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Choosing Hong Kong Is a Brilliant Move by Edward Snowden

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Re: Choosing Hong Kong Is a Brilliant Move by Edward Snowden

#91

Post by jacquesm »

mpyne wrote: post #42
Joeri wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Snowden knows exactly what the consequences would be, because he's not the first whistleblower. Bradley Manning is still potentially facing the death penalty, and at the very least he will never see the outside of a jail again. And still plenty of people found enough reason to label him a coward. It is way too easy to be in a comfy chair and say that other people should throw their life away to stand by their princip…

Manning is not facing the death penalty, is not a "whistleblower" by any reasonable stretch of the term (except perhaps by lucky accident), and his actions were different from Snowden's, at Snowden's own admission.

Manning fits the definition of a whistleblower just fine, he brought a bunch of injustices to public attention.

As for not facing the death penalty, he looks like he's halfway at deaths door already, they're just taking their time about it. The world is watching the way Manning is treated and drawing its own conclusions from that.

Re: Choosing Hong Kong Is a Brilliant Move by Edward Snowden

#92

Post by anigbrowl »

panacea wrote: post #39
Apocryphon wrote: post #35

I've been thinking of alternative destinations. New Zealand, home of exile Kim Dotcom, could work. But what about Sweden? Aren't they very neutral? Or Switzerland, the nation that's synonymous with neutrality?

Sweden? The country that's trying to extradite Assange?

For rape, not espionage.

Re: Choosing Hong Kong Is a Brilliant Move by Edward Snowden

#93

Post by anigbrowl »

msg wrote: post #14
spitx wrote: post #6

CBS' Bob Schieffer on Snowden's junket: "For one thing, I don't remember Martin Luther King, Jr., or Rosa Parks running off and hiding in China. The people who ran the civil-rights movement were willing to break the law and suffer the consequences." "That's a little different than putting the nation's security at risk and running away." "What I see in Edward Snowden is just a narcissistic young man who has decided he…

Martin Luther King didn't live in a world where we imprison innocent men in legal limbo without trial or habeas corpus, or where we officially sanctioned torture and the oubliette. He could trust that he would be vindicated by the justice system. The whole point of the Snowden story is that the government is not trustworthy in this era. I would not trust the US government to give him justice any more than they did Aa…

You need to read more history. Without commenting on Snowden, I think the US is a substantially freer nation then it was in the time of MLK.

Re: Choosing Hong Kong Is a Brilliant Move by Edward Snowden

#94

Post by pyre »

chengiz wrote: post #48
pyre wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

- If the country he moves to doesn't have an extradition treaty with the US, that doesn't necessarily mean a whole lot. If the country is small enough politically, then they will either be pressured into giving him up, or the US will just send in a strike team to kill/capture him. Heck, the US had no qualms about sending a strike team into Pakistan to assassinate Osama bin Laden, do you think that some country a lot…

This is in conspiracy theory territory. You really think there's no difference between sending strike teams to kill (a) the number one wanted war criminal responsible for the second biggest attack on your soil into a country where you already have troops for the same purpose, and (b) a regular old whistleblower into an independent country that owes you nothing?

Prior to the Osama bin Laden strike, claiming that such a thing could happen (the US sending a strike team into Pakistan without any approval/warning) would be in conspiracy theory territory.

I'm not saying that the US will send in a strike team to Hong Kong (or Pakistan or another political heavy-weight) over Snowden. I was operating under the assumption that most of the countries with no extradition to the US might not have the political clout for "anyone to care" if the US sent in a team to capture or assassinate Snowden[1]. I actually went an took a look at the extradition list[2][3], and it seems there are quite a few countries that I could see him stay in without the US caring enough to send in a covert team.

[1] The assassinate is just to drive the point home about how little people might care (other than politicians everywhere decrying the act to gain possible political favour). I agree that the US is probably more interested in putting him on trial than 'taking him out.'

[2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extradition_law_in_the_United_S...

[3] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:United_States_extradition_...

Re: Choosing Hong Kong Is a Brilliant Move by Edward Snowden

#95

Post by fnordfnordfnord »

kissickas wrote: post #37
alextingle wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because nobody sells phone for cash, right?

GP still has a valid point, SIM card swapping as mentioned in the article is not track-proof.

Well fine there's cloning a phone, setting a bogus or duplicate IMEI, or simply buying cheap throw-away phones. Here, have a look at a really terribly done video of one electronics market in HK. One of many. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dxTR5X0PIP4

Re: Choosing Hong Kong Is a Brilliant Move by Edward Snowden

#96

Post by toyg »

rdl wrote: post #80

I actually don't think Hong Kong was a great choice, as it brings up the whole question of foreign intelligence service involvement. He absolutely should have picked a common law jurisdiction (like Hong Kong), and probably not US/UK/Canada, but NZ would have worked pretty well. He's not "in hiding" from the intelligence services. I suspect even second tier countries know where he is.

I'm sure Kim Dotcom thought his move to NZ had "worked pretty well".

Re: Choosing Hong Kong Is a Brilliant Move by Edward Snowden

#97

Post by anigbrowl »

pg wrote: post #83
rayiner wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Its this sort of uneducated, a-historical crap that makes it impossible to read HN lately. If you think the government was less scary back then, in the grip of anti-communist paranoia, you're insane, deluded, or just plain uneducated. Saying that MLK could count on a fair shake from a justice system that didn't give any minority a fair shake back then, much less political radicals, is the height of ridiculousness.

You don't need to resort to insults.

Frankly, I think the offending comment is insulting to the intelligence, as well as to the (collective) experience of people who were the target of racial discrimination laws. I don't want to be political about it, but HN as a community is sometimes subject to an alarming degree of demographic myopia.

Re: Choosing Hong Kong Is a Brilliant Move by Edward Snowden

#98

Post by pyre »

XorNot wrote: post #74
anologwintermut wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apparently INTERPOL can issue red notices that are not public. So its possible if he tried to leave Hong Kong under his own ID he'd get arrested. I assume he doesn't have a real forged passport. But how hard do they check for leaving Hong Kong? Could he get to Iceland and instead of trying to fool Icelandic passport control, just request asylum?

Pretty hard? China has steep controls on its own citizens leaving China. Hong Kong is now part of China, and probably a favoured way out.

Travel between HK and 'mainland' China regulated, as I understand it. It's possible that China is looking more closely to that border as an escape point than people leaving HK.

Re: Choosing Hong Kong Is a Brilliant Move by Edward Snowden

#99

Post by toyg »

spitx wrote: post #33
david_shaw wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "The people who ran the civil-rights movement were willing to break the law and suffer the consequences." That's correct, and I agree that participating in civil disobedience, by nature, requires being willing to "do the time" as part of making a point. Whistleblowers, however, are a different story. I don't believe that Snowden was trying to be a martyr for Americans' right to privacy; I think he saw something tha…

What about Bradley Manning? That's as pristinely analogous a case as it gets to Snowden's, with diametrically opposed approaches the actors took to pursue their causes. Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Bradley_Mannin...

Manning didn't step forward -- he was trapped after confiding in the wrong person. He had no choice whatsoever, he couldn't flee.

Re: Choosing Hong Kong Is a Brilliant Move by Edward Snowden

#100

Post by anigbrowl »

Ygg2 wrote: post #27
spitx wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did Daniel Ellsberg bolt for a communist nation, sympathetic to his views after releasing the Pentagon papers? No, he turned himself in. Snowden wants all the glory and none of the bruises. If that doesn't demonstrate a lack of selflessness, what does? Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniel_Ellsberg#Trial_and_mistr...

Yeah, no. That doesn't work like that. The times now and 40 years ago were different. CIA, NSA and the whole gamut are now much more efficient than they were 40 years ago (no need for due process etc.) If you try to play fair, they'll fuck you over big time. Look how much good the legal system was to Aaron Schwartz for a minor misdemeanor. You'd never hear from Edward Snowden, until he just came out and admitted he w…

I don't know whether to be amused or depressed by the ahistorical ignorance of your comments.

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

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