Permanent record DB97138
Snowden, Edward J. Reading time: 11 hours, 33 minutes.
Read by Holter Graham.
Social Sciences
Government and Politics
Bestsellers
The man known for revealing the US government's system of mass surveillance
recounts his role in building the system that he ultimately reported.
Discusses his life from his childhood in bucolic suburbs to the clandestine
CIA and NSA postings of his adulthood. Unrated. Commercial audiobook.
Bestseller. 2019.
This book appeared on Bookshare a few weeks ago and I downloaded it then. I
am so pleased that BARD is making the kinds of books available now, that I
once was only able to get from Bookshare, or from Audible, when I could
afford Audible. Because I've been listening to Democracy Now since 2006 and
have been reading material from a variety of websites for even longer, I
followed every step of Edward Snowden's story, from the time he contacted
Glenn Greenwald and met him and Laura Poitras in Hong Kong, until now. But
during all of that time, Snowden talked only about the effect on Americans,
of the NSA programs which he made public. He talked about his reasons for
doing what he did, about free speech, about the right to privacy, but he
never talked about himself. So what is special to me, about this book, is
that in it, Snowden tells his personal story. Like so many of the other
whistle blowers whom our government has imprisoned, whose lives it has
attempted to , and sometimes succeeded in ruining. Snowden is a patriot
individual who chose to serve his country, and who believed in the
principles that he had been taught, were American tradition. I'd list them,
but I'd probably forget one or two names and I'd hate to omit anyone. These
are all people who tended to be politically conservative. Some of them still
are. There's a new book by one of them, Jeffrey Ssterling, which is on
Bookshare, The Unwanted Spy. If you feel inclined, you might look at it.
But first, do read Ed Snowden's book, especially if you've been swayed by
all of the negative government propaganda regarding him.
Miriam
