Russia Considers Returning Snowden to U.S. to ‘Curry Favor’ With Trump: Official - Polidicks

[QUOTE=Psychokitten;51806673]He caused untold amounts of unnecessary collateral damage to the intelligence community in the process. He also did it following a workplace dispute, which casts suspicion on the whole "altruistic hero" aspect of his story. He's a traitor and a shitbag. End of story.[/QUOTE] Can you point out this collateral damage?

[QUOTE=SIRIUS;51807631]Can you point out this collateral damage?[/QUOTE] Mostly he's just referring to the fact that most Western governments were terribly embarrassed. Snowden didn't actually put any HUMINT assets (Spies) at risk, he simply blew the whistle on the surveillance.

[QUOTE=archangel125;51807635]Mostly he's just referring to the fact that most Western governments were terribly embarrassed. Snowden didn't actually put any HUMINT assets (Spies) at risk, he simply blew the whistle on the surveillance.[/QUOTE] so... nothing of any value was harmed

[QUOTE=Psychokitten;51806673]He caused untold amounts of unnecessary collateral damage to the intelligence community in the process. He also did it following a workplace dispute, which casts suspicion on the whole "altruistic hero" aspect of his story. He's a traitor and a shitbag. End of story.[/QUOTE] you progress from vague mentions of nonexistant damage and "casts suspicion on" to "traitor and shitbag end of story". Unless you think the american public getting to decide how their government operates is "damaging" to the "intelligence community", in which case you could probably use a stay in a gulag to remind you how a government you seem to want actually operates. Im having trouble taking your hyberbolic comments seriously with that avatar. you know those imperial zealots are supposed to be parodies right?

Maybe it wouldn't suck so bad if our prisons weren't the worst of any 1st world country on earth. But really, we all know that he's gonna be penalized eventually. He pissed off big money.

At the very least this shut up the "Snowden is an old KGB agent, destabilizing good old US of A!" crowd.

[QUOTE=Psychokitten;51806673]He caused untold amounts of unnecessary collateral damage to the intelligence community in the process. He also did it following a workplace dispute, which casts suspicion on the whole "altruistic hero" aspect of his story. He's a traitor and a shitbag. End of story.[/QUOTE] you genuinely make me sick

[QUOTE=Cutthecrap;51807178]What a shitty country the US has become. To see its citizens bash against a guy who risked his life to show everyone what was going under the hood. If Americans don't care, then it's not his fault. It's the stupid Americans fault. He risked his life, not knowing if that would wake up the guys at home, and that makes it even more patriotic. What would be the point of doing things for people if you knew all the time the exact outcome? Let's not mind the fact that those who tried to denounce it via official channels were fired or removed by superiors who did not want that to be known. But oh well, most of the time people who aren't in these situations won't understand so I guess there's nothing you can do to make them comprehend the situation. Bu bu bu but he's with the Russians! Let him come back home where he won't be sui-won't be harass-won't face an unfair trial! EDIT: What's even worse, is seeing people think that SOMEHOW, the NSA and the CIA operate full time on behalf of the average joe who is busting his ass 24/7. Good grief...[/QUOTE] Yeah. I think the problem is the willful ignorance encouraged within American culture. No one likes a know it all 🙄

[QUOTE=TestECull;51807010]Or, hey, how about just not bothering? Maybe it's just hindsight but his reveals did fuck all to improve anything. [/QUOTE] That's factually wrong, the entire thing actually made a huge push into the web/mobile industries to invest more and more into proper cryptography scheme implementations. It also gave Richard Matthew Stallman some very needed credibility after people laughed at his expenses for all these years :v:

Lol what makes you guys think they stop looking up on citizens after all these fiasco

[QUOTE=HAKKAR!!!;51807904]you genuinely make me sick[/QUOTE] The complacency or outright defense of universal information gathering and literal spying is disturbing.

[QUOTE=shian;51808062]Lol what makes you guys think they stop looking up on citizens after all these fiasco[/QUOTE] Of course it didn't stop. And it never will. For those living in the national security and intelligence communities, threats are everywhere. They probably get warnings of a hundred terror attacks a year, beef up security, only to have most of the threats fail to emerge. So for them, there is no measure too drastic to try and prevent the next 9/11. Danger is all they know, and they consider vigilance their solemn duty. The common citizenry, as is their right, will disagree - and I'm with them. As Franklin once said, essential liberty should never be sacrificed for security. What Snowden did was to reveal to the American public that their government was secretly spying on them. He's a hero for doing so, even if it didn't stop. At least people now know.

Turns out, people don't give a shit about the evils their government does until they are physically affected by them. The possibility of something happening? Nah, let's just wait until the cops arrest me for a bullshit reason.

[QUOTE=TestECull;51807010]How about feeding it piecemeal to whistleblower channels like wikipedia under a pseudonym, such that a [i]constant stream of leaks[/i] can be maintained for as long as possible? A one time burst leak is nowhere near as bad as a constant pinhole. They can damage control a burst, but a pinhole in a particularly hard-to-find spot will be a thorn in their side for years. Or, hey, how about just not bothering? Maybe it's just hindsight but his reveals did fuck all to improve anything. [editline]10th February 2017[/editline] You'd have a point if the whistleblowing actually catalyzed something. But it didn't. Americans really just didn't care and he was quickly forgotten about. The spying's worse now than it was before he leaked anything and Americans [i]still[/i] don't care.[/QUOTE] Gathering and tracking down leaks is a key skill of the NSA and CIA, had Snowden done that he would have been taken in and arrested in under a year. He knew the best way was to get as much as possible, then find a way out with it before they caught on (and it sort of worked). You're ignorant at best if you think the leaks didn't change anything, maybe you're projecting here. but I know it pushed me to learn GPG, transition all my private communications to end to end encryption, or running the service my self. And it wasn't just me, after the slides revealing they intercepted the unencrypted data channels in Google's internal data center network Google moved to encrypt all traffic end to end, and use FDE for data at rest. The leaks also put the EFF into a legitimate position as a defender of digital rights. And the effects are far and wide, with the push of encryption after the leaks companies such as Cloudflare moving to provide easy and free SSL; the very website you're using now is on SSL because of that. Far and wide impacts. Just because you don't, or don't want to notice doesn't mean it isn't happening. [QUOTE=TestECull;51807010] The spying's worse now than it was back then, despite the leaks he made, despite his attempt at pseudo-martyrdom. Not only did he throw away a cushy lifestyle millions of Americans would do anything for, but he failed miserably at actually effecting any change. [i]Nobody cared.[/i] It was a blurb on the paper, on the 9PM news, and then everyone's attention shifted back to whatever random minutae they were focusing on before the blurb. At best he was just an ineffectual idiot, at worse he may have ended up inadvertently fucking the entire country over for decades by putting himself in the very situation the article OP posted is reporting on. We all know how it will go if the USGov gets a hold of him, especially with the strong GOP lean in every branch just about. He'll end up in Guantanamo and we'll never hear of him again. [/QUOTE] He didn't intend, try, or really turn out as a martyr. This is blatantly clear by his communicae with Laura Poitras and Greenwald. I recommend you watch the documentary Citizenfour, since it's what was recorded right after he left for China; he's clearly scared and knows the shit he's in. And it becomes clear he did it because the terrifying invasion of privacy being conducted at the NSA. He's a true Patriot, and he loves the USA; that is the reason he did what he did. [editline]11th February 2017[/editline] You also think nothing new came from his leaks, but that seems more to me your lack of looking into them. Here's a whole directory of the leaks: [url]https://nsa.gov1.info/dni/2016/index.html[/url] You'll notice there's some very scary shit in there.

[QUOTE=Nitro836;51808190]Turns out, people don't give a shit about the evils their government does until they are physically affected by them. The possibility of something happening? Nah, let's just wait until the cops arrest me for a bullshit reason.[/QUOTE] Correct. The way to fix things in America is make the voters on both sides suffer enough to motivate them to address a problem.

[QUOTE=Psychokitten;51806673]He caused untold amounts of unnecessary collateral damage to the intelligence community in the process. He also did it following a workplace dispute, which casts suspicion on the whole "altruistic hero" aspect of his story. He's a traitor and a shitbag. End of story.[/QUOTE] Remember guys, ignorance is bliss.

It is both amusing and terrifying that the same people who denounce Big Government will criticise the actions of Snowden et al. as treasonous in the same breath.

[QUOTE=Headhumpy;51811031]It is both amusing and terrifying that the same people who denounce Big Government will criticise the actions of Snowden et al. as treasonous in the same breath.[/QUOTE] Trump can't trust the intelligence community because they do the horrible things that Trump is telling them to do and also the horrible things Snowden revealed which Trump should kill him for revealing

[QUOTE=Psychokitten;51806673]He caused untold amounts of unnecessary collateral damage to the intelligence community in the process. He also did it following a workplace dispute, which casts suspicion on the whole "altruistic hero" aspect of his story. He's a traitor and a shitbag. End of story.[/QUOTE] You're an idiot howbowdah [highlight](User was banned for this post ("Shit Posting, howbowdah" - UncleJimmema))[/highlight]

[QUOTE=SIRIUS;51807631]Can you point out this collateral damage?[/QUOTE] Well, the leaks revealed an NSA program to listen in on Al-Qaeda agents who apparently used Skype for communication, believing it to be secure. After the leaks, they switched methods. To my knowledge there hasn't been any collateral damage on the level of human assets being lost or terrorist attacks occurring after surveillance programs were compromised. [QUOTE=archangel125;51808138]What Snowden did was to reveal to the American public that their government was secretly spying on them. [/QUOTE] What Snowden did was reveal to the American public that their government was using dragnet surveillance methods to specifically target non-Americans, but collecting American data in the process, and doing an inconsistent job of mitigating identifiable information. The leaks detailed programs which scanned for relevant metadata and were supposed to discard information collected on US persons, but sometimes kept the information of Americans contrary to conventional surveillance laws. This is a system that would be ripe for abuse in actual domestic surveillance programs, especially with operations being approved by the secret FISA courts. Those courts allowed the programs on the basis that unintentional violations of the privacy of US persons were an acceptable consequence of sanctioned operations, which it turns out is not something the public agrees with at all. The leaks also showed that US government agencies were involved in operations that compromised the security and integrity of US companies for the sake of intelligence work. The leaks were shocking because they revealed programs that had concerning implications and were frightening in their secrecy and lack of public oversight or legal accountability. The leaks document programs that were not actually targeted at Americans, but could very easily be used to target Americans, with government approval, and the public would never know. That's a serious issue, but a far cry from saying the US government was deliberately spying on the American public, which is nonsense. I really wish more people would make an effort to learn about the issue rather than toss out these bandwagon soundbites. [QUOTE=glitchvid;51808492]He didn't intend, try, or really turn out as a martyr. This is blatantly clear by his communicae with Laura Poitras and Greenwald. I recommend you watch the documentary Citizenfour, since it's what was recorded right after he left for China; he's clearly scared and knows the shit he's in. And it becomes clear he did it because the terrifying invasion of privacy being conducted at the NSA. He's a true Patriot, and he loves the USA; that is the reason he did what he did.[/QUOTE] At this point he's never willingly going to come back. Should Snowden be returned to the US and put on trial, I imagine the chances are pretty good he'll be ruled not guilty on all the leaks that revealed evidence of government wrongdoing, including surveillance operations that were not properly mitigated against US persons, evidence of whistleblowing complaints being silenced, and deliberate subversion of the security of US companies and persons. As with Glenn Greenwald, public sentiment is strong enough that the public value of revealing wrongdoing will outweigh the crime of illegally divulging classified information. Regardless of how Trump feels about him, the courts are aware of the legal precedent and it will be deemed whistleblowing. But then, of course, he'll also be tried for all the documents that had nothing to do with government wrongdoing. Without the defense of whistleblowing for those, he'll certainly go to prison for the rest of his life- not hard to see why he doesn't want to face that. I'm guessing he's hoping for a presidential pardon but with Trump at the helm that's not happening anytime soon.

[QUOTE=General J;51806481]the punishment of Snowden would be considered nothing less than one of the most shameful acts in our history by future historians. The guy is a national hero.[/QUOTE] I agree with you bless Trump for taking this felon home to face justice.

theoretically you could push the boundaries of corporal punishment with the assistance of Snowden's aura of misinformed hysteria relating to treatery and rape. trump could issue firing squad. probably would. we won't know until he does it. i could almost dare him if i were'nt crazy enough. going to smoke a menthol now, take my meds, take a shower... etc.