dagblog - Comments for "After 30 Years of Silence, the Original NSA Whistleblower Looks Back"

An example bearing on my last

A Guy Called LULU — Thu, 14 Nov 2013 18:09:07 +0000

In reply to On the issue of staying or

An example bearing on my last paragraph is here:

http://www.opednews.com/articles/The-Two-Snowdens-by-Philip-Giraldi-Inte...
Philip Giraldi divides Snowden's actions into good and bad. The good were revelations of domestic spying and the bad , according to Giraldi, are the revelations of the extent of international spying. Then, after he makes his dissertation he concludes that both the good and the bad are illegal, which is technically correct, and he suggests, through what I would bet is a concocted anecdote, what Snowden's proper path should have been after he blew the whistle as he did.

When one of my former colleagues was asked what he would have done if he had been Snowden he replied that he would have collected everything he could on illegal domestic spying, would have passed it to a highly trusted international journalist or lawyer with good access to place the material, and then would have proceeded directly to Washington to sit on the steps of the Supreme Court with a sign around his neck while he waited to be arrested. [My emphasis]

Sure he would. Bet on it if you believe it.
His former colleague, who is probably invented so as to allow Gibraldi to hint at what he wants to claim he would do himself, is one self-admiring, self-promoting braggart and probably one who would reconsider his words [Like most people, myself included, would probably do] if the opportunity presented itself to make a self-sacrificing stand for the greater good when the alternative is a safe, comfortable, trouble free life.

Because he did not wish to face the consequences of his action while much of the stolen material is background noise unsupportive of his central thesis regarding domestic spying, it is indisputable that Snowden willfully violated the Espionage Act in stealing information that he had sworn to protect and has to be regarded as a criminal even if his intentions were good. That is true whether one supports him or not and whether or not he provided a genuine service by revealing the NSA spying. [My emphasis]

What a cowardly wimp, that Snowden guy. Even for the good part of his actions, as Giraldi sees it, Snowden should go to jail, probably for many years. I disagree. But I guess that has been clear for a while.

Just wanted to put this

A Guy Called LULU — Wed, 13 Nov 2013 22:14:10 +0000

In reply to After 30 Years of Silence, the Original NSA Whistleblower Looks Back

Just wanted to put this somewhere relating to snooping. I got it from a post by Corey Robin. It is a campaign poster from 1929.

With the exception of

A Guy Called LULU — Wed, 13 Nov 2013 21:14:37 +0000

In reply to On the issue of staying or

With the exception of Ellsberg I hadn't noticed that, but I am glad to hear it.

On the issue of staying or

Donal — Wed, 13 Nov 2013 20:00:13 +0000

In reply to I'm glad you posted this

On the issue of staying or escaping, most of the prominent whistleblowers - Ellsberg, Drake, Klein, Wiebe - disagree with Fellwock.

I'm glad you posted this

A Guy Called LULU — Wed, 13 Nov 2013 19:15:56 +0000

In reply to After 30 Years of Silence, the Original NSA Whistleblower Looks Back

I'm glad you posted this because I am glad I read it. There is nothing revealed in it that would cause me to criticize Fellwock in any way. I admire him as he is described in this piece and I relate to and understand his feelings and thus his reasons for what he did.

One of Fellwock’s main targets in Vietnam was a particularly threatening North Vietnamese Army brigade. Using the NSA radio data, he helped prepare a map of the brigade’s travel patterns. That map guided an enormous B-52 bombing raid: One sortie per hour for 36 hours, lacing the area with 30 tons of explosives each time, according to Fellwock.

A few weeks later, he flew to the area and inspected first-hand the devastation he'd helped inflict. ... ... “I’d never seen so many bodies,” he said. It was a horrible sight and I knew I’d participated in it.

I do take issue with his current stand on Snowden's actions as posted in your introductory paragraph.

“I think Snowden is a patriot,” he said. “I admire Snowden and some of these other whistleblowers because they’ve come out in a time when there’s not a lot of political support.”

However, as someone who stayed in the United States after his own whistleblowing, he believes Snowden made a miscalculation by fleeing the country. “I think he should have stayed here and faced the consequences," he said. "I understand his fear, but I really think it was a mistake on his part.” [My emphasis]

Immediately before this is the statement that:

Today Fellwock doesn’t follow politics or the news. The last time he voted for president was in 1972, for George McGovern.

When I first called him, he had been only vaguely aware of Snowden’s disclosures. But as he read more, he said, he'd learned how little had changed since 1976. [Agai, my emphasis]

Not following the news might be an excuse for not knowing the treatment of recent whistle blowers including the financial ruin of some, the imprisonment of some, and the Presidentially condoned public torture of Bradley Manning that went on for months before he was convicted of anything. That is very different from Fellwock's situation and his probable evaluation of the risk of leaking as he must have seen it.

Before publishing, Ramparts had consulted with the lawyer for Daniel Ellsberg, the leaker of the Pentagon Papers. Ellsberg's lawyer told them that the government wouldn’t risk exposing more secrets by publicly going after them for the article. He was right.

I note this because I very much disagree with the notion often put forth that a person committing and act of civil disobedience such as did Manning and Snowden are somehow demeaned and shown to be less credible, or their actions proven to be less defensible, by the fact that they did not voluntarily lay down on a cross after their "crime" so that the government could nail them. They knew the risk they were taking and they chose to take it for what I see as admirable reasons. That was their act of courage and it is not devalued, IMO, by their not volunteering to be a martyr to the cause. The obvious analogy in Manning's case is that a soldiers courage is demonstrated by his actions and judging his actions courageous does not require that they lead to his injury or death.