Category Archives: Ethics

UPDATE II: ‘Thank You For Your Service, Mr. Snowden’

Barack Obama, Ethics, Fascism, Propaganda, Republicans, Russia, Technology, Terrorism, The State

“‘Thank You For Your Service, Mr. Snowden'” is the current column, now on WND. Here’s an excerpt:

“A heroic American whistleblower chooses, oh-so wisely, to expose Uncle Sam’s usurpations to the veteran reporters of the British Guardian and not to the partisan hacks of the American press. This fact tells you all you need to know about US presstitutes.

Confirmation of the degree to which American media has been co-opted by power came on June 10, again, via a British newspaper. The Mail Online divulged that Edward Snowden had ‘first approached the Washington Post with his leaks but the newspaper refused to comply with his publishing demands.’

You see, the Washington Post had to hotfoot it back to Big Brother Obama before it would do its journalistic due diligence. ‘The Post broke the story on PRISM two weeks later, on Thursday, after consulting with government officials,’ confirmed the Mail Online.

Even after being scooped by the Guardian, the Obama embeds at the Washington Post saw fit to inform their readers about PRISM on a purely need-to-know basis, ‘eprinting only four of the 41 PRISM PowerPoint slides,’ and generally misrepresenting the nature of the program known as PRISM. The manufactured-in-America version of PRISM thus contradicts the ‘internal NSA documents’ leaked to the Guardian.

According to the guardian of American freedoms at the Guardian, reporter Glenn Greenwald, the 41-slide PowerPoint presentation he acquired from Snowden has been authenticated as a document ‘used to train intelligence operatives on the capabilities of the program.’ The presentation, pictorials with captions, handed out by the National Security Agency, boasts of having ‘direct access to the systems of Google, Facebook, Apple, Yahoo, PalTalk, YouTube in 2010; Skype and AOL, and other servers.’

Contrary to what you’re being told, ‘the world’s largest surveillance organization’ can and does ‘obtain targeted communications without having to request them from the service providers and without having to obtain individual court orders.’ And it is contrary to the Bill of Rights, the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution, in particular. It specifies that ‘warrants shall issue’ only ‘upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.’

Tellingly, the tools of Big Media and big government are not apprising you of these facts. Like a tortoise in its shell they’ve retreated from the watersheds that are the AP, the IRS and the NSA scandals, informing you only of what New York and Northeast elites think is important: “Most of you still like Obama” …

The complete column is, “‘Thank You For Your Service, Mr. Snowden.'” Read it on WND.

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UPDATE I: In his unrehearsed conversation with Glenn Greenwald, Snowden demonstrates analytical clarity, the kind you don’t get from his inferior critics. It comes natural for him to distinguish between NSA posturing for the national interest and reality; between intelligence gathered overseas and domestically; between surveillance of the foreign born and the domestic.

Snowden’s desperation—defecting and leaking as a last resort—is corroborated by other whistleblowers. When you blow the whistle through acceptable NSA channels you can expect cover-ups, heavily redacted reports and retaliation. This is what two veteran intelligence officers relayed to Sean Hannity at Fox News.

UPDATE II: From the Facebook thread. Memorial Day is a way to ensure men die for the state, not for their neighbors. It wasn’t always so, but it has become that. It’s the sad truth. Good men serve their countrymen outside the state. For example, Samuel Williams is an American hero. The same goes for the wonderful JOE HORN.

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A Jarring Juxtaposition

Constitution, Ethics, Family, Individual Rights, libertarianism, Ron Paul

Economic Policy Journal juxtaposes Ron Paul and Rand Paul with resepct to what will, one day, be recognized as one of the defining issues of our time: EDWARD SNOWDEN’s whistleblowing bravery.

Ron Paul on Edward Snowden:

We should be thankful for individuals like Edward Snowden and Glenn Greenwald who see injustice being carried out by their own government and speak out, despite the risk.

Rand’s equivocation makes me miss Ron Paul even more. Read it at EPJ.

UPDATE II: The Kid Is Alright. Ditto The British Guardian (Which Exposed Indirectly Corrupt US Media)

Ethics, Government, Journalism, Justice, Media, Morality, Ron Paul, Technology, The State

People like Edward Snowden are the very people to whom we should say, “Thank you for your service.” Uncle Sam will destroy Edward Snowden, as it is destroying Julian Assange and Bradley Manning. Snowden knew it, yet he did what he did anyway.

Via The Guardian:

The individual responsible for one of the most significant leaks in US political history is Edward Snowden, a 29-year-old former technical assistant for the CIA and current employee of the defence contractor Booz Allen Hamilton. Snowden has been working at the National Security Agency for the last four years as an employee of various outside contractors, including Booz Allen and Dell.
The Guardian, after several days of interviews, is revealing his identity at his request. From the moment he decided to disclose numerous top-secret documents to the public, he was determined not to opt for the protection of anonymity. “I have no intention of hiding who I am because I know I have done nothing wrong,” he said.

The kid is more than alright. He’s a hero.

UPDATED: Corrupt US Media Usurped. An heroic American whistleblower chooses, oh-so wisely, to expose Uncle Sam’s usurpations to the veteran reporters of the British Guardian, and not to the partisan hacks of the American press: This tells you all you need to know about the state of US press and the entity (the state) to which it has sworn allegiance.

The best of Edward Snowden:

I could be rendered by the CIA. I could have people come after me. Or any of the third-party partners. They work closely with a number of other nations. Or they could pay off the Triads. Any of their agents or assets,” he said.

…”We have got a CIA station just up the road – the consulate here in Hong Kong – and I am sure they are going to be busy for the next week. And that is a concern I will live with for the rest of my life, however long that happens to be.”
Having watched the Obama administration prosecute whistleblowers at a historically unprecedented rate, he fully expects the US government to attempt to use all its weight to punish him. “I am not afraid,” he said calmly, “because this is the choice I’ve made.” …
… he learned just how all-consuming the NSA’s surveillance activities were, claiming “they are intent on making every conversation and every form of behaviour in the world known to them”.
…He described how he once viewed the internet as “the most important invention in all of human history”. As an adolescent, he spent days at a time “speaking to people with all sorts of views that I would never have encountered on my own”. …
…But he believed that the value of the internet, along with basic privacy, is being rapidly destroyed by ubiquitous surveillance. “I don’t see myself as a hero,” he said, “because what I’m doing is self-interested: I don’t want to live in a world where there’s no privacy and therefore no room for intellectual exploration and creativity.”
…Once he reached the conclusion that the NSA’s surveillance net would soon be irrevocable, he said it was just a matter of time before he chose to act. “What they’re doing” poses “an existential threat to democracy”, he said. …
…there still remains the question: why did he do it? Giving up his freedom and a privileged lifestyle? “There are more important things than money. If I were motivated by money, I could have sold these documents to any number of countries and gotten very rich.”
…For him, it is a matter of principle. “The government has granted itself power it is not entitled to. There is no public oversight. The result is people like myself have the latitude to go further than they are allowed to,” he said.

AND:

“Snowden said that he admires both Ellsberg and Manning, but argues that there is one important distinction between himself and the army private, whose trial coincidentally began the week Snowden’s leaks began to make news.
‘I carefully evaluated every single document I disclosed to ensure that each was legitimately in the public interest,’ he said. ‘There are all sorts of documents that would have made a big impact that I didn’t turn over, because harming people isn’t my goal. Transparency is.'”

He purposely chose, he said, to give the documents to journalists whose judgment he trusted about what should be public and what should remain concealed.

“I don’t want to live in a world where there’s no privacy and therefore no room for intellectual exploration and creativity.”

“The primary lesson from this experience was that ‘you can’t wait around for someone else to act. I had been looking for leaders, but I realised that leadership is about being the first to act.'”

UPDATE II: NO SURPRISE THERE; Edward Snowden had donated to libertarian Ron Paul.

Anti-Apartheid Does Not Mean Pro-Democracy

Democracy, Ethics, Etiquette, Individual Rights, Morality, South-Africa

Miguel write:

Mrs Mercer:

I purchased your book Into the Cannibal’s Pot and have just started reading it.

From your book and other sources on your website, I understand that you and your family (particularly your father) held an anti-apartheid stance.

Your book however, describes the current situation in SA, particularly after the multi-racial, democratic elections of 1994, as having resulted in a borderline lawless state.

My question to you is: Did you believe, prior to 1994, that the an end to the apartheid regime would bring a more beneficial political and quality of life process to SA.

Thanking you advance

It goes without saying that I make a point of replying to almost all letters I get, provide they’re polite. Thousands, since I began writing. As George Will once wrote, “manners are the practice of a virtue. The virtue is called civility, a word related—as a foundation is related to a house—to the word civilization.”

I’ll address in a future post the issue of what failing to answer your mail says about you. For now, here’s my reply to Miguel:

Hello Miguel,

Thank you for reading Into the Cannibal’s Pot: Lessons for America from Post-Apartheid South Africa.

I believe that nowhere in my book do I state the belief below. Moreover, from the fact that I oppose state-enforced apartheid—it does not follow that I support what I call in The Cannibal, a “raw, ripe democracy.”

By the end of the book, you will better understand this perspective. My involvement in SA as a young woman was humanitarian, not political.

You are correct in your assessment of my father’s thinking.

ILANA Mercer