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Disagree entirely. What needs to change is the current culture of individual worship. If we continue our insatiability for personal narratives, we run into sit

Disagree entirely. What needs to change is the current culture of individual worship. If we continue our insatiability for personal narratives, we run into situations where organizations like the NSA can choose scapegoats and blame everything on them. That would be bad, because mass surveillance programs are not the work of individuals, they are systemic constructs. So the NSA gets to hold one or two out people for crucifixion, say "see, we've made things right by punishing X and Y", and continue doing things exactly as they've always done them.

javajosh 13y ago
Criminal penalties cannot be levied against organizations, only the individuals that make up those organizations. The NSA might say, "Well, I was only following orders," but that wasn't a cogent defense at Nuremberg and it's not a cogent defense now. Given that prior NSA director (Hayden) threatened to resign rather than implement similar schemes, it seems that Alexander is indeed culpable.
w_o 13y ago
shhh, i think the greeks are calling. (in case this falls flat, individual worship is nothing new.)
- obstacle1 13y ago
  Heh. I hope I didn't imply that this attitude is something new. I think, frankly, that it's too engrained in our collective consciousness by now to ever change. But offering criticism that could be acted on is, I think, more productive than expressing the fatalist position that we're all fucked.
seclorum 13y ago
I agree that we could all do with a little less idol worship, but I think that what javajosh pointed out is also very important. We have all been conditioned to use dialectic materialism as a means by which to argue - and THIS is the issue. There is a third way in this debate - and that is, continue to discover the crimes of the US Military Industrial complex, enlighten the people, and remove the criminals from power before it is too late. Going back on forth on the "rightness/wrongness" of this whole situation is exactly what the powers that be expect, and depend on in order to continue to be able to operate in full view. Abandon the synthesis/anti-synthesis method in this debate, people. Remember: what he revealed so far is just the tip of the iceberg. There are far more heinous secrets to be revealed, and we would all be better off - US Citizen, or not - if these secrets were finally pulled out into the open and made available for The People to understand.
- embolism 13y ago
  Quite possibly not. If the revelation of such secrets allowed china or russia to rise to power we would be worse off. Remember China is a country in which a policeman can send you to jail without trial for criticizing the government.
  - seclorum 13y ago
    Its no less terrifying than the fact that the US gov't can send you off to a top secret location for whatever reason it feels is an appropriate reason, whatsoever, and you will be left there without recourse or access to any Internationally-recognized forms of justice ..

javajosh 13y ago

Criminal penalties cannot be levied against organizations, only the individuals that make up those organizations. The NSA might say, "Well, I was only following orders," but that wasn't a cogent defense at Nuremberg and it's not a cogent defense now. Given that prior NSA director (Hayden) threatened to resign rather than implement similar schemes, it seems that Alexander is indeed culpable.

w_o 13y ago

shhh, i think the greeks are calling. (in case this falls flat, individual worship is nothing new.)

obstacle1 13y ago
Heh. I hope I didn't imply that this attitude is something new. I think, frankly, that it's too engrained in our collective consciousness by now to ever change. But offering criticism that could be acted on is, I think, more productive than expressing the fatalist position that we're all fucked.

seclorum 13y ago

I agree that we could all do with a little less idol worship, but I think that what javajosh pointed out is also very important. We have all been conditioned to use dialectic materialism as a means by which to argue - and THIS is the issue. There is a third way in this debate - and that is, continue to discover the crimes of the US Military Industrial complex, enlighten the people, and remove the criminals from power before it is too late. Going back on forth on the "rightness/wrongness" of this whole situation is exactly what the powers that be expect, and depend on in order to continue to be able to operate in full view. Abandon the synthesis/anti-synthesis method in this debate, people. Remember: what he revealed so far is just the tip of the iceberg. There are far more heinous secrets to be revealed, and we would all be better off - US Citizen, or not - if these secrets were finally pulled out into the open and made available for The People to understand.

embolism 13y ago
Quite possibly not. If the revelation of such secrets allowed china or russia to rise to power we would be worse off. Remember China is a country in which a policeman can send you to jail without trial for criticizing the government.
- seclorum 13y ago
  Its no less terrifying than the fact that the US gov't can send you off to a top secret location for whatever reason it feels is an appropriate reason, whatsoever, and you will be left there without recourse or access to any Internationally-recognized forms of justice ..