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Kill the Snowden interview, congressman tells SXSW
- seanhandley 13y ago"Snowden, whom he described as lacking the credentials to authoritatively speak on issues pertaining to "privacy, surveillance, and online monitoring."" .... wow. I can't believe the gall of him to seriously say that. Of all the people on this planet, Snowden fits that criteria best. The congressman clearly isn't in Kansas any more on this one.
- jaworrom 13y agoKill the congress. We are tired of incompetency.
- weems 13y agoworking as an Analyst at NSA is not 'credentialed' enough? He's not a Intelligence State loyalist so he must be silenced. That is what this is about. Nothing more, nothing less.
- jmnicolas 13y agoHey at least he didn't say "kill Snowden" ... you see they're making progress :-)
- chrismcb 13y agoIt is good thing that Pompeo is concerned about SXSW's speaker's credentials. Because obviously that is why we have our government. But I'm a little surprised to see that Pompeo doesn't think that Snowden can contribute to a thoughtful and informed discourse.
- coldtea 13y ago>whom he described as lacking the credentials to authoritatively speak on issues pertaining to "privacy, surveillance, and online monitoring." That's a good thing, given that all the people with credentials giving "authoritative answers" have been bullshiting us.
- grej 13y agoSnowden was literally the catalyst for taking this entire conversation up another order of magnitude in interest. It's questionable this topic would even be at SXSW if not for him, much less headlining it. The congressman's suggestion is laughable.
- dotBen 13y agobecause, you know, being a former NSA contractor with national security clearance doesn't provide any authoritatively to speak on issues pertaining to "privacy, surveillance, and online monitoring." It's amazing that politicians spout this shit and expect the people to buy it. Actually, sadly, it isn't. :/
- molecule 13y agoGrandstanding attention whore accuses SXSW speaker of being a grandstanding attention whore.
- beedogs 13y ago> Pompeo, R-Kan., said he was "deeply troubled" by the scheduled video appearance of Snowden, whom he described as lacking the credentials to authoritatively speak on issues pertaining to "privacy, surveillance, and online monitoring." Snowden's "only apparent qualification," Pompeo wrote, "is his willingness to steal from his own government and then flee to that beacon of First Amendment freedoms, the Russia of Vladimir Putin." Right. If history has shown us anything, it's that a guy on the House intelligence committee has no idea at all what's going on in the NSA.
- baddox 13y agoWhat a dumb quote. Disregarding for the moment the wording, "willingness to steal from his own government" combined with the fact that he worked for the NSA absolutely gives Snowden the credentials to speak intelligently on these topics.
- mcv 13y agoExactly. If Snowden is not qualified to speak on this subject, then who is?
- taejo 13y ago> that beacon of First Amendment freedoms, the Russia of Vladimir Putin. This seems like a weird way to say freedom of speech, when talking about a foreign country. The first (and so far only) amendment to the Russian constitution is about term lengths for the president and Duma.
- akerl_ 13y agoThe first amendment covers more than freedom of speech, and Russia isn't exactly great at any of the other things it covers.
- ryanobjc 13y agoSo credentials aside, surely the story of Snowden has a public interest element, and is an interesting tale regardless of 'authoritative.' Besides which, in a democracy, anyone can be credentialed enough to serve in government. I'm pretty sure that Mr Pompeo's action could be seen as chilling actions in terms of the first amendment. PS: I'm watching cosmos, Mr Tyson just said "... prosecuted anyone who dared have opposing opinions to their own." He is talking about the catholic church and galileo, but it seems fitting now.
- sdrothrock 13y ago> Mr Tyson just said "... prosecuted anyone who dared have opposing opinions to their own." He is talking about the catholic church and galileo, but it seems fitting now. I don't think the US government is hunting Snowden because he "dared have opposing opinions [to theirs]," but rather because he stole state secrets and released them to the public. (I'm not saying whether that's a good or a bad thing here, just that that's why he's not the US government's best friend at the moment.)
- ryanobjc 13y agoThe parallels are more apt than it first seems... both people have their lives threatened by powerful vested interests. Both have threatened the legitimacy of the vested interests. Yes, proximately Snowden broke the law (and so did Galileo), but ultimately the real reasons was a difference of opinion.
- smsm42 13y agoCompared to Snowden, Galileo was treated much more leniently. The worst he got was house arrest, he was friends with many influential personas of the time and had opportunity even after conviction to continue his work, communicate with others, receive visitors, etc. I doubt Snowden would be allowed the same if he ever returned in the US.
- glenstein 13y agoIn this case I think that distinction is artificial. For both Snowden and the government, there's an integral relation between their actions and their opinions.
- grej 13y agoI wonder much campaign money intelligence sector crony corporations have donated to the dear congressman. EDIT: To whomever downvoted me for this comment, I looked this up on opensecrets.org. The answer is that the congressmen received a total of $20,500 in his last election cycle from defense/aerospace companies, another $10,500 from defense electronics companies, and yet another $6,000 from miscellaneous defense companies (total $37k). While those are not dominant contributions for him, they are significant. And that is a real problem when you have to ask yourself, would this person be making this statement and taking this position if they weren't receiving that money? We simply don't know the answer. Their financial support means he has a vested interest in keeping the funding flowing to these companies, which means not curtailing intel budgets.
- nodata 13y agoIt really scares me that $37k is the cost of something like that.
- panacea 13y ago$37k is just an expression of interest, and does not constitute anticipated future payments.
- pessimizer 13y agoaka speaking gigs, consultant's fees, a board seat, or a job as a lobbyist.
- pjc50 13y agoPoliticians in the West are astonishingly cheap compared to the budgets that they control. It's a sign that it's fairly hard to directly steal money and they have to be subtle about steering contracts. We're almost at the point of someone Kickstartering a politician, but not quite yet. Howard Dean came close to this.
- WickyNilliams 13y ago
- Crito 13y agoA congressman saying that an interview should not take place really tells us all that we need to know about just how much an interview should take place. I can think of no stronger endorsement of an interview.
- kevando 13y agoI didn't even know it was happening, and thanks to him I can now watch it live :)
- chris_overseas 13y agoI didn't know about this either until now. This is a great example of the Streisand Effect in action http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streisand_effect http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streisand_effect
- simonh 13y agoUnless he's a complete idiot, of course the Senator knows that calling for denying Snowden publicity is actually just going to get Snowden more publicity. That's irrelevant as long as making such a call gets him more publicity for his anti-Snowden credentials too.
- wooter 13y agowell, he definitely got himself on the incumbents-whose-challenger-i-will-financially-support list
- satellitecat 13y ago>Unless he's a complete idiot Possibly...
- minikomi 13y agoMaybe he's a Wikileaks supporter, cleverly drumming up attention for the speech.
- javajosh 13y agoThis is one of those times I wish someone with detailed knowledge of national politics could comment on this rather odd move. Why is a Congressman from Kansas making a public comment about a speaker in an event in Texas? Is he cementing his base? Pandering to his donors? It's not like SXSW is going to go, "Oh, you're absolutely right congressman, why didn't we think of that sooner?" so what's he really trying to achieve here? BTW good on SXSW organizers for involving Snowden in some way. I suspect that if you polled the participants you'd see a 90%+ Snowden approval rating.
- mattdawson 13y agoI think you underestimate the extent to which SXSW has gone mainstream. There are likely a lot of conservatives who deplore Snowden's actions participating in SXSW.
- Sanddancer 13y agoTo a decent extent, statements like this are designed to get himself some ink on a national stage, and throw his name out more on the national spotlight. He knows perfectly well that the chances of SXSW listening to his request are somewhere between slim and none, but at the same time, he can use this to help any claim he wants to lay that he's tough on terrorism and national security. Wouldn't be surprised if he's planning a move for senator or governor in the near future.
- br78 13y agoCongressmen like Mike Pompeo sit in the House of Representatives, which governs the whole US. Rep. Pompeo is on the House Intelligence Committee. He most likely honestly hate what Snowden has done and represents a part of the country which is very anti-Snowden. This is easy grandstanding for him. He's misguided, in my opinion, but that's "why".
- glenstein 13y agoI think the congressman knows he can't single handedly stop Snowden from speaking. But he can do his part to contribute to an atmosphere of pressure against Snowden speaking to nudge the probabilities in his preferred direction.
- ChuckMcM 13y agoIs he running for re-election or something? Seems like a quick way to get some press coverage, although of the Streisand effect kind rather than the 'we should listen to this guy' kind.
- rosser 13y agoIs he running for re-election or something? He's a member of the House; he's up for re-election every national election cycle. Given what I know of KS politics (I have friends and family who live there, some of whom are very politically minded), his taking a tough-on-Snowden stance will probably play very, very well to the people whose votes he cares about. For his purposes, little else matters...
- United857 13y agoJust another example of the Streisand Effect. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streisand_effect http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streisand_effect
- shmerl 13y agoApparently they got used to violating the Constitution so much, that freedom of speech doesn't concern them either.
- camus2 13y agoprobably wiping their asses with it as we speak.
- btilly 13y agoWho is he pandering to? He's in congress. So aside from his financial backers, he just needs to pander to the Republicans in his district who make it out to the primary. Because in most seats, the winner of the primary + the way the seat leans determines who wins the seat. Thus he only needs to appeal to a small niche. And how any of us feel about it is irrelevant. Understand that, and you understand the polarization of politics in the USA. Understand the polarization, and you understand a lot that is wrong with this country. :-(
- scrrr 13y ago"Pompeo, R-Kan., said he was "deeply troubled" by the scheduled video appearance of Snowden" - yeah I'm sure he can't sleep at night. Besides, don't US politicians at some point vow to protect freedom of speech?
- tinco 13y agoThat he is troubled and would recommend for Snowden not to speak at SXSW does not mean that he would not fight for Snowden's right to speak there or anywhere. Perhaps he would not though, that depends on his beliefs.
- randuser 13y agoThey should have killed the Snowden interview anyway because of all the stuff going on with Russia and Ukraine right now. Snowden's voluntary exile to Russia looks even worse to the general public and will overshadow anything he actually says during the interview.
- DanBC 13y agoThe fact that Snowden has to go to Putin's Russia to escape the US and find freedom of speech should make people realise just how weird the situation is and iust how terribly the US and EU have behaved. The UK detaining the spouse of a journalist for 9 hours, and the courts saying that was fine, was appalling.
- josephlord 13y agoYou missed the worst bit, not only did they detain him they did so under terrorism legislation on the basis that the information he might have been carrying might be useful to terrorists. The fact that the courts backed this interpretation brings all the terrorism legislation into (further?) disrepute.
- peterkelly 13y agosigh How many times do we have to go through this. Snowden is not in Russia by choice. He is there because the US government cancelled his passport, and demonstrated what would happen if he tried to go elsewhere by forcing the landing of the Bolivian president's jet based just on a suspicion he might be on board. I think it's pretty likely this was deliberately done just so they could say "Look! He's in Russia, what a hypocrite!"
- bdcravens 13y agoA live signal presumably to his location, at a scheduled time? Even though they can't do much with it (barring a World War instigating invasion), you think the powers that be would be salivating over the potential intelligence they could get out of it.
- simfoo 13y agoI presume it will be a live stream over the internet. Deploying decoy streams originating from Russia that have the same data characteristics as the real stream (encrypted of course) would be a way to make it harder to find the real origin.
- blueskin_ 13y agoSounds like an (accidental) great endorsement of the interview to me.
- Fuxy 13y agoLike anybody's going to care if the congressman approves of the interview. It's sad to hear that the opinions of the leaders are so off from the opinions of the citizens but that's precisely the reason for the leaks.
- bertil 13y agoIt’s a pet peeve, and I shouldn’t care that much but… Could we kill ‘virtual’ when used as ‘mediated’? Virtual is about not being real: it applies to stories, dreams, projects. Skype (or whatever cryptographically more relevant version Snowden will use) is as real as a phone, or a TV interview, and I don’t remember anyone describing a phone call or radio as ‘virtual’.
- minimax 13y agoI think the Snowden-in-Russia interviews are interesting to the extent that they show how Russian "active measures" actually work[1]. You can see it in the letter Snowden (and his handlers) recently sent to the European Parliament[2]. It's pretty clever the way they have been able to send thousands of troops into southern Ukraine, all the while fomenting distrust (and distraction) among NATO members with Snowden. 1. http://www.europarl.europa.eu/document/activities/cont/201403/20140307ATT80674/20140307ATT80674EN.pdf http://www.europarl.europa.eu/document/activities/cont/20140... 2. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Active_measures http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Active_measures
- gergles 13y agoOh sweet, prior restraint.