[Mini News] Snowden now on Twitter: first follow.... Guess who.

[Guest]

Edward Snowden has joined Twitter, with his opening tweet as ""Can you hear me now?" Take a long hard guess at who his first follow was? Nope, not Katy Perry. The US National Security Agency.

 

Labelling himself as 'working for the public', he now has over 370,000 followers within a few hours of opening his account - Twitter was quick off the mark to verify his account too. 

 

Jokingly, he tweeted about the discovery of water on Mars: 

 

 

Is Snowden using this as another means to show fellow citizens that he is "just a citizen with a voice", and not a traitor, or does he just want some norm back in his life? 

 

 

Source: https://twitter.com/Snowden

 

UPDATE: ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 

Snowden stating that 60Minutes, according to gov documents, planted government questions in a Wikileaks interview: 

 

 

46Gigs of notification emails... 

 

[PlayStation 2]

I should create a Twitter account that raises a bunch of suspicion because the NSA is filled with fucking hacks

[Wano97]

Who considered Snowden as a traitor besides the government?

[Ekpyrosis]

I'm sure following him puts you on some kind of list, like visiting www.torproject.org does.

[Guest]

LOL he's only following the NSA

I don't at all consider him a traitor; In fact a patriot, if not a hero 

[Guest]

Who considered Snowden as a traitor besides the government?

 

There's plenty of people who consider him a traitor, and are happy with what the government's intelligence agencies are doing and think it's necessary for 'security' (or just don't understand the scale of their secret programmes); as a result he 'compromised their national security' and is a traitor. Though, there's plenty who admire him. 

 

 

I'm sure following him puts you on some kind of list, like visiting www.torproject.org does.

 

What doesn't put you on a watch list these days?

[beach_boy98]

I thought you meant the mountain to begin with lol.

[TroubleKlef]

Looks like I gotta leak confidential government documents in order to get verified on twitter.

[roastduck]

 

I don't at all consider him a traitor; In fact a patriot, if not a hero 

Do I respect the guy for speaking out? Eh. Electronic surveillance has always been the NSA's job. I can respect him for having issues with the scope of the surveillance, because due process is a thing. That respect doesn't mean I think he's immune to charges, though. Dude broke the law.

[WereCat]

Looks like I gotta leak confidential government documents in order to get verified on twitter.

Sounds easy enough.

[Guest]

Do I respect the guy for speaking out? Eh. Electronic surveillance has always been the NSA's job. I can respect him for having issues with the scope of the surveillance, because due process is a thing. That respect doesn't mean I think he's immune to charges, though. Dude broke the law.

 

Interesting. 

 

So, in your eyes, the morals behind what he did - and the scale of what the government's intelligence agencies are doing - doesn't change whether he should or shouldn't be charged for what he leaked/exposed? Going on that basis, we'll never be in control or free, right?

[roastduck]

 

Interesting. 

 

So, in your eyes, the morals behind what he did - and the scale of what the government's intelligence agencies are doing - doesn't change whether he should or shouldn't be charged for what he leaked/exposed? In that sense, we'll never be in control or free, right?

 

Do I think some laws are unjust and should be changed/repealed? Yes. Until they are, though, we still have to abide by them.

I think the speed limit on the road to my house should be 55 instead of 45, but I'd still have to pay the ticket if I get pulled over for speeding. The same DEFINITELY applies to revealing state secrets. His leak sparked a debate about privacy that I think is necessary, but he should still face trial. That trial could be the reason a lot of legislation gets struck down, but we'll never know as long as he remains in exile.

[Trik'Stari]

Who considered Snowden as a traitor besides the government?

 

Do I think some laws are unjust and should be changed/repealed? Yes. Until they are, though, we still have to abide by them.

I think the speed limit on the road to my house should be 55 instead of 45, but I'd still have to pay the ticket if I get pulled over for speeding. The same DEFINITELY applies to revealing state secrets. His leak sparked a debate about privacy that I think is necessary, but he should still face trial. That trial could be the reason a lot of legislation gets struck down, but we'll never know as long as he remains in exile.

 

Just because something is the law, doesn't make it right, and doesn't mean that everyone should follow it. Adhering to the rules because "those are the rules" is one of the things that leads to disaster and horrific things. If most of society decides not to follow a law because it's immoral or egregious, then guess what? The law is wrong.

 

It's called Civil Disobedience.

[Guest]

Do I think some laws are unjust and should be changed/repealed? Yes. Until they are, though, we still have to abide by them.

I think the speed limit on the road to my house should be 55 instead of 45, but I'd still have to pay the ticket if I get pulled over for speeding. The same DEFINITELY applies to revealing state secrets. His leak sparked a debate about privacy that I think is necessary, but he should still face trial. That trial could be the reason a lot of legislation gets struck down, but we'll never know as long as he remains in exile.

 

Fair point. 

 

So, would I be right in assuming you think that if he was going to leak classified information, then he should have been willing to face the consequences? Or do you think he was just wrong for actually leaking the information...? 

[Guest]

Do I respect the guy for speaking out? Eh. Electronic surveillance has always been the NSA's job. I can respect him for having issues with the scope of the surveillance, because due process is a thing. That respect doesn't mean I think he's immune to charges, though. Dude broke the law.

He did break the law, yes I agree with that

but the laws he broke where stupid.

Yes he did leak government info but as soon as its been some 9 years till his charges are dropped and nulled & the U.S still goes after him

then I'm going to have a problem

[roastduck]

Fair point. 

 

So, would I be right in assuming you think that if he was going to leak classified information, then he should have been willing to face the consequences? Or do you think he was just wrong for actually leaking the information...?

Yes. If he was prepared to leak it, he should have been prepared to have charges filed against him, and been prepared to face them.

 

He did break the law, yes I agree with that

but the laws he broke where stupid.

Yes he did leak government info but as soon as its been some 9 years till his charges are dropped and nulled & the U.S still goes after him

then I'm going to have a problem

There's a process for getting those laws changed, though. Part of that process is the judicial system.

Just because something is the law, doesn't make it right, and doesn't mean that everyone should follow it. Adhering to the rules because "those are the rules" is one of the things that leads to disaster and horrific things. If most of society decides not to follow a law because it's immoral or egregious, then guess what? The law is wrong.

 

It's called Civil Disobedience.

And until the law is changed, practitioners of civil disobedience are breaking the law and subject to the consequences that accompany that. Civil rights activists still got arrested regularly, up until the point where their actions were no longer illegal.

[Zah]

As always, everyone goes "Black and White" with Snowden.  Yes, he technically broke the law, but there are laws which protect whistleblowers as well (I think), which he is one of.  I admire him because he got this message out, but I disagree with him giving it to all the journalists, because a lot of them failed to redact EXTREMELY SENSITIVE information.  Snowden is competent, the people he gave the documents to aren't.

[roastduck]

As always, everyone goes "Black and White" with Snowden.  Yes, he technically broke the law, but there are laws which protect whistleblowers as well (I think), which he is one of.  I admire him because he got this message out, but I disagree with him giving it to all the journalists, because a lot of them failed to redact EXTREMELY SENSITIVE information.  Snowden is competent, the people he gave the documents to aren't.

There are laws to protect corporate whistleblowers, but I'm pretty sure those laws don't extend to employees of US government intelligence agencies. There's a lot of paperwork and NDAs involved in getting security clearance.

[dfsdfgfkjsefoiqzemnd]

Do I respect the guy for speaking out? Eh. Electronic surveillance has always been the NSA's job. I can respect him for having issues with the scope of the surveillance, because due process is a thing. That respect doesn't mean I think he's immune to charges, though. Dude broke the law.

 

Snowden, like any other government official, swore an oath.  Not to the president or the government, but to uphold the constitution.  That last bit is exactly what he did. 

He found unconstitutional programs (even the supreme court labeled them as unconstitutional once they were revealed and reviewed, so there's no discussing that part) and couldn't report them because the corruption ran all the way up to the president. 

At that point he could either shut up and betray his oath like so many others or reveal the info. 

[ACatWithThumbs]

------.-.

[roastduck]

Snowden, like any other government official, swore to uphold the constitution and that's exactly what he did. 

He found unconstitutional programs (even the supreme court labeled them as unconstitutional once they were revealed and reviewed, so there's no discussing that part) and couldn't report them because the corruption ran all the way up to the president. 

At that point he could either shut up and betray his oath like so many others or stick to his oath reveal the info.

The legal issue doesn't lie in the surveillance program itself. It lies in his breaches of oath and contract. You think the just give security clearance to anyone who asks for it? It;s one thing to blow the whistle on a program, but he actually released intelligence info. I think he should at LEAST face trial for that. As to whether or not I think he should be convicted? I have no opinion.

[Suika]

Who considered Snowden as a traitor besides the government?

There are actually a small portion of Americans that believe Snowden to be a traitor to his country, almost purely on the basis that Uncle Sam said so.

 

On that very note, the average American is ignorant. Source: I'm American.

[Real_PhillBert]

*Ron Paul Snip*

 

 

Just because something is the law, doesn't make it right, and doesn't mean that everyone should follow it. Adhering to the rules because "those are the rules" is one of the things that leads to disaster and horrific things. If most of society decides not to follow a law because it's immoral or egregious, then guess what? The law is wrong.

 

It's called Civil Disobedience.

 

This post...

 

If I could "Like" it more than once, I would. Remind me to buy you a beer if we ever happen to meet.

 

 

And until the law is changed, practitioners of civil disobedience are breaking the law and subject to the consequences that accompany that. Civil rights activists still got arrested regularly, up until the point where their actions were no longer illegal.

 

Out of curiosity, are you familiar with jury nullification? And if so, what are your thoughts?

 

There are built in safe guards in our criminal legal system that are there for exactly this type of moral objections. The issue is that the US government does not want to try him in criminal court; they want to try him in a military trial where the rules are very different. 

[spartaman64]

Who considered Snowden as a traitor besides the government?

some extremely right winged and islamophobic republicans who think the NSA is the only thing keeping us safe from terrorists and ive seen them 

[Fetzie]

 

Interesting. 

 

So, in your eyes, the morals behind what he did - and the scale of what the government's intelligence agencies are doing - doesn't change whether he should or shouldn't be charged for what he leaked/exposed? Going on that basis, we'll never be in control or free, right?

 

 

He undoubtedly broke the law (whatever the Americans call their "Official Secrets Act") when he took the documents away from his place of work. He intended to use them to show the US population (and thus by proxy the world) what the NSA and the other national secret intelligence agencies (GCHQ, BND etc) were doing, which counts as whistle-blowing (because it gave citizens legal standing to take the government to court over it; before they didn't have legal standing because they couldn't KNOW what they were actually accusing the government of doing, and that it affected them).