Ron Paul Worried Government May Kill NSA Whistleblower With a Drone

Yesterday, former Congressman Ron Paul told Fox Business that he is worried the U.S. government may kill NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden with a drone.

Watch the clip below:

In a recent interview Edward Snowden said that he plans to stay in Hong Kong, adding that he has faith in Hong Kong's laws.

From the South China Morning Post:

Snowden said last night that he had no doubts about his choice of Hong Kong.

"People who think I made a mistake in picking Hong Kong as a location misunderstand my intentions. I am not here to hide from justice; I am here to reveal criminality," Snowden said in an exclusive interview with the South China Morning Post.

"I have had many opportunities to flee HK, but I would rather stay and fight the United States government in the courts, because I have faith in Hong Kong's rule of law," he added.

Snowden says he has committed no crimes in Hong Kong and has "been given no reason to doubt [Hong Kong's legal] system".

"My intention is to ask the courts and people of Hong Kong to decide my fate," he said.

Comments

[A Serious Man]

That might be too heavy-handed and obvious even for our government.

[ant1sthenes]

I don't put being heavy handed and obvious past them, but my opinion of them is no so low that they would risk war with China over something like this.

If he was hiding out in Yemen, you know, BAM, sure. But in a powerful rival's territory or a Western democracy, a drone attack would mean the start of WW3, and we would be the Germans.

[some guy]

I bet we could drone someone in downtown London without starting a war. It would "cool" relations between the two countries and summit would be called. We'd probably pay for the damages, apologize for this "unfortunate occurrence" and promise to "review our procedures". Then back to business as usual.

[ant1sthenes]

Well, call me naive, but I think something like that could be enough to start a war of Everyone Versus the U.S.

We have enough nukes that it would probably start out with "merely" sanctions, expulsion of U.S. forces, severing all cooperative overseas missions, cutting off intelligence sharing, divesting American dollars and companies, etc., but it could easily escalate from there given Washington's hubris.

[some guy]

it would probably start out with ... expulsion of U.S. forces, severing all cooperative overseas missions, cutting off intelligence sharing, ...

Hm. You make a compelling argument for the US to drone bomb someone in London...

[Gray Ghost]

A drone strike is flying a military aircraft through another sovereign's airspace and dropping ordnance therein. You could look at it as an act of war. Even as bad as the U.S. can behave, I don't see it committing acts of war within friendly nations. In Afghanistan, Yemen, (even Pakistan, cough, cough) the drones are there with the deniable, though de facto permission of the sovereign. I don't believe the U.S. has droned anybody without the tacit permission of the country that ostensibly rules the area.

So droning Snowden in H.K. is probably out. Asking the cops to grab the guy, is another matter. As is kidnapping him. Or just killing him. While Israel and Dubai are not sending each other Hanukkah cards, they are not currently at war with each other.

I still think he's going to be asked very nicely by the PRC to tell them everything he knows. I find his disappearance ominous.

[some guy]

I agree that it would be an act of war. But I don't think one of our "friendly" Western democracies would immediately start shooting afterwards. I think we could get away with it once with them, if we said we were sorry afterwards. China would be a different matter.

[CatoTheElder]

I'm not so sure ... remember when Clinton "accidentally" "smart-bombed" the Chinese embassy in Serbia?

The CIA said they had the wrong address.

[Gray Ghost]

There was also the accidental bombing near miss of the French embassy during the 1986 strikes on Libya, after the French denied the strike package overflight rights.

Whoops.

Both that oops and the Belgrade mistake were in the context of accidents within an existing military strike. Not something that's going to come up within H.K., and if it does, the U.S. has a lot more problems than an IT guy with an attack of conscience.

[John]

What is scary is not that this is true. I don't think it is a danger. But that Paul can say it and sound reasonable doing so. Our government has gotten so bad and trust in it eroded so much, someone can accuse it of official murder and people might disagree but will not write said person off as a nut. That should scare anyone.

[Almanian!]

Exactly my reaction.

"Used to be everyone wanted to come to the US cause, 'I know I'll get a fair shot there.'"

Now our own fucking citizens feel to the ChiComms because they believe they'll get more justice from them.

FUCK! DOOOOOOOOOOOOOMED we are.

[Brandon]

Of course, the President is focusing on the trust in it eroded so much part, to the complete exclusion of the government has gotten so bad part, because blame for the former can be shifted onto "Cynicism" engendered by "Tea Partiers" and "Racists" without him having to do any reflection or self-examination.

[CatoTheElder]

What is scary is that sensible people think that Ron Paul wasn't saying that tongue-in-cheek.

He knows that a drone wouldn't be the weapon of choice for such an assassination unless Snowden took refuge in NWTT, Pakistan or Yemen.

Still, the President claims unilateral authority to do such a thing.

[Lyle]

Has he failed to notice that the People's Republic of China flag flies in Hong Kong?

Yeah, there is a pretty Hong Kong flag too, but it isn't the one that matters.

[Brandon]

Have you failed to notice that we seem to have dropped below the PRC in our respect for individual rights?

[Lyle]

No, we haven't dropped that low yet. If you think that's the case you're not only very ignorant about your own country, but also the PRC.

[Episiarch]

A drone would be far too obvious. I'm sure they have other, tried-and-true methods for killing someone annoying to them.

[DEATFBIRSECIA]

Mr. Snowden, your Polonium Pizza is ready!

[tarran]

I think it was symbolic, like Jesus saying blessed are the cheesemakers.

[GILMORE]

Tarantula dropped from string by Ninja

[ant1sthenes]

That's a good way to kill a tarantula, if you're not careful.

[GILMORE]

dude, come on. You've seen Dr No = the spider *climbs down* the string. It has a 90% Non-Bond success rate

[Lyle]

Ron Paul shows how much a fool he is by talking like this. Why in the world would the U.S. drone this guy in the middle of Hong Kong? Is he at war with the United States?

He isn't going to be droned Ron Paul.. you idiot.

[DEATFBIRSECIA]

"Is he at war with the United States?"

Lyle, keep in mind that they already droned an American citizen, Anwar Awlaki (albeit not in Hong Kong) for the crime of preaching against the US. Then, just for good measure, they went back and droned his son.

But I agree with you that they wouldn't do it in Hong Kong.

Let's take the location of HK out of the mix. Do you think they'd do it if he moved to a less populated area? If not, why not?

[Lyle]

Awlaki was actually involved in planning attacks. He wasn't just preaching. If he was just preaching he could have just remained in the U.S.

[WTF]

So where is the proof he actually planned attacks? And what was his son found guilty of?

[Lyle]

Not sure, but why was he in Yemen encouraging people to kill you and me?

He could have just encourage people to kill you and me here in the States.

He was on the battlefield. He was a traitor and the enemy. The son shouldn't have gone to Yemen and been so close to him.

[MJGreen]

"These Americans working overseas are actually tax evaders. They're not just working. If they just wanted to work they could have remained in the US."

And you can also plan attacks in the US. The only successful attacks of the past 20 years have been planned in the US.

[Lyle]

9/11 was planned in the U.S.?

[Brandon]

Because the United States would never kill a US citizen with a drone. NEVER!! He is already being called a traitor in the mainstream media, which would be more "justification" than the government has needed for attacking other people with drones. Do you have anything other than weak ad hominems and stupid questions?

[albo]

Mr. Paul apparently sprinkled some Crazy, instead of sugar, over his Maypo this morning.

[Virginian]

How is he crazy? Obama has already murdered an American citizen in a foreign country without due process.

Change the name of the target and the name of the city he's in, and it's the exact same fucking thing.

[albo]

No, it's not the same thing. Snowden is a domestic criminal, not an enemy combatant. We don't have drones shoot Hellfires at bank robbers or murderers who've fled the country.

[tarran]

Given the fact that the United States did assassinate a 16 year old U.S. citizen who had never shown any signs of being an enemy combatant, albo, I suggest you go to the store an buy some sugar to replace the crazy you sprinkled over your cheerios this morning.

[Lyle]

He did show signs that he was an enemy combatant. He went to Yemen to be with his father.

[ant1sthenes]

An Al Qaeda propagandist isn't a foreign combatant either. And his crime isn't against little people like banks or rape victims or whatever, he betrayed USG to its most hated and dangerous enemy, the American people.

[tarran]

It was comical the way the newsdroid desperately tried to prevent the good Dr from bringing up Ellsberg.

[Crackers Boy]

Snowden's welcome to hang out at my house for a while, if he needs a place in the southeastern U.S. to lay low.

CB

[Raston Bot]

I could see the Chinese killing him and blaming the CIA.

[Gray Ghost]

And I see that I need to go through the whole thread before I post.

[Almanian!]

This, too. Get what they want out of him, then he's disappeared.

Very Chinese.

[Ken Shultz]

Sometimes Ron Paul says silly things.

And who cares?

But sometimes he says things that make other people ridicule libertarian ideas.

And that bugs the shit out of me.

We're in a marketing war. And that's an example of bad marketing.

[Sy]

That silly ol' Ron Paul.. Thinkin the US govt holds grudges against those that embarrass them. What he gonna think of next??

[Almanian!]

Probably that the Fed should be audited.

CRAZY!

[darius404]

No, I agree. It's one thing to say that they'll go after whistleblowers, it's another to say that they'll assassinate a whistleblower, let alone the currently highest-profile whistleblower. I don't think it's a crazy thing to consider, but I don't think it's very plausible in our current state of affairs. It might be at some point in the future, but I don't think the government's made the jump yet.

[Ken Shultz]

It's probably not very plausible, and the chances of the MSM picking up on that quote and using it to attack Rand Paul during the upcoming presidential primaries are very high.

God bless Ron Paul, but he needs to dial down on the hyperbole until after the Republican primaries, at least. What Ron Paul says can and will be used against Rand Paul in the court of public opinion.

I'm not saying that's the way it should be. I'm saying that's the way it is.

[Lyle]

Yep. There's good reason to believe that Ron Paul is some kind of a kook.

[cavalier973]

I'm pretty sure that his mention of "drone strikes" as a method of eliminating Snowden is hyperbole. He is also practicing a bit of marketing, by using "drone strikes" as shorthand for "extralegal government activity", which he thinks will arrest people's attention and get them to think about the situation beyond the "opposing the FedGov is treason" narrative that the gov't officials are pushing.

*Mr. Paul apparently sprinkled some Crazy, instead of sugar, over his Maypo this morning.*

[albo]

David St. Hubbins: It's such a fine line between stupid, and uh...
Nigel Tufnel: Clever.
David St. Hubbins: Yeah, and clever

[cavalier973]

I think the end result of this little drama is Snowden sitting in a chair in Budapest or Nairobi or some other exotic locale, a gun in his hand and his brains blown all over the wall behind. There will be narcotics paraphernalia scattered about, and a note stating something to the effect that he's so sorry over how he wronged the FedGov. There will be just enough "off" about the scene that Conspiracy Theorists will go into instinctive convulsions at the mere mention of Snowden's name, but just enough right that "normal" people can go about confident that their government is, on the whole, benign and even benevolent and where's my Obamacare check?

[Sy]

I was watching CNN this morning. The progressive hate was flowing predictably. Hell, they were pretty much begging for the Feds to interrogate his fianc? to find out what she knows. There was talking of having him tried as a traitor and some other nonsense.

[GILMORE]

It is truly amazing to witness how fast the "Progressive" left has been able to turn on a dime from being the "loyal dissidents!" struggling for justice and freedoms under the jackboot of the Robot BusHitler Regime.... to insisting that Room 101 in the Ministry of Love is not *mean enough* to potential opponents of Authority.

These people pride themselves on being "Truth to Power"-advocates.... until they *are* the power, in which case... Truth? "KILL IT WITH FIRE!!!"

[Brandon]

The worst part is, they are not *the power*, they are just courtesans. And Obama has shown no compunction about abusing his courtesans regardless of how well they fellate him.

[ant1sthenes]

Actually, that's the best part. At least they'll be made to suffer along with everyone else.

[GILMORE]

...sort of reminds me of the crucified guy in "Life of Brian"...

BEN: "Oh, yeah. If we didn't have crucifixion, this country would be in a right bloody mess...Now, take my case. They hung me up here five years ago. Every night, they take me down for twenty minutes, then they hang me up again, which I regard as very fair, in view of what I done, and, if nothing else, it's taught me to respect the Romans, and it's taught me... that you'll never get anywhere in this life, unless you're prepared to do a fair day's work for a fair day's pay"

CENTURION: Shut up!

BEN: Right. Right. Terrific race, the Romans. Terrific.

[Loki]

Yesterday, former Congressman Ron Paul told Fox Business that he is worried the U.S. government may kill NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden with a drone.

I don't know. I would think that the higher ups at the NSA or CIA would probably have their fingers crossed and pray to whatever God creatures like them pray to that nothing happens to this guy, at least in the short term.

If the guy dies in a car accident, even if it really is just a freak accident a lot of people will blame the government and public opinion would then swing in Snowden's favor. Better to let the David Brooks' and the Richard Cohen's of the world destroy his reputation and image with the people first. Then once he's been thoroughly discredited, you arrange for some kind of "accident" to happen.

[bunchesoffluff]

only criminals would say exposeing/leaking evidence of crimes is aiding the enemy because law-abideing people that try to stop crime are a criminal's enemy.

no less serious crimes than murder, torture, severe physcial abuse/neglect, or severe sexual assult, should be punishable by death.

no less serious crimes than neglect,

exsessive, unnessicary or offensive physcial abuse, kidnap/arrest/imprison/lock-up an innocent victim, pointing a gun at an innocent victim, or severe physcial direct endangerment of an innocent victim-that might include trying to run someone over with a car, should be punishable by life in prison.

freeom of speech and freedom of the press=no arresting or fineing people for speech or press.

'causing intelligence to be published', 'transmitting defense information', are covered under freedom of press and speech. speech. you cant legally be criminally charged w endangering, or aiding the enemy, merely for speech or press.

[bunchesoffluff]

some corrupt gov workers wrongly lable law-abideing average people terrorists based on speech or political/religious beleifs, because corrupt gov is terrified of law-abideing people that want to expose and stop corruption.

reported nazis called jews a threat to national security.

immediatly

fire gov workers who charge people with 'aiding the enemy' merely for leaking evidence of gov's crimes

'aiding the enemy' in the past might have been defined as: paying people who you saw(not video) commit offensive murder, violence, or kidnapping, to commit crimes.

'aiding the enemy' is a vauge term, just because you are labled an enemy doesnt mean your bad, the good guy's are the bad guy's enemy. 'aiding the enemy' is to vauge of a term to be a charge w.o further explaination.

the public and the gov includes criminals/the enemy.

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[sarcasmic]

As much contempt as I have for our government, I don't think they'd go that far. Yet.

[Lyle]

How would the government go after his family?

[PS]

I'm thinking Polonium, it's the romantic in me.

[tarran]

They did that with Abdallah Higazy in 2001. They told him that they were going to turn his family's names over to Egyptian Security forces so that the secret police would rape his sister.

That's how they got him to confess to being part of the 9/11 hijacking conspiracy. He prefered risking the executioner's needle to having his sister raped.

[cavalier973]

Hasn't the gov't already killed an American citizen or two with drone attacks?

[Hugh Akston]

Turn the IRS loose on his parents and his girlfriend.

[CatoTheElder]

Three felonies a day.

Pick one, and prosecute it.

If a US attorney launches an investigation on you, your best case scenario is bankruptcy.

[tarran]

Which by the way used to happen. In tha 1990's there was a huge scandal involving the IRS, where they would routinely audit people punitively.

I think they even played footsie with Justice, so a justice dept probe would be informed that all his relatives and his wife's relatives would be closely audited if he didn't play ball.

[jesse.in.mb]

No ricin tipped umbrella?

[tarran]

Hong Kong has lots of high-rises. Just toss him out of a window.

[PS]

Also. If we are going to assassinate our own citizens, let's at least do it in style.

[Almanian!]

That could NEVER happe....no, wait....

Shit.

[Gray Ghost]

Considering Snowden didn't release all of his information, and that said information is probably valuable to both the U.S. and other countries (like China), why wouldn't the PRC have a good motive for snatching him and emptying him of all he knows? After they've wrung him dry, dump him in the South China Sea next to some chum. Let the sharks eat the physical evidence of his interrogation, while still allowing enough of him to wash ashore to make the U.S. look bad.

Hell of a brave thing Snowden did, but he's in really deep shit.

[PS]

Totally lacking in panache.

As a decaying, decadent empire American has the responsibility to at least show some sophistication when murdering it's citizens.

[jesse.in.mb]

Wait, are you saying that a ricin tipped umbrella isn't stylish?

It's gloriously Cold War retro, and effective.

[PS]

No, I'm saying it's *also* stylish. Even more stylish than polonium.

[BakedPenguin]

Considering that the term "defenestration" was coined due to events that took place at Prague Castle, you're the last person I'd have thought would argue against it.

[jesse.in.mb]

That makes much more sense, you're too classy a guy to dislike a ricin tipped umbrella.

[CatoTheElder]

Yeah, but nothing says assassination by a State more clearly than polonium.

It's really hard to get polonium whereas a Texas housewife can manufacture ricin.

[Jon Lester]

Chinese methods are indeed rather ingenious, but I'm guessing they'll try a much friendlier approach at first, and let that option run its course.

[CatoTheElder]

Who is to say that Snowden didn't put a dead man switch on some NSA intel on PRC?

It's possible that he's thought this game through several moves.

[PS]

Those were government officials. I'm all for throwing those people out of windows whenever possible. But I think the government, with all of it's wealth, power and employee benefits, ought to try and show a little class when murdering its citizens. Let them do it in true decadent style.

[PS]

Thanks, jesse. I would've also accepted sharks with frickin' laser beams on their foreheads.

[jesse.in.mb]

what about mutated, ill-tempered sea bass?

[PS]

As long as they are ill-tempered.

[Lyle]

Sure the government can do that. But why would the government go after this guy's family? Is the family enemies of the state?

I think it is paranoia to think the government would go after some people just because they're related to this guy. Makes no sense whatsoever.

If they're working with him, that's something else.

[ant1sthenes]

"Sure the government can do that. But why would the government go after this guy's family? Is the family enemies of the state?"

Are you literally retarded or something? They would go after his family (publicly enough that the message would get out, not so much so as to worry Joe Sixpack) so that everyone thinking of whistleblowing would understand that they weren't just putting themselves in danger, but also signing up everyone they care about to be put through hell.

[Gray Ghost]

Go after meaning to kill, no. Go after meaning to investigate every family member top to bottom and find one of the three felonies a day we're supposed to commit? Hell yes. This is the same sort of thing the Soviets did to defector's families left behind, BTW.

Will the Fed put pressure on family members to get a desired response? Yes. There was a local case where a woman who negligently burned up four kids her family's daycare was babysitting, turned herself in to the U.S. Marshalls after she successfully jumped bail and fled to Nigeria. If you don't think the U.S. Attorney made it very clear to her family that they could cut the cord to her, and give up her location/induce her to surrender, or otherwise the USA would take a great interest into the accounting practices of their other businesses, then I don't know what to say.

She turned herself into the marshalls at Port Harcourt, Nigeria---thereby earning herself a session in Harris County Court with four separate murder charges (can't remember whether it was Murder 1 or 2) and was IIRC, looking at ~50 years in jail. Whoops, 80 years actually. She was looking at 99 or so for each count.

Naturally, it was made out to be her own idea to turn herself in. Sure she did.

[Lyle]

And you know what guys... if the government acts this stupidly (which is always possible) the family has recourse in America. They can sue!

We the people ain't without legal recourse.

Lets let the government behave badly first before we accuse them of "going after" anyone.

Right now the idiot in Hong Kong is just running his ignorant mouth.

[Lyle]

They have probable cause of a felony or something?