Robert Scheer: The Good Germans in Government

[marmar]

from truthdig:


The Good Germans in Government

Posted on Jun 25, 2013
By Robert Scheer


What a disgrace. The U.S. government, cheered on by much of the media, launches an international manhunt to capture a young American whose crime is that he dared challenge the excess of state power. Read the Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution and tell me that Edward Snowden is not a hero in the mold of those who founded this republic. Check out the Nuremberg war crime trials and ponder our current contempt for the importance of individual conscience as a civic obligation.

Yes, Snowden has admitted that he violated the terms of his employment at Booz Allen Hamilton, which has the power to grant security clearances as well as profiting mightily from spying on the American taxpayers who pay to be spied on without ever being told that is where their tax dollars are going. Snowden violated the law in the same way that Daniel Ellsberg did when, as a RAND Corporation employee, he leaked the damning Pentagon Papers study of the Vietnam War that the taxpayers had paid for but were not allowed to read.

In both instances, violating a government order was mandated by the principle that the United States trumpeted before the world in the Nuremberg war crime trials of German officers and officials. As Principle IV of what came to be known as the Nuremberg Code states: “The fact that a person acted pursuant to order of his government or of a superior does not relieve him from responsibility under international law, provided a moral choice was in fact possible to him.”

That is a heavy obligation, and the question we should be asking is not why do folks like Ellsberg, Snowden and Bradley Manning do the right thing, but rather why aren’t we bringing charges against the many others with access to such damning data of government malfeasance who remain silent? ..................(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/the_good_germans_in_government_20130625/

[Jesus Malverde]

1. The author does a good job of distilling the issue.

Did she know that the NSA had granted Booz Allen Hamilton such extensive access to our telephone and Internet records? Did she grasp that the revolving door between Booz Allen and the NSA meant that this was a double-dealing process involving high officials swapping out between the government and the war profiteers? Did she know that the security system administered by Booz Allen was so lax that young Snowden was given vast access to what she now feels was very sensitive data? Or that private companies like Booz Allen were able to hand out “top security” clearances to their employees, and that there now are 1.4 million Americans with that status?

Amazing that they would ever consider outsourcing access to these systems. I picture Dick Cheney and Karl Rove sitting at these terminals with unfettered access and they aren't looking for terrorists.

[Democracyinkind]

2. There's a reason that the national security was outsourced

One reason is profit.

Conspiratorial minded people might speculate that there's also a more nefarious reason for it. Much easier to fight an endless imaginary war this way.

[JW2020]

6. Plus there is less transparency in corporations

Not that there is much in government, but the Federal government does have to put on airs that we are a free and democratic society.

[Democracyinkind]

7. Exactly

The more transparency, the harder it is to fight endless imaginary wars.

[xchrom]

3. du rec.

[HereSince1628]

4. The certain damage done by Snowden is embarrassment of people in high places

Looking back over a half-century of political awareness, I note that this sort of damage is often the most seriously pursued. 'The Boss' never likes to be embarrassed.

Now, I'm open to the idea that I don't know the entire range and scope of information that Snowden may have possessed. Frankly, I accept that what we think of as the reality around Snowden and his activity is largely a purposefully constructed 'limited hangout.'

But the combination of Manning's document release and the suggestion that that Snowden has hundreds of documents whose release
'may get many people killed' suggest that the US security establishment has gotten very sloppy about compartmentalization of information. People can't leak, sell, or otherwise compromise classified information that they don't have. Something has gone awry.

The security apparatus has ALWAYS leaked, and the behemoth security apparatus that has risen like the fruiting body of a fungus since 911 is looking like an unfiltered sieve more than ever.

Administrative sloppiness would underlie such a problem. And embarrassment of those responsible for such porousness could be a significant motivator in this kurfluffle.

[steve2470]

5. k&r nt

[WillyT]

8. HUGE K & R !!! - THANK YOU !!!

[progressoid]

9. Throw Scheer under the bus.

[HardTimes99]

11. Pretty soon there will be more under the bus than still on it. - nt

[Octafish]

10. Scheer lost his job at LA Times for this kind of analysis.

The guy tells the truth.

[HardTimes99]

12. The LA Times lost many subscribers (myself included) for

replacing Scheer with Max Boot and Jonah Goldberg

Interestingly, I saw Scheer at a LA Times Festival of Books (Irony Alert) panel at UCLA a couple years back and he expressed no rancor towards the LAT. I have a lot more rancor at the way Scheer was treated than he apparently does