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[Scoops Novel]

He's met the human rights groups, with a handy photo attached, and this (short, face-affirming) video linked form the guardian: http://lifenews.ru/news/116311. There's a BBC article here; http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-23283684, an article from the guardian here; http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jul/12/edward-snowden-requesting-asylum-russia-nsa, and live updates from the guardian here. http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jul/12/edward-snowden-to-meet-amnesty-and-human-rights-watch-at-moscow-airport-live-coverag. The meeting wasn't open to the public and he has stated that he plans to talk to journalists at a later date.

Given the bleeding questions on every side of this story (how the Guardian, who as a prominent liberal newspaper would be under heavier surveillance then the standard dragnet, managed to successfully leak and published this, their doubtful proclivities to do so, the prolonged stays in China and Russia, particularly given their preexisting knowledge of everything he claims to know and sympathetic American public, the unsurprising nature of the leaks thus far aside) I take it that PRISM was leaked intentionally. I'm wondering why.

[DWC]

Well, personally I hope the guy gets extradited and put on trial.

I don't think Americans are surprised that their communication media is being monitored. It's right friggin there in the PATRIOT Act. The gov't has actually done nothing illegal. Everyone in the USA should know about the PATRIOT Act and about ECHELON and about secret courts. Two and two and two together. They have the legal means, they the technical means, they have their justification.

Snowden I think is an opportunist. He did all this for personal gain. He is running the PR machine as hard as he can, even though he really 'leaked' information everyone already knew. The gov't is spying on people, it's spying on Europeans and it's hacking networks in China. Really? He is no whistleblower patriot either. If he had only leaked about the domestic spying, that'd be a civil rights issue and would have gave me more respect for what he did, but he also aired out this dirty laundry about diplomats being diplomats and damaging foreign relations by telling the world what they already know about the world of spies and hackers is just harmful.

I think, Snowden tried to sell this information to Russia and they declined to hear him or pay him anything, so he made it all public, in hopes of getting asylum to do interviews and sell a book probably. He seems fixated on Russia to give him a new home. He'd have fled to Cuba or something by now. He seems to think he can be treated like some cold-war for-profit turncoat, which I think shows either some naivety or plan C desperate resort.

Either way, he broke his contract and his non disclosure agreement. Him and Manning have not revealed anything the world didn't know anyways.

[SalmonGod]

The ability to do these things is spelled out in law, but my experience with the majority of people over the last several years is disbelief that it's being carried out on this scale or that it effects anyone but terrorists.  You have no idea how many times I've been called a conspiracy theorist for telling people about these things, even when I put 2+2+2 right in their faces.  Now it's no longer debatable.  Those same people I was arguing with up to only a year ago are now as outraged as they should have been 10 years ago.  That's kind of a big deal.

[DWC]

The ability to do these things is spelled out in law, but my experience with the majority of people over the last several years is disbelief that it's being carried out on this scale or that it effects anyone but terrorists.  You have no idea how many times I've been called a conspiracy theorist for telling people about these things, even when I put 2+2+2 right in their faces.  Now it's no longer debatable.  Those same people I was arguing with up to only a year ago are now as outraged as they should have been 10 years ago.  That's kind of a big deal.

It's ridiculous they let this abomination like the PATRIOT Act survive this long anyways, with such little complaint. This isn't tin-foil hat stuff either. Thing is, it's true, nobody really cares. People suspected it in the USA, always. It's the entertainment media partially responsible for such a nonchalant response. The movies, TV, everything else has these story universes and themes where the US gov't is 1984 tier horrible, everything is monitored, listened to or read by at least 3 mysterious figures at a control terminal. People already know/ suspect their phone/ internet browsing history, whatever is being logged. Maybe not actually looked at. Maybe media has made people expect this, like they believe in erroneous things about war from hollywood. Pre-conditioned. It's made people paranoid and expecting the worst from the government, but not making them angry enough to protest either.

I think, this information is collected, but never looked at. They don't have the time or the people. They are working within the law that it only applies to terrorism and terrorism accessories. This PRISM shit has not likely effected anybody not a serious terrorist, I think the gov't is abiding by the law and Snowcone has not said anything contrary.

What I worry, is this kind of surveillance having a legal precedence, and some other future administration using it to horrible ends, with some other horseshit bill, set of crap freight-trained into law nobody in the USA agreed to. We have checks and balances, but we've seen politicians straining the constitution and the laws governing the government to their absolutes to push their agenda. Maybe PRISM is harmless now, but 20 years from now? 30? 40? Nope. This issue should have been brought up 10 years ago with the PATRIOT Act.

[SalmonGod]

I think, this information is collected, but never looked at. They don't have the time or the people. They are working within the law that it only applies to terrorism and terrorism accessories. This PRISM shit has not likely effected anybody not a serious terrorist, I think the gov't is abiding by the law and Snowcone has not said anything contrary.

How many times do I have to post direct and well-researched evidence to the contrary?

And I really don't care if they're abiding by law if that only means they're stretching interpretation of the law to allow them to do whatever they want.

[Zangi]

I think, this information is collected, but never looked at. They don't have the time or the people. They are working within the law that it only applies to terrorism and terrorism accessories. This PRISM shit has not likely effected anybody not a serious terrorist, I think the gov't is abiding by the law and Snowcone has not said anything contrary.

How many times do I have to post direct and well-researched evidence to the contrary?

And I really don't care if they're abiding by law if that only means they're stretching interpretation of the law to allow them to do whatever they want.

Alice in Wonderland:
Gov't/NSA is not doing anything other then what they say they are doing and it is all legal, take their word on it.

Nevermind the fact that everything they do is in secret and the ones watching over them are also doing it in secret, the whole arrangement has no accountability outside of itself. 
Nevermind the fact that our Gov't and its agencies have stretched interpretations and even redefined the interpretations of the law to best suit what they want done.
Nevermind the fact that this can just as easily be turned on dissenting American citizens, at any time, without anyone's knowledge, in the name of national security.  A small matter of expanding the definition of terrorist...

[Loud Whispers]

Nevermind the fact that this can just as easily be turned on dissenting American citizens, at any time, without anyone's knowledge, in the name of national security.  A small matter of expanding the definition of terrorist...

And that the agencies can just as easily turn their cameras on the government and take control.

[misko27]

Nevermind the fact that this can just as easily be turned on dissenting American citizens, at any time, without anyone's knowledge, in the name of national security.  A small matter of expanding the definition of terrorist...

And that the agencies can just as easily turn their cameras on the government and take control.

Now I don't know about that. There has never been a single successful coup in the history of the US. And the few near-misses were lower-ranking military leaders (I'm thinking of Macarthur, the Korean war). But those are from a long time ago. Plus, all it takes is one high-level, respected politician to say "hey they took over" for a entire mob of people from the South to march on Washington. They do it already. Trust me, there is more firepower in the south then protecting Washington DC. And assassinations would have the same effect. Hell, a single dead anti-communist senator got riots.


Plus everyone technically declares loyalty to the constitution, especially the military. The Pentagon would most likely take over in such a situation and reinstate the government.

No, if something illegal is going on in the government, it is almost certainly the politicians behind it. The others tend to do what they're told.

[Loud Whispers]

Now I don't know about that. There has never been a single successful coup in the history of the US.

Acquire knowledge on members of any official. Use knowledge to blackmail. No scrutiny, no transparency, no evidence and no coup needed. Control acquired.

[misko27]

Now I don't know about that. There has never been a single successful coup in the history of the US.

Acquire knowledge on members of any official. Use knowledge to blackmail. No scrutiny, no transparency, no evidence and no coup needed. Control acquired.

The problem remains. There is, technically, no law anywhere that guarentees a president can never assume complete power. Or, that any combination of the President, Congress and the supreme court can decide to completly destroy the legal framework and take over. The problem remains, that it would require blackmailing, A very large section of the US government to achieve. People have blackmailed congressman before (They do it in the Godfather part 2 after all) and it is probably possible to blackmail the president, but to accomplish power (and actually have control of the government, as opposed to influence) you would require far, far too many people.


And congress is almost as powerful as both of the other branches combined, it's just since they don't agree on everything the other 2 branches assume more power (Congress can overrule many of the Supreme Court's decisions, and block the president at every turn, but only if they can agree to do it).


I mean, I'm sure it's possible, but the risk and difficulty is huge, whereas regular influence in the government is easier to acquire and will still go pretty far.

[Zangi]

The best part is, the NSA is compartmentalized.  So the grunts and low level supervisors won't ever get the whole picture.  As long as they figure they are doing 'good work' in the name of national security/fighting terrorism.

Though... in the case of blackmailing Congress, if you do that to too many people, with power... you may find that a few of em might not quietly take it without some snooping.

[Another]

Why do you think that you need to blackmail individual congressmen to get power over the Congress when you can just buy them (donations of large sums of money to the electoral funds)?

And from the interviews I got the impression that Snowden decided to go the public disclosure route after he saw top NSA and/or other TLA officials directly lying to the Congress about domestic surveillance while under oath. They are not yet criminally charged for that by the way.

[DWC]

Now I don't know about that. There has never been a single successful coup in the history of the US.

Acquire knowledge on members of any official. Use knowledge to blackmail. No scrutiny, no transparency, no evidence and no coup needed. Control acquired.

Well that would all be really illegal and they could do that with or without this massive scale of surveillance boondoggle. Anyways, polictians are involved in scandals all the time and they get reelected. They'd have to be doing something really dirty for them to not just go public with some blackmail scheme anyways. Too much Hollywood in that line of thought.

Anyways, military coup? This isn't some backwards 3rd world country. Those countries have coups because the military is often the only functional institution in the entire country and they are often separate from civilian leadership where they have some system where it's a parallel government that handles foreign policy, with the civilian leaders handling domestic policy. It would not happen in the USA without restructuring the entire legal system and constitution to permit such a thing. They'd have no authority and no support.

[SalmonGod]

Insider Threat program initiated by Obama encourages government employees to report co-workers who may be interested in leaking information, and even threatens criminal charges against anyone who fails to do so.

Not sure how much this is sensationalized.  Don't have time at the moment to check multiple sources, but still wanted to share.

HOPE you like paranoia

[GreatJustice]

Insider Threat program initiated by Obama encourages government employees to report co-workers who may be interested in leaking information, and even threatens criminal charges against anyone who fails to do so.

Not sure how much this is sensationalized.  Don't have time at the moment to check multiple sources, but still wanted to share.

HOPE you like paranoia

Hey, remember when Obama was the president that respected privacy, stood up for civil liberties, and was going to accept the existence of whistleblowers exposing inefficient or unlawful programs? Yeah, me neither.