If you were going to make the USA your biggest enemy, shhhurely you’d plan your travel arrangements a little better? One way ticket to Mars anyone?
Edward Snowden’s grand whistleblowing revelations have not saved lives and were not super urgent so why did he not fly to a safe country before making his announcements? He could then skip along to the respective embassy that he would apply for asylum and hey presto, relief and a new start while the USA initiated life-long legal proceedings for extradition.
Whilst Edward Snowden’s revelations have initiated an important debate about privacy, spying and freedom of speech his actions do sit uncomfortably with me. On the one hand the revelations show how little control we have over our privacy and how the English language can be abused by determined politicians and civil servants to reach and justify their means. The revelations also demonstrate the Special Friendship that Britain and the USA always claim to have: if you scratch our back, we’ll scratch yours.
The latest set of revelations about the USA spying on their European allies seem more in the vein of Wikileaks revelations from diplomats and not as crucial to the debate around privacy of individuals. To me it just sounds like desperate nations trying to gain a competitive edge over one another. Shocking yes but worth losing your future over? Naaaahhhh.
Incidentally, Latin American countries are being touted as the most obvious choice for Edward Snowden’s final destination and their leftie governments are winning brownie points from other lefties. Can I just point out that while I don’t know about Ecuador and Venezuela in particular, Latin America played safe haven to dozens of disgusting Nazi war criminals. Some of these very high ranking war criminals (many of whom were personally responsible for millions of deaths) were aided in their safe passage to Latin America from Germany by the Vatican no less so perhaps Snowden should consider applying for the Pope’s assistance since human rights records seem to be of no concern to him when seeking asylum.
Bubbly
The Chatterjis Blog 
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