Posted by
glen ropella on
URL: http://friam.383.s1.nabble.com/The-AP-kerfuffle-tp7583146p7583443.html
Marcus G. Daniels wrote at 07/15/2013 12:09 PM:
> He signed an NDA and in all likeliness become a corpse, a fugitive or a prisoner
> for the rest of his life because he broke that deal. His 2nd interview with the
> Guardian make it clear that he knew he'd go down for this. There's no selfish
> upside I can see.
There need be no selfish upside. His lies could easily be seen as motivated by
a delusional disorder. He may feel like a martyr. He may feel his chances of
surviving are greater than they actually are. ... Whatever. The point is that
he saw lying to and about perfectly innocent people as his means to an end.
Take my point as a comment on our byzantine "rule of law", where laws must be
broken in order for justice to be done, or take it as naive rhetoric for "two
wrongs don't make a right." It doesn't change the fact that Snowden is a weasel.
Now, I happen to be OK with weasels when their actions make our lives, our
democracy better. I don't expect people to have infinite foresight or even to
be ideologically stable. People make mistakes and, whenever possible, systemic
causes should be sought before assigning blame to a pure, single cause.
Persoally, I think Snowden should be welcomed back to the US as a hero, at least
to some demographic, perhaps in the same way Ollie North is treated these days.
But you can safely bet that I won't be telling any of my secrets to Snowden. 8^)
He'll have to steal them (which is not hard, given my lax security).
> It's intelligence arena; it's all about deception and manipulation. Children
> need not apply. It's fine if you think deception and manipulation cannot serve
> the greater good of the democracy and promoting individual freedom. But by that
> standard every competent employee in the intelligence community would be guilty
> of having that character flaw/feature.
No, I don't think so. I actually think the balance between empathy for those
you've infiltrated and your original mission is a _difficult_ balance. To paint
the whole community of spies and undercover cops as having this particular
character flaw/feature is too broad. It does a disservice to those who think
long and hard ... and get professional training regarding ... what it means to
go undercover.
O'Keefe and Snowden seem particularly cavalier to me. They seem very
agenda-driven and don't have much respect for the humanity of their targets.
--
⇒⇐ glen e. p. ropella
There's a light that used to shine
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