8 ms·

Since there are multiple comments about how the US government must/should pardon Snowden now, I'd like to make a top level comment to clarify some things about

by parsimo2010 6y ago

Since there are multiple comments about how the US government must/should pardon Snowden now, I'd like to make a top level comment to clarify some things about how this does not obligate the government to change his status. 1. The court only found that a single program exposed by Snowden was illegal. Snowden released a bunch of other information that was a violation of the NDA he signed when he was given a security clearance. 2. Even if all the information he disclosed revealed illegal activity, Snowden's actions make him ineligible for whistleblower protection. Whistleblower protection for the intelligence community[1] is only provided if a person follows the proper procedure to securely notify their Inspector General and/or Congress. Since he's not automatically protected, it would take Congress or the President to decide to offer him protection. Snowden (allegedly) did not even attempt to notify the proper authorities before going public with the information, so not only is he ineligible, it's not likely that anyone will take pity on him. 3. There's a chance that this ruling won't stick as the legal system chugs along and a few more judges look at it, and even if they were willing to help Snowden, nobody in Congress is going to take action until there is some permanence with the ruling. IANAL, but I think this would be decided if the Supreme Court either decides to decline or hear the case. If it's declined, then it's pretty much final. If they decide to hear the case, then it could be another year or so before they make a decision. [1] IC whistleblower protection is a little different than standard whistleblower protection: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligence_Community_Whistleblower_Protection_Act https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligence_Community_Whistle...

syshum 6y ago
1. All of the other things he exposed should also be illegal 2. He tried they denied him. I think the entire process of "exposing" illegal acts that has to be done through the very system that is committing the illegal acts is asinine, and anyone that is defending that process is complacent in the abuse of human rights 3. Highlighting the pure and total corruption that is the 3 branches of government, no longer is there a check and balance they have combined into a single corrupt abusive state
raxxorrax 6y ago
I think this is true and that is why fleeing to Russia was the correct choice. Because the whistle blower channels don't work.
- lettergram 6y ago
  Just for additional clarity, Russia wasn’t his first choice. It was somewhere in South America. US decided to ground him in Russia (best optics for them really)
- koheripbal 6y ago
  Russia was probably his only choice. Every other country would have extradited him. I doubt he is happy with having to live in Russia - the main benefactor of his leaks. It's impossible to imagine that he is able to reconcile his hatred of US spying with the malicious actions of the government he now relies on for protection. ...and that's the ultimate crux of this whole thing. When you go up against the US government, you have to ask yourself - is there any major world power out there that's better? I don't think he asked himself that question.
  - kentrado 6y ago
    Perhaps he didn't go against the government but went in support of the US citizens and believed what the government did was wrong.
  - raxxorrax 6y ago
    I do think he asked himself that question. edit: Saying Russia is the main benefactor of the leaks sounds like evidence of long lost cold war thinking to be honest. Perhaps it would also be to the benefit of the targets of surveillance? Because if you wouldn't want to hand Russia a win, not subjecting the population to surveillance would have been quite the strategy in this case.
    - alilsumpinditto 6y ago
      Would just like to point out, Putin was on record in an interview talking about Snowden, and was pretty open about how these programs make sense from an intelligence point of view, and pretty much said that Russia is doing the same thing. He wasn't pretending like they're not doing the exact same thing. I believe it's somewhat of a don't hate the player, hate the game from the perspective of the CIA/KGB/what have you. Why can't we just be open about our smart TVs listening to us?
AnthonyMouse 6y ago
What you're saying is that the existing whistleblower protections are inadequate: > 1. The court only found that a single program exposed by Snowden was illegal. Snowden released a bunch of other information that was a violation of the NDA he signed when he was given a security clearance. Requirement of perfection and a superhuman level of ability to sift through more information than any individual could before sharing it with anyone who could help with doing so. > Whistleblower protection for the intelligence community[1] is only provided if a person follows the proper procedure to securely notify their Inspector General and/or Congress. Requirement to do something that can get you put on a list, and thereby either lose access to the information or get put under surveillance so that you can no longer release the information if the official channels are fruitless. Moreover, "official channels" even when they work don't disclose the existence of the program to the public, which is a necessary public good, because otherwise even if that gets it shut down, the structures and incentives that led to its creation aren't addressed and it just happens again until they get it running with a group of people not willing to risk their own careers to report it up the chain. > There's a chance that this ruling won't stick as the legal system chugs along and a few more judges look at it So a whistleblower has to spend how many years in exile before they get their vindication?
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- arghwhat 6y ago
  Whistleblower protection are bit tricky to define. When is something whistleblowing, when is it a leak, when is it malicious, and when is it espionage? It's easy to allow leaks about illegal acts, but if you start allowing leaks about secret but legal acts too, then things get blurry. I personally don't think a government, ultimately a servant of the people, should be allowed to keep secrets from the people, but that's currently legal for e.g. military reasons, and thus needs to be considered. Imagine for a second a parallel universe where the government wasn't evil, and while some of the released documents was showing illegal activity, others did not and in fact contained secret information about national security matters where releasing the information undermines the work (e.g. Russia/China/... monitoring, intercept measures, etc.). > So a whistleblower has to spend how many years in exile before they get their vindication? The legal system would be fundamentally broken if you could evade judgement by going into hiding, regardless of reason. Snowden should have been pardoned a long time ago, but his time in hiding is and should be inconsequential from a legal standpoint until laws are changed and pardons are made. It's up to the citizens of the U.S. to fix their country and welcome him home.
ykevinator 6y ago
That's precisely what a pardon is for. It's for exceptions.
thechao 6y ago
Put me in his jury and I’ll happily give the US govt a lesson in the powers of jury nullification.
- jacobush 6y ago
  They learned that a long time ago and screen jurors carefully.
borg_ 6y ago
Makes you wonder what was the motivation behind creating "Whistleblower protection" program in the first place.
- TheSpiceIsLife 6y ago
  Legal Theatre. Bureaucratic / political butt covering theatre.
pps43 6y ago
#2 means that there is no wistleblower protection in the intelligence community. What else could Snowden have done do to stop the crimes being committed?
craftinator 6y ago
1. Snowden is not a US judge, and hasn't spent the last half decade deciding whether each US spying operation was legal or not. Snowden released the documents that allowed the courts to decide which programs were legal, so he cannot be held responsible for the decision that the courts made, because time machines don't exist. Holding him responsible would be the same as a person calling the police to report a crime, the cops showing up and arresting a person, then months down the line the courts rule not guilty on the arrestee, so the police now go charge the original caller with false reporting. It's ludicrous to think he could've known which programs would be borderline illegal and which would step over that line. And if it took the US justice system 6 years and millions of dollars worth of man hours to actually make that decision, how could he possibly have correctly come to the same conclusion, beforehand, with no governmental support?
TheSpiceIsLife 6y ago
Simple solution: Donald Trump puts his money where is mouth is, pardons him and repatriates him.
- havetocharge 6y ago
  Right after he releases his tax records following the completion of the Mexican wall.
627467 6y ago
Non-us citizen nor lawyer, but doesn't a pardon require a conviction? Has Snowden been convicted? Does _anything_ obligates the President to pardon anyone? And why would those points you listed invalidate a pardon? If Snowden was considered (by courts, government) to be a whistle blower by legal definition, he wouldn't need a pardon, right?
- yokaze 6y ago
  > Non-us citizen nor lawyer, but doesn't a pardon require a conviction? No, Nixon wasn't convicted either. He received a pardon nonetheless. Accepting a pardon implies though an admission of guilt. > Does _anything_ obligates the President to pardon anyone? AFAIK, not in the strict sense of the word. In the looser sense, public opinion. > And why would those points you listed invalidate a pardon? It would at most, because it influences public opinion. But technically, all those are reasons, why there is a pardon. The law may say he is guilty, but there might be overruling concerns at hand.

syshum 6y ago

1. All of the other things he exposed should also be illegal 2. He tried they denied him. I think the entire process of "exposing" illegal acts that has to be done through the very system that is committing the illegal acts is asinine, and anyone that is defending that process is complacent in the abuse of human rights 3. Highlighting the pure and total corruption that is the 3 branches of government, no longer is there a check and balance they have combined into a single corrupt abusive state

raxxorrax 6y ago

I think this is true and that is why fleeing to Russia was the correct choice. Because the whistle blower channels don't work.

lettergram 6y ago
Just for additional clarity, Russia wasn’t his first choice. It was somewhere in South America. US decided to ground him in Russia (best optics for them really)
koheripbal 6y ago
Russia was probably his only choice. Every other country would have extradited him. I doubt he is happy with having to live in Russia - the main benefactor of his leaks. It's impossible to imagine that he is able to reconcile his hatred of US spying with the malicious actions of the government he now relies on for protection. ...and that's the ultimate crux of this whole thing. When you go up against the US government, you have to ask yourself - is there any major world power out there that's better? I don't think he asked himself that question.
- kentrado 6y ago
  Perhaps he didn't go against the government but went in support of the US citizens and believed what the government did was wrong.
- raxxorrax 6y ago
  I do think he asked himself that question. edit: Saying Russia is the main benefactor of the leaks sounds like evidence of long lost cold war thinking to be honest. Perhaps it would also be to the benefit of the targets of surveillance? Because if you wouldn't want to hand Russia a win, not subjecting the population to surveillance would have been quite the strategy in this case.
  - alilsumpinditto 6y ago
    Would just like to point out, Putin was on record in an interview talking about Snowden, and was pretty open about how these programs make sense from an intelligence point of view, and pretty much said that Russia is doing the same thing. He wasn't pretending like they're not doing the exact same thing. I believe it's somewhat of a don't hate the player, hate the game from the perspective of the CIA/KGB/what have you. Why can't we just be open about our smart TVs listening to us?

AnthonyMouse 6y ago

What you're saying is that the existing whistleblower protections are inadequate: > 1. The court only found that a single program exposed by Snowden was illegal. Snowden released a bunch of other information that was a violation of the NDA he signed when he was given a security clearance. Requirement of perfection and a superhuman level of ability to sift through more information than any individual could before sharing it with anyone who could help with doing so. > Whistleblower protection for the intelligence community[1] is only provided if a person follows the proper procedure to securely notify their Inspector General and/or Congress. Requirement to do something that can get you put on a list, and thereby either lose access to the information or get put under surveillance so that you can no longer release the information if the official channels are fruitless. Moreover, "official channels" even when they work don't disclose the existence of the program to the public, which is a necessary public good, because otherwise even if that gets it shut down, the structures and incentives that led to its creation aren't addressed and it just happens again until they get it running with a group of people not willing to risk their own careers to report it up the chain. > There's a chance that this ruling won't stick as the legal system chugs along and a few more judges look at it So a whistleblower has to spend how many years in exile before they get their vindication?

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
arghwhat 6y ago
Whistleblower protection are bit tricky to define. When is something whistleblowing, when is it a leak, when is it malicious, and when is it espionage? It's easy to allow leaks about illegal acts, but if you start allowing leaks about secret but legal acts too, then things get blurry. I personally don't think a government, ultimately a servant of the people, should be allowed to keep secrets from the people, but that's currently legal for e.g. military reasons, and thus needs to be considered. Imagine for a second a parallel universe where the government wasn't evil, and while some of the released documents was showing illegal activity, others did not and in fact contained secret information about national security matters where releasing the information undermines the work (e.g. Russia/China/... monitoring, intercept measures, etc.). > So a whistleblower has to spend how many years in exile before they get their vindication? The legal system would be fundamentally broken if you could evade judgement by going into hiding, regardless of reason. Snowden should have been pardoned a long time ago, but his time in hiding is and should be inconsequential from a legal standpoint until laws are changed and pardons are made. It's up to the citizens of the U.S. to fix their country and welcome him home.

ykevinator 6y ago

That's precisely what a pardon is for. It's for exceptions.

thechao 6y ago

Put me in his jury and I’ll happily give the US govt a lesson in the powers of jury nullification.

jacobush 6y ago
They learned that a long time ago and screen jurors carefully.

borg_ 6y ago

Makes you wonder what was the motivation behind creating "Whistleblower protection" program in the first place.

TheSpiceIsLife 6y ago
Legal Theatre. Bureaucratic / political butt covering theatre.

pps43 6y ago

#2 means that there is no wistleblower protection in the intelligence community. What else could Snowden have done do to stop the crimes being committed?

craftinator 6y ago

1. Snowden is not a US judge, and hasn't spent the last half decade deciding whether each US spying operation was legal or not. Snowden released the documents that allowed the courts to decide which programs were legal, so he cannot be held responsible for the decision that the courts made, because time machines don't exist. Holding him responsible would be the same as a person calling the police to report a crime, the cops showing up and arresting a person, then months down the line the courts rule not guilty on the arrestee, so the police now go charge the original caller with false reporting. It's ludicrous to think he could've known which programs would be borderline illegal and which would step over that line. And if it took the US justice system 6 years and millions of dollars worth of man hours to actually make that decision, how could he possibly have correctly come to the same conclusion, beforehand, with no governmental support?

TheSpiceIsLife 6y ago

Simple solution: Donald Trump puts his money where is mouth is, pardons him and repatriates him.

havetocharge 6y ago
Right after he releases his tax records following the completion of the Mexican wall.

627467 6y ago

Non-us citizen nor lawyer, but doesn't a pardon require a conviction? Has Snowden been convicted? Does _anything_ obligates the President to pardon anyone? And why would those points you listed invalidate a pardon? If Snowden was considered (by courts, government) to be a whistle blower by legal definition, he wouldn't need a pardon, right?

yokaze 6y ago
> Non-us citizen nor lawyer, but doesn't a pardon require a conviction? No, Nixon wasn't convicted either. He received a pardon nonetheless. Accepting a pardon implies though an admission of guilt. > Does _anything_ obligates the President to pardon anyone? AFAIK, not in the strict sense of the word. In the looser sense, public opinion. > And why would those points you listed invalidate a pardon? It would at most, because it influences public opinion. But technically, all those are reasons, why there is a pardon. The law may say he is guilty, but there might be overruling concerns at hand.