"I'm not going to be scrambling jets to get a 29-year-old hacker."
Thus said President Obama on Edward Snowden. That's what Mao Zedong said when told that Defense Minister Lin Biao was fleeing to the Soviet Union in a plane. Mao refused suggestions to shoot down Lin's plane (it crashed in Mongolia.). Whatever "damage" Edward Snowden did to national security, that horse is out of the barn and the door closed. The political damage to the administration, the embarrassment at the hands of the Russians and Chinese, will be minimized if the president's nonchalance becomes his administration's policy. It has not been so far. Instead, Kerry, Holder, Feinstein, Carney, have gone nuts: "traitor," "treason," "espionage." Ladies and gentlemen, whatever you think of Edward Snowden's actions, prosecutors are NOT going to be able to prove beyond a reasonable doubt the legal charge they filed against him, espionage.
Administration spokespersons also have gone nuts on the Chinese and Russians over this. Turn it around: If Edward Snowden were a Chinese or Russian national and he had done the identical things and had then fled to America, would the US have extradited him to China? To Russia, with whom the US has no extradition treaty? Are you kidding me, there would be ticker tape parades for him here. By charging Snowden with espionage Holder was asking the Chinese to do the following: extradite an American for spying on behalf of China. The Chinese are going to do that? No. The Americans would do that? No.
The political damage that the Obama administration has suffered thus far could have been avoided entirely if the president had stuck with his instincts, "Let him go," the political lesson of Mao Zedong In the Lin Biao Affair.
Administration spokespersons also have gone nuts on the Chinese and Russians over this. Turn it around: If Edward Snowden were a Chinese or Russian national and he had done the identical things and had then fled to America, would the US have extradited him to China? To Russia, with whom the US has no extradition treaty? Are you kidding me, there would be ticker tape parades for him here. By charging Snowden with espionage Holder was asking the Chinese to do the following: extradite an American for spying on behalf of China. The Chinese are going to do that? No. The Americans would do that? No.
The political damage that the Obama administration has suffered thus far could have been avoided entirely if the president had stuck with his instincts, "Let him go," the political lesson of Mao Zedong In the Lin Biao Affair.
