Puppet Masters
In an op-ed for The Guardian, the newspaper that originally published his first leaks, Snowden said he asked about Russia's surveillence in order to push the conversation and Putin's response into the public dialogue.
"I expected that some would object to my participation in an annual forum that is largely comprised of softball questions to a leader unaccustomed to being challenged," he wrote. "But to me, the rare opportunity to lift a taboo on discussion of state surveillance before an audience that primarily views state media outweighed that risk. Moreover, I hoped that Putin's answer - whatever it was - would provide opportunities for serious journalists and civil society to push the discussion further."
They said it is hard to imagine that Snowden was not prompted and coached to pose his question about domestic surveillance in Russia to the country's leader.
And the answer he got in return, they said - that none of Russia's programs reached the size and scope of anything at the National Security Agency (NSA) - was most likely a lie.
"They've got him by the shorthairs," said James Lewis, director of the strategic technologies program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
"He knows from his NSA days that their surveillance system - their domestic surveillance system - puts ours to shame, and the fact that he's calling in with these questions, he's [got to be] sitting in the room with a guy with a gun."
Others suggested the pitch would be an easier sell for Snowden, who has not been shy about appearing in the spotlight in recent weeks, even while staying in Russia to avoid U.S. espionage charges.
"I know how all these conversations go with these guys," said Thomas Nichols, a professor at the Naval War College who has focused on Russia and national security issues.

An artist's rendering provided by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), on April 23, 2012 shows the Hypersonic Technology Vehicle (HVT-2) which failed just minutes into a test flight in 2011.
The test makes China the second country after the United States to conduct experimental flights with hypersonic vehicles, a technology that could allow armies to rapidly strike distant targets anywhere around the globe.
"We're aware of the test of the hypersonic vehicle but we are not commenting on it," said Lieutenant Colonel Jeff Pool, a Pentagon spokesman.
The flight was conducted on January 9 and the Chinese vehicle, dubbed the WU-14, is supposed to travel at Mach 10, or 10 times the speed of sound, according to a report in The Washington Free Beacon, an online publication.
The missile facility, based in the Outer Hebrides on Scotland's extreme west coast, was established in 1950 and employs around 200 staff.
Concerns have been raised locally over its future if Scotland chooses independence in an upcoming referendum.
But during a visit to the Isle of Lewis, First Minister Alex Salmond dismissed concerns claiming the facility would be even more important to the local economy if Scotland declared independence.
Two other pro-federalization protesters were injured, he said adding that protesters in neighboring Donetsk were preparing to transport the injured people from Slavyansk to the local hospitals.
Earlier reports said some 150 armed men from the radical Right Sector movement had arrived in Slavyansk to participate in the special operation against pro-federalization protesters.
"It's clear that the CIA director's presence in Kiev is much more than mere coincidence," Turbeville said.
"Despite the denials by the White House, it seems that Brennan's visit was an attempt to, at the very least, express support for a violent crackdown on pro-Russian protesters and militants in Eastern Ukraine. It is more likely, however, that Brennan's trip was an attempt to formulate, encourage and initiate that use of force," he added.
CIA Director John Brennan visited Ukraine over the weekend, information that was confirmed by White House Press Secretary Jay Carney on Monday, after being reported by media on Sunday.
Over the same weekend, Kiev authorities cracked down on pro-federalization protests in eastern Ukraine. Regime troops advanced toward a number of cities in eastern Ukraine Tuesday to attack the protesters.
"Brennan's appearance in Kiev just before the announcement of a violent crackdown in eastern Ukraine is just too timely to assume that it is a coincidence," Turbeville said.
"Brennan, who has been actively involved in arming insurgents in Libya, Syria and Venezuela, has a reputation for using thuggish tactics in pursuit of CIA goals," Wayne Madsen, an American investigative journalist told RIA Novosti.
The cuts form a large part of the savings demanded by the country's so-called €50bn "Responsibility Pact".
He said that the government plans to slice €10bn from the cost of health care and €11bn from pensions and social care by 2017 - but he vowed to maintain benefits for those with the lowest incomes, and said the minimum wage would not drop from it's current €9.43/hr level.
Family benefits, however, will be frozen until October 2015. This measure alone is expected to save the government between €2bn and €4bn.
Meanwhile, central government will have its spending cut by €18bn, while local councils will face cuts of €10bn.
Mr Valls took the unusual step of addressing the press after the Wednesday meeting of the Council of Ministers, a job usually reserved for a government spokesman.
In addition to this money, Zionists [adherents of "political Zionism," a movement to create a Jewish state in Palestine] had become influential in creating a fundraising umbrella organization, the United Jewish Appeal, in 1939[iii], giving them access to the organization's gargantuan financial resources: $14 million in 1941, $150 million by 1948. This was four times more than Americans contributed to the Red Cross and was the equivalent of approximately $1.5 billion today.[iv]
With its extraordinary funding, AZEC embarked on a campaign to target every sector of American society, ordering that local committees be set up in every Jewish community in the nation [for decades the larger majority of Jewish Americans had been either non-Zionists or actively anti-Zionist]. In the words of AZEC organizer Sy Kenen, it launched "a political and public relations offensive to capture the support of Congressmen, clergy, editors, professors, business and labor."[v]
Following the four-side meeting on the Ukrainian crisis in Geneva on Wednesday, John Kerry lashed out at a letter that was allegedly sent to Jewish citizens in Ukraine's eastern town of Donetsk, asking them to register and report all their property, or be stripped of citizenship and face expulsion.
"In year 2014, after all of the miles traveled in all the journey of history, this is not just intolerable, it's grotesque... beyond unacceptable," he stated.
Images of the letter have been circulating online.

Ukrainian border guards stand on guard at a base close to the Russian border near Donetsk April 15, 2014. Ukrainian armed forces on Tuesday launched a "special operation" against militiamen in the country's Russian speaking east, authorities said, recapturing a military airfield from pro-Moscow separatists.
The authorities in Kiev will use the army in order to prevent Russian troops from moving in as they did in Crimea, Turchynov said as he pledged amnesty to anyone laying down arms by Monday morning.
"The Security Council has made a decision to begin a large-scale anti-terrorist operation with participation of army forces," he said. "We're not going to allow Russia to repeat the Crimean scenario in Ukraine's east."













Comment: Just to add on the earlier influence of Zionism in the U.S. From Eric Walberg's "Postmodern Imperialism: Geopolitics and the Great Games":