551–560 of 814 posts
I don't think he should be pardoned. He claims that it's because he helped the public see the sinister plot of our government and their internal spying. Ok, fine. So, should we have pardoned Jack Ruby (if he were alive) for killing the guy that killed JFK? No. Why does Snowden deserve any different treatment. He still release confidential information. It's not like what he did can just excuse that fact. He exposed US…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
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.
If people are emboldened to blow the whistle on outrageous, secret, unconstitutional, anti-democratic activities of the US or state governments, then this is the best possible outcome.
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They should be condoning it. For that, a lot of things would have to change first though, like, for example, the community has to come to the realization that the (supposed) ends do not justify the means and that it's therefore the right thing to do to whistle-blow about them. They also need to realize that the internal mechanisms to whistle-blow are "not effective", to say the least.
The internal mechanisms actually work, if you use them. Snowden has admitted in subsequent interviews to not even trying to report through any channel. Something most people that are not government don't realize about whistleblowing is that your options are not just your boss. We can report to any supervisor (given the proper clearance), a branch specifically designed for whistleblowing (including a 24 hour 1-800 num…
Seems there are numerous examples of people going through proper channels and then getting retaliation[1]. Also, Snowden was a contractor, so was not covered under the whistleblower protection act as government employees are, so could not talk to members of Congress.
Thomas Drake complained internally to the designated authorities: to his bosses, the NSA Inspector General, the Defense Department Inspector General, and both the House and Senate Congressional intelligence committees, was labeled a troublemaker and then charged with (of all things): willful retention of national defense information, obstruction of justice, and making false statements.
> Do you really think all 600+ members of Congress would have turned him away? Being the Senator or Representative that brought that info forward would have guaranteed re-election...
What about all the members of Congress that already knew about it? Why doesn't the same logic apply to them? that's 20+ members from both sides of aisle. At the end of the day, the proper channels have no obligation to do anything, it can go up the chain and decided things are better left unchanged, public non-the-wiser.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_whistleblowers [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Andrews_Drake
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Just like there's no such thing as domestic mass surveillance under US law? And who said he was tried in our criminal court system? If it's a matter of "national security" all due process flies out the window. My point is there is literally no way for you to know and claiming people are wrong and dismissing them with "tin foil" arguments is shitty.
Just because you don't understand why it's not possible, doesn't mean that it is. A US citizen cannot be imprisoned without due process or being found in contempt of court (and in that case, only until the moment they comply with the court order). This is a basic premise of shelves upon shelves worth of Supreme Court decisions, and is guaranteed by the Fifth and Sixth Amendments. Even without those amendments, what y…
I'm kinda suspicious of this site -- none of the ACLU, HRW , Amnesty International links work at the bottom. And none of those organizations use whoisguard.
I have found that the ACLU links from their site to the Pardon Snowden site. Interestingly, Human Rights Watch does not link to the site, but seems to have their own petition (maybe connected?) and that's as far as I went.
Even with that bit of confirmation that this site is legit. I am not that promiscuous with my information.
To pardon Snowden seems like a very popular opinion around here. Can anyone help me change my opinion on this matter? The way I currently see it: - Snowden indiscriminately hovered up so many documents, it was impossible to vet all of them. - The vast majority of these documents do not constitute whistleblowing, but are standard operating procedure for the NSA. The US expects the NSA to do this. - Leaking standard-op…
Pardonning Snowden while allowing the NSA to continue their business as usual would be strange.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
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.
And this is a problem how?
What about that kind of problem?
Maybe a naive question, but what would the risk be for me to sign this? I wonder if I (a US citizen) might get trouble the next time at the border? Or get a higher score in some database, that combined with other things might get me into trouble? Increased scrutiny from the IRS (which should have nothing to do with this, but "they" might say hell why not?)? Inability to get security clearances in future? Being target…