
Edward Snowden says he would like to return home - smacktoward
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/edward-snowden-nsa-cbs-this-morning-interview-today-2019-09-16/
======
BucketSort
Edward Snowden being treated like a criminal instead of a hero really opened
my eyes. He's a patriot who tried to warn us about a government agency
reaching far beyond the powers granted to it by the people...and he is called
a traitor? It's the most outrageous thing I've ever witnessed in this country.
We need Snowden back. He put his life on the line for the people of this
country. I can't say I know anyone in Washington with an equal commitment to
the people.

~~~
smolder
While I agree Snowden did a heroic thing, he is very visible due to being a
whistleblower. There are potentially lots of people doing selfless and
principled things that stay secret, since secrecy really is important in that
business. There is a tension between citizens need to keep their government
from going astray and the government's need to outwit its adversaries. It's
pretty clear to me we have gone too far in the direction of a surveillance
state, but those agencies still serve a good purpose, too.

------
rhacker
I can't fucking believe that it's come to this. Every top social media company
was (is?) funneling private data into a search interface presented to an agent
with no need of warrants.

The trial should be the other way around - The People Suing the US Government.
The top lawyer representing the people? Edward.

~~~
smacktoward
I like to believe there's an alternate-universe America where it's Ed Snowden
who is filling stadiums to hear him speak, and Donald Trump who has been
exiled to Russia. It feels more like the America I grew up believing in.

~~~
DoofusOfDeath
Having attended public elementary school in the 1970's, it would seem we were
fed a very optimistic, filtered version of American politics.

Schoolhouse Rock's presentation was very selective.

~~~
rukittenme
I'm sorry Schoolhouse Rock did not give you a complete and definitive
understanding of human political order...

~~~
DoofusOfDeath
To be fair, it did give me great clarity on the topic of conjunctions.

------
tgsovlerkhgsel
I'm wondering what Russia did or did not get.

Assuming we trust that Snowden acted based on the motivation he stated, it's
plausible that he destroyed his copy of the documents before traveling to
Russia.

However, once there, and stuck in that holding cell for weeks, completely in
the hands of Russia, I can't see how he'd withstand the pressure to give them
what he still had and couldn't get rid of - the knowledge in his head. (But
keep in mind that the US brought the "Snowden in Russian hands" situation upon
themselves by cancelling his passport.)

I also can't see how the newspapers would be able to keep the documents secret
from a foreign intelligence agency. Such a high-value secret stored and
handled in a dozen different places, by people who only have a short opsec
training, limited understanding, and few resources and little support to
establish effective security...

Not saying Snowden shouldn't have done it; his revelations showed massive
illegal spying by the NSA, and triggered (some, not sufficient but better than
nothing) reforms. But claiming no harm seems a stretch.

~~~
cmiles74
Unless the US has someone from inside Russian intelligence willing to go on
the record that Snowden provided actionable intelligence, this seems like a
moot point. Certainly this kind of circumstantial evidence (or, really, lack
of evidence) wouldn't be allowed in a proper, legal trial.

~~~
lern_too_spel
We already know that he divulged detailed lists of Chinese targets in a failed
attempt to gain asylum in Hong Kong. That would be allowed in a trial, and
would lock him away for sure. [https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-
kong/article/1260306/edward-s...](https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-
kong/article/1260306/edward-snowden-classified-us-data-shows-hong-kong-
hacking-targets)

~~~
cmiles74
This seems like a mis-characterization of the information in the article.
According to the piece, Snowden provided this data to the South China Morning
Post directly, not the Chinese government. This article also makes no mention
of this information being used as an attempt to gain asylum in Hong Kong.

~~~
lern_too_spel
> According to the piece, Snowden provided this data to the South China
> Morning Post directly

A newspaper that must hand over any data it has to the Chinese government upon
request but is already fully surveiled by that government anyway, as anybody
(even a high school dropout) can figure out.

> This article also makes no mention of this information being used as an
> attempt to gain asylum in Hong Kong.

He made it clear that he was attempting to gain asylum in Hong Kong
([https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/jun/12/edward-
snowden...](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/jun/12/edward-snowden-us-
extradition-fight)). What reason does he have to divulge details of the NSA's
(not illegal) hacking of Chinese infrastructure other than to try to help his
case?

~~~
cmiles74
The Guardian article mentioned doesn't state that he provided the information
on NSA cracking attempts of civilian Hong Kong and Chinese targets as an
attempt to gain legal asylum. On the contrary, Edward Snowden maintains that
he provided the data as further evidence that the NSA was targeting civilians,
a claim that the NSA at the time contradicted.

> Snowden said he was releasing the information to demonstrate "the hypocrisy
> of the US government when it claims that it does not target civilian
> infrastructure, unlike its adversaries".

~~~
lern_too_spel
That is a ridiculous excuse. The US has never claimed that it does not target
civilian infrastructure. Snowden made that claim up out of whole cloth to
justify his actions.

~~~
cmiles74
Edward Snowden has been hitting on this point for a long time. This is from an
article from 2014[0]:

“It’s no secret that we hack China very aggressively,” he says. “But we’ve
crossed lines. We’re hacking universities and hospitals and wholly civilian
infrastructure rather than actual government targets and military targets. And
that’s a real concern.”

I don't think that you can in good conscience argue that the NSA has been open
and clear about their attacks on foreign civilian targets. The Obama
administration repeatedly attempted to draw a line between the sort of hacking
the US performed, for national security reasons, and the kind of "cyber
espionage" that China and Russia were undertaking.

[0]: [https://www.wired.com/2014/08/edward-
snowden/](https://www.wired.com/2014/08/edward-snowden/)

~~~
lern_too_spel
Nowhere in your whole comment have you given any evidence for Snowden's
ridiculous claim that the US has said it does not target civilian
infrastructure.

------
kerkeslager
I'm not a lawyer, but it seems to me that the two most relevant pieces of law
to this case are 18 U.S. Code § 798[1] and the First Amendment[2]. I think
having read both of these is a minimum prerequisite for having an opinion on
how the law should be enforced: you can't say how the law should be enforced
if you don't even know what the law is.

I also think that the following are two very different questions:

1\. Is what Edward Snowden did legal?

2\. Is what Edward Snowden did ethical?

It's dangerous to be right when the government is wrong.

[1]
[https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/798](https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/798)

[2]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Amendment_to_the_United_...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution)

~~~
AndrewKemendo
There is nobody who questions whether his actions were legal, they clearly
were not. Snowden acknowledges this. So to that end, he could have a
completely fair trial and still be found guilty and sentenced to punishment.

The follow on question is whether the law is constitutional.

So far the government hasn't agreed that it is unconstitutional, and the USA
Freedom act is a result of the interpreted language, see:

ACLU v Clapper

Klayman v Obama

Jewel V NSA

~~~
dragonwriter
> There is nobody who questions whether his actions were legal,

A number of people have suggested that at least some of the programs he
revealed were illegally classified to conceal their own illegality (and at
least one was found to be illegal in one of the court cases fueled by the
revelations), and that no lawful prosecution can proceed for revealing
material illegally classified in that way.

------
docdeek
Reporting [0] yesterday had him give an interview where he suggested he would
love to find asylum in France instead of returning to the US. I get the
feeling he just wants something like a life back.

[0] [https://www.leprogres.fr/france-monde/2019/09/15/le-
lanceur-...](https://www.leprogres.fr/france-monde/2019/09/15/le-lanceur-d-
alerte-edward-snowden-aimerait-obtenir-l-asile-politique-en-france)

~~~
emilsedgh
Another scenario is that extortion of Julian Assange made him realize that
sooner or later Russia will use him as a leverage in a negotiation and send
him to the U.S.

------
pgcj_poster
Snowden should be brought home, given a medal, and put in charge of the NSA.

—Richard Stallman

~~~
derwiki
Just because Stallman said a thing doesn't lend much credibility to it. See
also: his defense of Epstein.

~~~
emilfihlman
Mate... I recommend you read on the matter before making such wild claims. It
was basically a hit piece on him.

~~~
ceejayoz
They're hardly wild claims.

Here's ([http://stallman.org/archives/2012-nov-
feb.html#04_January_20...](http://stallman.org/archives/2012-nov-
feb.html#04_January_2013_%28Pedophilia%29)) him in 2013:

> There is little evidence to justify the widespread assumption that willing
> participation in pedophilia hurts children.

and 2006 ([https://www.stallman.org/archives/2006-may-
aug.html#05%20Jun...](https://www.stallman.org/archives/2006-may-
aug.html#05%20June%202006%20%28Dutch%20paedophiles%20form%20political%20party%29)):

> I am sceptical of the claim that voluntarily pedophilia harms children.

Defending someone like Epstein is hardly off-brand here.

~~~
cameronbrown
Had no idea he'd said something like this. It's deeply disappointing - he
always seemed analogous to a software Jesus or the like.

~~~
dagw
If it matters he has apologized for those statements, said they where made in
ignorance and claims that he's completely changed his mind now.

Still it shows, at best, questionable judgement to have said those things in
the first place.

~~~
ceejayoz
Could you link to that apology?

~~~
palunon
I'm not sure if he apologized, but here he at least recognize he was wrong

[https://stallman.org/archives/2019-jul-
oct.html#14_September...](https://stallman.org/archives/2019-jul-
oct.html#14_September_2019_%28Sex_between_an_adult_and_a_child_is_wrong%29)

> Many years ago I posted that I could not see anything wrong about sex
> between an adult and a child, if the child accepted it.

> Through personal conversations in recent years, I've learned to understand
> how sex with a child can harm per psychologically. This changed my mind
> about the matter: I think adults should not do that. I am grateful for the
> conversations that enabled me to understand why.

~~~
fuzz4lyfe
The reason he requires state actor threat level privacy on all of his devices
is now stunningly clear to me. I used to think it was tin foil hat paranoia,
but the government has good reason to look at the computers of people who have
spoken in the manner shown.

------
ydnaclementine
Obama should have pardoned him

~~~
adam12
Yeah, especially since open government and whistleblower protection was a part
of his campaign for president. He is a liar.

~~~
lern_too_spel
Does it count as whistleblowing if 99.9% of the documents you leak don't
describe anything illegal the US government did (the only one being phone
metadata collection) and if far more of the documents leaked describe
compromised foreign systems that will then be patched?

Obama is way smarter than anybody asking for clemency for Snowden.

China: [https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-
kong/article/1266777/exclusiv...](https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-
kong/article/1266777/exclusive-snowden-safe-hong-kong-more-us-cyberspying-
details-revealed)

Pakistan: [https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-
security/docum...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-
security/documents-reveal-nsas-extensive-involvement-in-targeted-killing-
program/2013/10/16/29775278-3674-11e3-8a0e-4e2cf80831fc_print.html)

------
tyingq
I wonder if he is seriously considering returning, or if this is just to
generate some renewed interest, or perhaps offers from countries more
comfortable to him than Russia.

While I respect his motivations for doing it, smuggling classified info out of
a secure facility on a memory card hidden in a Rubik's cube is a crime. A fair
trial won't change that.

He can do a lot more good staying free and sharing his viewpoints, versus
rotting in a Federal facility for years.

------
reeboo
He wants the jury in his trail to be made aware of jury-nullification.

~~~
cm2187
But are you suggesting the laws that penalise stealing classified information
are unfair and should be abolished (like slavery laws in the past)? I think
these laws must exist.

If I was a jury (but keeping in mind I am not even a US national), a fair
sentencing would be to recognise him as guilty but to sentence him to a short
term / time served.

There were many ways in which he could have blown a whistle without releasing
wholesale everything he could find on the internal network to some foreign
newspapers.

~~~
Voloskaya
> "But are you suggesting the laws that penalise stealing classified
> information are unfair and should be abolished (like slavery laws in the
> past)? I think these laws must exist."

Where did OP suggest that? Jury nullification is specifically a case by case
judgement, not a broad statement.

~~~
cm2187
I am referring to the wikipedia definition (I had to look it up, I had not
heard the term before) [1]

 _Jury nullification (US) or a perverse verdict (UK) generally occurs when
members of a criminal trial jury believe that a defendant is guilty, but
choose to acquit him anyway because the jurors also believe that the law
itself is unjust,that the prosecutor has misapplied the law in the defendant
's case,or that the potential punishment for breaking the law is too harsh._

I don't think the law is unjust or misapplied, just that the sentence should
give him credit for the public interest aspect of the revelations.

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jury_nullification](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jury_nullification)

------
dsfyu404ed
Talk about an adversarial interview. It reads like a higher brow version of
the game of 20-questions you play with the cops when you get pulled over for a
fishing stop. They're constantly trying to trip him up and get him to say
something harmful to his case.

~~~
yellow_lead
Call me tinfoil, but I got the feeling the interviewer was fed questions by
the government.

~~~
hannasanarion
Not necessary. TV media networks have been sucking up to the government
basically since the beginning of TV news. See also, TV news' furor to hype up
the Iraq War, even as many newspaper journalists and politicians were crying
foul. Or the news' complicity in covering up the bombings of Laos and
Cambodia, widely reported in foreign news.

------
tssva
It is technically impossible for the government to guarantee that he can
present a "public good" defense. The most they could agree to is not opposing
him presenting such a defense. The judge presiding over the trial would
determine whether he could actually present such a defense and could decide to
forbid it even if prosecutors don't object and could also decide to allow it
if they do.

~~~
dragonwriter
> It is technically impossible for the government to guarantee that he can
> present a "public good" defense

It is quite possible for the President to guarantee that he will not face any
charges for which he is not allowed to present such a defense.

~~~
tssva
The President can't guarantee he won't face any charges. The President could
grant a pardon for any crimes the judge rules he cannot present a "public
good" defense for but before a judge makes such a ruling he would have already
faced the charges.

Getting a fair trial would mean going through the same process that others
charged with a crime must go through. If he is asking for a promise of a
presidential pardon based upon a judge's decision then he is not asking for a
fair trial but a trial which is slanted in his favor.

~~~
dragonwriter
> The President can't guarantee he won't face any charges. The President could
> grant a pardon for any crimes the judge rules he cannot present a "public
> good" defense for but before a judge makes such a ruling he would have
> already faced the charges.

I would argue that he won't have faced the charges until and unless he has
gone through, or waived, a complete trial on them.

> Getting a fair trial would mean going through the same process that others
> charged with a crime must go through.

Only if you assume that the process others charged with a crime must go
through in THE US federal system is always and without exception fair in all
circumstances.

Really, it seems like you have confused “routine” with “fair”.

------
SolaceQuantum
So Snowden here claims there has been no evidence whatsoever he caused any
harm. Is this true? I realize I personally haven't heard any cases where the
info Snowden leaked was linked to the death or bodily injury of persons of
interest or their friends/family. Which is like, hm, ok, is there something I
missed here?

If no one's been hurt, and the US has long upheld the need for law breaking
when the law is unjust (the unlawful action of a black woman sitting in the
white section of the bus) then I don't understand why his asking for a fair
trial where established cases of just law breaking are brought up is
contentious.

EDIT: I should clarify since I think there might be some confusion- I'm not
saying that Snowden broke no laws. I'm saying I don't understand why his law
breaking is contentious, given we have cases in the past of people breaking
laws for just purposes that are generally accepted as just behavior. If
Snowden wishes to make that argument, why are people scandalized about him
wanting to go on a fair trial about it?

~~~
fortran77
Rosa Parks was arrested and convicted.

[https://nccriminallaw.sog.unc.edu/was-rosa-parks-
convicted/](https://nccriminallaw.sog.unc.edu/was-rosa-parks-convicted/)

> Parks’ conviction seems to have stood despite the unconstitutionality of the
> ordinance she was convicted of violating.

While she did do a lot to effect change, your statement that "the US has long
upheld the need for law breaking when the law is unjust" is untrue.

~~~
SolaceQuantum
Sorry, I should clarify-

The US has upheld, culturally, that what Rosa Parks did was just. Snowden
isn't asking not to go to jail, he is asking if he goes to jail that he be
given a fair trial where the cultural impact is also implicated in his law
breaking. Thus, I'm confused why his position is so contentious.

~~~
guitarbill
what in this context is a "fair" trial? the quote is a "public interest
defence", which I think would require the NSA to come clean and the gov to
acknowledge more than they're willing to. so if he's indirectly asking for
that, good luck.

it's the same with asylum. implicitly, another country giving him asylum sends
an interesting political/diplomatic message to the US.

------
jhales
The plausibility of a fair trail in the shadow of the Assange debacle is 0.

------
jambalaya0
Video here
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OOlllv-m79k](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OOlllv-m79k)

------
dx87
I wish news sites would stop omitting that in addition to the information he
leaked about what was going on in the USA, he also leaked a lot of classified
information that had nothing to do with the USA. I don't know how he'd argue
that providing classified intelligence about China to the Chinese government
is in the public interest.

~~~
_iyig
Can you be more specific, or provide a citation?

~~~
dx87
Here's a news article where they say that he showed them classified
information about computers in China that the NSA had access to.

[https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-
kong/article/1260306/edward-s...](https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-
kong/article/1260306/edward-snowden-classified-us-data-shows-hong-kong-
hacking-targets)

~~~
tobylane
That seems related to the US. Is there anything where he leaked memos between
other countries, etc? I faintly remember something like ambassador of A
stationed in country B reporting that the government of B had a problem with
country C.

~~~
dx87
By "had nothing to do with the USA", I meant things related to collection in
the USA. It's not like he needed to leak information that the NSA was spying
on other countries, that's pretty much their entire job. I don't see how he
could argue that leaking classified information about NSA operations in China
is in the public interest.

------
sys_64738
He'll be executed as a traitor by the US government.

------
jameslevy
Not to tread too much into political territory, but if Warren or Sanders is
the next US President I'd assume he will receive a full pardon.

~~~
fooker
That seems like an interesting assumption, given than Snowden had to escape
the country when Obama was the president.

~~~
imglorp
That was a disappointment. Obama ran on restoring the rights retracted by the
Patriot act, on closing Guantanamo, etc. After taking office though, things
went in the other direction. There were new abuses and more National Security
Letters issued than ever before.

It makes you wonder if new presidents get "read in" on what the "puppet
masters" are expecting of them (/s) or is each simply more corrupt than the
last, regardless of Party.

~~~
nappy-doo
Or, it makes you wonder what Obama learned when he took office that were
extenuating circumstances he didn't understand while running for office.

~~~
dllthomas
> that were extenuating circumstances

Or that seemed like extenuating circumstances. There was very interesting
commentary on this I heard somewhere from someone who'd been through similar
experience. If memory serves - and it very well may not - it was Henry
Kissinger on the extras for the Doctor Strangelove DVD.

~~~
Consultant32452
There's no good reason to believe that people are honest with the President.
Even if you give everyone the most generous assumptions, someone still
determines what makes it into reports that reach the President and what
doesn't. That takes things to a whole different dimension of impossible to
unravel.

------
test2018
He should be protected.

------
pastor_elm
He could have gotten pardoned by Obama, but he preferred to remain under the
protection of Vladimir Putin.

~~~
alasdair_
The only reason Edward Snowden is in Russia right now is that the US cancelled
his passport while he was in transit, leaving him stuck there.

~~~
pastor_elm
That prevented him from returning back to the US?

~~~
wavefunction
It would, yes.

~~~
ceejayoz
The US Embassy in Moscow would _happily_ take him in and provide travel
documents, tickets, and an "escort". It's clear Snowden doesn't want to take
that approach. (I wouldn't, either.)

------
Simulacra
I think what Snowden did was treason and if he were to return to the United
States he should be put on trial. There were better ways than defecting to
Russia. A true patriot would have never defected and run.

------
mrlala
Then come home. I'm not really on his side here. If he thinks what he did was
so morally correct then he should have stayed.

------
helen___keller
Honestly, I'm pretty over Snowden.

The moment he fled to a foreign power, he should have known he would never be
a free man in America. Chelsea Manning's sentence was commuted, but Snowden
will never have that opportunity because he fled. Furthermore, since the day
he fled, he has literally done nothing but try and shame our government and
our system through media.

There's a chance the motivations behind his actions really are what he says
they are. There's no doubting that his leaks were a good thing for Americans
to know about. But at this point I'm more inclined to believe he's a foreign
asset working on a campaign to kill trust in American government and American
intelligence.

He's been working this "fair trial" thing for years now. He's just another
marketing tool as far as I'm concerned.

~~~
AlisdairO
Whistleblowers in the US are almost universally abused by the system. If the
US wants whistleblowers to stick around, it should consider treating them with
the kind of respect they deserve.

It's crazy to me that in all the talk of punishing snowden, there's never a
mention of punishing those who betray the country by spying on their own
citizens.

