Though former NSA contractor Edward Snowden has been indicted for leaking secrets about the U.S. government’s intrusive surveillance tactics, he was honored by a group of former U.S. intelligence officials as a courageous whistleblower during a Moscow ceremony, reports ex-CIA analyst Ray McGovern…
Tag: Surveillance State
Surveillance State Takes Offense
President Obama proclaims his love of “transparency” but has an odd idea what the word means. He generally defines it as sharing some information with Congress and the Courts but keeping the public in the dark and punishing those who ask…
Feinstein’s Phony Excuse for NSA Spying
After 9/11, the excuse for missing clues was too much data trying to sip from a fire hose but with the priority now excusing NSA spying, the metaphor is for more data you can’t find a needle in a haystack…
How Congress Overlooked NSA Spying
Edward Snowden’s leaks about the National Security Agency’s surveillance programs might have been avoided if more members of Congress had done their duty to stay informed about these classified activities, rather than get distracted by the fluff of politics, says…
Who Benefits from the Various ‘Wars’?
P.R. experts are skilled at framing policy debates in favorable though misleading ways, like the “war on terror” or the “war on drugs.” What gets shielded by this packaging are the unstated goals, interests and outcomes that would draw popular opposition if…
The Moral Imperative of Activism
Exclusive: Today’s crises endless war, environmental catastrophe, desperate poverty and more can seem so daunting that they paralyze action rather than inspire activism. But the imperative to do something in the face of injustice defines one’s moral place in the…
Who’s to Blame for NSA Excesses?
After a terrorist attack like Benghazi or the Boston Marathon the press, pols and much of the public decry the failure to prevent the violence, but the mood shifts amid disclosures of intrusive means to counter threats. This ambivalence can…
Puttin’ the Pressure on Putin
Exclusive: The Obama administration continues to compound the diplomatic mess around former NSA contractor Edward Snowden. The latest blunder was announcing that the U.S. wouldn’t torture or execute Snowden, a reminder to the world how far Official Washington has strayed from…
L’Affaire Snowden Shows US Weakness
Exclusive: The U.S. threw its diplomatic weight around getting several European countries to block a plane carrying Bolivia’s President Evo Morales thinking NSA leaker Edward Snowden might be a stowaway but the clumsy affair only spotlighted declining U.S. influence in…
A Foot Soldier Throws Down His Gun
Brandon Toy, an Iraq War veteran and a mid-level project manager at General Dynamics, concluded that what he had done and was doing went against the best principles of the United States and so resigned with a declaration that if…