General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsSnowden will go down a hero for my generation
and for many others as well.
babylonsister
(171,079 posts)russspeakeasy
(6,539 posts)brush
(53,833 posts)Snowden now seems a disillusioned pawn of that reporter. And why did he sneak out all those documents to show the Chinese and others that we are spying on them?
News flash! Every government snoops on every other government, otherwise they're not doing their job of protecting national security.
He should've stayed right here and turned himself in like Ellsberg did if he so thought he was doing the right thing.
one_voice
(20,043 posts)Tierra_y_Libertad
(50,414 posts)uponit7771
(90,359 posts)thx
ProSense
(116,464 posts)http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023084246
Fleeing the country to avoid prosecution makes Snowden a coward.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023032645
gcomeau
(5,764 posts)Lady Freedom Returns
(14,120 posts)A TRAITOR!
Vietnameravet
(1,085 posts)Must be nice to live in an ivory tower applauding those that betray your country's secrets..
Tx4obama
(36,974 posts)Vietnameravet
(1,085 posts)the public seems them as soft on terrorism..Idealists without a clue..
avaistheone1
(14,626 posts)It's worse than pathetic when someone is smeared because he is whistle-blowing the unethical and illegal behavior of our government against its own citizens. When people are willing to subordinate their 4th amendment rights to government that is the definition of insanity. Our founders must be rolling in their graves.
Egnever
(21,506 posts)avaistheone1
(14,626 posts)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.
Egnever
(21,506 posts)Courts issued the warrants.
I dont particularly like whats going on but this tool certainly didnt allert me to the fact it was going on. this all started with the patriot act and there were widespread reports at the time of the government tapping into the data trunks and collecting all the data from there.
I was upset then about it and that hasnt changed but nothing this guy revealed is new information. It's just being used as a tool for political theater at this point. To derail the Obama administration.
avaistheone1
(14,626 posts)they have not been allowed to know.
Wyden is regularly briefed about the activities of the NSA and FISC, and he asked the Director of National Intelligence (DNI) last year to release some information about the Patriot Act and the Fourth Amendmentmost probably because he knew it existed and he couldnt talk about it directly.
A letter to Wyden from Kathleen Turner, the director of legal affairs for the DNI, confirmed that on at least one occasion, FISC found that an information request from the NSA wasnt reasonable under the Fourth Amendment.
Turner also said, I believe that the governments implementation of Section 702 of FISA [the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act] has sometimes circumvented the spirit of the law, and on at least one occasion the FISA Court has reached this same conclusion.
http://news.yahoo.com/courts-doj-tussle-over-fourth-amendment-spying-violations-100040425.html
Egnever
(21,506 posts)from the fisa courts turning down requests to the whole thing being illegal.
Doesnt it make more sense that the fisa court is turning down requests that go beyond the scope of the law?
The idea that because they turned down some applications all applications are illegal is absurd.
Thats like saying because some criminal warrants arent issued all criminal warrants are illegal which is clearly ridiculous.
caseymoz
(5,763 posts)". . . 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."
There's no probable cause for the broad gathering of information. There's no Oath or affirmation, no description of the place searched, nor the person nor things seized, an it's all done in secret, so there's no way either the people nor the Congress can give oversight, check or balance. The 4th Amendment, by the way, was written with assumption that the actions of the court would be open to scrutiny. It doesn't mean much of anything if the court handing out the warrants (like FISA) is secret.
The warrants are extremely broad, and the government has a huge database without any warrant whatsoever. And if it doesn't upset you, I have to presume it could only be because you don't understand the implications of this. You seem to think it's okay as long as the government doesn't abuse it's power, when actually our system cannot operate as a minimal democracy as long as anybody has this type of power. It takes away your power to check the governments power of abuse.
We should have gotten rid of the NSA and CIA at the end of the Cold War. If it weren't for their actions, we wouldn't need them to fight terrorists. They do a fine job justifying their existence by existing.
The Obama Administration makes use of this power look benign now, until you look too close, then it either scares you or you shoot the messenger. (Snowden, Greenwald, Assange and Manning, among others.)
And just remember, the NSA surveillance apparatus was the brainchild of Dick "The Dick" Cheney. The perfect patriot, always concerned about protecting us from terrorists, and you know he started it with best of intentions.
appal_jack
(3,813 posts)zeemike
(18,998 posts)With probable cause that they committed a crime?...WTF?
We are all suspects now?
And you can't see how that violates the forth amendment?
I think I fell asleep and woke up in East Germany...
Tx4obama
(36,974 posts)Snowden committed several felonies - he knew what he was doing was a criminal.
That is not a smear - that is the TRUTH.
As far as the NSA what they've done is not illegal, meta-data collected by a 3rd party (the telecoms) is NOT protected by the 4th amendment.
avaistheone1
(14,626 posts)Lady Freedom Returns
(14,120 posts)MADem
(135,425 posts)A hero for the likes of Doctor Evil, or his son Scott, perhaps!
He'll go down in history, all right, like Aldrich Ames, John Walker, and Robert Hanssen.
marions ghost
(19,841 posts)People who identify themselves as tea partyers believe the release of this information is in the public interest by a 56 to 39 percent margin. An almost identical segment of liberals 57 to 38 percent say the same.
Meanwhile, the 18-to-29-year-old set feel even more strongly 60 percent to 34 percent that American citizens are well-served by the knowledge Snowden has provided.
(Yahoo news)
Young people these days are smart IMO. They see where this surveillance program is going, left unchecked.
Vietnameravet
(1,085 posts)Maybe they are smart enough to tell us how to catch terrorists without spying?
Cooley Hurd
(26,877 posts)marions ghost
(19,841 posts)of the Booshcheney Era, and they can see that Iraq and Afghanistan are a big FAIL as a response to Al Qaeda. And that The Patriot Act sucks, and that Snowden showed us just how bad it sucks. So they have learned not to trust the government in dealing with our enemies. Like I said, they are smart. Maybe they are smart enough to tell us how to catch terrorists--their elders have not done very well. I'd give em a crack at it since they're smart enough to appreciate what Snowden has done for us.
Blue_Roses
(12,894 posts)they didn't know what they were doing.
How old are you again?
JoeyT
(6,785 posts)the wrong country twice, killing tens of thousands of people that had nothing to do with it, breaking virtually every war crime there is, and spending untold trillions?
That catching Osama Bin Laden? Yeah, they did a bang up job of that.
marions ghost
(19,841 posts)++++
see my post #100
marions ghost
(19,841 posts)oh sure, one day they were going to catch up with him. Look at all the misery, destruction, waste. You think the Bush wars for oil were a good thing?
Yes, I blame the elders--not those who were against the wars, but everybody who supported those tragic horrendous mistakes inflicted by the Bushites. But they had a lot of support. Everybody knows who were complicit by now.
This is what the younger generations have witnessed. Plus all the dastardly things the RepugliCons have wrought on the home front. I don't think the younger generation is impressed, they are disgusted. And they want some real changes.
Boomers, Gen X & Millennials--ALL those who are disgusted by the events of the 21st century--had better stop this divisiveness and get on top of these issues. It does no good to divide generations--that's what the corporates try to do to us.
This generational divisiveness is toxic.
AnotherDreamWeaver
(2,852 posts)Lied us into the current wars and steal elections with fake vote machines. Maybe those NSA spies are just interested in who in the USA is awake to the situation. It's likely the FBI bombed Judi Bari, and did you read this post today: http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023119333
marions ghost
(19,841 posts)and they want to continue to do so.
baldguy
(36,649 posts)And don't pretend you don't know what Snowden lied about.
marions ghost
(19,841 posts)eg. Vietnam, the Bush wars, the stolen elections etc etc. You know, the epidemic of corruption ruining the country.
I don't see Snowden acting as part of the corrupt government.
baldguy
(36,649 posts)Snowden didn't start having concerns about govt corruption until that black man was sitting in W's chair.
marions ghost
(19,841 posts)and if you're trying to paint him as a racist, you can forget that. no evidence whatsoever
Snowden is your target, not mine. I'm just glad that what he's done has opened this discussion. Long overdue.
Harmony Blue
(3,978 posts)they can call young adults dumb all they want, but the truth is that these young adults understand what is at stake.
zeemike
(18,998 posts)It is your future...most of us old farts have one foot in the grave but the young have their whole life ahead of them....and I can't say I am proud of the country we have left you to live in...
Egnever
(21,506 posts)Smart people would realize that in this digital age there is very little privacy left and act accordingly. Smart people wouldnt equate logging phone cals origins and destinations to listening to them.
Nothing smart about the arguments being made for this guy being a hero on this thread.
marions ghost
(19,841 posts)--most people now know that's not really the issue.
Egnever
(21,506 posts)marions ghost
(19,841 posts)by The Nation's Jonathan Schell
"The first thing to note about these data is that a mere generation ago, they did not exist. They are a new power in our midst, flowing from new technology, waiting to be picked up; and power, as always, creates temptation, especially for the already powerful. Our cellphones track our whereabouts. Our communications pass through centralized servers and are saved and kept for a potential eternity in storage banks, from which they can be recovered and examined. Our purchases and contacts and illnesses and entertainments are tracked and agglomerated. If we are arrested, even our DNA can be taken and stored by the state. Today, alongside each one of us, there exists a second, electronic self, created in part by us, in part by others. This other self has become de facto public property, owned chiefly by immense data-crunching corporations, which use it for commercial purposes. Now government is reaching its hand into those corporations for its own purposes, creating a brand-new domain of the state-corporate complex.
Surveillance of people on this scale turns basic libertiesabove all the Fourth Amendment, which protects citizens against unreasonable search and seizureinto a dead letter. Government officials, it is true, assure us that they will never pull the edges of the net tight. They tell us that although they could know everything about us, they wont decide to. Theyll let the information sit unexamined in the electronic vaults. But history, whether of our country or others, teaches that only a fool would place faith in such assurances. What one president refrains from doing the next will do; what is left undone in peacetime is done when a crisis comes."
Egnever
(21,506 posts)This is data you submit willingly. This is not the same as someone coming into your house and searching it.
I agree there needs to be laws created regarding the use of publicly available data in our new digital age but the idea that data you give up willingly is somehow protected under the same laws as things you never reveal to outside people is silly.
Maybe we need better education on what data is being collected on us by third parties so that people are more aware of how to protect parts of their lives they dont want to be collected for whatever entity to use be it the government or some giant corporation.
If they were listening to the phone calls I would have a different opinion but Just looking at the call logs doesnt come close to the same thing IMHO.
marions ghost
(19,841 posts)--good idea. Strange they never thought we needed to know. Til now.
New laws--that's for SURE!
zeemike
(18,998 posts)Do they have the right to that too because you willingly submitted it to a third party?
How about your bank records?...can they just collect that meta data too?
still_one
(92,370 posts)Harmony Blue
(3,978 posts)for the most part.
MADem
(135,425 posts)Vietnameravet
(1,085 posts)They couldn't find the US on a map of the world..They have no idea what the real world is like.. They havent a clue as to the sacrifices of those that came before them. They just sit around in their ivory towers in an Alice In Wonderland fashion dreaming of an ideal world that exists only in their imagination. ripping down those that defend them and criticizing everyone and everything while doing nothing themselves.
Blue_Roses
(12,894 posts)---they already "know" everything and we don't understand.
HipChick
(25,485 posts)as soon as he is done with his perp walk
longship
(40,416 posts)I do not doubt the apparent (at this time) impact of his revelations. (Although I think that they may not be as sweeping as some here portray. I am still not convinced either way.)
There are some troubling issues with his story, but I will not hold that against him. Nor will I hold his apparent political attachments, in spite that they may speak to his personal justifications.
What very much concerns me right now is that it seems like this guy was a loose cannon. He had no plan and apparently (as of now) seems to be losing allies quickly. He has been a flash in a pan, with people going utterly crazy for a few days, inventing all sorts of wild speculations, people calling each other names and making personal attacks here on DU, even those who I have long trusted. Now, all of a sudden he's gone from sight.
Hopefully, DU will settle down and one hopes that the Ignore lists will dwindle and we can again work together.
Snowden situation will sort itself out. What happens will be part of history. Hopefully we will all act like George Satayana suggested, and fucking learn from it.
we can do it
(12,190 posts)Whisp
(24,096 posts)what would it take for you to change your mind that he is not the hero you think he is?
probably nothing. Heels dug in deep and hard to get out.
Rowdyboy
(22,057 posts)Last edited Sat Jun 29, 2013, 12:11 AM - Edit history (1)
(who had the guts to face the court system to defend liberty). Shirley Chisholm and Hubert Humphrey and George McGovern.
To call Snowden a "hero" is telling for the country.
marions ghost
(19,841 posts)--We have crossed the Digital Divide. It's not the same world. Not your Daddy's surveillance apparatus.
"Defending Liberty" IS STILL the point, however. And this generation gets that it's a defining moment where the downside of the e-revolution can clearly be seen. It's heartening to me that they are on it. They will live with what happens now.
What is this whole NSA debate if it's not about Liberty?
Rowdyboy
(22,057 posts)But who am I to dismiss someone from an entirely different world. A person has zero control over the caliber of public figures they have to choose their heroes from. I was lucky. Young people today face some sad choices. The congressional political establishment has gone to hell over the last 50 years. Today, I have no idea who in congress would be a hero to me. Maybe Keith Ellison or Tammy Baldwin-it speaks volumes.
I'll edit to be at least a little less of an asshole.
marions ghost
(19,841 posts)to younger generations. Can't pass on a legacy of hope by being a curmudgeon.
This generational divide is manufactured and destructive. The same issues exist today as then, even as they take different forms-- and the younger generations need their elders to be with them in spirit, and maybe with them in the trenches if they aren't too badly downtrodden.
It is still the same battle for freedom from greedy rulers who do not have the interests of the people at heart. The wheel turns slowly but it turns by many hands helping.
It's the same battle and there are heroes in this.
Whisp
(24,096 posts)*just fixed your typo.
[hr]
[font color="blue"][center]I'm always right. When I'm wrong I admit it.
So then I'm right about being wrong.[/center][/font]
[hr]
dionysus
(26,467 posts)DCBob
(24,689 posts)RBInMaine
(13,570 posts)Egnever
(21,506 posts)A generation that posts every little detail of their life to facebook is concerned about who is looking at their phone records?
I find that really difficult to believe.
Whisp
(24,096 posts)freshwest
(53,661 posts)Using the pronoun you in general. but not personally:
While you're at it, close your bank and savings account, credit cards, stop paying health insurance, car insurance, rent, taxes, mortgages, car notes, memberships and any other payments that are traceable. Each and every one in the same data base in order to make them work, understand?
Then go sovereign citizen and give up your driver license, and any vehicle that has to be registered, and your passport - unless you're leaving to a country where no ID is ever required.
((Get back with us on this. I'm thinking Somalia. Wait, they have guys with guns who can tell who's who. If you are not who they like, too bad for you.))
And while you're at it, burn your social security card that started all this mess. Everything I've listed uses it as an ID. It's the master file. Don't get any vaccines, as that's how they microchip you, don't you know. Muahaha. Really, get your bug out kit and boots and flee for the hills.
Don't go and see any of your family and friends who are still in the evil electronic system, or the Terminator Two will acquire you there. No escape from technology. But John Connor did escape for quite a while. Until the future came back for him.
Just like it's coming for all of us.
I don't know whether to put a , a , or just . Fine, let's leave it at the last one. I'm a bit tired of people yelling for freedom from the technology they pay every day to support, which has out run the basis of privacy laws in the world.
Do I like it? No. Am I an authoritarian swooning, boot licking fascist for stating plain facts and suggesting that the solution to the problem is not poutrage on the net, but taking responsibility for one's own data and refusing to submit to an ever increasing grid of communications that may or may not end up being oppressive?
Am I at fault for not trying to force every news story to match up with the paranoid fantasies of Infowars about a dystopia that doesn't have to happen, if people would start getting into government since as it's said it's the big evil government doing this?
When that is the mantra of Reagan and the Koch brothers who would put no limits on corporations ruling us directly and without any voice, as they buy up all the necessities of life to extort our labor from?
And even that is not a sure thing, as there are infinite variables, that the media has not considered, and are being swallowed like kool aid here about this issue?
I ain't buying any of it.
Whisp
kwassa
(23,340 posts)All of your generation thinks the same way and has the identical beliefs to you?
Fascinating. And unique in the history of mankind.
baldguy
(36,649 posts)J. Bruce Ismay?
Jack McCall?
Francesco Schettino?
George Costanza?
Zachary Smith?
Like those heroes?
jazzimov
(1,456 posts)The more I hear about him, the less I like. But my opinion doesn't matter -
BenzoDia
(1,010 posts)Sorry, I don't generally wade into Snowden threads, but the actions after his NSA leaks are incredibly suspect.
Grassy Knoll
(10,118 posts)Hero This.
delrem
(9,688 posts)zeemike
(18,998 posts)It is not enough that you obey Big Brother, you must love him...
Historic NY
(37,452 posts)he died lonely and unwanted in Britain by Britians..
But he does have a boot leg memorial here....and a namesless plaque at West Point.
delrem
(9,688 posts)raindaddy
(1,370 posts)I've seen nothing that convinces me that Snowden is a traitor to his country. And calling him a coward based on the kind of justice we've seen since 9/11 seems extreme.
Hiring corporations to invade the privacy of innocent Americans once would've been considered unacceptable to most Democrats. I never thought I'd see the day when a Democratic President would promote cuts to Social Security and negotiate trade agreements that hand already too powerful corporations even more power in secret.
You're right, there are still a few good democrats, but for the most part this is becoming a party that seems to have lost it's core values and Snowden is just the messenger.
zeemike
(18,998 posts)It is the invasion of the party snatchers.
Catherina
(35,568 posts)railsback
(1,881 posts)grasswire
(50,130 posts)...in the months ahead.
penndragon69
(788 posts)His stupidity has alerted AL QUIEDA to the fact that the NSA was
monitoring their communications via SKYPE, now they will use another
method to plan attacks. Snowden (the traitor) has caused a serious
blow to our defense networks.
Watch your back because the NEXT terrorist attack may happen
because this traitor sold out to the highest bidder.
Cast him down with the sodomites, that is his best future.
caseymoz
(5,763 posts)but I think he's heroic. Not for who he is, but for what he did.
And as a guilty pleasure, I've begun to take some joy in how much he pisses some people here off. It's something you either take misery from or delight in.
And I don't think they know just what they're supporting by calling for Snowden's persecution, whether under immoral, unconstitutional laws or not.
Grassy Knoll
(10,118 posts)A hero,
MirrorAshes
(1,262 posts)I think we'll look back on everything that's happened and ultimately be glad we now know what we didn't know before, but Snowden personally will be remembered as a damned fool for the way he went about it all.
arely staircase
(12,482 posts)unless you define your generation as you and your like-minded friends.
DeSwiss
(27,137 posts)...and he's a hero to me as well.
K&R
arely staircase
(12,482 posts)Whisp
(24,096 posts)paste that in...
IT'S not ABOUT SNOWDEN!!!!@$$%!!
that will make sense then.
arely staircase
(12,482 posts)snowden is a hero makes about as much sense as scalia dissent on DOMA.
meaning, none
like fucking none at all
MjolnirTime
(1,800 posts)sagat
(241 posts)Like the whole Occupy movement.
Norrin Radd
(4,959 posts)Gen-Xer here...just ignore the conservative/nationalist infiltrators.
Tarheel_Dem
(31,237 posts)all have fan clubs. You go! YaY!!!!
Narkos
(1,185 posts)Whisp
(24,096 posts)and I know some recs aren't really recing in the positive, they just want the thing to stay alive longer to laugh at.
Harmony Blue
(3,978 posts)it is about making a statement that will stand the test of time.
JI7
(89,262 posts)Blue_Roses
(12,894 posts)Thinkingabout
(30,058 posts)nation in anyway, he is a thief, is a patsy to the cause. You can't dine with buzzards and soar with eagles at the same time, keep on dining with the buzzards and you may become the next road kill.
Narkos
(1,185 posts)DrDan
(20,411 posts)Progressive dog
(6,917 posts)and call it "fled to Hong Kong day" or something equally as descriptive. It might be better to wait until after the Obama administration uses a predator to take him out; then we could sell it better.
HiddenAgenda63
(36 posts)Your generation must have some seiously low standards of worship. Most GenXers and Millenials I know seem to have the attention spans of cats in chicken coops.
Many of my generation (and nationality) fail to understand how anyone could possibly include this featherheaded yahoo in the same category as Robert Jarvik, Frederick Banting, Arthur Currie or Sandford Fleming...
Let alone that of real heroes like Henri Richard, Jean Beliveau and Guy Lafleur!!!
marions ghost
(19,841 posts)are hard on the younger generation and scoff at their support of Snowden.
I hope the younger generation ignores them, like younger generations must do in order to change anything for the better (sort of like their parents the Boomers did...
Dividing the generations is a corporate scam. Don't fall for it.
The younger generations sense the dangers in the misuse of technology. Snowden is warning all of us about just how bad it is, and it certainly confirms our worst fears. It's important for younger generations to know this, important for them to know that many of us elders (50+) have their backs on this.
my 2 cents
Good thread, food for thought. Harmony Blue