re: #28 iossarian

My position on this has always been that we’re currently in the unfortunate position of needing people like Snowden and Greenwald, whatever their flaws, in order to achieve this (the “going over with a fine tooth comb and made better” thing).

It would be better if there were an effective oversight function being performed by our elected government *without* the actions of such people being necessary, but my take there is that the political process is so screwed up right now (with plenty of blame to share around but most of it going to Republicans) that we just don’t have that luxury.

I think Greenwald and Snowden have made that effort more difficult with their actions. They distract from what the true discussion would be about with their grandstanding. And they’ve polarized the camps further and made the discussion harder to have without the whole “patriotism”, “traitor”, etc. etc. crap coming out.