Snowden: I raised NSA concerns internally over 10 times before going rogue

reply to post by Blackmarketeer


i was referring to the content of the original post. Not the poster.

Snarl



And ... no ... I'm not the least bit concerned that some of the information which can be related to me is swept up in that process. They can't 'do' anything with it. As soon as my citizenship is identified it is subject to stringent handling procedures. 99.99% of the time it has to be purged before it's subject to any analysis whatsoever.

Do you know who 'they' are then? Who's standing over 'they' as 'they' have a little peeky? do 'they' report to their boss, "I have just looked at 65 million names, they are all Americans...here's the list, let me know the cop-outs by 2100 AD" It's fecking silly, isn't it? So you tell me how it's done?

smurfy

Snarl
And ... no ... I'm not the least bit concerned that some of the information which can be related to me is swept up in that process. They can't 'do' anything with it. As soon as my citizenship is identified it is subject to stringent handling procedures. 99.99% of the time it has to be purged before it's subject to any analysis whatsoever.

Do you know who 'they' are then? Who's standing over 'they' as 'they' have a little peeky? do 'they' report to their boss, "I have just looked at 65 million names, they are all Americans...here's the list, let me know the cop-outs by 2100 AD" It's fecking silly, isn't it? So you tell me how it's done?

You know how it's done.

I just got called a statist. Might be an apt definition ... might miss the mark completely.

What this boils down to is personal integrity. No one forces a person to take an oath. People oughta be considerate of that. I remember someone once telling me a man is only as good as his word. Look at the divorce rate and you'll get a better understanding of where I'm coming from. There's a lot of folks out there who care little about their word being their bond.

Snarl



I just got called a statist. Might be an apt definition ... might miss the mark completely.

Do you know what the difference between a Nationalist and Patriot is?
A Nationalist sticks up for the government of the day regardless of who is running.
A Patriot sticks up for the values and freedoms the country was founded upon.

Snarl

smurfy

Snarl
And ... no ... I'm not the least bit concerned that some of the information which can be related to me is swept up in that process. They can't 'do' anything with it. As soon as my citizenship is identified it is subject to stringent handling procedures. 99.99% of the time it has to be purged before it's subject to any analysis whatsoever.

Do you know who 'they' are then? Who's standing over 'they' as 'they' have a little peeky? do 'they' report to their boss, "I have just looked at 65 million names, they are all Americans...here's the list, let me know the cop-outs by 2100 AD" It's fecking silly, isn't it? So you tell me how it's done?

You know how it's done.

I just got called a statist. Might be an apt definition ... might miss the mark completely.

What this boils down to is personal integrity. No one forces a person to take an oath. People oughta be considerate of that. I remember someone once telling me a man is only as good as his word. Look at the divorce rate and you'll get a better understanding of where I'm coming from. There's a lot of folks out there who care little about their word being their bond.

I would say that Snowden has More, 'personal integrity' than those who advised him to hush up. Whatever oath he took was corrupted by the work he was given being in violation of America's written constitution, and he has the evidence. American legalese can't handle that in any which way because America has the written constitution. Do you see the conundrum?
However, I did also note the sleekedness in your remarks about Snowden-Putin-Ukcraine invasion, that was sound bites through the back door, and nothing to do with integrity.

jacobe001

Snarl
I just got called a statist. Might be an apt definition ... might miss the mark completely.

Do you know what the difference between a Nationalist and Patriot is?
A Nationalist sticks up for the government of the day regardless of who is running.
A Patriot sticks up for the values and freedoms the country was founded upon.

So ... we're safe to say Snowden is an anti-nationalist ... a bold one, I'll grant you. He's certainly no patriot.

Smart as he is ... he casts aspersions on the wrong group? Look up there at smurfy's post and the first line of my response. Now you know why I didn't comment on the rest of BFFT's reply.

-Cheers

Something else just popped up regarding Snowden:

Kill the Snowden interview, congressman tells SXSW
(source CNet)

A member of the House Intelligence Committee, Mike Pompeo, published an open letter to South by Southwest Interactive conference organizers on Friday demanding that they rescind their invitation to Edward Snowden.

Pompeo, R-Kan., said he was "deeply troubled" by the scheduled video appearance of Snowden, whom he described as lacking the credentials to authoritatively speak on issues pertaining to "privacy, surveillance, and online monitoring."

Snowden is scheduled to speak by video conferencing on Monday at 11 a.m. CT with Christopher Soghoian, a privacy advocate and principal technologist at the American Civil Liberties Union, who will be onstage at SXSW in Austin, Texas. Moderated by Ben Wizner, the director of the ACLU's Speech, Privacy, and Technology Project, Snowden is expected to answer audience questions.

The panel, "A Virtual Conversation with Edward Snowden," will focus on the impact of the NSA spying revelations and how technology can be used to protect privacy.

Love the comment from Pompeo that Snowden was 'lacking the credentials to authoritatively speak on issues pertaining to "privacy, surveillance, and online monitoring." ' No jackass, he only blew the lid off all the domestic & international spying. I'd say Snowden is eminently qualified to speak at such a conference. Why the hell is a politician telling a civilian tech conference who they can or can't have on their list of guest speakers anyhow?

Snarl, every time I see you on a Snowden's thread, it's calm-water clear that you've given yourself a personal mission to make him look like a traitor for the sole reason he might haven't respected his oath in the first place.
I mean, how can you seriously call somebody a traitor when for once we have one that's raising by his own against an unacceptable lookalike orwelly state.

A traitor, you say?

Let me ask you this then. Would it be a robbery to take back something that has been stolen from you, even if it means taking it back the hard way? Because that's exactly what's happening right now.

Government taking away our right to freedom and privacy doing it slyly without nobody knowing it. And then justifying themselves with unjust and criminal laws that are supposed to make them look like reasonable officials.

It's true a lot of people don't give a sh-t about this whole mass-surveillance program and the way the government communicates about it. However, it doesn't make it less outrageous and offensive considering the reasons they supposedly do it, which is, to protect the country (if not the whole world) of these so-called terrorists threats. War on terror, they say.

They believe that with fear they are going to make us accept anything possible. We'll prove them wrong.

reply to post by St0rD

Actually, I could care less about what he did. You find me taking an opposing viewpoint for the sake of discussion. That's why I never say anything back to anyone who makes it personal. You'll find at least one star of encouragement beside every reply to me.

-Cheers!!

ETA: I also don't want anyone to EVER accuse me of star farming on this site.

reply to post by Blackmarketeer


Thank you for posting this.

All those people who called him a traitor should apologize to him. You can only do what you can do! Snowden done the right thing.

reply to post by Snarl


For the sake of discussion you say?

I'm always on for another viewpoint especially in this kind of discussion, but I sincerely don't think it will bring anything positive to the NSA debate to call Snowden a traitor to his country in every single thread about him. It's got to be more complex than that, don't you think?

reply to post by St0rD

It's got to be more complex than that, don't you think?

Without a doubt. I've previously asked in-thread and privately for support from folks who are in-the-know. An explanation would be a daunting task, possibly lead to real-life repercussions, and met with contemptuous ridicule and mockery from the membership at large. IOW, it would be a massive waste of time and effort.

Here's some discussion:

What did he change (other than making a lot of people upset)? Collection continues same as it always has ... might even get better, depending on how things change.

Why did he go to Greenwald?

But time after time Greenwald has returned to the mantras of supporting massive wealth redistribution and maligning the U.S. as the source of the world’s ills. His commitment to Trotskyists and other totalitarian socialists is no accident, but an expression of his inner core.

Source (an excellent read)

Why did he run to China and then on to Russia? I've already answered this numerous times ... and no one wants to challenge me on it ... because deep down everyone knows I'm right ... but they've already called him their hero, and it's embarrassing to be wrong and have to admit it.

benrl
Shuts up people that said "Why didn't he follow chain of command" He did, they ignored him.

Snowden deserves a Nobel over Obama any day of the week.

Why would the chain of command even listen to him when the orders came from the top? Not much you can do when the executive office of the U.S.A was the source to begin with. We all knew this was happening and it escalated even further under Bush jr. People didn't care then and they don't care now. Facebook campaigns and internet petitions are about all the U.S populace could muster. It ruffled a few feathers overseas and that was about it. No mass demonstrations, no civil disobedience, nothing.

We are kidding ourselves if we think that Obama or any other future U.S president is going to curtail surveillance. It will just continue to increase exponentially, although at a somewhat slower rate since the chef noticed that the frogs seemed to figure out they were in a pot of water (but the latter are still comfortable since it hasn't reached boiling point yet).

Snarl
What this boils down to is personal integrity. No one forces a person to take an oath. People oughta be considerate of that. I remember someone once telling me a man is only as good as his word. Look at the divorce rate and you'll get a better understanding of where I'm coming from. There's a lot of folks out there who care little about their word being their bond.

But the Oath that he took was, "to support and defend the Constitution of the U.S., against all enemies, foreign and domestic." It wasn't to serve the president or his military commander or to keep secrets or anything else. So if he concluded that what the NSA was doing, or having him do for them was in violation of that oath then he was in fact keeping his oath.

Now, he may very well be breaking a "Contract Agreement" which was a condition of his employment but that is something different. Being that the Contract has him legally bound to act against his Oath is the real problem here.

reply to post by Snarl

He's a mudslinger and a sissy.

^^ Irony

What did he change (other than making a lot of people upset)? Collection continues same as it always has ... might even get better, depending on how things change.

From the security-apparatus perspective, nothing will change beyond making it harder to whistleblow and data collection will still gather increasing momentum. That's the way of the world.

What has changed for some of the public is that surveillance concerns are no longer the jurisdiction of conspiracy websites or fringe political blogs. Right now, European nations know their allies are looking through their metaphorical cupboards and drawers. The public in Europe and the US know that their unelected protectors aren't just analysing the data of potential enemies; they are essentially seeing all of us as potential enemies.

Rather than excessive surveillance being ill-defined and almost mythical, it now has substance and reality. That's what's changed.

Will this take the wind out of the sails of all those people who view what he did as an act of treason? So what should someone do when they are working for the government, learn that the government is doing something illegal and unConstitutional, attempt to have something done about it and get nowhere because of the corruption and disregard for the law within the government? Keep his mouth shut? Anyone who would keep their mouths shut when the government is ignoring the Constitutional rights of the citizenry should be arrested and tried for treason.

JiggyPotamus
Will this take the wind out of the sails of all those people who view what he did as an act of treason? So what should someone do when they are working for the government, learn that the government is doing something illegal and unConstitutional, attempt to have something done about it and get nowhere because of the corruption and disregard for the law within the government? Keep his mouth shut? Anyone who would keep their mouths shut when the government is ignoring the Constitutional rights of the citizenry should be arrested and tried for treason.

Clearly it won't, since one of Snowden's strongest ATS critics chimed in right on the first page.

Kandinsky
Irony

What can I say? Touché!!

From the security-apparatus perspective, nothing will change beyond making it harder to whistleblow and data collection will still gather increasing momentum. That's the way of the world.

What has changed for some of the public is that surveillance concerns are no longer the jurisdiction of conspiracy websites or fringe political blogs. Right now, European nations know their allies are looking through their metaphorical cupboards and drawers. The public in Europe and the US know that their unelected protectors aren't just analysing the data of potential enemies; they are essentially seeing all of us as potential enemies.

Rather than excessive surveillance being ill-defined and almost mythical, it now has substance and reality. That's what's changed.

I think when the apparatus being designed is fully implemented ... there will be no more whistleblowing. As for the Surveillance State and mythic proportion ... it's pretty safe to say that if you can imagine it being possible ... it's already being done.

What is also true, is that the average Joe need not become paranoid. The likelihood of anyone becoming a 'target' of the intelligence community is incomprehensibly small.

Snarl
I think when the apparatus being designed is fully implemented ... there will be no more whistleblowing. As for the Surveillance State and mythic proportion ... it's pretty safe to say that if you can imagine it being possible ... it's already being done.

What is also true, is that the average Joe need not become paranoid. The likelihood of anyone becoming a 'target' of the intelligence community is incomprehensibly small.

Yes but that is hardly the point now is it???

After all, my chances of being Raped are pretty damn small as well. In fact, I'd say they are even less then the odds that the NSA is collecting my data. Yet does that mean that I should turn a blind eye to Rape as being wrong??? Should I care nothing for those who suffer from Rape simply because I don't suffer the same as them???

For someone who speaks so much about integrity I don't seem to be finding much of it from what I am reading in your posts.

reply to post by mOjOm

You make excellent points.

We have to define what an oath is. I use the term rather loosely ... a promise being a promise. In that regard, Snowden DID take an oath not to divulge classified information. He Did break his vow ... and look who he ran to.

One can be bound to multiple oaths simultaneously. Having served, in similar circumstances to Snowden's, I never ran into conflict. I've found the waters far cloudier in my current profession.