[mortehu]

What's the ouch?

> Barack Obama will strengthen whistleblower laws

2012: President Signs Whistleblower Protection Enhancement Act[1]

> Obama will ensure that federal agencies expedite the process for reviewing whistleblower claims and whistleblowers have full access to courts and due process.

2013: Whistleblower Edward Snowden is charged by federal prosecutors[2]

Has something happened to Snowden that I'm not aware of? As far as I understand, he fled to avoid a trial, not because there was some imminent threat to his life.

1. http://www.whistleblower.org/blog/42-2012/2380-president-sig...

2. http://apps.washingtonpost.com/g/documents/world/us-vs-edwar...

[jussij]

> not because there was some imminent threat to his life.

Treason does actually carry the potential of a death penalty.

Based on poor state of the current US legal system, I too would have run.

The last decade has seen the US legal system turned into nothing but a rubber stamp and puppet for the government.

The founding fathers would be turning in their graves.

[rtpg]

He isn't going to be charged with treason.

[muuh-gnu]

How is he supposed to know in advance that they will not try to kill him if that legal option is on the table and they are known to be willing to make examples out of previous whistleblowers like Bradley Manning?

And even if he is not threatened with outright execution, even slightly less radical but more likely punishments, like that of Manning, are sufficiently radical to justify defecting to the Soviet Union. Even a simple life in some far away Siberian village will be more endurable than a US 24/7 waterboarding & force-feeding facility.

[sampo]

> defecting to the Soviet Union

Soviet Union ceased to exist in 1991. 1991 was 22 years ago. You must be a real old-timer?

[3825]

Perhaps a jab at Putin, if I had to guess

[ChikkaChiChi]

Russian Federation has a far less ominous sound to it than Soviet Union. When you say the Soviet Union (or USSR) you can almost hear the evil Ivan Drago music playing in your head.

[mortehu]

> How is he supposed to know in advance that they will not try to kill him if that legal option

Well, in most countries it's illegal to deport someone if there's a risk of a death sentence, which is why US often cannot extradite people. Hence US has to convince the "host" country first, which I guess counts for something. That's what US is currently trying to do with Russia:

> "The charges he faces do not carry that possibility, and the United States would not seek the death penalty even if Mr. Snowden were charged with additional death penalty-eligible crimes," Attorney General Eric Holder said in a letter to Russian Minister of Justice Vladimirovich Konovalov.

[jussij]

Ok, let’s say they charged him with of "aiding the enemy". That also carries the death penalty.

Who knows what kind of trumped up charges the government where planning to throw at him.

But there's no way he'd be getting a fair trial, so why on earth would he be offering himself up for trial.

[arunkd13]

I have heard the term secret court, for the first time only with reference the the USA. With secret courts, secret indictment, your statement of 'He isn't going to be charged with treason' only looks like a trap being laid.

[rayiner]

Oh for fucks sake. There are no secret courts that can issue indictments.

[jussij]

> There are no secret courts that can issue indictments

You are 100% correct. The US government now thinks it's a court all unto itself and is now above the law.

It's got to the point where it doesn't even try to hide these indiscretions.

Rendition of prisoners to foreign countries by US personnel is now OK as long as no US personnel are involved in the subsequent torture.

It’s a well known fact the US government does not participate in torture, they don’t condone torture and as a government they do everything in their power to stop it. But rendition is OK. Out of sight, out of mind.

So that does not mean they can't assist in the process of rendition.

Also water boarding is not considered a form of torture by the US government. We the government consider it a form of intelligence gathering.

Unlawful detention? There is no such thing. We can hold any one for any length of time as long as it is in the national interest.

Is this the new US democracy?

The big disappointment for me is Obama.

I actually thought he was different, but I now know that was just foolish of me.

In many ways he is turning out to be much worse than the alternative :(

[graycat]

> Unlawful detention? There is no such thing. We can hold any one for any length of time as long as it is in the national interest.

It appears that you are referring to the people the US is holding in Gitmo.

Uh, an issue here is the "lawful" part: A claim is that the whole Gitmo thing is part of the US military fighting a war. The Gitmo people are prisoners of war or some such. So, they are not to be handled in the US legal system. So, for how they are being handled, "lawful" in the US legal system makes little or no sense.

For "torture", the US military claims not to use torture. Okay. Maybe water boarding is torture, but apparently it does no physical harm and, so, maybe is not really torture.

In broad terms, many well informed people, e.g., D. D. Eisenhower, understood very well that the US military in times of war does things on battlefields that would be totally unacceptable against US citizens inside the US. E.g., Ike was very reluctant to send the Army to Little Rock. So, one broad lesson is that (1) the US legal system and law enforcement inside the US are one thing and (2) what the US military does outside the US to enemies of the US is a very different thing. In particular, Gitmo is just not like a US prison or a county jail. Asking if Gitmo is "lawful" is like asking about the wings on hogs.

I don't say this because I like Obama or liked W or Cheney.

For W and Cheney, they got us into foreign wars that were good candidates for "absurd foreign adventures" and didn't get us out. There's "Occupy a country, pull down a statue, now what? Do you know what I mean?" or some such from just retired Marine four star General J. "Mad Dog" Mattis.

For Obama, my first time really torqued off was his early 2008 interview with the SF Chronicle (off and on on YouTube -- once when on I typed in a full transcript which I still have) where he said that he wanted to use carbon cap and trade to ratchet up the charges on coal fired electric generating plants to "bankrupt" the plants. From some DoE reports, at the time that was 49% of our electric power and about 23% of all our energy. Outrageous. He'd need a crash program in nuke construction to make up the difference. He also said that of course "electric rates would skyrocket".

So, what was he doing? Best I can tell, he was waving a smell of raw meat to get some greenies up on their hind legs. And he was building a consensus to throw money at green projects, please some greenies in business, and get back some campaign donations. For shutting down coal plants, likely the EPA has been slowly shutting down some of the older plants the owners didn't want to upgrade to cleaner burning. There I would be more concerned about NOx emissions, that cause acid rain, than CO2 (that plants like!).

So, my reading is that mostly he has just played politics with the greenies: Give them a little smell of what they want, throw some money their way, pretend to be doing what they want, and otherwise do essentially nothing.

E.g., in Mideast Arab Spring politics, he doesn't want to appear to be on the side of either secular dictators or the radical Islamists. So, in Libya he did something but apparently mostly (set aside Bengazhi) not enough really to entangle the US. Apparently in Syria he trained a few rebels to use some Russian missiles -- again, appearing to fight the dictator but not getting the US entangled. Now the US DoD has given him a list of options for more in Syria; my guess is that he will take none of the options but continue to find ways to posture. For actually influencing the outcome in Syria, I suspect he will do nothing. Of course, I don't see a good outcome in Syria -- it looks like either Al Qaeda or back to Assad as the Mediterranean branch of Iran.

Maybe in Egypt he did or enabled something productive: Uh, it appears that from the deal between Sadat and Begin at Camp David, the US heavily funds the Egyptian military. Sooooo, net, the Egyptian military is nearly a branch of the US DoD! Sooooo, the US essentially has a big veto and say-so in Egypt. So, after a year of Morsi and his true believers messing up the economy, there was enough discontent in the streets to let the military dump Morsi and set up an interim techocrat government and then hold elections. If this works out, good. If Obama played a significant role, also good.

My explanation for nearly everything Obama does is he just wants to play politics or be a political leader. So, pick some issues, appear to be for some and against others. For each side, make some statements and maybe some weak actions and otherwise do next to nothing.

When would he actually do something? Maybe when about 70% of the voters really wanted it. Otherwise he will just say things and do little things that make his base feel good.

My take is that basically he is indifferent and cynical about government and, instead, is willing just to play feel good politics. E.g., "bankrupt" the coal plants is just feel good nonsense to please some greenies and not something he's actually going to do.

So, as an engineer, to me one place he fails is (1) see a serious US problem, (2) analyze the problem, (3) find a good direction, (4) explain the problem and direction to the American people and build a consensus to solve the problem, (5) move on with a solution. Instead he just plays politics until some other forces get maybe 70% approval for some action and then steps in front of the crowd as the leader.

In part playing such politics can generate political capital that can be used for something definite.

It seems to me that such leadership looks weak to the voters and, as a result by now, is costing him political capital.

One place where maybe 70% of the people will get torqued at him is the Trayvon Martin matter: So, again, Obama hasn't done much, and since it really isn't necessarily a Federal issue he didn't have much to do. But he has said some things that appear to please his base. And his buddy the AG has said some more such things. Apparently so far their actions have amounted to next to nothing except one might guess that some of the rioting that has happened since the jury decision was stimulated or encouraged by some of what Obama and his AG did say. Sure, that can mean that some dumb people rioted for no good reason so blame the dumb people; still, the statements were not good.

One danger of Obama is that many problems in the US are permitted just to fester, e.g., the economy, energy planning, immigration, health care reform, etc. instead of receive serious attention. A second danger is that if there were a serious problem, would he be a good and serious leader?

One piece of good news is that Obama seems to be going along with the plan to put the DHS in the old DC Saint Elizabeth's Psychiatric Hospital. Sounds fully appropriate to me. Hope that the TSA is one of the first inmates. Sad part is that they want to spend $4.5 billion moving in.

Also apparently constitutional scholar Obama failed to notice how the NSA tracked mud over the Fourth Amendment and, again, let that problem just fester until the sh!t hit the fan.

[officemonkey]

They're not needed. The government can just declare him an enemy combatant and stick him in Guantanamo. (see: Jose Padilla.)

Or, drop a drone bomb on him. (see: Anwar al-Aulaqi, Samir Khan, Abd al-Rahman, and Jude Mohammed.)

[rayiner]

Jose Padilla was never held in Guantanamo. He was held in a military brig in South Carolina, longer than he should have because of litigation surrounding the authority of the Bush administration to hold him without charges. The Bush administration did charge him, likely because they lost Hamdi v. Rumsfeld which rejected their attempts to detain a different U.S. citizen.

The only American citizen targeted in a drone strike was Al Awlaki. The others were killed because they happened to be traveling with Al Qaeda leaders in Pakistan or Yemen who were targeted. We can argue about the legality of targeting Al Awlaki, someone who was actively waging war against the U.S. and tried to evade capture for a decade, but it's ridiculous to bring up the other three. Hundreds of U.S. citizens were killed in the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The fact that U.S. citizens may be killed collaterally in a military strike with legitimate targets has never been construed to be a violation of due process.

Snowden is a completely different situation. He's not waging war against the U.S. and leaking classified information is a criminal charge, not an act of war.

[socialist_coder]

Who cares what he's charged with. Look at what they did to Bradley Manning. Actions speak louder than words.

[adventured]

The ouch is that the Obama Administration has been hyper aggressive in attacking whistle blowers and leaks of all kinds.

"The Obama administration has already charged more people — six — under the Espionage Act for alleged mishandling of classified information than all past presidencies combined. (Prior to Obama, there were only three such cases in American history.)"

http://www.salon.com/2012/02/09/obamas_unprecedented_war_on_...

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/04/16/obama-whistleblower...

[joering2]

> As far as I understand, he fled to avoid a trial, not because there was some imminent threat to his life.

Would you write your comment again after knowing this:

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/15/opinion/15tue3.html?_r=0

http://www.bradleymanning.org/news/bradley-on-abuse

http://www.cnn.com/2012/11/29/justice/manning-wikileaks

Enough?

[mortehu]

Have civilians ever been tried in US military courts?

[glesica]

Have military prisoners ever been subjected to torture while awaiting trial?

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/apr/10/bradley-manning-...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bradley_Manning#Detention

It doesn't matter if he's tried in a civilian or military court, if he's tortured or otherwise subjected to inhumane treatment and if he is not likely to receive a fair trial then he should flee.

Edit: typo

[wooster]

Not since Ex parte Milligan (1866), AFAIK: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ex_parte_Milligan

[ry0ohki]

No, but they have been targeted by drones without a trial...

[jasonlotito]

Once. Al Awlaki.

I'll refer to https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6107997 for the rest.

[CWuestefeld]

Once. Al Awlaki.

As far as we know.

Remember, we are now in an age where we do not know what our government is doing. In fact, we're not allowed to know what it's doing, or even why we're not allowed to know.

Smart money shouldn't bet that this is the only actual occurrence.

[jasonlotito]

> As far as we know.

Yes, anything else is pure speculation. Wars have started because of speculation like that.

> Remember, we are now in an age where we do not know what our government is doing.

That's naive. We are not now in such an age, it has always been like this. We are now in an age where it's far easier to know what is going on. Things aren't getting worse. They aren't getting less transparent. Read your history if you think the government was more transparent in decades past. It wasn't.

We've done far, far worse than target Al Awlaki. Hell, if that's our biggest concern, we are doing well.

[StevenRayOrr]

We _know_ of one instance and that instance alone is bad enough that we should be alarmed, but "smart money" doesn't legitimize the claim that it has happened on multiple occasions.

[Demiurge]

Has Obama even called Snowden a whistle-blower? He called him a hacker, and his tone of voice has always been dismissive and implying treason.

[mortehu]

If I'm not mistaken, he was responding to the question of whether he would put pressure on China to extradite Snowden, and he basically said that he wouldn't scramble jets or start wheeling and dealing for a single case of a 29-year-old hacker suspect.

Reading this in the context of what his actual powers and responsibilities are in this case, it seems to me like he was diminishing the crime, rather than rallying for a witch-hunt.

[Demiurge]

Besides not rallying for a witch-hunt, which is of course extremely commendable, he could acknowledge Snowden as a whistle-blower who sacrificed comfort and freedom for protecting constitution. Even while pursuing him for prosecution.

[Buzaga]

The ouch to me is how much this that's written relates to what's happening today, I just imagine the shame he ought to feel if he reread this today, or someone read this to him...

Obama is great at keeping a straight face(he's a lawyer, after all), but sometimes it makes me wonder how far can he handle since there's so much dirt with all that stuff... I mean, the "The programs are transparent" is a Bush-like statement from 'the great talker', and really, he is, but he's now completely demoralized in many eyes, people from the world rooted for him, I watched the fucking debate and shared a pic of 'debate drinking game' with my friends, we all wanted that seemingly enlighted dude at this position... it's just a very ugly story, even considering that arriving there it was inevitable that he would have to give in to a shit or two or three, but it went overboard, this is a disaster in my 'very-far-away' eyes... what will it be of his name in history? What will this do for future 'enlighted-hopeful' candidates? What about the next black person running for it?

It just makes you go 'ouch'.