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Snowden Offers to Help Brazil Uncover Possible U.S. Espionage
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This is the biggest thing to me. What's done is done. But any further action that would people in danger is past the line.
I'm not saying that what he did was wrong or right. That's not my call to make, and I really don't have an educated opinion on it. Information is just that, information. But when lives start to be at risk, then it's really hard to defend the guy.
You mean... like HIS life? >_>
Maddocks
Member
I know they already said no, but the way the thread title is worded it makes it sound like a desperate play. It's like in the Simpsons when the pi says he will make sideshow Bob leave and then is....awww come on... I'll be your friend.... you're mean...
its like he's saying he will do it only if you let him stay and it might not even uncover anything, he will only look into it. Almost like he will do a Google search and say,"thanks, but couldn't help ya, bye"
its like he's saying he will do it only if you let him stay and it might not even uncover anything, he will only look into it. Almost like he will do a Google search and say,"thanks, but couldn't help ya, bye"
Bam Bam Baklava
Member
Well he's hiding out in Russia for one thing. A country that is unapologetic about their abuses and doesn't mask the idea that they control the media. Now he's offering to just go work for other countries spy agencies and do exactly what he blasted the NSA for.
IdreamofHIME
Member
For all the secrets he knows, you'd think he'd be keeping quiet about some stuff. Can't help but feel he's gonna have an 'accident' sooner or later.
Poor Snowden
You can't be serious...
IdreamofHIME said:
A well-deserved one, at that.
He hasn't put lives at risk, though. There hasn't been any information released about American agents.
It doesn't apply to Top Secret/Classified information. There's a process by which Snowden could have complained internally to DOD and to the Congress Intelligence committees but they probably would have kept a lid on the information
Funky Papa
FUNK-Y-PPA-4
Quite the contrary.
why? I want to know more
The protests had many themes but were mostly about resentment of the government, so we had people protesting for education, some about corruption and some were very specific like the bus fares. Snowden could become a theme of protest for a part of the population that dislikes the US or that was offended by the spying.
The decision of asylum will be made by president Dilma, who will face an election next year. Dilma loves to give speech about the spying and I think that the asylum will be a popular decision. With some pressure (from the electoral scenario or protest pressure) I can see Dilma using the asylum as a political act.
You don't think snooping on phone records is a valid counter terrorism tactic?
Right. I'm saying at that point. Didn't mean to imply he had.
He wasn't a whistleblower though. He is implicitly a 'traitor' and committed espionage against the United States.
A whistleblower would be someone who sees wrongdoing and alerts higher ups or an authority with oversight.
What Snowden did, is get hired by the NSA, use his position to download, catalogue highly classified US documents and intelligence and then share them with foreign nations, like China and Russia. The key here people need to remember, the NSA is part of the US defense network and is a foreign intelligence gathering organization, and monitors both foreign and domestic communications.
Not only has Snowden completely thrown the NSA into turmoil, but has weakened the entire US intelligence community. China and Russia would have already taken steps to now ensure they use the same tactics or prevent the US from using those means.
If something was illegal and against the constitution, he could have hired a lawyer, gone to the justice department (little good it would have done him), but when both the Congress, Senate and the President approve of what the NSA/CIA is doing, no laws are broken.
People are utter fools to think the US was the only one doing this, that China doesn't do the same, that Germany, France, the UK also don't monitor their citizens or foreign intelligence.
Why would anyone take him in? They'd risk US ire, and they don't need that. This isn't the Cold War where both sides had defections. You can bet if this was a Chinese national or Russian national, just the sheer amount of information he's stolen and released, he'd probably have been assassinated by now. Imagine if Snowden was Israeli and selling/sharing top secret information with Iran, or he was Indian and sharing it with Pakistan, what would happen?
Deified Data
Banned
Could be that touting all the damaging secrets he has is the only thing keeping him alive - or free, in any case.
PflargBlarg
Member
Mm, NSA doing a really good job on you guys with the demonization of snowden. I have yet to see anything about him sharing secrets on US undercover agents, or anything else that would put lives at risk, but people love to make assumptions.
Sirpopopop
Member
Your post is silly hyperbole. The U.S. isn't an innocent actor, nor should it be. Furthermore, the U.S. hasn't murdered innocent people by the thousands with drones. While the actual number is still high, it's nowhere near the level that you are striking out with, at all.
Your post ignores the good the U.S. has done with regards to aids in Africa, the help offered to many governments after they get hit by a natural crisis, and successful attempts at intervention such as Libya & Serbia.
MisterFalcon
Member
Snowden does not really care about innocent deaths or he would not offer his help to a nation where police death squads kill thousands or seek refuge in Russia that actually kills whistleblowers. He only cares about damaging the US intelligence services.
Why? I want to know much more.
US law doesn't seem to be absolute.
For example it seems to be totally okay for some people to lie to congress.
http://www.slate.com/articles/news_..._lied_to_congress_about_nsa_surveillance.html
Someone already tried that.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Andrews_Drake#Drake_action_within_the_NSA
Why do you propose to try that route again?
Definition of insanity: Doing the same thing over and over and over again and expecting different results.
Also what do you seriously expect from US government especially Obama? When your nobel prize winner lies over and over again.
I find that pretty funny. Getting lied to by your own president and not questioning it, but calling Snowden - an actual hero - a traitor. Getting spied upon by your own government + having your own government violate the constituion over and over again, but calling the one telling you that fact a traitor. smfh
Why don't you call Obama and the NSA traitors? Because those are the actual traitors here. But right, the red pill is hard to swallow. So better use the blue pill and stay in la-la-freedom-land.
Snowden is going to overextend his hand an end up with a bullet between the eyes. Obama won't even be impacted that negatively by it either because the more this goes on and Snowden shifts to other areas of exposing the more he is going to become disliked.
He can parade around Russia like he is safe all he wants but you can bet your ass snipers are locked on his every movement
He can parade around Russia like he is safe all he wants but you can bet your ass snipers are locked on his every movement
Kite
Member
heh this move is going probably going to lose him most mainstream support here in the US. I don't think most Americans are going to be shocked, outraged or angry that we are spying on foreign countries like Brazil or that they are probably spying on us as well. Offering to give up our spies is pretty much a traitor's move, gg.
ElectricBlue187
Member
The real world isn't like Call of Duty, antonz
Call of Duty wishes it could claim to be the real world.
Eh, if anything, being grabbed by Russian intelligence is much more likely if he starts showing that he has more information than he first let on.
Assuming they don't already have a good amount of what he had.
What choice does he have? Russia probably made him an offer he'd rather refuse, that's why he's shopping around for another place to flee to.
No one is saying hos whistleblowing is treason. His offer to rat out our foreign intelligence in exchange for asylum, however, is.
I guess said agents probably have all the time in the world to move back to the US, back to safety, but their supervisors will not do that and if anything happens to them, will redirect the blame back to Snowden....
There are sudden leaks that put agents lives at risk, but this does not seem to be one of them. This can be predicted, countermeasures (defensive, not offensive) can be taken. I wonder if they are doing it now, to save lives.
Future PhaZe
Member
None of this stuff affects anyone.
It's like people forget Bush still gets applause when he goes to baseball games despite commiting war crimes or that the US has illegally invaded countries or that we routinely accidently kill innocent people on their own soil in places we don't belong.
People live with this knowledge every day and go back to ESPN on monday nights to watch football.
NSA? Spying? The US will just pin the blame on a couple of figureheads and let the local networks blow their loads and watch the controversy boil into nothing within three months if that.
It's like people forget Bush still gets applause when he goes to baseball games despite commiting war crimes or that the US has illegally invaded countries or that we routinely accidently kill innocent people on their own soil in places we don't belong.
People live with this knowledge every day and go back to ESPN on monday nights to watch football.
NSA? Spying? The US will just pin the blame on a couple of figureheads and let the local networks blow their loads and watch the controversy boil into nothing within three months if that.
#"slow clap!"
At the beginning of this process I was willing to give Snowden the benefit of the doubt. After all, it's perfectly legitimate to have a conscientious objection to a domestic spying program if one feels it violates the constitution, and if one feels strongly enough to do what he did, so be it.
However, at this point he's gone beyond revealing what he feels is damaging to the US Constitution and the American public and is outright threatening to completely reveal information that is sensitive as if having an international intelligence apparatus is either unusual, unlawful, or uncommon amongst not just western civilization but all first-world civilization.
Given this behavior I can't help but feel he's not in it for doing good, nor for protecting people, nor for love of country or Constitution. He's in it for love of infamy, plain and simple.
However, at this point he's gone beyond revealing what he feels is damaging to the US Constitution and the American public and is outright threatening to completely reveal information that is sensitive as if having an international intelligence apparatus is either unusual, unlawful, or uncommon amongst not just western civilization but all first-world civilization.
Given this behavior I can't help but feel he's not in it for doing good, nor for protecting people, nor for love of country or Constitution. He's in it for love of infamy, plain and simple.
what do you think he is threatening to reveal and why do you think this?
Bam Bam Baklava
Member
Fair enough but don't tell me he's not a hypocrite or call him a hero. If he had some real integrity he would be talking shit on Russia and Brazil for the crap they pull instead of kissing their asses.
AyaisMUsikWhore
Member
At first, I thought he was doing this to protect us Americans from what was we didn't know. Now I feel like he's trying to kill us. Does he have any idea what this does for the American people. What if these countries he's helping rises up in one huge Alliance and tears us out? Did he think of this at all?
Just going by this topic and the other currently on the first page of the OT. However, beyond that, this all started with domestic surveillance concerns, and I can see the rationale for doing what he did. However, he's since gone beyond that (even disregarding the allegations in the two threads here in the OT right now) and revealed non-domestic surveillance information. So it's a matter of what he might reveal and what he's already revealed.
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