trial-all-whistleblower-evidence-would-likely-be-inadmissible [pressfreed...dation.org]
Whistle blower protection does not exist for IC (Score:4, Informative)
People talk about whistle blower protection and legitimate whistle blower, etc. There is no whistle blower protection for the Intelligence Community (IC). The IC is specifically exempted by U.S. law from all whistle blower protection acts. Posted via TOR, for good reason!
Oh, they are worth it (Score:2, Insightful)
> he comes across as essentially saying that he's smarter and more moral than anyone in the executive, judicial, or legislative branches of government ... which seems not to be a very high bar, alas.
> he chose the nuclear route [...]
which other routes, pray tell, were open to him?
> Whether exposing the abuses of power that were happening is worth the side effects [...]
It is worth the side effects. It can be seen already.
Re:What he said in the interview (Score:5, Insightful)
I think there are a lot of smart people in the executive, judicial, legislative, and even in the intelligence branches of government. The problem is, they are in opposition (e.g., the executive preventing consideration of these issues by blocking court cases for years), the judiciary can only interpret the law as it is, the legislature has signed "blank checks" and been told only a limited amount of information about what is actually going on, and the intelligence agencies have regularly downplayed or outright lied about what they are actually doing.
At no point have the public been properly informed or consulted on this. Everything that was done to this point was a token, bogus effort. In the government it's a lot of smart people with (I believe) largely good intentions, but none of them have been allowed to see all of the pieces of the puzzle at once, or alternatively been able to share it with the public to get the public's views. That's a fundamental failure that defies the entire point of democracy and representative government. Yes, Snowden "chose the nuclear route" to get information out there, but considering the couple of decades of opportunity for any of those branches of government to do the right (inform and consult the public), it was justified. There was ample time for smart people in government to say "Wait, no, we shouldn't be doing this. At least, not without the public *really* knowing about it and giving their okay." Fail.
While I agree exposing these abuses of power has come at a high cost, there are two reasons why my concerns are tempered: 1) government had their chance to do it right, and didn't; 2) if nothing else, this episode should demonstrate yet again what most people should already know: you can't keep a secret forever, and it's better to get in front of it than to deal with the aftermath of an uncontrolled release to the public that isn't on your terms.
The public probably would be willing to grant the NSA and other intelligence agencies a lot of leeway to do their job, if properly monitored. Now? Not so much, because public trust has been violated.
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Wish I had mod points today. +1 Insightful.
Re:What he said in the interview (Score:5, Informative)
Actually, there aren't any ways to address government abuse of power, except whistleblowing.
Kiriakou: torture whistleblower, only person person to go to prison over torture. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Kiriakou [wikipedia.org]
Binney: Going to the DOJ about waste in the NSA will fuck up your life: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Binney_(U.S._intelligence_official) [wikipedia.org]
Drake: Going through the legal processes within the NSA got him prosecuted: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Andrews_Drake [wikipedia.org]
Re:What he said in the interview (Score:5, Interesting)
We've already suffered a soft coup by the Executive branch, I don't know why you think a different coup would make things better. One of the Unique things about the revolutionary period in 1700s and early 1800s, was the focus on liberty and democratic institutions of various varieties, but most coups are just about a different group of power hungry dicks taking power from an established group of dicks.
What we need is a judicial and legislative branch willing to step up to the role created for them in the Constitution -- to jealously guard their powers against Executive abuse rather than cede it, and to thereby ensure that no side gets too powerful. The mistake the founders made was in believing that politicians would consider it in their self-interest to protect their power areas and that this conflict would prevent the rise of one all powerful branch.
Over time, however, the branches got wise to this. For example, Congress figured out is was politically expedient to let the President "declare" war, or the Courts decided to defer to the Executive on anything labeled "State Secrets" and exercise no oversight -- now we have ideas such as the Unitary Executive, signing statements, extra-judicial everything. If the other branches got off their collective asses and protected their turf, a lot of these problems would go away. And note, this turf protecting presumes that they're all sociopaths -- it is the process of turf protection that was designed to protects us, not reliance that the people in the dirty fight would be good people. Our problem is that the politicians have figured out how to go beyond that level in furthering their self-interest and no longer engage in that internal war the founders envisioned, to our deep detriment.
Re:What he said in the interview (Score:5, Interesting)
There are ways to address concerns about abuses of government power, he chose the nuclear route. Whether exposing the abuses of power that were happening is worth the side effects remains to be seen.
There are, but when you are likely to get brushed under the rug, other approaches need to be used. He essentially blew a hole through the rug, meaning there was no way to hide his message.
Was the way he did things the best way, it is hard to say, since I don't fully grasp the workings of the agency, but I suspect that there are too many people with vested interests in hiding their and the agencies failings? Sometimes in politics you need someone to put their neck on the line for the greater good, but it has to be done with care since otherwise to have collateral damage and possibly a miscommunicated message. IMHO Snowdon probably did something many people would have wanted to do, in the sense of causing change, but are too stuck in the political labyrinth to achieve anything. Don't underestimate the weight of government and bureaucracy to block real change. Too many stake holders who either have vested interests or don't want to experience change.
However you look at things, Snowdon was brave, but he did follow his convictions to the end. I think many of us would be too coward to do what he did.
They leave you no choice (Score:5, Insightful)
There are ways to address concerns about abuses of government power, he chose the nuclear route
They leave you no choice. For decades now they've been saying "we'll protect the whistle blowers" and doing the exact opposite.
I've heard some people say that this is the same mentality that put Hugo Chavez in office. Why? Because whenever a moderate left-leaning person got in office, the CIA toppled them. Thus, the only way to go was full-bore hard Left militant. It's the same logic you get when all crimes are capital. You don't steal bread when all crimes are capital. You steal a gun and a jeep, rob the bank, and bust through the border blazing away.
14.4 Sec. for Library of Congress (Score:2)
(235 [TByte] / 14.4 [sec]) X 60 [sec/min] X 60 [min/hr] X 24 [hr/day] = 1.4 X10^18 [Bytes/day] = 1.4 [Exabytes/day]
Re:14.4 Sec. for Library of Congress (Score:5, Interesting)
The flow of data in was vast but not hard for the US and UK to balance for fast processing over a few sites around the world.
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2013/08/dea-and-nsa-team-intelligence-laundering [eff.org] really shows the end game - decades of calls reduced to a usable size under just one simple program.
The next trick will be to have it made legal in US domestic courts, no more magical parallel construction needed
So there. (Score:2)
Nya.
Good work reporting it (Score:2)
And with a good precedent too. (Score:2)
"A republic, if you can keep it." -Benjamin Franklin
"Remember, I didn’t want to change society. I wanted to give society a chance to determine if it should change itself." -Edward Snowden.
Best part of the story (Score:3)
How do you get the average person to care. (Score:4, Interesting)
Snowden sacrificed a lot for the world. I wish I knew of a way to get the world to care.
This isn't a liberal--conservative issue. (Score:5, Insightful)
The NSA's policies have remained constant through "liberal" and "conservative" administrations. This is not a liberal/conservative or right wing/left wing issue. You don't need to decide which side you are on before you decide where you stand on the issue of the NSA's bulk surveillance of American citizens. Maybe you actually ought to think for yourself on this issue!!!
The NSA is a HUGE waste of money. I defy anyone to prove otherwise.
I like the idea of the NSA spying on the rest of the world. But when the NSA starts spying on Americans, bad people--very bad people--have taken over the NSA. These people are acting just like Stasi functionaries and it is scary.
This is awful and it needs to stop.
Re: (Score:3)
And, I'd add that I want there to be real checks and balances on their spying activities. Not just a "secret rubber-stamp court" that approves all requests and seals them behind a "National Security" veil where nobody, not even Congressfolk with high security clearance, can see them. I understand why they wouldn't want the world to know that they are listening in on Suspect X because they might be contacting Suspected Terrorist Y, but there's got to be a way to balance their need for secrecy with our need
Information Dominance? (Score:3)
Does this imply there is an "information dominatrix?"
"50 shades of gray for your firewall?"
Re:And nothing has changed... (Score:5, Insightful)
If nothing has changed, it's not his fault.
It's ours.
Re:And nothing has changed... (Score:5, Insightful)
And nothing has changed. What a waste of time. Enjoy your stay, comrade.
It took years for this shit to become entrenched, it is going to take at least as long to unwind it.
Re: (Score:2)
Attention span? (Score:2)
Attention span? Absolutely NOT! The public can't remember when 9/11/01 happened. Heck, they've already forgotten the Boston Marathon bombing.
Re: (Score:3)
Heck, they've already forgotten the Boston Marathon bombing.
Obviated by the fact that even though the NSA keeps telling us their illegal spying program has stopped terrorist attacks, they never seem to want to talk about the ones they "failed" to stop.
Scare quotes around "failed" because I question whether the federal government ever had any intention of preventing said attack.
Re: And nothing has changed... (Score:5, Insightful)
No! We need real change away from both what Bush did AND what Obama is doing.
Every time people make the "but Bush" argument they're giving Obama more power to abuse the system.
Meet the new boss, same as the old boss.
Re: (Score:3)
I wish I had a mod point.
The usual procession of the conversation on this goes from "Obama did X, facscist, marxist, communist!" to "Bush did X too" to "OMG!!!1!! Obamabots don't take responsibility". Both of the last two administrations have MAJORLY fucked up our basic civil rights and since, once again, the air to so super-partisan we can't have a clear conversation about how the presidency is going downhill.
Re:And nothing has changed... (Score:4, Insightful)
Hmm,
I think a few things are or will be changing. Now as an amateur democracy activist I think more things would change if U.S. citizens realized how much political power they actually have.
Read and understand the Constitution: the only powers the government has are specifically listed in that document; to that end, it even states that any power or right not specifically delegated to the government in the Constitution (and Amendments) is a right and power of the people.
The people running the government have been very successful at convincing regular folks that we don't actually have as many rights as the Constitution allows us. Not sure what to do about that one...
Re: (Score:2)
Anyone will know, it will take one other attack for the General public to go up and screaming back at the NSA for not doing its job, if because they didn't see it coming.
That has more to do with their lack of principles (Whatever happened to "the land of the free and the home of the brave"? It never existed.) than what Snowden has done.
Re: (Score:3)
Thanks to Snowden the US courts are able to understand what was going on domestically and there is less cover for tame press and well funded sock puppets.
http://www.freedomwatchusa.org/federal-judge-rules-against-nsa [freedomwatchusa.org]
Re: (Score:2)
Perhaps you mean the (possible) pullback on monitoring the cell phones of the leaders or our allies, like Angela Merkel. They didn't say, but I would imagine they'd stop doing that shit, at least for a while.
So, what was your point again?
Re: (Score:2)
Rushed changes = removing more freedoms in the name of security.
Re: (Score:2)
Rushed changes? WHAT rushed changes?
Well, I encrypted my hard drive and changed my passwords. Should I have waited?
Re:Congratulations! (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
The American public can't understand it correctly unless they are first exposed to it. Prior to a few months ago, how often did you hear normal people using terms like "metadata"? And now?
Though the process might hurt and might not turn out perfect, it's far better that we, as a country, go through these growing pains and make these decisions now, together, rather than forfeiting that opportunity by allowing the decisions to be made for us in shadowy, smoke-filled rooms. We've gone from having no say in the
Re: (Score:2)
That's only because they do not realise that Snowden is so much smarter/more moral than anyone else (except possibly for those who agree with him).
Re: (Score:2)
He'd like his red stapler, please.
Re:Yep. (Score:4, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3)
He may have gotten us all to open our eyes regarding the NSA, Constitutional abuses, Corporate America's involvement and capitulation, etc, but as long as he has more documents his mission is not complete.
If he's smart (and I think he is) there is a cache of documents somewhere that the NSA never wants exposed. The NSA knows he has them. That's Snowden's insurance policy. They will only come out if Snowden is killed or captured.