When The Guardian first published this story, it gave the impression that Miranda was a mere tourist transiting through Heathrow. Greenwald was quick to tweet that Miranda was “not even a journalist.” The Guardian admitted only after other news organizations looked into the matter that Miranda was, at the time of his detention, on a trip – paid for by The Guardian – to meet with Ms. Poitras and very likely ferry UK national secrets from Germany to Brazil.
If Mr. Greenwald is going to make use of these classified national security documents, and involve Mr. Miranda to transport them, he doesn’t get my sympathy when Mr. Miranda is inconveniently detained. If Mr. Greenwald cannot stand having Mr. Miranda in harm’s way, he should do his own international traveling. Mr. Greenwald and Mr. Miranda have no one to blame but Mr. Greenwald.
Just as trivial as it would be for the authorities to inspect your mail. Now you’ve got the worst of both worlds: Not only has your data security been compromised, you also don’t know it has been.
Unless you use a third party to mail the letter/parcel, and send it to a third party who will then deliver the data to the recipient. In which case we’re back to how well the authorities are tracking your known associates.
You may have better luck hiding said microSD card in the packaging material, however. But for that matter, you may be able to hide the microSD card (a technology I somehow completely forgot about) on your person.
I don’t think that evidence of illegal wiretapping can be classed as a national secret. Especially a national secret of a country that wasn’t doing the wiretapping.
"If Mr. Greenwald is going to make use of these classified national security documents, and involve Mr. Miranda to transport them, he doesn’t get my sympathy when Mr. Miranda is inconveniently detained. "
He wasn’t inconveniently detained. He was illegally detained. Your point is moot and a very basic example of victim blaming.
I don’t want him to receive sympathy, I want him to receive justice.
What an unintelligent remark. I’m not offering an opinion on the NSA debate. I simply believe that if you’re going to practice civil disobedience, you have to suffer repercussions. If you believe in something and you take action to change it, you can’t whine when the path to change is not a cakewalk.
He was detained under the Terrorism act, illegally, for being the boyfriend of a reporter working on a case exposing illegal snooping practices by our governments.
Then he should pursue his legal remedies. If you are confident that he was illegally detained, then he should easily prevail and be awarded a measure of compensation for his illegal treatment.
The law is an abstract concept. The law itself doesn’t prevent anyone from doing anything. But the consequences should. Mr. Miranda should pursue those consequences.
There’s no debate. He was very obviously illegally detained. Hence why our government is now reaching out to our Border Agency to find out why they’re illegally detaining people.
The fact that you consider whistle-blowing illegal wiretapping practices as ‘ferrying national secrets’ is what caused someone to Godwin you, and although I wouldn’t have gone down that route myself, it’s a fair comment.
He was yes, I didn’t use that term to detract, although I appreciate it may look that way.
The point is that it doesn’t matter, it would have been just as egregious if it happened to Greenwald himself. It wouldn’t change the fact that the Border Agency used a law designed to ‘fight terrorism’ to harass someone loosely involved with exposing a governments illegal actions. Just because the government doesn’t like it doesn’t mean that they can do what they want. On the contrary, it makes it worse; they’re quite literally abusing laws that were abusing human rights to begin with.
So just to be clear here, this is all okay, right? Let’s go with your assertions and say that he was actually carrying something for Greenwald, and ignore the fact that I might carry something for my wife, say, without actually being involved in her work.
It is okay that the UK use laws passed to prevent terrorism to detain people that they do not suspect of terrorism at all when the law specifically states it is for use against terrorism. It is okay that they held the person exactly as long as they were allowed to before having to give a reason why they did that. That in no way suggests that their reasons for doing it weren’t on the up-and-up in the first place - that they released him because they had no legitimate cause to hold him - but instead it is plausible to believe that they just happened to need exactly nine hours to properly interrogate him.
Just tell us that this is all okay and we’ll understand why you are saving your outrage.
I’m not sure how tough it’d be to smuggle a microSD on your person (I guess it depends if they x-ray your shoes and stuff), but it seems like a good bet to send an encrypted card stashed in some sort of package, and yeah, obviously without using any names of interest.
Whether or not the surveillance programs are illegal is a separate question that has yet to be determined. We cannot expect the government to act differently until then. If you believe that they will eventually be found illegal, then this injustice could only serve to expedite that process. Either Mr. Greenwald is skillfully playing the game, or he is naïvely outraged. In either case, I do not have sympathy for his personal plight. The change Mr. Greenwald, and you presumably, seeks requires sacrifice.
How about this for perspective? At the end of the day, Mr. Greenwald will once again get to embrace his loved one.
What’s your point? That Greenwald should be thankful that the government only illegally detained him? Are you being serious?
Again, these things aren’t really up for debate, not outside of the farce of government anyway. The NSA exposure was unconstitutional in the US and illegal in Europe.
Furthermore, suppressing journalists reporting on it is also unconstitutional (and in this case still illegal in Europe).
Furthermore, detaining someone under the terrorism act with no suspicion over them being a terrorist is illegal.
Do you cut as many breaks for normal criminals? Or just criminal governments?
Also, what game? He’s a journalist. You understand the role of journalism, right?
Actions have consequences. Whoever decided it was worth stopping this guy had to weigh the consequences of losing the ability to detain people under this law. Very public egregious examples of abusive use will inevitably invite criticism of the law and very likely lead to changes. Shit, this is just the latest example of abuse under this law that is already under attack for being misused.
There is a larger game to be played. Merely being upset doesn’t change a thing.
