Edward Snowden’s Dad Brands Obama ‘Orwellian’
NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden
Lon Snowden, the father of NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden has published an open letter to President Obama in which he quotes iconic 19th century philosopher and libertarian Henry David Thoreau to explain his son’s actions.
Dear Mr. President:
You are acutely aware that the history of liberty is a history of civil disobedience to unjust laws or practices. As Edmund Burke sermonized, “All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing” says the letter (written by constitutional lawyer Bruce Fein).
“Thoreau’s moral philosophy found expression during the Nuremburg trials in which “following orders” was rejected as a defense. Indeed, military law requires disobedience to clearly illegal orders,” the letter continues, going on to note ‘civil disobedience to the Fugitive Slave Act and Jim Crow laws provoked the end of slavery and the modern civil rights revolution.’
“From the commencement of your administration, your secrecy of the National Security Agency’s Orwellian surveillance programs had frustrated a national conversation over their legality, necessity, or morality,” Mr Snowden concludes.
“That secrecy (combined with congressional nonfeasance) provoked Edward’s disclosures, which sparked a national conversation which you have belatedly and cynically embraced.” (link to letter in full: http://on-msn.com/148Fumk )
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