Snowden the Coward

The loss of Congressman Justin Amash's amendment to the House Defense appropriation's bill blocking the NSA's phone record program this past week is due to Edward Snowden's cowardice. Yes the intelligence community has pushed well beyond many limits set for it because that is what happens in a closed loop. A secret agency supervised by a secret court is certain to spin off into an extremity which we never intended it to go. Therefore I applaud Snowden for having exposed the intelligence gathering excesses and started a debate about the limits of what we will tolerate in the name of security. The problem is that his seeking asylum outside of the country. Instead he should be here in the U.S. going to trial and willing to endure punishment for pledges he broke and knew for which there would be existential consequences for himself.

Unfortunately his request for asylum from anti American authoritarian states has reduced the worth of his sacrifice to nothing by giving authoritarians the ability to call him a traitor and thereby cut off the debate.

Postscript - Aug 14

Today's Thomas Friedman editorial "Obama, Snowden & Putin" makes the same observation about Snowden really needing to come home and face the music.  The longer he hides under Putin's authoritarian skirts, the better he makes the NSA look.

Krugman

Yesterday's post had me quoting Paul Krugman on the GOP having lost it's moral compass.  My complaint about Krugman  is that he favors increased spending with no real direction with regard to the quality of the spending for enhancing the economy.  Not all spending is equal.  On the flip side not all tax cuts are equal.  To be dogmatic on either side is, well Paul you should be better than that.

Time for Class Warfare

The Republican Party is showing a selfishness reminiscent of Marie Antoinette's "Let them eat cake."  Paul Krugman's editorial  "Hunger Games, U.S.A." in today's New York Times decries the GOP's loss of it's soul with the recent passage in the House of a stripped down Agriculture bill where the gains are for the rich Ag combines and the shaft for recipients of Food Stamps.  I have always been for the elimination of farm subsidies, The Department of Agriculture and the Food Stamp program because it was contrary to a free market. But the mean spirited gall of favoring generously a few with public money (heads the rich win) while others are cast aside using the flip side of the same argument (tails the poor lose) is the warped machination of cronyism.

Sweden! Send us some of your Politicians, because ours Suck

This is a placard held up by Brazilian demonstrator protesting against Dilam Rousseff's administration. The protestor must be a reader of “The Economist” as well as a good example of the recent dissatisfaction experienced by Brazil's socialist government.

BrazilianPresident’s Attempts to Placate Protesters Backfire in today's New York Times shows a leader without direction, sense of economic limits nor capable of discerning value for expenditure. I may not agree with Scandinavian Socialists, but I do admire their insistence on receiving value for money.

 

Hitch 22

Christopher Hitchens memoir is fascinating reading brilliantly written. He peels away his conversion from English socialist to American neocon and I wonder how such a facile mind could have been so wrong on both counts?  It's enough make me believe in God.

Absolute Power Corrupts, Absolutely

Pardon the stale quote but it seems to me that Edward Snowden has done this country a service by putting the spot light on an agency gone wild. The NSA's hegemony on our 4^th amendment rights comes from a build it because we can attitude that is unconstrained because of secrecy. It's all trust and no verify with the Congress and public so that an awful lot of lines in the sand have been crossed.

I am optimistic when reading “Resume Shows Leaker Honed HackingSkills” in today's New York Times that the NSA has a problem with hacker talent that it may never resolve. That problem being the personality of a good hacker is rebellious and difficult to keep in a box.