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He used 'have' after United States of America, which is a Britishism. To Americans, 'United States of America' is singular and would use "has" in this particula

He used 'have' after United States of America, which is a Britishism. To Americans, 'United States of America' is singular and would use "has" in this particular sentence: For decades the United States of America have been one of the strongest defenders of the human right to seek asylum. Maybe I'm overanalyzing but I don't think this is a verbatim statement from Snowden.

deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
il 13y ago
Sarah Harrison, the Wikileaks advisor accompanying Snowden, is a UK citizen. It's likely she had a hand in drafting this statement.
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
bcn 13y ago
Maybe it was changed since you saw it, but the statement now reads: "...the United States of America has been..." Edit to add: The statement as quoted at http://boingboing.net/2013/07/01/snowden-asks-russia-for-asylum.html http://boingboing.net/2013/07/01/snowden-asks-russia-for-asy... has the original version with "have" still in there. Here's a screenshot from twitter of the original - https://twitter.com/ClaraJeffery/status/351833289000112128 https://twitter.com/ClaraJeffery/status/351833289000112128
- tlrobinson 13y ago
  Well that's interesting...
- mpyne 13y ago
  So it was changed, and not flagged as being changed. Interesting...
  - lawnchair_larry 13y ago
    Not that interesting. It's probably because they proofread and edit statements in a manner typical of any writing fitting of a professional appearance, and didn't want tinfoil hats with an anti-wikileaks agenda to take cheapshots based on the benign edits, when the substance was not materially affected.
    - mpyne 13y ago
      I work with coders and developers from the U.K. They know what en_US is, and they know what en_GB is, and it's very obvious which is which. So to claim that WikiLeaks would fixup all of Snowden's writings to conform to en_GB and then switch it right back to en_US after HN notices is rather surreal. At best you could claim that Harrison herself simply transcribed Snowden's speech and that no one caught it until it was posted. But that still wouldn't explain what happened to some of the missing words that Snowden would have said. And that still wouldn't explain why WikiLeaks revised a statement so important without so much as a mention of proofreading corrections post-facto.
      - jlgreco 13y ago
        If they "know" en_US and en_GB, then assuming the statement is not actually Snowden's but rather was written by a Brit, why did that Brit get it wrong? If making a mistake while falsifying a statement from Snowden is plausible, then why isn't making a mistake while editing or transcribing plausible? I think you need to loosen your tinfoil.
        mpyne 13y ago
        It may very well be tinfoil. But right now the totality of the evidence points me to the idea that this isn't 100% Snowden's words. Forget about the grammar and punctuation; read the words. Does that sound like the same person talking about civil liberties and how Obama didn't change enough for him, and being ready to stand up for what he believes in? Or does that sound more like a certain other ego at opposition to the U.S. government and especially its President?
- qwertzlcoatl 13y ago
  Oh, they edited it in the last 8 minutes. I was copy pasting from the wikileaks post in my comment and still have a tab open where they used "have" instead.
brown9-2 13y ago
Since it was a letter to Ecuador, it may have been poorly translated into English for posting.
teeja 13y ago
There you go, let's all get caught up in the endless distractions. Maybe Snowden's words were run past an editor (as are most journalist's words) of British public-school extraction, who applied reflexively what he'd been taught? This kind of over-parsing is typical of the kind of intensive derailing of Snowden's message that's been going on. ANYTHING to distract us from the Naked Exercise of Unlimited Power of Questionable Legality that's been uncovered.
- krapp 13y ago
  Or, perhaps it's only reasonable to be skeptical.
decklin 13y ago
This has actually been a debated usage in American English: http://www.visualthesaurus.com/cm/wordroutes/the-united-states-is-or-are/ http://www.visualthesaurus.com/cm/wordroutes/the-united-stat...
- mpyne 13y ago
  That debate effectively ended in 1865.
mistercow 13y ago
In addition to the likelihood of this just being a matter of editing, I use British style punctuation with quotation marks even though I'm an American. I wonder, were I ever in a situation where the authenticity of my statements were hard to validate, if my punctuation style would be taken as evidence of forgery.
wavesounds 13y ago
He probably called someone and read them the statement over the phone. That way he wouldn't have to risk exposing his laptop to the internet, assuming he even has a laptop or access to the internet.

deleted 13y ago

[deleted]

il 13y ago

Sarah Harrison, the Wikileaks advisor accompanying Snowden, is a UK citizen. It's likely she had a hand in drafting this statement.

deleted 13y ago
[deleted]

bcn 13y ago

Maybe it was changed since you saw it, but the statement now reads: "...the United States of America has been..." Edit to add: The statement as quoted at http://boingboing.net/2013/07/01/snowden-asks-russia-for-asylum.html http://boingboing.net/2013/07/01/snowden-asks-russia-for-asy... has the original version with "have" still in there. Here's a screenshot from twitter of the original - https://twitter.com/ClaraJeffery/status/351833289000112128 https://twitter.com/ClaraJeffery/status/351833289000112128

tlrobinson 13y ago
Well that's interesting...
mpyne 13y ago
So it was changed, and not flagged as being changed. Interesting...
- lawnchair_larry 13y ago
  Not that interesting. It's probably because they proofread and edit statements in a manner typical of any writing fitting of a professional appearance, and didn't want tinfoil hats with an anti-wikileaks agenda to take cheapshots based on the benign edits, when the substance was not materially affected.
  - mpyne 13y ago
    I work with coders and developers from the U.K. They know what en_US is, and they know what en_GB is, and it's very obvious which is which. So to claim that WikiLeaks would fixup all of Snowden's writings to conform to en_GB and then switch it right back to en_US after HN notices is rather surreal. At best you could claim that Harrison herself simply transcribed Snowden's speech and that no one caught it until it was posted. But that still wouldn't explain what happened to some of the missing words that Snowden would have said. And that still wouldn't explain why WikiLeaks revised a statement so important without so much as a mention of proofreading corrections post-facto.
    - jlgreco 13y ago
      If they "know" en_US and en_GB, then assuming the statement is not actually Snowden's but rather was written by a Brit, why did that Brit get it wrong? If making a mistake while falsifying a statement from Snowden is plausible, then why isn't making a mistake while editing or transcribing plausible? I think you need to loosen your tinfoil.
      - mpyne 13y ago
        It may very well be tinfoil. But right now the totality of the evidence points me to the idea that this isn't 100% Snowden's words. Forget about the grammar and punctuation; read the words. Does that sound like the same person talking about civil liberties and how Obama didn't change enough for him, and being ready to stand up for what he believes in? Or does that sound more like a certain other ego at opposition to the U.S. government and especially its President?
qwertzlcoatl 13y ago
Oh, they edited it in the last 8 minutes. I was copy pasting from the wikileaks post in my comment and still have a tab open where they used "have" instead.

brown9-2 13y ago

Since it was a letter to Ecuador, it may have been poorly translated into English for posting.

teeja 13y ago

There you go, let's all get caught up in the endless distractions. Maybe Snowden's words were run past an editor (as are most journalist's words) of British public-school extraction, who applied reflexively what he'd been taught? This kind of over-parsing is typical of the kind of intensive derailing of Snowden's message that's been going on. ANYTHING to distract us from the Naked Exercise of Unlimited Power of Questionable Legality that's been uncovered.

krapp 13y ago
Or, perhaps it's only reasonable to be skeptical.

decklin 13y ago

This has actually been a debated usage in American English: http://www.visualthesaurus.com/cm/wordroutes/the-united-states-is-or-are/ http://www.visualthesaurus.com/cm/wordroutes/the-united-stat...

mpyne 13y ago
That debate effectively ended in 1865.

mistercow 13y ago

In addition to the likelihood of this just being a matter of editing, I use British style punctuation with quotation marks even though I'm an American. I wonder, were I ever in a situation where the authenticity of my statements were hard to validate, if my punctuation style would be taken as evidence of forgery.

wavesounds 13y ago

He probably called someone and read them the statement over the phone. That way he wouldn't have to risk exposing his laptop to the internet, assuming he even has a laptop or access to the internet.