Traitors vs. Whistleblower

[j1mmyd]

Snowden and Manning are scumbag traitors. Period.

This is a whistleblower: http://dailycaller.com/2014/02/24/va-em ... sts-audio/

Although I'm not sure that the subsequent treatment of Mitchell or others (Dodson of BATFE) doesn't actually hurt our case against the traitors. Not hard to point to actual retaliation like this as an excuse, flimsy as it may be.

[Taggure]

Snowden is a TRAITOR Plain and Simple.

[Reverenddel]

Playing devil's advocate, are you sure? Without Snowden, we would have never known the scope that the NSA is taking with it's investigations.

[j1mmyd]

Yes, I'm sure. The end does not justify the means.

[Taggure]

Anytime National Security information is devulged it has potential to put lives in jepordy, and since one of those lives may be my son's then yes I say he is a TRAITOR to this country. Some things need to be kept secret and the General Public has no need in knowing, and is better off not knowing because most would not know what to do with it anyway.

[Kreutz]

I have nothing but the highest praise for Snowden and Manning; they did much to expose the sheer power hunger of the US government.

IMO the ends certainly justify the means. Last I checked some of those dudes on our money were traitors to King George the 3rd.

[762]

'National security' a term that's overly used. Frequently information is classified in an attempt to hide dealings that a group (whether it's the admin or any alphabet agency) that has very little to do with actual security and everything about shady dealings.

[dusterdude]

Im still reserving jusgement on snowden


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[BertMacklin]

When that final noose slips tight, the last bolt slams home, and the incinerators are fully stoked, no amount of patriotism is going to save anyone. If someone is willing to face death and life imprisonment to get out a piece of information, then the message is clearly more important than the messenger.

[WRW]

Taggure, I most certainly would not wish ill for your son. That said, do you think your son's employer was not complicit by placing other employees in a position of reporting the illegal actions of their employer?

[ Post made via Mobile Device ]

[kelu]

I disagree. And you should too. This country is created by what brits called traitors. Do you feel that way?
What Snowden had disclosed is not a threat to the security of the country, but to the security of elites. It's not the same thing.

[trailrunner]

Manning is a traitor who should have faced the noose. There was nothing courageous in his actions. He was a mixed-up, unhappy kid. If he had disclosed one or two documents to a senator to expose something wrong then maybe -- maybe -- I might sympathize with him. But instead, he downloaded hundreds of thousands of documents in bulk and turned them over to a foreign national seeking to profit and damage the US. I deal with the repercussions of what he did every day. The noose for him.

Bottom line is that both of them betrayed the oath they took when they were granted access to classified material. That oath didn't say that it didn't apply when they thought they were right, or if they felt that they were being mistreated, or if they couldn't make up their mind if they were a boy or a girl. It said that they would not disclose those secrets, period. There is no discretion, there is no interpretation: it's black and white.

They are both selfish traitors.

[Palladin]

+1 kelu

...not a smidgen of wrongdoing anywhere, nope none.'Scuse us while we finish fundamentally transforming this country... gotta draw down the military and ramp up your local police a bit more, get your kids all on Kommon Kore, that's right komrades you just need a little more government, that's all. Have a nice day, beyotches.

[j1mmyd]

I have nothing but the highest praise for Snowden and Manning...

Traitorous f*cks and I hope that they and their supporters die of gooch cancer. (Too much? Maybe just let them die and let their defenders survive the gooch cancer?)

They did nothing to improve our lot. They only weakened us and helped those that wish to gain advantage over us.

[j1mmyd]

Manning is a traitor who should have faced the noose. There was nothing courageous in his actions. He was a mixed-up, unhappy kid. If he had disclosed one or two documents to a senator to expose something wrong then maybe -- maybe -- I might sympathize with him. But instead, he downloaded hundreds of thousands of documents in bulk and turned them over to a foreign national seeking to profit and damage the US. I deal with the repercussions of what he did every day. The noose for him.

Bottom line is that both of them betrayed the oath they took when they were granted access to classified material. That oath didn't say that it didn't apply when they thought they were right, or if they felt that they were being mistreated, or if they couldn't make up their mind if they were a boy or a girl. It said that they would not disclose those secrets, period. There is no discretion, there is no interpretation: it's black and white.

They are both selfish traitors.

+1

[762]

Tailrunner - I could not disagree with you more. I will leave it at that.

[ShotgunBlast]

Manning is a traitor who should have faced the noose. There was nothing courageous in his actions. He was a mixed-up, unhappy kid. If he had disclosed one or two documents to a senator to expose something wrong then maybe -- maybe -- I might sympathize with him. But instead, he downloaded hundreds of thousands of documents in bulk and turned them over to a foreign national seeking to profit and damage the US. I deal with the repercussions of what he did every day. The noose for him.

Bottom line is that both of them betrayed the oath they took when they were granted access to classified material. That oath didn't say that it didn't apply when they thought they were right, or if they felt that they were being mistreated, or if they couldn't make up their mind if they were a boy or a girl. It said that they would not disclose those secrets, period. There is no discretion, there is no interpretation: it's black and white.

They are both selfish traitors.

Eh, it's black and white that they betrayed their oath, but their intention on what they did with the information determines more the status of traitor or whistleblower.

traitor - a person who betrays a friend, country, principle, etc
whistleblower - a person who exposes misconduct, alleged dishonest or illegal activity occurring in an organization.

I think it's easier to brand Manning a traitor because he just dumped a ton of intel to WikiLeaks without discrimination, but although some military personnel have said he's endangered lives no one can give any examples. Snowden specifically chose what to leak and who to leak it to in order to start a national conversation about abusive government surveillance. I'm sure plenty of people called Daniel Ellsberg a traitor when he released the Pentagon Papers, but it is a requirement of good people to bring to light evil deeds.

"I'd love to say something, but I took an oath to keep quiet about all these classified documents that highlight all the nasty things our country is doing" is not a very patriotic excuse. Whistleblower protections go back all the way to the Continental Congress and our founders would roll over in their grave if good people stood by and did nothing to expose the sins of the government.

[grumpyMSG]

The big difference between the two is Manning put all the info out there, for all to see. Snowden on the other hand said what programs were out there. He didn't actually offer details about what is known and unknown information wise. To try to compare the two, I will offer this analogy:
Snowden-- the XYZ spies on American gun owners forums and XYZ knows who the individual posters are.
Manning-- the XYZ knows that GrumpyMSG, Palladin, trailrunner, kelu, WRW, BertMacklin, dusterdude, 762, Kreutz, Taggure, j1mmyd and Reverendel post on gun owners forums. Here are their names and addresses to prove it.

I can't say I know and understand them both, but I believe Manning was a guy who wanted to play the system to gain VA benefits (educational in particular). He happened to be gay and figured he would serve long enough to get the benefits and then get "outed" and get thrown out. He never thought he would actually have to do the job he contracted to do in a war zone. I believe he thought he was going to play the system and got it wrong, this was his revenge, which may very well cost him the rest of his life. In my book his actions were Traitorous.

I think Snowden, on the other, thinks as long as he stays quiet about anything more specific than he has already said will get to stay alive. He believes whatever information he holds is his life insurance policy. As long as he lives it doesn't get published. If someone were to kill him, it would be put out there for all to see. I think the way Snowden has done it, has gotten the "what" out there, but not the "who" and "where". What little info he has released that I have heard might be embarrassing for the folks involved, but not placed troops lives at risk like Manning's actions. In his case I think maybe, I emphasize maybe, it could have been he was a guy who saw how the "sausage" was made and had a conscience that bothered him to much.

[trailrunner]

Eh, it's black and white that they betrayed their oath, but their intention on what they did with the information determines more the status of traitor or whistleblower.

Manning's intention was to get revenge on the military system he didn't like and that didn't like him.

There are procedures in place to blow the whistle. Neither one of them followed those procedures, nor did they even try.

A whistleblower exposes the wrong thing, and nothing more, and certainly not a bulk download. He does it to the proper people. Did either of them try to report their allegations that way?

[kelu]

Let's play a scenario. It may be useful for how you look yourself in the mirror.
Let' say you have access to top secret documents and you discover that Obama is a Manchurian candidate put there by Chinese or Russians with support from a faction of CIA, with the goal of knocking down US. And you discover that a powerful part of the Congress knows and is complicit in this. Gee, this scenario does not even look so far-fetched.
If you disclose public, you can save the country, and being labeled as a traitor, while in fact you are a hero. If you shut up, you have to live with the guilt of being complicit, and a real traitor (albeit undiscovered).
Or you discover that 9/11 was indeed an inside job, with Bush knowledge, with the goal of reducing people liberties. There, I covered both political parties.
What do you do?
Trailrunner? As you said: black or white.
An example of Snowden great crimes - expose this: http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-02-2 ... eive-and-d

BTW, what detergent are using the agencies to brainwash their employees?
60 years ago the communists in my country tried the same thing, to brainwash the political dissidents. But because we were not advanced in chemistry, they failed and throw them in jail instead, where most have died (about 60% of the cultural elite). The prisons were like an academy, while the political police was made of people who barely could read or write, but were hungry for power and revenge. This is nothing new for me. And look closely to Ukraine, where police begged for mercy in their knees. http://www.businessinsider.com/riot-pol ... viv-2014-2 You will see a lot of this. I saw it in my country during revolution days, when an army of angry armed factory workers roamed the streets, looking for those who shot people. And I can tell you about the revolution days when some over-zealous officers died shot in the back. What can you do? Poorly trained soldiers can't aim too well...

I heard that a lot of people are scared because in Snowden files are lists of ALL employees of all agencies, with all their personal data. Ughhh... that's nasty if SHTF and your team is losing the game.