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Bolivian President's Plane 'Rerouted Over Snowden Suspicions'
niftydude writes with the latest news on the Edward Snowden saga. It appears that the Bolivian President's plane was denied access to French and Spanish airspace due to suspicions that Snowden was on board. Quoting a few pieces from the Guardian: "In an extraordinary move, France and Portugal revoked flight clearances for the Bolivian President's plane on Tuesday after representations were reportedly made by the U.S. State Department. Mr Morales was flying home from an energy conference in Moscow and his aircraft was hastily rerouted to Vienna, Austria. Bolivian Foreign Minister David Choquehuanca angrily denied that Mr Snowden was on the President's aircraft, a fact later confirmed by Austrian authorities, and said France and Portugal would have to explain why they abruptly canceled authorization for the flight. AP reports that Venezuela's foreign minister Elias Jaua has condemned the decision by France and Portugal to block the plane from its airspace. He claimed that changing a flight's route without checking on how much fuel was left in the plane, put Morales' life at risk."
Spain claims they only agreed to allow the plane to refuel there if it were subject to search, and France did end up authorizing use of their air space today. In related news, Julian Assange and the general secretary of Reporters Without Borders Christophe Deloire published an Op-Ed today why Europe must protect Snowden. And: dryriver sends news that Ecuador discovered that their embassy in London was bugged, describing the incident as "another instance of a loss of ethics at the international level in relations between governments."
"Home of the brave, land of calling for the assassination of anyone who pulls back the veneer hiding the relentless authoritarianism" just didn't have the same ring, I guess.
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He must be something much more dangerous to somebody. I don't understand how everything he revealed can be so trivialized, and yet he be this sought after.
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and I'll bet France and Portugal have business interests associated with Bolivia's lithium deposits. Morales could spank both of them by levying an access fee amounting to a few hundred million Euros. Gotta make it more expensive to be a USA poodle if we want this bad behavior to stop.
No matter what you think of Snowden, at this point he's just a whistleblower or spy.
Just a whistle blower? He's God damn American hero, even if most American's can't understand that. Where are the yellow ribbons reading "Support Our Whistle Blowers"?
Simple. The hunt for him is a threat against any other would be whistleblower.
It's time to go beyond petty shit like that.
Patriotic Americans should descend on DC with pitchforks, tar and feathers, and enhanced voting techniques.
What changed under Obama? Nothing Good
land of the free, home of the "shit, that guy must be snuffed out, he told the world how dirty we really are. an example must be made so that others think twice about being a whistleblower".
happy fourth of july, fellow americans ;( can't say I'm very proud to be american right now. in fact, I'm ashamed of what my country is looking like, to the rest of the world.
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"It is now safe to switch off your computer."
Snowden didn't make you look bad by revealing your little games both at home and abroad. You made us look bad by pulling this shit in the first place.
Cut it out and give Snowden the hero's welcome home he deserves.
I like this quote: "Index on Censorship said to EU states this morning: "Members of the EU have a duty to protect freedom of expression and should not interfere in an individual's attempts to seek asylum. Edward Snowden is a whistleblower whose free speech rights should be protected not criminalised.""
If this was done to Air Force One, there would be outrage and calls for war.
Of course. But it wasn't Air Force One, it was merely the plane of the president of some unimportant country that's not the US. So who cares, right? Only the US really matters. Only the people in charge of the US really matter, I mean. If there's one thing abundantly clear now, it's that.
lets also blame our fellow geeks who have ENABLED this spying via their tech efforts.
do you work for a networking company and have you worked on any sniffer or DPI code or hardware? you are to blame - you are part of the problem!
do you work for anything having to do with calea? you are to blame!
do you look the other way when you go into work each day? how do you justify the harm you are doing? oh right, you're helping to 'catch bad guys'. yeah, keep telling yourselves that.
fellow geeks who enable the evil governments that spy are FULLY TO BLAME just as much as the politicians and folks in power who ordered the equipment and software to do this.
seriously - if we, as a group, said NO to such jobs, they would not get done. but we are whores and will work for spying companies and not even think twice about it.
its fucked up beyond belief. and we are part of the problem.
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"It is now safe to switch off your computer."
He's a man with principles. There's nothing more dangerous to illegitimate authority. They are sending a message to every individual who cares about liberty and the rule of law: "If you stick your neck out, we will stomp on your face".
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the highest rule one can follow is to Do The Right Thing. we each should have some idea as to what that is.
this is higher than any loyalty to a government or country. higher than loyalty to a religion. higher than what your employer wants you to do.
I include manning and snowden as true heros and patriots. when a country or government goes bad (ours has, in case there was any doubt) then its your DUTY to Do The Right Thing and inform on them.
the notion of checks and balances is near and dear to my heart. those who keep the people informed of wrongdoings are at the highest level of hero.
its sad that our modern heros are being treated like criminals. isn't that a laugh, the criminals are punishing the good guys. I'm not sure when things got so backwards, but they clearly are, now.
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"It is now safe to switch off your computer."
i assume some blame must also reside with the ball-less wonders of Europe?
If this was done at the request of the Americans, they've well overestimated their own importance
I take great offense at that statement. the corrupticians in power run bartertown. the american people have no say in things anymore.
please do not assume that We The People have any control over our lawless government officials. that boat sailed a long time ago and it isn't coming back any time soon.
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"It is now safe to switch off your computer."
There's laws (in theory at least) in the US to protect whistle blowers, even those who release information the way he did. While we can argue back and forth over whether he'll get a fair trial, he is entitled to his day in court. From what I've read of it, the information gathering being done is against the US constitution, and he should be exonerated.
So why, then, did he choose to go into exile rather than accept the consequences and justify his actions in court? And what did he think he had to gain by going to Julian Assange? These are the questions people need to be asking about this situation...
I'm sorry, but your arguments sounds a lot like the ones we hear against anonymity, and in favor or letting the government spy on its people.
The reason he went into exile is simple: he doesn't trust the government. And rightly so.
Maybe he doesn't want to be a martyr?
morcego
If it's not specifically authorized in the Constitution, it's not legitimate authority. Generalized surveillance is prohibited by the 4th amendment, no matter how many representatives or judges have oversight. Congressional oversight of an unconstitutional law does not make that law legitimate, it makes those congress people traitors to their oath to defend the Constitution. The only way to make this legal is to amend the Constitution.
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Sadly, in America there does seem to be a growing number of people who have no issue with arresting protesters, dissenters and other people who speak against the status quo. You only have to look at major recent protests over the past ten years (OWS, G8, anti-Iraq War, etc) to see how often people are detained under the most frivolous of charges. Dare to step outside the designated "free speech zones" they outline for you, be they literal or figurative and thereby attract the attention of the Powers That Be and you are ever more likely to rue your actions. I had a colleague who went to one OWS protest, was arrested but never charged and /still/ he had to go to court three times. He wasn't imprisoned but just the inconvenience of having all these court dates has made him reconsider participating in future protests.
The grandparent poster wasn't suggesting that /you/ believe in arresting dissenters, or even that most Americans do. But increasingly there is an awareness that if you /do/ go to one of these protests, you are likely to face detainment despite the fact you are doing nothing more than expressing your right to free speech and assembly. Are they arresting everybody? Of course not, but it is far more likely to happen than it was even fifteen years ago. It is a legitimate fear.
And America is less free because of it.
The american people are complicit in the thuggish behavior of their own government in the same way the German populace was complicit with the thuggery of the Nazi government of the 1930's and 40's.
So why, then, did he choose to go into exile rather than accept the consequences and justify his actions in court?
Have you seen what due process has been for Bradley Manning? During his nine-month stay in Fort Quantico, he was reportedly held in solitary confinement for 23 hours a day, forced to sleep naked without pillows and sheets on his bed, and restricted from physical recreation or access to television. A military judge ruled that his treatment was excessive and credited him with some time served against any future punishment.
The government has demonstrated that it will crush whistleblowers who try to defy it. Who in their right mind would allow this to happen to them? Extreme measures for Snowden to protect himself just mirror the extreme measures our government has taken to punish those who oppose it.
Yes, an assassination is unlikely.... now. Snowden played it smart, got a lot of media involved, and got his face and his story spread all over the world. That is the only thing that has kept him alive.
Right now all we have are the accusations of one man who, by the way, has his own agenda.
President Morales was not the only one on that plane. It is the accusations of everyone on that plane. And his agenda was just to fly home.
He's riled up sentiment among the Latin American countries against the U.S.
No. We and our French and Portuguese lapdogs (who cannot seem to get enough of our cum down their throats) have riled up sentiment. And rightfully so. If we are willing to essentially ground the plane of a foreign president for just the slightest of rumors can you imagine what we would do if there were some real evidence that Snowden were on the plane. Would we simply shoot the plane down? Maybe. I've never heard of anything like this before. It sounds like the US government wants Snowden more than they have ever wanted anyone. I shudder to think what the government has done that makes them so afraid of this guy.
Maybe what he is saying is true, but the countries involved deny it.
Have you got any evidence for that? They haven't denied it. Even if France and Portugal do deny it no one with any sense is going to believe them because it is by far the most likely sequence of events that could lead to President Morales' plane changing course and landing in Austria.
I'm beginning to suspect that Snowden is dead no matter what he does. If the US governemnt feels he is so dangerous that they have to ground a president's plane like this over the most insubstantial of rumors then he is well and truly fucked. They will simply assasinate him and try to make it look like an accident or extraordinary rendition him to gitmo and torture and murder him there. It is sad because he truly is a brave hero. Obama's protest that this issue is not worthy of his attention is starting to sound more and more like the opposite of the truth. It is becoming clear that they are terrified of what he might reveal. It's sickening to speculate about, but maybe it is something that makes Abu Ghraib seem tame in comparison.
Quite an experience to live in fear, isn't it? That's what it is to be a slave.
Apologies if you were trying to be ironic, but that sounds like a perfect comparison.
How many people disappeared in the night, only to be rendered to random countries around the world to be tortured?
How many were sent to Guantanamo?
How many were just killed by extra-judicial drone attacks?
Backup not found: (A)bort (R)etry (P)anic
Right now, there are people who will throw acid on girls for going to school or kill their sisters for dancing in the rain
There are also people who will fabricate grounds for a war that kills half a million people (iraq). Those who will overthrow democratically elected regimes in favor of friendly dictators (iran). Those who will ally with the worst of the wahabists (saudi arabia) while overthrowing a much more progressive secular government.
These are not people who will sit down at the breakfast table and discuss their problems calmly over a croissant. They're going to kill people for what we consider no reason at all, and the only thing they can understand is force
You could say the same about the hawks in the US government.
WE ARE the kinds of people who will sit down and discuss our problems over a croissant.
Apparently we're not. It's been, what, 50 years now and Kissinger has never as much been indicted for war crimes? Can we expect Bush to be?
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To be honest, I'm kind of shocked at how far they've let that veil fly open, and for how long. If there's one thing politicians are good at, it's PR and vague, meaningless statements. But they're being really specific. "These programs are legal! Full oversight! Bipartisan support! That dude's a traitor!"
It's incredibly (or intentionally?) botched PR. Why is the NSA still in the spotlight (or at least light) instead of slipping back into the shadows?
Usually, it would go something like:
1) Whistlerblower: "They doin' the snoops!"
2) Republicans: "Saint Bush never intended this! It must be a secret Muslim plot by Obama to install Sharia law!"
3) Dems: "No way, it was the Cincinnati branch of the NSA!"
4) Senate hearings: "Mr. Snowden, thank you for your service to your country."
5) Snowden: "No prob. I'll go rot in obscurity now."
6) NSA: "Ow. My wrist. From the slapping." (Goes right back to biz as usual)
Instead we've got international relations breakdowns, furious Internet rage that might actually result in demonstrations (for what that's worth).
What the hell is going on?
We don't have a state-run media we have a media-run state.
Well, if you want to get into raw numbers, the United States is responsible for at least a few million deaths worldwide since the end of WWII. If you count our proxy wars and the wars we helped arrange, such as the Iran-Iraq War, the Soviet-Afghan conflict, various central American death squads, etc, then it is upwards of 20-30 million dead in the last sixty years or so.
(Here's a weak source, but discussing our empire isn't exactly acceptable conversation in regular media outlets. The basic facts are undeniable, even if you'd like to discount our role in arranging, funding, and supplying arms for war that are in our own interest.)
We're not above watching people die of starvation either:
I think we all remember how many WMDs were found after we spilled the blood of our own and hundreds of thousands of Iraqis, along with emptying our treasury of five trillion dollars.
In any case, what is undeniable is that the United States of today and the Stalinist era of the USSR both share one common feature: the respective governments of both nations are hiding their decisions to have people killed and imprisoned from a transparent judicial process. Our government has now openly declared that the political elite are above the law.
But instead of talking about those hard realities, you have backpedaled to the position that we are not as bad as Stalin.
Well, that's a load off my mind! I hope Obama spends the 4th helping military doctors force feed hunger striking prisoners at Guantanamo while they celebrate spending the rest of their lives without the right to a trial. I even have an idea of what we can write on the cake:
"NOT AS BAD AS STALIN!"
"USA! USA! USA!"