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Edward Snowden: NSA Spies More on Americans Than Russians
nationaljournal.com ^ | April 30, 2014 | Dustin Volz

Posted on 05/01/2014 4:28:47 AM PDT by Las Vegas Dave

Edward Snowden told a crowd of fans Wednesday that the government's surveillance programs collect more data on Americans than any other country.

"Does the NSA know more about Americans in America than Russians in Russia?" Snowden said, appearing by live video during an awards ceremony in Washington. "We watch our own people more closely than anyone else in the world."

Snowden also took several shots at the National Security Agency and its top officials, and criticized the agency for wearing two contradictory hats of protecting U.S. data and exploiting security flaws to gather intelligence on foreign threats.

"U.S. government policy directed by the NSA ... is now making a choice, a binary choice, between security of our communications and the vulnerability of our communications," Snowden said, suggesting the government was biased toward the latter activity.

The former NSA contractor was awarded the Ridenhour Award for Truth-Telling along with Laura Poitras, one of his chief confidants. The 30-year-old fugitive remains in Russia, where he fled and earned temporary asylum following his disclosures of classified information about the NSA's bulk data-collection practices.

Poitras also beamed into the ceremony from Berlin. The documentary filmmaker is believed to be one of only two people—along with journalist Glenn Greenwald—to possess the entire cache of Snowden files.

The two collectively lambasted both the Senate and House Intelligence committees for what they said was a failure of sufficient oversight of the intelligence community. Snowden also said he believed the Judiciary committees were more likely to enact substantive surveillance reform, and noted his support of the USA Freedom Act, a bill that would end much of the government's bulk collection of phone "metadata."

Snowden, who has also been nominated this year for the Nobel Peace Prize, was a natural choice for the Ridenhour award, which has honored in recent years journalist and undocumented immigrant Jose Antonio Vargas and Thomas Drake, a former NSA official who also exposed secrets kept by the spy agency. The left-leaning group is named named after Ron Ridenhour, a Vietnam veteran who helped expose the massacre of hundreds of unarmed civilians by U.S. soldiers at My Lai in 1968.


TOPICS: Constitution/Conservatism; Crime/Corruption; Culture/Society; Government
KEYWORDS:

1 posted on 05/01/2014 4:28:47 AM PDT by Las Vegas Dave
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To: ADemocratNoMore; advertising guy; aft_lizard; AJMaXx; Alice in Wonderland; american colleen; ...

Of possible interest to the ping list.


2 posted on 05/01/2014 4:35:00 AM PDT by Las Vegas Dave (The democRATic party preys on the ignorant..!)
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To: Las Vegas Dave

America is where the enemies are. Terrorist cells using electronic radio signals need to be ferreted out.

Snowden’s example also points to the fact that Russia is no longer the American enemy many think it is.


3 posted on 05/01/2014 4:39:50 AM PDT by bert ((K.E. N.P. N.C. +12 ..... History is a process, not an event)
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To: bert

Obama is America’s enemy.


4 posted on 05/01/2014 4:44:58 AM PDT by ilovesarah2012
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To: All

Don’t forget America, that Russia is the true enemy.


5 posted on 05/01/2014 4:45:01 AM PDT by escapefromboston (manny ortez: mvp)
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To: ilovesarah2012

——Obama is America’s enemy.-—

The MSM propaganda corps is his army


6 posted on 05/01/2014 4:48:00 AM PDT by bert ((K.E. N.P. N.C. +12 ..... History is a process, not an event)
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To: bert; ilovesarah2012

BTW..... when Obama was actually attacked, with real weapons and bullets in Bengazi, he did not order guns to defend, he ordered words, propaganda.


7 posted on 05/01/2014 4:50:05 AM PDT by bert ((K.E. N.P. N.C. +12 ..... History is a process, not an event)
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To: Las Vegas Dave

And there is good reason they watch us so closely. They know what they plan for us...


8 posted on 05/01/2014 4:50:34 AM PDT by wastoute (Government cannot redistribute wealth. Government can only redistribute poverty.)
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To: Las Vegas Dave
NSA Spies More on Americans Than Russians

They vet the enemy and he is us.

9 posted on 05/01/2014 4:55:07 AM PDT by WilliamofCarmichael (If modern America's Man on Horseback is out there, Get on the damn horse already!)
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To: Las Vegas Dave
Like any other government bureaucracy, the NSA will pad it's "work product" with whatever is easiest to produce no matter what they're supposed to be doing instead of the easy stuff. Americans blather their whole personal lives and even post self-incriminating pictures of themselves and others all over Face book and anywhere their iPorno can reach. So, naturally the NSA spies on Americans more than anyone else, they get anything they want over the transom with little or no effort.

There are exceptions, of course. I'm sure, for example, they monitor those who inhabit the welfare plantations very carefully since funds are allocated based on headcount and Canada doesn't comply with American "Fugitive Welfare Recipient" laws that demand such folks be returned their plantation.

They also no doubt have kept careful watch on cattle since Algore was the VP and after inventing the Internet discovered that cattle farts are the cause of global warming, climate change, cold winters, warm winters, and boils in the crack of, um, your armpit.

10 posted on 05/01/2014 5:06:47 AM PDT by Rashputin (Jesus Christ doesn't evacuate His troops, He leads them to victory.)
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To: Las Vegas Dave

Thanks for the ping.


11 posted on 05/01/2014 6:00:54 AM PDT by khelus
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To: Las Vegas Dave

Any one still calling Edward Snowden traitor might actually be a traitor.


12 posted on 05/01/2014 6:29:12 AM PDT by Durus (You can avoid reality, but you cannot avoid the consequences of avoiding reality. Ayn Rand)
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To: bert

He also said the “cause” of Benghazi was “words”...ie. A video


13 posted on 05/01/2014 7:38:40 AM PDT by goodnesswins (R.I.P. Doherty, Smith, Stevens, Woods.)
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To: escapefromboston
Don’t forget America, that Russia is the true enemy.

Actually it appears that the Russian government is just less corrupt then the EU and US governments.

Unfortunately however, government always represents, the sum of all evil within a society. The stronger the government, the greater the evil within a society.

14 posted on 05/01/2014 7:43:11 AM PDT by justa-hairyape (The user name is sarcastic. Although at times it may not appear that way.)
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To: Las Vegas Dave

There are more Americans than there are Russians.


15 posted on 05/02/2014 12:00:14 AM PDT by reg45 (Barack 0bama: Implementing class warfare by having no class.)
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