
Edward Snowden responds to release of e-mail by U.S. officials - ChrisAntaki
http://m.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/edward-snowden-responds-to-release-of-e-mail-by-us-officials/2014/05/29/95137e1c-e781-11e3-afc6-a1dd9407abcf_story.html
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rdtsc
"No we never got any concerns from Snowden"...

(months later)

"Oh here it is, an email from Snowden"...

"So how do you explain that you lied before?"

(silence)

Is NSA just lying because it hopes the problem will go away? I guess that is
not unreasonable. Public has a pretty short attention span. So rather than
trying to engage just brush off and deny everything.

Was anyone at the NSA ever punished for lying to the public or Congress? If
not they have exactly 0 incentive for not doing it. The part of "Oh yeah here
is the email" and the follow up question of "Why were you lying?" quite often
never comes. Everyone just moves on.

Looking at the organization as a whole and comparing to a person, NSA acts
like a psychopath that climbed its way up to into a power position. Lying
through its teeth. Engaging in illegal activities. Every time they are caught,
telling lies, they follow up with more lies. Spy on Congress members and
judges. Presumably to be able to manipulate them. This is a person you'd want
to run away from in real life as fast as possible. They are dangerous because
they have power and they have no morals.

~~~
jonnybgood
Well, from the looks of it Snowden was asking a procedural question, not
outlying any concerns. He also received a response. I have to wonder if you
actually read the email.

~~~
ChrisAntaki
> The NSA’s new discovery of written contact between me and its lawyers -
> after more than a year of denying any such contact existed - raises serious
> concerns.

^ Something Snowden says, at the beginning of the article.

~~~
mpyne
It's something Snowden _claims_ , but I don't see the justification for it if
you actually read Snowden's email.

Snowden says his one (instead of multiple emails as he previously claimed)
disproved this NSA claim:

"after extensive investigation, including interviews with his former NSA
supervisors and co-workers, we have not found any evidence to support Mr.
Snowden’s contention that he brought these matters to anyone’s attention."

But his one email made no such suggestion as bringing any legal matter
whatsoever to anyone's attention. It asked whether an E.O. was really at the
same level of statute law (it is, it is only the scope of effect that is
different). Snowden's email didn't even suggest he had any complaints to make
about NSA interpretation of law. If anything it reminded me more of the
arguments made by "Freeman on the Land".

Snowden claims that other emails do exist though, with actual substantive
complaints. But I'm not sure what to believe, if he actually seems to think
_this_ email of his represented a formal complaint, then who knows what was
actually in his claimed email to the SID Office of Compliance?

He also doesn't mention who he sent his email regarding his EO 12333 question
to. Was it this very email? Does he expect legal counsel to read minds too?
And either way, his complaint was that the activity conducted under EO 12333
was "indefensible", not "illegal". But I don't know of any major organizations
(private corporations or public agencies) that would deliberately take a
harder route to undertake an activity they were authorized to do.

~~~
ChrisAntaki
First, there was a complete denial, and now magically, an email manifests.
That's the point you seem to be missing.

~~~
mpyne
There was no complete denial. Does anyone really believe the NSA said "We
promise we have never received a single email from Edward Snowden"? He'd
probably have to send dozens of emails every day in the normal course of his
duties.

The NSA _did_ put out a complete denial that he has raised an actual issue
with the agency's conduct of their intelligence programs, and this email
doesn't contradict that line one bit.

There may be such emails out there (Snowden claims there's at least one), but
this isn't one of them.

I mean, otherwise _NSA wouldn 't have released it_.

~~~
ChrisAntaki
> I mean, otherwise NSA wouldn't have released it.

Good point.

------
joejohnson
So yet again we have reason to trust Snowden's word and to further doubt
official statements from the NSA.

~~~
k-mcgrady
As he said in the article they continue to contradict themselves. They said no
communications existed - and now suddenly they have one. Why should we believe
them when they say they don't have any more when they've already lied about it
once?

~~~
mpyne
> They said no communications existed - and now suddenly they have one.

There's no contradiction at all.

He said he sent emails of a certain category. NSA still says they have no
emails of that category—but they do have an email of a different sort, asking
a procedural question.

NSA probably has _lots_ of emails from Snowden on file, after all. What
they've said (and continue to maintain) is that they don't have any reflecting
a concern (edit: typo fix) over these programs. The email they released from
him certainly doesn't show any concern. Seriously, read the actual question:

"I am _not entirely certain_ , but this _does not seem correct_ , as it
_seems_ to imply that Executive Orders have the same precedence as law."

This is hardly anything even approaching a hard charge of misconduct being
done. Especially so given that the General Counsel announced that they agreed
with Snowden's interpretation, "That said, you are correct that E.O.s _cannot
override a statute_."

------
sixQuarks
On the Washington Post comments section, I feel that users "still here" and
".Morti" are shills from the NSA. One of Snowden's leaks confirmed that they
do try to change viewpoints on online discussions.

~~~
ChrisAntaki
Who are the shills on HN? ;)

~~~
sitkack
I have watched some accounts on HN gain over 1000 karma in less than 80 days.
They appear to be using machine learning techniques to pump links into the
site. They made no comments for days until their karma was high enough.

~~~
rthomas6
Well, why not name names?

~~~
sitkack
Because w/o damning evidence of any wrongdoing at this point I don't want to
turn it into a witch hunt. Watching.

~~~
sixQuarks
You're like the Paul Revere of HN.

~~~
sitkack
More like that other guy no one can remember. ;)

It is interesting to watch the ebb and flow of political opinion on discussion
forums. And it would be extremely interesting to have logs of HN or Reddit to
do shill and multiple account detection.

~~~
sixQuarks
Someone could do their PhD thesis on this. All you grad students out there -
pay attention!

------
argumentum
How can the supposedly most capable "intelligence" organization in the world
be so dumb at understanding public opinion in the internet age? It's like they
are operating out of a 1930s propaganda playbook ..

Especially when Snowden, Greenwald et al appear to be _masterminds_ at the
same task. Of course, it helps to have the truth on your side, but considering
that they are up against the most powerful people on the planet .. very
impressive.

~~~
Terr_
Two possibilities:

1\. "It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary
depends on his not understanding it." Replace "understand" with "acknowledge"
as necessary.

2\. They know they only need to worry about the opinions of certain key
players, not the public in general.

------
dueprocess
The fact Snowden had the conviction and courage to challenge the NSA on
fundamental issues, both verbally and in writing, is remarkable.

This was Snowden's employer and the source of his income. Evidently, the
preservation of civil liberties was more important to him.

~~~
gahahaha
He risked much more than his income - he risked (and is risking) his life.

~~~
Bluestrike2
I think he means before he decided to leak information, when he was just
voicing his concerns to his superiors.

