Jeff Jarvis writes about how the Obama administration is coming to realize the cost of its repeated lying and other attempts at media manipulation.
That is the punchline of the Snowden affair: when we can’t trust what government tells us, we come to trust those whom government doesn’t trust. Thus, we no longer necessarily care what the official line is and who delivers it. And when that happens, access – the currency of the Beltway – becomes worthless. Ah, the irony.
The one big lesson is that whatever one might think about the advisability of the revelations by WikiLeaks, Manning Snowden, Greenwald, etc., they have not lied to us while the government has repeatedly lied.
So who are you going to believe?
I am going to trust the one who recklessly exposes what the government “spies” on and tramples upon human rights and liberties while seeking political asylum in Russia, which historically has been the beacon of morality when it comes to respecting privacy and liberties of its citizens.
The ineptness of our media does not make our government untrustworthy any more than their new found zeal for piling on makes the Obama administration any different than its predecessors.
We have one weapon in our arsenal; lying, and intimidation. Two, two weapons…
In a related development, Glenn Greenwald’s significant other one David Michael Miranda, was detained by British authorities for 9 hours on a stopover on a flight from Germany to Brazil; his personal affects were confiscated during the interrogation. Looks like things are even worse in Great Britain then they are in the US.
Considering that Laura Poitras had to go through exactly that kind of bullshit every time she came to the US for quite a while, I wouldn’t say things are worse in the UK just yet.
Link in comment #1.
Quite an ironic detention given his surname. If you’re going to walk over somebody’s rights, however temporarily, you don’t go for a bloke called Miranda. I mean, I know we Brits are renowned for our almost mandatory sense of irony, but that goes above and beyond.
By “partner”, does Greenwald mean that Miranda is his boyfriend? He’s gay?
Just trying to get clarification on the exact meaning of this story, since “partner” is a very ambiguous word (professional or personal), though the article does mention “family members and loved ones of journalists”.
Yes, Greenwald is gay. That is why he moved to Brazil because the US would not allow his partner to come here.
It is my understanding via Andrew Sullivan that the restriction of out of closet gays being barred entry to the US has been relaxed. This was an issue with him as he was unable to return to England for a visit with his family because he feared that he would be refused reentry.
However, I suspect that Greenwald is not anxious to pay any visits to the US at this time for fear of being arrested so the issue is moot.
It’s not that gays were barred entry entirely, it’s that they could not get visas based on engagement or marriage to a gay spouse in the US. That restriction was relaxed only several weeks ago.