Respectfully submitted by Lawrence E. Rafferty (rafflaw)-Guest Blogger
In recent weeks and months, we have all heard and read the many articles and stories about the whistleblower Edward Snowden and his disclosure of enormous amounts of NSA “secrets”. His disclosures have exposed what the NSA was really doing, which is spying on practically every American’s metadata online and on the phone. His disclosures have also put on display what happens to a “whistleblower” in this day and age. He has been forced to flee his home country and is currently living in exile in Russia.
Just what were his crimes that made him fear for his safety and raised doubts as to whether he would ever be given a fair trial for his alleged disclosures of secret material and programs? He did what any good American should do and that is expose illegal or immoral governmental activities and allow the American public to decide whether its government is acting legally and fairly. Didn’t he?
You may think his disclosures were an unprecedented example of a citizen uncovering and disclosing government programs designed to, at best, skirt the line of legality by spying on Americans, but you would be wrong.
Over 40 years ago, a group of anti-Vietnam war activists did what Snowden did and actually escaped any notoriety or criminal prosecution in order to show that the FBI was involved in a then unprecedented level of spying on Americans involved in the anti-war and civil rights movements.
“In 1971, as opposition to the Vietnam War peaked and civil unrest rattled America, activists knew they were being watched, infiltrated and undermined by the FBI. But they didn’t know the extent of the agency’s efforts, nor how far J. Edgar Hoover’s agents would go to suppress dissent.
That would change one night in March, when eight men and women broke into an FBI satellite office in Media, PA. They absconded with nearly every piece of paper they could find, sifted through it and anonymously sent various documents detailing the agency’s spying and dirty tricks to major media organizations. While some outlets were initially reticent about reporting on the documents, the revelations would ultimately unleash a torrent of investigative reporting, shining a light on Hoover’s efforts to destroy Martin Luther King and the agency’s now-notorious COINTELPRO program.” Nation of Change
These “burglars” not only escaped with a treasure trove of FBI documents that proved the agency was involved in improper spying on Dr. Martin Luther King, and most, if not all of the anti-war organizations of the day. They also escaped prosecution and they have just recently gone on record to explain what they did and why they did it.
The 5 of the 8 activists/whistleblowers who were interviewed prior to the release of a book described just how they pulled the covers off the secret and seamy side of the FBI and eventually the program mentioned above, COINTELPRO. This “heist” took a lot of planning and the activists planning it were taking a big risk. They all knew the reputation J. Edgar Hoover had and what could happen to anyone who attacked his agency and programs.
‘“When you talked to people outside the movement about what the F.B.I. was doing, nobody wanted to believe it,” said one of the burglars, Keith Forsyth, who is finally going public about his involvement. “ There was only one way to convince people that it was true, and that was to get it in their handwriting.” ‘
Mr. Forsyth, now 63, and other members of the group can no longer be prosecuted for what happened that night, and they agreed to be interviewed before the release this week of a book written by one of the first journalists to receive the stolen documents. The author, Betty Medsger, a former reporter for The Washington Post, spent years sifting through the F.B.I.’s voluminous case file on the episode and persuaded five of the eight men and women who participated in the break-in to end their silence.
Unlike Mr. Snowden, who downloaded hundreds of thousands of digital N.S.A. files onto computer hard drives, the Media burglars did their work the 20th-century way: they cased the F.B.I. office for months, wore gloves as they packed the papers into suitcases, and loaded the suitcases into getaway cars. When the operation was over, they dispersed.” New York Times
It is an amazing story that the FBI and its reported 200 agents that were investigating the burglary, were unable to prosecute any of the whistleblowers. The documents, once disclosed, were instrumental in shining a bright light on the FBI’s illegal activities. The documents also provided the first glimpse of the COINTELPRO program.
The COINTELPRO program had been in place since 1956 and was designed to spy on and disrupt civil rights groups and later, anti-war activists and organizations. ‘“It wasn’t just spying on Americans,” said Loch K. Johnson, a professor of public and international affairs at the University of Georgia who was an aide to Senator Frank Church, Democrat of Idaho. “The intent of Cointelpro was to destroy lives and ruin reputations.”‘
Senator Church’s investigation in the mid-1970s revealed still more about the extent of decades of F.B.I. abuses, and led to greater congressional oversight of the F.B.I. and other American intelligence agencies. The Church Committee’s final report about the domestic surveillance was blunt. “Too many people have been spied upon by too many government agencies, and too much information has been collected,” it read.” New York Times
The Church Committee’s report can be found here. Without these brave activists and the documents that they disclosed, the Church Committee may not have even been formed to investigate the FBI and its illegal activities. When one reads about what these people did in 1971, do you think we, as a country, have learned anything about how important our privacy is and how important legitimate whistleblowers are to our country?
It does seem obvious that these 8 brave activists improved our country and helped protect our privacy rights, at least for a short while. Mr. Snowden gave us a stark reminder that we have tumbled back to the J. Edgar Hoover days. What do we need to do as a country to make sure our privacy is protected and that our intelligence and law enforcement agencies do not continue to make a mockery of the Fourth Amendment?
Should we consider these activists in 1971 as heroes and is it right that our government considers Edward Snowden to be a traitor? I submit that 40 years ago, these 8 people made a difficult decision that improved our country and brought some sunshine upon the programs of the FBI. Will Snowden’s revelations really bring about the changes and improvements that followed the break-in in 1971? Or will the intelligence agencies succeed in hiding behind the veil of national security and continue to gather data on all of us? I am not too optimistic about our current situation, but what do you think?
A bit OT, perhaps:
Chris Hedges today on Chris Christie:
http://www.truthdig.com/report/page2/the_trouble_with_chris_christie_20140112
Excerpts:
“New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie has been Wall Street’s anointed son for the presidency. He is backed by the most ruthless and corrupt figures in New Jersey politics, including the New Jersey multimillionaire and hard-line Democratic boss George Norcross III. Among his other supporters are many hedge fund managers and corporate executives and some of the nation’s most retrograde billionaires, including the Koch brothers. The brewing scandal over the closing of traffic lanes on the George Washington Bridge apparently in retaliation for the Fort Lee mayor’s refusal to support the governor’s 2013 re-election is a window into how federal agencies and the security and surveillance apparatus would be routinely employed in a Christie presidency to punish anyone who challenged this tiny cabal’s grip on power.
…
The visceral need by Christie to ridicule and threaten anyone who does not bow before him, his dark lust for revenge, his greed, gluttony and hedonism, his need to surround himself with large, fawning entourages and his obsequiousness to corporate power are characteristics our corporate titans embrace and understand. They see in Christie versions of themselves. They know he will enthusiastically do their dirty work. They trust him to be a real bastard. If Christie and the billionaires behind him take the presidency and begin to manipulate government agencies and pull the levers of our Stasi-like security and surveillance apparatus, any pretense of democracy will be gone.”
Bea Edwards (link in previous comment):
“In arguing against clemency for Edward Snowden, Fred Kaplan cites the disclosure of documents that reveal putatively legitimate anti-terrorist attacks in Pakistan. Based on those documents, Barton Gellman and Greg Miller of the Washington Post wrote a story about NSA/CIA collaboration in the killing of a target with a drone strike in Pakistan in 2012.
Kaplan argues that revealing this information exposed legitimate anti-terrorist actions of U.S. intelligence agencies and compromised the security of the nation. But it’s worth asking why the American public should not know about this? Our government now implements a strategy and technology that includes the targeted killing of foreign nationals in countries with which we are not at war, more than 10 years after the Al Qaeda attack on the US. Shouldn’t an informed public in a democratic country know a) the rationale, b) the consequences c) the effectiveness surrounding this campaign?
Kaplan claims that these activities are neither illegal nor immoral and should not have been disclosed. That’s a sweeping judgment to make on behalf of the international community. Moreover, the drone operation in question killed an Al Qaeda operative who led U.S. agents to Osama Bin Laden’s courier, and ultimately to Bin Laden himself. We’re already pretty well-informed about parts of this tale. Why? Because CIA Director Leon Panetta told Zero Dark Thirty scriptwriter Matthew Boal about it in 2011 during a speech at CIA headquarters. The speech contained classified information. So did the movie.
Two things. First, if we live in a country that allows us only the official line about an extremely controversial story that involves torture and death, then we live in an authoritarian state, not a democracy. We are obliged to base our opinion on official propaganda rather than the full array of relevant facts. Second, we have not only a right but an obligation to know that our government is frequently killing people in another country. We should know this because our government’s actions may involve us in yet another war or destabilize an already dangerously unstable country in a region equipped with nuclear weapons.
Conor Friedersdorf made this argument in The Atlantic. He pointed out that the debate about Snowden’s disclosures has to do with democracy vs. authoritarianism, not privacy vs. security. Framing the controversy as a need to balance personal privacy and national security trivializes the concept of individual freedom and forces us to weigh petty inconveniences against mortal danger. Because of Edward Snowden’s disclosures about NSA/CIA collaboration on the drone program in Pakistan, we now know that the real balancing act may well be about an informed awareness of our country’s foreign policy vs. unquestioning support for the murder of civilians abroad, whoever they are.”
“Bea Edwards is Executive & International Director of the Government Accountability Project, the nation’s leading whistleblower protection organization.”
Why Snowden’s Disclosures of Foreign Surveillance Are Legitimate
Posted: 01/13/2014 9:23 am
by Bea Edwards, Executive & International Director, Government Accountability Project
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/bea-edwards/why-snowdens-disclosures_b_4588387.html
Why Snowden’s Disclosures of Foreign Surveillance Are Legitimate
Posted: 01/13/2014 9:23 am
by Bea Edwards, Executive & International Director, Government Accountability Project
In arguing against clemency for Edward Snowden, Fred Kaplan cites the disclosure of documents that reveal putatively legitimate anti-terrorist attacks in Pakistan. Based on those documents, Barton Gellman and Greg Miller of the Washington Post wrote a story about NSA/CIA collaboration in the killing of a target with a drone strike in Pakistan in 2012.
Kaplan argues that revealing this information exposed legitimate anti-terrorist actions of U.S. intelligence agencies and compromised the security of the nation. But it’s worth asking why the American public should not know about this? Our government now implements a strategy and technology that includes the targeted killing of foreign nationals in countries with which we are not at war, more than 10 years after the Al Qaeda attack on the US. Shouldn’t an informed public in a democratic country know a) the rationale, b) the consequences c) the effectiveness surrounding this campaign?
Kaplan claims that these activities are neither illegal nor immoral and should not have been disclosed. That’s a sweeping judgment to make on behalf of the international community. Moreover, the drone operation in question killed an Al Qaeda operative who led U.S. agents to Osama Bin Laden’s courier, and ultimately to Bin Laden himself. We’re already pretty well-informed about parts of this tale. Why? Because CIA Director Leon Panetta told Zero Dark Thirty scriptwriter Matthew Boal about it in 2011 during a speech at CIA headquarters. The speech contained classified information. So did the movie.
Two things. First, if we live in a country that allows us only the official line about an extremely controversial story that involves torture and death, then we live in an authoritarian state, not a democracy. We are obliged to base our opinion on official propaganda rather than the full array of relevant facts. Second, we have not only a right but an obligation to know that our government is frequently killing people in another country. We should know this because our government’s actions may involve us in yet another war or destabilize an already dangerously unstable country in a region equipped with nuclear weapons.
Conor Friedersdorf made this argument in The Atlantic. He pointed out that the debate about Snowden’s disclosures has to do with democracy vs. authoritarianism, not privacy vs. security. Framing the controversy as a need to balance personal privacy and national security trivializes the concept of individual freedom and forces us to weigh petty inconveniences against mortal danger. Because of Edward Snowden’s disclosures about NSA/CIA collaboration on the drone program in Pakistan, we now know that the real balancing act may well be about an informed awareness of our country’s foreign policy vs. unquestioning support for the murder of civilians abroad, whoever they are.
Bea Edwards is Executive & International Director of the Government Accountability Project, the nation’s leading whistleblower protection organization.
anonp I agree with most of Edwards argument, but part is a bit off.
the real balancing act may well be about an informed awareness of our country’s foreign policy vs. unquestioning support for the murder of civilians abroad, whoever they are.”
It is a real stretch to call any civilian casualties who are killed as part of a legitimate action against a combatant, murder. If you are at a dinner party with Hitler and the USAAF drops a bomb on the party, you aren’t being murdered in any legal sense.
Thanks, Elaine M.
James Carroll’s conclusion, from the same op-ed piece:
In the nation’s broader culture, a new kind of madness has taken hold. While effectively sponsored by the government, its reach extends across the entire global Internet infrastructure, which has become not only a playground for spies, but a self-committing loony bin. This madness not only oppresses citizens, but keeps citizens from feeling much oppressed at all.
Snowden has sounded a desperately needed alarm. Because of him, we have begun a reevaluation of government intrusions, but also of our own indifference to them. Snowden has presented us with the true cost of our omnivorous communications technology. We can chide the young man for his crime, or his arrogance. But that misses the larger point of “times that call for bold action.” The Media burglars kept their eye on what mattered most. Edward Snowden has done the same. It will be a crushing American failure if he is made to wait 43 years for exoneration.
=====
As he says, these are “times that call for bold action.”
And let’s not forget that there’s more to come.
One can hope…. Snowden will be heralded one day for what he’s exposed….
Elaine,
Thanks for the Globe article. While I agree that there is no one figure to compare to Hoover, the important comparison, in my opinion, is the government secrecy and actions of both times.
Larry,
Here’s an op-ed from this morning’s Boston Globe:
Sounding the alarm, then and now
By James Carroll
Globe Columnist
January 13, 2014
http://www.bostonglobe.com/opinion/2014/01/13/fbi-burglars-were-right-what-about-edward-snowden/8ppMC17OWnHx1GJp07eyWN/story.html
Excerpt:
One night in March 1971, eight anti-war protesters broke into an FBI office outside Philadelphia in Media, Penn. They stole files that they soon released to the press, revealing the extremes to which J. Edgar Hoover was going in his vendettas against political dissent. Ultimately, the Media burglary helped lay bare an extensive domestic spying program, known as “Cointelpro,” a clandestine system of life-shattering assaults on Hoover’s enemies. The revelation prompted a major overhaul of the bureau by the US Senate. Even the FBI website today acknowledges the role the Media burglary played in this “significant reevaluation.”
Despite Hoover’s rage at the Media burglars’ success in countering FBI excesses, they were never caught. Last week, though, with the publication of the book “The Burglary” by the steadfast former Washington Post reporter Betty Medsger, five of the long-secret raiders identified themselves. They had never sought attention, had kept faith with one another, and emerged from anonymity as elderly people who have lived exemplary, if ordinary, American lives. Yet neither had they forgotten what motivated them in the first place. One of them, Brenda Robbins, told Medsger, “The times called for and supported bold actions.”
The times, in fact, were mad. The government had gone rogue — with its conduct in Vietnam, its massive attempts to squelch free speech, its routine deceit of the nation, its dirty tricks, and its own secret readiness to break the law. What was a conscientious citizen to do? Last week’s news about the perpetrators of the Media burglary made evident the essential virtue of those who had committed a crime for which, if caught, they would have served years in prison.
At the time, they would have been roundly denounced for their action, chided for not raising their complaints in legal ways, lectured on the importance of law for social cohesion, and disdained, in the case of a married couple who took part in the burglary, for indifference to their children. But the Media burglars had their eyes on a larger value. They accomplished what Medsger — whose stories first publicized the Media files 43 years ago — now calls “perhaps the most powerful single act of nonviolent resistance in American history.”
These burglars, it now seems clear, were entirely right.
In its coverage of last week’s revelation, The New York Times drew an inevitable parallel between the Media burglary and the action of National Security Agency contractor Edward J. Snowden, which has also “opened a national debate about the proper limits of government surveillance.” Unlike the Media burglars, Snowden has made no secret of his identity. But there are other differences, as well.
There is no villainous figure in the NSA to compare with Hoover. He presided over a single bureau; the intrusive NSA data-collection program PRISM is the tip of an iceberg that is far bigger than the national security establishment. What Snowden exposes is a public-private bureaucracy of such scale as to be beyond any conceivable system of accountability. While government overreach is partly to blame for privacy-destroying intrusions into the communications of average citizens, so are unbridled new technologies to which citizens have willingly made themselves hostage.
It is time for a Presidential pardon for Snowden. If Obama can ignore the crimes of established governmental employees, he can undo some of that shame by granting a pardon. Snowden is at least as deserving a pass as the other governmental crooks and torturers. Hell, if Nixon could get one for even more outrageous conduct and MASS violations of his oath of office and criminal activity. then even considering Snowden’s crime, it pales in comparison with others crimes.
NW Nye & Rafflaw,
The founding fathers risked their lives & fortunes going against the tyranny of Government. It was a just venture, as it sought to increase the liberties of the majority. However imperfect is their final adoption of our founding documents, if they would have been caught, they surely would have been hung or shot for treason. They were fighting against the crown trying to implement various mercantilistic policies and thankfully they won, as it brought to the greatest extent every employed.
It is this attitude of those in government and it’s proponents, whom profess to be concerned with the Citizens of their nation, but if you expose their unethical practices, as Manning did, they will lock you up and throw away the key. They, bureaucrats, judges, prosecutors and politicians, use the intuition of force and coercion, to line their pockets first and foremost, and what ever is left over, they first distribute the money to those who provide the greatest amounts of money for their campaigns and then what ever is really left over, goes to the multitude of homeless, walking the many street of our cities. “sarcasm” as our nation refuses to care for many of the homeless. With forked tongues, they lie strait to our faces, while continuing to increase the socialistic programs that are destroying our great nation, they exact same things that our founders tried to protect against in the Constitution.
People argue for the living breathing elements within the Constitution, despite it’s originally intent and unlawfully abrogate it, with immunity.
America and the ruling anti-capitalist intellectuals has gotten what they want; our money and each and every American is paying the price for it.
rafflaw
I think you are spot on with this post.
Another thing your post today does is to show how far in the wrong direction we have evolved from our founders:
(Whistleblowers According To The Early Americans, emphasis added).
Whistleblowing on government wrong was once a duty but now has evolved into a crime.
How is that for going the wrong way down the path of liberty!
Well said Darren. The efforts and expense to bring Assange to justice on the condom issue are proof that the government doesn’t like it when their lies are exposed. No matter what country or whistleblower is involved.
As for the Julian Assange question on this thread, it is about as kangaroo as you can get. Many extradition treaties will not allow the requested nation to extradite the accused if there is no analogue of the crime alleged in the country the defendant has sought harbor within. And from what OS has mentioned I don’t see how this applies to English law.
The fact that the prosecution refused to interview him for the alleged crime while he was at the embassy is also difficult to justify. A video conference could easily be arranged. Some interviews are even conducted over telephone. In fact, in the US, at least in my state, Miranda did not apply since the defendant was not in custody and speaking on a telephone.
Another issue is the matter of extradition. I would be curious to see if UK had extradited anyone to Sweden based upon the crimes alleged. (the condom issue) If it did that would be one thing but if it hasn’t it would certainly give credence to the notion the extradition request was politically motivated or at least a pre-text.
In our state, and likely most others including international cases, minor crimes rarely result in extradition. In our state most of the time an offense needs to be at least a Class B Felony before the state will consider issuing a warrant out of state, or at least restrict it to bordering states. Expense is the most likely cause.
Speaking of expense. Would the metro police force ever allocate the resources to guard the location where a run of the mill accused rapist might hold out but the police cannot legally, for whatever reason, arrest him? That will not happen. The cost of resources in having several constables guarding one location such of this would be in the hundreds of thousands of Pounds if not more, especially given the time it has been. A random rapist would have been off the radar long ago.
It is that various governments want Assange at any cost is really at the heart of the matter. These governments would have never went to this much trouble on a he-said-she-said type of case.
Thanks Mespo!
also lets not leave out little known whistleblowers… phil schneider, al bielik, susan ford, brice taylor, andy pero, ted gunderson,and don nicholoff and thats just a few to name..
Good read, raff. And it meshes nicely with my next installment about current day NSA whistleblowers and how they’ve been treated. Two great minds, I suppose ….
while i see mention of cointelpro in the article i do not see any mention of mk ultra, or the other programs used on our citizens and soldiers. and since when has exposing corporation corruption become a crime? only the truly brainwashed and controlled believe that whistle blowers should be punished. and see how that works means they are corporation trolls. who believe all the lies told them from the beginning to end.
These same people still refuse to believe their cell phones are tracking devices, so are credit/debit cards even metro cards here in nyc. why do you think free cell phones were given to those who cant afford the high tech ones?
smh will the brainwashed ever wake up? as for the lame stream media seeing as how they are now all owned by those who are the cabalist bankers of course we arent going to get the truth. the news today are used as they always were to control what the public knows and to publicly destroy those who refuse to go along with the corporation….
ex. were so broke they just cut food stamps. yet they still somehow have billions to spend on specialized military weapons that they dont even bother to use. they have millions to spend building high tech buildings that they then turn around and demolish without even using them.
but hey lets ignore that. lets ignore the fact that the police are now using military weapons against the people…. whats more important is to hunt down snowden, manning, bradley ,and others and make them pay for exposing the true nature of the nsa and all the other 3 letter agencies we arent supposed to know about….
Jamie,
Fear sells. It works for the govt., cable news, weather channels, etc.
Excellent article, but your statement, “He did what any good American should do and that is expose illegal or immoral governmental activities and allow the American public to decide whether its government is acting legally and fairly.” may need to be discussed further. I think there are fewer ‘good Americans’ than you think. A solid minority still think Snowden should be punished for exposing government crimes against its citizens.
A November poll shows: “Six in 10 Americans — 60 percent — say Snowden’s actions harmed U.S. security, increasing 11 percentage points from July after a cascade of news reports based on his disclosures detailed the National Security Agency’s expansive web of telephone and Internet surveillance efforts. Clear majorities of Democrats, Republicans and independents believe disclosures have harmed national security.”
http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/poll-most-americans-say-snowden-leaks-harmed-national-security/2013/11/20/13cc20b8-5229-11e3-9e2c-e1d01116fd98_story.html
For some reason, most ‘good Americans’ aren’t concerned about govt crimes against the people, they are still fearful of the national security implications. Fear rules the masses. Fear allows govt to continue to trash the law and the Constitution. The security fear state fears the truth tellers and rewards the liars. After all, how will the security fear state continue its unsavory ways without citizen fear? How will they garner more money from a mealy Congress for their efforts to track every American’s communications. Americans are willing to cut food stamps, unemployment insurance benefits, Social Security and the social safety net in order to feed the security state more resources.
The majority live in a state of fear and until that changes America will continue to feed the security fear state all it needs, regardless of the consequences to freedom and the rule of law..
Let me say, there were a few months after 9/11 when the MSM put aside their hate of Bush. And in that short span we got the Patriot Act and Iraq War, w/ Dem cooperation. If Snowden outed the NSA in 2007, he would be getting total MSM support.
Magginkat, The MSM hated Bush, they worship Obama. Geez???