Snowdon is a dummy

oralloy wrote:

spendius wrote:

You're being legalistic

With justification. I was responding to an untrue claim that the NSA had violated the law.

But I undermined legalism enough to at least make you stop and think. Legalism is a bit like cryogenics.

oralloy wrote:

We already knew the NSA was listening.

I know. It is the size of the trawl that has outraged us.

oralloy wrote:

Exposing the exact tactics used by the NSA only benefits people who are trying to hide from them.

That is not quite true old boy. We have been there and it wasn't very convincing.

From yesterday's WaPo-blog:

Quote:

An analysis of 225 terrorism cases inside the United States since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks has concluded that the bulk collection of phone records by the National Security Agency “has had no discernible impact on preventing acts of terrorism.”

In the majority of cases, traditional law enforcement and investigative methods provided the tip or evidence to initiate the case, according to the study by the New America Foundation, a Washington-based nonprofit group.

According to a report in the Süddeutsche Zeitung, the USA won't tell how long they spied Merkel's phone. Additionally, they want to spy on other German top politicians as before.
The paper quotes sources from the German spy agency BND, saying, they want to stop the 'no-spy-talks'.
"Sources in the Chancellery" are quoted, saying that in the next three months or later still some positive results might be possible.

Sorry Frank but you can not have a free nation when not only are the american people being lied to but congress is also.

Those papers needed to be released in order to help safe guard our freedoms from a run away intelligence community that is far more of a danger to our freedoms and our society then all the terrorists in the middle east.

At least, Nelson Mandela got his fair trail. George Washington didn't and that's a pity. The guy deserved death for being such a traitor.

Why, you think Washington did not deserve a fair trial?

Joan of Arc got hers. Check.

Who else benefits from having the NSA's exact tactics exposed?

I do not understand why you people want to deny him one.

German media blast US 'No' to no-spy agreement

After last year's media outrage was appeased by the prospect of a no-spy pact, recent reports that US-German talks are unlikely to lead to binding promises on the US side have once again stoked the German media fire.

In a story that ran under the headline "The US lied to us," the Süddeutsche Zeitung (SZ), along with national public broadcaster NDR, reported on Monday (13.01.2013) that the planned no-spy agreement between the US and Germany was on course to fail, according to insiders.

On Tuesday (14.01.2013), the SZ voiced an expectation that US President Barack Obama could make a statement on reforms at the NSA this week, but claimed that these are likely to be "political declarations" rather than detailed agreements. An opinion piece also published in the Munich-based paper on Tuesday poured scorn on US justifications for refusing to come to a binding agreement, for example by pointing out that "The US refusal [to agree to stop spying on German politicians] shows that the fight against terrorism is only an excuse." The daily paper claimed that it was an illusion to think that the spying was an "aberration, an excess of the US intelligence agency alone, and not of US politics in toto", which it concludes must see itself as "above the law."
... ... ...
The weekly news magazine Stern went further in chastizing the government and Angela Merkel's politics in particular. It wrote that by refusing to guarantee that the NSA will stop spying on German politicians and adhere to German law in their missions in Germany, US President Obama has "conclusively downgraded Germany to a second-class ally," and is even labeling the country as a potential enemy. And since Merkel was depending on the negotiations over a no spy agreement to resolve the NSA scandal, Stern concludes that "The German state is not able to protect our civil rights. It can't even protect itself." And if Merkel "doesn't dare" to risk putting transatlantic relations on the line to "put up a fight," the NSA will have won, the newpaper said.

What are you talking about? We all want Snowden to be given justice.

We're just less credulous than you are about the fairness of the US justice system.

Well if you do...and if the others do...why are you not seconding my motion that he be returned to the United States to stand trial?

That is giving him justice, right?

The right of asylum (sometimes called political asylum, from the Greek: ἄσυλον)[1] is an ancient juridical concept, under which a person persecuted by his or her own country may be protected by another sovereign authority, a foreign country, or church sanctuaries (as in medieval times)
[...]
The United States recognizes the right of asylum of individuals as specified by international and federal law. A specified number of legally defined refugees, who apply for refugee status overseas, as well as those applying for asylum after arriving in the U.S., are admitted annually.

German media reports of an impasse at US-German talks to avert spying between allies prompted several senior German politicians on Tuesday to suggest diplomatic and economic pressure on Washington.
[...]
Stephen Mayer, the internal affairs spokesman for Chancellor Angela Merkel's conservative parliamentary group, told Reuters on Tuesday her government should consider withholding contracts with US firms that operate in Germany.

Mayer said if the talks failed then Germany must contemplate whether "US firms receive government contracts from the German side or public institutions."

"The Americans understand one language very well, and that is the language of business," Mayer said, adding that such a deal could not be seen in isolation from current EU-US free-trade negotiations.
He also told the newspaper Die Welt that an anti-spying agreement should not amount to a "placebo."

Thomas Oppermann, the caucus leader of the center-left Social Democrats, who are Merkel's new coalition partners, said the "failure of the agreement would be unacceptable" and would "change the political character of relations."
... ... ...

..why are you not seconding my motion that he be returned to the United States to stand trial?

Well if you do...and if the others do...why are you not seconding my motion that he be returned to the United States to stand trial?

I am not sure about how much less credulous you are...but it sounds to me as though you just want him to get a free pass.

Quote:

Well if you do...and if the others do...why are you not seconding my motion that he be returned to the United States to stand trial?

The US are being accused by Snowden of all sorts of malpractice and therefore they cannot render fair justice:

they are just a party to the dispute.

The US government deserves a fair trial too...

Quote:

I am not sure about how much less credulous you are...but it sounds to me as though you just want him to get a free pass.

You're wrong. We demand justice and the punishment of Obama and co.

BRAVO!