Remember when Glenn Greenwald flew into a rage yesterday and claimed Edward Snowden’s obsequious open letter to Brazil had nothing to do with asylum, and the entire media establishment was “distorting” it?

Oddly enough, the Brazilian government seems to think the letter did have something to do with begging for asylum, and officials told a Brazilian newspaper today that Brazil Will Not Grant Snowden Asylum. Oops.

More than that, however, these officials also made it clear Brazil won’t be taking up Snowden on his offer to help “investigate US crimes.”

BRASILIA (Reuters) - Brazil has no plans to grant asylum to Edward Snowden even after the former U.S. National Security Agency contractor offered on Tuesday to help investigate revelations of spying on Brazilians and their president, a local newspaper reported.

The Folha de S.Paulo newspaper, citing unnamed government officials, said the Brazilian government has no interest in investigating the mass Internet surveillance programs Snowden revealed in June and does not intend to give him asylum.

In an “Open Letter to the Brazilian People” published by Folha and social media, Snowden offered to help a congressional probe into NSA spying on the country, including the personal communications of President Dilma Rousseff.

The cynic in me wonders if the reason Brazil is “not interested” in investigating NSA mass surveillance is because it would end up revealing their own mass surveillance programs. Much safer to pretend outrage in public and keep their own domestic spying on the down low.