Monday, July 29, 2013

Noam Chomsky on NSA--ZNET Internet Radio

Research updated August 17: Here's a video from July 27, in which Chomsky states at the Geneva Press Club.  The format is questions and answers. The video is 1 hour and 44 minutes. The video opens with Chomsky talking about Kerry, Israel and Palestine. He moves on to discuss Iran, Syria, Egypt, Jordan. He includes Washington and Europe's role in the conflicts. He addresses the justaposition of power in America against the emerging powers of China and South America at about 1: 11. He offers a critical historical fact on America "losing" China in 1949 (at about 1:13). He offers an informative talk on the prevalent practice of rendition (sending prisoners to other places for torture) and its current changing face, especially in Latin America. Near the end of this discussion, he brings up the barring airspace to the the plane believed to be carrying Snowden (about 1:15). At about 1:19, he addresses the Switzerland and the Geneva Initiative. These comments are followed by comments on Snowden's situation at about 1:21. The full written text on Chomsky's response on Snowden is on the page link. He argues that Snowden should be "honored."

He states,

My own opinion is that Snowden should be honored. He was doing what every citizen ought to do, telling. [Applause] He was telling Americans what the government was doing. That's what's supposed to happen. 
See the link for the entire response.

Earlier Post published on July 29

While doing research, I just discovered this Internet Radio Station. Here are my notes.

There is a strange recording that starts with this post! I'm trying to find it and remove it. It's on Occupy.

Blog Radio interview with Noam Chomsky on Snowden and NSA

The above interview starts out a bit chaotic and slow. It begins with that traitor/hero dichotomy. After that surface discussion, the interview takes off in an informative manner. Chomsky goes over Snowden's innocence and appropriate actions, but also covers an overview of his thoughts on the surveillance system the American government uses on everyone and anyone it chooses.

1. hero or traitor? Hero.
2. Some things should remain secret such as negotiations. Snowden has kept certain materials secret that might harm national security. Embarrassment is not an issue that harms national security.
3. Government argues that metadata collection is necessary to prevent terrorism. But such a claim is ludicrous because the governments own actions (such as drone attacks) creates potential terrorists.
4. Bradley Manning has been tortured and will probably get a long sentence.
5. Snowden could easily get the death penalty.
6. Other countries fear the United States because it is a violent and vindictive "master."
7. South American countries cannot get Snowden out of Russia safely.
8. Once considered America's backyard, South America is now the only region of the world willing to stand up to the US.
9. The US is sending people to other countries to torture them for information. Other countries help out. Latin America, once a torture center, is the only place in the world (for past ten years) that refuses to participate in the terror programs of the US.  First time in 500 years Latin America has not been under foreign powers.
10. US is threatening Latin America to keep Snowden out. US refuses to extradite wanted "real" criminals from Latin America. Chomsky does not advise any Latin America country to take Snowden in. Why? US will retaliate. Doesn't have the power to institute a coup. But it can punish in many other ways. Which country would Snowden be the most secure it? Possibly Brazil.
11. Appeals Court case: Hedges against Obama. NDAA legislation authorizes government to keep others (including American citizens) under indefinite detention. A district court accepted Hedges position. But the Obama administration went to court to appeal and won. Thus, people can be indefinitely detained.
12. US does not allow itself to be subjected to international law. It has exempted itself. US cannot be brought to trial for any international treaty.
13. Metadata collects communication. It identifies hubs of dissent.
14. PRISM has direct back door access to emails, calls, etc. These communications are stored in NSA storage. Strategy: Collect it all. If you need it, it's there. While the US is more free than other countries, the government protects concentrated powers and state's interests.
15.According to James Madison (Constitutional Convention), power must be in the hands of the wealth of the nation, the most responsible group of men, those who respect property ownership. Aristotle didn't like most governments. But Aristotle pointed out that democracy was probably the best. Like James Madison (who came over 2,000 years later), Aristotle pointed out the dangers of democracy (the vote) was that the poor could take the powers away from the rich. Madison's solution was to reduce democracy. Aristotle's solution was to reduce inequality. He called for what we call today welfare state measures. With a strong middle-class there's less pressure for rebellion. Powerful sectors do not run away. They find new ways to hang on to their power.
16. Seventy percent of Americans have no influence on policy. Thus, we live in a plutocracy.
17. Over sixty percent of young people approve of Snowden's revelations. Gap between popular opinion and policy common.
18. Past US President Jimmy Carter supports Snowden's whistleblowing. He also states that US has no functioning democracy. But Carter received almost no coverage for his statements. Got around through Internet a bit.
19. Domestic drones spy on and threaten ordinary citizens. Population wants more environmental legislation.
20. Just about every European country spies on its citizens. France doesn't even need a court order and that's pretty much true throughout Europe. But they don't have the sophisticated technology that US has.  If governments have the power and technology, they are going to use it. COINTELPRO and Red Scare were worse in the US.

Saturday, July 20, 2013

Snowden, Neither Hero Nor Traitor

Updated Research August 17

Recent developments include American corporations mining China through surveillance, or the "shoe is on the other foot." For article head to the Motely Fool site. The headline of this article reads:  Did Edward Snowden's NSA Papers Really Hurt American Business Interests?

Updated research August 7: Here's an article by Glen Greenwald on the canceled meeting between Obama and Putin as well as references to several refusals of the Washington administration to extradite people to other countries. It offers a bit of a global view of the extradition battleground arena an inspires further research.

Here's a taste of the article

Research Notes

Update, August 1: Snowden leaves airport room with temporary asylum to live in Russia for a year.

Now that Snowden has left the airport and is busy reestablishing a life in a new country, I hope to see a strong move toward investigating, reducing and monitoring surveillance programs around the world. It will be an interesting year for 27/7 surveillance programs versus people who find them offensive, illegal and dangerous. We'll see if anything happens happens.

July 21

In the case of Edward Snowden, let's drop the argument on whether he is hero or traitor. It will not do us any good as a population of people attempting to enhance our living conditions in America. Either way, we would have found out the details sooner or later.

Besides, how could I or anyone possibly know if is a hero or traitor? Just the word hero limits his actions as does the word traitor. Anyone using either term to define Snowden should perhaps take a think it over walk. You may have been too quick with the labeling gun. I'm suggesting, for those of us interested, it isn't an either-or situation. Its complexity makes him both and neither, one cancels out the other.

 I like the word enlightener for Edward Snowden. Such a word has nothing to do with whether he's a traitor or hero. It defines the act. An enlightener simply makes public what until his or her exposure has remained, more or less, hidden.

I like to think of Voltaire, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Harriet Tubman, and Naomi Klein as enlighteners to the positive. Poets, novelists, filmmakers and song writers can be enlighteners. Satirists such as Michael Moore, Paul Krassner and Matt Groening are perhaps some of the more visible enlighteners today as they use humor to bring questionable behavior to the surface, and in doing so, reach a broad range of people from varied cultures and backgrounds. Daniel Ellsberg, Bradley Manning and Julian Assange fit into another category of enlighteners. Supporters of Edward Snowden put him in with this last group. But there are all kinds of enlighteners with a political microphone,  Elizabeth Warren, Robert Kennedy, Bernie Sanders, to name a few.

We should note another group of enlighteners. This last group of enlighteners have no recognizable face of intent. These people go on missions to enlighten people for the wrong reasons, those likely to harm  Main Street for the benefit of the few. I suppose voices such as Dick Cheney fall under this category. These are the ones who expose to justify actions or ideas such as metadata collections, the presence of terrorists, dangers of a weak economy or public debt, the need for higher interest rates, the justification for a mortgage crises, and so on, in order to shape public acceptance and attitudes and prevent mass discontent.

So, what are we supposed to do with our new knowledge, the facts?

First we have to answer some critical questions. Should the government or corporations be the first to know when we fall in love? Or have an argument? Or come up with a new idea? Should some bored or unimaginative hack steal our earliest creative impulses put on paper or into an image and sent to friends or colleagues for early feedback? Should the government have the tools to create a working profile of us and use it for its own purposes with or without our consent? Is it okay for other people--our neighbors, perhaps--to follow our every move? Listen to our every word? Know where we are at all times?

If so, I suggest we tear down the walls of our homes and put a giant transparent tarp over neighborhoods. That might be the best way to ensure one another nothing fishy (dissent or broadly defined terrorism) is going on behind closed doors.

We're familiar with boogeymen from our childhoods. While we've grown up, we still harbor emotional canals filled with pus (fear) that make us do stupid things, like put our heads under the covers (give up our civil liberties) in hopes the boogeyman won't get us.

While many of us already knew we live under a system of international surveillance, we lacked the detailed facts of its extent. Now we have them and the responsibility that goes along with it. Will we act on the responsibility?

I digress for one moment. I voted for Obama. But not for the reasons you may think. One person cannot possibly undo the extensive damage imposed on how we govern ourselves in the US.  I never believed him capable of making the changes he promised for Main Street. But I did believe--probably just as naively--he'd leave open the door just a crack (through transparency?) for Main Street to get its foot in. I really believed Main Street would rise to the occasion and spend Obama's 4-8 years in the streets and at the tables making untold critical changes to create a truly better America in terms of education, health care, distribution of wealth, cost of living, working conditions, and increased awareness at all levels.  I was wrong. Whether feeling comfortable or paralyzed, Main Street has sat on the couch most of the time.

To grind myself further into disappointment, I now predict Main Street will not jump to its feet and stop the massive surveillance against our personal privacy. So far I've seen less than a handful on Main Street jump to their feet this past week when the Fisa Court quietly extended the government's surveillance programs. Meanwhile, the government, just as do corporations, has assured Main Street it can self-regulate its surveillance. And that appears all it takes to keep people on the couch.

We should look at who has the chance to benefit from the Edward Snowden saga.


Group A
This group believes in freedom of the press and privacy. It's been unable to get any real traction in support of these freedoms since 9/11, when America put the brakes on real freedom and stalled its own momentum toward a greater open society with real liberty and real opportunity for all. Real freedom. This group has the opportunity to benefit now if it becomes very visible and very loud. It can demand that all records collected on Americas be destroyed and surveillance stopped. It can boycott social media and corporations who spy (is that all by now?) until they prove they stop. It can call for dismantling the Utah Storage Chamber and using its funding, present and future, to establish and maintain some kind of research, arts and recreation center for the advancement of culture, science and medicine. It can borrow the mantra, America will never be the same after 6/9-11 with the intent that the people will be keeping an eye on Washington and Corporations rather than the other way around. For this group to benefit, it has to engage in movement and get itself and others off the couch.

Group B
The group trying to make the debate on privacy versus security now has a very large microphone inside the public arena, including just about every media outlet, to get its argument heard and repeated, echoes in the closed chamber of the new America. They benefit because they can accumulate followers who are willing to vote for less privacy to gain what they believe is more security.  

Group C
The government officials and petty officials who wanted to go public, at some point, with the news that everyone in America is being watched in order to prevent terrorism but really to control dissent. This group now has an international open ear.  This group needed a Snowden in order for this group to use his revelations to sensationalize, distort and circulate the news. They welcomed a diversion (Snowden) to lighten the blow to the American people and to keep the real issue--privacy and freedom of speech and the press--in the background. Chase scenes in films are usually mesmerizing.  If the Snowden saga seems like a chase scene in a movie, this group benefits. With Main Street focused on the chase rather than the revelations, the exposed surveillance systems get twisted into appearing as the victims in this saga. Once the fake victims convince Main Street that Snowden, in the chase scene, is a bad guy not good guy, it gets Main Street to root against itself and save the fake victims and crucify Snowden. Meanwhile, time passes and Americans get used to this notion of being watched 24/7. We're very good at taking sides or adjusting to changes in the weather.

This group can also benefit by finding a new context--6/9-11--to remind Main Street that terrorists still exist and pose a threat 24/7. It can also benefit by using Snowden as an example of what happens to you if you reveal illegal (and spying on innocent Americans is illegal) actions people running the society engage in.  So for this group, they have 9/11 and 6/9-11 to maintain control 24/7.This group benefits by turning and twisting Snowden's plight until it ends up free advertisement for a system already in place!

Group D
Social media groups and communication corporations. These groups benefit by no longer having to hide their subservient role to the government. With the news in the open, everyone is now free to spy on everyone else. Let us not forget that hundreds of anti-surveillance devices to protect privacy (not really but kind of) from the government and corporations are emerging for reasonable prices. Such a deal. Oy!

Group E
Other countries with repressive regimes. These countries can now bring to light that the United States is just as another form of corrupt and disfigured Democracy. It spies on its people just as does China, Russia, Germany, England, and others. Just because everyone is spying on Main Street does not make it right. Other regimes can benefit because they too can make their surveillance systems known. I guess it cost more money to hide them than it does to make them visible.

Group F
Boogeymen can benefit by being set on a pedestal, capable of taking over at any time, powerful to the nth degree. There's a lot of ego to be gained if Main Street willingly gives up its civil liberties and money just to keep you at a distance.

Ultimately, with everyone being watched 24/7, the world has a chance to become globally in tune with one another, more narrow in its thinking, less imaginative in its art, more suspicious in its dealings, and less energetic to build a freer environment for itself. Settling for surface living, we have the chance to willingly censor and scrub our words and our gestures. In our bedrooms, we have the chance to willingly let in satellite devices that pick up our making love moves. We have already let smart meters in to measure how often we turn on our ovens and computers. When we sit down to dinner, we can now willingly agree which devices we'd like the government to use to count our calories.

updated July 20 & July 26.

My novel Plato's Screw will be published next month by Del Sol Press. It is about love, work and surveillance. It took ten years to write it. 

Tuesday, July 2, 2013

Surveillance Devices Found at Ecuador's London Embassy

June 3, 2013
 Ecuador's Embassy in London is removing planted, hidden surveillance devices from its office.
Julian Assange has...condemned the bugging of Ecuador's London embassy, where he is living, after Ecuadorean Foreign Minister Ricardo Patino announced that a listening device had been found in the ambassador's office. (for full story).
My Own Musing over Events

Obama has publicly used the word transparency to define his Presidency. We might remind him that Snowden's exposure is also what transparency looks like. We might remind the administration as well that it's not enough for us to know that these surveillance programs exist.

(Obama said everyone is engaged in these surveillance practices. We might remind the administration to look at the logic of that statement and check a basic book of logical fallacies.)

But more important, we might remind the administration that transparency does not give the green light to acceptance. Transparency is not the end, is not the last stop of arrival in our journey toward a more democratic government. It is the first step.

 I hope we as a people are smart enough to understand the crossroads we are it. Do we make transparency the end point? Or do we make it the beginning point to an equitable and open society? The choice is ours. We can no longer trust the current leaders of the world who participate in controlling our every day lives for the benefit of the few.

If the government is asking us to take sides, I am on the side of those calling for the US to return Edward Snowden's passport, so he may travel to a country that will give him political asylum.

I fear a fixed debate on the issue of privacy versus safety.  This either/or fallacy is a trap to get us to accept transparency as the end point. Why should we agree to protect the interests of the wealthy with our right to privacy?  We have many options at our crossroads, finding a balance is not the only one and should not be viewed as the equitable option. If we poke out our own eyes, how many of us will live fulfilling lives?