John Stewart, Steven Colbert, and John Oliver give interviews that are far more journalistic, than the so-called MSM talking heads.

I think one of the main reasons for this is because they listen to the person that they are interviewing, and follow-up appropriately. Also, if they interview an author's book, they personally read the book themselves before the interview, not delegate it to someone else on their staff to give a synopsis of the book

it addressed privacy issues, but also did not let Snowden off the hook for being responsible for what he releases.

Last edited Mon Apr 6, 2015, 09:51 AM - Edit history (1)

It was a good interview. I have zero problem with what Edward Snowden did. He's a hero

Full John Oliver interview with Edward Snowden

Last Week Tonight With John Oliver - Edward Snowd…:

Every bit of real analysis does the same.

He is a hero wannabe, that much is for sure.

He alerted the nation to the fact that NSA intrusion into our privacy was far broader and deeper than the government ever admitted. If Snowden had merely blown a whistle, without stealing proof of his charges, the evidence would never have been released. In stealing the documents he insured himself a miserable life on the run, or eventually a very long prison term. If that's not heroism, I don't know what is.

If you approve what he did, why isn't that enough. Why does it have to be added that he is a "hero?" Shouldn't anyone have done it if it was the right thing?

He's the one hiding in Russia. And as the reporter did expose, he didn't care what was in the documents and that some of it could have led to danger to somebody.

the government is not spying on all of us. The exaggeration of what he did to make him a "hero" is odd, too.

Few would do that.

If he didn't care what was in the documents, he would have made them freely available instead of having them vetted by responsible people with great resources.

He won't even face the criminal charges.

A violation of international law, and more blinding incompetence.

It's not unreasonable to believe that Snowden could have gotten killed in this whole episode, or tortured and/or imprisoned for life and/or executed.

He had a choice.
He disrupted poorly.

eom

eom

eom

Sure, heroes retreat all the time. Or rather, they strategically reposition themselves so as to win their fights in the long run. Snowden moved to a place where he could continue to speak out. He's a far from perfect messenger, but the interview makes it very clear that Snowden is continuing to speak out against the rise of the American security state... even if (like FDR) he's gotta make deals with some unsavory characters along the way.

Look at all the words you had to type to express reality.

some have been fooled.

He exposed Operation Spy On Everyone™ (or Operation The Government's Storing Your Dick Pics per Oliver's piece). Exposing the Crypto-Government was important, and I'm not sure there was a better way to do it.

This exposure also showed that the Director of National Intelligence and his crew can lie to Congress with impunity, and that's fine by our President. And finally, it showed the staggering incompetence of our "security" apparatus, allowing a low-level employee (or any employee!) to make off with so many documents.

himself, rather than have Faux Noose interpret his courageous actions for him.

Eg, Snowden did not release the information to the public.

He did it responsibly, handing it over to journalists in order to ensure there were enough people with the experience to redact anything harmful before release of the information.

It's funny, anti-Whislte Blowers attacked Whistle Blowers for releasing material without editing all at once.

Then they attacked Snowden, Greenwald et al for releasing the information slowly AFTER editing.

Let's face it, if the government has nothing to hide, they have nothing to fear.

The assault on Whistle Blowers and Journalists, is proof positive of just how much they need to hide from the public.

...

Even the Guardian said Oliver asked 'uncomfortable' questions - http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/apr/06/edward-snowden-john-oliver-last-week-tonight-nsa-leaked-documents

I've only seen excerpts but the bit where he said Snowden had to "own" where bad faith and even incompetent elements would release that sensitive info he turned out without having fully read himself, Snowden looked like he was about to jump out of his seat.

As for this bit: “You will never be completely free from risk if you’re free,” Snowden said. “The only time you can be completely free from risk is when you’re in prison.”

Not only does that make absolutely no sense whatsoever, but lots of people are injured, raped and even killed in prison along with the horror of being "surveilled" 24 hours a day, seven days a week. He seems to be getting both more grandiose and more confused by the day.

[hr][font color="blue"][center]"If you're bored then you're boring." -Harvey Danger[/center][/font][hr]

No one likes Snowden.

...he can continue to be heroic in his own mind. This interview must have shaken his worldview but he may be able to 'forget' it on a higher level and continue with the heroic fantasy game that plays continuously in his head.
[hr][font color="blue"][center]"If you're bored then you're boring." -Harvey Danger[/center][/font][hr]

Vladmir Putin is and Russia for their "..stand against human rights violations..". Such hogwash.

"Yet even in the face of this historically disproportionate aggression, countries around the world have offered support and asylum. These nations, including Russia, Venezuela, Bolivia, Nicaragua, and Ecuador have my gratitude and respect for being the first to stand against human rights violations carried out by the powerful rather than the powerless. By refusing to compromise their principles in the face of intimidation, they have earned the respect of the world. It is my intention to travel to each of these countries to extend my personal thanks to their people and leaders."

https://wikileaks.org/Statement-by-Edward-Snowden-to.html

Snowden likes playing the victim.. John Oliver didn't let him do that.

Edward R Murrow standard.

Sid

But I do hope Snowden takes to heart that he has some responsibility here, and isn't just manipulated into releasing information to the benefit of his handlers, or for his own ego. I honestly think he had good intentions and terrible judgement.

Or better yet an attack on the collective intelligence of Americans in general

https://firstlook.org/theintercept/2015/04/06/john-oliver-interview-political-disengagement-american-public/

I've just finished watching the John Oliver interview. It was an excellent interview. It was also a tough interview in parts. But Snowden didn't flinch. That' simply not true, and all I can conclude is that the people spreading this falsehood are useful tools for yellow journalism.

Have you watched the interview, Sid?

Doesn't matter who asks the question.

Google could move your data to an overseas storage center and the NSA could have enough time to grab it and the NSA could, in fact, grab it.

That's an important point. Did he need to steal thousands of documents and flee the country to make it?

And he still thinks PRISM is a way for Google to simply transmit anything and everything to the NSA? That's a bizarre contention without, as usual, any proof to back it up.
[hr][font color="blue"][center]You have to play the game to find out why you're playing the game. -Existenz[/center][/font][hr]

it is Last Week Tonight

I mean here you are dissing us poor uninformed saps who watch the Daily Show...err poor uniformed saps who know that John Oliver is not on the Daily Show.

Get your facts right before you paint with that large brush of yours.

are what's problematic. The domestic spying that he revealed is a good thing, the problem is he didn't stop there.

In John Oliver's words, "that's a fuck up."

about international covert operations could've endangered operatives and solders in the field.

That is not a good thing and certainly not the purview of a low-level IT guy to make the choice to reveal.

Snowden was taken aback that someone actually pointed out his "fuck up" instead of groveling in hero worship at his feet.

...well apart from the "Do you miss Florida?" question....

Careful pal, your agenda is showing...

Oh, my.

But is there anything about the interview specifically you'd like to criticize?

Remember everyone saying- They gubmit is recordin' all me phone calls!

Um, no- And finally Snowy finally reveals as much-

See video and start watching at 29:25 - Oliver has to talk about dick picks and calls to get Snowy going LOL

I was disappointed.

[hr][font color="blue"][center]Everything is a satellite to some other thing.[/center][/font][hr]

...it's a grimace. Halo's on too tight.

Any harm done by Snowden's revelations is pure speculation and probably non-existent.

The damage done by the US corporate political power structure, on the other hand, is easy to quantify. We see it clearly in events like the invasion of Iraq, which resulted in the destruction and of an entire country and the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people (mostly women and children, of course). How can anyone not believe that a lot more needs to be revealed about its policies and conduct?

Can you people truly not see the glaring lack of fundamental logic in your ridiculous position?

I'm far more interested in the systemic corruption of our policy making establishment and our de facto national security state. It's a much more pressing issue, and has far greater potentially negative repercussions for our entire country, than the soap opera facet of this issue and the purely speculative "harm" by Snowden's revelations. Those who focus on this, are attempting to divert from important issues, plain and simple.

That's why our "news" is shit.

More like he made people aware of some things, but in the process, he did allow for certain secret information to be leaked that was harmful in our efforts to engage Al Qaeda

...post #5. Leser works for FOX News.

I thought he sometimes appeared on it to give the Democratic view of things.
Obama has been on fox as well.
Does he "work for Fox News" too?

FFS, our Congress doesn't even read the laws they pass, and I'm sure they don't evaluate them either.

Snowden made a good point that freedom wasn't perfect (hence the NY Times deliberate(?) faulty redaction). I think Oliver's point was that people won't care about privacy unless it's presented to them in ways they'll understand. They don't care about how NSA invasion can affect elections or labor organizing. However, that same invasion can affect their dick pic privacy.

In my working days, we were restricted in our handling of certain types of documents. Press releases were public info. Organization charts were internal. Other types of documents had an increasingly restricted audience. Et cetera. We were required to EVALUATE the type of data to know how it s/b handled. We didn't have to read it all.

I'm not talking about properly sorting them into piles, now.

argument.

Interviewers have a serious issue today and it is based on the all mighty dollar. When someone does an interview of a public figure today, one of their great concerns is 1) I want to interview this person in the future, 2) This person has lots of acquaintances I want to interview. Those two items along have done great harm to holding public figures accountable.

Oliver doesn't give a fuck. He doesn't count his chickens before they hatch. He has that one opportunity at an interview and wants to make it the best he can. "Best" being used in multiple ways.

Because that's how he rolls...

Although for once I do have to give a *little* credit to the world's most famous defector, since for the first time ever he granted interview access to someone who wasn't already 100% sympathetic to his 'cause', or one of Greenwald's clubhouse gang cronies...

I don't think Snowden is a hero, but confidential information should not be a barrier to leaking documents. By that logic, the Pentagon would be immune to whistleblowers. It's up to journalists to redact information that might be a threat to National Security and summarize it in a non-dangerous way.

whistleblowers---that is, if they are legally whistleblowers.

Snowden does not do well with tough questions.

believe any serious attorney thought this was a good idea.

If I were a prosecutor, I'd just play that for the jury, over and over.

will be all too happy to clean up later.

I expect a full throated assault on John Oliver from Greenwald any second. And his lackeys will eat up his spews with a spoon as they always do.

they don't have a clue about Snowden or surveillance, but no ones wants their own naked pictures in a government file!!

squirming. Edward Snowden in that interview? Not a damn squirm in sight.

and publicity. So, it's funny that some here think that Snowden has made such a massive impact or that he's got the NSA shaking in their boots.

Even Snowden admitted that this issue wasn't as sexy as others and seemed to appreciate the angle of John Oliver's peter pics being part of the NSA sweep of information.

When the only way you can make your government is spying issue "hot" is to say that the government may be collecting your dick pics, something is awry.

If they want to claim that Snowden is some of kind of genius, they ought to look in to his past a little more.
He ran off to China, and now is currently stuck in Russia with no way out, and no end in sight.
How fucking smart was that??

John Oliver just exposed a very big lie surrounding Edward Snowden

Former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden spoke with HBO's John Oliver in Moscow recently, and one exchange stood out amid the discussion of Hot Pockets and nude photos.

"How many of those documents have you actually read?" Oliver asked, referring to the estimated 200,000 NSA documents Snowden stole and turned over to journalists in Hong Kong.

"I have evaluated all of the documents in the archive," Snowden replied.

"You've read every single one?"

"Well, I do understand what I turned over."

"There's a difference between understanding what's in the documents and reading what's in the documents," Oliver countered.

http://www.businessinsider.com/snowden-and-john-oliver-2015-4

Huge shock. Really. Obviously, Oliver has more than Snowden "squirming" despite the half-manic protestations from his "not nearly as large as Snowden was hoping it would be" fan base.

If he had been sitting outside of a Ron Paul convention and gotten the slobbering that he obviously feels Snowden deserves, I have a feeling the tenor of this entire report would be different. But I'm actually surprised that he's as civil as he is.

When Edward Snowden leaked secret documents revealing how British and US intelligence agencies monitor personal computers and mobile phones around the world, he became a hero of the Left.

The Guardian newspaper – which published the leaks – said the traitor had ‘performed a public service’ by exposing techniques by which an oppressive State invaded the privacy of millions of citizens.

To those charged with defending Britain it was very different. Security chiefs and senior politicians were horrified, saying the breach had risked lives and dealt a body blow to our ability to track terrorists.

But with supreme arrogance, the Guardian dismissed these concerns, insisting that Snowden and its journalists had vetted all the documents and rejected anything which might endanger life.

Snowden said: ‘I have to screen everything before releasing it.’

Yesterday he was forced to admit this was a lie. Not only did he fail to read documents before handing them over, he also confessed in an interview that his treachery had ‘carried dangers’.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-3028193/DAILY-MAIL-COMMENT-Traitor-damned-lips.html