The “Edward Snowden affair” appears to be taking a sinister turn. I quote from this Huffington Post article, which reflects many comments elsewhere:
Director of National Intelligence James Clapper urged former NSA contractor Edward Snowden and his “accomplices” to return leaked documents during a hearing on Wednesday.
“Snowden claims that he’s won and that his mission is accomplished,” Clapper said, according to a transcript from the Senate Intelligence Committee hearing, posted by the Washington Post. “If that is so, I call on him and his accomplices to facilitate the return of the remaining stolen documents that have not yet been exposed, to prevent even more damage to U.S. security.”
So who, exactly, are Snowden’s “accomplices?”
Guardian national security editor Spencer Ackerman, among others, questioned on Twitter whether Clapper was referring to journalists.
HuffPost put the question to the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, which didn’t rule out that journalists could be considered “accomplices.”
End of quote.
Just in case you missed the fact that the United States and perhaps most of the rest of the world is becoming or has become a police state, where the power is deemed by government to be held entirely by them, rather than residing with those they ostensibly represent. The natural next step is to see journalists, in addition to whistleblowers, being prosecuted under the 1917-8 Espionage Act. This places the frighteningly few real journalists – rather than the mainstream mouthpieces – at a very real risk of being prosecuted for speaking up in the public interest. Reminiscent of anything to you?
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