At last I truly see.
The Case For a Pardon of Edward Snowden by President Trump
The real criminals are those he exposed: the security state officials who illegally and unconstitutionally spied on innocent people by the millions, and who still do so.
Glenn Greenwald 2 hr ago
Abuses of power by these agencies continue in full force. More recently, the Justice Department’s Inspector General found in 2019 that the FBI deceived the FISA court with false statements to obtain a warrant to spy on former Trump 2016 campaign official Carter Page. A former FBI lawyer pled guilty to doctoring emails to obtain those spying warrants. A DOJ report found more material errors from the FBI in the spying process in 2019. Late last year, the FISA court itself “issued a strong and highly unusual public rebuke to the FBI” and, the prior year, “found that the FBI may have violated the rights of potentially millions of Americans — including its own agents and informants — by improperly searching through information obtained by the National Security Agency’s mass surveillance program.”
Meanwhile, so many of the arguments against pardoning Snowden, and demanding his lifelong imprisonment or exile, come from the very security state operatives whose crimes he exposed. That includes John Brennan and James Clapper, along with their hawkish and neocon allies such as Susan Rice and Liz Cheney.
But James Clapper was never prosecuted for lying to the Senate. In fact, he did not even lose his job: he served as Director of National Intelligence for another three years, until the end of the Obama administration. And now this proven liar — like so many security state agents — works inside the corporate media, delivering the “news” for CNN.
The same is true of former CIA Director and proven pathological liar John Brennan. On Monday, he echoed the same false allegation as Liz Cheney did, in order to defend James Clapper and attack Senator Paul for advocating a pardon for Snowden:
But he was trapped in the Moscow International Airport because the U.S. State Department under John Kerry invalidated his passport while he was in transit, and then-Vice President Joe Biden threatened and coerced every other country considering offering him asylum or allowing him safe passage to South America (as he did with Cuba, which withdrew its offer of safe transit). A 2013 NPR headline tells part of that story: “Biden Asks Ecuador To Deny Snowden Asylum.” That was before he obtained asylum in Russia, something he was forced by Obama officials and Biden himself t>o do.
https://archive.vn/7q2uy Glenn GreenwaldVerified account @ggreenwald 9 Dec 2020
This was the statement by Trump that caused Chuck Schumer to warn on the Rachel Maddow Show in 2017 that if Trump continued to criticize CIA, they would get back at him "six different ways to Sunday":
Michael TraceyVerified account @mtracey
Happy four-year anniversary of this statement. Seems to have made some people in the government mad
Firstly,
Is utter garbage. Anybody who knows anything about Russian visas (and I do) knows that is literally impossible. Snowden could never have gotten on the plane to begin with without at least a Russian transit visa. The airlines are really picky about this stuff and check passports and visas very carefully, because by international agreement the airline is responsible for re-transporting anyone who is refused entry into a country. Snowden HAD TO HAVE a Russian permission of some kind to get on the plane in the first place.
And secondly, let's remember that the Intercept announced publicly that they were never going to publish the rest of the Snowden files, which they still have. You might want to question Greenwald's ex-business partner Pierre Omiydar about that.
Is just fucking laughable, anybody who believes that is a fool. That was the dumbest dog-and-pony show I have ever seen. Snowden was likely picked up at the airport on arrival and whisked away to a safe haven.
Greenwald may tell the truth sometimes. But not always.
Also I remember reading recently that Snowden has been offered Russian citizenship. For a foreigner to get Russian citizenship is almost impossible.
I like Russia, I have no problem with Snowden living there. But Greeenwald is yanking your chain with this shit.
By Snowden's own admission, he was only in Moscow on a stopover when his passport got flagged. He's said time and time again he was on his way to Ecuador.
What?? Snowden was allegedly destined for Cuba from Hong Kong (remember?), on a flight which had a stopover in Moscow. He would have needed a Russian transit visa for that. or he would never have gotten on the plane.
A brief glimpse at the map does not put Russia between Hong Kong and Cuba.
Maybe you're confusing the Assange who spent 7 years of asylum in the Ecuador embassy, and who was the middleman between the Snowdon files and getting those files to Greenwald.
Which is why Assange is still in jail and the the rest of Snowden's info got buried by the Intercept project.