Letters: What to do about Edward Snowden

Re “Snowden lashes out from limbo,” July 2

It seems that the U.S. government has already convicted Edward Snowden by denying him the use of his passport and by obstructing the fundamental human right to seek asylum from prosecution.

The absence of any legal due process speaks volumes about how the government views itself — judge, jury and prosecutor — on any and all actions that may reveal the truth about its covert activities and schemes of privacy destruction, especially when they involve billions of dollars for its corporate subcontractors.

The pressures applied by the U.S. government on other nations’ leaders also seem to confirm American officials’ views of other countries as mere pawns in a global chess game of domination, in which sovereignty means little and can be trampled on whenever circumstances require it.

Luis Suarez-Villa

Irvine

If Snowden was indeed acting on principle when he leaked information on electronic surveillance by the National Security Agency, then why is he running and hiding? If his principles are so righteous, why not face the music?

Think of Martin Luther King Jr.’s principled civil disobedience. He accepted going to jail because he knew that his stance was morally superior and would, in the end, prevail.

Yet Snowden wants it both ways: to be hailed as some sort of hero while running from whatever lawful consequences await.

William Choslovsky

Chicago

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