Film director Oliver Stone—who has made no secret of his liberal political views—called President Barack Obama a "snake" for his role in National Security Agency spying programs that have become, he said, more about silencing protestors than finding terrorists.
"Obama is a snake," Stone told an audience in Tokyo on Monday. "He's a snake. And we have to turn on him."
Film director Oliver Stone speaks before press in Tokyo on August 12, 2013. (Getty Images)
"The Boston Marathon, they were so busy tracking down potential protestors...that they missed the bombers," Stone told the Foreign Correspondents' Club of Japan. "It's never about terrorists, it always becomes about the way J. Edgar Hoover did it; he brought all the weight of government to bear against protestors. He didn't like protestors. He thought they were left-wing communists. He never could find the proof, but by the time the Vietnam War came around, as you know, 500,000 people were on the list, and they were being eavesdropped on. And where are we now? Same place."
Stone said that admitted NSA leaker Edward Snowden “is a hero to me. He sacrificed his well-being for the good of us all" and that Russia's Vladimir Putin did the right thing by granting Snowden asylum, according to PressTV.
"I’m proud of him for doing it,” Stone said of Putin and Russia. “We need more countries to stand up to the U.S.”
Stone also called Snowden a hero last month and said it’s “a disgrace that Obama is more concerned with hunting him down Snowden than reforming these George Bush-style eavesdropping techniques."
Last summer in the lead up to the 2012 Republican National Convention, Stone said he'd vote for Ron Paul over Obama if Paul secured the GOP nomination. Stone suggested that Paul was the “only one” who’s “saying anything intelligent about the future of the world.”
Relations between Russia and the U.S. have been frosty since the Snowden asylum decision, with Obama abruptly canceling a meeting with Putin, which was taken as a snub.
(H/T: PressTV)
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