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Eric Holder Says Snowden Performed 'Public Service' (cnn.com)
An anonymous reader writes from a report via CNN: Former U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder says Edward Snowden performed a "public service" by triggering a debate over surveillance techniques, but still must pay a penalty for illegally leaking a trove of classified intelligence documents. "We can certainly argue about the way in which Snowden did what he did, but I think that he actually performed a public service by raising the debate that we engaged in and by the changes that we made," Holder told David Axelrod on "The Axe Files," a podcast produced by CNN and the University of Chicago Institute of Politics. "Now I would say that doing what he did -- and the way he did it -- was inappropriate and illegal," Holder added. "I think that he's got to make a decision. He's broken the law in my view. He needs to get lawyers, come on back, and decide, see what he wants to do: Go to trial, try to cut a deal. I think there has to be a consequence for what he has done." "But," Holder emphasized, "I think in deciding what an appropriate sentence should be, I think a judge could take into account the usefulness of having had that national debate." You can listen to the podcast with Eric Holder here.
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Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
He doesn't want immunity for Snowden. He's explicitly said that there must be consequences.
It's possible to acknowledge that an act led to good outcomes while still breaking the law in a way that can not be supported. Holder is taking that perspective.
Sorry, but "elevating the debate?" NOTHING has changed. The NSA is still illegally conducting mass surveillance on innocent American citizens. There has been ZERO accountability for the NSA and CIA's blatant and PROVEN lies to Congress under oath. There has been no systemic reform nor even the slightest attempt to adhere to Constitutional principles.
And all this while the US government is still seeking to blame Snowden for endangering national security, haul him back to the US and put him on trial? Should we feel comforted by the statements of a FORMER US Attorney General who has no actual power, just because he says that a judge would consider the ends of Snowden's actions when punishing him for the means by which those ends were achieved--mind you, never once actually admitting that such disclosures would NEVER have come to light by any other way? So we are now to believe Eric Holder's facetious claims of leniency, when NOT ONCE has he said anything to the effect of needing to investigate the NSA for breaking the law and for lying to Congress?
Fuck you and the high horse you rode in on. This is why we can't trust the government. This is why nobody with a brain believes you for a second, because we KNOW what happened in the past and we are not so stupid as to forget actual concrete outcomes. The harassment of past NSA whistleblowers, ruining their ability to work in anything but the most menial jobs for having dared to expose the corruption of those higher up; the incarceration and inhumane treatment of Chelsea Manning for her involvement in Wikileaks' exposing the indiscriminate behavior of the American military; and the complete arrogance of the FBI in attempting to force Apple to write source code to circumvent iOS encryption that would allow them to access all data on any iPhone--these are just a FEW of the demonstrably true actions on the part of the government that show that they cannot be trusted and are hopelessly corrupt in their thirst for power.
Snowden was correct to expose the NSA. However, he was wrong to believe that his actions could have possibly shamed the US government and it citizens into holding it accountable.
Fuck Holder. If him and his stupid cronies didn't retaliate against whistle blowers Snowden might not have had to do what he did.
He doesn't want immunity for Snowden. He's explicitly said that there must be consequences.
It's possible to acknowledge that an act led to good outcomes while still breaking the law in a way that can not be supported. Holder is taking that perspective.
That kind of reasoning should have led Holder to crack down hard on illegal immigration.
He didn't, so I suspect he doesn't reason that way.
It's wrong to presume that there was a legal way for Snowden to do what he did, because several previous whistle blowers who went by the book were targeted and prosecuted by the government. The intelligence agencies, and the politicians who support them, do not tolerate leaks—even well-intentioned ones that follow protocol and seek only to expose wrongdoing to the "proper" authorities.
Let's not talk about Edward Snowden being brought to trial. Rather, the people in our intelligence agencies and their allies in elected offices who subvert our laws, or who downright break our laws, and who vindictively attack anyone who tries to expose their unlawful, un-democratic, and anti-social behavior are the ones who need to be brought to trial. Hold them accountable first—and then we can talk about Edward Snowden.
quiquid id est, timeo puellas et oscula dantes.
The 'He did a public service; but how he did it was wrong and wicked and why didn't he go through channels?' position is insufferably smarmy.
Had he gone through channels, that public service would never have occurred. He wasn't the first person inside the intelligence apparatus to grow uneasy with what was going on; but 'politely ask your boss to reconsider his own malfeasance' just doesn't do very much.
If you agree that he did something valuable for the public and the country; you pretty much have to admit that his options were limited for doing so(there is room for quibbling about the finer points of his plan; but you can't very well deny that it was a 'leak it or let it stay in the dark indefinitely' situation). That's the whole point of 'whistleblower' as a distinct class of people working against corruption: they are the ones who bring in external scrutiny when an organization's internal governance has been co-opted by whatever malfeasance they are exposing. More or less by definition they have to use 'illicit' methods; because the problem extends to the people who control all the legitimate methods.
It's perfectly cogent to argue that someone leaked something without reason, and should therefor face the consequences; but 'his reasons were excellent and he did us all a service' is an admission that there were no 'legitimate' channels through which he could have worked.
As far the deal cutting part that is bullshit. Justice is not served by some deal under the table! Whether or not you agree what with happened.
You're pretty optimistic if you think it would be as short as 5 years. In all likelihood, he would be jailed for the rest of his life, assuming he wasn't executed for treason. It is unlikely he would see anything approaching justice were he to come back.
It certainly doesn't help his expectation of justice that the US is still largely continuing unconstitutional practices and that no one has been taken to task for the exposed, illegal actions.
Quote from summary:
"I think a judge could take into account the usefulness of having had that national debate."
Under current laws, such an argument would not be allowed in front of a jury. Snowden have stated that he would return and face a jury of his peers if they were allowed to consider the utility of the public debate.
Yup. If the administration weren't just blowing smoke about "defend his acts in court", they would need to drop the accusation under the Espionage Act and instead charge him for something matching his actual offense, like Pubilcation of Classified Documents, where he actually is allowed to justify his acts rather than having only the option to deny them which would be absurd.
The US was founded by quite a few acts like that - remember the Boston Tea Party for one ?
You would think the government born from civil disobedience against unjust laws would be less eager to punish that.
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