Why us furrrners get upset at some US foreign policy etc

[Mysturji]

His choice of destinations so far has been... strange.
Apart from heading straight to Ecuador before spilling the beans, what would you suggest?

I'd start with a Congressman that wanted to make headlines and could afford protection.

You mean one of the ones who did nothing after learning that the head of the NSA lied to them?

[Gawdzilla Sama]

His choice of destinations so far has been... strange.
Apart from heading straight to Ecuador before spilling the beans, what would you suggest?

I'd start with a Congressman that wanted to make headlines and could afford protection.

You mean one of the ones who did nothing after learning that the head of the NSA lied to them?

Oh, yeah, that would be the ones.

[Mysturji]

His choice of destinations so far has been... strange.
Apart from heading straight to Ecuador before spilling the beans, what would you suggest?

I'd start with a Congressman that wanted to make headlines and could afford protection.

You mean one of the ones who did nothing after learning that the head of the NSA lied to them?

Oh, yeah, that would be the ones.

Have they done something? I haven't been checking the news much today.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

We have hundreds of Congressmen, and one of them would have run with this. A Republican Congressman wanting to make Obama look bad, for example.

My point here is that Snowden was clumsy and oafish in his outing of the material.

[Warren Dew]

However, it seems to me, and many others across the world, that some early warning signs of unthinking and arrogant use of power are here already, and should not be ignored as minor quibbles.

If you read my posts, or Seth's tirade against the Obama administration, you should see that it seems that way to many of us in the U.S. as well. You seem to be ignoring that, though, simply because Seth provides details that don't seem to be discernable overseas.

Warren is relatively reasonable here - at least he's not going the whole Sethian hog, and calling him a Marxist...

Yeah. Obama's a socialist.

As much as hollande is... the difference is that he did not take the label to get elected.

Thus far, Obama has not gone further in his socialist initiatives than Hollande has, and of course not all of Obama's initiatives have been successful. I can see how those overseas would see him as no more dangerous than a Hollande with a bigger country - and might consider Hollande more benign than he apparently is, what with his willingness to assist with the business of the Bolivian presidential plane.

There is, however, reasonable evidence that from a personal philosophical viewpoint, Obama really is a Marxist in the mold of Lenin and Stalin. He certainly was when he was in college, as evidenced by his writings at the time and his participation in and leadership of demonstrations in favor of repressive Soviet puppet regimes in the late 1970s. As president, he has also demonstrated a willingness to use secret police style tactics to achieve his ends, as evidenced by the use of the IRS to suppress political opposition, the willingness to attempt criminal sanctions against those who write adverse press reports, and the institution of the very surveillance mechanisms this thread is about.

The reason he can't yet publicly push beyond Hollande style policies is only because he hasn't managed to consolidate his hold over all the levers of power. With the loss of one house of Congress in 2010, and with the newfound willingness of the press to criticize his repressive measures, there's hope that he won't ever be able to. Given his refusal to admit that any of the things he's done is actually wrong, though, it seems likely he will keep trying.

Perhaps the reason this seems so unbelievable to Europeans is that they know from personal experience, either under National Socialism or Marxism, what happens when socialism is pushed too far. However, few Americans have personal experience with that, so the socialists here remain perfectly willing to push things as far as they can get away with.

[Warren Dew]

We have hundreds of Congressmen, and one of them would have run with this. A Republican Congressman wanting to make Obama look bad, for example.

At least one of them actually is running with this:

Rand Paul: Clapper Lied, Snowden Told the Truth

Senator Rand Paul told CNN yesterday that NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden will be historically viewed as a truth teller whereas Obama national security director James Clapper will be judged as a liar for telling Congress that the NSA was not spying on Americans.

“I would say that Mr. Snowden hasn’t lied to anyone,” Paul told CNN’s Candy Crowley. “He did break his oath of office, but part of his oath of office is to the Constitution, and he believes that, when James Clapper came in March, our national director of intelligence came and lied, that he [Snowden] was simply coming forward and telling the truth that your government was lying. This is a big concern of mine, because it makes me doubt the administration and their word to us when they talk to us, because they have now admitted they will lie to us if they think it is in the name of national security.”

http://www.infowars.com/rand-paul-clapp ... the-truth/

Snowden handled this in the only way that wouldn't be hushed up.

[Robert_S]

However, it seems to me, and many others across the world, that some early warning signs of unthinking and arrogant use of power are here already, and should not be ignored as minor quibbles.

If you read my posts, or Seth's tirade against the Obama administration, you should see that it seems that way to many of us in the U.S. as well. You seem to be ignoring that, though, simply because Seth provides details that don't seem to be discernable overseas.

Warren is relatively reasonable here - at least he's not going the whole Sethian hog, and calling him a Marxist...

Yeah. Obama's a socialist.

As much as hollande is... the difference is that he did not take the label to get elected.

Thus far, Obama has not gone further in his socialist initiatives than Hollande has, and of course not all of Obama's initiatives have been successful. I can see how those overseas would see him as no more dangerous than a Hollande with a bigger country - and might consider Hollande more benign than he apparently is, what with his willingness to assist with the business of the Bolivian presidential plane.

There is, however, reasonable evidence that from a personal philosophical viewpoint, Obama really is a Marxist in the mold of Lenin and Stalin. He certainly was when he was in college, as evidenced by his writings at the time and his participation in and leadership of demonstrations in favor of repressive Soviet puppet regimes in the late 1970s. As president, he has also demonstrated a willingness to use secret police style tactics to achieve his ends, as evidenced by the use of the IRS to suppress political opposition, the willingness to attempt criminal sanctions against those who write adverse press reports, and the institution of the very surveillance mechanisms this thread is about.

The reason he can't yet publicly push beyond Hollande style policies is only because he hasn't managed to consolidate his hold over all the levers of power. With the loss of one house of Congress in 2010, and with the newfound willingness of the press to criticize his repressive measures, there's hope that he won't ever be able to. Given his refusal to admit that any of the things he's done is actually wrong, though, it seems likely he will keep trying.

Perhaps the reason this seems so unbelievable to Europeans is that they know from personal experience, either under National Socialism or Marxism, what happens when socialism is pushed too far. However, few Americans have personal experience with that, so the socialists here remain perfectly willing to push things as far as they can get away with.

He's out again in 2016.

[Warren Dew]

He's out again in 2016.

Given the rising opposition, yes, likely. However, before all the scandals hit, there were trial balloons about removing the presidential term limit, or having Michelle Obama run in his place in 2016.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Snowden handled this in the only way that wouldn't be hushed up.

[Warren Dew]

The Cold War as a whole was much more morally justified than WWII. Much of Eastern Europe was freed from repression and the yoke was made lighter in Russia and China as well, without ceding vast swathes of the world to dictatorship, as we did in WWII.

Well, I didn't mean to include the USSR - which,although it took the brunt of the fighting, was first allied with the Nazis to carve up Europe between them, and only when things went against them did they change sides.

But the effort in Western Europe was relatively moral.

Now that we've watered it down to the 20% of WWII that was in Western Europe being only "relatively" moral, I'd agree with that - and it might apply to part of the war against Japan, too. However, even in Western Europe the war still involved highly immoral tactics such as the slaughter of 20,000 civilians in a single raid in the firebombing of Dresden.

It was during the Cold War that the USA took over from the UK to become number 1 installer of totalitarian dictators from Saddam to the Shah. It was in that period that the US adopted the vile Saudi regime and so on. Realpolitik takes you places that are very unsavoury.

Given how many Iranians greatly prefer the Shah to what has followed under the Iranians' own direction, I'd say that installing autocrats like the Shah compares favorably to the firebombing of Dresden from a moral standpoint. The cold war still compares well to WWII from a moral standpoint.

[Warren Dew]

No, he was a contract employee and wasn't required to swear any kind of oath. He very likely did have to sign a non-disclosure form, probably a DOD9918-A.

Snowden was previously a government employee. It's not clear that one's oath of office ends when the office ends.

[klr]

And now the (inevitable) revelation that those dastardly Frenchies are also into mass surveillance:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-23178284

Who's next?

[laklak]

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized

Which part of this is unclear? "papers and effects" - to me, in my unreconstructed, libertarian mind - would include my phone calls, emails and any other communication not specifically posted in a publicly accessible place. Back then they didn't have email or telephones, communications was handled by letter, so it's specifically mentioned. As are "effects", which has been held to include one's automobile, something they also didn't have. Any argument that the 4th does not apply to modern communications media is pure bullshit, like the argument that the 2nd only covers muzzle loading muskets. We need a Congress and Supreme Court with some cojones, to put the executive branch back in it's proper place. As far as I can see Rand Paul is the only one out there willing to take them on, more power to him, he's got my fucking vote.

[Warren Dew]

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized

Which part of this is unclear? "papers and effects" - to me, in my unreconstructed, libertarian mind - would include my phone calls, emails and any other communication not specifically posted in a publicly accessible place. Back then they didn't have email or telephones, communications was handled by letter, so it's specifically mentioned. As are "effects", which has been held to include one's automobile, something they also didn't have. Any argument that the 4th does not apply to modern communications media is pure bullshit, like the argument that the 2nd only covers muzzle loading muskets. We need a Congress and Supreme Court with some cojones, to put the executive branch back in it's proper place. As far as I can see Rand Paul is the only one out there willing to take them on, more power to him, he's got my fucking vote.

I certainly agree with you. However, the current legal interpretation is that things stored on a server are not protected. Email is only protected while it's in transit - before you've opened it - and not if it stays on a IMAP server after you opened it. Since almost everyone uses IMAP servers for receiving mail, the NSA can freely grab your email between the time you click on it to read it and the time you delete it.

Of course, if everyone would use strong client side encryption for their email, the email contents would be a nonproblem. Unfortunately, the big email providers seem unwilling to provide this service automatically. And, of course, metadata would still be available to the spooks.

[laklak]

Yes, and that needs to change. The fact that it's a public server should NOT mean the Feds can look at whatever they want. I'm not allowed to troll through an IMAP server reading people's email, why should they be able to do so without a warrant? One issued under probable cause and supported by oath or affirmation.

I have little hope it will change. The American public are imbecilic sheep, fools willing to trade their birthright for a pile of dross. In this case "dross" means the dubious promise of "security" against the terrorist hordes lurking under every bed. Public opinion polls have repeatedly shown they are willing to trade their Constitutional liberties to help fight the "war on terror" or the "war on drugs" or whatever other "war" the propagandists in D.C. come up with. On the whole they're stupid, ill-educated morons, more concerned with what Kimye is naming their latest mewling, puking cabbage or how to lose 20 pounds without doing anything at all. Like George Carline said - You know how stupid the average person is? Half of them are stupider then that.