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U.S. charges Edward Snowden with espionage

washingtonpost.com

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Re: U.S. charges Edward Snowden with espionage

#221

Post by laureny »

DanielBMarkham wrote: post #7

So now is the time to identify the federal prosecutors who filed this and petition the government to have them fired. In addition, of course, to asking for a complete pardon for Snowden. It also should be noted that any of the Congressional investigations into this mess are perfectly capable of giving Snowden a grant of immunity from prosecution. People ask what to do. There are at least two avenues open to nip this…

> These are political charges

What does this mean exactly? "Political charge" is absurd.

Besides, are you seriously suggesting that a petition should be enough to drop criminal charges brought upon someone? That's not how things work in any civilized country.

I tend to side with him at the moment but there is no way I will trust my judgment, or that of 90,000 angry online petition signers, to decide justice for me. Let the trial happen, let's see everything that's going on, this will bring up a lot of things up in the open.

Maybe we'll find he's a hero and he's done nothing wrong, or maybe we'll find that he has sold intelligence to the Chinese or whatever.

Either way, the right way is to go through the judiciary system.

Re: U.S. charges Edward Snowden with espionage

#222

Post by timr »

mpyne wrote: post #199
timr wrote: post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Soldiers are supposed to disobey their military superiors if told to commit crimes against humanity." Well, no. A soldier isn't supposed to say "I think that command is illegal under international law, therefore I will choose not to follow it." They'll be court-martialed, and rightly so. Choosing to make that call is intentionally risky, because it's supposed to be rare. Likewise, Snowden will be prosecuted...and ri…

Actually, in the U.S. servicemembers are supposed to refuse to follow orders that are not lawful. You are right that such cases are (and are meant to be) exceptionally rare. The U.S. Supreme Court gives exceptionally wide latitude in what counts as a lawful order, and as far as I know no servicemember has ever been tried (much less convicted) for following a valid order (even if they thought it was illegal). But with…

"The U.S. Supreme Court gives exceptionally wide latitude in what counts as a lawful order, and as far as I know no servicemember has ever been tried (much less convicted) for following a valid order (even if they thought it was illegal)."

Yes, exactly. And of course, there have been many examples of soldiers who were court-martialed for disobeying orders. The risk of disobeying is on the soldier -- they're taking their life in their hands when they make the decision to cross a superior. It's not as if the military says: "oh, you thought that order was illegal? We won't court-martial you, then."

The parent comment was totally specious, because Snowden is being treated exactly the way any soldier would be treated for a similar behavior. We don't just automatically pardon people for breaking laws because they broke laws with patriotic intent.

Re: U.S. charges Edward Snowden with espionage

#223

Post by krapp »

enraged_camel wrote: post #203
krapp wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not obsessed about the law. And honestly, I agree personally with everything Snowden did. I'm just disagreeing with the premise that even having a trial is itself unjust.

If the trial is a mechanism to enforce the bad laws, of course it is unjust. The dictionary definition is justice is "the quality of being fair and reasonable." Is there anything fair ad reasonable about how Snowden is about to be treated?

You seem to be presuming absolute corruption on the part of the legal system and absolute innocence on the part of Edward Snowden. What would you expect to happen, under these circumstances?

Re: U.S. charges Edward Snowden with espionage

#224

Post by kinghajj »

peripetylabs wrote: post #192

The Chinese authorities will hold him until they feel he has given them all he knows, then quickly extradite him to the US. At that point he will probably try to get to Europe. If he makes it, his appeal to those governments on humanitarian grounds may be weakened by the fact the first country he picked practices capital punishment far more than the US (more than every other country in the world combined): http://www…

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

And there's the whole moratorium currently in place against extradition in HK right now, and they have a British-based judicial system that takes FOREVER (just like ours!), and have an exemption in their extradition treaties for political crimes. HK != PRC.

Re: U.S. charges Edward Snowden with espionage

#225

Post by krapp »

anigbrowl wrote: post #216
enraged_camel wrote: post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the trial is a mechanism to enforce the bad laws, of course it is unjust. The dictionary definition is justice is "the quality of being fair and reasonable." Is there anything fair ad reasonable about how Snowden is about to be treated?

And who is in charge of deciding which laws are bad? What if two people disagree about the goodness or badness of a particular law, who should prevail?

If only there were some adversarial process by which these issues could be decided....

Re: U.S. charges Edward Snowden with espionage

#226

Post by baddox »

tptacek wrote: post #61
eli wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There actually are whistleblower protections he could have taken advantage of... but it would have meant working within the system (for example, taking his concerns to Congress or the NSA's Inspector General rather than a reporter) and it only applies if he uncovered fraud or illegal activity. AFAIK there isn't any proof that he uncovered anything illegal .

The national security establishment is more or less exempted from the whistleblower statutes.

And all other laws, if they choose to be.

Re: U.S. charges Edward Snowden with espionage

#227

Post by wisty »

eli wrote: post #58
vehementi wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's kind of hard to be a whistleblower without breaking some sort of secrecy law.

There actually are whistleblower protections he could have taken advantage of... but it would have meant working within the system (for example, taking his concerns to Congress or the NSA's Inspector General rather than a reporter) and it only applies if he uncovered fraud or illegal activity. AFAIK there isn't any proof that he uncovered anything illegal .

AFAIK, other whistleblowers in the NSA have tried. The fact that it was all swept under the rug may have made Snowden consider a more rash course of action.

Re: U.S. charges Edward Snowden with espionage

#228

Post by baddox »

jlgreco wrote: post #44
sigzero wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Neither of those is ever going to happen, petition or no petition.

Of course, but that is a poor reason to not make your voice heard.

The fact that the time it takes to sign a petition is worth more than the effect it will have is a good reason to not make your voice heard.

Re: U.S. charges Edward Snowden with espionage

#229

Post by baddox »

betterunix wrote: post #157
zacharyvoase wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The role of the prosecutor is to prosecute the interests of the State, which in this case they have done. I’m wondering how grand juries play into this—the Fifth Amendment states that “no person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury” (except for those in the military, which I think he wouldn’t classify as). There’s a great article her…

"The role of the prosecutor is to prosecute the interests of the State" One would think that, as public servants, their role is to prosecute in the interests of the public at large. That might mean going against the interests of the state, if the state is working against the public.

That would only be in the case of a government that represents the people and has their consent to govern.

Re: U.S. charges Edward Snowden with espionage

#230

Post by anigbrowl »

krapp wrote: post #225
anigbrowl wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And who is in charge of deciding which laws are bad? What if two people disagree about the goodness or badness of a particular law, who should prevail?

If only there were some adversarial process by which these issues could be decided....

...we could enshrine it in our constitution!
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