Giving
Snowden additional negligent--had it been solicited--legal advice Obama
counsels: "If, in fact, he believes that what he did was right, then
"[Snowden] can come here, appear before the court with a lawyer and make
his case." As a patriot, Snowden
has better legal alternatives for the time being than trusting Obama
and the lowly
ranked independence of his courts. Obama's challenge is intended to
give credence to the concept that Snowden's decision to take refuge abroad
while negotiating his legal status, rather than subject himself to the
pre-judgment, possible torture, silencing and denial of constitutional rights
inflicted upon Bradley Manning, somehow impeaches Snowden's patriotism.
Obama
concluded his presentation by dangling a lead-in for the predictable, if not
set-up, question by MSNBC's Chuck Todd--a follow-up about Snowden's
patriotism and the only
NSA-related question posed by the supine
press corps. Obama said: "I believe that those who have lawfully
raised their voices on behalf of privacy and civil liberties are also patriots
who love our country." Using this classic
divide and conquer strategy for isolating effective citizenship like
Snowden's from efforts by others who are routinely ineffective, Obama thus
praises as patriots those who--perhaps as professional
activists providing Obama support and cover--have "lawfully"
(and impotently) merely "raised their voices," and been ignored, or
who more courageously--as muffled whistle-blowers--have buried their more
credible voices within "lawful" bureaucratic processes, and risked
reprisals for that.
A
whistle-blower who puts his oath of loyalty to the Constitution above
considerations of technical legalities applied to perpetuate and hide those
violations, and who actually exposes criminally unconstitutional conduct that
should trump such lesser legalities in a court fairly applying the
Constitution, and who thereby also stimulates an essential national debate on
the subject is, to Obama, not a patriot because of "the fact...that Mr.
Snowden has been charged with three felonies." Charged and pressed by the
constitutional offenders themselves. Is a more technical principle-twisting
rationalization even possible?
Being
rusty at the unscripted performance format had an ironic consequence for Obama
when he allegedly
himself violated the law and judicial secrecy rules during the press
conference question period. He did so in the interest of scoring an
off-the-cuff political point by implying he is close on the trail of the
Benghazi attackers. Revealing a sealed indictment would be acting "unlawfully,"
even if in pursuit of such a higher political purpose. Elsewhere Obama has said :
"If I was to release stuff, information that I'm not authorized to
release, I'm breaking the law." He is presumably not authorized to release
information about a sealed indictment. Yet that seems to be what he did by
revealing "there's a sealed indictment." Thus Obama apparently broke
the law himself at a press conference which was conducted for the very purpose
of hanging a hyper-technical "broke the law" sign around Snowden's
neck.
We
already know about Obama's asymmetric
enforcement of such obligations, a practice that falls within a general
category that Snowden labeled "unequal pardon." Obama, independent of
public opinion, can pardon his own law-breaking, James Clapper's
lies , and the massive bankster
fraud that helps fund him. But no similar leniency about technical
legal violations, whether in pursuit of higher goals like the Constitution or
otherwise, can be expected to be shown by a hypocritical Obama to a mere
patriotic citizen like Snowden.
Obama
has stopped talking about his war in Afghanistan after what amounts to an
official whistle-blower was appointed under a law authorizing the investigation
of the waste, fraud and abuse involved in the enormous expense of that war. John F. Sopko is
the "special inspector general" partly responsible for the growing
public opinion that the Afghanistan war is a useless and " expensive
boondoggle. " Like Snowden, Special IG Sopko knows "If you
want to make a change, you need to get to the American people".putting people
in jail also works--it gets their attention." Congress should appoint a
similarly aggressive IG to investigate commander-in-chief Obama's other war,
the similarly prolonged "war on terror." Special focus of such a
Special IG on the expensive and illegal surveillance programs the war on terror
has spawned would likely also change public opinion on the war against
whistle-blowers.
Congress
could at the same time strengthen the constitutional oath of office with
supportive legislation making it clear that it constitutes the crime of "misprision" for
public officials not to inform the American people of known high crimes
and constitutional violations. Sunlight is still the best natural disinfectant.
CounterPunch
published an earlier version of this article.
1 An updated application of the
Third Amendment could perceive permanent NSA spying on one's private electronic
communications from home as a modern form of quartering. A living Constitution
requires re-conceptualizations for modern application to new technologies of
such deeper principles as that embodied in the Third Amendment, which bans
military imposition upon civilian life without consent, except in case of a war
within the United States.
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