Not everyone agrees. TPM Reader SR offers his own perspective on the Snowden Prism and sub-prisms …
I haven’t detected the supposed excessive “snarkiness” of your coverage of Snowden others apparently have, at least, it hasn’t been any snarkier than the coverage of many other figures, including Obama. And certainly not by comparison to my comments about him.
But the thing that’s driving a lot of my snark is the pervasive left wing truthiness that has followed the man on his flight.
Another longtime TPM Reader, DG, questions the tone of my writing on Snowden …
I am a long time reader of TPM, an early joiner to TPM Prime, and a huge admirer of your work and TPM Media, which I recommend to all my friends for its excellent coverage and analysis of American politics. When I returned from a recent family vacation in Yosemite I used the Livewire to catch up on news. It’s the first site I read every day after the daily paper and my go to for short breaks in between work.
I am sure I am not the first long-time reader and fan to make note of my displeasure with TPM’s coverage of the Snowden case. I agree that to say “you have a problem with Snowden because he’s a punk” is a caricature of your position, and I think you’ve written quite eloquently about Snowden in the context of your belief in the necessity of military secrecy. Still, I get why JO thought to describe your position that way – there’s a snarkyness in the editorial tone to TPM that conveys certain disgust with the person beyond a disagreement over the efficacy of his actions and the extent to which we should or should not tolerate government secrecy. Personally, I find the mocking tone towards Snowden off-putting. And I write that as someone who is not a huge fan of the man himself – the kind of knee-jerk libertarianism he seems to represent does not appeal to me.
TPM Reader JO says he buys Ellsberg’s argument about the different country we’re living in today …
Ellsberg says “The country I stayed in was a different America, a long time ago” and you ask what that means.
Ellsberg points out that Snowden would get the full Manning treatment. I buy that. If Snowden had been sitting in any Holiday Inn in the USA instead of in Hong Kong, do you have any doubt that he would now be under the control of federal authorities, and unable to move or communicate?
Need a primer on just what’s happened over the last 10 days in Egypt. Broken down day by day. Here it is.
Longtime TPM Reader JL tries a hypothetical with himelf. What would Rand Paul have to do, have to propose to get him to abandon the Democratic candidate in 2016?
I’m just one person and this is about just one moment in time but …
Yesterday, reading the NYT article on FISA Court, I found myself thinking, if Rand Paul were to make GWOT reform the, or at least a, centerpiece of his campaign … and if he were to get the nomination … what would he have to include, and perhaps more importantly exclude or downplay, to get me to vote for him over Hillary, assuming Hillary runs and defends the GWOT status quo.
Three year old accidentally shoots himself in the head with an unattended hangun. The boy died.
Whatever the facts turn out to be on who fired the first shots, the embattled and deposed Muslim Brotherhood now has its martyrs. Latest report list at least 51 killed in a clash between the Egyptian Army and Brotherhood protestors camped outside the military barracks where Morsi is apparently being held. More details on each side’s account of what happened here.
A major insurer of schools has declined to continue offering coverage to Kansas schools after passage of a new state law allowing teachers and staff to carry concealed firearms on campus.
The company, EMC Insurance Cos currently covers between 85% and 90% of Kansas school districts.
Egypt’s top cleric, who stood beside top general announcing Morsi overthrow, goes into seclusion, warns of civil war.
Not everyone happy about “White History Month” parade float in North Carolina town.