Sunday, July 28, 2013

Information Dominance, Michael Hastings, and Rolling Stone

We once thought propaganda was the ultimate form of organized lies and manipulation. But one facet of Information Dominance goes the next step.


For the most part, it appears that the military's broad concept of Information Dominance refers to cyber-warfare, which we would expect there is a need. However, Information Dominance can also be interpreted as dominating our information systems with overwhelming propaganda on almost every channel, every radio station, every newspaper, every magazine, and eventually, every website. Ultimately, the dark side of Information Dominance gives most people no real option to learn the truth.

China is best known for attempting to dominate all information available. But the desire for excessive power exists everywhere. And the desire to lie for personal gain is far too common everywhere. Here in America; there are frauds (who, ironically, enthusiastically call themselves “patriots”) who are working on dominating our information systems in more surreptitious ways than China.

Examples?

Let's start with the Army manual titled Inform Operations: Doctrine, Tactics, Techniques and Procedures. In this manual, the Army includes in its definition of Information Operations; “the employment of... psychological operations... to influence decision making.”

Apparently, this is mainstream U.S. military doctrine. And Information Dominance is the goal. But included in Information Dominance is the control the minds of enough people such that dissent is insignificant.

And they're not just talking about enemy combatants here. This applies to propaganda and news here in America also.

Achieving Information Dominance involves 1) building up and protecting friendly information and 2) denying, degrading, and destroying unfriendly capabilities.

We saw the worst of this back when American military forces attacked Al Jazeera offices in Afghanistan and Iraq.

In spite of what Fox “News” may have led you to believe, Al Jazeera is not a terrorist organization. In fact, it is arguable that Al Jazeera is a much more accurate world news source than Fox “News.” Al Jazeera simply has far more journalists in the field – and they don't have to rely on advertisers' dollars.

In 2001, U.S. military forces attacked and destroyed Al Jazeera offices in Kabul, Afghanistan. And in 2003, U.S. Military forces attacked and destroyed Al Jazeera offices in Basra and Baghdad, Iraq. In the Baghdad attack, an Al Jazeera journalist was killed.

 

Why? The answer is obvious. To prevent Al Jazeera from reporting the wars.
Why? Apparently; Information Dominance.
Evidently; America's military organizations are now willing to kill journalists so that our propaganda will dominate the airwaves... This is not a conspiracy theory. This is history.

But that's just likely the tip of the iceberg – and the beginning of the conspiracy theory. What about all those alphabet soup of American “Intelligence” Agencies? We don't get to read their manuals. In fact, most everything they do is classified – often just to keep secrets from Americans. Could the CIA be killing journalists who don't report what the “Intelligence” Agencies want us to hear?

As far as I know, worldwide, journalists aren't dropping like flies so that American propaganda can dominate the airwaves. But they don't have to. A few critical “hits” and all journalists would know what not to report on – or else.

Which brings us to the suspicious story of Michael Hastings and Rolling Stone.

Micheal Hastings was a journalist and contributing editor of Rolling Stone magazine.

Rolling Stone magazine was one of the only alternative news publications people could find on the magazine racks in grocery stores in suburban and rural America. Which means ordinary Americans (who don't have access to internet news) just might happen to read some of Micheal Hastings' articles. And there were many.

Back in 2010, Micheal Hastings wrote an article for Rolling Stone that depicted General Stanley McChrystal in such a bad light that it prompted President Obama to fire him. By not backing down from the truth to keep a privileged reporting assignment, Micheal Hastings clearly was not willing to participate in Information Operations. In fact, the concept of Information Dominance would definitely put him on the side of the adversaries.

In 2011, Micheal Hastings wrote an article for Rolling Stone that exposed a U.S. Army team specializing in “psychological operations” attempting to manipulate visiting U.S. Senators. In this instance; Micheal Hastings was brave enough to expose illegal efforts at Information Dominance.

Micheal Hastings' last article; The Spy Who Cracked Up In The Cold, was about a CIA agent who went rogue – and ended up in prison (an extremely rare event for CIA operatives). The article was not a fluff piece, and it did not portray the CIA in a good light.

There are a number of stories online that claim that Micheal Hastings' next story was also about the CIA. Apparently, his last email stated; “the Feds are interviewing my “close friends and associates”... Also, I'm onto a big story, and need to go off the radar for a bit.” The very next morning, 15 hours later, he was killed in an abnormally fiery single-car accident.

Witnesses claim Micheal Hastings' car was driving very erratically – speeding, running a red light, etc. Yet Micheal Hastings was known to drive “like a grandma” and hadn't drank alcohol in five years.

One witness even claimed that he heard two explosions before the crash.

And then after all of this, authorities have withheld information from the public – and cremated Micheal Hastings' body against the family's wishes.

Even Richard Clarke (who was once the Terrorism Czar for both Presidents Clinton and George W. Bush – and the author of Against All Enemies) told Huffington Post that this single car crash was “consistent with a car cyber attack.” (For more information on how this hack might be done check out this Car and Driver article.)

The Los Angeles Police Department does not suspect foul play. However, Richard Clarke said the Los Angeles Police Department likely wouldn't have the expertise to trace such an attack.

We may never know for sure if this was or was not an assassination.
Most likely, we will never know what Micheal Hastings was investigating.

But we do know that the mass media news, just a couple of weeks later, attacked Rolling Stone magazine over an insignificant matter – the picture of a Boston Marathon bomber on the cover. This blatantly contrived controversy led to CVS, Walgreens, Stop & Shop, and Rite Aid pulling Rolling Stone magazine from their shelves.

The question that begs to be asked is; what if these two “hits” are related?

If one were to look at these events together through the lens of Information Dominance, they would appear like a coordinated attack on an adversarial information source. Could Micheal Hastings have been assassinated to hide the truth, and Rolling Stone attacked to assure no one ever investigates again?

If so; who would have the expertise to technically hack into someone's car and the political power to news hack into the mass media? I doubt rogue agents would have that kind of power. I doubt a foreign intelligence agency would have that kind of power. Which leads us to suspect “official” power – our secret government.

Micheal Hastings said he was “onto a big story” and that he would have to “go off the radar for a bit.” But apparently, the radar had already locked onto him. The consequences are we never got to read his report and we may loose easy access to the publication that has provided this type of information... The harsh reality is the First Amendment doesn't matter to this reporter if he's dead and his magazine has been banned.

Back in 1971, Daniel Ellsberg went to the New York Times to publish the Pentagon Papers. But nowadays; Edward Snowden felt he had to go to the British publication The Guardian and Bradley Manning felt he had to go to Wikileaks. This, along with the apparent attempt to shut out Rolling Stone, suggest the age of Information Dominance has quietly superseded our Constitutional right to freedom of the press.

And all the while, “our” government keeps trying to take over the Internet.



...One more thing: If someone can hack a car, maybe they can hack a plane. This might shed some light into the suspicious plane crash death of Senator Paul Wellstone and his family (and Missouri Governor Mel Carnahan in a separate plane crash).


Sunday, July 21, 2013

This Is How They Manipulate You

I just ordered a subscription to Rolling Stone magazine. You see, I can't find it on the store shelves any more. The mainstream (for profit) news media has manufactured a quasi-outrage that led to the pulling of this more honest journal of news. The way I see it, this has nothing to do with idolizing some terrorist. They're trying to kill the competition – and control what you know.

Because if they can exclusively control what you know, they can control you. 

 
But you're not feeling manipulated. Right?... Good. It's working. Every year they get more and more sophisticated. But even so, the (for profit) news media usually only resorts to a few types of dirty tricks. Here are a few examples:

Just recently, Ex-President Jimmy Carter exclaimed to the world; “America does not at the moment have a functioning democracy.”

Now, that's big news. All of the talking heads on all of television combined do not carry the weight of credibility of an ex-president when criticizing our government. In all of my lifetime, I have never heard an ex-president say something so shocking. So, how did the (for profit) news media report such a bold and important statement? They didn't.

That's right. An ex-president proclaims that America does not have a functioning democracy and somehow it never got reported by the American press.

Now why wouldn't they report something as important as that? If you live in America, you probably already know the answer. Because the (for profit) news media is part of the problem.

And that problem is screaming at you every time you watch “for profit” news. Who's screaming? Advertisers. Follow the money. There is a seemingly endless stream of ads from fossil fuel companies, big pharma, big banks, etc. It is blatantly obvious that this constant steam of millions of dollars influences what (for profit) news media reports on – and of course, what they leave out.

I'm not claiming that it's all lies. Most of what they say is true. And of course, some of the best journalists in the world work for “for profit” news. But those who own these “for profit” news companies have their own agenda. They're in business to make profits, not to tell you the whole truth. And their advertisers; well, it's obvious they're trying to influence your opinion. They wouldn't spend all that money on advertising if it didn't work.

Consequently, the (for profit) mass media owns a piece of your mind – if you let them. And if you watch them, you will let them.

Even if they cannot change your mind, they will still get you to pay attention to what they want you to think about – and consequently ignore what they don't want you to think about.

However, not all “for profit” news broadcasters and publishers are created equal. Some news organizations don't feed off the advertising dollars of the big monopolies. The magazine Rolling Stone is one such publication. And in the past few years, Rolling Stone has published a number of far more accurate and in depth articles than the mainstream “for profit” news organizations.

Examples:
2009 – Matt Taibbi's article on how banksters manipulate economic bubbles (with the unforgettable quote about Goldman Sachs; “the great vampire squid around the face of humanity”)
2010 – Michael Hastings' article on General Stanley McChrystal (that ultimately led to the General's resignation)
2012 – Bill McKibben's article “Global Warming's Terrifying New Math
2012 – Matt Taibbi's article on Mitt Romney (which got Rolling Stone pulled from shelves here in Ely, NV)
2012 – Douglas Brinkley's interview with President Obama
2013 – Antonia Juhaz's article on big oils' lies about renewable energy
2013 – Ryan Devereaux's article on the demands of the California prison hunger strikers

...and, of course, the recent article on the Boston Marathon bomber with the “glamorous” picture of Dzhokar Tsarnaev on the cover

Now let's think about this...

A magazine that has been able to skirt the usual limitations of having to financially support itself with illicit hush money (in the form of advertising revenue) has been for years achieving far better reporting than the “for big bucks any way you can get it” talking heads. And people are starting to take notice.

One might expect that the (for profit) mass media just might see this as a threat. They could lose viewers. They could lose advertising money. They could lose their jobs... They might even be forced to actually report more “fair and balanced.”

Ultimately, the (for profit) mass media might even consider more honest publications such as Rolling Stone as the enemy.

So, Rolling Stone publishes this article on the younger Boston Marathon bomber. It's a great article. In fact, it is iconoclastic. It was a revelation that none of this young man's friends, teachers, coaches or even parents had a clue that he would soon be a terrorist. Before the bombing, none of them saw him as a psycho killer.

This Janet Reitman article reminds us that seemingly normal people sometimes have the capacity for bizarre bloody violence. Nonetheless, “Jafar” – as his friends called him, was for most of his life, the person we see on the cover.

Which means; the cover photo makes sense in the telling of the story.
And this very same picture was used on the cover of The New York Times – without complaints.

But the reports on television “news” are that there is this huge uprising of outrage – before the issue even gets published. Every channel is covering this semi-scandal – not just once, but repeatedly.

This was silly. Worst case scenario; the Rolling Stone publishers used bad taste. That's it. But there they were; all ganging up on Rolling Stone magazine. They were creating a scandal from the way they were reporting it. And in the end, a number of retailers pulled the magazine from their shelves. Effectively, television “news” conducted a hit.

Obviously, somebody or some group has been hunting in every issue of Rolling Stone for some potential scandal to report on. And then, like a tail wagging a dog; their reporting on the “scandal” creates a scandal. And then; the schemers can revel in the knowledge that they cut off Rolling Stone's newsstand income stream.

These people fight dirty.

So, I've decided to fight back.
I've ordered a subscription of Rolling Stone.
I've decided that I support the truth.
And if television “news” continues to attack the truth, I will watch less and less of it.


need more examples?
OK:

Dan Rather used to be the most powerful journalist in television news. 60 Minutes has been one of the most respected news programs on television. When Dan Rather reported on 60 Minutes that President George W. Bush had a very questionable military record – that may have included (privileged) draft evasion and even (privileged) desertion, the “for profit” mass media went after him like wild hyenas. They never mentioned any of Dan Rather's points. And they never mentioned any of the evidence other than one questionable document. I saw this report. I believe it deserved an award. Like all 60 Minutes reports, it lasted from 15 to 20 minutes. This one questionable document was on screen for less than 10 seconds. But the (for profit) “news” media, in a coordinated fashion, ignored everything else and went in for the kill over that one document. It ruined Dan Rather's career, and truth never again saw the light of day.

Howard Dean's whoop during the Democratic primary.
Howard Dean was a liberal candidate who had briefly taken the lead during the 2004 Presidential primaries. However, he placed 3rd in Iowa. Afterwards; he let out one whoop in a crowd of enthusiastic screaming supporters. The television media also jumped on this like like a pack of wild hyenas. The (for profit) mass media television “news” knew that the clip was not an accurate reproduction of the actual audio in the room. Because of a directional microphone, it sounded like Howard Dean was screaming to the crowd by himself. Nonetheless, they played it over and over again without a disclaimer. This clip shows the full “incident,” but by far, most of the news clips were just a two second clip of him screaming.


Every television “news” organization showed it over and over again until just enough people perceived Howard Dean as a screaming idiot – and he lost his running in the election. I'm convinced this wasn't an accident. It had all the markings of a politically motivated “hit.” An effort like this had to be coordinated amongst all the television news organizations. And, of course; we can surmise that if it had been a corporatist candidate, this minor incident never would have been reported on. What's worse; coordinated “news” altered truth (half-lies) like this happen in every Presidential election. (Check out the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, the misquote of Al Gore; “I invented the Internet,” and Willie Horton.)

One more example – the rainbow flag. Everybody now perceives the rainbow flag as a symbol of gay pride. But gays didn't choose this symbol. It was originally a symbol of the Rainbow Coalition. The Rainbow Coalition was formed by Rev. Jesse Jackson, once Martin Luther King's right hand man. The Rev. Jackson's goal was to create a political organization that included everyone who had been marginalized by the U.S. political system. This included gays. So, every time there was a Gay Pride parade somewhere, somebody brought a rainbow flag. The mass media news picked up on this. And every time there was a gay event, the mass media showed a picture of a rainbow flag. By now, we consider a rainbow flag to mean nothing like it's original intent. I find it impossible to believe this wasn't planned, coordinated, and executed without some kind of mass media conspiracy.

Those in power don't want to share that power.
Those in power own the mass media.
Those in power advertise on the mass media.
Since there are essentially no limits on what the mass media can do, we must expect them to abuse their power. We cannot trust them.

This type of reporting hasn't just been directed towards liberal organizations. Militias have been portrayed as a bunch of white supremacists. Anyone who points out a possible conspiracy has been portrayed as paranoid. Environmentalists have been portrayed as bleeding heart wimps. The internet has been portrayed as full of lies. And now; Neighborhood Watch has been portrayed as a bunch of trigger happy fools (though, admittedly, that's exactly what George Zimmerman was).

This is how they keep us disorganized.

Not that there isn't some element of truth to these mass media portrayals. That's what makes them so effective. They find some truth and blow it totally out of proportion. The citizens of America are being manipulated. Think about it; these silly “news” reports always seem to benefit the oligarchy... how convenient.


But these efforts to keep us weak pale in comparison to the (for profit) mass media's most effective tool; distraction. Distraction is a weapon. While they got us all worked up about Travon Martin, etc; they're quietly taking away many Americans' opportunity to vote. It's been years since Americans lost our faith in electronic voting. Gerrymandering is common. Poling places in poor neighborhoods have required hours of waiting. And efforts to exclude the poor, the young, the old, and people of color from elections have become common. What's worse; the “Supreme” Court apparently supports this.

With the Citizens United case (and the striking down of most every other law that was enacted to control campaign spending), our supremely corrupt Supreme Court has given big corporations unlimited power to influence what was once a democratic process. And now, with the shutting down of the Voting Rights Act; they have decided that election protections for the poor and the brown aren't necessary anymore.

Essentially, the Supreme Court considers corporations people and Democrats not people.

No wonder former President Jimmy Carter said; ““America does not at the moment have a functioning democracy.”


(...Oh, one more thing. A Federal Appeals Court has just ruled that the First Amendment does not fully protect investigative journalists.)

Friday, July 12, 2013

Please Don't Frack Up Nevada

The BLM has announced that they are considering leasing almost 400,000 acres for drilling and fracking of oil.
As if the SNWA watergrab isn't bad enough...
Now they want to frack Nevada, including Steptoe Valley.

(Fracking in Wyoming)
Do you know how much water that's going to cost?

A 2009 report on fracking by the Groundwater Protection Council stated that “the amount of water needed to drill and fracture a horizontal shale gas well generally ranges from about 2 million to 4 million gallons...”

...That's just one well.

And what's in that fracking fluid? They don't have to tell us. Surreptitiously, they have finagled the legal right to put whatever they want to in fracking fluid without anyone ever finding out. Frackers could be putting their toxic waste in it, and we can't know. (Maybe that's why a U.S.G.S. survey found millions of barrels of fracking wastewater with radioactivity levels over 3,000 times the Federal limit for drinking water.)


...And in what is an insult to our "democracy" and a disgrace to America; billions of dollars of our tax monies are being squandered on subsidies for fossil fuel companies' exploitative and unsustainable projects – so that their monopolistic companies can be even more profitable. We're paying them to poison us! 


(Great speech. It points out that America's Congress has done everything within their power to give the fossil fuel industries billions of dollars of unfair advantages in the market - and continues to do so. Meanwhile, President Obama has also helped the fossil fuel industry - but talks tough on issues he can't personally change.)

What's worse; it's this way all over the world:

Worldwide subsidies for fossil fuels remain six times higher than economic incentives for renewables”

Not only are the fossil fuel monopolies utilizing an unfair advantage to displace renewable energy in the market, fracking will displace traditional renewable industries (such as farming and ranching) in Nevada. There is only so much water. And what's left will probably be poisoned. A Cornell study has found numerous symptoms in cattle near fracking wells: “Reduced milk production. Gastrointestinal, neurological, and urological issues. Even sudden death.”

And the EPA recently stated, in report about water contanimnation in Pavillion Wyoming; “had most likely seeped up from gas wells and contained at least ten compounds known to be used in frack fluids.” No doubt; fracking pollutes groundwater.

Drilling for oil is a very dirty job. Oil spills on land in the U.S. last year were cumulatively greater than the Exxon Valdez oil spill in Alaska back in 1989. That's right, the more than 6,000 spills that occurred in 2012 amounted to 15.6 million gallons of oil, fracking fluid, wastewater, and other liquids reported spilled at production sites last year. The Exxon Valdez only spilled 11 million gallons. The fracking companies may try to clean things up, but they won't ever be able to return things to their natural state and the spilled fluids have to go somewhere. Which means Nevada will end up with at least one toxic waste dump. No thanks.

And to top it all off; fracking causes earthquakes. The U.S.G.S. has reported that “the annual number of earthquakes recorded at magnitude 3.0 or higher in the Central and Eastern United States has increased almost tenfold in the past decade.” So, who's going to pay for the earthquake damage? I guarantee you not the fracking companies. They'll blame (an act of) God.

It's foolish to abandon sustainable ways for locals to make money (such as ranching, farming, and tourism) for a quick buck – for some far away oil company.

It's a foolish act to waste water in the desert. And poisoning water is wasting it.

The world has already reached peak water. The Earth Policy Institute has claimed that “18 countries (including the U.S.) together containing half of the World's people, are now overpumping their underground water to the point... where they are not replenishing and where harvests are getting smaller each year.”

...So don't be surprised if the same people who've invested in the companies that plan to pollute our water with fracking fluid intend to use their profits to buy up what remaining clean water rights that will exist and then sell our own water back to us (for a very big profit, of course).

This isn't Free Market Capitalism. This is Crony Capitalism. This is Monopoly Capitalism. And it's destined to fail. By now we can see it. An unstable system is inherently short-lived. And if a system can't correct itself, really bad things end up happening. Everything starts to fall apart. 

Eventually, Nevada's oil will run out. And when that happens, all we will be left with is polluted water (and not much of it), rampant illness, and an atmosphere we won't recognize.

Vast methane plumes have been spotted in the Arctic. The Earth's subterranean methane is now melting – and we cannot stop it. Methane is 20 times the greenhouse gas Carbon Dioxide is. The horror of our world being dangerously chemically out of balance may already be upon us. We may have already past a tipping point in Global warming that could have far more devastating results than our scientists have predicted. But even if we haven't, the fossil fuel industry is in high gear to make Carbon Dioxide emissions even worse.

This video is a couple of years old. But it points out the lies – that are even more blatant today.

 

It has become obvious that the greedy will risk the future of humanity, even the future of life on Earth... for billions of quick and dirty bucks. In this way; they are no better than organized thieves. In fact, I would claim this is what organized crime looks like in the 21st century. 

It may even be likely that this is what the beginning of the collapse of our civilization looks like. We can't seem to fix things. Consequently, our system is starting to fall apart. 

We cannot allow this.

I fear the BLM may only be a rubber stamp organization – that writes great reports. But we still need to participate in their comments by the end of July.

This is the link to the BLM preliminary Environmental Assessment.
Send your comments to the BLM. 

 


Tuesday, July 02, 2013

The NSA - National Spying Agency

The Restore the 4th movement is about restoring the 4th Amendment to the Constitution. You know:
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.”

...We don't have to be suspicious any more. Now we know we are being spied upon; both on your phone and on the internet – by the NSA – a secret organization within our Government.



So...
What if the NSA found something on Obama?
What if President Obama is right now being blackmailed?
That may explain why President Obama isn't fulfilling the promises of Candidate Obama. That might also explain the troubled expression.



There is a possibility that President Obama is right now, against his own wishes; protecting his own blackmailers.

We now know that the NSA has been spying on our allies.
What if the NSA found things?
What if a number of political figures all over the world are being blackmailed?

Could it be that the NSA is becoming the illegitamate secret rulers of the world?
Or maybe just helping our oligarchy be the illegitamate secret rulers of the world?

America already knows, from bad experience, that secret spying organizations have a propensity to take advantage of all that “intelligence.” ...That's why they spy.

Consider the FBI under J.Edgar Hoover. It is well known now that he had a secret file on a number of U.S. Politicians. With that kind of dirt on so many powerful people, J. Edgar Hoover was able to hold onto power as the head of the FBI for life... for life!

““Hoover [and some of his aides] would be prosecuted under today’s standards. No question of it. And should have been,” Buck Revell, formerly the bureau’s associate deputy director over investigations, says. “Hoover for the money he kept from the books he supposedly wrote but didn’t write. Using government funds and resources for personal gain. And use of government employees to maintain his residence. Again, that is fraud against the government. Taking vacations and putting in vouchers for expenses. Agents have been prosecuted for that.”

And that's just a list of the blatant rules of conduct J. Edgar Hoover broke. There is a very real possibility he blackmailed politicians. That would be a difilement of our Democracy. Nonetheless, there must be people who admire what they think he did – and even now, follow in his footsteps.

J. Edgar Hoover was a very public figure. Moreover, Hoover probably believed so much in himself, he probably felt justified in the rules he broke. Or then again, maybe it was just the effect of unbridled power. It wouldn't be the first time.

Nonetheless; the recently revealed NSA spying on everyone is potentially orders of magnitude more insidious.

First: Other than a couple of guys who claim to represent the NSA, we have no idea who these people are. Anonimity means you don't have to worry about your reputation.

Second: There is an obvious finacial incentive to sell secrets to the highest bidder. There are members of the 0.01% would pay big bucks for dirt on political enemies.
(The Federal wiretap that led to the public embarassment (and likely political assassination) of Elliot Spitzer (over a “$4000” an hour hooker) is an example of obviously politically motivated use of spy data. Elliot Spitzer was poised to stop the blatantly illegal big banking affairs (and possibly jail some of the perpetrators) before the bank crisis of 2008. Had it not been for a “Federal wiretap,” our economic history might have been different.)

Third: The revolving door into private corporations must exist here too. Every Government employee knows; big favors now can equal big money later. Across our Government, for decades now; taking bribes have essentially been called career moves. 

Fourth: Though we live in a Country where we are told we are free, so many things that people like to do are illegal. This makes virtually everyone a potential target for blackmail or political attack.

Fifth: If having the power to blackmail or politically ruin almost every elected representative in the world doesn't scare you, maybe you think the NSA is on your side. Think again. Someday you may run for office. Gauranteed; whoever ends up with secretly obtained evidence on you won't have your best interests in mind.

And this whole publicity stunt distraction of accusing Edward Snowden of being a traitor... Edward Snowden is more of a patriot than anyone in the NSA. Snowden isn't the one who systematically trashed the 4th Amendment to the Constitution. 
 

The Chief of the NSA, Gen. Keith B. Alexander, has claimed that the NSA has thwarted dozens of terrorist plots. I'm skeptical. First, they lie to us about spying on us. Then, when they get exposed, they won't come clean on details of the terrorist plots they claim to have foiled. Sounds to me like they're just doing what bureaucrats do – telling us what we want to hear so we don't cut their funding. They're playing games with us – at taxpayer expense. 



In a way; calling Edward Snowden a traitor for sharing sensitive information with the enemy (the American people) infers that our Government considers the American people the enemy

The American people know very little about the NSA. But we do have experience with Homeland Security in these matters.

In 2012, a Senate investigation found that DHS's intelligence sharing hubs, called fusion centers, gobbled up billions of dollars but disrupted no actual terrorist plots and mostly targeted Americans with no connection to terrorism.
Instead, the fusion centers were "circulating information about Ron Paul supporters, the ACLU, activists on both sides of the abortion debate, war protesters and advocates of gun rights," the AP reported.”

The Founding Fathers of our Nation had an opinion on all this.
We call it the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States.

http://www.restorethefourth.net/