In this excellent debate from Democracy Now!, Chris Hedges makes a brilliant defense of Edward Snowden, and the collapse of our institutions:
"Unfortunately, the press, like most institutions in this country, and I would add the legal profession, has largely collapsed under this corporate coup d’état that’s taken place and is no longer functioning. And I want to get back, that what this is fundamentally a debate about is whether we are going to have, through the press, anindependent institution within this country that can examine the inner workings of power or not. And it is now—I mean, many of us had suspected this widespread surveillance, but now that it’s confirmed, we’re seeing—you know, why did Snowden come out publicly? Well, because I think he knew that they would find out anyway, because they have all of Glenn Greenwald’s email, phone records and everything else, and they can very quickly find out who he was speaking to and whether Snowden had contact with him. And that—I speak as reporter—is terrifying, because it essentially shuts down any ability to counter the official propaganda and the official narrative and expose the crimes. And we have seen in the last few years tremendous crimes being committed by those in power. We have no ability now to investigate them."
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CHRIS HEDGES: Well, what we’re really having a debate about is whether or not we’re going to have a free press left or not. If there are no Snowdens, if there are no Mannings, if there are no Assanges, there will be no free press. And if the press—and let’s not forget that Snowden gave this to The Guardian. This was filtered through a press organization in a classic sort of way whistleblowers provide public information about unconstitutional, criminal activity by their government to the public. So the notion that he’s just some individual standing up and releasing stuff over the Internet is false.
But more importantly, what he has exposed essentially shows that anybody who reaches out to the press to expose fraud, crimes, unconstitutional activity, which this clearly appears to be, can be traced and shut down. And that’s what’s so frightening. So, we are at a situation now, and I speak as a former investigative reporter for The New York Times, by which any investigation into the inner workings of government has become impossible. That’s the real debate.
The full transcript is well-worth reading to the bottom
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