"Welcome to Heathrow" or Let us enter/de-tain you!

Cannonfire, one of my regular internet stops during a daily surf-ride, yesterday mentioned a writer Juan Cole, of whom I'd until now been unaware. I shall keep an eye on Mr. Cole's blog:
Informed Comment
from now on.


The piece which caught my eye and was quoted at Cannonfire: Greenwald Partner falsely detained as Terrorist: How to Create a Dictatorship
is a brief 10-point list (How to turn a democracy into a STASI authoritarian state in 10 easy steps), and ends with this paragraph:

Presto, what looks like a democracy is really an authoritarian state ruling on its own behalf and that of 2000 corporations, databasing the activities of 312 million innocent citizens and actively helping destroy the planet while forestalling climate activism.

Grim, ain't it?

I wasn't too surprised, to read that Glenn Greenwald's partner, David Miranda had been detained by UK officials at Heathrow Airport in London under some Terrorism Act or other. The length of the detention seemed excessive though: 9 hours - reportedly the maximum allowed under law before police must release or formally make an arrest. Miranda's electronic equipment (laptop, cell phone) were confiscated before he was eventually released.

UK and USA are obviously in cahoots on the "get Edward Snowden" job, so Glenn Greenwald and anyone associated with him are going to be near the top of their lists of travellers to be detained, if for no other reason than to scare the living daylights out of others who might be considering a little whistle-blowing or leaking action. Did the authorities really think Miranda would be travelling with sensitive material so easily accessible, or that he'd be open to spilling any beans at all? Really? Really??

POINTS OF LIGHT

Latest chapter in the Snowden-NSA story involves an encrypted email service, Lavabit, run by Ladar Levison, and reportedly used by Edward Snowden. Levison completely shut-down the service rather than participate in what he described as "crimes against the American people". See a full report in The Guardian newspaper. A second e-mail service, Silent Circle, has since also shut down.
(Hat-tip to Ganga Seva Nidhi for the photograph.)


A commenter (myguardian001) to The Guardian article wrote:

On a positive ... this protest/battle for our privacy, in the long run this will turn out to be a good thing for the cause. Everyone on this comments section already is aware of the implication of government surveillance ... it's the majority who go about their business either not caring or not worried enough that we need engaged.
There's now a further 350,000* people who (if not already concerned about government intrusion into their privacy) will be made more aware of whats going on, and hopefully a good proportion will take a more active part for change. (Me: * meaning Lavabit's clients).

Hopefully more companies make a stand, and more people are sucked into the debate ... we can't really depend on the traditional media outlets to spread the word (seems like they've all been gagged)..................Lose some battles, win the war ... patience, it will happen ... I hope.

Me too.

"Points of light" in the courage of Edward Snowden, Bradley Manning, WikiLeaks, have come into view through the darkness, one after another, though quite slowly. The pace seems to be quickening now. I hope that soon more and more points of light will shine, to join those already shimmering and form a massive searchlight to cut through the gloom, shed light on, and expand the much-needed debate on this very important issue of our time .

Glenn Greenwald finished his piece HERE thus: "There will undoubtedly be more acts inspired by Snowden's initial choice to unravel his own life to make the world aware of what the US government has been doing in the dark."

And borrowing, again, another point made by a commenter at The Guardian
(Lidblownoff)

There are critical moments in history - when the mob hunted down Ceaucescu in Romania, when the Germans turned a blind eye to grim reality, when the Resistance in France took enormous risks, when each one of us gets the chance to demonstrate which side of the line we are willing to live on.
So the govt can force you to collaborate and violate the privacy of your customers thereby damaging the reputation of your business OR
if you refuse, then you can give up your business.
With regard to ordinary people, we are on notice that all our communication--phone, email, postal mail, and conversations--are now subject to govt surveillance.

Last 2 verses of a poem by W. H. Auden titled September 1 1939. I've probably quoted these before, but they continue to remain so very apt.

All I have is a voice
To undo the folded lie,
The romantic lie in the brain
Of the sensual man-in-the-street
And the lie of Authority
Whose buildings grope the sky:
There is no such thing as the State
And no one exists alone;
Hunger allows no choice
To the citizen or the police;
We must love one another or die.

Defenceless under the night
Our world in stupor lies;
Yet, dotted everywhere,
Ironic points of light
Flash out wherever the Just
Exchange their messages;
May I, composed like them
Of Eros and of dust,
Beleaguered by the same
Negation and despair,
Show an affirming flame.

Argus Panoptes & The Surveillance State

A phrase used in an essay by Alfred W. McCoy, professor of history at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, featured at Common Dreams yesterday: Surveillance Blowback: The Making of the U.S. Surveillance State, 1898-2020 prompted several good comments, one especially caught my eye, when the commenter quoted a phrase from these brief paragraphs of Prof McCoy's long essay:

Writing for TomDispatch four years ago during Obama’s first months in office, I suggested that the War on Terror has “proven remarkably effective in building a technological template that could be just a few tweaks away from creating a domestic surveillance state -- with omnipresent cameras, deep data-mining, nano-second biometric identification, and drone aircraft patrolling ‘the homeland.’"
That prediction has become our present reality - and with stunning speed. Americans now live under the Argus-eyed gaze of a digital surveillance state, while increasing numbers of surveillance drones fill American skies. In addition, the NSA’s net now reaches far beyond our borders, sweeping up the personal messages of many millions of people worldwide and penetrating the confidential official communications of at least 30 allied nations. The past has indeed proven prologue. The future is now.

Commenter "Aleph Null" said:

The author's phrase "Argus-eyed gaze of a digital surveillance state" raises the hope that the digital surveillance state can be defeated, as was Argus, the hundred-eyed giant appointed by Juno to keep watch over her rival Io (temporarily inhabiting the body of a cow). Jove sent Mercury, the trickster, to lull Argus to sleep with a magic wand and a story about panpipes. Mercury's next trick was to lop off Argus' head, which went rolling down the hillside. Juno caught it and arranged Argus' eyes into the tail of her favorite bird, the peacock.

Perhaps this myth pertains to our time. Argus' job was keeping track of Io, which today connotes the Input and Output of computer systems. Snowden is the magic wand of courage, and Greenwald is telling the story. The fact that the surveillance state is sleepwalking explains the idiotic antics over Evo Morales' flight, which have further alienated most of Latin America. The demise of Argus arises from the enduring suspicion world citizens retain for the US and all its national and corporate minions. The modern totalitarian Argus can only see in the darkness of concealment, and now the jig is up.

Another commenter ("theoldgoat") responded and expanded on the myth and analogy:

Wonderful post! Taking a look at Wikipedia on Argos, one finds that Argos was Hera's servant and guardian of Io (seduced by god-husband-Zeus who turned her into a heifer to escape detection!). Io is situated within the symbolic dynamics of the natural world and directly connected to the dimensions of Gaia.

I'd expand on your interpretation of Io connoting the binomial reductionistic vision of life to input-output of the computer information dynamic - to the commodification of life: everything measured as relativistic resource for "consumption".

There is a reciprocal mortification (rendering lifeless) in conceptualization and resulting usury, setting up a cycle of devolution. We tend to limit the concept of usury to a monetary transaction. But before any transaction is the mortification of living dimensions rendering them 'invisible' to be reduced to the monetary.

Notable is Hera functioning within the possessory scope of the patriarchal god-symbol of Zeus. Is it any wonder womens' rights are such a target right now!

Depictions of the Argus Panoptes myth can be found on Greek pottery, as above. There's a modern painting of the myth by Andre Durand at his website.

Back to real life, and the essay linked at the top of this post. The last three paragraphs are especially spooky - even if you don't have the time, or inclination, to read the whole essay, please read these.

Daniel Ellsberg in a recent talk said:"There's the infrastructure for a police state here that has never existed in the history of the world................You may think you have nothing to hide, but how sure are you that your congressman has nothing to hide?"

The executive branch has access to blackmail leverage over the legislature, the judiciary, and the media, subverting the structure envisioned by the US constitution. The Carlyle Group (parent of Booz Allen where Edward Snowden was last employed) will have blackmail leverage over the executive branch. Something to keep in mind from now on, because this isn't going away any time soon, or any time at all, without a long and determined fight. Hermes isn't on hand to do the deed these days, sad to say.

Anecdotal Evidence

Current news on the Edward Snowden front: CARACAS, July 5 (Reuters) - Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro offered asylum to former U.S. intelligence contractor Edward Snowden on Friday in defiance of Washington, which is demanding his arrest for divulging details of secret U.S. spy programs. "In the name of America's dignity ... I have decided to offer humanitarian asylum to Edward Snowden," Maduro told a military parade marking Venezuela's independence day. "He is a young man who has told the truth, in the spirit of rebellion, about the United States spying on the whole world.".

We await further developments - will Snowden meet further unexpected difficulties before he can take advantage of the offer? In the meantime, and in spite of many opinions that roughly go "why should we care about all this surveillance if we haven't done anything wrong? He shouldn't have been giving away secrets anyway", or: "everybody's doing it, so what...", there are still arguments illustrating why we should care - and care a lot.

Arnold Lakhovsky, "The Conversation".

 When politicians are on the campaign trail a favourite ploy is to collect anecdotes from people they've met on the road (or they perhaps sometimes make them up, Aesop's Fable-style). President Obama keeps this tactic in his bag of tricks and uses it regularly, as I recall. Let's play him at his own game then, but to do so I need help from a couple of columnists who've led more exciting lives than I have. My only (known) experience of being spied upon was when I'd been in the USA for a few weeks and couldn't find any comparable over-the-counter headache tablets such as those I'd used in the UK. I found the nearest available formula in tablets available from a Mexican pharmacy, ordered a pack of 30 tablets. I was unaware of the drug law restrictions on tablets containing with the usual ingredients even a teeny-tiny amount of codeine, a "listed" drug. I'd used such an over-the-counter formula for years in the UK (Solpadeine, as it was 10 years ago, anyway) with no problems. Anyway, my package was stopped in the mail and a letter sent to me from the DEA (I think it was the DEA) slapping my wrists and threatening action if I was so naughty again. Nice welcome to the USA - all over 30 headache tablets! Still, I do realise there was a good reason for that particular kind of spying.

So, for more apt anecdotal evidence I need a couple of snips from pieces appearing recently at The Smirking Chimp - and thank you gentlemen:

#1 What's In Your Mail? Inquiring Minds Want to Know by Stephen Pizzo:

Let me tell you a little story... a true story.

One day I went off to the post office where my group had a PO box to pick up the day's mail. We got a lot of mail, mostly contributions from supporters. So much mail in fact that the PO box would not hold it all, so we usually just found a note in the box to come to the counter window where we'd be given the mail in a large flat box.

That day the clerk looked around and, when sure the coast was clear, gestured that I should lean towards him. He whispered something to me. He said that the FBI had been requesting all our mail be handed to them before it was given to us. They weren't opening it, apparently, but rather scanning the return addresses.

A week later I was at home in my SF apartment and noticed that, after the postman put my mail in the box, two guys in suits who had been sitting in a nondescript Ford Galaxy got out, went up to my mail box, removed the mail and calmly began copying down the return addresses on the envelopes.

Back at our modest office, we already were fully aware that our phones were being monitored. But mail monitoring was a new wrinkle.

Oh, sorry, I need to stop here and orient you. I'm not talking about the current NSA revelations. I am talking about 1968. Back I was part of a group that organized all of the Bay Area's antiwar rallies - the Vietnam War for you youngsters. Back then the guys in charge of all this snooping were Richard Nixon and that chubby little cross-dresser, FBI Director, J. Edgar Hoover.

My point being, we've been here before. But I never dreamed we would be. That we never again could be. That we'd learned our lesson back then; that, wholesale snooping on ordinary Americans not only violates the core principles we as a nation claim as our patrimony, but also doesn't work.

#2 A Noir America: Killers and Roller-Coaster Rides by John Grant

We're all aware of the reputed Chinese curse about living in interesting times. Upheaval seems to be in the air. According to Wikipedia, the interesting times curse was linked with a second, more worrisome curse: "May you come to the attention of those in authority."

If a young computer nerd like Edward Snowden can access so much secret information concerning US citizens’ lives, what’s to stop some righteous NSA employee with the moral intelligence of Adolf Eichmann from accessing the same material and, in collusion with a para-military cabal of like-minded and armed patriots, deciding someone (me!) is a national security threat in need of neutralization?

Paranoia? Maybe. But I see it as paying attention and having the historically-based imagination to understand we’re no longer in Kansas -- that we actually live in Oz and Toto has been declared a terrorist. The basis of Franz Kafka’s absurd world, of course, is that what you know about yourself doesn’t matter if powerful, secretive elements act hostilely against you based on what they think they know about you. (My highlighting.)

At an anti-Iraq War demonstration in Philadelphia some years ago, a Civil Affairs cop took me aside and told me the FBI had just called him about me. He seemed to be warning me so I could clean up any suspicious behavior. Since I was exercising my first amendment rights, I felt I had nothing to hide. But, then, I began to wonder why exactly some FBI drone thought I might be a threat and how dangerous for me such a person might be.

It all distills down to Power versus Truth and which one is the lodestar for one’s actions.

“The way things are supposed to work is that we're supposed to know virtually everything about what they [the government] do: that's why they're called public servants. They're supposed to know virtually nothing about what we do: that's why we're called private individuals.”
― Glenn Greenwald

New Fashion Fascism?

Very little in the news is uplifting these days, the best at present is that Edward Snowden has not yet been arrested and was reported yesterday to be en route to a country where he could be granted political asylum. We'll discover exactly where he's headed soon enough, but where are we, as a country, headed? Although, as has been acknowledged before here in posts and comments, blanket surveillance of the population of the USA and elsewhere by our government didn't come as an absolute surprise; recent re-revelations have opened up valuable new conversations on the topic and have kick-started more writings on "where we'll be headed" if nothing changes.

Is there a "new fascism" either already in place or on the rise here in the USA? Our view of what fascism means is coloured by what we know of history, comparatively recent history from the 1930s onward. I've seen, from time to time around the net lists of "symptoms" of fascism - many are easily identifiable in today's USA, but I'm certainly not qualified to make a confident diagnosis. As in physical disease, certain symptoms can mask other problems, or the same set of symptoms combined in different proportions might be evidence of some other, still serious, ailment.

A good, reliable, starting point to understanding what's what is investigative journalist John Pilger's article: There's a New Fascism on the Rise, and the NSA Leaks Show Us What It Looks Like: The power of truth-tellers like Edward Snowden is that they dispel a whole mythology carefully constructed by the corporate cinema, the corporate academy and the corporate media.

Snowden’s revelation that Washington has used Google, Facebook, Apple and other giants of consumer technology to spy on almost everyone, is further evidence of modern form of fascism – that is the "abyss". Having nurtured old-fashioned fascists around the world – from Latin America to Africa and Indonesia – the genie has risen at home. Understanding this is as important as understanding the criminal abuse of technology.

I liked this comment from the long thread beneath Pilger's excellent piece - it's from William W. Haywood:

The US form of fascism does not look exactly like any thing we have seen so far, and why should it? There has never been a nation like the US. There is no exact form of fascism, either! Fascism is based on taking control of a nation's economy like an aids virus compromises an immune system. The fascists mutate into a form we don't readily recognize to get their work done. It doesn't attack from the outside but learns how to unlock the defenses of our democratic system using the power of wealth. This is what you see when a fascist form of government has taken control: first, it starts to prey on the citizens and institutions that once kept it democratic, and then it reverts to a full blown disease that destroys its host. This is the phase we are entering now.

An offshoot - and a dangerous one - is brought to our attention by a article from "Digby"

This Really is Big Brother: The Leak Nobody's Noticed

SNIP: Even before a former U.S. intelligence contractor exposed the secret collection of Americans’ phone records, the Obama administration was pressing a government-wide crackdown on security threats that requires federal employees to keep closer tabs on their co-workers and exhorts managers to punish those who fail to report their suspicions.....................President Barack Obama’s unprecedented initiative, known as the Insider Threat Program, is sweeping in its reach. It has received scant public attention even though it extends beyond the U.S. national security bureaucracies to most federal departments and agencies nationwide, including the Peace Corps, the Social Security Administration and the Education and Agriculture departments. It emphasizes leaks of classified material, but catchall definitions of “insider threat” give agencies latitude to pursue and penalize a range of other conduct.
The program could make it easier for the government to stifle the flow of unclassified and potentially vital information to the public, while creating toxic work environments poisoned by unfounded suspicions and spurious investigations of loyal Americans, according to these current and former officials and experts. Some non-intelligence agencies already are urging employees to watch their co-workers for “indicators” that include stress, divorce and financial problems.

And, from Bernie Sanders:



I found, among my drafts a list a commenter at Common Dreams, some months ago, provided on a topic touching on fascism in the USA - this is a list of "symptoms" by commenter "Jimbo.  "Jimbo"   set out to illustrate to readers that in the USA we are on the edge of a precipice, likely at any time to fall into a 21st century version of a fascist nation, albeit fascist with a pretty bow on top, a smartphone, i-pad, and a large-screen TV attached - initially. The commenter presented a list of evidential facts to support the premise. (I'm confident that the author of the comment would not object to my spreading the word, blanket permission was given another individual to do so.)

The List (slightly condensed here, for brevity's sake)

Some of the achievements during Obama's "Lesser Evilism Reign of Terror Traveling Road Show." The list is not exhaustive and covers only recent history:

Obama and the Democrats' Fascist Maneuverings:

Executive Order to create a Cat Food Commission stacked with anti-Social Security / Social Program corporatists.

White House opposed bringing back Glass Steagall.

WARS fully funded and EXPANDING- see AFRICOM.

Trillion dollars given to friends and campaign contributors on Wall Street.

Military Spending INCREASED.

Trillion+Dollars given to the Health Insurance Industry.

Killed possibility for a REAL “Public Option” or REAL Universal Health Care for at least another generation, and begin the “Entitlement Reform” defunding of Medicare (-$500 Billion).

Blocked ANY re-regulation of BIG BANKS and Credit Cards.

Protected the Bush War Criminals and Torturers from JUSTICE.

Expanded Drone Assasinations.

Reinforced the worst Police State provisions of the Patriot Act.

Expanded government surveillance.

EFCA (Employee Free Choice Act) killed in the crib

Free Trade Job Off-shoring.

Supports De-regulation (see: Clinton & Death of Glass-Steagal)

NDAA / Expansion of Government Power.

Bernanke, Geithner. Holder.

Monsanto @ FDA.

Linking Social Security to the Deficit via the Payroll Tax “Holiday”

Crackdown on Occupy movement via Homeland Security.

Whistleblowers, a-la Bradley Manning & WikiLeaks attacked

Shielded BP for its Gulf Disaster

Pushed through the Trans Pacific Partnership

Expanded Military Involvement in Africa

Education plan boosts privatization, victimizes teachers

Put Pesticide Pusher in Charge of Agricultural Trade Relations.

Indefinitely imprisons detainees without charges

Promotes the Militarization of Mexico

Supports the Permanent War Budget

20,000 Airstrikes in President Obama's First Term Cause Death and Destruction From Iraq to Somalia.

Signed the NDAA into law - making it legal to assassinate Americans w/o charge or trial.

Initiated, and personally oversees a 'Secret Kill List'.

Waged war on Libya without congressional approval.

Started a covert, drone war in Yemen.

Escalated the proxy war in Somalia.

Escalated the CIA drone war in Pakistan.

Maintained a presence in Iraq even after "ending" the war.

Sharply escalated the war in Afghanistan.

Secretly deployed US special forces to 75 countries.

Sold $30 billion of weapons to the dictatorship in Saudi Arabia.

Signed an agreement for 7 military bases in Colombia.

Opened a military base in Chile.

Signed the Patriot Act extension into law.

Deported a modern-record 1.5 million immigrants.

Continued Bush's rendition program.

Sent U.S. troops to Niger to set up drone base

Warrantless wiretapping of American citizens, Indefinite detention
without charge or trial, Targeted killings of suspects by drone,
without any pretense of due process (even if they are US citizens).
These are not opinions these are ordinary facts- if it smells like fascism.............


From elsewhere a down-to-earth view of our plight and the difficulties we face in addressing it, by commenter "Nevada Liberal" (I've stupidly lost the source)

You would have to elect 218 Alan Graysons to the House. 60 Bernie Sanders' to the Senate. And Elect Dennis Kucinich as President in order to stop this thing you profess not to like. Off the top, 50% of the Nation would vehemently disagree with me. And, even if you could do that, it would still take you.....????.....10 - 20 years to turn the Supreme Court to that ideology, if you could maintain power that long???? You starting to kinda sorta get a feel for where we are at folks. Until then, keep calm and carry on.
(Nevada Liberal)

OR....if an opportunity should arise the more pro-active route would be
:

If fascism is indeed the disease we face, it will prove to be terminal to our way of life. Whereas socialism and capitalism might prove, with much sincere and determined effort from both sides, to become workable bedfellows in government, that other "ism" - fascism - is good for nothing and nobody in any civilised and humane society.

LAND OF DOUBTS

The Edward Snowden story has grown several different sets of legs; news stories in the USA tend to do this.


Call it a growing distrust, or conspiracy theorising, call it critical thinking, call it general whacko-nuttery, but it happens.

A couple of front-runners (other than the always-out-there Alex Jones) in the "story has different legs" category are Naomi Wolf and Jon Rappoport.

Ms Wolf has the feeling that all is not exactly as presented to the public, and that Snowden's history and attitudes do not pass the smell test of an astute/intuitive looker-on. My own initial feelings were along those lines too (I wrote that I "felt uncomfortable" about it all, without knowing exactly why). However, Dave Lindorff, whose writings I've long respected (his website is among my links - see This Can't Be Happening) isn't convinced by the points Ms Wolf raises. Her opinion swings towards the idea that the whole thing is a staged "reveal" - her whole piece is HERE, it ends with:

"But do consider that in Eastern Germany, for instance, it was the fear of a machine of surveillance that people believed watched them at all times – rather than the machine itself – that drove compliance and passivity. From the standpoint of the police state and its interests – why have a giant Big Brother apparatus spying on us at all times – unless we know about it?"

Jon Rappaport's views were featured at Cannonfire a few days ago (Friday 14 June), by another respected blogger from my links. (Update: See also the post for Tuesday 18 June there). Snip from Mr Rappoport's piece (for all of it, see HERE) :

"Scandals, and how they’re presented to the public through the press, are rarely what they seem.
The players are different, their motives are different, and they’re trading blows in a different arena.
They’re accessing the Matrix and manipulating it at levels invisible to the general public, who are trained by mass media to look in the wrong direction."

It's a bit like looking at the situation through a set of those magic mirrors often found in fairgrounds: different, possibly distorted, possibly accurate views of the same thing. It's the way some of us see the President too (see my own post Obama x 3).

Suspicious minds, like that old song Elvis sang : "We're caught in a trap....We can't go on together with suspicious minds". Nobody trusts anybody any more, often for valid reasons. At the core: the government doesn't trust any of us, we don't trust the government, some speak out, some of us distrust even their motives. Where does it end?

A commenter online, sadly I failed to keep a reference to the source, pointed out a danger in this mushrooming climate of distrust:

If you read most peoples' writings from the most totalitarian states, or the most competent and cogent figures in political fiction, and the motif remains the same: The worst part of totalitarianism is the public distrust sown between neighbours, when you believe that each other member of the state is a potential part of the apparatus that monitors you. Resisting a monolithic authority is possible when you can combine. Resisting the rest of your citizens is impossible, because you are alone.

What's the remedy? Is there one? Keeping an open mind is the only way, I guess.

Why Should We Care? & Edward Snowden's Natal Chart

By the time I click on the publish button the current surveillance saga will probably have moved on to yet another chapter. I'm still not as invested in the whole public outcry as most, mainly because we should have realised it was going on, and had been ever since 2001 - maybe even before that to the extent that technology then available could cope. A trawl through the nets to see whether I'm missing something crucial that'd kick my reactions up a notch or two followed.

Thinks: terrorism, though it poses a clear threat, doesn't pose such a huge threat to the USA as to warrant the allocation of billions of dollars to surveillance programs said to be the best way to circumvent such threats, when such programs involve wholesale invasion of telephone and internet communications of hundreds of millions of individuals - a mind-boggling volume, daily. In effect, though, chances of anyone's e-mail or phone call to friends and family being intercepted has to be tiny indeed, or even chances of defining the patterns of any individual's habits of communication, come to that - or so I assume. But the expense of all this to the country, when not in the most robust of financial health - there's that!

The item I found with a possibility of getting me engaged more in this issue was a comment at a blog called Lawyers Guns and Money, where a post by Erik Loomis asking why people were getting so much up in arms about this issue and not about several other important matters facing us. A commenter "Yankee Frank", responded well, I thought, and I trust he would not object to my spreading his words here:

The only reason people don’t care much is that they don’t really understand the import of this. Once the government can examine everything (pretty much) about someone’s past, that person is no longer free. If the government wants to, they can doctor up anything about you they want — to prove you are “evil”, or mentally ill, or a liar… and once they can do that to anyone they have total control over us. They can retroactively examine anyone’s life and find whatever “evidence” they want of anything they want to charge you with.

Why do you think criminal lawyers tell their clients never to speak to the police without their lawyer present? Even if you tell 100% truth and are innocent they can turn your words against you. All they need is a “witness” who saw you somewhere you (or your decades of internet history) claim you weren’t and they have you as a liar, and if you’re lying about an alibi, well then you are very likely guilty. They don’t even have to fabricate the witness. People want to help the police, and they “see” things they didn’t see all the time. This scenario plays out regularly in this and other ways. Hence lawyers tell you to say nothing to the police. These records mean you’ve been talking to the police since 2006, and they can catch you in any number of “lies” to weaken your credibility. People get life sentences for things they didn’t do based on evidence just like this.

Once you are a suspect, that is the beginning of the end of your freedom. The fact that we are all under threat of becoming suspects based on something we said or wrote 15 years ago, or whenever, because the NSA has all our history, means we are all constantly under threat of suspicion. This is what totalitarianism looks like.

The reason this is more important than income inequality and unemployment, and I think those things are hugely important, almost as important as this… is because this freedom underlies all the others. WIthout the freedom to speak out without the government being able to silence you and/or destroy your life, forget protest. Forget fighting for the unemployed, and forget arguing against any government activity period. We will live in a world where 99% of us are too terrified to even raise our voices, let alone dissent.

These things are only abstract because most of us just don’t understand how the state works when it goes after you. Hopefully I have shed some light on this.

I don't think we're quite at that stage of a totalitarian-like state quite yet, but an atmosphere where such things could become a daily worry may not be that far over the horizon.

Something upon which to chew, indigestible as it may be!

There's a good run-down of the situation in this video interview : Jake Tapper and Glenn Greenwald on CNN (around 14 mins)




For any passing astrology buffs, here's a natal chart (12 noon version) for Edward Snowden constructed using birth data given by Wikipedia - "The army did confirm Snowden's date of birth: June 21, 1983." Place of birth stated is Elizabeth City, but that's not an option on my software so I've used the nearest place available. (Update: see comments below for exact time of birth and a link to updated chart on site elsewhere- Gemini was rising by the way).

Snowden has lots of Air in his chart, unlike Greenwald : 3 Gemini planets and 2 in Libra. 3 in Sagittarius (Fire), with Uranus conjunct Jupiter - I'd bet on that conjunction as his "daring" trade mark. Natal Moon will be in Scorpio whatever his time of birth - between around 10 and 23 degrees. Whichever, transiting Saturn is heading that way, indicating some kind of restriction or limitation in his future. It's actually already happening, so his time of birth was likely to be earlier in the day rather than later, I think.

Pluto conjunct Saturn in Libra form an harmonious trine to his Sun and Mars in Gemini, blending a passionate, almost obsessive draw to legal matters (in this case Constitutionality?)with his naturally energetic and communicative core personality.

"Star" and key element of his chart, in the circumstances, for me has to be Uranus conjunct Jupiter.