The source of the bombshell leaks about the U.S. government gathering information on billions of phone calls and Internet activities was an American employed as a contract worker for the National Security Agency, The Guardian newspaper, which broke the story, said Sunday.

The British newspaper has identified the source as 29-year-old Edward Snowden, who worked for defense contractor Booz Allen Hamilton and was a former technical assistant for the CIA.

The Washington Post followed the Guardian announcement by saying Snowden was the source for its surveillance stories that followed.

Snowden told The Post from Hong Kong, where he has been staying, that he now intends to ask for asylum from “any countries that believe in free speech and oppose the victimization of global privacy.”

In a nearly 13-minute video that accompanied The Guardian story Sunday, Snowden says he has no intentions of hiding because he has done nothing wrong.

“When you’re in positions of privileged access … . You recognize some of these things are actual abuses,” Snowden said about his decision to be a whistleblower. “Over time, you feel compelled to talk about it.”

The Guardian broke the story late Wednesday that the federal government was collecting phone call records from Verizon customers.

The paper and The Post followed with a series of reports about the calls being taken from other telecommunications companies and that the NSA and FBI have a Internet scouring program, code-named PRISM, that records Internet activities, all part of a post-9-11 effort to thwart terrorism.

Booz Allen said Sunday that Snowden was employed at the firm for less than three months and was assigned to a team in Hawaii.

“News reports that this individual has claimed to have leaked classified information are shocking, and if accurate, this action represents a grave violation of the code of conduct and core values of our firm,” Booz Allen said in a release. “We will work closely with our clients and authorities in their investigation of this matter.”

White House spokesman Josh Earnest said the Oval Office would not comment on Snowden before Monday.

The Office of the Director of National Intelligence declined to comment on Snowden’s disclosure, saying the issue has been referred to the Justice Department.

However, the agency said: “Any person who has a security clearance knows that he or she has an obligation to protect classified information and abide by the law.”

New York Republican Rep. Peter King, chairman of the Homeland Security Subcommittee on Counterintelligence and Terrorism and a member of the Select Committee on Intelligence, said: “If Edward Snowden did in fact leak the NSA data as he claims, the United States government must prosecute him to the fullest extent of the law and begin extradition proceedings at the earliest date. The United States must make it clear that no country should be granting this individual asylum. This is a matter of extraordinary consequence to American intelligence.”

Washington officials have acknowledged all branches of the federal government — Congress, the White House and federal courts — knew about the collection of data under the Patriot Act.

Still, the leaks have reopened the debate about privacy concerns versus heightened measure to protect against terrorist attacks. They also led the NSA to ask the Justice Department to conduct a criminal investigation.

Fox News confirmed the Obama administration took the first steps Saturday in a criminal investigation when officials filed a “crimes report.”

National Intelligence Director James Clapper has decried the leaks as reckless. And in the past days he has taken the rare step of declassifying some details about them to respond to media reports about counterterrorism techniques employed by the government.

“Disclosing information about the specific methods the government uses to collect communications can obviously give our enemies a ‘playbook’ of how to avoid detection,” Clapper said Saturday.

PRISM allows the federal government to tap directly into the servers of major U.S. Internet companies such as Google, Apple, Microsoft, Facebook and AOL, scooping out emails, video chats, instant messages and more to track foreign nationals who are suspected of terrorism or espionage.

The chief executives of Facebook and Google have said their companies were not aware the data grab.

Officials say the government is not listening to any of the billions of phone calls, only logging the numbers.

President Obama, Clapper and others also have said the programs are subject to strict supervision of a secret court.

Obama said Friday that the programs have made a difference in tracking terrorists and are not tantamount to “Big Brother.”

The president acknowledged the U.S. government is collecting reams of phone records, including phone numbers and the duration of calls, but said this does not include listening to calls or gathering the names of callers.

“You can’t have 100 percent security and also then have 100 percent privacy and zero inconvenience,” he said. “We’re going to have to make some choices as a society.”

However, the president said he welcomes a debate on that issue.

Snowden is quoted as saying that his “sole motive is to inform the public as to that which is done in their name and that which is done against them.”

The Guardian reported that Snowden was working in an NSA office in Hawaii when he copied the last of the documents he planned to disclose and told supervisors that he needed to be away for a few weeks to receive treatment for epilepsy.

Snowden is quoted as saying he chose Hong Kong because it has a “spirited commitment to free speech and the right of political dissent” and because he believed it was among the spots on the globes that could and would resist the dictates of the U.S. government.

Snowden is quoted as saying he hopes the publicity of the leaks will provide him some protection and that he sees asylum, perhaps in Iceland, as a possibility.

“I feel satisfied that this was all worth it. I have no regrets,” Snowden told the Guardian

Snowden was said to have worked on IT security for the CIA and by 2007 was stationed with diplomatic cover in Geneva, responsible for maintaining computer network security. That gave him clearance to a range of classified documents, according to the Guardian report.

“Much of what I saw in Geneva really disillusioned me about how my government functions and what its impact is in the world,” he says. “I realized that I was part of something that was doing far more harm than good.”

As we demonstrated in our article of May 16, 2012, True Champions of American Blacks, the Democratic Party has a long history of doing everything in its power to curtail the advancement of America’s minorities. This destructive assault is well documented in this video>.

What began as a decades-long violent opposition to American blacks and other ethnic and religious minorities (Germans, Italians, Catholics, Mormons, etc.) was eventually transformed into an exploitation campaign wherein blacks and other minorities were converted to a voting coalition with the sudden and wholesale “adoption” of them by the Democratic Party. Indeed, the same party that had blocked voting and civil rights acts fought for by the Republicans in Congress and the White House, now pretended to be the friends and advocates of minorities, promising them social and economic elevation and fulfillment of the American dream—in exchange for their votes and their autonomy.

As a direct result of Democratic policies, American blacks were immediately forced into lifetime welfare status and herded into ghettos called government housing. For decades our black brothers and sisters have endured an assault on their spirit that few could survive, and we have seen the results in cyclical poverty, tens of millions of abortions, the breakdown of the black American family, the wholesale dependency on drugs and alcohol, etc.

We saw a government sign the other day that explained to park visitors that by giving the bears handouts, it would make them dependent on handouts and destroy their ability to provide for themselves and to thrive. This sign was printed by the same government that has made an entire race of Americans entirely dependent on its handouts, and has re-enslaved them in the process.

“We liberals made a terrible mistake, going back 30 years ago. We made a dependent society because we thought we were doing the right thing. We had things like public housing, and we had welfare payments, and all that bred dependence.” Bob Beckel, Liberal Commentator.

So what has the Democratic Party done for American blacks and Hispanics lately?

Since Barack Hussein Obama and his Democrats entirely took over the government just 4 years ago, the average American family has lost 40% of its wealth and assets (worse for minorities), with 11 million family homes sinking into the quicksand of foreclosure during Obama’s tenure in office, and the rate climbing fast in 2012, much more of the remaining wealth will be destroyed by the time the next president takes the oath of office.

Since taking office Obama has seen the addition of over 6 million Americans to the poverty rolls, with those on food stamps doubling to 47 million, and unemployment averaging 9%–15.5% if you figure in those who have dropped off the rolls after their 99 weeks of benefits expired and they just gave up.

Which Americans are bearing the brunt of Obama’s socialist takeover? American minorities, of course.

Under Obama we are now suffering the highest, longest-running unemployment rate since the Great Depression. The average unemployment rate under George Bush was 5.2%, and candidate Obama blasted him for that number. President Obama promised Americans that if they would support his $900 billion spending stimulus package, unemployment would sink to less than 5.6%. As with every leftist promise, it was a lie.

Here are some real world numbers of the past 3.5 years that the president can’t spin:

• Women in poverty has skyrocketed to 17,000,000, up 800,000
• 7,500,000 women are in extreme poverty,
• 25% of Hispanic women are in poverty
• 2,500,000 women over 65 are in poverty
• Most of the job losses under Obama have been women (780,000), who have now left the workforce
• Official black unemployment rates are 14.4 (actually much higher)
• Official black youth unemployment rates are 40%
• Official Hispanic unemployment rates are 11 (actually much higher)

Every week the “New Jobs” reports come out, and with fanfare the administration announces a number like 80,000, which is actually a seasonally adjusted number, not reflective of the reality of the dismal job market, and most of which are mere temp jobs, not career positions with benefits. Those numbers are quietly downgraded every week, uncovered by the mainstream media.

What’s worse, is that population growth demands 200,000 new jobs, just to keep up with the expanding workforce. Obama’s tiresome whining that it is a republican economy, not his, is belied by George Bush’s low unemployment rates, not to mention Ronald Reagan’s million job a month growth at this point in his administration, in a much smaller population and following the horrific economic crash under President Carter and his Democrats.

American Blacks and Hispanics have been led down a dangerous path by the Pied Pipers of the left. Their only hope for a brighter future is to reject the new plantation bosses of the Democratic Party and to move to traditional American values and politics, which provide personal liberty and economic freedom for all.

PUBLIUS

The New York Times editorial board, which twice endorsed President Obama and has championed many planks of his agenda, on Thursday turned on the president over the government’s mass collection of phone data — saying the administration has “lost all credibility.”

The grey lady’s editorial section lately has shown frustration with the administration’s civil liberties record. It has criticized the escalation of the lethal drone program, and it lashed out after the Justice Department acknowledged seizing reporters’ phone records last month.

The report that the National Security Agency has been collecting phone records from millions of Verizon subscribers appeared to be the last straw.

An editorial published late Thursday said the administration was using the “same platitude” it uses in every case of overreach — that “terrorists are a real menace and you should just trust us.”

The editorial continued: “Those reassurances have never been persuasive — whether on secret warrants to scoop up a news agency’s phone records or secret orders to kill an American suspected of terrorism — especially coming from a president who once promised transparency and accountability. The administration has now lost all credibility.”

The editorial board claimed Obama “is proving the truism that the executive will use any power it is given and very likely abuse it.”

The language was a far cry from the Times’ Oct. 23, 2008, endorsement of then-candidate Obama. At the time, the Times praised Obama’s “cool head and sound judgment,” and said he was “putting real flesh on his early promises of hope and change.”

Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle voiced concern on Thursday about the records collection effort. It was first reported by The Guardian newspaper, which obtained a copy of a secret court order allowing the government to collect phone call information – though not monitor the calls themselves — directly from Verizon. Civil liberties-conscious lawmakers like Sen. Mark Udall, D-Colo., and Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., cried foul, as did the American Civil Liberties Union.

Lawmakers in the loop on the program tried to assuage concerns, however. Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., and Sen. Saxby Chambliss, R-Ga., who lead the Senate intelligence committee, defended the program as necessary to keep the country safe.

White House Deputy Press Secretary Josh Earnest also said there is “extensive oversight” on such activity.

“The order reprinted overnight does not allow the government to listen in on anyone’s telephone calls. The information acquired does not include the content of any communications or the name of any subscriber. It relates exclusively to call details, such as a telephone number or the length of a telephone call,” he said.

The Times editorial described this explanation as “lame” — “as though there would be the slightest difficulty in matching numbers to names.”

“Essentially, the administration is saying that without any individual suspicion of wrongdoing, the government is allowed to know who Americans are calling every time they make a phone call, for how long they talk and from where,” the Times editorial board wrote.

The Times editorial board has long opposed The Patriot Act, which was the legal basis for the records collection, and reiterated that opposition in light of the latest revelations.

But the law’s author, Rep. Jim Sensenbrenner, R-Wis., said Thursday that this application of the law was “never the intent.”

Published June 06, 2013 / FoxNews.com

There is a growing divide in the United States, as there is throughout the world, regarding the role of governments in economies.

Following the phenomenal success of “The American Experiment” of the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries, the world saw the rise of socialism in the early part of the Twentieth Century, when the economies of China and Russia were usurped by the mass murder of many millions of their citizens who owned or produced more than the bare minimum.

This “redistribution” of wealth was sold to the common people as “fairness,” and the Red Army was simultaneously forgiven its atrocities as the blood of millions stained the Eastern Hemisphere.

After World War II, less militaristic forms of socialism spread to the west, first in Europe, then to Banana Republics where dictators quickly rose to power on the backs of local revolutionaries they slew once “independence” was gained.

To understand Socialism, we should contrast it with its opposing economic system—Capitalism. Capitalism is a system where individuality reigns supreme, and independent persons utilize whatever resources they can develop, individually or in a voluntary aggregate, to generate the production of goods and services, which are sold to others who need them as an unhampered market requires. This is the system that catapulted America to world leadership in mere decades.

Socialism, on the other hand, is a system where government officials dictate every aspect of economic production and distribution. Government bureaucrats ascertain and determine what products will be produced, which services will be required, and which people will provide them. Socialism decries individualism, citing the accumulation of economic and social power into the hands of a few as a natural result of unbridled performance.

Socialism was proved a flawed system when those nations who had adopted it collapsed under their own weight, or as in the case of China, moved toward capitalism to save their faltering economies. The social impact on the citizens of those countries was much worse than the economic difficulties created by centralized control, however. The concentration of wealth and power under capitalism was eclipsed under socialism, where a mere handful dictated terms of life to the masses and lived like potentates compared with the working class.

Leftists in the U.S. have long eyed the wealth produced by America’s economic engine and have waged a hundred year war to siphon its prosperity off to socialistic programs. Indeed, power has shifted from the individual American to state and federal bureaucracies as individual liberties have been subordinated to government institutions through burdensome taxation and regulation. This loss of individual liberties has been accomplished in the name of “fairness” by the same methods employed in China and the U.S.S.R., only on a slower course.

President Barack Hussein Obama outlines in his own autobiographies his affinity with socialism, and his disdain for what he terms colonialists (essentially, America’s founders). He has surrounded himself with socialists and communists his entire life, including during his presidency. His open agenda has been to subordinate and nationalize large portions of the American economy, and his insatiable appetite for spending the money of his fellow Americans, present and future, knows no practical bounds.

Obama, and all of those on the left who fantasize about a socialistic utopia covering our once-great land, should take some lessons in reality from history—recent at that. Lacking the wisdom to do that, they should reconsider the sage words of U.K.’s former Prime Minister:

“The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people’s money.” ― Margaret Thatcher

PUBLIUS

In the eight months since Human Events and The Columbus Dispatch reported that several counties in the major Swing State have voter rolls that boast literally 110 percent voter registration, the Obama-Holder Justice Department has yet to investigate the widespread voter fraud that is occurring in particularly Left-leaning districts.

Human Events reported:

“In two counties, the number of registered voters actually exceeds the voting age population: Northwestern Ohio’s Wood County shows 109 registered voters for every 100 eligible, while in Lawrence County along the Ohio River it’s a mere 104 registered per 100 eligible.”

Human Events also said that, an additional “31 more counties report over 90 percent voter registration, which is a good 20 percent higher than the national average.” 

Furthermore, the Ohio Secretary of State, Jon Husted, said that he sent Attorney General Holder a letter in February of 2012, which warned him that “Common sense says that the odds of voter fraud increase the longer these ineligible voters are allowed to populate our rolls… I simply cannot accept that.”

Holder, nor anyone under his command, got back to the Secretary of State before the state turned Obama-Blue in November of 2012.  The Justice Department still has yet to respond.

Meanwhile, voter fraud continues to be a major issue in Ohio and around the country as a whole.

Human Events said that nationally, “The Pew Center for the States estimates about 24 million ineligible voter registrations, including more than 1.8 million dead people listed as voters; about 2.75 million with voter registrations in more than one state; and about 12 million voter records with incorrect addresses.”

While these numbers are staggering, what is even more shocking is that despite the Justice Department being made aware of these facts, Eric Holder still opposes a national requirement for voters to show ID in order to cast their ballot.

People have to present ID to cash a check, buy a beer, test drive a car, and sign their children out when they get picked up for day care.

Why does Eric Holder think casting a ballot to elect local, state, and national leaders is so much less significant?

By Joe Calandra Jr.

Congresswoman Michele Bachmann says she will not run for re-election in 2014, ending her tenure as the representative from Minnesota’s sixth congressional district after four terms.In a video released on her website early Wednesday, the Tea Party favorite says that, in her opinion, if presidents can only serve eight years that length of time is sufficient for her to serve in Congress.

Bachmann claims her decision was not influenced by concerns that she would not be re-elected, or by recent inquiries into her 2012 presidential campaign.

In January, a former Bachmann aide filed a complaint with the Federal Election Commission, claiming Bachmann made improper payments to an Iowa state senator who was the state chairman of her 2012 presidential run. The aide, Peter Waldron, also accused Bachmann of other FEC violations.

Bachmann says she considered not running again for her House seat in 2012 after her failed presidential bid, but felt another Republican candidate would not have enough time to adequately prepare for the race.

“I will continue to work overtime for the next 18 months in Congress defending the same constitutional conservative values we have worked so hard on together,” Bachmann says in the video.

Bachmann had given few clues she was considering leaving Congress. Her fundraising operation was churning out the regular pitches for the small-dollar donations that Bachmann corralled so well over the years, and she had an ad running on Twin Cities television talking about her role in opposing President Obama’s health law.

As for her plans beyond Congress, Bachmann said, “There is no future option or opportunity, be it directly in the political arena or otherwise, that I won’t be giving serious consideration if it can help save and protect our great nation.”

Published May 29, 2013 / FoxNews.com / The Associated Press contributed to this report

Newly uncovered court documents reveal the Justice Department seized records of several Fox News phone lines as part of a leak investigation — even listing a number that, according to one source, matches the home phone number of a reporter’s parents.

The seizure was ordered in addition to a court-approved search warrant for Fox News correspondent James Rosen’s personal emails. In the affidavit seeking that warrant, an FBI agent called Rosen a likely criminal “co-conspirator,” citing a wartime law called the Espionage Act.

Rosen was not charged, but his movements and conversations were tracked. A source close to the leak investigation confirmed to Fox News that the government obtained phone records for several numbers that match Fox News numbers out of the Washington bureau.

Further, the source confirmed to Fox News that one number listed matched the number for Rosen’s parents in Staten Island.

Rosen’s father, attorney Myron Rosen, told FoxNews.com he found the records seizure to be “downright ludicrous.”

“My son and his wife call us all the time, and we talk about grandchildren,” he said. “We don’t talk about nuclear proliferation.”

He continued: “The fact that they had our phone records, it shows how crazy they are, how desperate.”

The government began to push back Wednesday on some of the information circulating about the case. The office of U.S. Attorney Ronald Machen Jr., who is prosecuting the case, stressed in a statement Wednesday that his office “did not wiretap the phones of any reporter or news organization” or “monitor or track the phone calls of any reporter’s parents.”

“We take seriously our obligations to follow all applicable laws, federal regulations, and Department of Justice policies when grand jury subpoenas are issued for phone records of media organizations, and strive to strike the proper balance between the public’s interest in the free flow of information and the public’s interest in the protection of national security and the effective enforcement of our criminal laws,” the statement said.

Asked about the documents, White House Press Secretary Jay Carney told Fox News earlier that he “can’t comment on an ongoing criminal investigation.”

The documents filed in October 2011 appear to show exchanges that match the specific locations of Fox News’ White House, Pentagon, State Department and other operations. The last four digits of each of the phone numbers listed are redacted in the government filing.

Among the numbers listed were several that start with the area code and exchange, 202-824 — which is an area code and exchange for the Fox News Washington bureau.

The phone information was included in a long list of numbers, email addresses and other details that prosecutors shared with defense attorneys shortly after the alleged leaker was indicted. The document said the government had already obtained a trove of material from the defendant, Stephen Jin-Woo Kim, including his passport applications, State Department badge records, emails, computer and hard drive.

Click to read the documents.

Meanwhile, the White House Correspondents’ Association spoke out on incidents involving two news organizations. The Justice Department secretly obtained two months of phone records from the Associated Press and obtained a search warrant for the personal emails of Fox News’ James Rosen. The information about the phone records was uncovered Tuesday.

In the latter case, an FBI agent also claimed in an affidavit that Rosen was possibly a criminal “co-conspirator.”

Though no charges were brought against Rosen, the White House Correspondents’ Association said no journalist should even face that threat for doing their job.

“Reporters should never be threatened with prosecution for the simple act of doing their jobs,” the WHCA said in a statement Tuesday. “The problem is that in two recent cases, one involving Fox News’ James Rosen and the other focused on the Associated Press, serious questions have been raised about whether our government has gotten far too aggressive in its monitoring of reporters’ movements, phone records, and even personal email.”

The statement went on: “We do not know all of the facts in these cases, so we will just say this in general: Our country was founded on the principle of freedom of the press and nothing is more sacred to our profession. So we stand in strong solidarity with our colleagues who have been scrutinized. And in terms of the administration, ultimately what will matter more in all of these cases is action not words.”

Earlier, Carney said President Obama believes reporters shouldn’t be prosecuted for doing their jobs. The association said it agreed.

The WHCA’s board is led by Fox News’ Ed Henry.

The statement comes after court documents showed the Justice Department obtained a portfolio of information about Rosen’s conversations and visits to the State Department. This included a search warrant for his personal emails.

In an affidavit, an FBI agent claimed there’s evidence the Fox News correspondent broke the law, “at the very least, either as an aider, abettor and/or co-conspirator.”

Michael Clemente, Fox News’ executive vice president of news, defended Rosen in a statement issued Monday afternoon.

“We are outraged to learn today that James Rosen was named a criminal co-conspirator for simply doing his job as a reporter,” Clemente said. “In fact, it is downright chilling. We will unequivocally defend his right to operate as a member of what up until now has always been a free press.”

In the case involving Rosen, a government adviser was accused of leaking information after a 2009 story was published online which said North Korea planned to respond to looming U.N. sanctions with another nuclear test.

Rosen said Monday that “as a reporter, I always honor the confidentiality of my dealings with all of my sources.”

The Department of Justice said in a statement that “leaks of classified information to the press can pose a serious risk of harm to our national security and it is important that we pursue these matters using appropriate law enforcement tools.”

The U.S. attorney’s office for the District of Columbia also said the government, before seeking approval for the search warrant, “exhausted all reasonable non-media alternatives for collecting this evidence.”

Click for more from The New Yorker.

Published May 23, 2013 / FoxNews.com / Fox News’ Bret Baier and FoxNews.com’s Judson Berger contributed to this report.