re: #169 Rev_Arthur_Belling

I’m late to the party tonight because I had shit to do today, but to answer your question: I want GG to answer when he knew Snowden was accessing government materials and was he aiding him before he began working for the NSA contractor. If so, GG has slipped out of the land of “journalist” protected by the First Amendment (admittedly a gray area on the issue of national security) and into the land of accomplice to some serious criminal activity.

Yes, I understand that you want that. What I haven’t seen so far is a compelling argument for what trying to force him to say “when he knew” actually gains us as a nation?

Like you said, at best it’s a gray area. I’m dubious in the extreme that Greenwald is just going to admit to criminal collusion or of being any kind of significant co-conspirator to Snowden’s actions before the fact. Let’s say Snowden told him explicitly what he was going to do, did Greenwald have some kind of enforceable legal obligation to inform the authorities? His profession isn’t licensed like psychologists are, so he’d just be another guy with suspicions about some dude he hadn’t even met face to face with yet.

No, hounding him would only serve to give substance to his otherwise bullshit argument that the United States government unfairly violates the civil rights of journalists and restricts the freedom of the press. It’s basically the most counter-productive move imaginable in this situation.