I'm surprised by the amount of anti-Snowden sentiment in the WaPo comments.
I suspect that it is 'opinion shaping'
Snowden: Why hasn’t DNI Clapper been punished for lying to Congress?
61–70 of 119 posts
Re: Snowden: Why hasn’t DNI Clapper been punished for lying to Congress?
#62Earlier quoted context omitted.
Each house of Congress has inherent contempt powers and can jail people, in the Capitol if necessary. They haven't exercised that power since 1934, these days they refer contemptors to the US Attorney for the District of Columbia. The older power still remains though and is on very firm Constitutional grounds (though for a cabinet official there are issues of executive privilege). More generally it's hard to take Con…
Any member of Congress that starts putting Administration personnel in jail will be committing political suicide.
When you work in a body with a 13% public approval rating, you'd think there would be little effect political suicide could have.
More seriously: I think it'd be a wild-card maneuver, but I honestly don't know that it would be political suicide. Some people are angry at Congress for being ineffective. Some people are angry at the administration for failing to check the powers it has been given along lines of "decency" and restraint. I don't think those people would be sad to see Congress start using its authority as a non-executive branch.
Re: Snowden: Why hasn’t DNI Clapper been punished for lying to Congress?
#63Earlier quoted context omitted.
Fleeing the consequences of his actions is akin to ducking after disagreeing with an irrational person. Right or wrong, they're about to hit you. You don't have to stand there and take it. If he had faced the consequences of his actions, he wouldn't be around right now to continue this discussion.
You don't have to stand there and take it, but sometimes it is better if you do. You don't know that he wouldn't be around right now. I happen to think that he would still be around, but certainly his life would be more difficult. But I also think he'd be more "popular".
Interesting trade-off: living in exile but invited to video conference at every big name event and helping direct the course of the national security discussion, or in solitary confinement in Guantanamo but more "popular"
I'd say Snowden made the right choice.
Re: Snowden: Why hasn’t DNI Clapper been punished for lying to Congress?
#64I'm frequently not on Snowden's side (and Clapper being wrong doesn't necessarily make Snowden right), but he's completely on point here. Clapper directly lied to Congress under oath. He needs some kind of censure.
Oh, great. I'm very curious. I am honestly very interested to hear what you feel Snowden has done wrong? I had always assumed that for everyone except those with something to lose (e.g. politicians, bureaucrats) that Snowden 's actions were seen in high regard.
> Oh, great. I'm very curious. I am honestly very interested to hear what you feel Snowden has done wrong?
Oh jeez, not this shit again. It's not even relevant to the topic of the OP this time.
That is to say, here comes another giant pointless derail that will distract from the actual topic at hand.
Re: Snowden: Why hasn’t DNI Clapper been punished for lying to Congress?
#65There is some good reporting here by the Washington Post about the circumstances of Clapper's testimony to Congress. Readers here who know my comments know that I'm not fully happy with how Snowden chose to disclose information from inside NSA, and particularly not about his travel to China (Hong Kong) and Russia, but I think Snowden raises a fair point here. There is some genuine difference of opinion among American…
Every national government in the civilized world needs an intelligence-gathering agency that can operate with some degree of operational secrecy. What is the basis for this assertion? What would happen to a nation that didn't have that?
It would lose wars, basically. Now, this matters less than it used to in this age of the nuclear bomb, but knowing what other nations are doing and planning is still useful in trade and technology. Knowing more about the market than others means you get better deals and China isn't the only nation doing industrial espionage.
Terrorism? It's a pretty pedestrian intelligence agency whose primary aim is to prevent terrorism. The NSA is stuffed full of paranoid people with information addiction. They don't care about terrorism; they just want all the world's secrets. An intelligence guy is just as likely to respect other's privacy as a security researcher is to accept other people reading his files. It's in their nature not to.
Re: Snowden: Why hasn’t DNI Clapper been punished for lying to Congress?
#66Why does it take Snowden to ask this question? Since when is blatant perjury before Congress not a punishable offense? I guess if you perjure yourself over drug use in baseball that's a lot more important.
Re: Snowden: Why hasn’t DNI Clapper been punished for lying to Congress?
#67Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Every national government in the civilized world needs an intelligence-gathering agency that can operate with some degree of operational secrecy. > I think Congress is unsure about how to proceed on this issue because not all members of Congress are of one mind about what is best for the country in administration of NSA. > The other reason I don't believe this HN hivemind theory of politics is that I by no means as…
They aren't. They wouldn't even be controversial at the EFF. The controversy stems from cost/benefit judgements on individual spy programs AND from the fact that Clapper perjured himself in front of congress and the american people. The latter is a far more clearcut issue than the former, and it's what we were talking about before the lawyer came in and changed the subject.
Has there been any cost/benefit analysis on any of the spy programs that Snowden's leaks have revealed? It doesn't look like it to me. For instance, it should also be uncontroversial that universal surveillance only ends up with an intimidated, fearful citizenry, and a total lack of innovation, but oh well. For those reasons alone, we should probably start out against universal or dragnet surveillance.
Re: Snowden: Why hasn’t DNI Clapper been punished for lying to Congress?
#68Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think perhaps you've been consuming only media that mirrors your own viewpoint. Many people are upset that Snowden "violated his oath," that he took it upon himself to effectively dismantle programs he disagreed with (even if the program was indeed out of line), and that he fled from the consequences of his actions. If you believe public opinion polling, a majority of Americans don't like what he did and think he s…
Bear in mind another point - believing Snowden needs to stand trial doesn't necessarily presume a belief that he's guilty, or should be punished, either. Americans also tend to believe the justice system works as advertised.
According to that poll, a majority of people also disapprove of what he did. But yes, very true.
Re: Snowden: Why hasn’t DNI Clapper been punished for lying to Congress?
#69As far as I can tell, Clapper was asked about a classified program during an open session of Congress. Confronted with a conflict between his oath to tell the truth and his obligation to preserve the secrecy of the program, he chose the latter and corrected his testimony later in private. Maybe I'm misconstruing what happened, but, if not, why is this controversial?
The legitimate response in such a situation is to officially dodge the question. It doesn't even have to be public since they're given the questions in advance and have veto power. But Clapper went before Congress explicitly allowing them to ask him about this program and knowingly lied about it. What's unfortunate is that it's not controversial. It seems Clapper has the backing of a pretty big group in Congress.
According to the article, ODNI's attorney was given the question in advance, but it wasn't passed on to Clapper, so he improvised. Maybe the attorney's just covering for him, but that's what it says.
Re: Snowden: Why hasn’t DNI Clapper been punished for lying to Congress?
#70There is some good reporting here by the Washington Post about the circumstances of Clapper's testimony to Congress. Readers here who know my comments know that I'm not fully happy with how Snowden chose to disclose information from inside NSA, and particularly not about his travel to China (Hong Kong) and Russia, but I think Snowden raises a fair point here. There is some genuine difference of opinion among American…
I doubt that the public lives full of dirt are the problem. If the dirt is out there, it's not a problem. It's the Larry Craigs of the Senate and House that are the problem. Dirt swept into the closet is the problem.
Also, how do you explain Jane Harman? Google "jane harman alberto gonzalez" for details.