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A Response to Your Petition on Edward Snowden

petitions.whitehouse.gov

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Re: A Response to Your Petition on Edward Snowden

#141

Post by caskance »

agd wrote: post #67

> He should come home to the United States, and be judged by a jury of his peers Why would Snowden come back when he can't make a public interest defence [1]? The trial would be a formality and he'd be locked up for 40 years without being able to contribute to any debate. [1] The espionage act does not allow you to make a public interest defence and makes no distinction between whistle-blowers and spies. https://en.w…

Because that would be a useful first step in getting that stupid law overturned. Unless you think it's more likely Congress will do it themselves?

Re: A Response to Your Petition on Edward Snowden

#142

Post by sitkack »

ewzimm wrote: post #118
blisterpeanuts wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Obama Administration has aggressively muzzled and prosecuted whistleblowers, possibly more than any previous president. It's remarkable that he would invite people to blow the whistle, given that sorry record.

It's not just possibly more than any previous president. Public records show that he has sentenced whistleblowers to 25 times the jail time of all previous Presidents combined. He has also used the Espionage Act more than all previous Presidents combined.

I would love to see both of these facts along with citations in an easy to read single page document. Are you counting Chelsea Manning in those numbers?

Re: A Response to Your Petition on Edward Snowden

#143

Post by teekert »

dragonwriter wrote: post #124
teekert wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Mr. Snowden's dangerous decision to steal and disclose classified information had severe consequences for the security of our country and the people who work day in and day out to protect it. As you say, where is the prove and also: He did not disclose the documents, respected journalistic institutions did. He did not just leak anything and everything. He did the right thing. This response is an insult to everybody…

> He did not disclose the documents, respected journalistic institutions did. How did the "respected journalistic institutions" get them if Snowden didn't disclose them once he had gotten them?

I'd say the "dangers to public safety" are in the disclosing-to-the-public part of the transactions. Snowden did not do that as he recognized he should not be the judge on that. Journalists are as important as Politicians and Judges (or in the US: Juries) in keeping things aligned with "common interest" (for as far as such a thing exists.)

Re: A Response to Your Petition on Edward Snowden

#144

Post by dogma1138 »

dragonwriter wrote: post #125
ewzimm wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not just possibly more than any previous president. Public records show that he has sentenced whistleblowers to 25 times the jail time of all previous Presidents combined. He has also used the Espionage Act more than all previous Presidents combined.

> Public records show that he has sentenced whistleblowers to 25 times the jail time of all previous Presidents combined. I strongly doubt that public records show that people sentenced were whistleblowers, or that the President sentenced them.

Not Obama, but the DOJ and the Attorney General are part of the Executive branch in the US which means they work for the president.

The judges don't but like in most cases the prosecution has just as much and even more power (with mandatory minimums for example) to affect the sentence than the Judge it self in such case when the accused is found guilty.

The prosecution charges them with the crime, as well as asks for the punishment, they can charge them with lesser felonies or less counts, they can ask for a more lenient sentencing, but when they charge you with everything in the book 10 times over and ask for the maximum penalty by law what you expect the judge to do?

I think people don't realize just how much effective power and agency by law the US executive branch has compared to most other western democracies.

Re: A Response to Your Petition on Edward Snowden

#145

Post by glitchdout »

meragrin wrote: post #136
Mithaldu wrote: post #47

As a non-american it's kind of hilarious to have the american government, with all its powers, assets and resources figuratively yell at a single individual: "Come out and fight like a man!" The fact that someone thought this kind of response is appropiate in any way means one of two things: 1. They think the american populace is irrelevant and they can flip them the bird unscathed. 2. They think they have substantia…

The petition is specifically about pardoning Snowden. The President cannot pardon someone for a federal crime they have not been convicted of. Snowden literally needs to come back, face the trials, and be convicted before the President could consider to pardon him. To me, the response is a have your cake and eat it too kind of response. They hint at the technicality of not being able to issue a pardon in a way they s…

> The President cannot pardon someone for a federal crime they have not been convicted of.

Yes, he can. http://www.nytimes.com/1988/01/05/opinion/l-constitution-all...

Re: A Response to Your Petition on Edward Snowden

#146

Post by dragonwriter »

meragrin wrote: post #136
Mithaldu wrote: post #47

As a non-american it's kind of hilarious to have the american government, with all its powers, assets and resources figuratively yell at a single individual: "Come out and fight like a man!" The fact that someone thought this kind of response is appropiate in any way means one of two things: 1. They think the american populace is irrelevant and they can flip them the bird unscathed. 2. They think they have substantia…

The petition is specifically about pardoning Snowden. The President cannot pardon someone for a federal crime they have not been convicted of. Snowden literally needs to come back, face the trials, and be convicted before the President could consider to pardon him. To me, the response is a have your cake and eat it too kind of response. They hint at the technicality of not being able to issue a pardon in a way they s…

> The President cannot pardon someone for a federal crime they have not been convicted of.

Not only can they, but perhaps the single most well-known Presidential pardon in history was of this kind: President Ford's blanket pardon of ex-President Nixon for any federal crimes he may have committed while President.

Re: A Response to Your Petition on Edward Snowden

#147

Post by dllthomas »

caskance wrote: post #137
dllthomas wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Given the apparent security practices where Snowden worked, I expect the Chinese/Russian intelligence services already had the entirety of what Snowden took. "A few Western journalists in their flats and offices does not a secure facility for storing highly classified information make." They might have done better if the NSA had not been deliberately undermining our ability to secure ourselves.

Whether they had the information or not, giving them a plausible excuse to know that information is still a security breach. There are countless examples in the past where one party had secret information they were forced not to act on for fear of revealing to enemies that they did in fact know it.

It is a breach, but only a severe one if there were things (of import) for which another plausible excuse could not have been trivially constructed. And again, this is an issue because individuals cannot credibly be secure, which is quite specifically something the NSA has worked to ensure.

Re: A Response to Your Petition on Edward Snowden

#148

Post by ellio »

This epitomizes why I will never consider Barack Obama a great President. I've seen good arguments that he is above average, even well above-average as a President. I respect a lot that he has done, such as engaging in effective diplomatic relations with Cuba and supporting a form of healthcare that is closer to universal. But I cannot ever look at a man who so openly and willfully jeopardizes the idea of a free republic and think of him as a good leader. Alexander Hamilton wrote,

“It has been frequently remarked that it seems to have been reserved to the people of this country…to decide the important question, whether societies of men are really capable or not of establishing good government from reflection and choice, or whether they are forever destined to depend for their political constitutions on accident and force. If there be any truth in the remark, the crisis at which we are arrived may with propriety be regarded as the era in which that decision is to be made…And a wrong election of the part we shall act may, in this view, deserve to be considered as the general misfortune of mankind.”

Mass surveillance and government secrecy are one of the greatest threats to this ideal ever to face this country. Can we survive with them? Of course. Life will go on, we'll live in our houses and buy nice things and generally lead comfortable lives. But we'll never live as free persons, and even those of us with the most comfortable lives will constantly be looking over our shoulders, burdened by the feeling that something is very wrong.

Re: A Response to Your Petition on Edward Snowden

#149

Post by toyg »

cjsthompson wrote: post #123
toyg wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "We have heard your voices and grievances and honestly couldn't give two shits about what you think. You have no power here." Isn't that the answer to all petitions? Petitions are just pleas to the king. It is in the king's prerogatives to ignore them. What you need in a democratic society is not petitions, but acts of parliament.

That's right. Petitions are just pleas to the king. Except that there is no king here. There is an oligarchy. This is what a republic is. In a real democracy (such as ancient athens) the citizens get to vote the laws directly and public officials are held accountable for their actions.

I'll just refer to one of my comments from 3 years ago, because this "democracy vs republic" thing is one of my pet-hate American myths.

"This split between "democracy" and "constitutional republic" is something being pushed more and more, but it's really a fantasy peddled by some US-based politicos with vested interests in devaluing the concept of democracy and making you accept the fact that you should be happy without it.

A "constitutional republic" is something defined by a set of laws with certain specific elements in common: having a constitution and being a republic (which is also quite a loose term, used to define "anything that is not a monarchy" -- Iran is also a constitutional republic, for example, albeit a theocratic one)."

Whole comment at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3668684 See also https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8542546

Re: A Response to Your Petition on Edward Snowden

#150

Post by IgorPartola »

cjsthompson wrote: post #123
toyg wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "We have heard your voices and grievances and honestly couldn't give two shits about what you think. You have no power here." Isn't that the answer to all petitions? Petitions are just pleas to the king. It is in the king's prerogatives to ignore them. What you need in a democratic society is not petitions, but acts of parliament.

That's right. Petitions are just pleas to the king. Except that there is no king here. There is an oligarchy. This is what a republic is. In a real democracy (such as ancient athens) the citizens get to vote the laws directly and public officials are held accountable for their actions.

So let me get this straight. You want the same people who voted for Palin and are saying yes to a Trump president in the polls to decide policy? The thing is that as awful as our current congress is, at least it's their job and responsibility to come up with policy and vote on it. In severe cases you can call them out on it and they can face certain consequences. If voting on policy was to be done by the masses you'd have the same uninformed people who can't tell a presidential candidate from an angry potato deciding how much fish is legal to pull out of a specific fishing region.

Someone recently pointed out that California is as close to a direct democracy as we get in the US and look at what it's doing there: "Raise taxes? Nope! Fund schools: Yup!" People end up making decisions that benefit them in the short term while ignoring the global consequences. That's human nature and direct democracy assumes that everyone is an informed rational thinker.

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