Who watches the Watchmen?

[Büge]

How is that propaganda?

[Blossom]

Pitching a deliberate softball as a spur for Dear Leader to expound on how great and free the country is, especially when you're famous specifically for what Snowden is? How is it not propaganda?

[Classic]

I'm inclined to give Snowden a lot of benefit of the doubt and not inclined to give Putin any though.

[Mongrel]

Whether or not he's been strongarmed or coaxed, it's still ridiculous propaganda and completely undermines Snowden's cause.

[Brantly B.]

There doesn't seem to be any response from Snowden, so who knows what the game even is here. All we have is a wide-open opportunity for the leader to go on record and say "No, we don't do this", which could be a prelude to a lot of things.

[Thad]

I continue to hold the view that any discussion of Snowden himself and whether or not he is credible is a sideshow that distracts from the pretty important stuff that he's called attention to.

Andy Kaufman used to have a bit he'd do called the Vietcong Confession where he'd apologize for whatever his latest offense was with a glassy-eyed look as if he was being coerced by captors into saying what he was saying. That could be the kind of thing that's going on with Snowden now -- this is what you're going to do if you want to keep the political asylum we've granted you. Would you rather go back on the run?

Or he could just be hopelessly, jaw-droppingly naive.

Personally, I think it's irrelevant, and plays into a narrative that seeks to discredit Snowden's leaks by way of "Look over there!"

[Mongrel]

Given what he's done I can't imagine he's that naive.

Don't get me wrong - I imagine there's no small element of coercion in there. But what might the Russians have done if he refused? Would they actually dare to revoke his asylum at this point? Seems like a risk worth taking. Especially given the fact of how few people can see past the sideshow. The distractions may be no more than that, but they're working and for most people they're carrying the conversation.

BUT I realize that standing up to Putin would be asking a man to martyr himself twice. A cat only has so many lives and humans have far fewer.

[Thad]

There's also the possibility that he's intentionally raising the larger point that Putin's denials and excuses sound a lot like Obama's, Clapper's, et al.

But that's just one more stab in the dark. Again, I don't think it matters.

(EDIT: And I still don't, but in case you're curious that's what Snowden himself is saying now.)

[Thad]

House introduces real NSA reform bill with actual teeth; pulls eleventh-hour bait-and-switch and completely guts it.

In particular, the EFF is peeved about the broadness of the terms under which agency staff can snoop, which now include any number of factors. The fear is that the agency will be able to perform its customary verbal jujitsu to mean it's business as usual when it comes to collecting people's data.

There was also a plan for the bill to include a special advocate in hearings held by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, who would put the public's case in hearings over whether to allow surveillance of particular targets or not. This has now been reduced to having an advocate if the court decides one is needed.

Surprised face, etc.

Apparently the advocacy groups are trying to get the Senate to push a stronger version. Haha, Senate.

[Thad]

FBI issues National Security Letter to investigate an Office 365 user.

Microsoft challenges the gag order provision; FBI withdraws the letter.

You know what, Microsoft? We've had our differences over the years. But kudos on this one.

Now, the FBI DID get what it wanted anyway, because it went directly to the customer -- but that's still a positive outcome.

[Mothra]

Baby steps.

[Thad]

Complete NBC Snowden interview. I haven't watched the whole thing yet but what I've seen so far is good.

And seriously, fuck John Kerry.

[Classic]

What'd he do this time?

[Mongrel]

He was recently quoted as saying Snowden should "Man up" and "come home to face justice."

[Thad]

I forget, was that before or after he called him a traitor?

The gist of the whole thing was "We're not the ones stopping you from coming home (we're just high-ranking government officials accusing you of a crime punishable by execution), stop being a pussy."

This is a guy who testified to Congress against the Vietnam War. What the fuck happened to you, John?

[Classic]

If I was going to be generous, I'd say that he clearly thinks that the government still works the way it did then, and listened to white, upper-class men when they had objections to the current course and didn't silently destroy them.

I mean, what happened to the service(wo?)men who had been speaking against the Iraq invasion? There must have been some.

[Thad]

If I was going to be generous, I'd say that he clearly thinks that the government still works the way it did then, and listened to white, upper-class men when they had objections to the current course and didn't silently destroy them.

Oh yeah, the good old days when the government didn't retaliate against whistleblowers.

You know, the Nixon Administration.

[Thad]

Something that made me actually shout at my car radio this morning: Ruth Marcus (as a guest on The Diane Rehm Show) repeating the talking point that Snowden "didn't go through the proper channels" by complaining to his superiors first, he just gave a bunch of documents to the press.

Snowden, as you might expect, claims this is false and that he made multiple complaints to multiple people in multiple offices.

Prior to yesterday, the NSA claimed he never said anything to anyone.

As of yesterday, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence posted an email and response it had "just found" and acknowledged okay, so Snowden DID send an E-Mail ONE TIME, but that's the ONLY one, and it wasn't whistleblowing, he was just seeking clarification on something somebody said in a training session.

Which sounds a lot like the "Would you believe...?" routine from Get Smart to me. "He sent us NO EMAILS, would you believe it? NOT ONE. Okay, how about one email, but it was for clarification of a minor point in a training course?"

I mean, I'm not saying that we should believe Snowden, without evidence, just on his say-so. But believing the NSA just on ITS say-so is complete lunacy. If Ms. Marcus had said, "He claims he did, but where are the emails? Why didn't he keep copies?" then I wouldn't have been as infuriated with her assertion that he hadn't gone through the proper channels (which, in her defense, she at least hedged with "as far as I know"). But if you're going to point out that Snowden hasn't produced any hard evidence that he went through the proper channels, then DO that, don't just say he didn't do it.

Because "give the whistleblower the brushoff and then deny he ever came to you" is exactly the sort of behavior I would expect, not just from the NSA, but from ANY entity engaged in major wrongdoing. It's okay to be skeptical of Snowden's version of events -- but if you're NOT skeptical of the NSA's version, then as far as I'm concerned you have no credibility.

[Blossom]

How exactly would one prove they've never received an email?

[Friday]

The thing that gets me about the whole Snowden thing is people questioning his motive.

I mean, you can make the argument that he shouldn't have done what he did because it will make tanks explode and endanger America even though his motive was pure. You can make that argument, even though it's stupid. But at least you can still make it and have maybe a tiny shred of merit.

But if you actually think he's some sort of bizarro reverse russian anti-spy in it for the attention or whatever the fuck, well...

EDIT: also, I don't give one tiny shit whether or not he went through "proper channels".