Knight to queen's bishop 3 - Snowden charged with espionage.

[IainB]

Re. MH370 - It amazes me that there isn't an EPIRB^w mounted on aircraft tail assemblies...

-4wd (March 16, 2014, 12:27 AM)

Are you thereby suggesting that the NSA or some other shadowy US SS organisation has not already done that and doesn't know exactly where the "missing" plane is - especially since 911?

Yeah, right.

[IainB]

NSA denies Facebook snooping as Zuckerberg lays into Obama | Security - InfoWorld

This seems to be more theatricals: Act 1, Scene 2 "The Denial"
(Act 1, Scene 1 was "The Zuckerberberg Attack" (Goodness! Mark Zuckberberg is finally really pissed off re the NSA surveillance!).

More popcorn please.

[40hz]

I think Zuckerberg "doth protest too much" with that one.

Re. MH370 - It amazes me that there isn't an EPIRB^w mounted on aircraft tail assemblies...

-4wd (March 16, 2014, 12:27 AM)

Are you thereby suggesting that the NSA or some other shadowy US SS organisation has not already done that and doesn't know exactly where the "missing" plane is - especially since 911?

Yeah, right.

-IainB (March 17, 2014, 02:52 AM)

I think it's more a situation of not "acknowledging" or "admitting" than it is a case of not "having" the capability of tracking all air traffic in realtime.



In an era of massive satellite reconnaissance, advanced commercial and military radar systems, the ongoing concern over the North Korea's belligerence, and the overall military importance of pretty much everything that happens in the vicinity of the China Sea...yeah...I think between China, Russia, and the USA, there were enough electronic "eyes-on" that somebody has a very good idea about where that plane eventually landed or crashed.

I suspect what's really holding up the announcement are high level discussions about how to best spin the story.

[IainB]

...I suspect what's really holding up the announcement are high level discussions about how to best spin the story.

-40hz (March 17, 2014, 03:26 AM)

Yes, eggsaggerly.

[IainB]

I read somewhere that Snowden had apparently been nominated for the Nobel Peach Prize, but after Snowden's open letter (below), Adam Scott reckons that Snowden could well end up being nominated for US President:
(Copied below sans embedded hyperlinks/images.)

SNOWDEN: I Questioned Putin To Get His Answer On Record - Business Insider
EDWARD SNOWDEN: Here's Why I Asked Putin A Question Yesterday
Edward Snowden, The Guardian
Apr. 18, 2014, 8:40 AM   12,819 20

On Thursday, I questioned Russia's involvement in mass surveillance on live television. I asked Russia's president, Vladimir Putin, a question that cannot credibly be answered in the negative by any leader who runs a modern, intrusive surveillance program: "Does [your country] intercept, analyze or store millions of individuals' communications?"

I went on to challenge whether, even if such a mass surveillance program were effective and technically legal, it could ever be morally justified.

The question was intended to mirror the now infamous exchange in US Senate intelligence committee hearings between senator Ron Wyden and the director of national intelligence, James Clapper, about whether the NSA collected records on millions of Americans, and to invite either an important concession or a clear evasion. (See a side-by-side comparison of Wyden's question and mine here.)

Clapper's lie – to the Senate and to the public – was a major motivating force behind my decision to go public, and a historic example of the importance of official accountability.

In his response, Putin denied the first part of the question and dodged on the latter. There are serious inconsistencies in his denial – and we'll get to them soon – but it was not the president's suspiciously narrow answer that was criticized by many pundits. It was that I had chosen to ask a question at all.

I was surprised that people who witnessed me risk my life to expose the surveillance practices of my own country could not believe that I might also criticize the surveillance policies of Russia, a country to which I have sworn no allegiance, without ulterior motive. I regret that my question could be misinterpreted, and that it enabled many to ignore the substance of the question – and Putin's evasive response – in order to speculate, wildly and incorrectly, about my motives for asking it.

The investigative journalist Andrei Soldatov, perhaps the single most prominent critic of Russia's surveillance apparatus (and someone who has repeatedly criticized me in the past year), described my question as "extremely important for Russia". It could, he said, "lift a de facto ban on public conversations about state eavesdropping."

Others have pointed out that Putin's response appears to be the strongest denial of involvement in mass surveillance ever given by a Russian leader – a denial that is, generously speaking, likely to be revisited by journalists.

In fact, Putin's response was remarkably similar to Barack Obama's initial, sweeping denials of the scope of the NSA's domestic surveillance programs, before that position was later shown to be both untrue and indefensible.

So why all the criticism? I expected that some would object to my participation in an annual forum that is largely comprised of softball questions to a leader unaccustomed to being challenged. But to me, the rare opportunity to lift a taboo on discussion of state surveillance before an audience that primarily views state media outweighed that risk. Moreover, I hoped that Putin's answer – whatever it was – would provide opportunities for serious journalists and civil society to push the discussion further.

When this event comes around next year, I hope we'll see more questions on surveillance programs and other controversial policies. But we don't have to wait until then. For example, journalists might ask for clarification as to how millions of individuals' communications are not being intercepted, analyzed or stored, when, at least on a technical level, the systems that are in place must do precisely that in order to function. They might ask whether the social media companies reporting that they have received bulk collection requests from the Russian government are telling the truth.

I blew the whistle on the NSA's surveillance practices not because I believed that the United States was uniquely at fault, but because I believe that mass surveillance of innocents – the construction of enormous, state-run surveillance time machines that can turn back the clock on the most intimate details of our lives – is a threat to all people, everywhere, no matter who runs them.

Last year, I risked family, life, and freedom to help initiate a global debate that even Obama himself conceded "will make our nation stronger". I am no more willing to trade my principles for privilege today than I was then.

I understand the concerns of critics, but there is a more obvious explanation for my question than a secret desire to defend the kind of policies I sacrificed a comfortable life to challenge: if we are to test the truth of officials' claims, we must first give them an opportunity to make those claims.

• Edward Snowden wrote for the Guardian through the Freedom of the Press Foundation
This article originally appeared on guardian.co.uk

It seems that some people, including Adam Scott (but not me, you understand) might think that having an honest and freedom-aspiring president could make a welcome and beneficial change for the people of the USA and for that country's national integrity and international standing, but I couldn't possibly comment.

[IainB]

U.S. announces first criminal charges against foreign country for cyberspying - The Washington Post

Interesting discussion here: Pot, Meet Kettle. « Samizdata

[Renegade]

Here's a recent C-SPAN interview with Glenn Greenwald:

http://www.c-span.or...nwald-edward-snowden

[Stoic Joker]

Elsewhere in the leaks department:

USA Today’s William Cummings: “White House blows cover of CIA chief in Afghanistan” The White House accidentally blew the cover of the top CIA officer in Afghanistan Saturday, when his name and title were released in an e-mail sent to reporters who traveled with President Obama on his surprise visit to Bagram Air Field. The CIA officer’s identity was released as part of a list of U.S. officials who were attending a military briefing with Obama at Bagram, the Washington Post reported. The individual was identified as “Chief of Station,” a term used for the top spy in a country, according to the Post

-ABC News

http://www.usatoday....s-cia-chief/9586633/

I wonder if they'll be honest enough to prosecute themselves..

[IainB]

@Renegade: Thanks for the CSPAN interview link (above).
@Stoic Joker: Maybe that leak was accidentally-on-purpose?

[Renegade]

Elsewhere in the leaks department:

USA Today’s William Cummings: “White House blows cover of CIA chief in Afghanistan” The White House accidentally blew the cover of the top CIA officer in Afghanistan Saturday, when his name and title were released in an e-mail sent to reporters who traveled with President Obama on his surprise visit to Bagram Air Field. The CIA officer’s identity was released as part of a list of U.S. officials who were attending a military briefing with Obama at Bagram, the Washington Post reported. The individual was identified as “Chief of Station,” a term used for the top spy in a country, according to the Post

-ABC News

http://www.usatoday....s-cia-chief/9586633/

I wonder if they'll be honest enough to prosecute themselves..

-Stoic Joker (May 26, 2014, 09:10 AM)

Honest? Politicians prosecuted? BWAHAHAHHAHA~!

However, in Iran a bankster was sentenced to death for a $2.6 BILLION fraud. Ironic how one can only view that sort of justice from afar. (I'm not in favour of CP, but seeing a bankster convicted of a crime is refreshing.)

Then there are more corrupt politicians/bureaucrats in China facing similar fates.

It's just bizarre. I don't typically think of Iran or China a being particularly "just" countries.

But it gets you thinking... If there is a God, then he is likely one of:

• Dr. Seuss
• Lewis Carroll

It was springtime in the Rockies
The snow was falling fast
A bare footed man with clogs on
Went slowly whizzing past

He went round a straight crooked corner
To see a dead donkey die
He pulled out a gun and stabbed him
And then began to cry.

I went to the pictures tomorrow
I took the front seat at the back
I fell from the floor to the ceiling
And broke the front bone in my back.

They took me to Cardiff Infirmary
And starved me with plenty to eat
They fed me plain cake with currants in.
And whipped me and tickled my feet.

[xtabber]

NBC News is supposed to air their interview with Snowden tonight.  In the meantime, the network has posted an excerpt in which he states that he was not a low level technician, but was in fact trained as a spy and did undercover work for the CIA and NSA.

[Renegade]

NBC News is supposed to air their interview with Snowden tonight.  In the meantime, the network has posted an excerpt in which he states that he was not a low level technician, but was in fact trained as a spy and did undercover work for the CIA and NSA.

-xtabber (May 28, 2014, 04:56 PM)

Excerpts from it:

And the pundits already out and screaming that he's a liar:

  Please tell us more...  Because CNN is just oh so incredibly credible! Pfft. Care to purchase a bridge or beachfront property?

[Renegade]

Looks like you can watch it live online here:

http://www.nbcnews.c...ysis-special-n116871

Well, it's pre-recorded... so, well... when they air it.

[40hz]

NBC News is supposed to air their interview with Snowden tonight.  In the meantime, the network has posted an excerpt in which he states that he was not a low level technician, but was in fact trained as a spy and did undercover work for the CIA and NSA.

-xtabber (May 28, 2014, 04:56 PM)

And the usual bogus counterpoint commentary has started.


Love those self-styled pundits...

As long as those implicated can have their CNN lapdogs keep the public's attention focused on Snowden the man - and not what he revealed - abuse of executive power will continue to be 'business as usual.'

[Renegade]

And the usual bogus counterpoint commentary has started.

Love those self-styled pundits...

As long as those implicated can have their CNN lapdogs keep the public's attention focused on Snowden the man - and not what he revealed - abuse of executive power will continue to be 'business as usual.'

-40hz (May 28, 2014, 09:25 PM)

It's not just executive power... Case in point:

"...faith in the US justice system..."

Really? Seriously? Is he:

• High
• Mentally challenged
• Drinking WAAAAY too much kool-aid

Or perhaps all 3?

[Stoic Joker]

"...faith in the US justice system..."

Really? Seriously? Is he:

• High
• Mentally challenged
• Drinking WAAAAY too much kool-aid

Or perhaps all 3?

-Renegade (May 28, 2014, 09:32 PM)

My money is on all 3 ... Definitely all 3:
High = Shitfaced drunk on power.
Mentally challenged = The dizzying height of the ivory tower makes it impossible to see anything clearly, and the air is so thin up there he's got to be a total turnip.
Kool-Aid = Shit man I think he's bathing in it by now ... That and the blood of virgins (blood of virgins is really just an old world way of conveying innocence).

[40hz]

"Whom the gods destroy, they first make mad."  - Euripides

[Renegade]

Interview is here:

Download it now. It might not be up for long. Other versions are down.

[wraith808]

"Being a patriot doesn't mean prioritizing service to government above all else." - Edward Snowden.

[40hz]

Kerry must be borrowing a page from Sinclair Lewis's novel It Can't Happen Here and modelling himself on the character Berzelius "Buzz" Windrip, populist-fascist dictator of the United States.

"He was an actor of genius. There was no more overwhelming actor on the stage, in the motion pictures, nor even in the pulpit. He would whirl arms, bang tables, glare from mad eyes, vomit Biblical wrath from a gaping mouth; but he would also coo like a nursing mother, beseech like an aching lover, and in between tricks would coldly and almost contemptuously jab his crowds with figures and facts — figures and facts that were inescapable even when, as often happened, they were entirely incorrect."

 

[tomos]

Interview is here:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yNhMXyAdjp8[/youtube]

Download it now. It might not be up for long. Other versions are down.

-Renegade (May 29, 2014, 12:35 PM)

thanks (I see it's gone now).
well worth listening to. Another copy here.

[Renegade]

Interview is here:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yNhMXyAdjp8[/youtube]

Download it now. It might not be up for long. Other versions are down.

-Renegade (May 29, 2014, 12:35 PM)

thanks (I see it's gone now).
well worth listening to. Another copy here.

-tomos (May 29, 2014, 05:14 PM)

That's 5 minutes longer than the one I saw. Commercials?

I noticed that in the interview there were some pretty brutal cuts. Completely WTF!?! cuts. Seems a lot of juicy stuff was left out.

[tomos]

That's 5 minutes longer than the one I saw. Commercials?

-Renegade (May 29, 2014, 09:12 PM)

I noticed that too, and started watching again: so far (@11:00) it has an intro the other didnt, and yes, it's less brutally cut - but nothing major extra.

[xtabber]

In response to Secretary of State John Kerry's statement that Snowden is a traitor and a coward because he won't come back to the U.S. to face a fair trial, like Daniel Ellsberg did with the Pentagon papers, Daniel Ellsberg commented today that:

Edward Snowden is the greatest patriot whistleblower of our time, and he knows what I learned more than four decades ago: until the Espionage Act gets reformed, he can never come home safe and receive justice

[40hz]

he won't come back to the U.S. to face a fair trial

-xtabber (May 30, 2014, 08:54 PM)

Kerry is correct. He won't come back to face a fair trial. US Espionage Act trials are notorious for being kangaroo courts.

Snowden won't come back to face a farce trial would be a much better a characterization.