Thread by @toholdaquill

THREAD — So many remarkable passages in #PermanentRecord. Here’s what stood out to me. 1/

https://twitter.com/toholdaquill/status/1178120913012842497

The ideals of the so-called “Inteligence Community” are to subvert our democracy, destroy our freedom, and to rule us in secret. There was never a golden age when the “IC” was anything other than state-sponsored criminals and terrorists who deserve to stand trial at The Hague. 2/

Technological illiteracy creates a technocracy—those who grok rule those who don’t. Combine with a lack of right to repair laws, and you have a recipe for “technological tyranny.” 3/

Just a game? Sounds like a pretty accurate description of the so-called IC’s ambitions to me. Remember this exposé in The Chronicle of Higher Education?

chronicle.com/article/How-Io…

4/

The so-called IC recruits sociopaths and cultivates their sociopathy. 5/

Somehow @Snowden manages to avoid using the obvious phrase that hangs in the air, unspoken: “secret police.” 6/

This sounds like racketeering to me. “Gee, sure would be a shame if something...happened to your democracy.” 7/

Ed, you silly goose. The CIA doesn’t kill people. You must be a crazed conspiracy theorist to think that. 8/

@snowden name checks Van Eck phreaking. I believe the FBI and some police departments are using TEMPEST attacks domestically. We busted them for using Stingrays, now it’s time to bust them for TEMPEST attacks. 9/

Never let it be said that Edward @Snowden doesn’t have a sense of humor. 10/

Think like an attacker: Why would the CIA run executive job search agencies? To covertly influence who leads America’s biggest corporations. 11/

I’ve been working in IT (and security) since 2002. Technologists have been screaming about mass surveillance for decades. Nobody listened. Even today muggles think the facts are an exaggeration. 12/

This may be the most important passage in the whole book. I’ve been saying this for years: the possible is the necessary. Imagine the most evil thing the so-called IC could be doing, and I guarantee you they are doing it. Investigate *that*. 13/

Folks have criticized me for calling NSA the secret police. But what do secret police do? They police in secret. Q.E.D. 14/

Whose job is it to demand that law catch up with technology? Journalists, that’s who. 15/

Knowledge is power. — Francis Bacon
Power corrupts. — Lord Acton
If you build it, they will come. — Kevin Costner
16/

So much sympathy. I moved back to the US last year after nineteen years abroad. I can’t even. 17/

Conform. Obey. Be silent. Or else. 18/

I am regularly appalled at US journalists who show no solidarity with their colleagues overseas. Either we are all of us free and secure, or we are none of us free and secure. 19/

To put it bluntly: The American secret police have seized power in a silent coup. 20/

Not just the Middle East. I reported from Colombia for four years. Death squads routinely murder journalists, dissidents, and union organizers. CIA works closely with partners in country. (Reading this, got docs? Leak to me!) 21/

um.
*checks watch*
*logs out*
22/

sudden thought mid-thread:

@Snowden’s signature phrase, “turnkey tyranny,” is absent from #PermanentRecord. Why?

Parallel construction—one of the worst abuses of our civil rights—doesn’t get mentioned at all. Why not? /23

Speculation: @Snowden *really* wants to come home, and he’s pulling his punches as a sop to the “IC”. /24

Are the CIA spying on—and interfering with—American journalists inside the US? sounds like it, per @Snowden /25

hey Ed? If this is true, you have the power to free us all.

What’s the point of coming home, otherwise?

So you can spend the rest of your life as a member of the cast iron club?

That’s hell on earth.

Do something before it’s too late.

@Snowden
/26

We no longer live in a free country. /27

Or whoever holds a gun to the head of the key holder. /28

In 2013 you’d have had to recompile modified gnupg source to use an 8192-bit key, I believe. /29

The “IC” can no more be reformed than the mafia (who they resemble in many respects). /30

@Snowden is happy to call out the euphemism “extraordinary rendition” (in reality: kidnapping) but reluctant to debunk the most obvious of euphemisms, “intelligence community” (in reality: the secret police). /31

It’s true, awareness is not enough, and #PermanentRecord, as good (if flawed) a book as it is, is also not enough.

What will you *do*, Ed? /32

Reforming the surveillance regime in the US won’t help domestic journalists like me either, Ed. Spies are state-sponsored criminals who break the law for the living. You really think the CIA cares what the *law* says? Come on, man.
/33

Either we are all of us free and secure or we are none of us free and secure. The distinction between US Persons and them ferrners is bogus “IC” spin to sell us continued domestic tyranny. /34

On the whole, #PermanentRecord reads like a many-holds-barred, punch-pulling plea by @Snowden to a corrupt secret police to let him come home. They won’t. And I fear, Ed, you will live to regret the punches you pulled—not the punches you landed. /FIN