President Vladimir Putin grants full Russian citizenship to American hero Edward Snowden

[basquebromance]

Snowden has been living in Russia since 2013 to escape prosecution in the U.S. after leaking classified documents.

Russia gives citizenship to ex-NSA contractor Edward Snowden

Russian President Vladimir Putin has granted Russian citizenship to Edward Snowden, a former contractor with the U.S. National Security Agency.

apnews.com

 

[Mac1958]

Vlad must think this will annoy us.

 

[B. Kidd]

Snowden, the Canary in our morphing totalitarian coal mine.

 

[basquebromance]

"my name is Edward Joseph Snowden. i used to work for the government, now i work for the public. It took me a while to figure out the difference, and i got in trouble for it" - opening line from his autobiography 'Permanent Record'

 

[basquebromance]

After 9/11, the IC was racked with guilt for failing to protect America, for letting the most devastating and destructive attack since Pearl Harbor occur on its watch. In response, its leaders sought to build a system that would prevent them from being caught off guard ever again. At its foundation was to be technology, a foreign thing to their army of political science majors and masters of business administration. The doors to the most secretive intelligence agencies were flung wide open to young technologists like Snowden.

And so the geek inherited the earth.

 

[basquebromance]

"I was sent to Japan, where I helped to design what amounted to the agency’s global backup—a massive covert network that ensured that even if the NSA’s headquarters was reduced to ash in a nuclear blast, no data would ever be lost. At the time, I didn’t realize that engineering a system that would keep a permanent record of everyone’s life was a tragic mistake" - Snowden

 

[ColonelAngus]

Trump should have pardoned him.

See that, cult *****….I disagree with Trump.

He should have pardoned Snowden.

Now call me a Trumptard, you stupid *****.

 

[Bootney Lee Farnsworth]

Vlad must think this will annoy us.

It does annoy you.

 

[basquebromance]

Americans were spying on the world without telling a soul...until Snowden exposed them!

 

[basquebromance]

When Snowden left Hong Kong and landed in Moscow to transit to Latin America, Obama officials like Ben Rhodes did everything possible to prevent him from leaving, to trap him in Russia. Rhodes boasted of it in his book. Ever since, they've use this to imply he's a Russian agent.

 

[basquebromance]

Think about it: if Obama officials believed Snowden had possession of an extremely sensitive archive of top secret documents - as they insist but Snowden denies - why would they *want to trap him in Russia*? Because they knew it'd be easy to convince idiots he was a Kremlin spy.

And let's not lose sight of the key point: The only reason Snowden -- who revealed illegal domestic spying -- can't come home is because the Obama Admin abused the Espionage Act to prosecute more whistleblowers than all previous presidents combined.

 

[BlindBoo]

Well he did help forge a bipartisan consensus.

"The House Intelligence Committee on Thursday released a declassified version of an investigative report on former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden that illustrates what committee leaders called a reckless disregard for Americans’ safety and privacy.

The review found that Snowden “handed over secrets that protect American troops overseas and secrets that provide vital defenses against terrorists and nation states,” according to the committee.

Chairman Devin Nunes (R-Calif.) said in a statement accompanying the report’s release that Snowden showed “reckless disregard” for “U.S. national security.” In the same statement, ranking member Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) said Snowden “and his defenders claim that he is a whistleblower, but he isn’t, as the committee’s review shows.”

The bipartisan report provides a history of Snowden’s career at the Central Intelligence Agency and as an NSA contractor, where he had several run-ins with colleagues and supervisors, according to the report. The committee found that a vast majority of stolen documents did not relate to electronic surveillance and instead delved into personal network drives of people who were involved in hiring decisions."

Declassified Snowden Report Says He Endangered American Lives

The House Intelligence Committee on Thursday released a declassified version of an investigative report on former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden that illustrates what committee leaders called a reckless disregard for Americans' safety and privacy.

morningconsult.com

Stay Ed. Stay.

 

[basquebromance]

Snowden:

"To whom could I turn? Who could I talk to? Even to whisper the truth, even to a lawyer or a judge or to Congress, had been made so severe a felony that just a basic outlining of the broadest facts would invite a lifetime sentence in a federal cell. I was lost, and fell into a dark mood while I struggled with my conscience. I love my country, and I believe in public service—my whole family, my whole family line for centuries, is filled with men and women who have spent their lives serving this country and its citizens. I myself had sworn an oath of service not to an agency, nor even a government, but to the public, in support and defense of the Constitution, whose guarantee of civil liberties had been so flagrantly violated. Now I was more than part of that violation: I was party to it. All of that work, all of those years—who was I working for? How was I to balance my contract of secrecy with the agencies that employed me and the oath I’d sworn to my country’s founding principles? To whom, or what, did I owe the greater allegiance? At what point was I morally obliged to break the law? Reflecting on those principles brought me my answers. I realized that coming forward and disclosing to journalists the extent of my country’s abuses wouldn’t be advocating for anything radical, like the destruction of the government, or even of the IC. It would be a return to the pursuit of the government’s, and the IC’s, own stated ideals."

 

[basquebromance]

me and Snowden have both been called: a Chinese double agent, a Russian triple agent, and worse: “a millennial.”

 

[Donald H]

Hopefully, some day we might get the full true story on Snowden.

Ed's books only provide hints.

 

[Harry Dresden]

Americans were spying on the world without telling a soul...until Snowden exposed them!

so no one was spying on us?....

 

[ColonelAngus]

Trump should have pardoned him.

See that, cult *****….I disagree with Trump.

He should have pardoned Snowden.

Now call me a Trumptard, you stupid *****.

It will still happen. I will be called a Trumptard in spite of criticism of his policies.

NOT ONE BIDEN CULTIST has even criticized anything Biden has done.

Who is in a cult?

I say **** Trump, hhe should have pardoned Snowden and Assange.

You chime in...Biden cult *****. Criticize your master

 

[Donald H]

For some important facts on Snowden's story, just ask. Nearly all Americans are unable to see the forest for the trees on account of their patriotism not allowing them to think it through clearly.

 

[basquebromance]

"For nearly all the years that my family spent in that house in Elizabeth City, this bedroom was mine, and its window was, too. Though the window had a curtain, it didn’t provide much, if any, privacy. From as far back as I can remember, my favorite activity was to tug the curtain aside and peek through the window into the den. Which is to say, from as far back as I can remember, my favorite activity was spying. I spied on my older sister, Jessica, who was allowed to stay up later than I was and watch the cartoons that I was still too young for. I spied on my mother, Wendy, who’d sit on the couch to fold the laundry while watching the nightly news. But the person I spied on the most was my father, Lon—or, as he was called in the Southern style, Lonnie—who’d commandeer the den into the wee hours" - Snowden

Snowden's Father was in the Coast Guard

 

[basquebromance]

so no one was spying on us?....

i didn't say that, did i?