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Don’t just pardon Edward Snowden; give the man a medal

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Re: Don’t just pardon Edward Snowden; give the man a medal

#131

Post by mzw_mzw »

logfromblammo wrote: post #111
mzw_mzw wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>So what? As one of the 7.1 billion people who are not US citizens, I object to the notion that only the rights of Americans warrant protection. If you're that keen to be covered by the United States Constitution, you can always petition for statehood; there's a procedure right there in Article IV, Section 3, Clause 1. Go to it, and good luck!

A careful reading of the U.S. Constitution reveals that the majority of the clauses that establish rights actually forbid the U.S. federal government from performing certain actions, period, rather than forbid it from performing those actions or not, conditional on citizenship. The 4th Amendment protections against unreasonable searches and seizures apply to everyone, everywhere. The U.S. government must always get a…

>The majority opinion basically said it would be too difficult for the U.S. to project its power overseas if it still had to obey its own laws there. I don't find political expedience to be an acceptable argument for voiding anyone's rights.

Are any other nations obligated to follow this principle as well, or just the United States?

>A foreign state need not petition for statehood. It would be sufficient to establish by treaty a court wherein a foreign person may sue a U.S. government and its agents for violations of U.S. law.

Why on Earth would we sign such a treaty?

Re: Don’t just pardon Edward Snowden; give the man a medal

#133

Post by lern_too_spel »

peterkelly wrote: post #10

Another important question is whether or not the NSA should be pardoned for their illegal activity: http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-security-nsa-idUSKBN0N... Or whether James Clapper deserves a pardon for committing perjury during a testimony to Congress: http://www.hasjamesclapperbeenindictedyet.com Edit: /s

That ruling was overturned. http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2015/08/28/435506021/...

Re: Don’t just pardon Edward Snowden; give the man a medal

#134

Post by rhino369 »

nickpsecurity wrote: post #85
Sneakos wrote: post #7

One thing this article doesn't take into account is that the movie the author undoubtedly watched before writing this was full of inaccuracies, and had the purpose of establishing Snowden as a martyr or sorts. This is evident because rather than just prove their point, the author makes several attempts to make sure the reader knows that if you hold an opposing view, you are intellectually lazy and unable to cope with…

You have to be either weak-minded or very selective about reading up on these things to not think he did some good that's reported in the article. Here's a few: 1. They kept promising it was just metadata they were collecting. Alexander got specific on all extra services they weren't collecting on. This was lies. 2. Another lies under oath to Congress about same thing. 3. They said it was just selective stuff to find…

The NSA isn't an antiterrorism agency. It's a general purpose spy agency. If you thought that it only was collecting meta data for terrorists purposes, that's on you. That was never the purpose of the agency and I'm not really sure how anyone could believe it was. What did you think they were doing during the Cold War?

It's also common knowledge that allies spy on each. America's biggest counter-intelligence threat is actually Israel. They are spying on us all the time.

Re: Don’t just pardon Edward Snowden; give the man a medal

#136

Post by okwhatthe2 »

freehunter wrote: post #78
NoGravitas wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could you expand on your reasoning here?

I can on his behalf, because I understand where he's coming from (though I don't agree with the conclusion). I've actually heard this argument a number of times before. Obviously I'm not speaking for him, just my interpretation of where he's coming from. Snowden revealed the things the NSA was doing that he believed to be illegal. The government agreed that what the NSA was doing was illegal, but no one really knew a…

> nothing has changed.

A key part of any propaganda war is convincing people to abandon the cause. Now that Snowden has stood up, we have no option, as citizens who care about reformation, but to ultimately support him.

Re: Don’t just pardon Edward Snowden; give the man a medal

#137

Post by dragonwriter »

logfromblammo wrote: post #123
dragonwriter wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The 4th Amendment protections against unreasonable searches and seizures apply to everyone, everywhere. Even granting that, what is "reasonable" depends on a lot of other factors (both legal -- such as specific grants of power to Congress, and laws passed under such grants -- and factual), and the nature of world of multiple sovereign states and the grant of power to Congress to regulate interactions with them, and…

Being able to actually enforce such a judgment would either require a treaty or that the defendant or defendant's property enter U.S. territory. I don't see how Article III would prevent the establishment of a U.S. District Court outside the territory of the U.S. There is no distinction there that makes the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington any more or less legal than a theoretical U.S. Distr…

> I don't see how Article III would prevent the establishment of a U.S. District Court outside the territory of the U.S.

It wouldn't, it would prevent something other than an Article III court from being established by treaty (and anything established by treaty would not be an Article III court.) Congress can establish, and has established Article III courts outside of the US (notably, the U.S. Court for China.) Not, of course, that such a court would be necessary to allow foreigners to sue US officials for violations of Constitutional rights, since offenses cognizable under US law that occur outside of any established judicial district can already be filed in district courts; see, 28 USC Sec. 1391(b)(1) and (b)(3).

(Aside from reducing inconvenience in the US government policing US citizens when granted an extraterritorial privilege to do so, as was the case with the sui generis US Court for China, the main benefit of a foreign-located US Court would be to provide a US -- from a legal perspective -- venue for parties to sue non-US persons local to the area where the court was located where forum non conveniens is less likely to be invoked as a reason for dismissal.)

> A treaty cannot establish such a court

But, upthread, you suggested that a court for the purpose you had in mind would be established by treaty, which I took issue with precisely because a treaty cannot establish such a court.

Re: Don’t just pardon Edward Snowden; give the man a medal

#138

Post by okwhatthe2 »

nickpsecurity wrote: post #90
bsparker wrote: post #19

A medal? I understand the importance of Snowden's revelations and I know he believes he did everything the only way it played out. But that doesn't mean he is above the law. Civil disobedience still implies civility and he should come to his day in court. We don't know what he's given Russia or China in order to remain on the run, even Glenn Greenwald admits that here, when discussing Snowden's "self preservation": h…

"But that doesn't mean he is above the law. Civil disobedience still implies civility and he should come to his day in court." The Constitution says we get due process in trials. People in Espionage Act trials don't. Further, there's no intent by the U.S. government or courts to prosecute anyone the leaks revealed were deceiving Americans in a number of ways. Accountability works both ways. Either they all get tried…

Indeed. This is bureaucratic warfare. We should keep that in mind when they say "Us Vs. Them".

Re: Don’t just pardon Edward Snowden; give the man a medal

#139

Post by kafkaesq »

zeveb wrote: post #2

An opposing view: http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/war_stories/... And the unanimous, bipartisan report of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence: http://intelligence.house.gov/news/documentsingle.aspx?Docum...

Aside from the fact that the report makes no mention of the crimes Snowden exposed (as if the American public were too dumb to notice, or care) -- would you care to comment on any of the apparently quite egregiously misleading assertions it makes? Questioning his lower leg fractures or his GED, in particular, smacks of birtherism.

https://tcf.org/content/commentary/house-intelligence-commit...

Re: Don’t just pardon Edward Snowden; give the man a medal

#140

Post by gravypod »

zeveb wrote: post #2

An opposing view: http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/war_stories/... And the unanimous, bipartisan report of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence: http://intelligence.house.gov/news/documentsingle.aspx?Docum...

I'd like to ask something. Is it leaking information if the information is commonly known?

It is said in this article that Snowden leaked information that is appropriately done by the NSA as part of their charter. The direct quote:

   Whatever one’s views of U.S. foreign policy in those parts of the world, these activities are legitimate aspects of the NSA’s charter
If this is the case, as in these activities are specified in the NSA's charter, then there can be no harm with talking about them publicly right?
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