Edward Snowden Statement

What has happened to our country?  Our freedom of speech is gone, with Americans fearful, for example, of losing their jobs over holding certain views, now under attack.  People of faith are now called "hate" and we have left definition for a by-gone era, leaving no landmark from which to measure. 

The Internal Revenue Service deliberately targets those of certain political or religious persuasion, to the very point of gaining access to medical records of United States citizens, once held sacred between doctor and patient, to use as arm twisting black mail, the release of sensitive or embarrassing information.  

We are very much like the Germany of the early 1930's, even if we have forgotten school children being taught to chant the president's name.  The right to bear arms, to resist tyranny, has been eroded to the point where it is about to end. 

Drones, and spying on our own citizens, even as our welfare system continues to grow and grow, without check or discrimination, and control is given to the government, now over our health and personal social security.  

We have major news networks willing to photoshop pictures in order to suit their philosophy or political belief, and when caught, suffer no consequence from the gullible, under-educated public. 

Some believe that Edward Snowden is a hero for showing the world our devious spying, while others consider him a traitor. 

Who do you trust?  

Best to listen, for yourself, and decide what you believe, from the words spoken, through the lens of Statement Analysis. 

I let readership analyze this statement first.  

What do you see in it?

"One week ago I left Hong Kong after it became clear that my freedom and safety were under threat for revealing the truth. My continued liberty has been owed to the efforts of friends new and old, family, and others who I have never met and probably never will. I trusted them with my life and they returned that trust with a faith in me for which I will always be thankful.

On Thursday, President Obama declared before the world that he would not permit any diplomatic "wheeling and dealing" over my case. Yet now it is being reported that after promising not to do so, the President ordered his Vice President to pressure the leaders of nations from which I have requested protection to deny my asylum petitions.

This kind of deception from a world leader is not justice, and neither is the extralegal penalty of exile. These are the old, bad tools of political aggression. Their purpose is to frighten, not me, but those who would come after me.

For decades the United States of America has been one of the strongest defenders of the human right to seek asylum. Sadly, this right, laid out and voted for by the U.S. in Article 14 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, is now being rejected by the current government of my country. The Obama administration has now adopted the strategy of using citizenship as a weapon. Although I am convicted of nothing, it has unilaterally revoked my passport, leaving me a stateless person. Without any judicial order, the administration now seeks to stop me exercising a basic right. A right that belongs to everybody. The right to seek asylum.

In the end the Obama administration is not afraid of whistleblowers like me, Bradley Manning or Thomas Drake. We are stateless, imprisoned, or powerless. No, the Obama administration is afraid of you. It is afraid of an informed, angry public demanding the constitutional government it was promised — and it should be.

I am unbowed in my convictions and impressed at the efforts taken by so many."

Edward Joseph Snowden

Monday 1st July 2013