{"id":3883,"date":"2013-12-19T21:08:38","date_gmt":"2013-12-20T04:08:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/myfutureamerica.org\/?p=3883"},"modified":"2013-12-19T21:12:07","modified_gmt":"2013-12-20T04:12:07","slug":"putin-i-envy-obama-because-he-can-spy-and-get-away-with-it","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/myfutureamerica.org\/?p=3883","title":{"rendered":"Putin: I envy Obama, because he can &#8216;spy&#8217; and get away with it"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>During an annual question-and-answer session with journalists, Putin praised Edward Snowden\u2019s actions, saying that he was working for a <em>\u201cnoble cause.\u201d<\/em> At the same time he accepted the importance of espionage programs in the fight against global terrorism, but said the NSA needed guidelines to limit its powers.<\/p>\n<p><em>\u201cThere is nothing to be upset about and nothing to be proud of, spying has always been and is one of the oldest professions,\u201d<\/em> said Putin.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/L_Jvb5cBfiE\" frameborder=\"0\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Referring to the vast amounts of metadata gathered on citizens by the NSA, Putin said it is impossible to sift through all of that information. It is <em>\u201cuseless\u201d<\/em> to look at the analysis of spy agencies because it is the opinion of analysts and not facts and as such can be misleading.<\/p>\n<p><em>\u201cYou need to know the people who analyze them, I know, I did it,\u201d<\/em> said Putin, harking back to his career as a KGB agent.<\/p>\n<p>The Russian president described Snowden as a <em>\u201ccurious character\u201d<\/em> and said it was not clear why the former CIA contractor had decided to blow the whistle on the NSA\u2019s international espionage program at such a young age.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Russia is not working with Snowden and has not received classified documents from him, Putin said. The whistleblower has been allowed to reside in Russia but only on the condition he does not <em>\u201cengage in anti-American propaganda.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Snowden fled to Russia from Hong Kong back in June after leaking a trove of classified information on Washington\u2019s espionage activities. He disseminated the documents to international media outlets who published them in articles blowing the whistle on the NSA\u2019s espionage activities.<\/p>\n<p>The spy revelations triggered massive diplomatic backlash and have had an adverse effect on the Obama administration\u2019s foreign policy. Europe in particular reacted angrily after it was found that the NSA had been monitoring high-ranking political figures, including German Chancellor Angela Merkel.<\/p>\n<p>The European Parliament\u2019s Committee on Civil Liberties and Home Affairs met Wednesday to discuss what action the EU should take in the wake of the spy revelations. Glenn Greenwald, the former Guardian journalist renowned for publishing Edward Snowden\u2019s leaks, testified at the meeting. Greenwald claimed that the NSA\u2019s activities had nothing to do with the fight against terrorism and are instead aimed at the elimination of privacy worldwide.<\/p>\n<p><em>\u201cWhat a lot of this spying is about has nothing to do with terrorism and national security. That is the pretext. It is about diplomatic manipulation and economic advantage,\u201d<\/em> said Greenwald.<\/p>\n<p>In the wake of the spy scandal Washington has defended the NSA, saying their work has foiled over 50 terror plots in the US and EU.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/rt.com\/news\/putin-snowden-press-conference-487\/\" target=\"_blank\">RT<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>During an annual question-and-answer session with journalists, Putin praised Edward Snowden\u2019s actions, saying that he was working for a \u201cnoble cause.\u201d At the same time he accepted the importance of espionage programs in the fight against global terrorism, but said the NSA needed guidelines to limit its powers. \u201cThere is nothing to be upset about [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3889,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[97,104],"tags":[185,190,186,179,166,141,116,140,159],"class_list":["post-3883","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-democracy","category-featured","tag-human-rights","tag-information-technology","tag-intelligence","tag-internet","tag-law","tag-politics","tag-putin","tag-russia-2","tag-security"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/myfutureamerica.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/12\/putin-10.si_.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2SfUR-10D","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/myfutureamerica.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3883","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/myfutureamerica.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/myfutureamerica.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/myfutureamerica.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/myfutureamerica.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3883"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/myfutureamerica.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3883\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3888,"href":"https:\/\/myfutureamerica.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3883\/revisions\/3888"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/myfutureamerica.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/3889"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/myfutureamerica.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3883"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/myfutureamerica.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3883"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/myfutureamerica.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3883"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}