Ed Edward Snowden - Whistleblower or Criminal?

[Jango]

He's a criminal by what's on the books now so far as law goes because he blew the whistle outside and did not keep it an internal manner.

 

[magellan]

He's a criminal by what's on the books now so far as law goes because he blew the whistle outside and did not keep it an internal manner.

Now that is a really funny definition of whistle blowing!
Let's pick a random dictionary and see how they define the term.

http://www.thefreedictionary.com/whistleblower

One who reveals wrongdoing within an organization to the public or to those in positions of authority

"Those in position of authority" doesn't necessarily mean internal either btw.
This court ruling says those who acted criminally where the NSA. With snowden you are supposed to presume he is innocent until proven guilty in court.

 

[Jango]

Now that is a really funny definition of whistle blowing!
Let's pick a random dictionary and see how they define the term.

http://www.thefreedictionary.com/whistleblower


"Those in position of authority" doesn't necessarily mean internal either btw.
This court ruling says those who acted criminally where the NSA. With snowden you are supposed to presume he is innocent until proven guilty in court.

1. Chain of Command. He went outside of it (after going to it and nothing being done).

2. He has admitted to leaking the information.

3. I am glad that he did, although to be honest, the post-leak stage has had nothing positive come about it for all of the involved parties: the American people, Snowden himself, the administration or the security services.

4. Americans lost the war against being spied upon or surveilled unconstitutionally many generations ago. The Snowden leaks, like all of those before them, exposed the built-in hypocrisy that has developed in large U.S. bureaucracies, such as how the professional discussions start at 'I'm Shocked That The Government Would Spy On Us This Much' to 'The Leaker Is The Worst Human Being That Has Ever Lived!'

5. We should not expect Progress if the professionals responsible for it are not serious about actually changing the system, like you know, realigning itself to the U.S. Constitution.

6. That won't happen because the National Security Apparatus has too much of a hold over the country, which was ironically cautioned against by President Eisenhower -- the military-industrial complex.

 

[cullennz]

Dude is a crim. The weird bit is people were surprised about meta data gathering etc.

Spying on other nations

what did you think they did?

Searching emails for the word bomb doesn't really worry me

 

[BenBurch]

Dude is a crim. The weird bit is people were surprised about meta data gathering etc.

Spying on other nations

what did you think they did?

Searching emails for the word bomb doesn't really worry me

That's a thing that I wonder about too. We all were discussing this sort of data collection on usenet way back in the 80s. To not have assumed that this went forward with new technology in the 30 years since would have been, to me, a startling lacunae.

 

[bit_pattern]

Dude is a crim. The weird bit is people were surprised about meta data gathering etc.

Spying on other nations
what did you think they did?

Searching emails for the word bomb doesn't really worry me

That's actually not the problem here. The issue is the mass internal surveillance of US citizens, which has recently been found illegal by US courts

http://www.forbes.com/sites/rexsant...of-phone-data-is-illegal-appeals-court-rules/

That's a thing that I wonder about too. We all were discussing this sort of data collection on usenet way back in the 80s. To not have assumed that this went forward with new technology in the 30 years since would have been, to me, a startling lacunae.

Foreseeing something doesn't make it any less illegal. The revelations have been quite startling to many others.

And, regarding the thread title, whether the actions of Snowden were illegal or not doesn't make him any less of a whistleblower, the two concepts are not mutually exclusive.

 

[bit_pattern]

Now that is a really funny definition of whistle blowing!
Let's pick a random dictionary and see how they define the term.

http://www.thefreedictionary.com/whistleblower


"Those in position of authority" doesn't necessarily mean internal either btw.
This court ruling says those who acted criminally where the NSA. With snowden you are supposed to presume he is innocent until proven guilty in court.

You can be a whistleblower AND be acting criminally by blowing said whistle. Not mutually exclusive concepts, I'm afraid. I think Snowden is a hero but lot's of heroes have broken the law, indeed it's almost a prerequisite in many instances.

 

[bit_pattern]

Well let's start with rule number one about being a man.

 

[Cl1mh4224rd]

Spying on other nations

In addition to bit_pattern's response, I'd say that if there was any surprise in this regard, it's about which countries we're spying on (allies). And the idea that this is part of some information-sharing scheme designed to get around each country's local restrictions against spying on their own citizens should be rather concerning in a broader sense.

Also, perhaps, some of the methods employed even against our "enemies". Nobody's really surprised, or particularly bothered, that we're spying on North Korea. But when some of the methods we use against them are similar to what we've condemned them for attempting to do to us, it just stinks of manipulation of the public.