Atlantic Monthly Contributors's Blog, page 977

John McCain Weighs In on his Foreign Policy 'Bromance' with Obama

Senator John McCain, President Obama's new foreign policy friend from the GOP, was on CNN Thursday to call the current state of U.S. -Russian relations a return to "1955," and to explain what happened on his White House-sanctioned trip to solve the Egypt crisis (he didn't). But most importantly, McCain addressed Obama's comments on Leno earlier this week regarding the budding "bromance" between the two. While many politicians are careful about not giving silly answers to obviously silly questions, McCain is running with Obama's quip that the two were in a relationship akin to a "romantic comedy," because that's what you do when you're in love.

(the relevant bit starts at about 4:00) 

To recap, Obama told Leno on Tuesday that the two, formerly opponents for the office of the president, had since found some common ground: "that’s how a classic romantic comedy goes. Initially you’re not getting along and then you keep bumping into each other," he joked.  

That prompted CNN’s John Berman to ask the follow-up question to McCain that America needs right now: which romantic comedy best encapsulates what's going on with McCain and Obama right now. "Given my age," the "December" in the August-December romance joked, "how about 'The Honeymooners’ or maybe ‘I Love Lucy,’” he replied, adding "The point is, I want to work with the president where the nation’s interests are at stake and we can work together." 

McCain did point out some friction between the two, adding, "There are other areas such as what we just described, Syria, where I think it’s been shameful that 100,000 people have been massacred and we’ve stood by and watched it."  

As for the Senator's Egypt trip, with Sen. Lindsey Graham, McCain defended his decision to call the overthrow of the Egyptian government a "coup," despite the White House's current refusal to do so. McCain told CNN that the military overthrow of the Egyptian government, and the subsequent jailing of the former Muslim Brotherhood leadership, "can only be described as a coup." Meanwhile, the Associated Press reports, Egypt still doesn't really know what to make of the U.S.'s stance towards them after the McCain visits, citing officials in the country who "expressed frustration that the message has been muddled by the comments of lawmakers who have offered strident personal, opinions on the situation that do not hew to the administration's line." 

       

Today in the American War in Yemen: Three More Drone Strikes

Early Thursday evening, reports emerged of a series of drone strikes on targets in Yemen that apparently killed as many as 12 people. With these three attacks, we now of at least eight drone strikes in the country over the past two weeks. 

The details of the strikes are still not clear. On Thursday morning, NBC News reported on the first strike, which they said struck a car about 100 miles east of the country's capital and killed six people. A bit later in the day, CNN had news of another strike, that killed two in the same region. CNN reported that the first strike killed eight, a figure echoed by Reuters. Then, in the early evening, a third strike, which USA Today reported, hit another vehicle in the country. Total number killed, in USA Today's estimation: 12. Yesterday, a strike killed four.

There's little question that the abnormal frequency of the strikes relates to the ongoing alert that shuttered American embassies in the region — an alert that apparently stemmed from a conversation between the global head of al-Qaeda and his counterpart in Yemen. While the country's government's claims ti have foiled terror plots proved to be exaggerated, the American response seems to be clear.

People in the region seem used to the activity.

Residents told CNN that the drone had been roaming the sky over the province since dawn and was flying at a low altitude.

"When we hear it flying above us we know there will be a strike later in the day," said a local in Hadramout who asked not to be named.

This is essentially how the war on terror has been conducted by the Obama administration. Gather intelligence about the location of known militants, strike them remotely. Since Obama took office, the United States has launched at least 300 strikes in Pakistan and Afghanistan alone; under Obama, the range of targets has expanded into Yemen and Somalia. It's a policy that the president suggested in May that he planned to reform; to date, it appears that hasn't happened.

"This war," Obama said in that May speech, "like all wars, must end." But how? How should we respond when we learn about a terror threat if not by flicking missiles from robot planes? Do we want American troops marching into eastern Yemen? Arming Yemeni troops to hunt terrorists themselves? Americans are fine with the way Obama's dealing with it now. The country has never before lost so few of its own lives in as inextricable a quagmire.

       

All of Time Warner's Customers Are Pirating 'Under the Dome'

Today in show business news: CBS-less people are stealing Under the Dome in droves, Milla Jovovich books a serious role, and France is about to make the best TV show ever. 

While Time Warner Cable and CBS squabble over transmission fees, meaning TWC is not airing CBS, Showtime, and several other CBS-owned stations in many cities across the nation, fans of CBS programming are being forced to get creative. Particularly, fans of Under the Dome have been pirating the show like crazy. Because you just cannot stand between a domehead and their #dome. Gotta have the #dome. Piracy rates went up a whopping 34% last weekend, just after TWC pulled the plug on CBS. So, you gotta get this sorted out, CBS. Because tons of people are stealing your #dome. And you can't have folks stealin' dome for too long or they'll get used to it. Because a domehead doesn't quit, no sir. You ask any committed domer out there and he'll tell you. Ain't no mountain high enough, valley low enough, or mysterious dome thick enough to keep us from getting our #dome. We're gonna dome no matter what, so CBS may as well make it happen on their terms. Fix this ish, guys. Fix it. Plus it'd be nice to watch Dexter too. [The Hollywood Reporter]

Well how about that. Milla Jovovich is getting Shakespearean. The Resident Evil actress, who will forever be likable if for no other reason than The Fifth Element (there are other reasons too, though), has joined the cast of the modernized Cymbeline, which stars Ethan Hawke and is being directed by Hawke's modern Hamlet director Michael Almereyda. Jovovich will play, in theory, the Queen, who plots to put her son on the throne instead of the rightful heir, Posthumus, who will be played by Penn Badgley. That's a fun role for her! And probably she won't have to slo-mo kill any zombies or hell hounds or anything in this one. I mean, who knows how "modern" this adaptation is going to get, but it seems unlikely that she will have to fire two pistols at some kind of infected horde while, I dunno, running on a wall or something. Shakespeare only gets as flashy as "Exeunt, pursued by a bear," so I think she's gonna get a break from all that. [Deadline]

So, TV actresses Chyler Leigh (Grey's Anatomy), Ally Walker (Profiler), and Jennifer Esposito (Blue Bloods) have all been cast on a TV show together. But! Not just any TV show. A French TV show. To be filmed in New York, but aired in France. The show is called Taxi: Brooklyn South and Deadline's description of it is perhaps the most marvelous thing you will read today. Take it away, Nellie Andreeva:

Taxi: Brooklyn South centers on Caitlyn Sullivan (Leigh), a brilliant investigator at the Brooklyn Police Station whose stubborn character and her recklessness behind the wheel have made her an outcast within the NYPD. She teams with Marseille-born Leo Romba, a happy New York Taxi driver full of energy and care for his clients, to form the most improbable and efficient partnership to solve crimes and mysteries around Brooklyn.

Yes. YES! A show about a French taxi driver solving mysteries in Brooklyn. All of our dreams have come true. Also: "the Brooklyn Police Station." Oh, right, the Brooklyn Police Station. Where you go if there's a crime in Brooklyn. You go to the one police station that's there, in Brooklyn. Ah, French people. That's wonderful. "Eet ees une show about zee Brooklyn Police Station. Brooklyn cops, bang bang, wow, pizza, Coney Island, are you talkin' to me. All of zat." I can't wait for this show. I'm going to move to Paris to watch this show. Finally an excuse to move to Paris. Thanks, Taxi: Brooklyn South. And thanks to all the fine folks at the Brooklyn Police Station. [Deadline]

Here is a trailer for Winnie, the Winnie Mandela biopic starring Jennifer Hudson and Terrence Howard. And, y'know what, I must say that it seems like Jennifer Hudson might not be too bad in it! That's a surprise to me, I'll admit it. But there it is. What we see in this trailer looks, I dunno, not too shabby. Way to surprise us, J.Hud. Or me, at least. Naomie Harris might have some competition after all.

       

A Short History of Richard Dawkins vs. The Internet

Richard Dawkins, celebrity atheist and evolutionary biologist, made a lot of people angry on Twitter today by weighing in once more with his views on Islam (spoiler alert: he's not a fan). It's just the latest in a series of online statements from the scientist that have even some of his most devoted followers wishing he'd be a bit more, well, rational, with his off-the-cuff remarks. 

Here's the tweet from today: 

All the world's Muslims have fewer Nobel Prizes than Trinity College, Cambridge. They did great things in the Middle Ages, though.

— Richard Dawkins (@RichardDawkins) August 8, 2013

After meeting resistance:

A similar (and infuriating for Dawkins) 'fact' is that Islam has more recipients of Nobel Prizes than Dawkins. It's bad scientific method.

— Jopathoc (@jptoc) August 8, 2013

 Dawkins dug in:

Something you can convert to is not a race. A statement of simple fact is not bigotry. And science by Muslims was great in the distant past.

— Richard Dawkins (@RichardDawkins) August 8, 2013

Interesting concept: a simple statement of undeniable FACT can be offensive. Other examples where facts should be hidden because offensive?

— Richard Dawkins (@RichardDawkins) August 8, 2013

The tirade prompted Alex Gabriel to weigh in at Heresy Club with a long, atheist-to-atheist explanation of what's behind Dawkins's "statement of simple fact," noting that Dawkins has a long history of praising anti-Muslim thought, while denying that there's a whiff of bigotry to be found. But the history of his comments speaks otherwise. It turns out that Dawkins has a particular grudge with Islam, with loose ties to the rhetoric of the European far right.  Dawkins is well-known as a "New Humanist" atheist, a particular cut of atheism that tends to see little to no value in religion at all — think Christopher Hitchens here. At its best, that argument gives equal time and criticism to all the religions of the world — like the opposite of a co-exist bumper sticker, with the goal of questioning and calling out religion's unique reverence in society. But Dawkins has taken New Humanism to a different end, focusing heavily in recent years on Islam. Here he is, calling Islam "One of the great evils in the world." 

And, from earlier this year, going full Godwin's Law on Islam: 

Of course you can have an opinion about Islam without having read Qur'an. You don't have to read Mein Kampf to have an opinion about nazism.

— Richard Dawkins (@RichardDawkins) March 25, 2013

Gabriel finds two particularly egregious examples of Dawkins tweets and blog comments about Islam, indicating that the speaker's comments are at their worst in the instaforums of the internet. Along with a third, particularly notorious incident of Dawkins combining his anti-Muslim beliefs with sexism, we have a trifecta of reasons for Dawkins to dial it back a bit online: 

Richard Dawkins Likes Geert Wilders 

Geert Wilders, a far-right Dutch politician and anti-Muslim activist, made a short movie called Fitna a few years ago. The film juxtaposes verses of the Koran with images of violence, with the explicit intention of arguing that Islam promotes violence among its followers. The film is popular in some corners of the right, both in the U.S. and in Europe. And Dawkins liked what he saw. Here's a comment he posted to his own blog, from 2010: 

I have just watched Fitna. I don't know whether it is the original version, but it is the one linked by Jerry Coyne. Maybe Geert Wilders has done or said other things that justify epithets such as 'disgusting', or 'racist'. But as far as this film is concerned, I can see nothing in it to substantiate such extreme vilification...Geert Wilders, if it should turn out that you are a racist or a gratuitous stirrer and provocateur I withdraw my respect, but on the strength of Fitna alone I salute you as a man of courage, who has the balls to stand up to a monstrous enemy.

Wilders was, at the time, a rising leader of an anti-Islam movement that wanted to ban the Koran, tax headscarves, and promote a nationalist, anti-immigration platform, all in the name of stopping the "Islamization of the Netherlands" 

Richard Dawkins vs. Feminism.

In 2011, Rebecca Watson, who runs the blog Skepchick, posted a video after sitting on a panel with Richard Dawkins, among other people, at a skeptics' conference. Watson talks about addressing a pretty common subject for women in the skeptic and atheist community — sexism, which she spoke about at a panel discussion. In the video, she briefly, and calmly, describes an encounter with a (male) in an elevator after the panel, during which she was asked back to his hotel room "for coffee." Richard Dawkins himself decided to weigh in on her video in the comments section of a separate blog post by PZ Meyers on Watson's experience (The original post is no longer available, but the New Statesmen preserved the entire spat). Here's Dawkins: 

Dear Muslima

Stop whining, will you. Yes, yes, I know you had your genitals mutilated with a razor blade, and . . . yawn . . . don't tell me yet again, I know you aren't allowed to drive a car, and you can't leave the house without a male relative, and your husband is allowed to beat you, and you'll be stoned to death if you commit adultery. But stop whining, will you. Think of the suffering your poor American sisters have to put up with.

Only this week I heard of one, she calls herself Skep"chick", and do you know what happened to her? A man in a hotel elevator invited her back to his room for coffee. I am not exaggerating. He really did. He invited her back to his room for coffee. Of course she said no, and of course he didn't lay a finger on her, but even so . . .

And you, Muslima, think you have misogyny to complain about! For goodness sake grow up, or at least grow a thicker skin.

Richard

It's not really clear why Dawkins decided to bring Islam into a debate over sexism in the atheist community, but there you go. When asked to clarify, Dawkins issued a follow-up: 

"...She was probably offended to about the same extent as I am offended if a man gets into an elevator with me chewing gum. But he does me no physical damage and I simply grin and bear it until either I or he gets out of the elevator. It would be different if he physically attacked me.

Muslim women suffer physically from misogyny, their lives are substantially damaged by religiously inspired misogyny. Not just words, real deeds, painful, physical deeds, physical privations, legally sanctioned demeanings." 

For speaking out against sexism in the atheist community, by the way, Watson has received a deluge of rape threats. 

Richard Dawkins vs. "Islamophobia"  

Dawkins often discusses Islam on his Twitter feed, so here's just one example: earlier this year, a university made a very dubious decision to let a fundamentalist Muslim speaker segregate the audience of a debate by gender. A lot of people, including a non-Muslim participant in the debate and a good portion of the audience, were deeply offended. But Dawkins's response probably gained more attention than the incident itself: 

Who the hell do these Muslims think they are? At UCL of all places, tried to segregate the sexes in debate between @LKrauss1 and a Muslim

— Richard Dawkins (@RichardDawkins) March 10, 2013

How has UCL come to this: cowardly capitulation to Muslims? Tried to segregate sexes in debate between @LKrauss1 and some Muslim or other

— Richard Dawkins (@RichardDawkins) March 10, 2013

I don't think Muslims should segregate sexes at University College London events. Oh NO, how very ISLAMOPHOBIC of me. How RACIST of me.

— Richard Dawkins (@RichardDawkins) March 10, 2013

       

'Sharknado' Sequel Title Is No Pun

Sorry, everyone who tweeted something puntastic for the Sharknado sequel title (Sharknado: The Second Chumming). SyFy has revealed to Entertainment Weekly (EXCLUSIVELY!) that the winner of among the 5,000 Twitter suggestions it received is Sharknado 2: The Second One. Thanks for playing!

When Syfy greenlit another Sharknado just days after the original premiered, the network also announced that they would be hosting a subtitle contest on Twitter, and all users need to do was submit their suggestions to @SyfyMovies with the hashtag #Sharknado. So we set out to find the brilliant person who suggested "the second one" and came up, well, empty handed. (Perhaps they've deleted their tweet out of modesty?) The earliest tweet we could find mentioning "Sharknado" and "second one" is this one from "tummy sticks." 

So, #Sharknado was in Los Angeles. The second one will be in New York. I'm pushing for the third to be in Miami!

— tummy sticks (@stagnooo) July 17, 2013

No, it's not a title suggestion (though, SyFy, you can have that one for free: Sharknado 3: The Third) but nor are any other instances tweeted out before today's announcement. So the bard who gave us "The Second One" remains a mystery. We've reached out to Syfy and Sharknado director Anthony C. Ferrante to see if we can learn now. 

For now: this is it. Sharknado 2: The Second One. Congratulations, Twitter. 

       

Science Fiction's Sexism Problem

Science fiction, you (allegedly) have a sexism problem. In an incisive article for the The Guardian's book blog, Damien Walter lays out a stark gender disparity: of the 29 Grandmasters of Science Fiction (yes, that's an actual thing), only 4 have been women. And the winners of this year's other main science fiction and fantasy awards, the Arthur C. Clarke and British Science Fiction Award, were also male. 

Part of the reason is that women's speculative fiction gets treated as "fantasy," while the imaginings of men are deemed "science fiction," which seems to have more of a connotation of gravitas. Science, after all, is serious, while fantasy is what children resort to.

Certainly, the dearth of female science fiction writers is a topic that has been covered extensively by bloggers, with one recently asking, quite pointedly, "Dude, where are all the women in science fiction?" The Guardian itself has previously written on "the incredible shrinking presence of women SF writers."

But the science fiction community is not bending to such longstanding charges. In a letter defending the Clarke award decisions, Clarke judge and feminist Liz Williams, said that the judges "received disproportionately fewer [submissions] from women, of which many were technically fantasy." Williams went on to say that the works that year just didn't match up, adding that: 

As a feminist, I am opposed to including women writers in shortlists just because they are female: the work has got to hold its own in its field: we can discuss whether that field is a level one or not, but when you're judging a work, you're obliged to deal with what you've got, and to me, that means regardless of any ideological criteria.

Isaac Asimov once said that the difference between the two genres is that science fiction is rooted in science and therefore possible, while fantasy is not. Walters, however, wonders in the problem isn't that the works of female authors aren't just being tossed aside as less serious "fantasy works." He writes: 

Encoded in to the this strange divide between fantasy and science fiction is what Joanna Russ, author of The Female Man, called The Double Standard of Content. "How To Suppress Women's Writing," Russ's satirical text on sexism in art, is 30 years old this year but its lessons are still largely unlearned. Women's writing is dismissed as fantasy, while the fantasies of men are granted some higher status as science fiction.

All women SF writers have to do, they are repeatedly told, is conform to this double standard to be accepted.

Instead, Walter notes, female speculative fiction writers are embracing fantasy because they know they won't be respected in the science fiction community. "Many women writers are, quite rightly, looking at the encoded sexism of the SF genre and taking their creativity elsewhere," Walter notes. 

       

Schindler's Letter Goes to Auction

Much as Schindler's famous list went up for auction last month, a New Hampshire auction house is now taking bids on the letter that allowed Oskar Schindler to move his factory to what was then Czechoslovakia—a move that ultimately allowed the German national to save his Jewish workers from the concentration camps.

The letter, dated August 22, 1944, and signed by Schindler himself, is just as important a document as Schindler's now-famous list. An expert told The Associated Press that if Schindler had "not gotten such permission to move, 'there would have been no Schindler's list'":

The letter, translated from German, gives permission to send Adam Dziedzic, a factory employee receiving a contract "for unloading and assembling war-necessary machinery," to Czechoslovakia under the order of the general military command in Krakow. The letter bears Schindler's factory stamp below the text and his signature in blue pencil

The online auction, which is currently at around $20,000,  is being conducted by RR Auction and includes other Schindler-related documents. The house certainly seems to have learned from the sellers of the actual Schindler's List, which failed to attract the sought-after $3 million eBay bid.

The letter, which the auction house deems, with good cause, to be "of great historical importance," is not expected to attract nearly as much, with one expert estimating a price of $50,000 for all the documents. The auction closes next Tuesday.

 

       

If the Email Service Snowden Uses Shuts Down, It Can't Work with the NSA

Lavabit, the super secure e-mail service that whistleblower Edward Snowden uses for his electronic communications, has shut-down because it does not want to "become complicit in crimes against American people," owner and operator Ladar Levison writes on the now defunct website. Levison doesn't go into too much detail about the circumstances of the site's suspension because he legally can't. But it sure sounds like he didn't want to participate in the kinds of data collection programs that Snowden revealed to the public:

Wow Lavabit is shutting down. Reading between the lines, most likely to avoid tapping Snowden’s email for the US gov https://t.co/BdfNpjW4A6

— tom robinson (@tlrobinson) August 8, 2013

Because of the type of encryption Lavabit uses, peer-to-peer, even if the government intercepted Snowden's emails sent using Lavabit, it wouldn't be able to read them without his encryption key. If the NSA was only after those old emails, shutting down Lavabit wouldn't do them much good anyway. But if the government demanded that Lavabit install a method for monitoring its users communications, as in an ongoing data collection program like PRISM, shutting down would be a drastic-but-effective way to avoid participation. So far, only one company is known to have challenegd a FISA order of that kind: Yahoo, and it lost. 

If Lavabit doesn't exist, then the NSA can't monitor it. Of course, that just means Snowden will have to find another ultra-secure email provider. Maybe he should consider a company with zero American ties, per Levison's urging:

This experience has taught me one very important lesson: without congressional action or a strong judicial precedent, I would strongly recommend against anyone trusting their private data to a company with physical ties to the United States.

       

The Hansons Make Wildly Erroneous Claims About Musician-Brewed Beer

The brothers of Hanson, the once-pubescent Oklahoma trio behind 1996's terrifyingly ubiquitous "MMMBop," are all of legal drinking age.

In fact, they're all pushing 30 or over and are married with nine combined kids between the three of them. (Time—it does strange things.) Two months removed from their ninth (really!) album Anthem, the members have been spending some time pushing their other latest project, a beer with a name that belongs in a 1997 issue of MAD Magazine. (Okay, it's "Mmmhops.") Today, after two boxes of the enviable beer arrived at the desk of New York's Rebecca Milzoff, the cultural world got a glimpse into the hidden beer-brewing world of the brothers Hanson, including the creative process behind the name that is "Mmmhops." Taylor, the middle brother, explains:

Facetiously, we began taking titles from songs that could be the moniker for our beer. Where’s the Lager, from "Where’s the Love." Pilsner and Me, from "Penny and Me." Of course, hops is the ultimate ingredient that you think of with beer, so Mmmhops was set into the air, and everyone went, "You know, that’s actually kind of genius." Like, here we are at the end of a long day, you sit down at the bar and think, Mmm, hops.

Members Zac and Taylor discuss the pros and cons of trying Mmmhops for yourself (it's a "gateway drug" that "allows the super beer hophead and the more causal beer drinker that isn’t aware of every kind of microbrew to meet in a very comfortable place"), the reasoning behind the venture ("it’s something we’re really into and know a lot about"), and the perceived weirdness of Hanson aging ("I always find it funny when people are like, 'You’re older? Oh my GOD!' Well, you are, too").

Then they claim the title of trailblazers, saying "there are not a lot of musicians that have actually really done beer." That's not entirely true—plenty have. A brief (and by no means exhaustive) study of prominent musicians who've had their own beers includes:

Motörhead, whose aptly titled Bastards Lager was said to be "distributed straight out of hell"—and, alas, only available in Europe. Kid Rock, whose Badass American Lager, OC Weekly reports, was distributed chiefly in Michigan until Michigan Brewing Company closed down in 2012. No word on its current status, but we doubt that Detroit's bankruptcy is a positive sign. Iron Maiden co-designed a beer called The Trooper, which is named after one of the band's own songs and carries a label featuring vocalist Bruce Dickinson's famous Union Jack flag.  Mumford & Sons, who recently helped create a craft beer, the Lewes Stopover Brew, to be sold exclusively at the Lewes music festival, which the band headlined. The Hold Steady's Craig Finn created a beer called Clear Heart in collaboration with English company Signature Brew, which frequently teams up with musicians to create their own beers. and many, many other artists (largely in the classic rock sphere) who've had beers inspired by or named after their music (though haven't necessarily had anything to do with it themselves), as chronicled by Flavorwire.

So there, Hanson. Don't flatter yourself—you're not so original in the jumping-from-music-to-beer sphere. 

But you'll always be the first to make a smash-hit chorus out of the lyrical refrain "Mmmbop, ba duba dop / Ba du bop, ba duba dop / Ba du bop, ba duba dop / Ba du," and nobody can ever take that from you.

       

Place Your Bets: Team Snowden vs. Team America

On Wednesday, Congressman and civil rights pioneer John Lewis became the latest public figure to throw his weight behind NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden, adding one more player to Team Snowden in the public opinion sideshow surrounding his story. As the list of opinions on the man behind the leaks grows — the supporters, detractors, and the neutral waiters — The Atlantic Wire began to wonder what the teams look like now. 

Turns out, there's enough for a soccer match. Meet your competitors:    

[image error]

Rep. John Lewis, civil rights hero

In an interview with the Guardian, Lewis said,  "In keeping with the philosophy and the discipline of non-violence, in keeping with the teaching of Henry David Thoreau and people like Gandhi and others, if you believe something that is not right, something is unjust, and you are willing to defy customs, traditions, bad laws, then you have a conscience. You have a right to defy those laws and be willing to pay the price. That is what we did." 

Anna Chapman, sexy Russian spy

Anna Chapman prompted a bit of international fan fiction after Snowden's flight to Moscow with the following tweet: 

Snowden, will you marry me?!

— Anna (@ChapmanAnna) July 3, 2013

Of course, Snowden himself has apparently said that he still misses his girlfriend.

Daniel Ellsberg, Pentagon Papers leaker

The leaker of the Pentagon papers has, unsurprisingly, praised Snowden's decision to release information into the world about the government's classified data collection programs. Ellsberg also thinks Snowden's decision to flee was correct: "I hope Snowden’s revelations will spark a movement to rescue our democracy, but he could not be part of that movement had he stayed here," he wrote. 

Americans

Americans consistently call Snowden a "whistleblower," as opposed to a traitor, in polling since the former contractor outed himself in the wake of the NSA leaks. According to Politico, the most recent whistleblower-traitor split is 55 percent to 34 percent. 

Rep. Justin Amash

Amash made himself famous with a (failed) amendment that would have defunded that NSA's phone metadata program. Of the leaker himself, the Republican cautioned his colleagues on denouncing Snowden: "He may be doing things overseas that we would find problematic, that we would find dangerous. We will find those facts out over time, but as far as Congress is concerned, he’s a whistleblower." 

Julian Assange, WikiLeaks founder

Obviously.

Evo Morales, re-routed head of state 

Bolivian President Evo Morales, one of a handful of leaders who indicated openness to offering Snowden asylum, was caught up in the Snowden sideshow after he claimed that his presidential plane was re-routed on its way home from Moscow due to fears that the whistleblower might be on board. 

Vladimir Putin, Russian President 

Russia's decision to grant Snowden a year of asylum speaks for itself. That decision, among other things, resulted in President Obama canceling a planned one-on-one meeting with Putin during the G-20 Summit in St. Petersburg (which Obama will still attend.)

Other NSA Whistleblowers 

As we've explained before, Snowden is far from the first whistleblower to call shenanigans on the NSA. Two of his predecessors, Thomas Drake and Mark Klein, have supported Snowden, hoping that this time the leaked information on what the U.S. is up to will stick. 

Ron Paul, libertarian brand-name 

Raul told Piers Morgan that Obama should send a "thank you letter” to Snowden for his leakage, adding, “When you have a dictatorship or an authoritarian government, truth becomes treasonous and this is what they do if you are a whistleblower or you're trying to tell the American people our country is destroying our rule of law or destroying our constitution, they turn it on and they say oh, you're committing treason. For somebody to tell the American people the truth is a heroic effort.”

Steve Wozniak, Apple co-founder

Wozniak told The Daily Beast that Snowden is a "hero," explaining, "He's a hero to my beliefs about how the Constitution should work. I don't think the NSA has done one thing valuable for us, in this whole ‘Prism’ regard, that couldn’t have been done by following the Constitution and doing it the old way."

[image error]

Dick Cheney, secret aficionado

Cheney called Snowden a "traitor" for his whistleblowing, which the former NSA contractor is wearing like a badge of honor. 

Someone in the Senate 

The IP address of a Wikipedia user who changed the word "dissident" to "traitor" in Snowden's entry on the site was traced back to the United States Senate. A Wikipedia editor noticed the change and restored it to its original form, explaining "Your recent edit to Edward Snowden seemed less than neutral to me, so I removed it for now."

Rep. Michele Bachmann 

Bachmann is not a fan of the NSA whistleblower for a number of reasons. While she's come out heavily in defense of the NSA spying programs themselves, the Representative isn't short on strong words for Snowden, either:  “It seems to me that the problem here is of an individual who worked within the system, who broke laws, and who chose to declassify highly sensitive, classified information,” Bachmann said. “It seems to me, that’s where our focus should be on how there could be a betrayal of trust and how a traitor could do something like this to the American people.”

Rep. Dutch Ruppersberger

Another congressional Snowden hater, Ruppersberger called Snowden a "traitor," adding, "Snowden turned his back on his country. In my opinion, based on what I do, he’s going to cost lives short-term and long-term. I believe he’s a traitor, and it really upsets me when I hear people say he’s a hero."

Rep. Mike Rogers 

Another member of the House of Representatives' anti-Snowden huddle on Team America, Rogers also called Snowden a traitor. "He should be punished to the fullest extent," Rogers said. 

Rep. Peter King

Peter King does not like Edward Snowden. He does not like the journalists who publish his leaks. He does not like his colleagues who praise his whistleblowing. "I think it is important for the American people to realize that this guy is a traitor, a defector, he’s not a hero,” King said of Snowden. Peter King may be Team America's biggest red card risk in this hypothetical matchup. 

John Bolton, 2016 presidential hopeful 

Former U.N. ambassador John Bolton called Snowden a "traitor," adding that he believes the whistleblower has "committed an act of war against the United States." 

Jeffrey Toobin, eloquent Snowden opponent 

The New Yorker's legal eagle called Snowden "a grandiose narcissist who deserves to be in prison." Toobin thinks that the NSA leaks were indiscriminate and therefore dangerous. He concluded, "in an act that speaks more to his ego than his conscience, he threw the secrets he knew up in the air —and trusted, somehow, that good would come of it. We all now have to hope that he’s right." 

Meet The Press, on behalf of Sunday talk shows

NBC's David Gregory joins Team America for the following question/accusation thrown at Glenn Greenwald: "To the extent that you have aided and abetted [Edward] Snowden, even in his current movements, why shouldn’t you, Mr. Greenwald, be charged with a crime?"  As we noted earlier, however, Gregory was just one of a handful of reporters picking up an anti-Snowden thread of questioning.  

John Boehner, Speaker of the House 

Boehner joined up with his Team America colleagues in the House with the following comment on Snowden to ABC: “He’s a traitor. The disclosure of this information puts Americans at risk.  It shows our adversaries what our capabilities are. And it’s a giant violation of the law.”

Dianne Feinstein, Democratic Senator

Over in the Senate, no one's earned a spot on Team America more than Feinstein (except for the anonymous Wikipedia editor, unless that's also Feinstein.) “I don’t look at this as being a whistleblower," she has said, "I think it’s an act of treason.”

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Barack Obama, President of the United States of America

The man under whose direction the NSA spying programs just keep on keepin' on declined to speculate on Snowden's character last night on Leno: "We don't know exactly what he did, except what he said on the Internet and it's important for me not to judge."

Rush Limbaugh

Of all the things to stay neutral on, Limbaugh, not known for taking his time before voicing an opinion, reflects some of the internal tension among Republicans on the Snowden question with his answer here: "I'm sitting here sort of undecided. Snerdley's been asking me, 'Do you think this guy ought to be tried for treason?' I don't know yet. I'm not gonna be hurried into judgment on this, because to me it matters who has this kind of information. It matters to me who's collecting it. It matters ideologically who they are."