No Place to Hide: Edward Snowden, the NSA, and the U.S. Surveillance State Paperback – April 28, 2015

Deacon SolomonReviewerToday I saw an article on the website of Investigative Reporters and Editors. The headline asks: Should law enforcement tell the public about new surveillance tech?I didn't bother to read the article because my journalist's education makes the content plain enough. Other Americans may remember a time (as I do) when the proper response to such a question was "What the hell kind of a question is that? Are you stupid or just plain crazy?"Too bad: many Americans no longer think that way. Our vaunted 'Land of the Free' is presently peopled by a lot of paranoid wimps who depend on government to protect them from any person, any thing, and any idea that might possibly scare them for any conceivable reason.Government, naturally, gives them what they ask for (We live in a democracy, right?) while it dreams up more 'scary' things from which to protect them. In short, many Americans think blanket surveillance is a Good Thing - until comes the day (soon, I hope) when they find themselves strapped down on a waterboard because secret police saw them speaking with or reading a book written by someone Big Sam doesn't like.Luckily, there are still some Americans who don't believe blanket surveillance is a Good Thing. They don't believe government has any right to listen to our phone calls, record our emails, snoop in our medicine chests, send murder squads into our homes, or poke its nose into our body cavities at airports.Noting some disparity between those who like and those who don't like surveillance, an enterprising journalist named Glenn Greenwald has written a book he calls 'No Place to Hide: Edward Snowden, the NSA, and the U.S. Surveillance State'. Greenwald's book could reunite Americans - those who like being watched and those who don't - because it will scare the livin' crap out of everybody who reads it.Mr. Greenwald is what I call a good writer, by which I mean that 'No Place to Hide' is well-organized, and the author's prose is an easy read for being both coherent and lively.Greenwald's 'Introduction' tells how he got interested in surveillance: He once made a career of civil rights and constitutional law. He took up journalism (political blogging) in the first few years of this century, when, as a lawyer, he grew more and more aware that our country was being run by a lot of dangerous cranks. Shortly after Greenwald took up blogging, the 'New York Times' reported that President Bush II secretly ordered warrantless, blanket surveillance of Americans' electronic communications.That's how and why, for the next few years, Mr. Greenwald got a living reporting dirt on the Bushmen. As Heaven and the world both now know, the Bushmen had no dearth of dirt on which to report. Of course, Greenwald's criticism of government and especially the Bushmen put him in the way of counterattacks by government, by the Bushmen, and by the many human and institutional actors within journalism who defended the Bushmen and their vicious, idiotic policy initiatives.Greenwald knew he was making enemies. But little did he realize that his treatment of government-by-perfidious cranks and his disdain of mainstream journalism would bring him a reward - a scoop - as big or bigger than any journalist probably ever hoped for or thought possible.Speaking now of 'No Place to Hide' (NPTH), Chapter 1 is titled 'Contact.' There, Greenwald tells how he was first contacted by Edward Snowden, a person of whom neither Greenwald nor anybody else had heard at the time.Snowden acted anonymously when first approaching Greenwald. He assumed the (to me) laughably melodramatic moniker, 'Cincinnatus.' Too bad: Greenwald had never heard of 'Cincinnatus,' either.When Greenwald found the first 'Cincinnatus' message in his email inbox, he ignored it. Over the next few weeks he ignored several more, believing they came from some kind of a nut. So it was through a third party - journalist and documentary filmmaker Laura Poitrus - that Greenwald and Snowden finally started 'talking' via encrypted email. The rest of the chapter tells how the three of them finally found their way onto the same page and agreed to meet in Hong Kong, there to deal in smoking-hot, national-security documents.Chapter 2, 'Ten Days in Hong Kong,' tells Greenwad's version of what went on in Hong Kong, tells of how well and how carefully Snowden had organized and stored and closely kept the many tens of thousands of electronic documents.No sooner did they get the documents (all on thumb drives) from Snowden than Greenwald used them to write two stories for 'The Guardian,' the newspaper that had paid for Greenwald's Hong Kong 'vacation.' The stories splashed around and over Washington, D.C. for the next couple of weeks and predictably left those embarrassed by them howling 'Murder! Treason! Kill the Swine!' and screaming for investigations.How the documents changed hands is told. How they were divided up, for obvious reasons, is not made plain. Surely no one person carried the whole trove back to the States - or to Rio - or wherever they were taken. If one mule got arrested, everything would be lost.My own surmise is that the world will never know any of those who might have taken part in that escapade beyond the few Greenwald named in the book. Regardless, he and his did the deal with Snowden and filed two stories, and then beat it the hell out of there.Snowden was spirited away by some Chinese hoteliers and eventually ended - as the world knows - in Russia. The chapter ends with Greenwald in a television studio at an undisclosed location sweating under a nasty, on-camera grilling by noxious 'journalists' who host noxious, daytime TV 'news' shows called 'Morning Joe' and 'Today.'Chapter 3, titled 'Collect It All,' fingers the NSA for precisely what it is and all it hopes to be in the future. Nothing in Chapter 3 is pretty except Greenwald's own prose and his take-down of the sneaking, treasonous creeps that establishment journalism calls 'our leaders.' Beautiful, black-and-white reproductions of secret NSA documents are replete with handy NSA graphics. The documents and the graphics amply support every last accusations that lawyer Greenwald hurls at the agency. And yes: there are lots of accusations.Chapter 3 is NOT an indictment; it is a nuclear 'smart-bomb' and it hits the target squarely. Of the 5 chapters in NPTH, 'Collect It All' is the meatiest and most laborious read because it does the bulk of the heavy lifting.Chapter 4 discusses 'The Harm of Surveillance'. Author Greenwald's essay explains for readers the numerous ways that a surveillance state does damage to us as individuals, to democracy in America, and to the nation at large. If you're one of those who cannot understand why people such as Greenwald and this writer preach that government surveillance will yet be the ruin of us and of our country, Chapter 4 is for you. Folks who read History and other sentient beings already know such stuff.Finally, Chapter 5 is dubbed 'The Fourth Estate,' because that's where Greenwald takes his lawyer's rhetorical ax to the likes of David Gregory and Michael Kinsley, and other yahoo 'journalists' who in this, that, or the other mainstream venue do their cussed, pathetic best to tar-and-feather Greenwald's credibility. The author disposes of their arguments in ways that look easy because, when their arguments are cut wide open (as good lawyers like Greenwald can do) readers see there's nothing but a few cubic feet of hot ventosity in the heads of David Gregory, Michael Kinsley, and the rest.Considering the entire Greenwald-Snowden-NSA surveillance scandal, this review will now make a long, complex story as short as possible: Edward Snowden gave Glenn Greenwald a huge cache of top-secret documents, the sum of which prove beyond any doubt that if you use the telephone, the Internet, or any other electronic communication device for any purpose whatsoever, the NSA hears every word you say and sees every message you send.Summing up, every American had best depend on this one thing: every word you say on the telephone and every message you post on the Internet can and will be used against you if ever for any reason something you've said or done or borrowed from the library makes Big Sam or some of his friends sore at you. It's there; it's real; it's really there, and there it is.Americans are privileged (and encouraged by government) to stick their heads in the sand at any time they choose. Americans are also privileged to rue the day, the hour, the minute, the second they chose to do so.

No Place to Hide tackles a few things. Glenn Greenwald was one of the two people Edward Snowden (the NSA consultant who leaked the magnitude of governmental surveillance to the public) contacted when he decided he wanted to make his knowledge public. The magnitude of the leak will be remembered for a long time and the contents of the leak will probably be remembered for longer. No Place to Hide starts out with the story of how the author was contacted by Greenwald and their subsequent interaction, he tries to portray the character and intent of Snowden through his experiences with the man. We should all remember most people talking about Snowden have no personal experience with him and are purely self interested conjecture, so this insight is valuable. The author then moves onto the very large topic of government reach and the accountability of government and as well the way journalism was attacked and the freedom to report (in particular the author's experiences due to his involvement in the reporting) and the deep dangers of believing in a benevolent state and thus the excuses for the need for surveillance.The author begins by telling the story of how Snowden contacted him and how he didn't give it much of a second thought. The prerequisites for further engagement by the person contacting Greenwald was to install security software and being slightly less computer savvy, the author didn't end up doing as Snowden asked (at this point neither the identity, nor the information known by Snowden was known to the author). Greenwald then goes into how he got the Guardian on board, the magnitude of government espionage on basically everyone, how things progressed in HK and the legal challenges that the papers were concerned about when it came to actually publishing. It was fascinating and engaging and it is remarkable it is all true. The author then went into detailing from his access to all of Snowden's files what it is the government was spying on. Effectively it was everything; the author includes the presentation materials that were used within the NSA to describe the various programs that they were employing. The collaboration with various other governments was detailed as well as acts of US espionage on both countries and corporations. The author then moves into the ethics and politics of the whole situation. He argues strongly for the need of the "fourth state", which is effectively an independent press to keep the abuse of power by the state in check. He argues that the experience with Snowden and how he was attacked by both officials as well as other journalists with talk of litigation is incredibly worrisome as it is strong evidence that we are closer to a police state. He argues that even though the invasive nature of surveillance might not immediately concern people because they aren't doing anything wrong and thus aren't the supposed target of surveillance, the jurisdictional creep is worrisome and knowing that people are watching psychologically impacts freedom. The author argues strongly against passivity and that though there are imaginable benefits there are also direct costs to freedom.No Place to Hide serves several purposes with different levels of success. The authors auto biographical sections about his dealings with Snowden, his colleagues and other journalists is all really engaging and gives a great picture of how things unfolded in what was a landmark event. The authors discussion of the contents of the NSA programs and his outrage at some of their targeting and methods resonates less well. There are times when you are reading and getting upset along with the author only to then look and read the section that outrages him only to realize that its not nearly as aggregious as was first described. This happens numerous times. The authors discussion of why ever growing surveillance is a problem is definitely well thought out and argued. There is no question that even if surveillance can be portrayed as benign and in the interest of citizens it is an infringement on freedom and has been a step in the wrong direction for a decade. The surveillance that is being used is not preventing terrorism but authorities constantly use emotionally charged narratives to justify their position. There needs to be better oversight of government and its creep; the author does well to make the case for the need for accountability. I think this is interesting and good to read my only criticism is the author is not as even handed as he claims to be. The author does recognize that there are limits to the freedom of press (for example leaking the names and whereabouts of undercover agents) and yet he spends no time on what he perceives the appropriate boundaries to be for responsible reporting. All in all though this is a worthwhile read.

Si te interesa el tema de Snowden y sus filtraciones sobre el espionaje a todos los ciudadanos del mundo, este es el libro que debes comprar.El autor hace un detallado relato de cómo lo contacto Snowden, qué información le dio, en dónde y los problemas que enfrentaron para publicar los artículos, no ahonda tanto en los miles de archivos recibidos, pero si hace un resumen de ellos. Básicamente "no hay lugar donde esconderse" como dice el título.

He who reads this book, should also read "The Wikileaks Files."Both are excellent, all citations are substantiated by documents and very carefully researched.Unfortunately not given enough credit by the media, as only very few ones dare to mention them.The mainstream media is controlled by "Big Brother" with a few notable exceptions!

Clearly this book tells about why the ubiquitous surveillance is dangerous with the help of various analogies and examples which are clear and will definitely be able to change the opinion of novice people who don't know how dangerous mass surveillance is. Also , this book keeps you engaged and thrills you enough as if you were present with the characters in the book.

This book is a obligatory for anyone who cares what happens in the world. It shows the conflict between my privacy rights vs government duties over electronic surveillance. The case brought to light by Edward Snowden give us some sense of what the governments all around the world are doing behind our backs. It gives us some idea involving the press and the journalists and the government -establishment press vs adversary media. Learned a lot here. Highly recommended.

国家による個人情報収集プログラムについて、その暴露の過程を詳細にたどっています。