The 13 Most Bizarre Things From Edward Snowden's NBC News Interview

[babylonsister]

Bob Cesca
Managing Editor for The Daily Banter, Host of The Bob & Chez Show

The 13 Most Bizarre Things From Edward Snowden's NBC News Interview
Posted: 05/31/2014 3:53 pm EDT Updated: 1 hour ago


While watching Brian Williams' interview with Ed Snowden, I actually agreed with Glenn Greenwald about something. Back in 2012, Greenwald referred to Williams as "NBC News' top hagiographer," using "his reverent, soothing, self-important baritone" to deliver information in its "purest, most propagandistic and most subservient form."

It's worth noting at the outset that Greenwald flew all the way to Moscow specifically for the NBC News interview, and he appeared on camera with Snowden and Williams, answering questions from this so-called "hagiographer."

Now, I'm not a Brian Williams hater. I think he's a fine news anchor. But his interview with Ed Snowden was yet another in a long, long line of deferential, uninformed, unchallenging genuflections before a guy whose story and motivations are more than a little specious. But it's not a stretch to presume that Greenwald, the man who once aimed all of his wordy, caustic vitriol in Williams' general direction, referring to him as possessing "child-like excitement" over gaining access to a source, probably loved every minute of it. However, don't break out the champagne just yet, NBC News, Greenwald will immediately shift gears sometime very soon and continue to indict any and all mainstream news outlets, including NBC, as being impotent, pernicious, drooling shills for President Obama and the D.C. elite.

So what about the telecast itself? Here are the 13 most bizarre things from Snowden's NBC News interview.

1) Snowden claimed he has "no relationship" with the Russian government and that he's "not supported" by it. That's odd, given how the Russian government has twice offered him asylum and one of his lawyers, Anatoly Kucherena, is an attorney with the Russian intelligence agency, the FSB (formerly the KGB). Tell me again why anyone should trust this guy?

2) "Sometimes to do the right thing you have to break a law." So it's really up to each of us individually to decide whether our own interpretation of "doing the right thing" necessitates breaking the law? A lot of awful things have occurred with that exact justification. Also, what if NSA feels the same way, Ed?

3) Snowden said that no one has been harmed by his disclosures. Yet. Already, though, one of his documents escalated tensions between Australia and Indonesia, and another document endangered lives in Afghanistan to the point where Greenwald refused to publish the name of that country. It's only a matter of time, sadly.

4) Early on, Snowden said, "I'm not a spy." Later he famously confessed to being "trained as a spy." Huh?

more...

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/bob-cesca/edward-snowden-bizarre-interview_b_5421572.html

[MannyGoldstein]

1. America's Founders should have been tortured,

then imprisoned for decades?

Numbers 1, 3 and 4 are equally silly. Didn't click the link for the others.

Snowden's revelations were staggering. Now we need to act on them.

[LeftyMom]

2. Good lord, does anybody find that persuasive?

I realize all it takes to write for the SideboobPost is a pulse, but that's stupid even by their standards.

[grasswire]

3. already posted

...and Cesca already discredited weeks ago.

[babylonsister]

4. He was discredited for his opinion?

You know what they say about those.