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Author Topic: Is Richard Snowden a heroe or a criminal?  (Read 193272 times)

dreed

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RSL

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Re: Is Richard Snowden a heroe or a criminal?
« Reply #162 on: July 12, 2013, 01:32:19 pm »

Yeah, I was going to find this article from this morning's WSJ and post a link to it. Thanks, Dreed. In a way it's an unfortunate article because Randy's dead wrong about the constitutionality of what the NSA's doing when it analyzes communications traffic. On the other hand, he's dead right about the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. That's a new, Obama-created board of busybodies that actually looks at the content of citizens' financial transactions. It's unconstitutional on the face of it, but since Obama created it the "media," other than the WSJ, have ignored it.
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Gulag

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Re: Is Richard Snowden a heroe or a criminal?
« Reply #163 on: July 12, 2013, 01:55:44 pm »

That's because they get all the circuses (cable TV) and bread (fast food) that they want already:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bread_and_circuses

I suspect that the very same great majority of American consumers that don't mind also don't fully understand the dangers of what's going on and where it leads. None of the people that fully understand what Snowden has revealed and what it means like where it ends. Except those that benefit from it.

Strange as it may seem, but Europeans fully understand the dangers of what is going on in the USA because they've already been through it (from Hitler through until the wall came down.)

It won't be until Americans suffer from this that they demand change. Question is whether or not they're full from bread/circuses and will notice. Or in other words, things have to get worse, possibly much worse, in the USA (in terms of lost liberties/freedoms/rights) before anything stands a chance of getting better. Will it happen? Time will tell.

You sound like our new overlord that wants submissive subjects that make you rich and don't ask any bothersome questions.

Problem is that the USA was founded as a Democratic state, not a Fascist state.

And I'm pretty sure that if you went to the public and asked them to vote for one or the other that most would choose Democracy.

I think that you've got the wrong idea about centuries as the 20th century has already concluded (it did so at the end of year 2000 - we're now in the 21st century), unless you mean that democracy has been dead in the USA for the last 13 years already?

Do you really believe somehow magically "people" will be able to wake up and say no to EBT cards so to speak? Should I remind you that Ben Franklin famously foresaw "when the people find that they can vote themselves money, that will herald the end of the republic"? Do you really believe this is a democracy in its classical sense as defined by the Ancient Athenians?  Inverted Totalitarianism is what Sheldon Wolin, one of America's leading political philosophers, said we currently live in. Perhaps you want to read that book Inverted Totalitarianism to dust off your indoctrination first? If you ask me, I'd say it has been on a slow train to the total Fascism since the days of the New Deal.
« Last Edit: July 12, 2013, 02:00:46 pm by Gulag »
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Chris_Brown

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Re: Is Richard Snowden a heroe or a criminal?
« Reply #164 on: July 12, 2013, 04:30:42 pm »

If you ask me, I'd say it has been on a slow train to the total Fascism since the days of the New Deal.

Here, here.

Repealing the Current Tax Payment Act of 1943 would be a good start to righting the sinking ship.
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dreed

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Re: Is Richard Snowden a heroe or a criminal?
« Reply #165 on: July 13, 2013, 12:41:39 am »

Yeah, I was going to find this article from this morning's WSJ and post a link to it. Thanks, Dreed. In a way it's an unfortunate article because Randy's dead wrong about the constitutionality of what the NSA's doing when it analyzes communications traffic.

And you know this for sure because...? With that sort of response, you make it sound like you know something that the rest of us don't about this.
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Rob C

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Re: Is Richard Snowden a heroe or a criminal?
« Reply #166 on: July 13, 2013, 05:37:56 am »

And I suppose you never found yourself in a situation similar to Snowden did where what you were seeing at work was morally wrong and not at all in accordance with American values or the constitution, did you?


American values is a spoiler to the argument. Values should be wider than that in order to mean very much. If you are willing to balance your right and wrongs upon such a narrow beam, then you have to give equal value to advocates of Sharia Laws too. Do you imagine them to be a tiny, insignificant minority?

Anyway, regarding you original question above: I have no idea what Snowden actually saw, invented, imagined or whatever; what I do know is that every walk of life, business experiences included, are always anything but perfectly balanced on that beautiful beam of rightness to which I alluded a moment ago. Life is always flawed, as is every aspect of living it. Some 'flaws' are based on personal greed, some on other character failures and many are simply based on what has to be done to prevent things deteriorating even more rapidly than they always seem to do.

America intervention... well, Clinton and Kennedy and now O'Bama (visual verbal joke) think they magicked Ireland out of chaos. Did Belfast news reach the States today? Pour all the money you like into something - willing hands will always accept it gratefully - but basically, old hatreds and ignorances never die out. It's the fabric of the structures. It's the only game in town. It's always been there, and not limited to that poor country, either.

Rob C

dreed

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Re: Is Richard Snowden a heroe or a criminal?
« Reply #167 on: July 13, 2013, 07:08:51 am »

Anyway, regarding you original question above: I have no idea what Snowden actually saw, invented, imagined or whatever; what I do know is that every walk of life, business experiences included, are always anything but perfectly balanced on that beautiful beam of rightness to which I alluded a moment ago. Life is always flawed, as is every aspect of living it. Some 'flaws' are based on personal greed, some on other character failures and many are simply based on what has to be done to prevent things deteriorating even more rapidly than they always seem to do.

And in this case, Snowden decided that enough was enough and that it was time for someone to do something; something had to be done to try and stop things deteriorating further.
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RSL

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Re: Is Richard Snowden a heroe or a criminal?
« Reply #168 on: July 13, 2013, 10:22:47 am »

And you know this for sure because...? With that sort of response, you make it sound like you know something that the rest of us don't about this.

You'd know it too if you'd read the rest of the WSJ regularly.
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Rob C

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Re: Is Richard Snowden a heroe or a criminal?
« Reply #169 on: July 13, 2013, 10:24:52 am »

And in this case, Snowden decided that enough was enough and that it was time for someone to do something; something had to be done to try and stop things deteriorating further.


But at the cost of making them worse?

Rob C

Slobodan Blagojevic

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Re: Is Richard Snowden a heroe or a criminal?
« Reply #170 on: July 13, 2013, 01:07:52 pm »

Little something making rounds on the Internet:

BernardLanguillier

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Re: Is Richard Snowden a heroe or a criminal?
« Reply #171 on: July 13, 2013, 04:33:09 pm »

Little something making rounds on the Internet:

http://www.quora.com/NSA-PRISM-Scandal-June-2013/What-are-the-best-jokes-about-the-NSAs-PRISM-project-and-its-collection-of-Verizon-phone-records

Now, the funniest part is that they are all about Obama having done it, as if he had something to say!  ;D

Cheers,
Bernard
« Last Edit: July 13, 2013, 04:36:42 pm by BernardLanguillier »
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dreed

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Re: Is Richard Snowden a heroe or a criminal?
« Reply #172 on: July 13, 2013, 08:23:43 pm »

But at the cost of making them worse?

Exactly how has Snowden made anything worse?
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dreed

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Re: Is Richard Snowden a heroe or a criminal?
« Reply #173 on: July 13, 2013, 08:29:04 pm »

You'd know it too if you'd read the rest of the WSJ regularly.

Well if your source is the WSJ then why don't you post some links that back up:

In a way it's an unfortunate article because Randy's dead wrong about the constitutionality of what the NSA's doing when it analyzes communications traffic.

I'd be interested to read something that went through the details of the issue and explained how what the NSA is doing is constitutional. So far none of the columns or stories that I've read have said that.
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RSL

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Re: Is Richard Snowden a heroe or a criminal?
« Reply #174 on: July 13, 2013, 09:14:47 pm »

Sorry, Dreed. I have other things to do than teach you what you ought to know. The question about communications traffic analysis goes all the way back at least to WW II, and it's always been found constitutional. Under the Constitution the President's first duty is not to get more people onto food stamps or to review citizens' financial transactions with something like the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau; it's to defend the United States. He has huge latitude to do that job.
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Rob C

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Re: Is Richard Snowden a heroe or a criminal?
« Reply #175 on: July 14, 2013, 05:04:45 am »

Exactly how has Snowden made anything worse?


In exactly the same way as anyone else who discloses state security measures. He arms the very people that the state is trying to keep under control before they kill the rest of us.

But then, that becomes another of those silly student arguments: defending the right to life v. the imaginary rights of those who seek to take it.

But I don't hope to convince you or any of the rest of those who think that 'rights' at all costs is the way to go. It's just another manifestation of the endless bullshit we have in Britain about the 'human rights' of terrorists, illegal immigrants, criminals already in prison - the list is endless and bleeding hearts have been with us all my life. I don't expect that to change.

Rob C

BernardLanguillier

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Re: Is Richard Snowden a heroe or a criminal?
« Reply #176 on: July 14, 2013, 05:39:44 am »

He arms the very people that the state is trying to keep under control before they kill the rest of us.

Rob,

You do not think for a second that the KGB first started by defending its approach by focusing on the need to defeat the ennemies of Russia?

You do not think that, in 1953, there was a guy called RobovitchC who was defending them out of fear that their claims of terrorist threat was true?

The commonality is the effectiveness of the strategy of fear to motivate the citizens to support measures authorizing non democratically elected bodies to run their lives.

Cheers,
Bernard

Bart_van_der_Wolf

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Re: Is Richard Snowden a heroe or a criminal?
« Reply #177 on: July 14, 2013, 06:50:58 am »

He arms the very people that the state is trying to keep under control ...

That also includes the citizens of that state, doesn't it. Besides, the so-called enemies of the state already knew that all communications can be monitored.

Cheers,
Bart
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dreed

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Re: Is Richard Snowden a heroe or a criminal?
« Reply #178 on: July 14, 2013, 07:32:08 am »

Sorry, Dreed. I have other things to do than teach you what you ought to know. The question about communications traffic analysis goes all the way back at least to WW II, and it's always been found constitutional.

Thank you for underscoring the point that there is no substance to your assertion that what the NSA is/was doing today is ok.

Your inability to back up your claims of their actions being "ok" with evidence renders them invalid.

Please return to the debate when you have something of substance to provide rather than finger pointing.

So we're back facing a situation where the NSA is quite clearly operating in a manner that finds some of its actions unconstitutional.
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dreed

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Re: Is Richard Snowden a heroe or a criminal?
« Reply #179 on: July 14, 2013, 07:48:40 am »

Exactly how has Snowden made anything worse?

In exactly the same way as anyone else who discloses state security measures. He arms the very people that the state is trying to keep under control before they kill the rest of us.

He arms who? The terrorists? With what? Knowledge that they need to keep using encryption because the NSA might be listening? Because that's about the sum position thus far.

Snowden hasn't revealed how the US army operates or anything like that.

All that Snowden has done is given those that had reason to suspect that the USA was bugging everyone confirmation that they actually are doing it.

For some people, that confirmation is proving to be a very confronting piece of evidence to swallow because they don't want to believe that their government is doing something wrong - for these people he has made life worse for them because it is now harder to deny that the US government is operating under questionable legal basis.

If you seriously believe that the NSA has done nothing wrong then please, take the blue pill and continue to live your life in denial. If on the other hand you're prepared to wake up and seriously consider what Snowden has to offer then I'd like to offer you the red pill.

The choice is yours.
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