<story><title>Edward Snowden nominated for Nobel peace prize</title><url>http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jan/29/edward-snowden-nominated-nobel-peace-prize</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>duaneb</author><text>I&amp;#x27;m not sure if either of them deserve the Nobel Peace Prize, but I believe Manning&amp;#x27;s sentence is reasonable. I&amp;#x27;d like to shake his hand, buy him a beer, thank him personally, but it&amp;#x27;s a decision he made that has severe consequences for a reason. And while I don&amp;#x27;t like Snowden at all, I think his actions are much more justifiable from an ethical point of view. It&amp;#x27;s not like terrorists were unaware the NSA was spying before they had proof—the only people being blindfolded were citizens. Manning&amp;#x27;s actions were more complex and the ramifications were less straightforwardly positive.</text></item><item><author>ck2</author><text>Everyone has already forgotten Pfc. Manning rotting away for 35 years.&lt;p&gt;I saw a &amp;quot;free Snowden&amp;quot; sign the other day which I thought was asinine.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>ck2</author><text>So by your standard, Martin Luther King Jr. should be getting out of prison just about now?&lt;p&gt;Manning was a whistlerblower, just like Snowden, with less power and ability for flight to defend themselves.&lt;p&gt;There was no personal gain ever intended or achieved, yet great personal loss even in the best outcome. They saw something very wrong happening and had little to no way to say &amp;quot;hey there are some incredibly powerful forces in this country doing some very evil things&amp;quot;.&lt;p&gt;The problem is we only treat whistleblowers like traitors legally and Manning&amp;#x27;s &amp;quot;trial&amp;quot; was a complete scam, zero media coverage allowed on purpose by the government so they could be railroaded.</text></comment>
<story><title>Edward Snowden nominated for Nobel peace prize</title><url>http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jan/29/edward-snowden-nominated-nobel-peace-prize</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>duaneb</author><text>I&amp;#x27;m not sure if either of them deserve the Nobel Peace Prize, but I believe Manning&amp;#x27;s sentence is reasonable. I&amp;#x27;d like to shake his hand, buy him a beer, thank him personally, but it&amp;#x27;s a decision he made that has severe consequences for a reason. And while I don&amp;#x27;t like Snowden at all, I think his actions are much more justifiable from an ethical point of view. It&amp;#x27;s not like terrorists were unaware the NSA was spying before they had proof—the only people being blindfolded were citizens. Manning&amp;#x27;s actions were more complex and the ramifications were less straightforwardly positive.</text></item><item><author>ck2</author><text>Everyone has already forgotten Pfc. Manning rotting away for 35 years.&lt;p&gt;I saw a &amp;quot;free Snowden&amp;quot; sign the other day which I thought was asinine.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>efdee</author><text>&amp;quot;I&amp;#x27;d like to shake his [sic] hand, buy him [sic] a beer, thank him [sic] personally&amp;quot;, &amp;quot;but I believe Manning&amp;#x27;s sentence [of 35 years in prison] is reasonable&amp;quot;.
My jaw dropped to the floor. Assuming that you want to thank her for doing that thing that landed her in prison, there is nothing you can say that can reconcile those two statements for me.</text></comment>