We all knew we were being spied
on. But the scale of operations is just staggering. Has Obama forfeited his
claim to be a people’s president, some claim he is worse than Richard Nixon.
Ed Snowden, a former systems
administrator at the NSA (national security agency) gave a startling interview
to the Guardian Newspaper from his June 2013 position in Hong Kong. He is now
on the run and has given encoded files containing NSA secrets to several
trusted friends. If anything happens to Snowden, the files will be unlocked and
publicised.
Extracts from the interview sums
up the world we can look forward to if the Prism programme continues on present
course.
Snowden: Intro
“Sitting at
my desk I certainly had the authority to wiretap anyone right up to the
president who has a personal e-mail…. I think the public is owed an explanation
of the motivations behind the people who make these disclosures that are
outside of the democratic model.
When you are
subverting the power of government - that is a fundamental dangerous thing to
democracy….. And it (Surveillance society) is going to get worse with the next
generation and the next generation who extend the capabilities of this type of
architecture of repression
I could be
rendered by the CIA, I could have people come after me and they could even pay
off the Triads. That’s a fear I will have to live under the rest of my life for
however long that happens to be….. If they want to get you they will get you in
time.”
Guardian: Why should people care about surveillance?
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PRISM/US-984XN much of the world’s information flows
through the USA.
Prism targets phone calls, e-mail or chat to take the cheapest path….
It has already 97 billion pieces of intelligence from networks
worldwide.
“You can’t come forward against the world most powerful
intelligence agencies
and be completely free from risk, no one can meaningfully
oppose them” Ed Snowden.
|
“Because even
if you are not doing anything wrong you are being watched and recorded….to the
point where you don’t have to have done anything wrong, you simply have to eventually
fall under suspicion from somebody even by a wrong call….
Then they can
use the system to go back in time and scrutinise every decision you have ever made,
every friend you have ever discussed something with and attack you on that
basis….. to sort of derive suspicion
from an innocent life and paint anyone in the context of a wrongdoer.
The greatest
fear I have regarding the outcome for America from these disclosures is, that
nothing will change….people will know the lengths government is going to grant
themselves power to create greater control over American society and global
society……. but they will not take the risk to stand up and fight to change things.
And, the
months ahead and the years ahead it is only going to get worse until eventually
there will be a time where a new leader will be elected, they will flip the
switch and say that because of a crisis or the dangers we face in the world…we
need more authority we need more power and there will be nothing the people can
do at that point to oppose it and it will be turnkey tyranny”…..ends.
Typical of
people who relish control, some politicians rushed to call for retribution,
including Southern Baptist Republican Lindsey Graham who said;
"I hope
we'll chase him to the ends of the earth, bring him to justice and let the
Russians know there will be consequences if they harbour this guy."
Wasn't the
Cold War about ending communist state repression and advancing civil liberties
& democracy???
Snowden is in
the Cold. But because of him, the government’s prying Prism feels the Heat.
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