Why would the Russian connected Trump hunt down a Russian spy?
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Pardon Snowden
521–530 of 814 posts
Re: Pardon Snowden
#522Also don't forget about Manning who actually went to prison and is not getting any publicity now.
I have mixed feelings about Manning. What did she release that made this country "better". Snowdon's leaks were controlled, and focused. The content has had a meaningful impact.
> What did she release that made this country "better".
The truth. You deserve to know what crimes are committed in your name.
Re: Pardon Snowden
#523Earlier quoted context omitted.
My conservative friends, not in the intelligence community, really don't like him. They try to be civil, but I can almost hear them hiss when I mention "Snowden". It's odd to me. They don't mind digital surveillance at all. They think it's good if it makes everyone safer. Throwing in my two cents, what interests me on the Snowden topic, is his character. While I'm glad Snowden took the initiative and risk, I don't be…
I really wish I could understand the people that are: 1. "patriotic" but don't respect those who stand up for ideals in the Constitution 2. "anti-government" or "anti-authority" but don't respect those who stand up to challenge the blind power grabs by the government and say things like "fix it from within" (when they would never, ever say the same thing about the IRS, for example) 3. "libertarian" but again, don't a…
Was GP talking about libertarians? I only saw mention of conservatives. Granted, there are people who blur the line, and libertarianism isn't as coherent a political philosophy as e.g. anarchism, but there are lots of libertarians who care much more about e.g. police excess or censorship than about gun rights or taxes. It is a disservice to rational conversation to conflate different concepts in this way.
Re: Pardon Snowden
#524Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is not true. Snowden had to fly to Russia and live there for three years before a hypothetical pardon. If that is the minimum for the possibility of a pardon, I don't think many people would find that emboldening.
That's not really true. Though i'm in favor of pardoning him on balance, it would definitely embolden other leakers. I'm quite sure that if I was someone considering leaking classified documents and I saw him get pardoned after spending 3 years in Russia, it'd embolden me. Spending three years in exile is not great, but it's a far cry from a long prison sentence for leaking classified documents.
Especially if you plan ahead a bit better than Snowden did and emigrate to the country of your choice while you can still travel before leaking the documents.
Re: Pardon Snowden
#525Also don't forget about Manning who actually went to prison and is not getting any publicity now.
I have mixed feelings about Manning. What did she release that made this country "better". Snowdon's leaks were controlled, and focused. The content has had a meaningful impact.
The journalists' leaks were (arguably, I think I'd agree though) controlled and focussed. Snowden gave them the entire lot and handed judgement over to them.
Didn't he?
Re: Pardon Snowden
#526Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is the so-called "chilling effect" that's one of the most worrying implications of mass surveillance on a society... people feel afraid to speak out due to a concern they may be added to a list of some sort, and face negative real-life repercussions due to expressing their free speech. There were a couple of times where I actually called the public contact numbers for NSA & GCHQ regarding particular stories abou…
This chilling effect has a counterpart which would be directly amplified by pardoning Snowden. In short, if Snowden gets pardoned, it will encourage further people to leak confidential documents and violate the Espionage act since they will be emboldened by the thought they might get pardoned down the road.
You could make the same argument about every single pardon, and yet nobody really worries about this outcome.
Re: Pardon Snowden
#527Earlier quoted context omitted.
> ... hedging and differentiation ... How is the distinction hard to understand? Socialism is a system characterised by social ownership of the means of production, as opposed to capitalism, which is characterised by private ownership of the means of production. Both are ideologies. You could have compared to Soviet or East Germany directly if you wanted to make a point about totalitarian regimes. Also, I'm pretty su…
> Socialism is a system characterised by social ownership of the means of production, as opposed to capitalism, which is characterised by private ownership of the means of production. Both are ideologies. Historically, every attempt to build a socialistic society has led to tyranny. One can wonder, if this might be an inevitable consequence along the path to attempt socialism. But we have managed to build several cap…
> Historically, every attempt to build a socialistic society has led to tyranny.
http://wrightstories.com/attempts-to-fly-before-the-wrights/
Re: Pardon Snowden
#528Earlier quoted context omitted.
Noam Chomsky talks a lot about "Manufacturing Consent" (he wrote a book with this title). He says that in a democratic society you can't use force to control people, so you have to control them by controlling attitudes an opinions instead. It works well, and the people of the United States are heavily controlled by the elite, who in this case are the corporations and the media companies they control. https://www.yout…
David Hume came to this conclusion in OF THE FIRST PRINCIPLES OF GOVERNMENT (in the 1st paragraph). people of the United States are heavily controlled by the elite is too simplistic and some "elites" make the world better.
Isn't "making the world better" a value judgment that can be shaped by your peers and by your environment, and also not mutually exclusive with making the world worse?
Thus, if an elite makes the world worse in my opinion by reducing diversity of competing opinions in mass media, they could use that platform to propagandize and publicize any philanthropic efforts they may also involve themselves with, such that your opinion of them is neutral or positive.
Do you derive from first principles what things would make the world better and then check to see who might be doing any of them, or do you hear about what certain people are doing, and then make value judgments on their public activity?
Re: Pardon Snowden
#529I will not support Snowden. He invaded the government's privacy by releasing those documents.
Re: Pardon Snowden
#530Earlier quoted context omitted.
I "love" how China actually tried to formalize this some time ago. Every citizen would get a citizen score, like our credit ratings, but grading how politically loyal they were. There was quite a bit of outrage on the western internet about this. The "funny" thing is, our governments are probably doing very similar things (though still to a lesser degree, and secretly). A big difference is that China often doesn't ha…
> The "funny" thing is, our governments are probably doing very similar things perhaps in capital driven liberal countries it's called Credit Ratings - rather than your worth being judged through your loyalty, it's judged through your willingness to spend and accrue debt. not trying to sound bleak and cynical, but just a thought.
why so tentative? i pay my limited bills on time, i have taken on debt twice and paid it off as soon as possible, living basically within my means, and because of this my credit score is terrible.
i can't get a phone contract, a mortgage is out of the question. i automatically fall to the bottom of the list when trying to rent an apartment. don't know what went on at the places i applied to for employment that requested a credit score waiver, but can't imagine it was to my benefit.
now i can't even get on the credit train and start maintaining a card because i'm apparently such a poor risk.
its clearly not the same set of concerns as a patriotism score. but there's clearly some kind of profiling and clustering going on.