They snubbed Assange a few years back, I wouldn't be all that surprised if they snubbed Snowden this year.

Actually, the runner up was Snowden. I heard the interview with the guy from Time this morning. The purpose of the prize is basically to highlight someone who made a big impact, not to judge whether they are good or bad.

You *want* a traitor to be MotY? Assange wasn't an American so I can't expect him to be held to the standards of an American spy who signed up for the top secret program then turned on his nation. I give Manning a pass before I give Snowden. He was a double agent. An American spy who is selling secrets to the Russians and the Chinese. The only distinction he should get is the first American executed for treason and espionage against America since the Rosenbergs.

Yes, I want to reward a "traitor." Lol...

@krellin - The I suppose Adolph should have been MotY. Or maybe Mussolini or Saddam or Osama in 2001. Can't say he didn't make a huge impact.

Draug - I think that is Time's philosophy, yes. I'm not saying I agree with it - just saying that is what the dude from Time said.

Wow. I know what magazine will never get my money. There must be a qualification of judgment or the worst terrorist or mass murderer would always qualify as having the biggest effect and be MotY.

Seems you are spot on with regards to their views...

From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time_Person_of_the_Year:

Time's Person of the Year 2001, immediately following the September 11, 2001 attacks, was New York City mayor Rudolph Giuliani, although the stated rules of selection, the individual or group of individuals who have had the biggest effect on the year's news, made Osama bin Laden a more likely choice. The issue that declared Giuliani the Person of the Year included an article that mentioned Time's earlier decision to elect the Ayatollah Khomeini and the 1999 rejection of Hitler as "Person of the Century". The article seemed to imply that Osama bin Laden was a stronger candidate than Giuliani, as Adolf Hitler was a stronger candidate than Albert Einstein. The selections were ultimately based on what the magazine describes as who they believed had a stronger influence on history and who represented either the year or the century the most. According to Time, Rudolph Giuliani was picked for symbolizing the American response to the September 11th attacks, and Albert Einstein picked for representing a century of scientific exploration and wonder.

I guess Time's MotY/PotY shouldn't be viewed as a recognition of positive influence, but merely that the recipient changed the world.

@Draug - yes, the PoTY is just the biggest news splash, basically. It's shocking that they didn't give it to Miley Cyrus, honestly.

Need we wonder any longer why Time, and so many of our once-great publications, are failing?

Time is a trash magazine. I like the Pope, though. If all Catholics were like him, we'd have a lot fewer problems.

So, like the Nobel Peace Prize, this is a joke. It doesn't recognize greatness, but change only.

No, it simply recognizes who a panel of old men with wicked mustaches thinks is beneficial to the world.

Hence why Miley Cyrus finished in the top 10.

abge - and you have jut pointed out the problem with the Catholic Church...instead of their actually being a consistent set of beliefs, there is an ever-changin

ever-changing doctrine established by whichever almost-dead guy they put the funny hat on. He's cool, sure...but he'll be dead by the time most Catholics come to believe what he does, by which time some new, random element of Catholicism will be making new proclamations from God. I never knew God was so inconsistent until I watched the Popes...

He's 76, he has time.

Snowden should have been recognized as MOTY.

I think it's similar to Obama's Peace Prize. Too soon. He hasn't had an impact yet.

Neither has Obama.

http://media.giphy.com/media/xs6FqhzEdWMZW/giphy.gif

Actually, I think Pope Francis has had an enormous impact on the Catholic Church already, and a huge revitalizing effect on Catholicism worldwide. I think he's a good Person of the Year

"You *want* a traitor to be MotY?"

The real traitors are Barry Soetero, George "W" Bush, and a good number of people who get paychecks from the federal government. Snowden is no more a traitor than Daniel Ellesberg, and there's no evidence he's sold anything to anyone.

Anyhoo, as for TIME itself, they proved their award was a joke with their 2001 selection and just about every one after that.

If Snowden is a traitor, your government is just as much a traitor. If Snowden is going to be charged, your government should be charged all the same.

@bo - It's your government too. But more to the point, the government as a whole can't be a traitor. The definition of traitor requires the actor to take action against the government. The government can't take action against itself, because it is doing what it wants itself to do.

It's not my government. I didn't sign for selective services :D

But they can still arrest me I guess, and if I refuse, I'll just pull a Dumbledore and teleport with my phoenix and then BOOOM fuck you all I'm gone.

OK, step away from the 'shrooms, bo. You've had *way* too many of them.

@Draug,

"It's your government too. But more to the point, the government as a whole can't be a traitor. The definition of traitor requires the actor to take action against the government."

No, actually treason requires action against the *country,* not its government. Please distinguish between the two.

Anyway, Snowden is no traitor. Here's the definition of treason from the US Constitution:

"Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort."

Neither Russia nor China is an enemy of the United States.

No, Draug, that's the normal me. I try to contain it here but sometimes my awesomeness slips.

@semck - Doesn't releasing classified documents to the entire world (including our enemies) constitute "adhering to [our] Enemies"?

@Draug,

No. The documents in question didn't help our enemies.

How do you know that? Just like Bradley Manning's case, have you seen and read every document he has released and do you know the contents of the ones he is still releasing on an ongoing basis?

@semck - as we almost weekly get new surprises out of the released document (Hey! Guess What?!?! They're spying on you in World of Warcraft!!!!), there is no way to assess whether the document have or have not caused harm.

I'm pretty damned sure our enemies wouldn't throw up the following Twitter post: "Just read documents, certain this will really hurt the Great Satan Mwa ha ha #jihad"

krellin,

Well, I used the past tense. Sure, something he released might accidentally help our enemies I suppose. But then, lots of actions might help our enemies tangentially -- even lots of illegal actions. That doesn't make them treason. You have to do more than give aid and comfort -- you have to adhere to them, which requires mens rea, and that is completely absent here.

So semck, you are somehow psychic and know every single thing he has sold to every organization that even the federal government doesn't know yet? Sorry, but he is a criminal selling secrets to foreign governments.

"So semck, you are somehow psychic and know every single thing he has sold to every organization that even the federal government doesn't know yet? Sorry, but he is a criminal selling secrets to foreign governments."

No, but you're the one making positive claims. So maybe you're the psychic? If you're claiming he's a traitor, you'd need actual positive evidence that he had deliberately given helpful secrets to actual enemies of the United States, not just make big talk and ask for proof that he's NOT a traitor. Otherwise, you're just blowing hot air -- and what a shock that would be.

I'm backing down from saying he is. But I'm also not saying he isn't. I'm saying, now, he may be and, either way, he is still in breach of confidentiality. If we were Britain, he'd have violated the official secrets act, but we don't technically have one of those.

He would indeed have violated that act, but legality =/= morality, especially when it comes to being inconvenient to those in power.

What he did was also immoral. He was a spy. He knew what he was getting into when he joined the "spy corps" of the CIA. Anybody who joins the CIA and doesn't expect to discover deep dark secrets should not join and sign a contract stating they won't reveal what the learn.

I have more sympathy for Bradley Manning than I do for Snowden. Snowden is the worst scum of the spy world. He is, effectively, an agent for a foreign power acting as an agent for us for a time. In other words, a double agent.

What if, because of the nature of social media basically allowing us to just gaze vapidly into the intricacies and appalling minutiae of each other's eyes, what if we are all, in fact, the NSA spying on each other...?