Edward Snowden Declares Himself Torture-Proof

[ProSense]

Edward Snowden Declares Himself Torture-Proof

Geoffrey Ingersoll

The dramatic plot of the Edward Snowden NSA whistelblowing saga has just taken an interesting twist: in a letter to U.S. Senator Gordon Humphreys, Snowden declares himself impervious to torture.

Furthermore, he claims his encryption cannot be hacked.

From his letter, posted in the Guardian:

(N)o intelligence service — not even our own — has the capacity to compromise the secrets I continue to protect. While it has not been reported in the media, one of my specializations was to teach our people at DIA how to keep such information from being compromised even in the highest threat counter-intelligence environments (i.e. China).

You may rest easy knowing I cannot be coerced into revealing that information, even under torture.

So everyone is to understand that Snowden's counter-cyber-intelligence capability is greater than that of the U.S. government, Chinese government, and Russian government ... combined?

Also, that methods of torture that make waterboarding look like a walk in the park — fingernail torture, cattleprods, smashed toes, blaring Sesame Street songs directly into the ears for hours on end — are all in a day's work for Snowden?

Pretty strange coming from a guy who allegedly fled Hong Kong for fear of losing Internet, who's now growing "tired" of living in a Moscow airport's hotel.

- more -

http://www.businessinsider.com/snowden-declares-immunity-to-torture-2013-7

Gets more weird with each passing day.

Fugitive Edward Snowden applies for asylum in Russia
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023271629

Carl Bernstein: Greenwald 'out of line' (updated)
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023261520

[Enrique]

1. go get him!

spin! spin!

[randome]

2. But he compromises secrets voluntarily by giving it to media like Der Spiegel.

I wonder what kind of torture they employed.
[hr][font color="blue"][center]I'm always right. When I'm wrong I admit it.
So then I'm right about being wrong.[/center][/font][hr]

[Cha]

42. He didn't say anything about not accepting carrots did he? nm

[flamingdem]

3. He thinks he knows more than the Putin and gang about torture and coercion?

[ProSense]

5. First, Greenwald announces that he has enough information to bring down the U.S.

Snowden follows by declaring he's immune to torture.

He's applying for temporary asylum in Russia.

Doesn't get any more bizarre than that.

[Cha]

44. They're playing their own little "I'm a big fat fucking hero" game on

the internet. Starring greenwald and snowden! Or is it snowden and greenwald?

[Sheepshank]

49. Putin's requirement is that Snowden stop releasing docs/hurting the USA

And Snowden responds by telling the USA he has enough infor that nneded protecting vian unbreakable encryption and even safe from torture?

And still he is the hero looking out for the benefit of the nation? Why are people still buying that crap.

[Mojorabbit]

70. If he wants to leave Russia he has to apply for temp asylum

so he can get to an embassy of a place he would like to go. Nothing bizarre about it.

[FSogol]

21. "As Putin rears his head and comes into the air space of the United States of America, where do they

go? It's Snowden!"

[Waiting For Everyman]

4. He really upsets you, doesn't he?

That's too bad, you have my sympathy.

[ProSense]

6. I think my criticism of him "upsets" you.

I sorry!

LOL!

[Waiting For Everyman]

8. Nope, go for it, post a zillion more threads if you need to.

I find your little circus amusing.

[ProSense]

11. Thanks. n/t

[Robb]

7. He's like Paul Revere meets Jack Bauer.

[NoPasaran]

12. You win the internet today, sir!

[11 Bravo]

26. Dingbat my ass! Robb for the WIN!

[CakeGrrl]

50. With a thumb drive full o' tyranny

...or is it laptops full of liberty?

[Bobbie Jo]

57. With a touch of John Galt.

[BeyondGeography]

9. From the start, he has always managed to say something grave and self-important

whenever he makes a statement. Never fails.

[Cha]

46. Looks like greenwald and snowden go through the internet thesaurus

madly searching for scary propaganda words to pack their statements.

It would be hilarious if they weren't so petty and pathetic.

[Scurrilous]

10. He's like William Wallace meets Samsonite luggage. n/t

[11 Bravo]

30. Nathan Hale with frequent flier miles.

[struggle4progress]

13. Quit high school, took a few courses at various community colleges, worked as a security guard,

short incomplete military stint, possible IT stint in Geneva, worked at Dell, then a few months as an NSA contractor

Now he says "one of my specializations was to teach our people at DIA how to keep such information from being compromised even in the highest threat counter-intelligence environments"

It doesn't add up. I'm beginning to think he's something of a self-aggrandizing fabulist

[renie408]

15. Gee, YA THINK??

[snooper2]

19. But he is an expert HACKER!

So many people are making themselves look so stupid here-

[randome]

23. So talented he couldn't get anything to support his claims!

[hr][font color="blue"][center]I'm always right. When I'm wrong I admit it.
So then I'm right about being wrong.[/center][/font][hr]

[flamingdem]

36. Just in case, a backup plan

[tblue37]

43. If someone takes him up on it, will he pee on their shoes? nt

[BklnDem75]

52. LOL!

That's actually hilarious!

[Mojorabbit]

71. Don't forget to bring up Ron Paul. It will make the thread complete. nt

[noamnety]

35. I think he was working in this field for the intel community since 2007.

He started with the CIA in 2007. The dell gig was doing this work as a contractor for the NSA and I think that was years, not months.

[renie408]

14. Soooo...the longer this goes on, the less he looks like a freedom fighting genius and the more

he looks like an attention seeking idget.

"You may rest easy knowing I cannot be coerced into revealing that information, even under torture."

Oh, please. Give somebody a car battery and some nipple clamps and I would like to see how long he lasts.

Who SAYS stuff that stupid?

[Scurrilous]

20. Car battery and some nipple clamps?

This guy probably couldn't even handle Comfy Chair.

[renie408]

27. I was thinking of the first episode of Archer when I wrote that.

[Scurrilous]

45. I always think of Monty Python when I'm on DU.

Especially of late...

[Aerows]

51. Most disturbing avatar

ever.

[Scurrilous]

56. The full pic is much better:

Kyary Pamyu Pamyu's "Moshi Moshi Harajuku" wins 'Music Jacket Award 2012'

<snip>



"It's been revealed that Kyary Pamyu Pamyu's debut mini-album, "Moshi Moshi Harajuku", has received the grand prize for 'Music Jacket Award 2012'. This year's winners were chosen from music CDs released between April of 2011 and March of 2012.

The cover for "Moshi Moshi Harajuku" was done by Steve Nakamura, and it shows Kyary's unique style with a Kuchisake-onna-style (a woman with her mouth torn to her ears) paint make-up. On winning the award, Kyary expressed, "I'm very happy that my debut work received such an honored award!! When I make jacket covers, I not only make them cute, but I also think about making them fun and strange."

http://www.tokyohive.com/article/2012/10/kyary-pamyu-pamyus-moshi-moshi-harajuku-wins-music-jacket-award-2012/#disqus_thread


Her latest (it really kicks in at 3:12):

&list=FLwR6PWsAcHq0TXOltqiRYAw&index=6

[Aerows]

62. It looks like a half

Glasgow smile, which is very disturbing to me. I just cringe when I see it, and can't help it.

[Scurrilous]

64. Sorry about that.

I didn't mean to disturb anyone.

(just googled Glasgow smile...ugh!)

[Aerows]

65. Do you see why it freaks me out now?

Eww

[renie408]

16. Hey, I wonder how fast he can run a marathon and how many mountains he has climbed??

[FSogol]

18. and he can see Russia from his porch.........oh, nevermind.

[renie408]

29. Well, now he can for sure.

[FSogol]

17. Can he shoot eye beams at the CIA's Orbital Mind Control Lasers (OMCL)?

Pew, pew, pew...

[allin99]

24. :D. most awesome.

[quinnox]

22. he doesn't have to worry about it anyhow, because the US would never dream of torturing him, right?

So this is a non-issue.

[emulatorloo]

48. You lack reading comprehension. Snowden assures US Senator

that US Secrets are in safe hands from foreign powers &quot i. e. China)"

[Pretzel_Warrior]

25. This guy is such a joke

[pnwmom]

28. They don't use have to use torture in Russia to get info. Former agents who have been through it

say they use drugs. And that the drugs are accompanied by forgetfulness.

If this had happened to him, he wouldn't even know.

[flamingdem]

33. Maybe a side effect of that drug is self aggrandizing behavior!

And a sense of immortality.

[pnwmom]

38. He does appear to be a full blown narcissist. More and more over the top

in his proclamations.

[FarCenter]

31. Gordon Humphrey, Republican senator from NH, 1978-1990

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gordon_J._Humphrey

Originally a liberal, Humphrey said he converted to conservativsm because of "the force of my own logic".[1]

In 1977, Humphrey became the leader of the New Hampshire chapter of Conservative Caucus, which had been looking for someone to head it up for months.

In 1978 Humphrey won election to the U.S. Senate, despite being only a local Republican activist holding no political office. He defeated three-term incumbent Thomas J. McIntyre by barely two percent. He won election without help from the Republican Party and had few links to party regulars. Humphrey's 18-month campaign was run for the most part by himself and Patricia Green, a former New York City schoolteacher whom he married just after the four-way GOP primary that September. According to a New York Times article written a month after the election, she was "considered the strongest force in his camp and is expected to have a strong influence on his Washington staff."

In the Senate Humphrey served on the Committee on Foreign Relations, and the Armed Services Committee, and was a leader in the Congressional Task Force on Afghanistan, which shaped U.S. policy regarding the Soviet war in Afghanistan and Operation Cyclone. He voted against the federal budget all 12 years he was a member of the Senate, each time because the proposed budget ran a deficit.

Sort of a Rand Paul Tea Partier before his time?

[ProSense]

32. Extreme Anti-Choice Activist Gordon Humphrey Supports Ovide Lamontagne for Governor

Extreme Anti-Choice Activist Gordon Humphrey Supports Ovide Lamontagne for Governor

By cgately on July 9, 2012in Uncategorized

Will Ovide Now Come Clean About His Anti-Choice Agenda?

CONCORD - Ovide Lamontagne should come clean about his anti-choice agenda as he accepts the endorsement of extreme anti-choice activist former U.S. Senator Gordon Humphrey, New Hampshire Democratic Party officials said today.

“Ovide Lamontagne supports an amendment to the constitution that would make abortion a crime in all cases, including rape and incest, and that would even criminalize some forms of birth control and fertility treatments,” said Collin Gately, spokesman for the New Hampshire Democratic Party. “But he has been trying to hide his extreme agenda, refusing to say where he stands on important issues like funding Planned Parenthood. It’s time for Ovide Lamontagne to be clear with the people of New Hampshire about his anti-choice views, and what those views would mean to their lives.”

As a U.S. Senator, Humphrey supported efforts to de-fund Planned Parenthood, even going against officials in the Reagan administration to further the effort. Humphrey even backed Operation Rescue Founder Randall Terry in his congressional campaign.

Humphrey said that he was endorsing Lamontagne because of his stand on “liberty and freedom.”

“The women of New Hampshire have the right to know that Ovide Lamontagne’s agenda includes taking away their freedom and liberty to make their own health care choices,” Gately said. “Ovide Lamontagne should be honest about his views, starting with telling people where he stands on defunding Planned Parenthood.”

http://nhdp.org/blog/2012/07/09/extreme-anti-choice-activist-gordon-humphrey-supports-ovide-lamontagne-for-governor/

What a guy!

[FarCenter]

37. He was co-chair of the Congressional Task Force on Afghanistan, and Reagan's point person

He appears to have been enthusiastic about the CIA and covert operations in Afghanistan and then soured on US policy during the Soviet withdrawal, since we did not continue to support the mujahideen groups, (presumably including Bin Laden?).

[bunnies]

40. He also calls affirmative action "reverse discrimination"

By a 6-3 vote, the justices said a 1964 civil rights law banning on-the-job discrimination allows such preferential treatment.

Sen. Gordon Humphrey, R-N.H., was disturbed by the ruling.

"I'm very much opposed to these affirmative action quotas," he said. "They are, in plain English, reverse discrimination, and two wrongs dont make a right. I thinkk the Supreme Court has been wrong in up-holding affirmative actions"

http://news.google.com/newspapers?id=VU9KAAAAIBAJ&sjid=zJMMAAAAIBAJ&pg=6725%2C8741959

Yep. He's a real gem.

[Rex]

34. Who knew he was Superman!

I hear he too is torture proof!

[AtomicKitten]

39. I think Terry Gilliam should direct the movie.

It's going to be epic.

[burnodo]

41. HAHAHA A snarky flamefest from "business insider" does a fact-free depiction of what Snowden is doin

You authoritarian types really like to push that envelope, dont you? I suppose Obama's hagiography of Bush Sr. gave you the gumption to use Republican-think as a basis for your point-of-view.

[ProSense]

47. Yeah,

"HAHAHA A snarky flamefest from "business insider" does a fact-free depiction of what Snowden is doin

You authoritarian types really like to push that envelope, dont you? "

...hahahaha: Edward Snowden, International Man of Delusional History.

Lied is way to being trapped in Russia.

[Number23]

53. Did you see this Washington Post article a few days ago?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/she-the-people/wp/2013/07/15/what-should-edward-im-a-brave-martyr-but-i-wanna-go-home-snowden-do-now/

Etrella Berosini grew up in a family of longtime Eastern European circus performers. Magicianship and high-wire walking (the latter, her father’s specialty, and her own were learned from childhood). “Circus folks were among the few who could travel freely in old Europe,” she says.The best ploy was a circus trick that some Nazis stole, to sneak out of Germany: She suggests that Snowden “buy a trained bear and a flashy costume. When you’ve got a bear on a leash, no one looks at your face.”

[noamnety]

54. Is it your belief that torture usually works? (nt)

[emulatorloo]

59. Cool non sequitur (nt)

[noamnety]

69. I don't see it that way.

Prosense seems convinced that Snowden would give up info if he was tortured.
This despite all the evidence that torture has been remarkably ineffective historically.

So I'm thinking Prosense has some inside information about torture that the rest of us missed.

[emulatorloo]

73. Ok

Personally, I think you are making a pretty big (il)logical leap.

[Apophis]

55. What is this, like your 3rd OP about Snowden today?

Yawn.

[ProSense]

58. Counting OPs, huh?

No wonder you're yawning.

[sadbear]

60. I'm beginning to wonder if this is all a bluff.

Seriously.

[Cronus Protagonist]

61. I think a lot of people are making uneducated assumptions here

If he has no knowledge and therefore no memory of the keys used to encrypt the information, torture cannot succeed if the intent is to gain access to encrypted information and not just to punish him (like it was used by the US in Abu Graib).

It seems to me that most people here appear to be under the assumption that he has something stored in his mind that would be worth torturing him for, when clearly he is indicating otherwise. You could drug him until he acts like a baboon but if the information isn't there, it won't work.

He knew when he started this that torture might be applied, so he likely built his encryption around super long public/private digital keys and gave some of the files to some people, some keys to others and some matching keys to another trusted party.

Of course, he cannot remember the keys contents, they being long and cryptic themselves, but he can have stuff unlocked at his command by a third party who has one or more of the keys. If the keys were distributed well, he would be able to get each portion of his bounty unlocked upon request simply by asking one friend to send the key to another party who has the encrypted file.

So all they could get out of him is the names of the parties who have the files and the keys, and these parties could be scattered around the world and simply be known under their hacker names to him. He may not even know what country these people are in, never mind who they really are or their addresses.

So they could get some email addresses out of him. Then what? As soon as it became evident that they had tortured the information out of him, all parties might send their keys to certain locations which they already know, and which Snowden does not know. The whole thing gets unlocked and all data is dumped for public viewing. He has already indicated that he is assassination proof for that very reason. All this talk about him being a lowly idiot employee is propaganda, remember.

Anyway, in this scenario he's torture proof because if they torture him and try to act upon anything they uncover, they might trigger the total act of clarity, which is surely something the people doing the torturing won't want to happen, ergo, they won't torture him. Or kill him.

He knows nothing worth torturing for and killing him would release all his info at once. I don't doubt it for one minute.

[stupidicus]

63. my thoughts exactly

thanks for saving me the time and text investment.

You apparently have to be SDS-free to understand what he was saying, as opposed to reading it as a claim to having some immunity to torture.

[RedCappedBandit]

72. Seemed clear to me that's how he meant it.

[shawn703]

66. What would be interesting

Is if Snowden fell for the old "honeypot" trick. He seems like the type of nincompoop that would. Have any of the supposed targets ever verified that they've seen evidence of NSA spying?

[Life Long Dem]

67. A zero, a rat, and more

[TampaAnimusVortex]

68. I find it more likely that the NSA/CIA released that pretending to be Snowden...

I think it's fairly obvious that a corrupt set of intelligence agencies with a history of lying and hiding the truth about how their spying on the populous would falsely release fake data pretending to be Snowden in a smear campaign.

But hey, that's me... I'm not one just to believe stuff simply because the Guardian told me to.