The Snowden Effect
Jay Rosen has a nice piece on The Snowden Effect, a term coined by Charlie Pierce.
The Snowden Effect covers actions and reactions that are a result of the information that Edward Snowden made available through the Guardian and the Washington Post. Examples cover the ‘debate’ that is now taking place over the balance between government information gathering and the civil rights of US citizens.
There is another series of things going on that I will call The Snowden Deflect. these are actions that are designed to deflect attention from what Snowden revealed, and focus attention on Edward Snowden. ‘Noz has an example of the celebrity type of coverage, while Digby covers the attack version.
John Kiriakou’s open letter to Snowden details exactly what the government is going to attempt to do if Snowden returns.
Edward Snowden will be kept incommunicado if he returns to the US. The government will maintain that everything is classified, so Snowden won’t be able to mount a real defense of his actions. People who claim that he exaggerated his danger when he revealed himself forget that he knows what the government has been doing, so he knows what they are willing to do. People may not want to accept it. but we are not nice people when anything can be excused by a claim of ‘national security’.
2 comments
Snowden won’t be back (unless he’s forcibly returned). He’s too smart for that, but he has friends in the USA (and not just people who are grateful for what he’s done).
Seems there are more Manning’s & Snowden’s to come. 🙂
Anonymous’ Secret Presence In The U.S. Army
I’ve read similar on other sites also. Whether it happens or not… *shrug* But it wouldn’t surprise me give the culture now.
The problem that the government has with people in intel fields is that we know the truth. When the people at the top lie, intel knows they are lying. Intel people have to know the truth to do their jobs, and they have to be intelligent to do the jobs well. That is not a group that is going to be a cheerleader for propaganda. I had some notoriety for an ability to convert AF memos into articles for Pravda – the information was all there and accurate, but translated into Russian using the Pravda ‘stylebook’ it was really obvious that most were just the same as what the Soviets were putting out. We both know that working in intel makes you cynical, and it is often difficult to convince yourself that what you are doing is good for your country.
Bradley Manning was not personally strong enough to continue to fool himself and he snapped. His bosses should have seen it coming. He took the only course he could see, but was too far gone to cover his tracks. He will be in therapy a very long time.