In a previous column, I criticized the work of the White House Task Force on the NSA surveillance program as stacked with Obama loyalists with a majority of surveillance hawks. Later, one of the five members came out to say that the reforms were not significant and that he believes the program should be actually expanded not limited. Now, the only member without prior positions in the Administration and national security ties, University of Chicago Law School Professor Geoffrey Stone, has declared that the NSA is not a rogue agency and that Edward Snowden is a criminal.
I have great respect for Professor Stone as an academic but his comments reaffirmed criticism of the make-up of the panel as selected by the White House to offer “reforms” while protecting the underlying program.
Stone insists that NSA is not “some kind of a rogue agency” and that it should not be required to justify the program on the basis of whether it has thwarted any attack or conspiracy. Rather, like some many in the Obama and Bush Administration, Stone measured the program against the most extreme possible attack to argue that it is ipso facto necessary: “It is a mistake to ask, at least arguably a mistake to ask if any particular program . . . thwarted terrorist attacks, because we are not dealing with little things. It is possible that we are talking about a nuclear, a chemical, biological attack where tens of thousands of people’s lives could be at risk. If you thwart one every 20 years, you are doing pretty good. So the fact that hasn’t happened does not prove the program was worthless.” Well that would be an argument that would allow virtually any program with sweeping warrantless searches.
He reserved his harshest words for Snowden, dismissing the “positive consequences” of his disclosure while noting that he is still a criminal. Stone insisted
“we have a very strong legal principle in our system, that you don’t get to commit a crime because you have a good justification for doing so. . . .
Therefore, any kind of a notion that someone is not a criminal when they do this opens the door to other people saying, ‘Well, gee, I can do this and be a hero and I won’t even go to jail for it.’ I think you just don’t want that. . . . Basically, my view is I think Snowden is a criminal.”
What is missing is the fact that most whistleblowers released confidential or classified information. The government routinely classifies embarrassing or abusive programs to prevent the public from seeing the information. By Stone’s measure, historical figures like Daniel Ellsberg would be a simple criminal. The whole concept of a whistleblower is that they release information that would not have been made public. The Pentagon Papers are virtually indistinguishable on that basis from Snowden’s disclosures. Moreover, you have a federal judge who has declared the underlying program unconstitutional — even though Stone and his task force colleagues accepted the program as demonstrably legal. Also, as noted in the previous column,, this ignores the Administration refusing to investigate let alone prosecute Clapper for perjury, CIA officials for torture, or intelligence officials for admitted destruction of evidence on torture. It is simply all part of America’s Animal Farm. Finally, you have the White House and the Congress admitting abuses disclosed by Snowden and promising reforms. This is why I recently wrote a column on the relatively strong basis for a pardon for Snowden.
Stone’s comments shows the continued refusal of Administration allies to acknowledge that the standard applied to Snowden would have led to the incarceration of celebrated figures like Ellsberg and others who helped end abuses in history.
Are we still supposed to entertain “reform” without accountability for violating the Law?
Clapper lied to the Senate… But does the Senate care?
The CIA & NSA have routinely lied to the very body charged to oversee their activities. Good thing Clapper wasn’t a MlB steroid pusher, eh?
Question:
Why lie to the Committee?
What truths do these lies cover up?
How is Congress supposed to make informed oversight decisions if they allow themselves to be lied to? (Yes, allowed)
Again I say:
The best way to arrest the NSA abuses of our Liberty…
… Is to arrest, charge and try the abusers of our Liberty via the NSA.
THATS HOW THE FOUNDER WOULD HAVE IT DONE
Glenn Greenwald’s keynote at 30C3:
https://soundcloud.com/dlf-wissenschaft/keynote-glenn-greenwald-30c3
Dredd,
Correct.
The First Amendment protects a person from being arrested by a form of Government bent on silencing dissent…
… Just like the Fourth Amendment is supposed to protect a person, their papers and effects from a form Government bent on prying into our daily lives.
Dave,
It doesn’t help that Snowden fled the country.
One name spells it clearly…
… Chelsea Manning.
How did the Founders get the Fourth Amendment wrong?
Bulk collection under one order = GENERAL WARRANT
They were opposed to the concept. It appears the guardians of the Constitution refuse to affirm their OATH OF OFFICE by enforcing the Law that protects the Fourth Amendment, instead choosing to usurp the Right of the People (AKA THE BILL OF RIGHTS).
Of course, non democratic nations refuse to recognize essential Rights that ensure tranquility and Liberty for ALL… How is it that America joined the ranks of totalitarian states it once opposed?
It didn’t happen JUST under Obama or Bush or Clinton…
… It’s the slow creep of Fascism over the decades.
You know… Slow boil.
“It is better to roar like a lion for a day than be a sheep for your entire life” Sarah Harrison.
However it appears the MIC and their devotees prefer we all toe the line and stop bucking the system.
I’m curios if the judge will publish his home address…
… What does he have to hide? His social security number, too? Or maybe his passcodes to his porn subscriptions he hides from his wife?
Stone says: we have a very strong legal principle in our system, that you don’t get to commit a crime because you have a good justification for doing so. . . .
But “strong” isn’t absolute. I can kick down a door without permission in an attempt to save victims of a fire. I can manhandle a stranger with a Heimlich to keep them from choking.
Positive effects of a potentially illegal act are actually worthy of consideration, and that is why we have juries with human judgment in order to parse such things; and weigh whether the positive benefit outweighs the crime, or should mitigate punishment of it.
Certainly in the case of Snowden, no charges should be brought by the very people exposed by his acts, with the most to lose from them. If there was ever a time when random juries of common citizens should be entrusted with such decisions it is precisely when the government itself is the presumptive victim; the people in power cannot be objective with their reputations, jobs and political careers on the line.
To mespo727272
Therefore, as well as I can decline your meaning , “the whole country has been founded on a crime from the British point of view “. As I know Britain, when you buy steak and kidney pies or fish and chips there isn’t a part of the shop where the recently arrived African slaves are auctioned off . George III was a unrealistic syphilitic and he gave the world the best model for democracy ever. ( STD’s can be good research tool into the phobias and illogicality and madness of kings ) .
There’s a misunderstanding of British culture ; British cities welcomed people of different skin color and cultures until the small island of Britain was swamped with asylum requests. The Union Jack is no more defined as a 18th century racist flag than the Old Glory is defined as a property gentry flag by the slave owners who wrote the American Constitution.
Travelling Limey:
I can fully understand why you didn’t want to risk US citizenship given recent events. My wife and I have dual citizenship, so if it gets too repressive here we are gone.
Glenn Greenwald, streaming live from 30C3:
http://streaming.media.ccc.de/saal1/
Here is the opinion in ACLU v Clapper which anonymously posted mentioned up-thread.
If this judge is the way the Appellate and Supreme Courts are going to rule: farewell 1st and 4th Amendments.
Highlighting this, from Juan Cole’s “Informed Consent” posting (excerpt above):
“That so many Americans, including members of the Washington punditry, are so willing blithely to abandon these rights and that liberty is absolutely appalling. You have a sense of how they would have behaved in the 1930s if they had been Germans after Hitler’s coup.” -Juan Cole
Snowden’s Christmas Message on Privacy: Does NSA threaten 9th, 14th Amendments, ‘Inviolate Personality’?
By Juan Cole | Dec. 26, 2013
http://www.juancole.com/2013/12/amendments-inviolate-personality.html
Excerpt:
Snowden’s focus on privacy thus potentially widens the discussion from narrow procedural issues like warrantless search of electronic papers and effects to a much broader concern with the right of citizens to personal privacy from their government. This privacy is part of what Americans have typically meant by “liberty” and by being “free people.” That so many Americans, including members of the Washington punditry, are so willing blithely to abandon these rights and that liberty is absolutely appalling. You have a sense of how they would have behaved in the 1930s if they had been Germans after Hitler’s coup.
Snowden’s account of privacy is reminiscent of the work of Edward J. Bloustein as described in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy:
“Edward J. Bloustein (1964) argues that there is a common thread in the diverse legal cases protecting privacy. According to Bloustein, Warren and Brandeis failed to give a positive description of privacy, however they were correct that there was a single value connecting the privacy interests, a value they called “inviolate personality.” On Bloustein’s view it is possible to give a general theory of individual privacy that reconciles its divergent strands, and “inviolate personality” is the social value protected by privacy. It defines one’s essence as a human being and it includes individual dignity and integrity, personal autonomy and independence. Respect for these values is what grounds and unifies the concept of privacy. Discussing each of Prosser’s four types of privacy rights in turn, Bloustein defends the view that each of these privacy rights is important because it protects against intrusions demeaning to personality and against affronts to human dignity.”
The NSA mass surveillance is above all an “affront to human dignity.”
Having provoked a national and international debate over government surveillance, Edward Snowden is now doing us the favor of urging us to a profound consideration of what privacy and liberty mean in the 21st century.
Any terrorist worth their weight would have long ago disavowed the use of electronic communications and have reverted to a courier based system to hand/orally deliver any “secret” communications.
Red, commanded by retired Marine Corps Lieutenant General Paul K. Van Riper, adopted an asymmetric strategy, in particular, using old methods to evade Blue’s sophisticated electronic surveillance network. Van Riper used motorcycle messengers to transmit orders to front-line troops and World War II light signals to launch airplanes without radio communications.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Millennium_Challenge_2002
If Congress, the President, say it’s legal… then it’s legal.
Nixons congress just hadn’t been bought and paid for. … Poor guy was just 40 years ahead of his time.
I’m sure there are some fine people with good intentions working in these agencies but isn’t a big problem that since inception they were constructed on an unconstitutional foundation?
Chronologically, the Ninth Amendment and the Supremacy Clause were ratified “prior” to these agencies – meaning these agencies were mandated to follow the U.S. Constitution especially in regards to American citizens.
It is possible to have a constitutional NSA, constitutional FBI and constitutional CIA, etc. Instead of abolishing these agencies completely, shouldn’t that be the goal?
And “NSA Phone Surveillance Is Legal, New York Judge Rules”
12/27/13 11:33 AM ET EST AP
NEW YORK (AP) — A federal judge in New York has ruled that a massive federal phone-tracking program is legal.
U.S. District Judge William Pauley issued the decision Friday. He says the program “represents the government’s counter-punch” to eliminate al-Qaida’s terror network by connecting fragmented and fleeting communications.
In ruling, the judge noted the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and how the phone data-collection system could have helped investigators connect the dots before the attacks occurred.
He says the government learned from its mistake and “adapted to confront a new enemy: a terror network capable of orchestrating attacks across the world.” He said the data-collection program was part of the adjustment.
He dismissed a lawsuit brought by the American Civil Liberties Union. The ACLU did not immediately respond to a message for comment.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/12/27/nsa-phone-surveillance_n_4508483.html
Naming yourself for a Dune character. Some people.
Reblogged this on Brittius.com.
An obvious climber trying to ingratiate himself into the power elite.