Edward Snowden was a BOB

[Despanan]

[dexeron]

[Despanan]

And hey, by that logic, if the US Government wasn't doing anything wrong, then it has nothing to fear from the Data Snowden releases.

Just sayin'...

[Phantomgrift]

Except both of you are wrong.

In Dex's case, you're wrong because this is not a classic case of "Only those with something to hide have to worry". Seriously, the only way those triggers activate to call for increased investigation is if certain specific profiles and key phrases are noted and deemed a potential issue. So no, it's not just another argument of "the only people who need to worry about privacy are people with something to hide".

If you're not actively singing the praises of Al Qaeda and sending emails to known collaborators of the Taliban, then you're not even going to register on the program.

Likewise, "by that logic" doesn't dismiss Snowden either.
What he's released and what he claims to still have significantly threatens to undermine how we fight terrorists to begin with. It goes beyond a simple "Oh, he told everyone the NSA data-mines!". Some of the stuff he's released and is suspected of holding onto would be the same as someone during World War II sending a detailed document to the Germans saying "This shit is about to go down in Normandy and you don't even suspect it!" or outlining what specifics are needed to defeat modern armor or exploit vehicle weaknesses.

Again, I know you guys don't usually care about stuff like that, but mostly because to you the military is simply another over-inflated corporation of evil that America apparently has no reason for anymore.

And Desp, would your "prison" bit correlate at all to the fact that the 1980's were one of the most singularly crime-ridden decades in American History?

[Rip]

The Russians defeated the Nazis by being right bastards, destroying their own countryside, and leaning heavily on Baba Yaga's Deathly Winter spell. This is irrelevant to the conversation about them spying on their own people, but hey, they also spied on their own people. Let's just discard that entire topic now shall we.

What Edward Snowden threatens to do is expose a vast number of America's defense secrets. Secrets that actually defend Americans. I'm an American. Sure, we're friends with England right now. Sure, we're friends with a lot of countries, right now. But then this chap comes along and says "here's how America does EVERYthing they do." Who wouldn't take this opportunity? Someone stupid, that's who. I don't care about America's stupid enemies. I care about when Catherine's bratspawn ascends the throne with a red hot stick up his arse to take back the colonies and prove the throne still has a pair of balls underneath it and he says oh whoopsiedoodle I know how your entire system works foo'. Okay, maybe that doesn't happen. Maybe some other fucker just sells it to some hardluck fucker for coke money, and that hardluck fucker sells it to some white-bread country fuck who hates Obama and Socialist 'Murica, so HE sells it to some Mexican drug cartel guy who he gets his green from and that guy sells it to a guy he knows in Bolivia who sells it to his friend Jamal only Jamal is actually Horace Greenwood, CIA Motherfucker, get the fuck down, but the Bolivian already knew that and has set a trap for Agent Greenwood, and BAM, Edward Snowden just committed fucking murder.

On the other hand, Griswold v. Connecticut, 381 U.S. 479 (1965) guarantees a right to privacy. While Snowden's murderings is collateral damage, his main intent seems to be (and seems to have always been) to expose how private we are NOT allowed to be. The issue here is that now, one man and one man alone has all the power, and may not know exactly how much damage he can do to parts of life/the planet that didn't affect or concern him (until [hopefully] now). Is that groovy?

So, would Cap hunt the guy down, have a heart to heart about what this country used to stand for, and then run off to become Nomad again? Or punch his ass out and say that your one-man crusade isn't worth the lives of 320 million free-breathing American patriots? Or shrug, and just be glad Ultron is showing up for the Avengers sequel and the money is going to explode in his fucking face with flowers somehow composed of even MORE money, and he'll orgasm because he's the modern incarnation of capitalism..? So many possibilities

[dexeron]

See, I'm not singing Snowden's praises. Some of what he revealed is shenanegans that ought to have come out. That doesn't excuse him from legal responsibility for revealing them, nor does it excuse other information he might have taken/revealed/will reveal.

But again, I don't believe a word Phant says with regards to who is and is not under surveillence. I don't care what job he claims to have. He doesn't work for the NSA, so he does not know. All he does is sing his pollyanna refrain about how it's supposed to work, the failure of which was the whole point of those Snowden revelations that have everyone so pissed off.

[Phantomgrift]

Wow Dex.
You are stupid.

Right. Gotcha. I forgot this is the internet and everyone is viewed with automatic suspicion and/or dismissal unless they agree 100% with your own opinion.

I'll just be over hear and doing my job, ya know, working intel and knowing how this shit works. All pollyanna singing and dancing and pie-in-the-sky bullshit, because ten years of doing this job obviously wouldn't mean I know a fuckton more about it than you do.

You're an idiot Dex.

[Despanan]

[Phantomgrift]

Gee, Desp, I thought it was the FBI that was grilling Occupy, not the NSA? And the reason that happened Desp?
Occupy attracted the types that are attracted to things like the Animal Liberation Front and the Earth Liberation Front. The two groups listed by the FBI as the largest singular domestic terrorist organization in the United States.

"Dex is spot-on" is your base opinion.
You have no facts, no information, just speculative tidbits you've pieced together from appropriately biased sources.
I've worked in the Intel community for the last ten years. You'd think I'd pick up something here and there from my job. I mean, unlike Snowden, I'm not going to directly say what I've seen, because that would violate everything I've worked for over the last ten years.

Hoo boy! COINTELPRO! Something we still use today. Granted, you've highlighted the description of the historical aspect of it. I mean, we used to have Jim Crow laws and the "House of UnAmerican Activities" as well. So obviously, old-shit is still relevant because, wait, it's not, history changes, time changes, society changes, everything changes.

So toss around your "polyanna apologia" all you want. It's not going to magically make me roll over and see the glorious socialist light of anarchistic revelation anymore than me calling you a hippie dickwad is going to make you roll over and see how much of a pretentious git you are.

[dexeron]