If this be treason, make the most of it.
-- Patrick Henry
Whether you consider Edward Snowden a hero or traitor depends largely on your view of the role of our government.
If you believe it is the government's role to ensure all our security, that relinquishing a little liberty for a little security is ok, then you no doubt view him as a traitor. His actions dangerous to our national security.
If you believe and accept that nothing in this world is guaranteed safe, all of life is a risk and we are ultimately responsible for our own safety, then you likely view him as heroic.
The first view is the opinion of folks like Greg Gutfeld and Dick Cheney.
The latter those of Bob Beckel and Judge Andrew Napolitano and RandPaul.
I find myself siding far closer to the Beckels than the Gutfelds on this.
While I am not ready to label Snowden a hero because we really don't know his truest of motivations beyond what he has told us, I do view what he has done as a service to the American people.
And let's be clear here. We're not talking about just the Verizon and phone company scandals, though they are bad enough.
We are talking about PRISM, which very few seem to be addressing right now, instead focusing on the phone info gathering.
PRISM is the electronic equivalent of the government coming to your home mailbox, taking all your mail, taking it back to the office, opening it, photocopying it to have on record then resealing it and returning it to your mailbox without you ever being the wiser. Until the guy in charge of opening the envelopes bumps into you one day and tells you what's going on.
Still think we don't have a right to know about this? Still think he -- OR ANYONE ELSE WHO KNEW ABOUT THIS -- should have kept quiet? Taken their concerns to their bosses or someone "In authority" only to have it poo pooed and swept under the rug? (newsflash: they tried this and failed)
So while I am not ready to label him a hero, I cannot label him a traitor. Knowing what we know.
To me if he's a traitor then he is in the company of other traitors such as
Button Gwinnett
Lyman Hall
George Walton
William Hooper
Joseph Hewes
John Penn
Edward Rutledge
Thomas Heyward, Jr.
Thomas Lynch, Jr.
Arthur Middleton
John Hancock
Samuel Chase
William Paca
Thomas Stone
Charles Carroll of Carrollton
George Wythe
Richard Henry Lee
Thomas Jefferson
Benjamin Harrison
Thomas Nelson, Jr.
Francis Lightfoot Lee
Carter Braxton
Robert Morris
Benjamin Rush
Benjamin Franklin
John Morton
George Clymer
James Smith
George Taylor
James Wilson
George Ross
Caesar Rodney
George Read
Thomas McKean
William Floyd
Philip Livingston
Francis Lewis
Lewis Morris
Richard Stockton
John Witherspoon
Francis Hopkinson
John Hart
Abraham Clark
Josiah Bartlett
William Whipple
Samuel Adams
John Adams
Robert Treat Paine
Elbridge Gerry
Stephen Hopkins
William Ellery
Roger Sherman
Samuel Huntington
William Williams
Oliver Wolcott
Matthew Thornton
All Englishmen, subjects of the Crown and subject to English law.
Viewed by many of their countrymen as TRAITORS.
For doing what they felt was right. For their country and countrymen.
Had things broken badly for them, well. . .
While Snowden is no Thomas Jefferson neither is he a Benedict Arnold. And before taking rank with those who would have him returned in iron and shackles ask yourself just what kind of America you really want to live in. Accepting a surveillance society just because it already exists is a cop out.
THIS IS STILL AMERICA.
FIND ANOTHER WAY.
2 comments:
It doesn't depend on my view of government if I consider what the Founders did treason.
The Founders split one country, Great Britain, in half. They revoked the right of motherland Britons to be in America and their own right to be on the British Isles. They made themselves foreigners on British Isles and Britons foreigners in North America, subjecting them to immigration laws, encarcerating them in a small bit of their own country: the British Isles are decisively smaller than the 17 colonies and largely smaller than nowadays USA.
Also after each world war, the USA sent a bill to the UK. The Britons had to pay it by their taxes. They had control over their tax laws so they could decide by which taxes to pay the bill but they could not decide not to pay. After the seven years war, the UK did the same with its colonies in North America. Only that at that point of time North America and the UK were one country. So they didn't send a bill to Washington, they made an act, at first the stamp act. The Americans could still decide how they wanted to pay the bill. The stamp act was immediately repealed when the UKers learnt the Americans didn't like it, so were further acts repealed. But the American settlers decided not to pay at all.
The role of government as explained by the Founders is wonderfully explained by the Founders. They are right in their philosophical papers how countries ought to be run. Only it was a smokescreen. The Independence was not about securing the proper role of government and setting it the proper limits as they decried. It was about an elite: those Britons who already settled in North America; the elite revolted against the common people who by majority still lived in British Isles. They wanted the same privilege European nobles had: not to have to pay the taxes the commoner has to.
Rule #1) If this is treason, make the most of it.
Rule #2) if you feel like crying, refer back to rule #1
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