omnibus PRISM/NSA/free Edward Snowden/encryption tutorial thread

straight and direct has nothing to do with the truth, of course

Prism will help maintain order and vanquish pesky anti-Waterworld activists

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/earth-insight/2013/jun/14/climate-change-energy-shocks-nsa-prism

"Climate Change Energy Shocks NSA Prism"

cool. gov't analysts and scenario planners foresee potential disaster. government's response is not to actually do anything to prevent disaster, but to let it roll on and control us instead. great.

reminds me of that gov't memo that said we could all adapt and live in underground caves in case of climate change.

Strangelove 2019

with shit like this I honestly wonder if we're nearing the end of the current order of things. wtf is going on.

in fairness, Spectrum, they know it's too late to prevent it.

xxpost giant bell jar or gtfo.

that whole article is so poorly argued

like the crux is linking this:

"Just last month, unilateral changes to US military laws formally granted the Pentagon extraordinary powers to intervene in a domestic "emergency" or "civil disturbance"

to random quotes from random reports

like its that dude's job to churn out blog posts about the environment so it's easy to see why he'd be tempted to try to link it to the subject du jour that is a nonsense article

but that*

but the pieces, they all fit. i hope the impression i'm getting from this is wrong.

some of us don't give a shit about brilliantly argued articles, this ain't moot court

yes, the pieces being quotes from a bunch of different studies done by places that do thousands of nonsense studies

xp

do you guys think obama subscribes to the DoD's "Quadrennial Defense Review"

I think he borrows Biden's copy

i'm on board with The World Is On Fire thesis, but iatee otm that the article is kinda hand-wavey

building a conspiracy on random quotes from the PR document the DoD releases seems like a bad plan

certainly the government is forecasting a variety of strategic scenarios for the future, climate-driven unrest among them, and the ongoing surveillance of/application of anti-terror laws & techniques against environmental activists is very real as well. the convergence of these two things does worry me quite a bit. reading that snippet of that forecast in that way, though, strikes me as a little Alex Jones-y.

yah

White House press secretary Jay Carney told reporters this week that Obama “certainly believes that Director Clapper has been straight and direct in the answers that he’s given.”

depends on what your definition of 'wittingly' is, man

http://i.ytimg.com/vi/fdChg4P1wWY/0.jpg

man why do still from 1999 look like 1980

Should note that The Daily Banter, which I've never heard of, has been at this stuff all.week.

Two writers from that site have a podcast "The Bubble Genius Bob & Chaz Show" that seems to be 100% devoted to attacking Greenwald and Sirota.

So we learn more about the confrontation in Ashcroft's hospital room in 2004.

Yep.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/investigations/us-surveillance-architecture-includes-collection-of-revealing-internet-phone-metadata/2013/06/15/e9bf004a-d511-11e2-b05f-3ea3f0e7bb5a_story.html?hpid=z1

Oops, same linked article. Nucleon!

When the NSA aims for foreign targets whose communications cross U.S. infrastructure, it expects to sweep in some American content “incidentally” or “inadvertently,” which are terms of art in regulations governing the NSA. Contact chaining, because it extends to the contacts of contacts of targets, inevitably collects even more American data.

Current NSA director Keith B. Alexander and Director of National Intelligence James R. Clapper Jr. have resolutely refused to offer an estimate of the number of Americans whose calls or e-mails have thus made their way into content databases such as ­NUCLEON.

The Post has learned that similar orders have been renewed every three months for other large U.S. phone companies, including Bell South and AT&T, since May 24, 2006. On that day, the surveillance court made a fundamental shift in its approach to Section 215 of the Patriot Act, which permits the FBI to compel production of “business records” that are relevant to a particular terrorism investigation and to share those in some circumstances with the NSA. Henceforth, the court ruled, it would define the relevant business records as the entirety of a telephone company’s call database.

The Bush administration, by then, had been taking “bulk metadata” from the phone companies under voluntary agreements for more than four years. The volume of information overwhelmed the MAINWAY database, according to a classified report from the NSA inspector general in 2009. The agency spent $146 million in supplemental counterterrorism funds to buy new hardware and contract support — and to make unspecified payments to the phone companies for “collaborative partnerships.”

When the New York Times revealed the warrantless surveillance of voice calls, in December 2005, the telephone companies got nervous. One of them, unnamed in the report, approached the NSA with a request. Rather than volunteer the data, at a price, the “provider preferred to be compelled to do so by a court order,” the report said. Other companies followed suit. The surveillance court order that recast the meaning of business records “essentially gave NSA the same authority to collect bulk telephony metadata from business records that it had” under Bush’s asserted authority alone.

you know it's bad when cold-blooded corps would rather be forced to do the thing rather than being paid off to do the thing

otm

the name of the game is managing liability

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2013/jun/16/gchq-intercepted-communications-g20-summits

wow. am i just naive or is that a massive story?

seems like a big deal to me

I'm more amused that they still had documentation about it than the fact that they actually did it, tbh

Their powerpoint slides appear to be just as self-congratulatory as those of any other UK govt dept.

Some comments are saying this is commonplace behaviour by governments at this kind of high-level meeting. I have no clue whether that's true, and if so, how much of an idea the delegates themselves would have about it.

iirc Peter Wright's Spycatcher book outlined MI-5 domestic spying on foreign dignitaries, I have no doubt it's as true now as then

"yknow spies, buncha bitchy little girls"

wikileaks revealed that hillary clinton had approved spying on u.n. leaders so it's not exactly surprising

good post, and not just for the david simon stuff

https://blog.pinboard.in/2013/06/persuading_david_simon/

i've gotta admit i'm dyyyin to know what else is in that docu archive

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jun/17/turkey-russia-g20-spying-gchq

it's hard to know if they're actually mad or just drumming up nationalist rah rah mad

or they feel compelled to do something so that they don't seem like weak pushovers

Turkey probably legit angry. Would be surprised if Russia didn't know about it months ago but you have to keep up appearances.

two terrible countries to piss off if you plan to do something about syria

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2013/06/is-james-risen-real-journalist-or.html

NY Times reporter James Risen versus the inside the beltway folks on NBC's Meet the Press

Bob Medici Schiffer yesterday devoted a segment to showing how Snowden is NOT Rosa Parks and MLK Jr.

Schieffer was an asshole even before he lost his marbles, lotta that around CBS News the last 30 years or so.

any yall following this live q&a w/dude btw

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jun/17/edward-snowden-nsa-files-whistleblower

xpost

is he even considered a real journalist?

he co-wrote a good early Reagan bio depicting how the man was out to lunch. Reagan too.

One of his frequent guests:

http://images2.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20120109224754/muppet/images/4/4a/Bob_SchiefferAndKermit.jpg

Lots out there on the internet re his friendships with Cheney and with W Bush:

http://mediabloodhound.typepad.com/weblog/2008/05/story-of-the-da.html

During the ’90s, Schieffer also struck up a friendship with George W. Bush when his brother Tom—now the U.S. ambassador to Australia—became partners with the future president in the Texas Rangers. Bob and W. went to ball games together, played golf, attended spring training. “He’s a great guy—that doesn’t mean I agree with him,” says Schieffer, adding that the situation became “a little awkward” when Bush ran for the White House but that he’s never gotten favorable treatment.

What's worse, Bush not only rewarded Bob's brother Tom with the ambassadorship to Australia from 2001-2005, but later made him US ambassador to Japan,

do you even report, bro

dave weigel of slate thinks snowden is a 'useful idiot' for red china:

http://www.slate.com/blogs/weigel/2013/06/17/snowden_veers_into_useful_idiocy.html

man can someone retire that fucking phrase already

yeah, fuck this 'useful idiot' idiom. if you think he's a traitor, don't dance around it.

https://medium.com/state-of-play/bb27db32ae38

Two weeks ago, when the Guardian first leaked a Verizon court order to hand over its call metadata, a national debate began about privacy and security. Since then those leaks have continued, and they still drive the conversation. But much of that initial reporting turned out to be wrong — so much, in fact, that I’m starting to wonder if it’s approaching journalistic malfeasance.

so this turned out not to be true?
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-57589495-38/nsa-spying-flap-extends-to-contents-of-u.s-phone-calls/

They told Nadler he heard it wrong.

good post, and not just for the david simon stuff

https://blog.pinboard.in/2013/06/persuading_david_simon/

― caek, Monday, June 17, 2013 7:54 AM (Yesterday)

^^ booming post

Can we retire the use of "traitor," too? I mean, are we at war with China? Pretty sure we're not.

i think you mean "red china"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TGv2wqJJmbc

you don't have to be at war w/ a country for someone to commit treason on their behalf

i don't think it's a particularly broad reading to say that snowden violated the espionage act

P. sure there's a constitutional and legal definition of "treason" to which "violating the espionage act" doesn't even come close.

For everyone's edification though just in case.

Also: John Marshall and treason.

If only Charlie Rose had done research and then asked Obama good follow-up questions.

Charlie Rose is basically Bob Schieffer, right?

Here is a Wikipedia list of all persons (all four of them!) convicted of spying on the US for China. None were charged with or convicted of treason.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Americans_convicted_of_spying_for_the_People%27s_Republic_of_China

Treason is, like, an actual *thing*, not a word to be thrown about lightly. We haven't convicted anyone of treason in the US for more than half a century. We didn't even charge the Rosenbergs or Alger Hiss with treason, let alone convict them.

well it's easier to convict people for other things so they don't get charged w/ treason in the first place

treason isn't an actual 'thing' anymore than manslaughter is

It has a degree of specificity regarding what your actions are intended to accomplish that "espionage" does not.

actually, treason is both a law and a common term

anyone is within their right to judge an act as treasonous even if it isn't strictly legally so by united states standards

So is "rape" but I advise against its usage in casual conversation. xp

that's a good example. plenty of rapists are not convicted as such by the united states legal system.

and I advise you telling someone they weren't raped if the dude wasn't charged legally xp

against

u guys think there'll be Snowden Halloween costumes?

Was Jonathan Pollard a traitor?

I'm going as his gf xp

yes, duh xp

xxp I also advise against describing people convicted of or charged with sex offenses that don't rise to the level of rape as "rapists." If a dude whips his dick out on the subway and waves it at you, he may be guilty of sexual battery or another charge, but he's not a rapist.

xp he was? So Israel is an enemy of ours now, is it?

lotsa hardcore patriots on ILX all of a sudden, whippin' out treason charges left and right

obviously my position is that supplying classified state secrets to anyone is treasonous, not just countries we are at war with.

except when they are legit whistleblowing. i'd say the NSA disclosure wasn't treasonous. the G-20 leak was.

blowing the whistle...of treason

I think even questioning whether it was treason is sorta treasonous

To anyone? Even to, say, a US journalist?

hardcore patriots? dude told russia + turkey that we were spying on them. there was no reason to disclose that information except to undermine the US espionage program. i don't think you have to be a hardcore patriot to find that treasonous.

If Russia's and Turkey's real, not-for-PR-purposes reaction to this news was anything but a sarcastic "No shit," I'll eat my hat.

oh okay bc they weren't surprised then it's totes cool

i guess i'm just not enough of an free information radical. but to answer your other question - if someone leaked the names of undercover agents to a US newspaper, I'd consider that treasonous. whether that rises to the level where the government would (or should) prosecute them under a treason statute is an entirely other thing.

anyone is within their right to judge an act as treasonous even if it isn't strictly legally so by united states standards

― Mordy , Tuesday, June 18, 2013 10:36 AM (16 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

can't hear you, you're backtracking too fast

i mean come on dude

it's not treason unless they were working on behalf of a foreign power

not that it really matters, i guess. though treason proper is a capital crime and i don't think violating the espionage statue(s) is

it's a loose term. lots of countries define it differently. we happen to have a very strict definition of the term in the united states (plus an espionage act that covers a lot of what other countries might call treason). i don't think i need to not use the term bc of this legal coincidence.

ethel + julius were charged under violating espionage act no?

uhh well w/o checking wiki i think they were found guilty of DUN DUN DUN treason

for instance in canada: (2) Every one commits treason who, in Canada... (b) without lawful authority, communicates or makes available to an agent of a state other than Canada, military or scientific information or any sketch, plan, model, article, note or document of a military or scientific character that he knows or ought to know may be used by that state for a purpose prejudicial to the safety or defence of Canada;

i don't think so, checking wiki DUN DUN DUN "Charge(s) Conspiracy to commit espionage"

oh okay bc they weren't surprised then it's totes cool

just like why 'Murrican ADULTS know that the guvmint can watch and hear everything we do and it's childish to object, duh

the Supreme Court has spoken on this iirc - merely providing aid and comfort to the enemy isn't treasonous unless you're actually working for them. but it's mordy-treasonous, fair enough. when you use a word that has a specific legal meaning any way you want, not everyone is gonna roll with that

you're speaking as though once a word has a particular legal definition in a particular country that's the end of the conversation about it. do i need to make up a new word that describes someone betraying their country's trust by leaking confidential information that undermines its security -- but that isn't treason as defined by the supreme court? fine. i guess mordy-treasonous will have to do.

The question now to be decided has been argued in a manner worthy of its importance, and with an earnestness evincing the strong conviction felt by the counsel on each side that the law is with them. A degree of eloquence seldom displayed on any occasion has embellished a solidity of argument and a depth of research by which the court has been greatly aided in forming the opinion it is about to deliver. The testimony adduced on the part of the United States to prove the overt act laid in the indictment having shown, and the attorney for the United States having admitted, that the prisoner was not present when that act, whatever may be its character, was committed, and there being no reason to doubt but that he was at a great distance, and in a different state, it is objected to the testimony offered on the part of the United States to connect him with those who committed the overt act, that such testimony is totally irrelevant, and must, therefore, be rejected. The arguments in support of this motion respect in part the merits of the case as it may be supposed to stand independent of the pleadings, and in part as exhibited by the pleadings.

On the first division of the subject two points are made:

1st. That, conformably to the constitution of the United States, no man can be convicted of treason who was not present when the war was levied.

2d. That if this construction be erroneous, no testimony can be received to charge one man with the overt acts of others until those overt acts as laid in the indictment be proved to the satisfaction of the court.

"When I use a word,' Humpty Mordy said in rather a scornful tone, 'it means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less."
"The question is," said Alice, "whether you can make words mean so many different things."
"The question is," said Humpty Mordy, "which is to be master— that's all."

I just don't get what the purpose is of running around calling people "traitor?" Like, let's discuss the pros/cons/effects of what an individual did and what it means in terms of international relations and security and our relationship to the Constitution and whatever. What does adding "treason" to the discussion constantly actually accomplish? Aside from getting to say "I'm a good American unlike that TRAITOR."

sure! i'm just saying that when conservatives call it treason, they're sort of calling for the govt to charge the person with that

blowing the whistle...of treason

― iatee, Tuesday, June 18, 2013 2:45 PM (15 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

loll

the NSA FISA disclosures were technically legal but that doesn't mean that they weren't a violation against the american public. since when did the exact legality of actions determine the moral force of them? or is it only when it's convenient to arguing a point?

i should say, not the disclosures, but the actions about which were disclosed

i haven't made a moral judgment during this argument!

that's my point. if i defended wiretapping on the basis of its legality you'd say the legality is irrelevant. i'm saying that the exact definition by the constitution of the term 'treason' is irrelevant to determining is snowden betrayed his country.

if*

you don't even have to grant snowden's libertarian premises too much to see that being on the run from the USG and betraying the nation in toto are different things

I think there are TREMENDOUS implied moral differences among, say, "unauthorized disclosure," "espionage" and "treason."

i consider the G-20 leak a betrayal of his nation. obviously reasonable people can disagree.

yes, i agree. that's why i used the term 'treason.' bc of the moral force of the term. xp

why are there tremendous implied moral differences among 'espionage' and 'treason'

what if the country that you are treasoning with is actually of a higher moral character

i'm ready to admit that he or the G20 leaker broke laws (though maybe i'd want to see some laws changed), but that none of his offenses constituted treason

the g-20 spying was done by the british, how does that follow?

oh right i forgot he was the g20 leaker too

what if you betray your family business to another business that is more ethical? humans have long recognized that betraying your family/community/nation has inherent ethical problems, not just problems of inherent moral judgement.

xxp British + NSA both afaict

maybe i'm just less of a nationalist than confused-Marxist mordy

can we talk about how hilarious it is that one of the examples they are using to show that this program is working is that it averted an attack on the NYSE

why am i a confused-marxist? i don't feel confused.

about hyphen use?

yeah i should say complicated marxist, your understanding of marxism is def superior to mine tbf it just confuses me at times (tho i generally like it)

NYSE, the Sacred Seat of the American state

alfred otm ban me

i'm not even sure it's relevant here. i don't know about any radical free information principle in traditional marxism.

what 'enemy' is comforted by talking about the g-20 spying?

funny enough acc to the guardian the spying was kind of old-timey: fake internet cafes!

The same document also refers to GCHQ, MI6 and others setting up internet cafes which "were able to extract key logging info, providing creds for delegates, meaning we have sustained intelligence options against them even after conference has finished". This appears to be a reference to acquiring delegates' online login details.

i'm sure the british are pissed but it's not treason to talk about this.

sorry, I don't consider "telling countries that already know we are spying on them about a specific spying incident" to occupy the same moral plane as "taking up arms against the United States government."

i don't know why you're so hung up on 'enemy.' i consider pollard's actions treasonous and he was supplying information to an 'ally.' xp

i'm hung up on it because it's the language of the law

i think mordechai vanunu was definitely a traitor to his country (and he was even convicted of treason iirc!), and he just leaked to the UK press. not to a specific enemy of israel.

ok, but i'm not making strict arguments about the US legal code. i don't think the US can or should prosecute snowden under the treason act. i still think his actions may be treasonous.

just in a vaguely traitory hates his mother nation and wants his countrymen to die kind of a way

well i can't speak to his motivations. i'm sure he's very idealistic and thinks he is doing the right thing.

But he's really a filthy traitor.

Anyway, all hail the Rodinia!

i'm sure the rosenbergs had idealistic motivations as well

Sure. They wanted Meryl Streep to play Ethel.

He was subsequently lured to Italy by a Mossad agent, where he was drugged and abducted by Israeli intelligence agents.[4] He was transported to Israel and ultimately convicted in a trial that was held behind closed doors.[4]

cool country

what if we compromised and decided this was a little bit treason and a little bit espionage

vanunu is lucky he wasn't executed xp

L-R: Treason, espionage

http://www.bionicdisco.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/08/DonnyMarie_Show_Jan_1978.jpg

he committed treason against the dystopian 2013 america by aiding the imaginary future america he wants to create

anyone who tries to change america is kinda committing treason when you look at it like that

anyone who tries to change america is kinda committing treason when you look at it like that

i'm sure the rosenbergs had idealistic motivations as well

― Mordy , Tuesday, June 18, 2013 10:25 AM (9 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

yes it was marxism

Proverbs 16:2 "All the ways of a man [are] clean in his own eyes; but the LORD weigheth the spirits."

can we talk about how hilarious it is that one of the examples they are using to show that this program is working is that it averted an attack on the NYSE

"We had quite a bit of trouble deciphering the phone calls at first."

http://ifanboy.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/dark-knight-rises-stock-exchange.jpg

they see me snowden
they hatin
patrollin they tryna catch me speakin treason

i assume the G-20 leak is one of the things that barton gillman refused to publish. i wonder what other information he has (he might literally have lists of names).

FedSmith.com Users Say Snowden is a Traitor
Is Edward Snowden a hero or a traitor for leaking the information about the NSA? FedSmith.com users say he is a traitor in our recent survey.

He is a hero in that he has exposed the inappropriateness of having contractors do the work that federal employees should do. He is a traitor because he handled it inappropriately.

lol

I guess if we are at war with Terror, and Terror is fear of the the unknown, and this guy made is so that there is less that is unknown to us, then yes in some way he is threatening our ability to be Terrorized. So he's the opposite of a traitor.

the NSA FISA disclosures were technically legal but that doesn't mean that they weren't a violation against the american public.

informing the american public about secret policies they have a clear interest in knowing about is a 'violation against them'?

always hilarious to see liberals eagerly standing up for the espionage act, passed by notable racist warmonger woodrow wilson largely as an excuse to silence domestic opposition and lock up antiwar radicals.

Have there been photos of these fake G20 internet cafes?

http://www.ronsaari.com/stockImages/diners/tomsRestaurant1.jpg

the fake restaurants thing is like something baudrillard would have made up blows my mind

little did they know that they were spying on fake diplomats

informing the american public about secret policies they have a clear interest in knowing about is a 'violation against them'?

read my post immediately after the one you quoted. i clarified.

oops! sorry, missed that.

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/elements/2013/06/why-monopolies-make-spying-easier.html

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/dana-milbank-congress-has-become-a-rubber-stamp-for-the-nsa/2013/06/18/eb9ef4ee-d861-11e2-a9f2-42ee3912ae0e_story.html?hpid=z2

The only non-love-fest questions at the hearing:

Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-Ill.), (D-Ill.), who said the officials would have been better off providing information about the program “up front,” asked whether their newfound transparency would include the public release, with redactions, of secret court opinions related to the surveillance programs.

“It’s been a very difficult task,” was Litt’s noncommittal response.

Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) asked how soon Litt would have an answer on declassifying the opinions.

“I’m hesitant to answer any question that begins ‘how soon,’ ” Litt said.

Schiff, in the minority of lawmakers challenging the witnesses, suggested that the NSA might want to get the phone “metadata” from the telecommunications providers on a case-by-case basis rather than amass all the data for all Americans.

“The concern is speed in crisis,” Alexander told him.

Schiff wasn’t persuaded. “I think that the American people may be much more comfortable with the telecommunications companies retaining those business records,” he said. As for the intelligence officials’ boasts about self-supervision, Schiff added, “all those internal checks are valuable, but they’re still internal checks.”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/us-charges-snowden-with-espionage/2013/06/21/507497d8-dab1-11e2-a016-92547bf094cc_story.html

what can one say, but, welp

http://i.guim.co.uk/n/sys-images/Guardian/Pix/pictures/2013/6/21/1371831337646/Edward-Snowden-composite--009.jpg
http://i.guim.co.uk/n/sys-images/Guardian/Pix/pictures/2013/6/21/1371831337646/Edward-Snowden-composite--009.jpg
http://i.guim.co.uk/n/sys-images/Guardian/Pix/pictures/2013/6/21/1371831337646/Edward-Snowden-composite--009.jpg

yo dawg we heard you like espionage so we charged you with espionage after hiring you to perform espionage

if you knew this is Bam's SEVENTH Espionage Act prosecution, raise yr hand. (Wilson through Dubya: 3.)

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/jun/22/snowden-espionage-charges

I don't think Snowden should be charged, but either you or Greenwald are trying to be misleading here, because he says something very specific:

Prior to Barack Obama's inauguration, there were a grand total of three prosecutions of leakers under the Espionage Act

Note he's confining that statement to "leakers," however he's defining that, but either he -- or, I think, you -- are trying to imply that only three PEOPLE have been prosecuted under the Espionage Act, since 1917, which is . . . not true.

nope, just my mistranscription, my fault

no access to Wiki now, but wasn't Eugene Debs convicted under the EA?

yes -- the sedition act of 1918 was actually an amendment to the espionage act, so initially it was used almost entirely against antiwar activists (AFAIK no actual german spies were ever caught and convicted under the act.)

no one was successfully prosecuted for leaking to the press until this guy, in 1985: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samuel_Loring_Morison

Not sure if this is the thread for it, but uhm... uh oh...

In an email sent hours before his death in a single-car L.A. crash, journalist Michael Hastings wrote that his “close friends and associates” were being interviewed by the FBI and he was going to “go off the radar for a bit.”

According to the email, sent to KTLA, Hastings wrote he was working on a “big story” and was going to disappear. He told his colleagues that if the FBI came to interview them, they should have legal counsel present.

remember this?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RNdW2V5V8W4

Danny Casolaro, yes defo. Not seem the dramatic re-enacted video though.

god BCCI is one of the great forgotten scandals of the last twenty years.

Hastings wrote he was working on a “big story” and was going to disappear. He told his colleagues that if the FBI came to interview them, they should have legal counsel present.

max to thread

Speculative article stoking more fears: Pentagon bracing for public dissent over climate and energy shocks

yeah. iatee doesnt like that article.

Roseanne Barr ‏@TheRealRoseanne
here's what happened: the 2 (or 3) factions in r government set up the tech2 spy on each other-& each invented their own opposition, 4 gov$

snowden out

wikileaks twitter is saying they're helping him

out of what

frying pan and into fire

N.S.A. Leaker Leaves Hong Kong on Flight to Moscow

I guess he's attracted to Putin's strong commitment to killing journalists.

It's not his last stop. I think his main interest is in not being arrested by the fascist dick.

ok now i have a mental picture of a penis with a hitler mustache, thanks

here we go:

Even before a former U.S. intelligence contractor exposed the secret collection of Americans’ phone records, the Obama administration was pressing a government-wide crackdown on security threats that requires federal employees to keep closer tabs on their co-workers and exhorts managers to punish those who fail to report their suspicions.

President Barack Obama’s unprecedented initiative, known as the Insider Threat Program, is sweeping in its reach. It has received scant public attention even though it extends beyond the U.S. national security bureaucracies to most federal departments and agencies nationwide, including the Peace Corps, the Social Security Administration and the Education and Agriculture departments. It emphasizes leaks of classified material, but catchall definitions of “insider threat” give agencies latitude to pursue and penalize a range of other conduct.

Government documents reviewed by McClatchy illustrate how some agencies are using that latitude to pursue unauthorized disclosures of any information, not just classified material. They also show how millions of federal employees and contractors must watch for “high-risk persons or behaviors” among co-workers and could face penalties, including criminal charges, for failing to report them. Leaks to the media are equated with espionage.

Read more here: http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2013/06/20/194513/obamas-crackdown-views-leaks-as.html#.Ucb6zZymU0M#storylink=cpy

“Hammer this fact home . . . leaking is tantamount to aiding the enemies of the United States,” says a June 1, 2012, Defense Department strategy for the program that was obtained by McClatchy.

The FISA Court that Obama and some of Congress is proud of:

All 11 of the current members were tapped by Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. Ten were originally appointed to the federal bench by Republican presidents. Six are former prosecutors.

“The judges that are assigned to this court are judges that are not likely to rock the boat,” said Nancy Gertner, a former federal judge from Massachusetts who teaches at Harvard Law School. Gertner, a former defense and civil rights lawyer named to the bench by Democrat Bill Clinton, added: “All of the structural pressures that keep a judge independent are missing there. It’s ­one-sided, secret, and the judges are chosen in a selection process by one man.”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/for-secretive-surveillance-court-rare-scrutiny-in-wake-of-nsa-leaks/2013/06/22/df9eaae6-d9fa-11e2-a016-92547bf094cc_story_1.html

Ugh, getting so sick of people on twitter saying "So Snowden wants to go to Russia/Cuba/Ecuador, yeah?! Not exactly free havens, free speech paradises, good human rights countries amirite?!"... It is totally beside the point.

Afaict only thing Snowden wants now is to stay out the blood thirsty hands of USA justice. The enemy of the enemy is his friend. In this particular case, free journalism has little to do with it. Snowden just wants to reside somewhere where he can stay out of USA's hands. And with reason.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BNcBma5CAAEt0Jf.gif:large

Dutch cartoon figures Fokke & Sukke (yeah the names are a pun):

Fokke & Sukke have a tip for Snowden

Fokke: If you never want to appear in front of an American judge, there is only one place you can go...
Sukke: Guantánamo Bay

Damnit, cartoon's gone

The joke works without an image thought tbh

http://i649.photobucket.com/albums/uu216/le_bateau_ivre/BNcBma5CAAEt0Jf.png

Dutch cartoon figures Fokke & Sukke (yeah the names are a pun):

Fokke & Sukke have a tip for Snowden

Fokke: If you never want to appear in front of an American judge, there is only one place you can go...
Sukke: Guantánamo Bay

Dutch cartoon figures Fokke & Sukke (yeah the names are a pun):

Fokke & Sukke have a tip for Snowden

Fokke: If you never want to appear in front of an American judge, there is only one place you can go...
Sukke: Guantánamo Bay

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/06/23/david-gregory-glenn-greenwald-crime_n_3486654.html

Nilmar

tho i agree with lbi and the notion that he is being 'hypocritical' is retarded.....it seems doubtful that he can remain safely in russia

whether he gets leaned on to make pro-putin statements or present a death to amerikka show on russia tv or whatever

Otm.

is there any precedent for someone disclosing government secrets in a western nation being given asylum elsewhere?

Ugh, getting so sick of people on twitter saying "So Snowden wants to go to Russia/Cuba/Ecuador, yeah?! Not exactly free havens, free speech paradises, good human rights countries amirite?!"

OTM. Dude leaked this stuff to the press, he didn't mail a Flash drive of it to the Tabliban, he gave it to the supposedly free press that is supposedly protected by our so-effing-awesome freedoms that sets us apart from those horrible savages in the rest of the world. Why is Russa and China so much worse than the US? Cos they relentlessly spy on their own people? Cos they threaten whistle-blowers in the almighty name of State Security?

The fact that this guy has been working in national surveillance and probably knows the secret workings of most gov'ts of the world and chooses NOT to remain in "Freedom Lovin' 'Merica" just really underlines how far we've gone, how much like the dreaded horrors of the Soviet State or the Red Menace we have become. If any moment deserves a "Wake up, sheeple", this is it.

Philip Agee comes to mind.

xp

xp Exactly Adam! That's the thing. I see a lot of Obama supporters still clinging to the idea of 'Obama is the leader of the FREE world, of the greatest FREE nation", when in fact he's no better than his predecessors. As an outside I can truly say, if America had a republican president now the world would go all "oh yeah, BIG surprise". But not it is actually a BIG surprise, and people squirm their way into apologetics. This is way more of a 'wake up sheeple' moment than there ever has been.

There was an interesting interview with former NSA whistleblower Thomas Drake on Dutch telly yesterday. Asked if Obama is better or worse than Bush/Cheney, he said "worse, definitely. At least Bush/Cheney didn't hide the fact they wanted to spy on people more. It's like Obama wants it both ways: a) pretend he's a liberal president that holds privacy in high regard, and b) be seen as a tough president fighting trrrrism.

*But noW it is actually a BIG surprise etc

yeah i think it's possible to absolve snowden for finding sanctuary where he can whilst being cognizant that russia and china are rather worse than the united states

Oh I agree. It's just such a lame tu quoque to pull: "but but but look at China and Russia! They ain't sweethearts either!" While true, it is completely beside the point.

so people get that Moscow is likely a layover, right?

chuck schumer is angry

"The fact that [Russian officials] allowed him to land, indicates that we are not in a place of cooperation," Schumer said on CNN's State of The Union. He added that this could have "serious consequences" for Russian-U.S. relations.

Schumer also said he is "very disappointed" in Hong Kong's decision to let him leave, adding that he believes the "hand of Beijing" was involved here.

Russia & China not being evil enough for the US

"He added that this could have "serious consequences" for Russian-U.S. rleations"

Russia/Poetin: http://files.myopera.com/drlaunch/albums/37656/o-rly001.jpg

Schumer is still under the illusion that the US has as much power in the world as it had in the Sixties. He's living in the past, mahnnn.

i don't know where he got the crazy idea that beijing might have been involved in hong kong's decision to let snowden leave, though. he must have some sort of top secret nsa intelligence that the rest of us have no idea about

True, but it's people like Schumer who just do not understand what this is about. This is not about "oooohhh China's no picknick either!", this effectively is about how the US deals with dissidents; exactly the same way like China or Russia do. Capture them, try them, lock 'em up. The US isn't any holier than "the hand of Beijing" when it concerns this. As is proven by himself. Manning, Agee, Drake, Assange to thread.

I believe the hand of Schumer is involved in lotsa Wall St jagoffs

Can we send David Gregory and Schumer to Russia

and send Dianne Feinstein too, please

I'd actually keep the current Supreme Court and trade the other two branches

Reading anti-Snowden comment threads is a hugely demoralizing experience. People just bending over backwards in the name of authoritarianism. And if Cheney's outing of CIA informant or Clapper's recent perjury is brought up, they get a free pass cos apparently the law only counts if it's in favor of State power.

And the argument that PRISM disclosures simultaneously

1) something everyone already knew about anyways and does nothing to damage our global position

and

2) puts the US at a huge disadvantage and is equivalent to TREASON

scooter libby got a free pass?

Wikipedia:

"On June 5, 2007, the presiding trial judge, Reggie B. Walton, sentenced Libby to 30 months in federal prison, a fine of $250,000, and two years of supervised release, including 400 hours of community service,[14][15][16][17] and then ordered Libby to begin his sentence immediately.[18] On July 2, 2007, when Libby's appeal of Walton's order failed, President Bush commuted Libby's 30-month prison sentence, leaving the other parts of his sentence intact."

The money for the fine could probably have been raised from wealthy Bush/Cheney backers, so the 400 hours of community service were his only tangible forfeit. Not quite a free pass, but much worse than what Snowden would get.

much worse better than

"we've changed our passwords"

http://www.salon.com/2013/06/23/sunday_shows_what_you_missed/

Booz Allen Hamilton still needs to get a return-on-investment: After Profits, Defense Contractor Faces the Pitfalls of Cybersecurity

WASHINGTON — When the United Arab Emirates wanted to create its own version of the National Security Agency, it turned to Booz Allen Hamilton to replicate the world’s largest and most powerful spy agency in the sands of Abu Dhabi.

It was a natural choice: The chief architect of Booz Allen’s cyberstrategy is Mike McConnell, who once led the N.S.A. and pushed the United States into a new era of big data espionage. It was Mr. McConnell who won the blessing of the American intelligence agencies to bolster the Persian Gulf sheikdom, which helps track the Iranians.

“They are teaching everything,” one Arab official familiar with the effort said. “Data mining, Web surveillance, all sorts of digital intelligence collection.”

Yet as Booz Allen profits handsomely from its worldwide expansion, Mr. McConnell and other executives of the government contractor — which sells itself as the gold standard in protecting classified computer systems and boasts that half its 25,000 employees have Top Secret clearances — have a lot of questions to answer.

The blowback from this is going to suck.

@russian_market 20m

BOARDING IS OVER. SNOWDEN DIDN'T SHOW UP. POOR CNN & BCC JOURNALISTS WHO ARE FLYING TO CUBA NOW....HASTA LA VISTA!

Twitter is hilarious now. Reporters ON THE PLANE tweeting Snowden ISN'T on the plane. Plane already on its way to Havana...

awesome

https://twitter.com/maxseddon/statuses/349106511257161729

and Aeroflot isn't even serving drinks!

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jun/24/edward-snowden-booked-on-plane-from-moscow-to-havana-live-coverage

Maybe Rihanna took his place?

xp Lol

I enjoy seeing the entire state-media complex being turned into Dean Wormer by one guy.

Snowdenplane is really fucking funny

Now it's REALLY becoming a "Catch-22" reference.

"Tweet him! Tweet him! Tweet the bombardier!"

http://www.diena.lv/uploads/thumbnails/705x457/article/1402/14013333/5225298_ORIGINAL_1371888009.jpg.jpg

like something out of blade runner

@Conor Friedersdorf
How could Snowden go to Cuba, a country where untried prisoners on hunger strikes are force fed with -- oh, wait, it's us doing that.

The intermediary told Mr. Snowden Friday night that the government could not predict what Hong Kong’s independent judiciary would do, but that serving jail time while awaiting trial was a possibility. The intermediary also said that the Hong Kong government would welcome Mr. Snowden’s departure, Mr. Ho and the person who insisted on anonymity said. Both declined to identify the intermediary.

The Hong Kong government said that it would not interfere with Mr. Snowden’s departure and even provided unobtrusive police protection for him as he went through the airport, both of them said.

But, Mr. Ho said, Mr. Snowden went through the same security and immigration channels as most passengers at the airport, rather than a special channel usually used for people involved in highly political cases — a sign that the Hong Kong government wanted to minimize its involvement in Mr. Snowden’s departure.

At the same time, the Hong Kong government’s encouragement for Mr. Snowden to leave, instead of a suggestion that he stay and fight any return to the United States, had persuaded him that staying was risky because the Hong Kong government might not be on his side. “He would not like to fight with the Hong Kong government, with the Chinese government and the U.S. government” against him, Mr. Ho said.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/25/world/asia/snowden-departure-from-hong-kong.html?_r=0

So of course Snowden wasn’t on that plane. He couldn’t have been. If he’d disappeared into Cuba the Snowden story would be over and all that would be left is the NSA story. And that’s not the plan.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2013/06/24/wonkbook-does-edward-snowden-even-exist/?hpid=z3

Ezra Klein and Evan Soltas

Doesn't really make me feel great about either Snowden or Booz Allen's hiring practices:

http://livewire.talkingpointsmemo.com/entry/snowden-says-he-took-job-with-contractor-to?ref=fpblg

i mean afaic if dude was capable of using his skills and experience to get into a position to expose these programs, and if he set out to do so deliberately from the start, that's another notch for his temperate subversion in my book.

that said, i think this collective desire to lionize leakers as Great Heroes of The People is completely misguided. i'm glad he did what he did, and i'm glad he had the foresight to figure out how to do it more effectively than manning's indiscriminate document dump.

Leakers are necessary in a security state. I'm glad someone is willing to push some of these secrets out into the light.

ends/means etc

MLK said there are just laws and unjust laws. i think the info snowden made avaiable had little reason to be classified and that the public is better off than it was 2 weeks ago

Sure, which is why I value the info more than Snowden

the sheer number of documents that get classified every year is kind of stunning.

for me the issue isn't every leaker being a hero so much as the obama admin's reaction to leakers being horrifyingly over-the-top and frankly kind of tyrannical.

i do pretty much regard snowden as a hero, though.

snowden's a cool dude but i'm probably a bit more defensive of him than i would be ideally, given the mud-slinging attempts against him etc. i mean ideally the guy wouldn't be chraged w/ espionage

yeah agreeing w/ JD as per yoosh

You guys are in my cabinet iirc

can i be seward?

I call dibs on Salmon P. Chase.

I want to be Secrtareies of Fart

http://d3j5vwomefv46c.cloudfront.net/photos/large/784386973.jpg

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/johncassidy/2013/06/demonizing-edward-snowden-which-side-are-you-on.html#entry-more

way more in favor of demonizing Assange tbh

http://www.coasttocoastam.com/pages/poll-edward-snowden

speaking of balls

“Those people should be shot in the balls,” Snowden said of leakers in a January 2009 chat. Snowden had logged into an Internet Relay Chat (IRC) server associated with Ars Technica, a popular tech news site. While Ars itself didn’t log the conversations, multiple participants in the discussions kept logs of the chats and provided them to the technology site.

At this point, Snowden’s evolution into a fierce critic of the national security establishment was in its early stages. Snowden was incensed at the New York Times, which had described secret negotiations between the United States and Israel over how best to deal with Iran’s suspected nuclear program.
“Are they TRYING to start a war? Jesus christ. They’re like wikileaks.” Snowden wrote. “You don’t put that s— in the NEWSPAPER.”

“They have a HISTORY of this s—,” he continued, making liberal use of capital letters and profanity. “These are the same people who blew the whole ‘we could listen to osama’s cell phone’ thing. The same people who screwed us on wiretapping. Over and over and over again.”
He said he enjoyed “ethical reporting.” But “VIOLATING NATIONAL SECURITY? no. That s— is classified for a reason. It’s not because ‘oh we hope our citizens don’t find out.’ It’s because ‘this s— won’t work if iran knows what we’re doing.’”

“I am so angry right now. This is completely unbelievable.”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2013/06/26/four-years-ago-ed-snowden-thought-leakers-should-be-shot/

snowden... otm?

disappointed the post didn't include "-in-the-balls" at the end of the URL there

he evolved

you might someday xp

‏@chrislhayes
Quite an ideological journey for Ed Snowden … This seems to make the act of conscience motivation *more* credible

agree tbh

I see a significant difference between the leaks Snowden was describing in 2009 and this one

well and as has been discussed doc dump vs. targeted release are v diff imo

it's been mentioned over and over, but i'm not sure what the "terrorists" learned from the nsa leak. that they're trying to monitor their phone calls and internet usage? that doesn't strike me as a huge blow to national security.

whereas leaking "secret negotiations between the United States and Israel over how best to deal with Iran’s suspected nuclear program" seems a bit more consequential.

in other words hurting otm

Im confused as to why nobody has talked to him in the last couple days.. if hes just chillin in an airport how come nobody has seen him?

other day one of the reporters who was stuck on the flight to cuba landed back in moscow and chatted with a customs guy who said he sees him all the time

probably bs, but lol

used to think they should be shot in the balls, now he thinks they will be shot in the balls

BREAKING: Snowden found crying in Sheremetyevo Airport, shot in balls

are we really surprised that a guy who worked at the cia and then the nsa once felt that way?

what snowden leaked poses zero threat to national security; it poses a threat to the obama admin's ability to keep a lid on policies they know the public would be creeped out by.

In 2009 Snowden prob thought the gold standard was for pussies, too. But Snowden isn't the story, or he shouldn't be. Who cares what some 29 year old chatted about when he was 24? Either we care about NSA's harvesting data on billions of daily phone calls or we don't care. Snowden's faded opinions are irrelevant.

As Sen. Wyden keeps saying, no one has made a case that we couldn't achieve the same ends through less intrusive means. And yes, slippery slopes do apply here.

right

the plurality of american/english journalists with any national security remit are complaisant dicksucks who will personalize/psychologize this ephemera like it has any consequence to the material disclosed

The ACLU lawsuit, which establishes standing to sue bcz ACLU is a Verizon customer, seems like the most promising avenue being followed atm. The 'national conversation on security and privacy issues' Obama said he wanted really sucks ass so far. But "national conversations on X issue" usually suck ass.

http://nsa.motherboard.tv/

ACLU will lose but am so glad they are fighting. I should give them more money.

yeah i give them 10 bucks a month but i r poor

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/nsa-chief-says-surveillance-programs-helped-thwart-dozens-of-plots/2013/06/27/e97ab0a2-df70-11e2-963a-72d740e88c12_story.html?hpid=z1

NSA head vs 2 Senate Dems

Two Democratic senators, Ron Wyden of Oregon and Mark Udall of Colorado, have questioned whether the collection of tens of millions of domestic calling records has helped thwart plots.

“It appears that the bulk phone records collection program under section 215 of the USA Patriot Act played little or no role in most of these disruptions,” the senators said in a statement. They did note that targeting foreign communications under Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act was useful but that conflating these programs as one effort was misleading.

President Obama on Thursday defended the handling of the international chase for the former government contractor, calling it a legal matter and saying he was “not going to be scrambling jets to get a 29-year-old hacker.” Asked whether he had personally called Chinese President Xi Jinping or Russian President Vladi­mir Putin about Snowden, Obama said he had not.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/in-snowden-playbook-obama-administration-prioritized-legal-channels-over-diplomacy/2013/06/27/17523a0a-de7b-11e2-b797-cbd4cb13f9c6_story.html?hpid=z1

how old would a hacker have to be to make scrambling jets worthwhile?

17, like Broderick in WarGames

http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m7b6lfHFPz1qzx3igo1_500.jpg

Would scramble jets for.

there it is

Nina Khruscheva rants, goes in on Cheney

commenters are largely unimpressed

In 1982, for example, when I was in high school in Moscow, I was on the phone with one of my closest friends, talking about how relieved we were that Leonid Brezhnev had finally died, after 18 years of stifling power. Suddenly, there was a metallic click on the line and we heard a dour man’s voice. A KGB functionary, no doubt. “Hang up the phone,” he demanded, “immediately.” We did.

I dare anyone to tell me that this has happened to you in the United States.

yeah we have a fuckin budget here

hah

is julian assange gonna turn ecuador into reddit island

a dreamland where the bitcoins flow like water and nobody has to worry about broads calling it rape when they wanted it

Can you take me higher ruh. To a place with bitcoin streams ruh.

Memories of Stasi color Germans’ view of U.S. surveillance programs

Read more here: http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2013/06/26/195045/memories-of-stasi-color-germans.html

free Edward Snowden tutorials

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/28/opinion/the-criminal-nsa.html?src=recg

Be hilarious if dude ended up like the guy trapped in the Paris airport. It'd be like the end of "The Shield." Yeah, he got away with it ... but at what cost!?!?

Remind me what Snowden flew to China first, rather than someplace he actually needed to be? Why didn't he fly straight to Ecuador, or Mexico to Cuba or whatever?

reading the times account of his time in HK it sounds like he was kind of misled or overly optimistic about his chances of avoiding extradition

RT @Reuters: Putin says if Snowden wants to stay in Russia, he must "stop his work aimed at harming our American partners"

oh putin-paws

giving him up seems like a good move for putin. earns some political capital in the us/russia relationship at basically no real cost?

like it's pretty hard to imagine that mr. kgb has an ounce of sympathy for for snowden

But he doesn't seem to care too much about political capital with the US either

putin is just having fun out there, playing like a young kid

goole otm

he should send snowden back wearing the super bowl ring

he should make Snowden arm wrestle for it first

he should send snowden back wearing the super bowl ring

― iatee, Monday, July 1, 2013 3:35 PM (11 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

god i hope this happens

In just four days, J. Shot—in association with Fallout Media and Immortal Peach (which is a great name for anything)—put together a five-minute film depicting Edward Snowden's first days in Hong Kong, culminating in his unveiling in his interview with The Guardian. The film, called Verax, is in its entirety below

http://www.nationaljournal.com/nationalsecurity/the-edward-snowden-movie-already-exists-20130701

needs more guys staring up into a camera howling "snoooowwwdDDEEEEEEEEEEN!!!!!"
also batman

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/europe/edward-snowden-applies-for-asylum-in-russia-news-reports-say/2013/07/01/cc3daf20-e26e-11e2-aef3-339619eab080_story.html

idealist hacker steals secrets about the panopticon, flees to hong kong, runs into arms of "anti-secrets" organization known to ally itself with leakers, issues statement through organization

can we please stop living in a fucking william gibson novel

Can't. It's been 30 years since Neuromancer so most of the people that live and work in the Marketing/Intelligence/Surveillance state are already living a post-reality Gibson world anyway. It will only get even more surreal.

dammit.

post-cyberpunk can be kinda uplifting i think so let's hope that's the direction

the snowden archives

Neuromancer?

Putin says he can get asylum in Russia if he stops leaking information.
SNOWden must be QUIET: WINTER MUTE.

Watching the Greenwald speech from the Socialism 2013 conference--surprisingly full of jokes. Also:

I really do love this conference. There's no conference quite like it in terms of the vibrancy and energy, I genuinely leave inspired each time I've attended. These last 4 weeks have been the most exhausting and intense four weeks of my life, but I knew that agreeing to speak here would compel me to reflect on this time, and I wanted that. But the real reason I wanted to speak at this conference is that unlike a lot of conferences I attend & speak at, this conference is focused not only on identifying political grievances, but also on creating activism that will address those political grievances, which is crucial. The reason I say that is because at every political speech I give, one of the first questions is always "well what can we do about these things?" And I think that question is very much the predominant theme of this conference. The idea that there's really no point in talking about political problems and systemic injustices if you're not also simultaneously grappling with the question of what I as an individual can do about it.

whassup

this been done by a somebody

http://conference.first.org/program/index.aspx

ask a random anonymous private individual some questions

seriously hit it up babies

worst outcome is a little less cowbell than you dreamt

of

Ecuador has washed its hands of him and said he's Russia's problem now. Sheremetyevo's transit lounge isn't somewhere i'd particularly want to be stuck for weeks on end.

Can you get me a pass to that? I'm a well-travelled out-of-work drone rock database programmer who's looking to join the inside track.

Welcome back Tomboto

dang it, the conference already happened. Still looking for work though...

The requests were made to a number of countries including the Republic of Austria, the Plurinational State of Bolivia, the Federative Republic of Brazil, the People’s Republic of China, the Republic of Cuba, the Republic of Finland, the French Republic, the Federal Republic of Germany, the Republic of India, the Italian Republic, the Republic of Ireland, the Kingdom of the Netherlands, the Republic of Nicaragua, the Kingdom of Norway, the Republic of Poland, the Russian Federation, the Kingdom of Spain, the Swiss Confederation and the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela.

so... which of these states is going to take him? i think it's interesting that he put the prc and cuba on his list.

Boliva, probably.

Bolivia, even.

Cuba is nice for old school spy scenery.

Still confused: couldn't this clown have just driven to Mexico then flown to Cuba? Shouldn't he have maybe lined up asylum first, done a little googlin', before he started leaking stuff?

Also, how does a computer programmer/analyst geek for the gov get an exotic dancer girlfriend in Hawaii?

These are all important questions.

I would assume that Cuba isn't his favoured destination. "Defecting" to a communist country, rather than, idk Finland, is nagl if you want people in the US to take you seriously. Obv couldn't have lined up asylum first as the NSA is reading the Finnish embassy's e-mails.

Regardless, why did he start in Hong Kong? And why did he not work this shit out first? He's not ending up in Finland. One way or another, he's going to end up in a warm place with a horrible human rights record.

Also, sorry, but leaking state secrets before seeking asylum in some other country is "nagl" no matter where he ends up. It's not like his detractors will be all, oh, he's in Finland, that's cool. The people who want him hung for treason likely don't distinguish between Europe and Soviet Russia.

I can think of some other reasons why a Ron Paul fan wouldn't want to spend the rest of his life in Cuba

thanks for apologizing

I doubt the people who want him hung for treason will care either way but anyone who is conflicted about the morality of the US spying on its citizens and allies might. It's a lot easier to question his motives if he jumps on the first plane to Havana.

And yes, he seems more of a libertarian than a socialist so Cuba wouldn't exactly be ideal either way.

he should move to Somalia then badoom-tish

No internet access iirc.

To do list:

1) Find country that would give me asylum
2) Go close to - or even to - that country
3) Leak state secrets
4) Invoke asylum.

I seem to recall Snowden explaining why originally Hong Kong, but I can't remember why. Clearly it didn't work out for him, or at least hasn't yet.

hong kong is the libertarian dreamland

^^^

they got seat belts?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k68VJnpqJb8

HK also has some of the fatest internet infrastructure in the world, and is the "home" of shady web companies like megaupload

snowden was a big poster on ars technica forums:

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2010/04/1gbps-symmetric-fiber-us26-in-hong-kong/
http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2010/01/fiber-fail-hong-kong-booms-as-verizon-retrenches/

http://arstechnica.com/civis/viewtopic.php?f=23&t=177549

http://livewire.talkingpointsmemo.com/entry/peter-king-suspicious-of-snowdens-china-connections-he

lol check the anti-democracy comments up top on that HK youtube

He's the man without a country. Maybe he can get a job in that Russian airport?

If someone like Snowden were in China, say, would he have free and unfettered access to the fast internet? Or would his internet access be censored/monitored/limited?

from what ive read the reason he left HK is because he learned he could be jailed during his asylum/extradition process and would lose access to the internet

https://02varvara.files.wordpress.com/2011/03/sergei-yolkin-internet-addiction-2011.jpg

idk if everybody already read the interviews greenwald gave abt the initial encounters with snowden but in the socialism talk he says "from the moment he made contact with me he was clear in his understanding that he was relinquishing control of his life, that from here forward he would be pursued, imprisoned, or worse by the most powerful government in the world. i expected to meet a high ranking official at tne end of his career and prepared to live out his final years in defiance. i did not expect to meet such a courageous young man with his whole life still ahead of him, called by conscience to reveal the truth."

prob some hagiography happening there but this is a guy who seems to have gone into this clear eyed, if not entirely accurate in his predictions of outcomes.

"prob"

His poor father...

He's been so clear eyed and realistic that's it's a wonder he didn't work things out better before he sealed his fate.

What You Can Learn from Six Months of Phone Metadata

Wow

He's been so clear eyed and realistic that's it's a wonder he didn't work things out better before he sealed his fate.

― Josh in Chicago, Tuesday, July 2, 2013 3:10 PM (2 hours ago)

He should have contacted you and then he would be sitting pretty with your pal Josh in Caracas

really though, next time around call ahead first ed, no one likes the drop-in

dad wrote open letter, can't find full post

The father of NSA leaker Edward Snowden, frustrated by his inability to reach out directly to his son, has written an open letter to him extolling him for "summoning the American people to confront the growing danger of tyranny."

The letter was written jointly Tuesday by Lonnie Snowden and his lawyer, Bruce Fein.

It comes a day after Edward Snowden issued a statement through WikiLeaks ripping the Obama administration for leaving him "stateless" and revoking his passport.

Snowden is in Russia and has been seeking asylum in multiple countries.

Snowden's father has expressed concern that WikiLeaks supporters who have been helping his son seek asylum may not have his best interests at heart. The father has said he'd like his son to return to the U.S. under the right circumstances.

prob some hagiography happening there

"prob"

I don't think yer allowed to call anything hagiography unless it rises to the level of giving the Nobel Peace Prize to a guy about to embark on an 8-year killing spree, but meh, semantics.

I swear, someone could be talking about croissants and you'd pop up drily wondering how many people Bam the War Criminal had executed by drone strike to get those croissants extra buttery

i go with my strengths, dude

"strengths"

http://images.politico.com/global/2012/12/04/121204_barack_obama_ap_605.jpg

"HURRY UP WITH MY DAMN CROISSANTS!"

you see, when Kanye says it it's funny, when Obama says it it's chilling because he has his finger on the drone trigger if those croissants don't show up pronto.

morbs the kanye they're speaking of is kanye west, he's a rapper (it's when you talk in rhymes over a 'beat'), he's got an album about croissants out right now, lou reed loves it, says it reminds him of farts.

lol alfred

hey balls, i was goin to rap shows long b4 yr pubes came in, just sayin

http://images.politico.com/global/2012/12/04/121204_barack_obama_ap_605.jpg

http://i.imgflip.com/13lz5.gif

Moving on (gif hell on bookmarks).

Plane carrying Bolivian president, Eva Morales, rerouted to Austria on suspicion US whistleblower Edward Snowden is on board. More soon …

idiot! so many embassies and he had to take a plane

fuck you if you dont have #teamsnowden stickers on yr laptop right now

idk if snowden was naive about the ruthless american war machine hunting him down, but i think maybe he was naive about the stability of the current world order - i think he's surprised to find out that the united states has the pull that it does

that 'eva' morales was of course from the fine subs at the guardian

i think he's surprised to find out that the united states has the pull that it does

Massive irony in dude leaking proof of US omniscience taken by surprise by scope and reach of US power.

"Yeah, I knew they were recording and spying on countless phone calls and stuff, but who would have guessed they'd have so much away with their treaty-bound diplomatic allies?"

Schumer is still under the illusion that the US has as much power in the world as it had in the Sixties. He's living in the past, mahnnn.

― Le Bateau Ivre

josh i look forward to your guide on evading us hegemony after leaking top secret documents

whenever you make the time

when the dn changes to Josh in Bolivia, you will know he made the time

Snowden reminds me a lot of guys you would see at hacker conventions in the early 90s - the corporate cyberpunks who talked a big game about how one day they were going take on the system and defeat Big Brother like it was a James Bond story. I think Snowden thought that the reveal itself would give him don't-kill-the-messenger immunity but he badly underestimated just how ruthless this type of Power operates - you would think the house in Hawaii, the high-paying job, and the dancing exhibitionist girlfriend would be a tip off. It works in organized crime.

i mean i cant read the guys mind who knows but i think yeah there's a decent chance he thought this would be like the end of a movie where he spills the beans and the corrupt gov't can no longer touch him because all its avatars are being prosecuted or hounded from office or whatever. and therefore underestimated not just US ruthlessness but the extent to which people care, or want to know, the revelations. (or OTOH the extent to which people *already knew* what his documents revealed

)

Awful lot of mind reading here!

yeah I'm thinking he anticipated some of this could happen

"We cannot offer you asylum because we just found out that the Americans have bugged our entire government. Your case means nothing to us."

neway i found this about as infuriating as any of the stuff that snowden revealed, the pathetic way euro countries treated evo morales and his plane http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/04/world/snowden.html?hp

certainly Obama's remark – not sending fighter jets after a hacker – makes sense. He had other means of persuasion.

josh i look forward to your guide on evading us hegemony after leaking top secret documents

Like I said, the first step, retroactively, was to evade US hegemony before leaking docs.

I suppose the catch is finding asylum without it looking like some quid pro quo secrets-for-safe-haven trade. There's asylum, and then there's ... defection? But wtf does this guy care? He's not coming back here on his own. I don't know if that makes him brave or a coward that he's not willing to go full-martyr, but he's burned his bridges already.

Anyway, watch this: fly to Mexico on a vacation, fly to Cuba. Stay there. US hegemony: evaded! But at this point, post-leak, hornet nest -shaking, he's pretty screwed if he wants to live out the rest of his life in anything close to comfort. But he claims to have thought of that, per his initial comments, so who cares.

https://gist.github.com/anonymous/5917093

huh that's interesting

I'm not a big fan of Big Brother government, but if there's anything a gov seems to be justified in going to the ends of the earth to achieve, it's catching a former employee who not only has leaked ample state secrets, threatened to leak more, fled the country in search of sanctuary and thumbed his nose at the US the whole time. Is it it any wonder no one wants this particular hot potato?

justified in their eyes, yeah.

That's just silly. You can disagree with it, but there's really no way to defend it as unjustified. It'd be like if a guy robs a bank and flees the country and boasts about it and you being all, that's cool, well played. It's not like the US is sending out the drones to blow up Snowden family weddings.

Yet.

but dude robbed a bank to treat his sick aunt...who is president of that very bank!

the USG is a morally unjustifiable entity, but i'm not saying more with them watching, y'know

saying more would be a bit like pissing into the ocean at this point, no?

prism consists of google, facebook, apple, twitter and ilx

Obama has access to ALL your posts even the ones in 77

Aybe-May ecan-may alk-tay in ode-cay?

but dude robbed a bank to treat his sick aunt...who is president of that very bank!

― Sufjan Grafton, Wednesday, July 3, 2013 11:48 AM (3 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Is that a movie?

it's a mountain dew commercial. his aunt is 'sick' in the sense that she does indy nosebones

lol

It'd be like if a guy robs a bank and flees the country and boasts about it and you being all, that's cool, well played

i mean i get what you're saying, even if i disagree, but this is sort of a poor analogy

I'll concede that.

Obama has access to ALL your posts even the ones in 77

― iatee, Wednesday, July 3, 2013 3:52 PM (6 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

aw hell

lol we couldn't even keep 77 posts from leaking to BCO, of course the government has them

haha that was a joke ftr?

they've had access to 77 from the start, el tomboto was like the first person invited

crut how could you do this to us

Evo Morales is, with a stopover in Gran Canaria, now on the way home. But the involuntary stopover in Vienna Bolivian President leaves considerable repercussions. And questions, the answers are hidden in the false bottoms possibly that are standard in the diplomatic interiors.

i really enjoy google translate sometimes

‏@MartinxHodgson
Obama "not scrambling jets" to find #Snowden. Merely closing down European airspace and detaining a president!

Morales said Bolivia had not received a formal application for asylum from Snowden yet, but hinted it would consider any request favourably.

"If there were a request, of course we would be willing to debate and consider the idea," Morales told RT Actualidad, the Spanish-language service of Russian broadcaster RT.

"I know that the empires have an espionage network and are against the so-called developing countries. And in particular, against those which are rich in natural resources," he added.

His comments were echoed by favourable noises from Venezuela, another possible exit route for the former NSA contractor. President Nicolás Maduro said Caracas was also ready to consider Snowden's asylum should he ask for it.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jul/03/edward-snowden-bolivia-plane-vienna

Not scrambling jets, just searching the jet of another country's president

Amid a growing diplomatic storm, the Bolivian president, Evo Morales, has been allowed to fly out of Vienna, but only after a 12-hour interruption during which his plane was stopped and searched for the whistleblower Edward Snowden.

tho obv i'm in the free eddie camp there's a part of me that's coming around to the notion that turning himself in would be the fastest way to make this story about spying again instead of about the spy

wondering how many liberals in '71 were rushing to compare dan ellsberg to a bank robber

get him away from the people who want to use him at WL to keep gasping at relevance, away from the politicians that want to make him an accidental anti-imperialist mascot...but then, the alternative is how many years of solitary before a trial that would see him dismantled xp

It's not like the US is sending out the drones to blow up Snowden family weddings.

Yet.

― Josh in Chicago, Wednesday, July 3, 2013 3:43 PM (2 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

yeah they'd never kill an american who said some treasonous shit that aided the enemy and maybe his family for being in the wrong place at the wrong time amirite

idk if this matters but my understanding of the pentagon papers was that, while classified, they didn't contain anything the public didn't already know from various news sources about what had happened in vietnam -- what the PP showed was that the pentagon itself knew how useless and hopeless the situation was, and had known for years (right?)

also when ellsberg leaked them he didn't have a bradley manning figure being put in solitary w/o charge for months previously...

oddly, i remember my journalism professor in college saying basically the same thing -- that the PP were no big deal and nixon (being nixon) just went beserk for no reason. but according to wiki:

The Papers revealed that the U.S. had expanded its war with bombing of Cambodia and Laos, coastal raids on North Vietnam, and Marine Corps attacks, none of which had been reported by media in the US. The most damaging revelations in the papers revealed that four administrations, from Truman to Johnson, had misled the public regarding their intentions. For example, the John F. Kennedy administration had planned to overthrow South Vietnamese leader Ngo Dinh Diem before his death in a November 1963 coup. President Johnson had decided to expand the war while promising "we seek no wider war" during his 1964 presidential campaign, including plans to bomb North Vietnam well before the 1964 Election. President Johnson had been outspoken against doing so during the election and claimed that his opponent Barry Goldwater was the one that wanted to bomb North Vietnam.

mind you i don't think snowden = ellsberg or that the situations are exactly the same but all the same it's good to keep in mind that there was a time when ellsberg was not a beloved elder statesman of free speech et al, and that his actions were being denounced as treasonous. (also IIRC the PP were even more highly classified than what manning leaked, if not what snowden leaked.)

how many liberals in '71 were rushing to compare dan ellsberg to a bank robber

well, back then Obama Democrats woulda been right of Rockefeller Republicans

I think it's important to keep in mind this guy has spent the past 5+ years working with high level US secret intelligence across the world. Keep that in mind next time you read someone saying "This guy is stupid why didn't he do _this_ instead?" Clearly dude was privy to info the vast majority of us don't have, and undoubtedly that has informed his globe-trotting post-leak actions.

The truth prob lies somewhere between 'what a dolt' and 'he's super-informed and playing n-dimensional chess'.

bush jr was privy to all kinds of information but still thought invading iraq was a good idea, which i think indicates that access to intelligence doesn't necessarily replace personal intelligence.

yeah i saw a friend on twitter today suggesting 'what if all this asylum circus is just snowden's way of revealing the degree to which the us controls world affairs' and i was like um

There was just a piece in ... Wired? On NPR? Wherever. That went into about how much of the stuff Snowden leaked has been known, or at least highly suspected, for at least a decade. Will try to find.

Is the big Snowden revelation the extent to which the US has been spying on/in other countries? Because that seems to be more diplomatically damaging than domestic eavesdropping.

Like, here's an NPR interview with James Risin from 2003:

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5127932

INSKEEP: Can I get you to explain your best understanding of the nuts and bolts of what the National Security Agency has been doing? Who's calling from where, who's listening and how are they doing that, as best you've been able to determine?

Mr. RISEN: Well, what the government says they've been doing is eavesdropping on telephone and e-mail communications into and out of the United States without search warrants.

Sorry, that was 2006

the big Snowden revelation to me is the extent to which Russia and Bolivia still give a shit about keeping in Amerikay's good graces.

Yeah, that part is surprising!

The new Wired has a big NSA piece:

http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2013/06/general-keith-alexander-cyberwar/all/

But just six months later, Alexander and the rest of the American intelligence community suffered a devastating defeat when they were surprised by the attacks on 9/11. Following the assault, he ordered his Army intercept operators to begin illegally monitoring the phone calls and email of American citizens who had nothing to do with terrorism, including intimate calls between journalists and their spouses. Congress later gave retroactive immunity to the telecoms that assisted the government.

Anyway, this all might explain why Americans don't seem to care too much about this stuff. We've been sort of primed for these sorts of revelations, which I suppose is another sign of how bad it's gotten. So is the fact that Snowden, hero or loser or whatever he is, is afraid to return home to America to "face justice," given he knows absolutely well what a sham that would be.

yeah i was working my way through that on the train this morning, need to finish it

http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2013/07/hacker-jester-targets-assange-snowden-ecuador

The Jester, who has one of his computers on display in the International Spy Museum, is famous for launching cyberattacks against WikiLeaks and Al Qaeda-linked web sites. According to a May story in Newsweek, he's also sought to reveal the identities of jihadists recruiting online and affiliates of the hacktivist group Anonymous. The Jester told the magazine that he views his hacking as an extension of his former military service (he claims that he was affiliated with a "rather famous" unit in Afghanistan), but he said that he has "no official relationship with law enforcement agencies." On his website he describes himself as "pro OUR Military, LEA [law enforcement agencies], & Intel Communities who do the same job no matter who is sitting in the big seat."

In a June 26 blog post, the Jester writes that Snowden "is not a goddam hero, here to save Americans from 'the government' because of privacy infringements and breaches of the 4th amendment, he is a traitor and has jeopardized all our lives." He launched a similar tirade against Assange, who has been living in London's Ecuadorean Embassy for more than a year to dodge extradition, writing, "Let's not forget Assange isn't seeking asylum because he's some heroic whistleblower or do-gooder. He's wanted for questioning on a rape charge."

On July 1, the Jester tweeted this:

http://www.motherjones.com/files/Screen%20shot%202013-07-02%20at%202.48.47%20PM.png

In a subsequent series of tweets, the Jester alluded to hacking into the embassy's fire alarm system to force Assange out of the building. If Assange were to leave the embassy compound, he would face extradition to Sweden—where he's under investigation for sexual assault—or potentially to the United States, where Assange fears he could be prosecuted in connection with the publication of classified information allegedly leaked by Bradley Manning.

Yesterday the Jester tweeted photos of what he believed to be fire alarms on the exterior of the Ecuadorean Embassy, asking locals to crowd-source the name and logo of the alarms. The Jester also tweeted the following map, isolating what he says are the wifi networks that Assange may be using within the embassy.

http://www.motherjones.com/files/Screen%20shot%202013-07-02%20at%202.45.45%20PM_1.png

In addition to targeting Assange and Ecuador, the Jester circulated a list of 52 servers used by the Venezuelan government, which Snowden has reportedly also petitioned for asylum. The hacker told FoxNews.com on Tuesday that he would treat countries that consider housing Snowden as "enemies" (Snowden is requesting asylum in at least 21 countries). The Jester did not respond to an interview request from Mother Jones.

The Jester, who has one of his computers on display in the International Spy Museum
The Jester, who has one of his computers on display in the International Spy Museum
The Jester, who has one of his computers on display in the International Spy Museum
The Jester, who has one of his computers on display in the International Spy Museum
The Jester, who has one of his computers on display in the International Spy Museum
The Jester, who has one of his computers on display in the International Spy Museum

this two-part piece on the history of the NSA and whistleblowers is a must-read:

https://www.nsfwcorp.com/dispatch/nsa-whistleblowers-for-dummies/412c6c31f2a8081c10456a2f2c1087f345176369/

https://www.nsfwcorp.com/dispatch/nsa-whistleblowers-for-dummies-ii/81bc80840972053356854f3ac8c87cc4834afb97/

Chris Hayes made a point of reminding people of Admiral Poindexter's efforts in 2002.

Slate:

http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/view_from_chicago/2013/07/edward_snowden_and_asylum_he_is_a_terrible_candidate.html

Snowden has few options left. Any country with an extradition treaty with the United States would probably extradite him—so his efforts to get into Germany or France are pretty pointless. Perhaps, if he reached Cuba or Bolivia, he could stay in one of those countries, in the process giving up the civil liberties that he holds so dear.

Even Snowden’s supporters realize that he must face the music. The Guardian, having wrung him dry of secrets, has solemnly declared that he should be tried albeit as a “whistleblower,” whatever that means. If he returns to the United States, prosecutors can and will charge him under whatever law he broke, and that includes the Espionage Act. He is likely to be convicted, but he has an outside chance of an embarrassing mistrial, a nullifying jury, even a sympathetic judge who goes easy on him in sentencing. Americans have a soft spot for people like Snowden. This country has a long history of unsuccessful prosecutions of dissenters, from the alleged Nazi sympathizer Elizabeth Dilling, to the Chicago Eight, to Daniel Ellsberg. Thoreau, abettors of fugitive slaves, civil rights protesters, and Vietnam-era draft dodgers are honored in historical memory. The founders themselves were traitors who made good. Today, secure but stifling in the embrace of a government that protects us from crime, terrorism, old age, and ill health by keeping track of our every move, we play Patrick Henry and enact harmless mini-rebellions by cheering on people like Snowden and Julian Assange. They defy the system without threatening it.

eric posner doesn't know what a 'whistleblower' is, huh?

I think he meant that he doesn't know what "being tried as a 'whistleblower'" means. Glad I could help.

Does contemporary Bolivia have a notably poor record on civil liberties?

lol did the guardian actually say he should be tried???

thank you us government for protecting me from ill health with cellphone metadata what a country

Protecting us from old age wtf?

Does contemporary Bolivia have a notably poor record on civil liberties?

Indeed. Morales seems to be even worse on this than his hero Chavez.

As a total aside, here's a site that streamlines the entire process of filing a FOIA request to pull FBI files: http://www.getgrandpasfbifile.com

It's fun! Getting an envelope in the mail addressed from the FBI (logo and all!) is such a cheap thrill.

this two-part piece on the history of the NSA and whistleblowers is a must-read:

https://www.nsfwcorp.com/dispatch/nsa-whistleblowers-for-dummies/412c6c31f2a8081c10456a2f2c1087f345176369/

https://www.nsfwcorp.com/dispatch/nsa-whistleblowers-for-dummies-ii/81bc80840972053356854f3ac8c87cc4834afb97/

― (The Other) J.D. (J.D.), Wednesday, July 3, 2013 5:30 PM (Yesterday)

thanks for this!

i'd never heard of this mag/blog before, but that was a really well-written piece. makes me want to finally pick up takeover and finish it for good. interesting thesis that it was the shift from economics to reacting against the expanding security state that led to the sorry democratic party we've got today (though the author doesn't go into how the democrats managed to reverse themselves on the former). teaser for morbs:

That turn against government and towards market solutions eventually led to where we are today under Obama, the worst of both the national security state and austerity politics, a smoldering toxic dump of all the worst that the Democratic Party has offered.

It's run by Mark Ames who used to do The Exile with Matt Taibbi - quite a few of the writers (Yasha Levine, etc) are the same. I've been meaning to get a subscription for a while.

ftr, that sentence i quoted isn't representative of the article itself at all; it's an excellent history

also the article does address the left's slide away from protecting leakers (with the ACLU as the vanguard!) - i hadn't finished the last section

http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_slatest/2013/07/05/french_surveillance_program_european_nation_has_similar_spying_program_as.html

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/07/us/in-secret-court-vastly-broadens-powers-of-nsa.html

NY Times sums up how FISA Court gave NSA more power; and how FISA Court is selected by Justice Roberts and is largely a rubberstamp despite its claims of being more than that

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/daniel-ellsberg-nsa-leaker-snowden-made-the-right-call/2013/07/07/0b46d96c-e5b7-11e2-aef3-339619eab080_story.html?hpid=z2

Ellsberg editorial re Snowden being correct in fleeing

Part 2 of Snowden interview.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/video/2013/jul/08/edward-snowden-video-interview

http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2013/07/10/196362/trapped-an-air-escape-from-moscow.html

Snowden’s best hope for breaking out of the transit area most likely hinges on whether he could sneak onto one of five weekly, direct flights to Havana, Cuba. One such flight landed Tuesday evening, another leaves Thursday afternoon. The main drawback? The path takes the plane directly over the United States, which could flout a standing treaty and force a regularly scheduled commercial flight to land.

Has everyone else amassed hundreds of links related to surveillance states due to Snowden's leaks? At one point I was reading about 5 articles about or related to it a day for a couple of weeks. Then I realised I wasn't reading anything else and couldn't really continue. But I keep all those links and many more to read for later.

I'm surprised no one has made a repository for links related to the surveillance state.

The NSA has done so.

So Snowden may just stay in Russia because its too difficult for him to fly anywhere

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/snowden-wants-meeting-with-human-rights-activists-lawyers/2013/07/12/237d5254-eac6-11e2-a301-ea5a8116d211_story.html?hpid=z1

Curmudgeon, link?

Here is Snowden's actual statement (far better to post the original, I feel):

http://wikileaks.org/Statement-by-Edward-Snowden-to.html

i think that's a joke about how the nsa has made a repository of links

xp

I can't imagine the NSA being objective. They would need some way to brainwash most of the people who work for them, so their links/info on surveillance states would be pretty bias and would not include one of the most dangerous organisations, in my opinion.

ts: waterface vs crimsonhexagon

Joking about NSA link list...

this belongs here:

http://www.avclub.com/articles/matmos-covers-bow-wow-wow,100019/

Olaf Koens @obk

Lukin adds: 'He doesn't look very well fed, a skinny guy. But he has a great haircut'

ts: waterface vs crimsonhexagon

― k3vin k., Friday, July 12, 2013 Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

taking sides

eliot argonaut

ok, so let me get this right: the reason he's stuck in russia is that there's literally no flight plan that doesn't go over a country that would force it to land so they could detain snowden?

ok, so let me get this right: the reason he's stuck in russia is that there's literally no flight plan that doesn't go over a country that would force it to land so they could detain snowden?

― the late great, Friday, July 12, 2013 Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

As we have seen, however, some governments in Western European and North American states have demonstrated a willingness to act outside the law, and this behavior persists today. This unlawful threat makes it impossible for me to travel to Latin America and enjoy the asylum granted there in accordance with our shared rights.

Man, what does the US have against this guy??

seems like the solution is a non-commercial flight (like morales's) where there might be some flexibility with the flight plan? i'm not sure how that works.

With Napolitano leaving, there are now 15 open top positions in DHS

_ok, so let me get this right: the reason he's stuck in russia is that there's literally no flight plan that doesn't go over a country that would force it to land so they could detain snowden?

― the late great, Friday, July 12, 2013 Bookmark Flag Post Permalink_

I am trying to interpret your tone. If what you say is taken at face value, yes. But I sense you're trying to convey some type of befuddlement, shock or surprise. Am I wrong? I had written a rant in response, in case I wasn't, but I don't fully understand ILXor dynamics, so I've chosen to censor myself.
--c21m50nh3x460n

I'm not sure why any reading of this post would merit a rant

eh no offense intended, it was an honest question

from what i can gather russia hasn't cleared him to leave yet?

_ok, so let me get this right: the reason he's stuck in russia is that there's literally no flight plan that doesn't go over a country that would force it to land so they could detain snowden?
― the late great, Friday, July 12, 2013 Bookmark Flag Post Permalink_

I am trying to interpret your tone. If what you say is taken at face value, yes. But I sense you're trying to convey some type of befuddlement, shock or surprise. Am I wrong? I had written a rant in response, in case I wasn't, but I don't fully understand ILXor dynamics, so I've chosen to censor myself.
--c21m50nh3x460n

I'm not sure why any reading of this post would merit a rant

Didn't mean to come off accusatory, so my apologies to the late great if I did.

Anyway, here is a video of Snowden's speech, from a Russian newspaper:

http://lifenews.ru/news/116311

How surreal is watching this?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DXXshWGrDEQ

I'm waiting for all the nouveau NSA/PRISM fiction and movies to come out already.

Just look at that lady's eyes.

I'm waiting for all the nouveau NSA/PRISM fiction and movies to come out already.

Had to rewrite the first third of a story I'm working on.

Actually, I'm working on one, as well.

Hope yours turns out better than mine.

Basically, we have to encrypt EVERYTHING

Travellers' mobile phone data seized by police at border - Telegraph

Officers use counter-terrorism laws to remove a mobile phone from any passenger they wish coming through UK air, sea and international rail ports and then scour their data.

It echoes concerns surrounding an almost identical power police can use on the streets of the UK, which is being reviewed by the Information Commissioner.

However, in those circumstances police must have grounds for suspicion and the phone can only be seized if the individual is arrested.

Mr Anderson said: “Information downloaded from mobile phones seized at ports has been very useful in disrupting terrorists and bringing them to justice.

“But ordinary travellers need to know that their private information will not be taken without good reason, or retained by the police for any longer than is necessary.”

Up to 60,000 people a year are “stopped and examined” as they enter or return to the UK under powers contained in the Terrorism Act 2000.

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-201_162-57593688/greenwald-snowden-documents-detail-nsa-blueprint/

I don't think this Greenwald statement will help Snowden get a flight that can find a place to refuel (or make it past the US) and make it South, but who knows.

http://news.yahoo.com/putin-snowden-dubious-present-174832824.html

In comments reported by Russian news agencies during a meeting with students, Putin noted that Snowden flew to Moscow on June 23 "without invitation," intending only to transit to another country.

But Putin says the United States intimidated other countries against accepting Snowden, effectively blocking him from flying further.

"Such a present to us. Merry Christmas," he was quoted as telling the students on the Gulf of Finland island of Gogland.