Le'affaire Snowden; here's the real problem.

[Cleita]

We have out-sourced and turned our government and our military over to the private sector for their profit and enrichment. If the military had been run and operated by the military and our CIA and other spying agencies kept within the government, there would not have been these so-called security leak problems as they are today. Sure there have been leaks in the past that were severely dealt with. The Rosenbergs selling the secrets of the atom bomb to Soviet Russia comes to mind, but what is left of our government and military today, in the twenty-first century that is still in the realm of civil service, has been corrupted to practically uselessness. Anybody, it seems, can get a security clearance that the civilian contractors deem necessary. While we blame Edward Snowden for leaking information, he probably shouldn't have, why aren't we pointing fingers at the real culprits? Those culprits are the ones who put Snowden in that position to be able to do so.

[DURHAM D]

1. Agree.

Privatizing of government services is the real issue. That is the conversation we should be having. The rest of this is just noise.

[orpupilofnature57]

2. Privatizing everything is their ( TPTB ) goal .

I want surveillance on the people that mean to infiltrate our system for the purpose of spreading of Fascism, who'd be on that list ?

[iemitsu]

3. The idea that Americans bought privatization, as a means to get

better products or services at less expense, demonstrates just how bad we are at math.
Anyone with any sense can tell you it costs more to pay private industry, which wants to make a profit, than it costs to maintain a public work force.
100 years ago trained civil servants replaced corrupt, spoils system, contractors, who were profiting at the expense of the public.
That we are having to go through this again demonstrates just how bad we are at history.

[xiamiam]

4. obscene that carlyle group is profitting from surveillance because of the war on terror

its just so blatant in your face that I cant take anyone seriously who thinks that profit and war and national security should go hand in hand

[frazzled]

5. Manning was fully inside the military

It didn't make much difference there (except that the legal process will follow the Military Code of Justice rather than civilian law). I'm not sure who gave Manning his clearance.

It may not even be a question of the proper clearance in Snowden's case: we don't know if he was cleared for access to all these documents or whether he simply was able to hack them. I suspect largely the latter. What is clear is that he took that job in Hawaii specifically to get this stuff, and he had a quick getaway plan. He was there only a few months. That adds up to being a spy, imo. (You don't have to be paid by another entity in order to be a spy, btw.)

[randome]

6. I don't think he's half as good with computers as he claims.

If he has 4 laptops of documents as he claims, and he and Greenwald spoke before he started at the NSA, then it's clear to me this was planned espionage from the start.

Snowden didn't have the time to "see things" (whatever that means), as he claimed.

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[Cleita]

7. But he exposed what contractors were doing that our military was trying to cover up. n/t

[Warpy]

8. I've been trying to point this out from the beginning:

corporations charged with this stuff have no public oversight, at all. This is dead wrong and wide open to abuse.

Snowden will likely be hunted down and pilloried for exposing and embarrassing a great many bureaucrats.

However, we owe him our gratitude for ripping the lid off this stuff and allowing us to look within.

[Cleita]

9. This is why I don't think our PTB should be so anxious to hunt him down, and bring him to

justice for treason. He opened Pandora's box and if they aren't careful as to whom they charge, torture, and prosecute about this, they may find themselves being investigated and brought to justice as well. It will be interesting to see how it plays out.

[malaise]

10. Precisely

100% correct - I've been saying this from day one.

[truedelphi]

11. My understanding of the Fourth and The First Amendments indicates

To me, anyway, that Snowden did something patriotic.

People had tried to take the entire matter to court - but then were told they were informed by the court that they had no standing to do so, as there was no direct indication that any one individual had been spied on. Now that we know we have all been spied on, taking it to court finally became possible. The ACLU did that just last week!

[Cleita]

13. The problem seems to be that he was under some kind of oath and therefore committed treason.

However, there is something murky here. There was the outsourced contractor that hired him and another company that cleared him for a security clearance also outsourced. I think if he ever comes to trial a good lawyer might be able to point out that there was not an oath taken in the sense that would lead to espionage charges because of the way he was vetted and cleared. I think our Justice Dept. needs to research this a lot better or they might find themselves with egg on their faces.

I agree though, that this opens up a whole new approach to suing our country for civil rights violations, especially when it comes to our Fourth Amendment rights.

[MrScorpio]

12. Some of us are trying hard to get those points across...

However, panic is sooo sexy.

[A Simple Game]

14. How foolish of me, I thought that the real culprit was the

government that was spying on its citizens.

Oh well, can't be right all the time.

[Cleita]

17. Of course it is, but it's also about the selling of our government so private

companies can profit from spying on its citizens. Snowden is the boogeyman because both our government and the company who hired him screwed up and are trying to divert the blame. My point is go after those really responsible not the low level employee.

[A Simple Game]

19. I don't understand this part.

Snowden is the boogeyman because both our government and the company who hired him screwed up and are trying to divert the blame.

How are they trying to divert the blame? They don't seem to be denying any of the accusations.

There do seem to be many trying to shoot the messenger though.

[KoKo]

15. THANK YOU...Focusing Attention on the "Private Contractors!"

And, I truly believe that's the Message from SNOWDON... THEY HIRED ME!

And there are THOUSAND MORE LIKE ME they are HIRING!

It's getting lost in the Political Storm and the MIC storm to SHUT HIM UP!

[WillyT]

16. K & R !!!

[pnwmom]

18. Snowden's a real culprit -- and so, you are correct to point out, are the people who put him

in the position to do this.

I shudder to think how many more Snowden's there might be out there.

[davidpdx]

20. The contracting of these services should be talked about more

I oppose any privatization of these services. We need to be doing better background checks to know who has access to the information that is important.