
Why I don't care about Edward Snowden - dluan
http://www.sanders.senate.gov/newsroom/must-read/why-i-dont-care-about-edward-snowden
======
aerovistae
From reading the opening and skimming the rest, I infer that the author's
stance amounts to "Snowden raised incredibly important questions profoundly
affecting our society, but I don't care about the debate regarding his fate
and therefore the fate of future whistleblowers; they don't matter and neither
does the question of encouraging or discouraging them in the future."

Weak stance in my opinion.

~~~
mbrd
I read it as implicitly approving of Snowden's capital but not wanting to lose
the political points for calling him a hero.

I agree, weak stance from a politician who appears to avoid that kind of thing
more than others. At least that seems to one of the points he's campaigning
on.

~~~
dragonwriter
The piece is quite directly a statement that the focus on Snowden's is a
distraction from the issues he raised, and is actively being kept as such by
people who interest is in avoiding the substantive issues (and, while it
doesn't say this, one might argue that the actual discussion of the issues
raised by Snowden is essential to actually going anywhere with the debate
about his ultimate status, which until the issues debate happens is just a
noise that produces nothing.)

And it's not a stance by a politician. The HN headline was misleading (by
including "Sanders" as if it were part of the title or the original source, as
well as -- and this has still.not bee corrected -- by omitting the "(2013)"
that should be included): Sanders' office reposted this wheb ut was current as
recommended reading, but the source is Ron Fournier of the National Journal,
and there is considerable distance between reposting something as writing on
an important issue that people should be aware of and adopting it as Sanders
own position.

------
joytotheworld
To clarify:

Senator Sanders is not the author of the article. Also, when I read the
article there were no quotes at all from the senator.

Hacker News: Your Facebook post linking to this article has a misleading
title.

------
meesterdude
> Love him or hate him, we all owe Snowden our thanks for forcing upon the
> nation an important debate. But the debate shouldn't be about him. It should
> be about the gnawing questions his actions raised from the shadows.

Yes. This is about what snowden revealed, not snowden. He's just a guy who
fled this country for his life. It's a disservice to his sacrifice to try to
shift the focus from the issues he raised to something less important or
relevant.

------
ap22213
Aside from the privacy aspects, one of my main gripes with the surveillance
state is the return on investment. Who are we protecting ourselves from again,
and what are the risks of loss of life and property for me and the ones that I
love? Why are 'they' trying to kill 'me' and break my stuff? Or, are they
after someone else? And, if they really are after me, are there more effective
ways to get them to stop? Is it really an 'existential threat'? (What does
that even mean?). And, how does it compare to other threats that I face?

How does an average citizen like me even rationally assign a price that I'm
willing to pay when the facts are so obscured. I hear a lot of people (who I
don't necessarily trust) yelling 'fire', but I don't see any smoke or feel any
heat. And, conveniently, it just so happens that those people are the ones in
charge of taking my money and my freedoms.

------
alextgordon
"By: Ron Fournier"

...

~~~
dluan
Whoa, I did not originally catch that. Thanks very much for pointing it out. I
updated the title of the submission.

The original article is no longer available on that site, but here's the saved
version.

[https://web.archive.org/web/20150121075232/http://www.nation...](https://web.archive.org/web/20150121075232/http://www.nationaljournal.com/politics/why-
i-don-t-care-about-edward-snowden-20130612)

~~~
joytotheworld
The text of the Facebook post that links to this thread still needs to be
updated.

Thank you for your alertness.

------
utzhrzjrzuxt
Since the link is 404'ing, I'm going put this in the "internet troll using URL
manipulation" bin.

~~~
lsdafjklsd
Working for me

~~~
utzhrzjrzuxt
All I'm getting is a 404 error code and this:

[https://i.imgur.com/bTc7Tw4.png](https://i.imgur.com/bTc7Tw4.png)

~~~
marvy
works for me, try this:
[http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:tDSohcr...](http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:tDSohcrKjKQJ:www.sanders.senate.gov/newsroom/must-
read/why-i-dont-care-about-edward-snowden+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us) or maybe
this:
[https://web.archive.org/web/20150925204600/http://www.sander...](https://web.archive.org/web/20150925204600/http://www.sanders.senate.gov/newsroom/must-
read/why-i-dont-care-about-edward-snowden)

