Enough of this drama. Snowden has served his purpose in revealing the extend of the NSA shenanigans, but we really shouldn't have to read about his every move.
This Reuters news release does not even mention the nature of the leaks that put Mr. Snowden in this situation. It's truly a sad state of reporting and public discourse.
Edit: taking a bit of my own advice:
We need to stop the NSA snooping all of our communications and restore due process for searches and seizures!
If we continue our insatiability for personal narratives, we run into situations where organizations like the NSA can choose scapegoats and blame everything on them. That would be bad, because mass surveillance programs are not the work of individuals, they are systemic constructs. So the NSA gets to hold one or two out people for crucifixion, say "see, we've made things right by punishing X and Y", and continue doing things exactly as they've always done them.
I think there's the fact that a lot of people care about what happens to someone who has delivered some vitally important information to the world at large. In a sense, by keeping him in the public spotlight he's a little bit more protected. It's also likely that this latest grant of asylum is a PR stunt, one that wouldn't have materialized had it not been for the ongoing media circus.
2. Somebody calls out the trend
3. Somebody calls out the `the person that calls out the trend`
4. Repeat as long as neccessary
5. Somebody calls out the meta
Every time, every single time.
I think your problem is that you're seeing one article as the indicator of the state of public discourse. Heres a bunch more:
https://www.google.com/search?hl=en&gl=us&tbm=nws&authuser=0...
This article is a brief update on Snowden's asylum status and it conveys just that. Not every article on the matter needs to discuss the full depth of the issue.
I'm OK with some news about Snowden from time to time as long as the number of stories about surveillance largely outnumber the ones about Snowden. I think HN has a healthy ratio.
Furthermore since Snowden's revelations has resulted in basically zero change to the status quo (no legislation, no change in policies, no change in diplomatic relations, no mass uprising by the public) you have to imagine he's wondering what the whole point of it was.
There has never been any doubt that whistle blowers can seek refuge in countries that are enemies of the United States.
Does every article need to recount all the events leading up to the current situation? Where do we draw the line, exactly?
But I think the Snowden story is important as well, perhaps even more important. It's not really about Snowden, personally. It's about the power and secrecy of the government. It's about individual conscience and defiance. It's about how we, as a society, deal with non-conformity.
Compare Snowden with Bradley Manning. Compare Manning with previous whistleblowers like Daniel Ellsberg, Mark Fein or Thomas Drake. Manning's leaks were much more consequential than those that came before him, but things turned out pretty badly for Manning himself. Snowden clearly thought about how to increase the impact of the information he released, as well as how to decrease the negative consequences for himself. The next leaker, whoever it turns out to be, will undoubtedly learn from Snowden's example, just as Snowden learned from Manning.
Snowden's story is important for the rest of us as well. Most of us will never have the chance to do what Snowden did. But we all face situations where doing the right thing could lead to negative consequences. Seeing what happens to Snowden, seeing how we collectively react to what he did, in the media and in person, who can avoid putting himself in Snoweden's shoes? Who can help asking, "What would my family say about me if I did something like that?"
I think the focus on Snowden's story can help us figure out what kind of society we want to have, as 911 recedes into the past. Ultimately that's more important than the news that the NSA, the government's largest spy organization, is actually spying.
The reason why ALL the news sources (liberal and otherwise) covered this is because it is newsworthy. It's human nature to want to put a face to a scandal. And to be honest it's a great face. Snowden is young, exciting, mysterious, less than perfect. Add the fact that he is jetsetting around the world, visiting exciting countries with great visuals, upsetting foreign leaders and creating lots of mini scandals just keeps his story rolling.
CNN especially is just a business. And Snowden is a money maker. No conspiracy needed to work this one out.
CNN, and many other liberal "news sources" whose primary charter is to support the Obama administration can be blamed for most of this
I really don't know if Snowden knows that, but it would be really ironic if he accepted the proposal.
He wanted to do what he could to expose what he believed to be wrongdoing. And now he simply wants to avoid prison if possible, like pretty much anyone else would. There's no nobility in throwing away his lifetime in an American jail -- he's already exposed the NSA's programs, and prison accomplishes nothing more.
Sure, it's easy to call him a hypocrite for applying for asylum in countries "less free" than the US. But as long as "free" countries allow themselves to be pressured by the US, what choice does he have? Would you do anything different in his shoes?
I say this as an American who will pledge allegiance to the US Constitution any day of the week, but not to the US government, especially not in its current form. I'm genuinely scared at how far my government has gone in persecuting lawful, nonviolent protesters and activists. Just look at the Aaron Swartz case, the harassment of Jacob Appelbaum at the border, or police actions during the Occupy protests (less related to hacker culture but just as important).
I can no longer believe that those who stay within the law have nothing to fear from the US government. This may not be true of the Venezuelan government either, but the fact that they don't let USG boss them around means at least there are options.
If whistle-blowers are safe, we will see more of them. More whistle-blowers means less corruption and a healthier political system.
Snowden didn't do all this to enhance his personal freedom. He knew from the start it would be degraded, one way or another. He sacrificed his own freedom for the sake of ours.
Snowden's not exactly in a position to be so picky, at the moment.
It's also really ironic for people who aren't whistleblowers to criticize the limited options of whisteblowers.
> then aired private conversations by opposition leaders
The government owns the TV in Venezuela. This is a very different premise (one is about political propaganda and another is about general population privacy).
Take this for example:
'Snidely70448 Snowden STOLE 3 NSA computers with top secret classified government documents in violation of his employment agreement with Booz Allen, theft alone is a basic crime and when the theft involves top secret government documents it’s in violation of the Espionage Act. Flight to avoid prosecution is also a crime in this country. These laws weren’t written yesterday just for Mr. Snowden. The U.S. is seeking Edward Snowden to answer to those charges. Plain and simple. He isn’t being singled out or vilified. You claim that NSA is violating the 4th Amendment (Congress and the Patriot Act disagree with you), yet you ignore that Snowden violated basic laws of the land.'
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2011/mar/17/us-spy-oper...
That said the problem with the comments are:
* Violation of an employment agreement are not federal crimes * Theft of classified documents is not a violation of the Espionage Act. The reason why the espionage act is from 1917 is because government lawyers love the broad language in it. They haven't needed to update it because it can be applied so broadly, but the language of the law states that there needs to be an intent to aid the enemy or to prevent the US Military from carrying out operations.
The other red flag that indicated that Snowden hasn't violated 'basic laws' is that the USA is resorting to diplomatic pressure rather than an INTERPOL notice. You can't use INTERPOL for political charges but you can use it for more classic charges like theft.
There is a good reason why the 4th amendment was written, it was a lesson learned form British colonialism where independence oriented towns and villages were surrounded and houses were searched indiscriminately to shake out sympathizers opposed to the crown.
So to concentrate on the legality of the whistleblower's activity, instead of concentrating on the NSA's activity seems a little suspect.
In contrast Snowden seems to be at stage 6, and his actions seem way saner than that comment.
[0]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawrence_Kohlberg's_stages_of_m...
... sounds eerily like something you'd hear Carney or some other spokesman say at a press briefing. It's the familiar paternalistic tone that does it.
It's a counterpoint to people saying that Snowden is being 'persecuted' and that the USA is now a place that freedom loving people flee from.
Whilst I agree with the view that we should not have mass surveillance and it would be horrifying if someone were persecuted for expressing that view, that is not why the US is chasing him.
He is being chased for intentionally stealing classified documents. Can you name a government that wouldn't pursue someone who did this?
If had a penny for every time that happens when blindly accepted authority is criticized in any way, I could simply buy the NSA and DARPA, and start implementing some of Bill Hicks' ideas, like shooting food at starving people.
Isn't the 4th amendment a pretty basic law of the land, in the Bill of Rights along with free speech, trial by jury and the other nuisances?
Obama previously said 'he's not scrambling jets' to catch him, but given this week's events I don't believe him. I wouldn't at all be surprised if the US went after his flight somehow. It seems like this administration is willing to be the international villain in their attempts to catch Snowden.
And maybe the CIA wouldn't dare forcibly take Snowden out of Russia or China, but who's to say they wouldn't do so to a smaller, less powerful country?
I think this is more to do with the publicity than the power/size of the country he is in when they do it. Extracting Snowden from another country forcefully would have huge repercussions. I think that would be the step too far that would unite world leaders in rebuking America.
And be serious. Obama is not going to scramble jets to destroy a plane to catch one low level hacker. He doesn't need to. The damage has been done and Snowden doesn't have a whole lot more he can reveal that will hurt the US. They pretty much want to just set an example for other people thinking of leaking military secrets.
I just plotted a path from Moscow to Venezuela that avoids non-Russian/Venezuelan airspace. It's less than 12,000km. Several modern Boeing and Airbus planes can do that non-stop.
How they're going to actually get him to Venezuela without the plane being forced down and searched is another thing entirely.
AFAIK it later became clear they hadn't issued that document and Snowden was able to travel as his passport wasn't revoked until he was already in the air on his way to Russia.
Revealing himself can also give courage to those who are under the powerful illusion that the mechanisms of the US government are not able to be overcome by a living human being.
That's my take, anyway.
[1]: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/10...
why raise the standards for other countries?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Incarceration
(don't get me wrong - venezuela has serious problems. but cherry picking examples for one country is no argument at all. people in glass houses....
also, wouldn't it make the world a worst place if we required the country offering asylum to be "better" than the country persecuting someone? that seems pointless, except for internet point-scoring)
[edited multiple times btw]
And while we have entirely too many prisoners in this country, they aren't 'political prisoners'. People aren't thrown into prison for protesting the government. (Or not generally, you did have McCarthyism and such in the past)
It would end up being kind of ironic and sad if he had to live in a country that ended up being just as corrupt and used this level of spying on its own citizens. Pretty confident that Iceland would not be pulling crap like that.
"The proposal to grant Snowden citizenship received limited support when it was discussed Thursday — the last day before summer recess. Six members of minority parties were in favor out of Parliament's 63 members." http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/story/2013/07/05/nsa-snowden-ic...
I had to laugh at the sheer absurdity.