Chuck Schumer's attacks on Snowden and Putin: an errand boy on a fools errand.

Watching New York Democratic senator Charles Schumer descend to the level of  Obama errand boy attacking Edward Snowden and then Russian president Vladmir Putin with infantile name calling that falls somewhere between mindless and idiotic has been an embarrassment both to Schumer,  the U.S, government and the Democratic party

Schumer's childish,even  embarrassing attacks on Russian president Vladmir Putin, first making silly threats to Putin for not agreeing to U.S. demands to turn over Snowden which Putin ignored, and  then even more  childish, descending to name calling after Russia granted Snowden asylum, has made Schumer an embarrassment for doing Obama's dirty work and for how he's done it.

Instead of sounding tough, Schumer, with every word approved by Obama, has made the United States not just look weak and foolish but look and sound like the old Soviet Union while making Russia look and sound like the United States. It is Putin who has come out of this episode looking noble and Obama, Schumer, Lindsay Graham and a host of others who come out looking like the bullies Schumer tried to ascribe to Putin.

The role reversals are something to behold. Someone inside government exposes massive and secret government spying on their own citizens and allies then  has to flee to another country to escape prosecution and is granted political asylum by another country while his home country makes loud threats against any country that would give him asylum, tries to use bully tactics to prevent it,  and pounds its fists publicly demanding "the traitor's" return to face prosecution. Only the country spying on its own citizens and allies  and demanding the return of the whistle blower who exposed it is the United States and the country granting political asylum to the whistle blower is Russia. Nice.

And throughout this Obama/NSA fiasco, the main spokesperson for Obama has been NY Democratic senator Chuck Schumer who seems to care more about making his own place at Obama's table than the civil liberties of Americans ( the ACLU has publicly described Obama's record on civil liberties as "disgusting".)

Schumer was the first to make ridiculous and empty threats against Putin, issuing warnings that fell on deaf ears,  if Putin didn't turn Snowden over to United States, threats that were as silly and childish and empty as they were ineffective since Putin just ignored them.

Why Schumer ( and by extension, Obama)  thought they could publicly strong arm Putin  and threaten him and that he would somehow curl up into a fetal position overcome with fear and remorse and turn over Snowden to the U.S. even when there is no extradition treaty and the U.S. took the same position Russia is now taking in similar incidents,  shows how silly and shallow Schumer and Obama's tactics and position were, how ineffective, how much they are on the wrong side of the issue and how badly they miscalculated.

Schumer had gone on Meet the Press a week ago and sounding more like Chuckie Schumer in the 3rd grade, accused Putin of being a "school yard bully"  for refusing to  return  Snowden. Since it was Putin who refused to give in to Obama's attempts at bully tactics, Schumer calling Putin a bully becomes something psychologists call projection.

Schumer is going to have a hard time finding any other world leaders, or even many at home who are going to support the idea that Putin granting Snowden asylum is an act of a bully. And when you cant find the right words to support your side of the argument its usually because you dont have a legitimate side of the argument to make.

 

 It's been Schumer whose been making all kinds of idiotic,  hollow, empty and above all,  bullying threats to Russia which predictably has fallen on deaf ears. Schumer almost laughably ignores that its been  Obama who's been doing the bullying, making threats to other countries who might have the gall to offer Snowden asylum, threats which also fell on deaf ears. And  wasn't it Obama who pressured European countries to refuse permission for the president of Bolivia's jet to fly over their territory because they thought it was carrying Snowden? A lot of people would call that bullying.

As if  all that wasn't embarrassing enough to the U.S., Schumer issued another statement a few days ago after the White House announced that Obama  was going to have an official pout and cancel a scheduled summit with Putin  in September. Schumer, using the same infantile rhetoric  he used before which achieved nothing said "Putin has been behaving like a school yard bully and doesn't deserve the respect a bilateral summit would have accorded him".

Why both Schumer and Obama think infantile trash talk will make them look noble leaves a lot of people shaking their heads.  For Schumer to publicly say Putin doesn't deserve respect for not caving in to demands on Snowden when it is well known that it is  Obama who does not have the respect of foreign leaders, has never been able to get any foreign leader to agree to a single proposal he has ever made, and has little respect here at home, even among Democrats,  not only makes Schumer's statement a diplomatic embarrassment and factually dishonest,  but  makes Schumer's childish talk sound more as if it is being offered for consumption by the senate colleagues he is trying to impress and to curry favor with Obama than anything Putin will  ever care about. 

 And given that Schumer has had nothing to say about the 205 members of the House of Representatives who voted to dismantle and junk the spy program Snowden revealed,  it adds to Schumer's resume as acting more as Obama's errand boy and a bully boy in his own right in trying to bully Snowden than someone speaking out of any conviction. It might eventually lead to the conclusion that it is Schumer  and Obama who doesn't deserve respect.

Schumer, as well as others criticizing Snowden seem oblivious to the fact that 67% of Americans have a negative view of the NSA spy program, James Sensenbrenner, author of the Patriot Act voted to get rid of it and said it was something he never intended, and Obama himself, talking out of both sides of his mouth, said he is open to making changes to the program, things that never would have been discussed had Snowden not,  as a matter of conscience , revealed the program.

 So on what grounds does Schumer and Obama demand Snowden's return for prosecution? If what Snowden did in revealing the program was criminally acting against the United States why is the House of Representatives on the verge of getting rid of the program he revealed on the grounds that it is overstepping the rights of American citizens? Why is the author of the Patriot Act on record as wanting to get rid of it? Why is the president talking about changing it?

This isn't the first time Schumer  has looked foolish in trying to pander politically.  He did it a few months ago during the gun legislation debate with his remarks on the second amendment in a sorry attempt at trying to gather conservative support for stricter background checks by trying to show he is "one of them".

His statement was, " I believe in a person's right to bear arms. I don't believe in the liberal view that the second amendment is about militias."

It actually is not the liberal view that says the second amendment is only about  the right of the states to have their own armed militias its the conservative view.  Which is why many conservative judges blasted the 5-4 decision by the five conservatives on the Supreme Court over their second amendment ruling, pointing out that it completely undermines the cornerstone of conservative jurisprudence which is the concept of Original Intent. It is also why former conservative Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, Warren Burger, appointed by Richard Nixon, wrote extensively on the fact that the second amendment has nothing at all to do with an individual right to own a gun.

Its the liberal view that says we don't have to apply the constitution based on the words the Founders actually meant at the time  but can make those words mean whatever we want them to mean today. The word "arms" didn't mean guns to the Framers. It meant everything and anything that can be used as military weapons ( as the word "arms" still means today). And the term " to bear arms" to the Framers who wrote it, didn't mean to own a gun or use one.  It meant to go to war and to wage war.  So Schumer not only showed he knows nothing about what the second amendment actually means, he showed in his effort to pander that he doesn't know conservative judicial philosophy from liberal.  Hopefully for the state of NY and for Democrats, Schumer will face a legitimate primary challenge by another Democrat, someone Democrats can be proud of as they are of Kirsten Gillebrand and  not the White House sycophant and errand boy Schumer has become.

MORE OBAMA HYPOCRISY:

The White House announced that Obama had met yesterday with the CEO's of Apple, Google, ATT&T and other companies and groups with concerns over the surveillence program exposed by Snowden, The White House statement on the meeting was:

"The meeting was part of an ongoing dialogue the president has called for on how to respect privacy while protecting national security".

Actually it was Snowden who called for that dialogue  since prior to exposing the government program it didnt occur to Obama to consider ways to respect the privacy of Americans while protecting national secuirty.And yet the person who forced this dialogue, Ed Snowden, is still a fugitive and wanted man.

Obama's hypocrisy ( and by extension everyone else in and out of government attacking Snowden) went one step further during Obama's press conference when Obama said:

"Given the history of abuse by governments its right to ask questions about surveillence particularly as technology is reshaping every aspect of our lives". Ed Snowden may have said it better but it seems that Snowden has made his point even while Obama, Schumer and others continue to attack him as a traitor and Putin for giving him asylum.