There are two Snowdens: the whistle-blower, and the seemingly random leaker who is willing

[pnwmom]

to endanger American lives.

SPIEGEL, which published a sympathetic account of Snowden's story soon after all this began, has confirmed that Snowden shared information with them that went beyond issues of surveillance of communications and could put American lives at risk.

"SPIEGEL has decided not to publish details it has seen about secret operations that could endanger the lives of NSA workers. Nor is it publishing the related internal code words. However, this does not apply to information about the general surveillance of communications. They don't endanger any human lives -- they simply describe a system whose dimensions go beyond the imaginable. This kind of global debate is actually precisely what Snowden intended and what motivated his breach of secrecy. 'The public needs to decide whether these policies are right or wrong,' he says."

http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/secret-documents-nsa-targeted-germany-and-eu-buildings-a-908609.html

Some of us focus on the first Snowden and some of us on the second -- and some appreciate that he opened the debate on internal US surveillance while deploring his leaks about international spying.

[KittyWampus]

1. IMO, it all depends on your objective. If your primary interest is in becoming informed & reigning

Last edited Tue Aug 13, 2013, 04:02 PM - Edit history (1)

in the NSA then you can criticize the way S. & Greenwald handled this.

If your primary objective is to either whip UP outrage or damage a Democratic President, you will not be willing to acknowledge how improperly this was handled. Furthermore, you will spend a great deal of energy calling anyone who sees shades of gray an "apologist".

[The Magistrate]

2. Home Truths, Ma'am

That some here pursue the latter of those objectives is quite clear.

[kelliekat44]

3. Yes, and I simply can't read any of those posts anymore. I was trying to get a balanced view but

it seems hopeless so I guess I'll just be an apologist.

[Whisp]

5. stasi-bot is my particular favourite. n/t

[Just Saying]

8. Sounds about right.

I find it ironic that the group most worried about paid posters & disruptors here are the ones most responsible for shutting down and lowering the level of debate particularly on the issue they're most passionate about.

I'm happy to see more posters insisting on rational debate and more posts hidden that cross the line.

Personally, I think the intelligence community does have a job to do and legitimate reasons for spying. I don't think we should trust our government implicitly, but I also don't think they can or should tell us everything. Obviously if we know everything, our enemies know everything. I think there are plenty here who don't want the CIA, NSA or FBI to exist at all and that certainly plays into their zeal about this scandal.

It concerns me that the NSA may be going too far but I think we need to analyze what's happening and work to change the laws that overreach. Pissing and moaning about an authoritarian state does NOTHING. And it very well may be that we can't get what we want on some privacy issues which wouldn't be a surprise since we're dealing with one of them most obstructionist, right-wing congresses on our history.

It also concerns me that Snowden claims to have even more sensitive information and he went to China and now Russia with it. Use all the hyperbole you want about him being buried under the Capitol, the places he went for asylum do that and worse to their own people let alone some American whose useful information is sure to run out quickly.

[Jamaal510]

11. +1

[ljm2002]

15. You're complaining about name-calling?

Really? Do you really want to go there?

If you are seriously claiming that posters on your side of this issue have not engaged in name-calling, well ... you must not be reading the same DU I'm reading.

[Marr]

47. Hey! Zip it, you emoprog far left reactionary screamer firebagger!

[bowens43]

4. Snowden is irrelevant

[pnwmom]

6. He's absolutely relevant when he's in possession of information that could endanger lives.

The debate about the NSA and US internal surveillance can rage out without him -- true.

But meanwhile, he and his associates have thousands of pages of documents they've been threatening to release. Snowden has already shared some that Spiegel judged to risk US lives; and he told the Chinese newspaper that he planned to release other documents to media around the world. We'd be crazy to expect them all to handle this information as responsibly as Spiegel.

[Mojorabbit]

19. He said from the very beginning that he wanted the info vetted so that possibly harmful

information would not get out which is why he chose a handful of journalists to make that decision.
It was a smart thing to do. While I support Bradley Manning I did not think it was a good idea to just
release tons of info without any vetting. The day he releases all his info wily nilly I will change my mind but
it seems he has a good head on his shoulders and has been very careful thus far.

[pnwmom]

20. He didn't say that he would be choosing a "handful" of journalists.

Last edited Tue Aug 13, 2013, 08:36 PM - Edit history (1)

He said he wanted to choose an unspecified number of journalists from "each country," independent of his "bias" -- in other words, disregarding US interests.

But even if he had said he'd only share documents with a "handful" of people, I don't trust his judgement as to which journalists can be trusted. He's already shared documents containing IP addresses with a journalist from a Chinese newspaper. He was either deliberately trying to harm the interests of the US or he just didn't care.

http://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/1268209/snowden-sought-booz-allen-job-gather-evidence-nsa-surveillance?page=all


"If I have time to go through this information, I would like to make it available to journalists in each country to make their own assessment, independent of my bias, as to whether or not the knowledge of US network operations against their people should be published."

[Mojorabbit]

41. He did not give the Chinese anything they did not already have

The information that has been released has not had anything in it so far that would damage anyone in the field that I have seen. I think he has been very circumspect. He is doing a good job so far so it is a matter of opinion whether one trusts his judgement or no. The release bit by bit of info has kept the story in each news cycle so it has not dropped off the radar, it has forced a global discussion on the subject, and it has kicked congress's ass into motion. I am pleased with it all so far.

[pnwmom]

42. He gave them IP addresses. They didn't know which IP addresses we'd been targeting

and he shared that information with them.

No, this didn't place any lives in danger -- but it placed US jobs in danger. We were in the midst of negotiating with the Chinese government about the billions of dollars we lose in intellectual property each year due to Chinese hacking of American businesses and universities, and his action harmed US financial interests.

[Mojorabbit]

43. I don't believe it did any such thing. It was fairly benign information

We have been spying and hacking the Chinese as much as they have been doing the same to us. Everyone knows it. There have been numerous articles about it over the years. We have just pretended in the public realm that we were victims and left out the part where we were doing the same thing to them. Meh

[robinlynne]

62. come on.

[bhikkhu]

45. If he wasn't capable of vetting the information, maybe he shouldn't have leaked it?

I think that would be an issue, that he was personally trusted with classified information, which could endanger many lives, and decided to turn it over to the press which makes no promises and typically is is often concerned with little more than advertising revenue.

At least Assange carefully vetted the information he had (as far as I have heard).

[Mojorabbit]

50. It is a ridiculous argument. Of course he should have leaked it and then as he did, find

those he trusted to help him vett it.

[pnwmom]

55. Leak it first and vet it afterwards? That doesn't make sense.

[jeff47]

12. On the contrary, the secret information makes him extremely relevant

There's large swaths of information that we do not know.

Snowden has released a subset of that information. But he decided what information to leak, and what information to keep secret.

That means he is inherently relevant - he picked what we get to talk about.

[AlinPA]

13. When he needs more money he could sell the secrets to anyone willing to pay.

[Mojorabbit]

38. If that had been his goal he could have done that in the beginning

in secret and no one would have been the wiser. So I think we can pretty much rule that out.

[AlinPA]

48. Maybe he already has, but who can say for sure?

[pnwmom]

54. How can we rule that out? How would we know? n/t

[Mojorabbit]

59. It would not make logical sense to go to all the trouble he did

To leave everyone and everything behind so that he could expose what he did, to make himself public, GIVE info to the journalists and then turn around and sell it. If he was going to sell he did not need to suffer any loss, Hell he could have continued working while he raked it in. The inference that he is selling info is to further the traitor accusations instead of whistle blower. There is no evidence for the claim.

[pnwmom]

60. He couldn't have continued working while he "raked it in" without risking the prison sentence

he says he's so afraid of.

We can't know what his motives were at first or are now. There's no evidence for or against the claim that he might have been financially rewarded for his leaks.

[War Horse]

7. Thanks for injecting some sanity

I'm so tired of the either/or, black and white thinking on this.

[AZ Progressive]

9. I'm anti-surveillance but i'm cautious about Snowden for this reason

Then again, there are not that many absolutes in this world. Nelson Mandela could be accused of having done terrorism many decades ago according to U.S. definitions of terrorism.

[uponit7771]

10. *****DER SPIEGEL IS WORKING WITH THE CIA!!!**** Cause GG said, or will say they are...

....and there's no reason for ODS ridden GG to say the opposite

[midnight]

14. Me thinks Angela Merkel protests to much about friends spying on friends....

"The monitoring of friends -- this is unacceptable, it can't be tolerated. We're no longer in the Cold War." -- German Chancellor Angela Merkel

[pnwmom]

16. Me, too. n/t

[AverageJoe90]

17. The first Snowden was nothing more than a fabrication. A Potemkin man, as it were.......

.....while the second Snowden, the random(or not so much, maybe?) leaker who endangered American lives, is all too real; this is, indeed, the REAL Snowden, ladies and gentlemen.

[wtmusic]

18. That's Der Spiegel's determination.

The only life that Ed Snowden has endangered is his own - as little as some might appreciate that.

[pnwmom]

22. He trusted Spiegel's judgement on this. Why shouldn't we? n/t

[wtmusic]

23. You can say any of the leaks endangered Americans' lives.

Maybe we shouldn't be doing things that make others want to hurt us.

[pnwmom]

25. Maybe they shouldn't be doing things that could hurt us.

Welcome to the real world.

Spiegel has read the documents Snowden gave them -- you haven't and neither have I. And Spiegel says they contain information that could endanger American lives. The Spiegel article was quite sympathetic toward Snowden, so I think the great likelihood is that they are not exaggerating the risk of releasing the information they decided to withhold.

Greenwald, by the way, has made similar claims -- that he has access to much more harmful information but has chosen not to publish it. Do you not believe him, either?

[wtmusic]

30. Well so far those "things" are only in your imagination.

There has been no documented harm from these leaks whatsoever.

So instead letting our imaginations run away with us, let's perhaps consider the idea that these pronouncements are just self-defense by the administration designed to scare us.

Signs Point to Yes.

[pnwmom]

31. The "pronouncement" as to the risk came from SPIEGEL, not from the administration.

So it is not a part of the administration's self-defense.

[bhikkhu]

46. Spiegel is a news corporation, which is a business run for profit

There are some ethics expected of journalists, but the last couple of decades (at least in this country) aren't particularly reassuring as to how that works in practice anymore.

[pnwmom]

49. Exactly. He's said that he's planning to release his documents to journalists

"in each country" so they can decide what should be reported. I don't have the confidence in them that he does.

[DevonRex]

21. True. And some of us didn't NEED him. The debate was in progress.

Most just weren't paying attention until Snowden leaked information about the programs - thereby gaining sympathy when he had actually committed a very serious crime by also leaking the names of people in the intelligence community.

Ironically, just as the public cannot know everything about the programs, they also cannot know about the extent of the harm he has caused; even when it rises to the level of the deaths of certain agents.

This has Putin's prints all over it. He considers the West and its free press to be a weakness to be exploited. And he exploited it in this case. He also considers our form of government to be weak. That we don't rule with death threats to keep people in line is incomprehensible to him. So he exploited that, too. All he had to do was get somebody on the inside to steal just enough on NSA and CIA and then get a journalist to print it. The rest would take care of itself. Call the agent home with much fanfare about how even Russia is better than the United States because the American sought asylum there.

China will be Russia's ticket out of economic distress because this affair has thrown China some major bones in the cyberwarfare issue. They look much better now, right? Even though they're not at all.

This was always a game theory board with the US and Russia on it. The first stop was Russia and China - we weren't even in the mix.

[wtmusic]

24. Since you don't know - at all - whether he's caused any harm

why are you assuming he has? Because our lying government says so?

[pnwmom]

26. He and Greenwald have claimed that they have documents that could cause

great harm. Do you think he's lying?

[wtmusic]

27. They could possibly cause great harm to our clandestine, illegal security apparatus

which I hope they bring down with a resounding thud.

[pnwmom]

32. Right. Every other major country in the world can keep on spying,

but we should unilaterally disarm.

[wtmusic]

33. Are you really that frightened?

[pnwmom]

34. Do you know that little history? Here's an example of American spies who saved lives.

http://articles.latimes.com/1993-10-03/local/me-41666_1_world-war-ii

Their contributions led Gen. Douglas MacArthur to proclaim, "Never in military history did an army know so much about the enemy prior to actual engagement."

Other Allied leaders were convinced the work of the MIS saved hundreds of thousands of lives and shortened the war.

The MIS volunteers--original members of the 442nd and 100th Infantry Battalion--received no public acclaim. During their service they were cut off from their families and friends, unable to write to explain their duties in the war effort.

The MIS, which totaled nearly 6,000 by war's end, served as interpreters, translators, spies and intelligence specialists. They intercepted and monitored radio transmissions and communiques, translated captured maps, journals, letters and other documents which often disclosed critical enemy tactics, operations and troop dispositions.

[wtmusic]

36. We can always learn more, can't we.

Here's a little primer for you:

"Privacy International's 2007 survey, covering 47 countries, indicated that there had been an increase in surveillance and a decline in the performance of privacy safeguards, compared to the previous year. Balancing these factors, eight countries were rated as being 'endemic surveillance societies'. Of these eight, China, Malaysia and Russia scored lowest, followed jointly by Singapore and the United Kingdom, then jointly by Taiwan, Thailand and the United States. The best ranking was given to Greece, which was judged to have 'adequate safeguards against abuse'."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_surveillance

Your cherished government is considered an endemic surveillance society, and is ranked third from the bottom in privacy safeguards. I'd say that's pretty piss-poor.

[pnwmom]

39. You're ignoring the point of the OP.

I'm not objecting to having a vigorous debate on US internal surveillance, followed by a rollback if Snowden's claims are true.

HOWEVER, that is a separate issue from his choosing to release information about our spying on other countries. The NSA and the CIA are supposed to be spying internationally -- not within the US.

[wtmusic]

37. Please tell me you're not comparing the WOT to WWII.

That would be silly.

[pnwmom]

40. WOT?

[Th1onein]

28. You know, just because you repeat shit over and over again doesn't make it true.

[Just Saying]

29. Same goes. n/t

[pnwmom]

35. What did I say that isn't true? n/t

[Hekate]

51. You would know, I guess. nt

[Th1onein]

57. Is that how you "win" an argument? With a personal insult?

[Hekate]

58. You made me LOL:"You know, just because you repeat shit over and over again doesn't make it true."

Seriously, I am laughing at this exchange.

[Th1onein]

61. Well, they keep on and ON and ON with this bullshit about how Snowden endangered lives.

It's bullshit and I'm tired of it. When Snowden and Greenwald got together, they vetted all of the information to make sure that it didn't put any lives in danger. They didn't release anything that would endanger lives. Why wouldn't he do the same thing with Der Spiegel? Instead, HERE WE GO AGAIN. It's crap.

And, it's part of a concerted effort to change the subject from that of wholesale spying on Americans, and every other person in the world (who also deserve privacy), to Snowden and Greenwald.

I, personally, think that Snowden is a hero. He put himself in great personal danger, releasing this information. And, I don't care if he's a Paulbot, an Obamabot, a pole dancer loving, social security hating asshole. It doesn't matter why he did it; he did it at great personal cost, and it was a service to his countrymen.

They won't be honest and just come out and say that they support surveillance, so they attack the messenger. I, for one, am dead ass sick of hearing it.

[deurbano]

44. One of the authors of this (July 1) Spiegel piece is Laura Poitras.

Very interesting article, but the villain of this piece is not Edward Snowden.

[pnwmom]

53. You're right. The article is sympathetic toward Snowden. So there's no reason to doubt

the writer who said Snowden gave Spiegel documents that included information that could endanger lives.

[Hekate]

52. Good OP, pnwmom. KnR for the ones engaging your OP with thoughtfulness.

[pnwmom]

56. Thanks, hekate. n/t