Edward Snowden Reconsidered -- New York Review of Books

Final paragraph from an extensive Edward Snowden reality check:

"If there’s one thing Greenwald, Assange, and their followers got right, it’s that the United States became a tremendous economic and military power over the last seven decades. When it blunders in its foreign or domestic policy, the US has the capacity to do swift and unparalleled damage. The question then is whether this awesome power is better wielded by a liberal-democratic state in an arguably hypocritical way but with some restraint, or by an authoritarian one in a nakedly avowed way and with no restraint. In the five years since Snowden’s revelations, we have seen changes, particularly the election of Donald Trump with his undisguised admiration for strongmen, that compel us to imagine a possible authoritarian future for the United States. Democratic accountability, a system of checks and balances, and the rule of law may be imperfect measures but they look like our best hope for directing the American state’s power to humane ends. Previous failures are not a good reason to give up on this hope. Neither is faith in technology: it is a means; it doesn’t discriminate between ends. Technology is not going to save us. Edward Snowden is not our savior."

Edward Snowden Reconsidered -- New York Review of Books