Sometimes, very rarely I grant you, it is not a Sun headline but a front-page in the Guardian-my breakfast newspaper of choice-that makes me almost choke on my corn flakes.
The Guardian is unsurprisingly on a roll having first broken the story that has been subsequently covered widely by the media internationally , and stirred a political debate on both sides of the Atlantic. But while this story has , as they put in hack parlance ‘legs’, the direction of it seems somewhat one-sided thus far.
Today’s Guardian devotes most of its front page to boldly quoting Daniel Ellsberg’s view that there has not been in American history a more important leak than Edward Snowden’s release of National Security material. “The so-called intelligence community has become the United Stasi of America,” Ellsberg tells us.
Such hyperbole not only paints a false analogy between a western democracy and a Soviet satellite state,it is, to say the least, somewhat ill-timed coming as it does in a week when the commemoration of the D-Day landings remind us how secret intelligence based on surveillance techniques shared by the Allies contributed to defeating Nazism.
But it does sum up the central argument behind Snowden’s elevation to hero status, that the US intelligence community has become the 21st century’s criminal fraternity, and that what this ‘whistleblower’ has done has been to the overwhelming benefit of the civilised world and democracy.
Frankly while I can see why there are people out there who want to make a fuss about the US surveillance practices, I neither share in their anxiety or sense of outrage. Surely the fact that both the US and UK intelligence agencies take social networks extremely seriously and feel it necessary to follow, secretly, those who might misuse the information highway for criminal ends should not surprise us. I mean what do we expect them to focus their gizmos on in the second decade of the 21st century- carrier pigeons?
Let’s be clear. There are crazy people out there- from child violators to terrorists- who need monitoring, and catching before they do further damage by carrying out what they are plotting. Those of us who try and lead peaceful lives, within the law, have nothing to fear other than their own security being compromised. If I feel less safe today, it is because of Snowden not the spies.
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