The words "Orwellian," "Kafkaesque" and "McCarthyite" seem to apply to everything. Far too much is found to be "ironic," all too often "cruelly" so. Cliche after cliche sweeps by in a wash of ugly prose until you are overwhelmed with the cynical functionalism of the thing.
It wouldn't be a Guardian book without some institutional axe-grinding. I made the mistake of glancing at the index before I read the book. There I spotted my name, with the following reference:
Assange, Julian; Manichean world view of..........224.
There is something about seeing my "Manichean world view" casually assigned its own index entry that epitomizes the Guardian's longstanding, cartoon-like vendetta against me.
Whence issues the charge of Manicheanism? In 2012, I independently produced and presented a television show where I interviewed a range of world figures, from Noam Chomsky and Hassan Nasrallah to the presidents of Tunisia and Ecuador.
Among those I invited was Alexei Navalny, hoping to discuss the "managed democracy" of post-Yeltsin Russia. I was game, but Navalny declined. It was worth a try. But I sold a broadcast license to -- among others -- Russia Today, which is financed by the Russian taxpayer. I am therefore to be held complicit -- at least in Harding's judgment -- in Russian state repression.
Harding's buddies are spared this sort of nonsense. Ewen MacAskill, who spent years in Hong Kong writing for The China Daily, gets the benefit of the doubt, having been, says Harding "in theory at least" -- meaning "not really" -- employed in "the Chinese Communist Party's official propaganda unit." And yet it is considered self-evident that I identify with Vladimir Putin. This is the level of sophistication of the author who imputes to me a "Manichean world view."
If anyone should answer to the charge of "Manicheanism," it is Harding, who, when he is not slogging through clumsy Hollywood film treatments smearing whistleblowers, can be found busily obsessing over Putin in the pages of The Guardian.
Decades after the Cold War, British liberal antipathy to Russia continues to distort the perception of human rights transgressions at home. Harding just cannot resist insinuating that the "high-minded and melodramatic" Snowden's residency in Russia makes him a useful idiot, a "gift to Putin." He spends a whole chapter seriously trying to argue that Russia is holding Snowden "captive."
Outside of Harding's alternative reality, Snowden is a refugee. Russia is not holding him captive. I know this. I had one of my employees stay with him 24 hours a day for four months to make sure his rights were respected.
Anyway, it is quite odious that Snowden is being beaten over the head with Russia by The Guardian -- a publication he ought to have been able to trust. Snowden has to be in Russia. Russia is now the only place asylum for him can be meaningful. If he is anyone's captive, he is a peculiar kind of captive of the United States, which, having canceled his passport, will not allow him to safely leave Russia's borders, trapping him there.
Snowden Deserves Better
Even if Russia may not be kind to its journalists or its dissidents, granting Snowden asylum was a good thing to do and it deserves praise. Thanks to Russia (and thanks to WikiLeaks), Snowden remains free. Only someone with a "Manichean world view" would be unable to acknowledge this.
The most disappointing thing of all about The Snowden Files is that it is exploitative. It should not have existed at all. We all understand the pressures facing print journalism and the need to diversify revenue in order to cross-subsidize investigative journalism. But investigative journalism involves being able to develop relationships of trust with your sources.
There is a conflict of interest here. Edward Snowden was left in the lurch in Hong Kong by The Guardian, and WikiLeaks had to step in to make sure he was safe. While WikiLeaks worked to find him a safe haven, The Guardian was already plotting to sell the film rights.
How can one reconcile the duty to a source with the mad rush to be the first to market with a lucrative, self-glorifying, unauthorized biography? For all the risks he took, Snowden deserves better than this.
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