Spain had no problem letting CIA rendition flights use its airspace and airports. It’s good to know what their priorities are. Torture good, whistleblowing bad.
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The unfamiliar reality is there is no real system of international law. Just a bunch of treaties and conventions. With no real comeback for infringing those, a big gorilla like the US basically can ignore them once they’re no longer useful.
I mean cheese, has the US got up to date on its dues with the IMF / UN?
Wouldn’t he have taken the oath of allegiance to the flag, hundreds of times at elementary school?
Under that, surely anyone at all could be prosecuted. I could. Time to get crazy.
Something about a “dehumanizing stare.”
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It is not enough to write comments. Write to your representatives. Hold them accountable. This not just about Snowden, asylum, or airplanes, but about organized state mafia.
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Yes, I was being sarcastic.
Oh, not again. You think Manning deserved what he got? What do you think the consequences for Snowden will be?
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…for example, we may invade some unrelated third country and occupy it for years,
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Damn glad I live in Tokyo. This shit is really unbelievable… If I saw it in a film I would probably get up to go get popcorn at this point due to the unbelievable-ess-ness…
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Do you come down as hard on people who break their marriage vows?
This is a pretty agregious violation of diplomatic protocol. I hope the fact that Snowden wasn’t on board makes countries step back and realize that they’ve been caught up in a fervor over, what at the end of the day, is just one man who leaked information that was widely suspected by the public and probably known by foreign governments already.
The irony here is that the longer the administration continues this crazed international manhunt, the more feckless it makes the administration appear. This has gone from an embarrassment over surveillance to a double embarrassment about how powerless the US is; a country that hunted down Osama bin Laden, but can’t get a guy out of the airport lounge in Moscow.
Aside: this comment system is really, really bad. I gave it a few days, but its pretty clear that it fails as a comment system and as a bbs. The threads are hard to follow, comments are posted multiple times, the “promoted comments” don’t actually provide the highlights of the conversation, and I’m sure it’s more work for Antonius as well. I’m just one man, and not even one of the more prolific or influential commenters here, but I am going to be curtailing my comments going forward. It’s just too much trouble to follow the conversation and to add a comment.
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Snowden was a contractor to the government, not a soldier. It’s unlikely he swore an oath, he may have broken his contract.
It doesn’t matter, though. He percieved a wrong, and he’s trying to make it very public so that We, The People can make it right.
It’s all a question of loyalty.
The point of civil disobedience isn’t to become a martyr. The point of civil disobedience is to undermine unjust authority by refusing to obey it. If you can do this and survive, unscathed, it’s all the more likely that more people will follow your example.
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Exactly. Are you loyal to the country, or to the people that rule it?
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Was that an oath to the nation, the principles for which it stands, the constitution and justice for all? Or to the presidents and surveillance organizations that rule that country?
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But so is the comparison to D-Day. If you insist that blind obedience is necessary, you open the door to war crimes. It is vital that soldiers maintain their own conscience and are able to rebel when forced to do evil. Within the system if possible, but outside the system if necessary. And yes, that may make them traitors to their superiors, but it may make them heroes to future generations.
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Everyone seems to be missing the point. I realize that everyone here views Snowden as a hero and my opinion is not a popular one here.
I applaud Snowden for taking a stand and shedding light on what is going on at the NSA. However to do so he had to break an oath. Perhaps it WAS for the good of the Constitution, but the US does have a legal system. If Snowden believes that breaking his oath was right, then he should return to the US and face up to the consequences of his actions. Running is just cowardice.
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I see where you are coming from ,but the US has a history now of using extrajudicial means for its own citizens.
If Snowden could come back here, and enter the US Criminal Justice System, I think he would welcome the forum. I don’t think he’d “gladly” go to jail, but he would likely welcome the opportunity to plead his case in a public forum and be judged by a jury of his peers. His peers being US Citizens.
However, the current (and previous administration too) has set the precedent that it can brand some people as enemy combatants, and those people do not get normal trials. Both administrations have held that classified information means “non open trials”, which means we don’t get to see what occurs and we don’t get a gurantee that a jury of his peers gets to judge him.
Now I’m not going to bring Manning in on this, because Manning agreed from the outset to be judged under the UCMJ. And that has distinct rules and treatments and EVERY PERSON who breaks the law under UCMJ is treated that way. It’s not just Bradley Manning that had the isolation treatment and all that… even soldiers that get put in the brig in certain bases are also isolated in this fashion.
But, back to Snowden… would you bet absolutely everything you own, and your life, that he would get a fair trial with a jury of his peers? Or is there a little nagging doubt in you that says MAYBE he’ll just vanish?
Now ask yourself, if you’re Snowden, are you willing to take that risk, knowing that the current president HAS renditioned Americans, that the current president has executed americans by drone strike, and that the current president has not ruled out drone strikes on american targets IF the circumstances are right?
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Sort of a scary time to be alive right now.
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