Ecuadorian President Evo Morales was in Russia for some trade talks recently. Leaving the conference on July 2 (the report was posted on July 2, it was breaking news but it may have been July 1) the plan was to fly to Portugal and refuel in Portugal. But the government refused to allow Morales’ plane to land, citing reports that there was an unauthorized passenger on the plane, i.e., Edward Snowden. In addition, the government of France refused to allow Morales’ plane to take its planned route by flying over French airspace for the same reason.
This forced the pilot to make an emergency landing in Austria, where authorities took the opportunity to conduct a search of Morales’ plane, very much against Morales’ wishes. Without results. Snowden was not on the plane, say both the Ecuadorians and the Austrians.
Of course, everyone knows, despite official silence, that the source of those stories about Snowden was the US.
Huffington Post story on the incidents here.
So the US is left looking like an arrogant, clumsy, bullying doofus all to get Edward Snowden, whom Obama declared not importantenough to merit risking the ire of other countries to obtain less than a week earlier. Ecuador and several other Latin American countries are mad as hell at us, and I’m SURE that France, Portugal and Austria are enjoyed the role of American stooges that they’ve been pressed into, all for no result.
When I first encountered this story I was appalled at the level of arrogance it showed. And the stupidity: other reports say that Morales’ plane was never at the same airport in Russia that Snowden is hiding out in. This is the sort of thing I would have expected from George W. Bush and his administration of drooling retards, you know, the people who outed Valerie Plame as a CIA agent (endangering her entire network and destroying her effectiveness) over petty anger at something her husband did.
Yes, the Obama Administration has fallen that low, become as petty and arrogant and hypocritical as the Bush Administration, in one fell swoop. Because Obama was right when he lied that getting revenge on Snowden was not that important. But his administration’s actions show that they are willing to piss off much of Europe and South American to get revenge on Snowden. And they did it so stupidly!
Either Obama is a stupid lying hypocrite, or he is totally ineffectual as President, unable to control his State Department. I used to think he was a lot smarter than Bush, and that by extension his govenment would be run more intelligently than Bush’s, and for the most part, it has been, except in relation to the Wall Street moguls who own both his Administration and Congress. But this affair is right there in Dubya territory. Sad.