On PRISM, partisanship and propaganda

Actually, I think the bits you quote exactly show how Greenwald isn't demonstrating a very high standard of integrity here. I really want to take him seriously (although, in honesty, I also really want to believe that my employer, Google, is ethical), but even in the small bit you quoted, there are two major mistakes that completely change the story.

First, the NYT article that Greenwald links, by Claire Cain Miller, does make that claim (that Yahoo resisted joining Prism). However, it gives zero evidence, and in fact accidentally gives evidence against the thesis. As their evidence that Yahoo fought against Prism, they cite a court report that doesn't talk about Prism at all. It talks about Yahoo fighting FISA orders. (I didn't read every word, but I can manage a text-search. And while the docs never mention the Prism program (admittedly there are many many redactions), it does use the word "prism" in an innocent context. Would you let that slide, if you were redacting a document about a secret program called Prism?) As far as I know, nine out of nine accused companies agree that they comply with FISA orders if they receive any, and yes that presumably includes complying with the gag orders. On the other hand, while we're on the subject of those orders, several of the companies have publically stated that they fight to limit the scope of those orders, often refusing to fulfill requests until they're clarified or narrowed (or until a judge says "yes, really, do it like I said the first time").

It's kind of amazing that Greenwald turns such actions, protective on behalf of users, into an accusation of hypocrisy.

Second, far less important but still evidence of Greenwald's modest commitment to getting the details right... I have yet to see a statement by any of the nine companies that "Prism" is "a dropbox". I've read articles by reporters saying that insiders said that. Meanwhile, several of the companies, including Google, have publicly said that there is no such dropbox, and that information is delivered by various means, including SFTP and courier. (I admit, I liked the dropbox/work-tracker theory. Oh well.)

I would really like Greenwald's core goal, of focusing the public ire on getting some light shed on surveillance, and surveillance policy. I think there's a lot of good to be done there. But this article is just crammed full of dodgy claims. In fact, now that I've gotten started, let me pick a few more of them apart.

In the section marked (3), he says that Drake wrote that he (Drake) saw all the same things at the NSA that Snowden is writing about. Read the source. Drake very obviously means that at a very high level; Drake saw stuff that seemed unethical, Snowden saw stuff that seemed unethical. And then he says that Binney said that Snowden's claims are absolutely true. Watch the video or read the transcript, that's not what Binney says. Binney says that he believes Snowden (which is interesting, true, but not the same). Regarding Prism specifically, Binney spends most of his time talking about something else (wiretapping fibreoptics), and then ends with something equivalent to "but I bet they'd like to have access to more data, more directly" (paraphrasing mine, emphasis mine, read it for yourself). Seriously, that is some seriously deceptive writing by Greenwald.

Small quibble: I note that he says they didn't allege the Prism accusations, but rather claimed that they had a document claiming these things, and cites his own headline. I think he's insane. When a headline says "NSA program taps into user data of Apple, Google, others", that sure sounds to me like the headline is claiming that it's true. I guess this kind of weaseling is what it's like to be a yellow journalist.

Further down he references Elias Groll's week-old article about "spin", extensively quoting Chris Soghoian. I'm not a big fan of that article, but the day it was published, it wasn't obviously full of nonsense. It claims that the wording of various public statements was very legalistically chosen to be technically true but give the wrong impression. I disagree, but respectfully. But by the time Greenwald references that article a week later, every one of the claims made in that article have been debunked, in the sense that executives (in Google's case, that means Larry Page and David Drummond) have clarified and said "no no, we weren't weaselling... no access at all... you asked us about direct access, we answered about that, but there's no access of ANY kind, and we don't do sweeping surveillance, and we always have a lawyer in the loop, and so on and so on". I mean, they could be lying. But Groll's claim that they're weaseling is obviously false, at this point. Why, then, does Greenwald reference Groll's now-disproven article? Oh, right, demagoguery.

He next quotes an NYT piece on "secret meetings", but read the piece, you'll see that it's a combination of "the government WANTS crazy access" (which I believe), and "MAYBE SiVa gave up the goods!!" speculation (which is... well, wild speculation).

Then he brings up Perlstein, and calls him a liar. Read Perlstein's piece (linked), and Perlstain's "Response to Glenn Greenwald" (not linked), and you'll see that Perlstein's right: Greenwald hasn't answered the point that Perlstein thinks is critical. And Greenwald gives an interview on MSNBC as an example of him answering the points, and he's crazy, he doesn't answer the points at all (though Greenwald does, overall, make a very good showing in that interview, IMO). Perlstein's specific point is a (totally technically-correct) nit-pick about the word "servers" (the only discussion of this in the MSNBC interview involves Greenwald saying, in effect, "I have no idea if it's true, I'm just telling you what I was told"). Perlstein's broader claim, btw, is somewhat similar to my own here, which is that Greenwald is combining good reporting with sometimes-very-sloppy reasoning, and that it's sabotaging his own credibility, and he should get it right.

And finally, in Update 1, is the bit you quoted, possibly the worst reasoning in the piece.

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The thing is, there's a lot of good stuff in this article. It starts with a totally excellent reference to reporting on Loretta Sanchez's on-the-record remarks, which the public should hear about. And it's worth reminding people, as he does, that Wyden and Udall were yelling over a year ago, perhaps on this very topic (since they were vague, it's hard to be sure). I agree with him that this shit should make you think twice about partisan politics. And I agree that the meta-secrecy, blocking the EFF/ACLU/etc from even knowing about court rulings that may or may not rule the secrecy legal, are mind-boggling and very very hard to see in a positive light. (Tho I do take writings from the EFF with a grain of salt, much as I love them overall).

Moreover, Greenwald overall puts his focus where it should be: on the government. I mean, if he's right about all this complicit bullshit from tech companies, some focus is due there too, but it's minor by comparison. The real issue is government, and Greenwald agrees.

Goddammit, Greenwald, you're right about so much. Get your fucking act together on the last 20%, man!

Fascism has a particular meaning that most people misuse. While presidents like FDR took a lot of inspiration from the fascists, it's tough to say that the US is authentically fascistic. First of all, it's mistaken to proclaim that a government is something that it claims that it's not. Second, the US is too pluralistic in terms of policy towards culture to be considered fascist.

You can say that a system is bad or dysfunctional without likening it to the Italian and German/Austrian governments under Mussolini and Hitler. If you read Mussolini's speeches + books or Hitler's books + speeches (not that they're terribly interesting except as historical documents), you learn that most people using 'fascist' as a pejorative don't really understand what it means.

The US is just as it claims it is: a democracy. There are good reasons as to why thinkers ranging from the founding fathers of the US to Aristotle were skeptical about the long term viability of democracy as a system of government. All these brutal, freedom-sacrificing policies are absolutely necessary to maintain democratic government. This is something most modern Westerners are unwilling to acknowledge. Spooks in the NSA and elsewhere at least comprehend that what they do is necessary to maintain their government, as reprehensible as their actions are.

What do you get when you give 300m+ people political power? The same disaster that many of the founders predicted would happen: tyranny, social dissolution, and foul policies motivated by envy.

Exactly. This is the kind of thing that completely undermines the free market.

And particularly detrimental to our economy, is not only PRISM - but any secret deal carried out between a corporation & a government agency.

Google has had secret deals with the NSA for years [1] the scope of this relationship is now being revealed, but I'd also love to know if and exactly how much money has been transacted between these two 'partners'. Even if it's $1 that transaction signifies Google's participation in undermining the free market. Because how do we know that the NSA isn't funneling money to Google? If the deals are secret, we have to assume the worst.

Best case scenario there is no money changing hands. Worst case scenario, Google is being funded by the NSA to A) carry out tactics & strategies on behalf of the NSA and B) to gain market-share and competitive advantage so these operations can perpetuate. Highly immoral, deceptive, and completely unfair to any business, startup entrepreneur, or hacker trying to make a living in this industry.

[1] http://www.pcworld.com/article/217550/google_watchdog_white_...