The woman behind the NSA scoops: MacArthur genius winner routinely haraassed . . .

[snot]

http://www.salon.com/2013/06/10/the_woman_behind_the_nsa_scoops/ :

By now, we know the revelations about U.S. government surveillance published in the Guardian and the Washington Post in the past week have the same source, Edward Snowden. And despite what Politico, in typically overheated fashion, is calling a “feud” between reporters at the two news organizations, they share something else: the involvement of award-winning documentary filmmaker Laura Poitras.

Despite the customary competition between news sources — heightened, in this case, by differing accounts of how the story was reported — Poitras achieved the unusual distinction of sharing a byline both with Barton Gellman on the June 6 Washington Post story on PRISM and with Glenn Greenwald and Ewan MacAskill on the June 8 Guardian story naming Edward Snowden as a source. In the accompanying video interview of Snowden, Greenwald is credited as “interviewer” and Poitras as “filmmaker.” Greenwald wrote in a tweet this morning, “The reality is that Laura Poitras and I have been working with [Snowden] since February, long before anyone spoke to Bart Gellman.”

* * * * *

In 2012, Greenwald wrote about her repeated detention for Salon, saying she “produces some of the best, bravest and most important filmmaking and journalism of the past decade, often exposing truths that are adverse to U.S. government policy, concerning the most sensitive and consequential matters.” He also noted that “documents obtained from a FOIA request show that DHS has repeatedly concluded that nothing incriminating was found from its border searches and interrogations of Poitras.” A coalition of nonfiction filmmakers, including Albert Maysles, Alex Gibney and Morgan Spurlock, signed an open letter protesting Poitras’ treatment at borders and calling her “one of America’s most important nonfiction filmmakers.”

* * * * *

“The job of an artist is to express things; we’re not activists, we’re not organizers, we’re not politicians. So even though I do have political beliefs, my job as an artist is to express how I’m perceiving the world,” Poitras said in a 2011 video interview with the New York Times. ”And so the work I’ve tried to do as a storyteller, as a filmmaker, as somebody who captures images, is to create documents, to create a record, and to create a record that’s grounded in human stories. ”

More at the link.

[MADem]

1. “The reality is that Laura Poitras and I have been working with (Snowden) since February, long

before anyone spoke to Bart Gellman.”


HELLO? FEBRUARY?

That's BEFORE he started working for Booz--if his "less than three months" employment with them is accurate.

This guy has been talking about whistleblowing/data-dumping, to reporter(s), and he THEN decides to take a job in Hawaii...and THEN he decides that "now is the time?"

WTF?

And there's more--the filmmaker was first contacted in JANUARY?

http://www.salon.com/2013/06/10/qa_with_laura_poitras_the_woman_behind_the_nsa_scoops/

So how did this all begin?

I was originally contacted in January, anonymously.

By Edward Snowden?

Well, I didn’t know who it was.

What was the format?

Via email. It said, I want to get your encryption key and let’s get on a secure channel.

And he didn’t say what it was about?

He just said — that was the first, and the second was, I have some information in the intelligence community, and it won’t be a waste of your time.

Do you get a lot of those kinds of requests?

No, I don’t.

Did you immediately know what was the best, most secure protocol to go about it?

I actually did. I have a lot of experience because I’ve been working with — as you note in your thing, I’ve done filming with WikiLeaks, I know Jacob Appelbaum. I already had encryption keys but what he was asking for was beyond what I was using in terms of security and anonymity.

How did it proceed from there?

So that’s where I’m not going into a lot of details, but sort of ongoing correspondence. I didn’t know, I didn’t have any biographical details or where he worked, had no idea. He made claims and said he had documentation. At that point it was all completely theoretical, but I had a feeling it was legit.

Why do you think he contacted you? Were you the first person he contacted?

I can’t speak for him. Glenn and I just touched base about, what was your story, because we connected later in the spring. He, I think, got an email in February. But I didn’t know he’d gotten an email.......

MUCH more at link....


This just gets curiouser and curiouser....

K/R!

[Cha]

3. Did Greenwald in his necessity to be First(HEY LOOK AT ME!) before WaPo.. let

a cat out of the bag that he hadn't intended to?

If true, does it mean Snowden planned to steal before he started working for Booz Allen?

It's damn Curious, MADem and actually the one I'm most interested in having explained.

I really don't believe a word that comes out of his mouth.. thanks for his "timeline", though MADem.

MORE IS COMING!!

[MADem]

4. Everytime I think, well, THERE it is...something new comes out, and it get weird again.

I don't think this is as straightforward as the reporters/filmmaker want us to think it is.

But I still don't know what is driving Snowden's bus.

I'd love to hear from his (IT professional) mother--maybe she has insight.

I agree--there's at least one more shoe to drop. Question is, are we dealing with a centipede?

[Cha]

5. I'm thinking

"centipede" Now.

[MADem]

6. Looking more possible by the day. Spider at the very least, certainly! nt

[Surya Gayatri]

7. Sorry, but can you explain centipede in this context?

I've had no luck with the urban dictionary.
Thanks, MADem.

ETA:
And now I see the term 'spider'. Please elucidate.

[MADem]

10. No, it's not you---it is a vague reference, separated by a degree or two!

You know the term "Waiting for another shoe to drop?" If you're downstairs and you hear someone upstairs clomping around getting ready for bed, and they take off one shoe and "thud" drop it on the floor, the space between the first thud, and the second one, is an anticipatory one.

Used in the context of current events, that usually means that after a big revelation, there's another that follows within a brief, anticipatory period, and it's even more explosive.

I'm just wondering if this guy isn't a centipede, and has 99 more shoes to drop!

The spider would have only seven more shoes to drop...!

[Surya Gayatri]

11. Thanks for answering--now both references make sense!

[randome]

9. She's another goddamned James O'Keefe!

[hr]
[font color="blue"][center]Stop looking for heroes. BE one.[/center][/font]
[hr]

[Berlum]

15. Pretty damn peculiar

Thanks for pointing out the unbelievable inconsistencies.

This whole thing has RepubliStink all over it.

[Downwinder]

2. Follow the link to the interview.

[Octafish]

8. When telling the truth is un-American, we have a problem.

The terrorists have won.

Thanks for the heads-up on the filmmaker, snot.

Godspeed truth.

[OilemFirchen]

12. When being willingly duped for personal aggrandizement is Journalism...

the ratfuckers have impregnated a once venerable profession.

Godspeed fame!

[Octafish]

13. Guy spills the beans on illegal NSA domestic spying and you want to call journalists 'ratfuckers.'

I find that an odd perspective, as I value the First Amendment.

What else is odd: Your post is the second time today someone's used the term 'ratfucker' in reply to one of my posts.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10022983475#post86

I don't need to monitor you to see it's beginning to look like a pattern.

[OilemFirchen]

14. What beans?

He (and Greenwald) have "thousands" of documents, of whcih "dozens" are "newsworthy".

So far... a Powerpoint presentation confirming the worst-kept secret in American intel history.

I can be swayed, ya know, if one of these guardians of liberty were to actually reveal something nefarious. Unfortunately, I can, at this point, only assume that they're liars or cowards. Or ratfuckers.

And I've never seen your posts before. If you're not "monitoring" me, don't do so for my benefit.

[Octafish]

16. Like I wrote: I don't need to monitor you to see it's beginning to look like a pattern.

Here's the problem: "Ratfucker" is a term of art in politics to denote the opposition, particularly those involved in dirty tricks. I will not tolerate it being associated with me. Verstehen?

Second, its use prevents important posts, like Solly Mack's, from making it past SPAM filters. That's a real problem when you're interested in people learning new things, about government spying and democracy and such.

Speaking of Beans:

[font size="5"]Edward Snowden: saving us from the United Stasi of America[/font size]

[font size="3"]Snowden's whistleblowing gives us a chance to roll back what is tantamount to an 'executive coup' against the US constitution[/font size]

Daniel Ellsberg
guardian.co.uk, Monday June 10, 2013

In my estimation, there has not been in American history a more important leak than Edward Snowden's release of NSA material – and that definitely includes the Pentagon Papers 40 years ago. Snowden's whistleblowing gives us the possibility to roll back a key part of what has amounted to an "executive coup" against the US constitution.

Since 9/11, there has been, at first secretly but increasingly openly, a revocation of the bill of rights for which this country fought over 200 years ago. In particular, the fourth and fifth amendments of the US constitution, which safeguard citizens from unwarranted intrusion by the government into their private lives, have been virtually suspended.

The government claims it has a court warrant under Fisa – but that unconstitutionally sweeping warrant is from a secret court, shielded from effective oversight, almost totally deferential to executive requests. As Russell Tice, a former National Security Agency analyst, put it: "It is a kangaroo court with a rubber stamp."

For the president then to say that there is judicial oversight is nonsense – as is the alleged oversight function of the intelligence committees in Congress. Not for the first time – as with issues of torture, kidnapping, detention, assassination by drones and death squads –they have shown themselves to be thoroughly co-opted by the agencies they supposedly monitor. They are also black holes for information that the public needs to know.

The fact that congressional leaders were "briefed" on this and went along with it, without any open debate, hearings, staff analysis, or any real chance for effective dissent, only shows how broken the system of checks and balances is in this country.

Obviously, the United States is not now a police state. But given the extent of this invasion of people's privacy, we do have the full electronic and legislative infrastructure of such a state. If, for instance, there was now a war that led to a large-scale anti-war movement – like the one we had against the war in Vietnam – or, more likely, if we suffered one more attack on the scale of 9/11, I fear for our democracy. These powers are extremely dangerous.

There are legitimate reasons for secrecy, and specifically for secrecy about communications intelligence. That's why Bradley Mannning and I – both of whom had access to such intelligence with clearances higher than top-secret – chose not to disclose any information with that classification. And it is why Edward Snowden has committed himself to withhold publication of most of what he might have revealed.

But what is not legitimate is to use a secrecy system to hide programs that are blatantly unconstitutional in their breadth and potential abuse. Neither the president nor Congress as a whole may by themselves revoke the fourth amendment – and that's why what Snowden has revealed so far was secret from the American people.

CONTINUED...

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/jun/10/edward-snowden-united-stasi-america

Dick Cheney helped start us on this Unitary Executive path.

PS: No need to worry about me monitoring you or anybody. I've got a decent memory.

[OilemFirchen]

18. First off,

fuck you and your sanctimony.

Secondly, that Snowden and Greenwald are ratfuckers does not impugn you, nor are you maligned by having your posts "associated" with the term. I didn't call you a ratfucker. My posts are also "associated" with ratfucker. I'm not concerned. I'm not a ratfucker.

Third, I note that your (substantially more than fair-use) cite got past the "SPAM filters" just fine, thank you.

Fourth, I'm now giggling with anticipation that you may, ultimately, feel the need to "monitor" me. What does that entail? Will I have to wear special jewelry?

[Octafish]

19. What a nice thing to say.

BTW: Based on what you and they have written, it's clear that Greenwald and Snowden are way ahead of wherever you are.

[snot]

20. Thanks to Octafish for standing up (again) for info that empowers the people.

[RainDog]

17. k&r n/t