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House Committee: Edward Snowden's Leaks Did 'Tremendous Damage' (nbcnews.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from NBC News: The U.S. House intelligence committee on Thursday unanimously approved a blistering report on the activities of Edward Snowden, saying his disclosures of top-secret documents and programs did "tremendous damage" to national security. "The public narrative popularized by Snowden and his allies is rife with falsehoods, exaggerations, and crucial omissions," said the report by staff members of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence. Contrary to Snowden's statements that he intended to reveal programs that intruded on the privacy of Americans, the House report concluded that the vast majority of the 1.5 million documents he stole "have nothing to do with programs impacting individual privacy interests. They instead pertain to military, defense, and intelligence programs of great interest to America's adversaries." The report said Snowden did not, as he claimed, try to express his concerns about potentially illegal intelligence gathering in a way that would qualify him as a whistleblower. The report was disputed by Snowden's ACLU-provided attorney. "This is a dishonest report that attempts to discredit a genuine American hero," said Wizner. "But after years of 'investigation,' the committee still can't point to any remotely credible evidence that Snowden's disclosures caused harm. The truth is that Edward Snowden and the journalists with whom he worked did the job that the House Intelligence Committee was supposed to do: bring meaningful oversight to the U.S. Intelligence community. They did so responsibly and carefully, and their efforts have led to historic reforms."
CHELSEA MANNING should also receive a FULL pardon from President BARAK OBAMA. She is being tortured by the US Navy and is being DENIED access to her attorney and the internet and a cell phone and a laptop. She is also being force-fed through a tube because she refused to eat because she is being treated unjustly and has come down with several throat infections. When you forcefully shove a tube down someones throat, this causes irritation and ultimately leads to infection. She is denied linen and clothing and lives with a bright halogen light on in her cell 24 hours a day. SHE IS BEING TORTURED. What is America going to do about this???
This is an election year. they wont dare be authoritarian against such rallies. it would force them to eat the crow.
because laws are for the governed, no the governors.
those that embarass the govenors are traitors, because the governed are the natural enemies of the governors, and one must be among the elite to get such dirt to share.
this is very simple to understnd.
Snowden didn't post any documents online. That is what Manning did. Snowden gave his documents to journalists that reviewed them and release curtailed information.
Keep in mind he exposed a global crime spree by a criminal organisation that broke laws on every single country on the planet. We are literately talking about tens of millions of crimes being committed by that corrupt organisation. The core intent of the crimes, the total control of the planet and turning it into a slave nation via a permanent state of political blackmail. Really sick stuff.
Inherently electoral laws, the prime laws when it comes to democracy were broken upon a massive scale. Corrupt politicians and government officials were seeking to keep secret their criminal activities at tax payer expense when they knew full well those secrets would have a huge bearing upon the voters decisions. Wake up, we do not serve government, the government is our institution meant to serve us and tell us the truth, so we can choose whether or not to replace them at the next election based upon their true actions during their time in office. It is against the constitution and electoral laws for the government to keep secrets and lie to us when that would have an impact on elections.
Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen
Yet another American who doesn't know the difference between the EU, EC and Eurozone.
He seems to think the EU came to be when the Eurozone was instituted with a common currency.
So to help him out:
The EU as an idea was born in 1948 after World War 2 and the long, slow diplomatic process of establishing it began then.
The precursor of the EU were the European Coal and Steel Community which was form in 1951.
In 1957 the Treaty of Rome was signed which in 1958 became the European Economic Community, which consisted of the 6 original members including Germany and France.
In 1965 the 3 market communities that made up the EEC was merged together to use a single set of institutions (courts and such) and this became known as the European Communities.
By 1973 this had enlarged significantly and in 1979 the first direct elections to the European Parliament happened.
The EU effectively reached it's current form in 1991 after the fall of the Soviet Union when East-Germany and other East-block nations started joining.
But in effect the EU dates back to 1948. And you may have noticed the absence of any major European landwars after world war 2 - the EU was created to avoid that, and in that regard at least, it has succeeded.
It's also weird that me, an African, seem to understand EU structures better than the parent poster - in fact the EU is one of the most democratic systems on earth. The European Parliament members are elected by voters in member nations. The EU holds referendums on any major issues allowing voters to override their representatives (in this regard it's more democratic than America where referendums are extremely rare events). Essentially the EU is much like the US Federal government with memberstate governments no unlike US state governments - but significantly more powerful and with a very direct say in EU governance, which state governments in the US don't get.
The parent poster, like so many others, confuses the EC for the EU and calls the EU undemocratic, which it decidedly is not. The EC is not democratic, but the EC is also not a government - it's an economic management commission that reports to the parliament. It's powers are strictly limited to purely economic matters: the currency, trade regulations and common standards.
In effect, the EC's closest US counterpart would be the Federal Reserve Bank and the Treasury, neither of which is democratic THERE either - because it makes no sense for such institutions to be democratic. They need appointed experts who know what they are doing, not people good at winning elections and importantly they must be run by people who don't worry about winning re-election because such institutions *have* to be able to make unpopular choices at times.
Currently the EC is pushing austerity measures very hard - all the economics say this is a terrible idea but the current set of commissioners are sold on it. There is huge public unhappiness about this. But they are able to do this, which they believe is required to keep the economy functioning, despite the opposition. Now of course, the problem with experts being able to do unpopular things is that sometimes they do things which are unpopular because they are wrong. But that's still better than doing what's popular because it's popular - a great way to destroy an economy rapidly. It's not ideal, but it's also the best system we have for these things and until somebody invents something better - every other idea is even worse.
So no, calling the EU undemocratic is fundamentally ignorant. Confusing the EC with it's extremely limited powers undemocratic would be true - but meaningless.
Unicode killed the ASCII-art *
Unfortunately I never obtained a Slashdot ID, so I have to post as an AC, but this post is full of factual inaccuracies and outright errors.
Let's start:
Yet another American who doesn't know the difference between the EU, EC and Eurozone.
He seems to think the EU came to be when the Eurozone was instituted with a common currency.
So to help him out:
Well, you could start by toning down the arrogant attitude: it isn't an American's job to understand the EU or the Euro zone and you yourself haven't really understood it either.
The EU as an idea was born in 1948 after World War 2 and the long, slow diplomatic process of establishing it began then.
The precursor of the EU were the European Coal and Steel Community which was form in 1951.
In 1957 the Treaty of Rome was signed which in 1958 became the European Economic Community, which consisted of the 6 original members including Germany and France.
In 1965 the 3 market communities that made up the EEC was merged together to use a single set of institutions (courts and such) and this became known as the European Communities.
By 1973 this had enlarged significantly and in 1979 the first direct elections to the European Parliament happened.
The EU effectively reached it's current form in 1991 after the fall of the Soviet Union when East-Germany and other East-block nations started joining.
But in effect the EU dates back to 1948.
The EU (European Union) took shape after the treaty of Maastricht in 1992. Before that, there was the EEC, which was the European Economic Community, a rather different, substantially less political beast. Note the bold face: the EEC was a primarily economic idea.
And you may have noticed the absence of any major European landwars after world war 2 - the EU was created to avoid that, and in that regard at least, it has succeeded.
Wrong. The EU was not created to end European wars. That was NATO's job; that's why NATO was created. The reason why we haven't had a major war in Europe is due in major part to American military presence to counter Soviet aggression after World War II and of course to the creation of NATO.
The EEC was a side-note here: it made a major war between European countries less likely by promoting the integration of their economies and raising the bar to wanting to start a war. The EEC did not prevent any war in Europe.
It's also weird that me, an African, seem to understand EU structures better than the parent poster - in fact the EU is one of the most democratic systems on earth.
While the EU is democratic, it does have very significant democratic deficits. Calling it 'one of the most democratic' systems is quite a stretch.
The European Parliament members are elected by voters in member nations.
Correct, but the European Parliament has very little actual powers. The real power is wielded by the European Commission, which is appointed. This is what bothers so many people.
The EU holds referendums on any major issues allowing voters to override their representatives (in this regard it's more democratic than America where referendums are extremely rare events).
The EU does no such thing. National governments can call referendums, the EU cannot.
Essentially the EU is much like the US Federal government with memberstate governments no unlike US state governments - but significantly more powerful and with a very direct say in EU governance, which state governments in the US don't get.
The parent poster, like so many others, confuses the EC for the EU and calls the EU undemocratic, which it decidedly is not. The EC is not democratic, but the EC is also not a government - it's an economic management commission that reports to the parliament. It's powers are strictly limited to purely economic matters