Whistle Blower Flees To Russia.

[anotheoldgit]

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2346765/Edward-Snowden-Whistleblower-left-Hong-Kong-Russia-help-Wikileaks-day-US-charges-spying.html

Is Edward Snowden a traitor, or should he be admired for exposing evidence of a global surveillance regime conducted by US and UK intelligence agencies?

[jomifl]

How can he be a traitor? The government of a democracy is the servant of the population that elected it. Since the US government was betraying the trust of its electorate and fiddling the books to fund such a massive spyng operation, it was the government that was being traitorous. Mr. North should be recognised as a national hero at least before the CIA take their revenge. They will probably 'take him out' when they think he has been forgotten. Life expectancy 3 years?

[ichkeria]

It is also the duty of a government to protect its citizens. Doing nothing to tap into the vast global communicatios network when every dodgy operator from San Francisco to Seoul is already doing the same would be gross negligence. Nothing Mr Snowden has said or done marks him out for me as any sort of hero in my eyes .
It is probably a good thing that these operations are now known about but it wasn't up to him to make that know.
He claimed he's expressed his concerns to his superiors but no one listened - I'd be very sceptical about that indeed. One thing you would never do is ignore a potential security leak if one presented itself to you. If they did ignore him then they are idiots.

[LazyGun]

It certainly disturbs me the sheer quantity of surveillance that it appears the US and UK governments are indulging in, using the fig-leaf of "the war on terror" to justify the huge intrusion of surveillance, both real world and digital.

Seems to me that we should be grateful to him for exposing the sheer breadth of that surveillance, to open it up for discussion. As for moving to Russia - it is a move that can be seen as somewhat ironic, but given that the US wish to arrest him for treason, I cannot fault his survival instincts.

We take our democracy for granted in the UK, and in consequence have created a political elite insulated from the rest of us, and seen by that same elite as little more than obedient tax paying units, fixated on the circus of reality TV and the daily routine, heedless of the bigger picture. I think that is a worrying development.....

[Gromit]

In march, the man in charge of the US Intelligence denied that they collected any data from Americans, under oath to a Senate Committee.

// "It now appears clear that the director of national intelligence, James Clapper, lied under oath to Congress and the American people," Amash posted on Wednesday morning. "Members of Congress can't make informed decisions on intelligence issues when the head of the intelligence community wilfully makes false statements. Perjury is a serious crime. Mr Clapper should resign immediately."

At a hearing of the Senate intelligence committee on 12 March, Oregon Democrat Ron Wyden grew frustrated that he could not get a "direct answer" from Clapper about a question Wyden said he had been posing to the intelligence agencies in a series of letters for a year: when do US spies need a warrant to surveil Americans' communications?

"What I wanted to see is if you could give me a yes or no answer to the question: does the NSA collect any type of data at all on millions or hundreds of millions of Americans?" Wyden asked Clapper.

"No, sir," Clapper said. "Not wittingly. There are cases where they could inadvertently, perhaps, collect, but not wittingly." //

It is those people who should be in the dock, not the people who expose it.

[ichkeria]

He was a very silly man to deny they don't collect data from US citizens and the US citizens are very silly to believe it :-)

Not a traitor in my view Snowden (tho I'm not really best placed to make judgments about that not even being a US citizen. But no hero either.

I don't think he's going to be taking up residence in Russia btw. He hasn't even got a visa (tho if need be I'm sure they'd rustle one up for him :-) )

[ichkeria]

"deny they DO" collect (too many negatives!)

[jno]

if Gérard Dépardieu can do it...

[Peter Pedant]

does anyone remember Clive Ponting ?

He was acquitted against all the evidence and
this resulted in a change of the Official Secrets Act

[237SJ]

I can`t say I`d be thrilled to be spending the rest of my life in Ecuador. I wonder if he thinks it was worth it?

[jno]

he doesn't seem to have considered if it would be worth it, he just felt it had to be done and that nobody else could do it. He must have known the grief it would bring him and yet he went ahead anyway. That to me is a sign he was following his own conscience, not Beijing's orders.

[ichkeria]

Beijing's money? Moscow's blackmail?

I'm not saying I believe it, but that would be the scenario were it coming from those quarters.

[Gromit]

Ecador does in fact have an extradition treaty with the US. Think his final destination might be Cuba. They also have a treaty (an old one) with the US, but politically I don't think they would accept a US request.

[jomifl]

Ichkeria, I don't know what kind of superiors you have had but in my experience superiors generally don't like to here uncomfortable facts so ignore them.

[Peter Pedant]

joifl

yup my superiors were like yours

[FredPuli43]

237, Ecuador would be a lovely place to be retired to early . Good climate, very pleasant, though quiet, rural people, interesting scenery. If he can avoid eating shrimps and guinea pig, both thrust upon you, he'll be fine.

Ecuador granted Assange political asylum so they are unlikely to let this man be extradited.

[emmie]

he is going on to cuba afterwards, according to the news this morning.

[ichkeria]

"Ichkeria, I don't know what kind of superiors you have had but in my experience superiors generally don't like to here uncomfortable facts so ignore them. "

It depends what your line of work is. And on the people you work for. In that situation, if he really did voice his concerns, then someone should have done something. My bet would be that he did not, or at least not seriously, but then that's just a gut feeling.

[emmie]

i don;t believe he is a traitor, as i said the news has him going to Russia but onto cuba. What has Gerard Depardieu got to do with this, i remember the idiot politician calling him a traitor for leaving France, all because of that other idiot in power Francois Hollande idea of massive hike taxes for those earning over a certain amount.

[ichkeria]

jno mentioned this because Depardieu was "handed" citizenship by Putin, without even asking (!). Without getting into another argument about the rights and wrongs of the French President's abortive tax plans again.
So it is slightly odd perhaps that in this instance Russia was unwilling to have him off the plane or at least beyond passport and visa control, even if only temporarily. But maybe only slightly.

[emmie]

don;t understand the last part, have who off the plane, Edward Snowden?