Ex-CIA Director: Snowden Should Be 'Hanged' For Paris
Source: The Hill
A former CIA director says leaker Edward Snowden should be convicted of treason and given the death penalty in the wake of the terrorist attack on Paris.
“It’s still a capital crime, and I would give him the death sentence, and I would prefer to see him hanged by the neck until he’s dead, rather than merely electrocuted,” James Woolsey told CNN’s Brooke Baldwin on Thursday.
Woolsey said Snowden, who divulged classified in 2013, is partly responsible for the terrorist attack in France last week that left at least 120 dead and hundreds injured.
“I think the blood of a lot of these French young people is on his hands,” he said. Woolsey, who served as the head of the CIA from 1993 to 1995, said the Snowden leak was “substantial.”
Read more: http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/260817-ex-cia-director-snowden-should-be-hanged-for-paris
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enid602
(8,627 posts)Hope Eddie likes borscht.
Demeter
(85,373 posts)Ed Snowden merely confirmed what everyone with any interest in the subject suspected. He gave away no secrets...he just shut down the whole Conspiracy Theory dodge for unconstitutional behavior by the government.
No, sorry, can't blame Paris on Snowden. Can't blame the failure of intelligence on Snowden, either. That's the NSA's fault. They are so busy scooping up everybody's phone calls and emails that they can't be bothered to concentrate on their job. They are Hoovering....just like J. Edgar did...collecting blackmail material without the formality of a subpoena. Sniggering over naked pictures. Stalking ex-lovers. The usual nasty tricks.
With the US committing terrorism with every mis-directed drone, Woolsey should show a little care for his own reputation as a war criminal....
starroute
(12,977 posts)His stint as CIA director was nothing compared to what he got up to afterwards. He was one of the PNAC signers calling for war against Iraq in 1998 and was working for the Iraqi National Congress by 2000, but he really went into high gear after September 11. On October 14, 2001, The Guardian reported (http://www.theguardian.com/world/2001/oct/14/terrorism.afghanistan6):
"It was confirmed yesterday that Jim Woolsey, CIA director from 1993 to 1996, recently visited London on behalf of the hawkish Defence Department to 'firm up' other evidence of Iraqi involvement in 11 September.
"Some observers fear linking Saddam to the terrorist attacks is part of an agenda being driven by US hawks eager to broaden the war to include Iraq, a move being resisted by the British government."
During that same London visit, he was looking for evidence to tie Saddam Hussein to the anthrax attacks. And a couple of months later, he was already pushing the Curveball/mobile labs claims.
That man has more blood on his hands than almost anyone else except Dick Cheney.
haikugal
(6,476 posts)billhicks76
(5,082 posts)They dropped the ball.....again.
LiberalLovinLug
(14,175 posts)Is this the new plan?...Every terrorist attack blame Edward Snowden? Laughable if it weren't so despicable.
The historical criminal record of the CIA and the millions upon millions of innocents killed and tortured by their hand throughout the last and present century is too long a record sheet to even list. Installing Pinochet in Chile, and the Shah in Iran, are but a couple off hand.
compared to a whistleblower that exposed blatant lies by the NSA on how it abuses the practice of scooping up information on its own citizens.
I read that article and nowhere is there any actual proof or link that anything Snowden revealed had anything to do with empowering the Paris terrorists.
GoneFishin
(5,217 posts)
dixiegrrrrl
(60,010 posts)surprised he did not want Snowden drawn and quartered.
yourout
(7,531 posts)
NRaleighLiberal
(60,015 posts)
forest444
(5,902 posts)"I'm old, I need the money, and no one will give me the time of day!"
Purveyor
(29,876 posts)forest444
(5,902 posts)There are numerous theories as to why. My favorite is probably Woolsey's alleged refusal to show Clinton the UFO files. 
sinkingfeeling
(51,466 posts)
jalan48
(13,874 posts)What should his sentence be for the massive death and destruction that continues to this day? Seems like he's shifting the real blame from Neo-cons like himself onto Snowden.
Response to Purveyor (Original post)
1000words This message was self-deleted by its author.
840high
(17,196 posts)
valerief
(53,235 posts)
closeupready
(29,503 posts)bobthedrummer
(26,083 posts)R. James Woolsey Jr. (SourceWatch profile 2013)
http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/R._James_Woolsey,_Jr.
Geronimoe
(1,539 posts)Scapegoating
Jack Rabbit
(45,984 posts)Of course, he's not the only one.
What a sick, twisted man.
Indeed.
grasswire
(50,130 posts)Two is a trend. A talking point.
Solly Mack
(90,777 posts)Not that torture is a punishable offense in America. Well, not for government sanctioned torture. Well, a few soldiers might go to jail, get labeled " a few bad apples" - as if torture wasn't systemic, sanctioned and widespread.
But don't mind me. I'm still not over it. Unable to move forward from crimes against humanity. I'm strange that way.
Woolsey on torture.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p02f38cj
http://www.nbcnews.com/id/56622366/ns/msnbc-hardball_with_chris_matthews/t/hardball-chris-matthews-wednesday-december-th/#.Vk6cxS9dHIV
krispos42
(49,445 posts)Hell, the first ten are pretty easy.
Xipe Totec
(43,890 posts)
elias49
(4,259 posts)the next time you say 'He should come back - he'd get a fair trial'
You betcha!
Purveyor
(29,876 posts)Must have retreated to a cave or something or other...
cstanleytech
(26,303 posts)Yes, I believe he does deserve some just like Jonathan Pollard and Manning both deserved atleast some jail time for breaking the law.
blackspade
(10,056 posts)Who says shit like this?
Opinions are like assholes. And he should know being a an asshole himself.
Zen Democrat
(5,901 posts)
backscatter712
(26,355 posts)Contrary to popular belief, the Paris terrorists used cleartext SMS messages to coordinate their attacks.
I'd like to see this fascist right-wing brainstem explain exactly what it was that Snowden disclosed that made it easier for the ISIS goons to make their attack. Which unconstitutional program did he out that got ISIS to go "BWAHAHAHAH! NOW WE CAN HIT PARIS!"?
Which program? Anyone? Anyone? Bueller? Bueller?
You know why this nazi is really saying this shit, right?
In the UK, David Cameron and his Tory fascists are shoving legislation through Parliament to require that all crypto in the UK have a backdoor so their law-enforcement and intelligence can crack it. This idea, is, of course, completely stupid, in that it is mathematically impossible to make such a back-door in such a way that only the Good Guys can use it, but unauthorized Bad Guys can't. It's legislated mandatory security holes in just about every piece of software ever made.
And Woolsey is spewing the authoritarian hysteria to pave the way for similar legislation here in the US. Hope everyone likes having their bank accounts hacked by Nigerians, and likes having their entire lives profiled and filed in NSA data centers, because that's what's going to happen if the spooks get what they want...
billhicks76
(5,082 posts)They didnt protect us and they knew. Turns out the Parisian attackers were on US watch lists and it didnt even matter so how does Snowden have anything to do with anything. Woolsey is shameless.
TSIAS
(14,689 posts)He is a Democrat and was appointed by Bill Clinton. Since party label is all that matters, I'm surprised he isn't being lauded here.
Laughing Mirror
(4,185 posts)(Woolsey) is by far one of the most extremist and radical neoconservatives ever to be puked up by the intelligence world. He not only was one of the leading advocates of attacking Iraq, he was one of the leading proponents of all of the lies that led to that invasion, and has been calling for war and other sorts of really extremist policies, and disseminating lies to the American people for decades. And so, to hold him out as some sort of authority figure, some kind of like respected elder intelligence statesman, on these attacks is just exactly the sort of thing we’ve been talking about, which is the state of the American media. Not one person has challenged anything that he said.
....
And again, as far as who has blood on their hands, there’s zero evidence that the attackers used encryption or anything else that was revealed as a result of Edward Snowden, but there’s lots of evidence that the CIA utterly failed in their mission and that the U.S. government has done all sorts of things unwittingly to strengthen ISIS. And so, I think if you want to talk about who has blood on their hands, personally, I would look first to ISIS, the people who actually shot those people in the Paris streets. It’s really weird. Usually after a terrorist attack, nobody is allowed to suggest that anybody has blame other than the terrorists themselves. But for some reason, in this case, leading establishment figures and journalists feel free to go around detracting—distracting attention from ISIS and saying, "No, it’s not ISIS that has blood on their hands, it’s Edward Snowden." For some reason, that’s now allowed. So, if that’s what we’re doing, if that’s the game we’re playing, I would look to the U.S. government first, because they failed to find the plot despite huge amounts of money and unlimited power to do so, and because they’ve done all sorts of things to strengthen the group that apparently bears responsibility for this attack.
http://www.democracynow.org/2015/11/19/glenn_greenwald_on_submissive_medias_drumbeat
adir
(33 posts)Big mistake by the Big Dog.
Warpy
(111,300 posts)He just confirmed what everybody already knew, that everything was being spied on in this country and that privacy is a quaint concept that was relegated to history's dustbin with the onset of the stupid War on Drugs.
If you think those goons were going to communicate via phone calls and unhidden social media accounts, you're nuttier than most of your foaming at the mouth spook cohort, Mr. Woolsey.
Scuba
(53,475 posts)Javaman
(62,531 posts)trial for war crimes.
woolsey is an asshole
Taitertots
(7,745 posts)I'd rather blame the CIA for decades of criminal behavior.
Nitram
(22,840 posts)Herman4747
(1,825 posts)
librechik
(30,676 posts)well, they don't. The COG government never changes, no matter who is president.
http://www.bostonglobe.com/ideas/2014/10/18/vote-all-you-want-the-secret-government-won-change/jVSkXrENQlu8vNcBfMn9sL/story.html
librechik
(30,676 posts)no I'm not. he will die un-prosecuted and stinking rich, like the rest of the gang.
Blue_Tires
(55,445 posts)Besides, summary execution isn't going to teach him anything...
olddad56
(5,732 posts)
restorefreedom
(12,655 posts)
MADem
(135,425 posts)That said, he is making a fair point about the damage that Snowden did with his race to Russia and his comments about encryption, that warned terrorists to secure their transmissions more thoroughly than they were doing to that point.
We were blinded to the planning for this attack SOLELY BECAUSE OF what Snowden revealed.
But hanging? Naaah.
Octafish
(55,745 posts)
daleo
(21,317 posts)“...I would give him the death sentence, and I would prefer to see him hanged by the neck until he’s dead, rather than merely electrocuted,” James Woolsey told CNN’s Brooke Baldwin on Thursday.
What sane person talks like those? He talks like a Bond villain.
JackRiddler
(24,979 posts)Though no longer in government, in 2002-3 Woolsey was very much at the forefront of the propaganda campaigns to launch a war of aggression on the nation of Iraq, without which of course there would have never been a jihadi "state" on Iraqi and Syrian territory today.
