When I saw this headline on an entry at Foreign Policy.Com, my interest was piqued:
The Biggest Foreign Policy Screw-Up of 2013
I thought: “This has got to be good considering all of the competition in the screw-up category”. I was surprised when I read that the author, Daniel W. Drezner, choose this adminstration’s handling the Edward Snowden affair as this year’s worse screw-up. Specifically, he was talking about a time six weeks after Snowden fled the country and was in Russia seeking asylum. That when the government, using its proxies: Portugal, Spain, France, and Italy to refuse to allow Bolivian President Evo Morales’ plane to land for refueling while on his way back from a conference in Russia. The suspicion was that Evo Morales was providing passage to Snowden to Bolivia where he would be granted asylum. The plane finally had to make an emergency landing in Austria.
I don’t know how much coverage this story got in the US, but down here where I live it was a very big story. After all, Evo Morales is a bought and paid for ally of this country where I live and the local news was full of anti-American rhetoric. This was one time I had to agree with that rhetoric. Messing with the plane of the president of a sovereign nation is a very big deal. But, that is not what I want to talk about today. Drezner point to another bit of fallout from this incident. It clearly demonstrated that this administration had been lying about the importance of the material stolen by Snowden. Just a couple of weeks earlier Obama’s favorite Liar-for-Hire, Susan Rice, said:
…the Obama administration was not weakened by Edward Snowden’s leaks, and that it was simply a difficult issue of the day.
Clearly, the US would not have forced the plane of Evo Morales to make an emergency landing, unless it really, really wanted to get its hands on Edward Snowden and the documents he had stolen.
One thing we have learned for sure about the Obama administration is that its words are not important but their actions are. And yesterday, as reported by Fox News, their words have caught-up with their actions on Edward Snowden:
The head of the National Security Agency task force assessing the effect of leaks by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden opened the door to the possibility of offering Snowden amnesty in exchange for documents — though his boss is not on board with the idea.
In an interview with CBS’ “60 Minutes,” Rick Ledgett said that Snowden took “the keys to the kingdom” when he left the U.S. earlier this year and was granted temporary asylum in Russia.
So, Snowden took “the keys to the kingdom“? I guess someone forgot to tell Susan Rice, right? And, now, this administration is willing to entertain “amnesty” for Snowden if he will return the NSA secrets he stole? What did the Keystone Cops at the NSA allow this low-level nobody to steal? According to Ledgett, Snowden has over 1.7 million documents that show what the NSA is trying to learn from their spying activities and where the gaps in their knowledge are.
Oops! That’s not the kind of information you want to fall into the wrong hands; like Russia, maybe? It sounds like our National Security Agency has a security problem. maybe they should hire a private security company to provide their security. UNBELIEVABLE!
So, was anyone fired for allow this security breach? Of course not. At least in the Obama administration, no one is ever fired for “screw-ups”.
The ATF screwed-up and allowed guns to walk into the hands of Mexico’s drug cartels. Was any one fired?
The State Department screwed-up the security in Benghazi, Libya, which got the Ambassador and three other Americans killed. Was any one fired?
The IRS was caught targeting conservative NGO’s. Was any one fired?
The so-called Justice Department was caught spying on news journalists. Was any one fired?
The HHS totally screwed-up the roll all of the biggest new social program (Obamacare) in 80 years. Was any one fired?
Your humble observer of the asylum we all have to live in has a suggestion. It’s time that We The People fired a few people. I’m thinking a good start would be to fire 435 Congress critters, 100 Senators, 1 president, and 9 Supreme Court Justices. Then we could get seious and start firing 100,000 or so bureaucrats.
Well, that’s what I’m thinking. What are your thoughts?
Asylum Watch 
And if snowden got the keys to the kingdom this easily, one can be sure there are others as well who got the keys long before he. Considering all the clearances given to everyone and anyone, the point is moot IMO.
They can’t protect their own security; but they want to spy on us for our own protection. 😦
The King’s retainer’s in the elite class of Federal employees NEVER get fired or otherwise have to show responsibility for their actions. Wouldn’t be fair. After all, they are experts. They know better than us. They have been to better schools. We need their expertise.
If only we stoooooopid peons would realize this.
This is one crazy asylum we’re living in, my friend.
Despite his rhetoric that people will be held accountable for their mistakes nobody ever is. It makes you think that Obama doesn’t feel as if these are mistakes, perhaps they are all part of his plan…..
They don’t even try to hide their disdain for us. To them, we are the enemy.
We can assume Russia does not have those keys yet. Sure, we can assume that. Snowden knows he’ll be struck by a bolt of lightning if he ever comes back.
A classic case of closing the barn doors after the horses are already gone.
Considering how much they screw up, Steve’s comment make a ton of sense.