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Snowden Granted One-Year Asylum In Russia
New submitter kc9jud writes "The BBC is reporting that NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden has been granted temporary asylum in Russia. According to his lawyer, Snowden has received the necessary papers to leave the transit zone at Sheremetyevo Airport in Moscow, and the airport press office is reporting that Snowden left the airport at 14:00 local time (10:00 GMT). A tweet from Wikileaks indicates that Snowden has been granted temporary asylum and may stay in the Russian Federation for up to one year."
Reader Cenan adds links to coverage at CNN, and other readers have pointed out versions of the story at Reuters and CBS.
Guess that gives him 1 year to plan and execute his trip to South America.
...aaaaaaaaaaand he's gone. Hopefully out of reach of all repressive regimes, including the USA.
http://news.slashdot.org/story/13/07/25/2135207/us-lawmakers-want-sanctions-on-any-country-taking-in-snowden
^_^
He'd better be careful. If he waits a few more months, he'll be snowed-in and unable to leave at all.
Since the CIA can't outright shoot him, they'll just alter a few videos to make it look like he's gay in Russia.
I'll think of it as forever.
But seriously. Think back a quarter century and ponder what someone would have said if you told him that a US citizen flees to Russia to beg for asylum because he's being prosecuted for telling the truth...
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
I'm not sure if you're trolling, since I've seen posts of this ilk that are completely serious...
Anyway, I'll take the bait -- the NSA can read your "private communications": http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/jul/31/nsa-top-secret-program-online-data
It's not the government's right to know. Yeah your email goes through a service provider.. and they could theoretically track it.. the admins could read it.. sure and they probably do.. But they are not the government. I think you are trolling, but it's possible you are just insane.
"There may be a time where it would be constructive to try and meet and ... resolve this in a way that honors due process and the highest principles of fairness and civilization,"
Seems resolved to me. What remains to be sorted out:
* who is accountable for all of the laws broken by the NSA
* what programs they still have in place which are illegal
* when these illegal programs will be terminated
Let's not forget, if the NSA/US had followed the letter of the law, Snowden's claims would have been pointless.
Join the Slashcott! Feb 10 thru Feb 17!
He would be thrown incommunicado into a U.S. prison and never let out again if he ever came back here. We all know his trial would just be a show trial.
The cow says "Moo." The dog says "Woof." The Timothy says "Thanks, valued customer. We appreciate your input."
That is because the Democratic party is vastly different from your dearly beloved Republican party.
I can tell, because in addition to the end of secret courts and the rest of the Patriot Act, Guantanamo closed, we left Iraq on the Bush timetable, and drone strikes have ceased.
Or did you think the Republicans were going to pass socialized health-care?
You mean like the Medicare Part D that was passed by a Republican House, Senate, and President? You are right, that would never happen.
Otherwise, it goes a bit too far, but is a pretty solid troll.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
Back then many of us were naive enough to believe the U.S. propaganda. But that didn't make it true, even then. Looking back, I realize that most of the "U.S. is so free, Soviet Union is so repressive" canards that I grew up on were mostly bullshit. The U.S. was never nearly so free or noble as it pretended, even in its heyday. All these post-911 revelations have done is just highlighted the hypocrisy.
Looking back, I realize that most of the "U.S. is so free, Soviet Union is so repressive" canards that I grew up on were mostly bullshit. The U.S. was never nearly so free or noble as it pretended, even in its heyday.
While that's true, it's also never been so heinous (for the bulk of its citizens) as Russia. We may well be wending that way now; it certainly does appear so.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
The 1 year asylum means they get to pump him for information for the next year and have an exclusive on any information he produces. What information he has is perishable and the US public will forget about this and he will be useless to the Russians by then. They will then decide not to grant permanent asylum and expel him from Russia. He will be right back where he is now but with no spotlight to protect him and a pile of useless information.
Then go Green, it's all the good parts of libertarianism, without the economic extremism.
What changed under Obama? Nothing Good
My first thoughts exactly. Who'd have thought, after just a few short decades, that the tables would be so profoundly turned? Not that Russia is any shining beacon of democracy and civility, but the fact that someone must seek asylum from the United States, in Russia of all places, is quite telling.
By insisting that they be able to pay people whatever the market will bear rather than a living wage, libertarians are insisting that they should be able to keep slaves.
Behold the left-wing argument, complete with no substance yet full of appeal-to-emotion bullshit like "living wage" and "slavery."
This is an appeal to people to hate the Libertarians. More hate from the left, and ironically the one thing this man didn't quote from the person he replied to was about the intolerance and hate of the left-wing.
Exactly.
"His name was James Damore."
You are deeply wrong and your understanding of privacy is very one dimensional.
Consider walking somewhere in New York city. You will be 'seen' by potentially thousands of people but noticed by none. Ask them 5 minutes later and show them a picture of you and you'll get no useful information. Yet you were in 'public' and were seen many times over. That is the privacy of being lost in a crowd that you can have even in a public space.
That privacy can be violated by following a specific person or (in the case of the NSA) by following everyone such that later you can know where the person came from and where they went.
I run a router in the internet. yes, I can see your IP headers. I could see yoiur email headers but I don't look. I know not who you are and I don't bother to do reverse lookups on the IP addresses. I don't care. I don't store that information. I don't care about it. You have the privacy of being anonymous in a crowd.
Ask me tomorrow if I saw any packets going to 192.168.201.192 and I won't be able to tell you one way or another.
So sorry, but as much as I would like to believe the Democrats are still fundamentally different from the neocons, I'm having a hard time buying it. I wish they were. I hoped they were.At this point, an old-school Republican like Eisenhower better reflects the will of a liberal than the current Democratic party. (I said Better, not necessarily well)
I'd like to see more actions against little brother (the corporate version of big brother) and big brother. I would like to see REAL healthcare reform, not an insurance mandate originally authored by the Republican opposition. I'd like to see the corruption swept out and abominations like NSA, TSA, DHS, and DEA disbanded.
Signed, a disgruntled left leaning libertarian.
What illegal activity has Snowden actually revealed? The leaked slides I've read so far indicate the NSA are:
Can someone please calmly and rationally clarify or illuminate evidence which suggests or proves the NSA are doing anything nefarious (e.g., hacking into personal computers, tapping databases containing private information, installing key loggers) with their alleged spying activities?
The excitement and emotion around this issue are running high, generating noise that drowns out sane analysis. If I go onto a crowded street and speak loudly, I can't complain if others overhear. Likewise, if I send information across a public network that's not encrypted, I can't complain if it gets intercepted. Nor can I bemoan the loss of privacy if I put private information in the hands of a third party that I don't trust.
Privacy only exists when protected. Lock it away, encrypt it, or take some measure to safeguard anything you consider sensitive. Otherwise, consider anything you put out in the open fair game for others to use.
I'm sorry, which programs were illegal and which laws were broken? I'm sure you missed the news that these laws were written and passed by the House and Senate, funded by same, and just recently re-affirmed in the House.
See, that's the thing about "laws" - they're written by the legislature and confirmed by the executive branch. Unless and until the judicial branch finds them to be technically inadequate or violating the constitution, they ARE the law. It's how a representative democracy works. Or would you rather have a dictatorship, a monarchy? Perhaps you hold up Russia as a shining light of transparency, liberty, and justice?
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
The first sentence of my post only contained five words....
Please wake up yourself and READ them.
Secure messaging: http://quickmsg.vreeken.net/
See, the funny thing about a constitutional republic is that the legislature, executive branch, and judiciary do not have the authority to exceed nor violate that constitution. They have the ability to do so, but authority? Not even remotely.
In SOVIET RUSSIA... erm...NSA AMERICA, the Internet logs onto YOU!
That said, I'm just going to note here that the bill to strip the NSA of these powers was supported by more democrats that republicans -- but the split was by no means a party-line vote. Here, left-right is not a good identifier. I
I'm definitely on the side that thinks the NSA program amounts to a general warrant, and is therefore unconstitutional no matter what FISA says about it.
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.
4th Amendment to the United States Constitution.
-GiH
You mean like the Medicare Part D that was passed by a Republican House, Senate, and President? You are right, that would never happen.
Medicare Part-D isn't healthcare, its a funnel for pouring cash from the federal coffers into the accounts of insurance companies - and very little more than that.
The major problem we have is the third party doctrine, which says you lose 4th amendment protection when you share info with a 3d party because you then have no reasonable expectation of privacy.
But that isn't really true. People share info with 3d parties all the time and expect and demand that information be kept confidential. It really is impossible to participate in the modern world without engaging in such transactions. But the Supreme Court has just gone off the rails on the notion that once you do this, you have no expectation of privacy.
If that theory was really the case, people wouldn't freak out when their email accounts get hacked and people snoop on their mail. People wouldn't go to jail for doing that. People would walk down the street handing out their credit card to everyone they meet. People wouldn't make their facebook pages private ... on and on.
There needs to be legislation that destroys this 3d party doctrine exception to the 4th amendment. The underpinning of all these NSA programs, is that piece of warped Supreme Court logic.
What changed under Obama? Nothing Good
Well, Bill Haywood is sort of an example.
"It's such a fine line between stupid and clever" -- David St. Hubbins, Spinal Tap
I know, if I would not have beleived that when I was a kid. Either things are changing, or my brainwashing is slowly wearing down.
Things are definitely changing in many ways. Certainly the USA is getting a bit scary in the level of monitoring. However I don't think that's the thing that changed here. Remember though what was done to Charlie Chaplin and company. Snowdon is hardly the first US dissident.
What's new about this is the total level of apparent visible incompetence involved. The fundamental rule of being Russia and China is "never do anything you don't want to do if the USA states openly that you you have to do it". Their entire world power comes from the feeling of other countries that if you have one or both of them your side then you may be able to stand up to the USA and do what you want in your own country. The moment American politicians started threatening Russia and China about asylum there was nothing they could do to avoid helping him. Even weirder because think if the dissidents which the US embassy helps in China and used to help in the USSR.
Given everybody knows this, then the main thing was to get to him in Hong Kong and promise safe passage to a friendly neutral country like Iceland where there would be a chance to limit leakage of damaging material that didn't show illegal activity. They could probably wait a few years, give him an offer of a plea bargain (20 years?) and have the Icelandic winter drive him home. Why the hell drive him to Russia, the country most likely to know what to do with whatever secret information he has?
=~ s,(.*),<sarcasm>$1</sarcasm>,g if any_point_you_wish();
No you and parent still don't get it.
And your selective quoting is a big hint.
I never said that Russia looks better as a whole. (Re-read those first five words again, better yet do it a few tims).
As for the sentence you qouted: it also contained the words 'IN THIS CASE' which you conveniently left out.
To make it a little bit easier for those who still don't get it:
-Russia bad
-Russia looking better than US in regard to Snowden.
Secure messaging: http://quickmsg.vreeken.net/
Sir, I'd give you +5 on your Trollship skills. If there have ever been a wonderful homeland of Trolls, for example The Kingdom of Trollistan, you would no doubt be its emperor.
Except that by asking him to do something illegal, the NSA invalidated their own contract. Under U.S. law no contract may require a person to commit an illegal act, nor may it prevent them from reporting a criminal act so long as they have first attempted to report the criminal activity using internal policies. As long as Snowden tried to get his bosses to stop the illegal wiretapping and reported their actions to his supervisor, he should be protected under us whistleblower protection laws.
That said, this is the NSA, and they seem not to care about the law. Running away is smart, to keep them from doing something illegal to punish him for reporting the OTHER illegal things they did.
You joke, but the military is very quick and free to trot that idea out. "He did it because he is gay" as if being gay makes a person more likely to leak information, I mean, commit treason. Some of Bradley Manning's posts I ran across would seem to show he might indeed be gay. Then it occured to me those posts might be fakes.
The 1989 gun turret explosion on the USS Iowa was a classic. The navy put out this ridiculous hypothesis that Clayton Hartwig, a sailor who died in the disaster, was gay and so sexually frustrated that he was suicidal and deliberately caused the explosion. Under pressure, the navy dropped the gay part but clung on to the idea Hartwig was suicidal and did it on purpose. As the disaster was investigated further, it became even more painfully obvious that the navy was doing a cover up. The real reason was that they were using experimental mixings of explosives that if not rammed slowly could prematurely detonate. Strangest was that the officer the navy picked to lead the investigation was the same guy who made the experimental mix.
And remember, some of the most radical social conservatives advanced this absurd notion that 9/11 happened because America is too tolerant of homosexuality. Just the other day I stopped in at my insurance agent's office and heard Limbaugh on their radio, ranting about the possibility that Trayvon Martin might have been gay and tried to sexually assault Zimmerman. I don't expect any better of those retards, but we should have smarter military leaders than that. No General Boykins! May be hard to do. I suppose a military career is attractive to simpletons who think force is a good answer to most problems.
Intellectual Property is a monopolistic, selfish, and defective concept. It is "tyranny over the mind of man"
Democrats /= Left, Republicans /= Right. Parties are not constants - they are groups of people and their ideologies shift over time. The Republicans of the 50s and 60s were consumed by the southern democrats, there has been a complete flip in party politics over the last one-hundred years.
Wrong! It has not been a flip, it's been a take over. There is no longer a left or right, or Democrat and Republican. It's one team that plays on people's desire to still believe a left-right paradigm exists.
All you have to do to validate my claims is to look at politician's records. Obama promised hope and change, and is a Democrat. Name something pertinent that was done differently than Bush. Go ahead and look, but outside of lies and fabrications you won't find anything. The Patriot act was strengthened, not dismantled. Gitmo was not closed, it's still used to torture people. A Presidential "Hit List" was made public, if the guy was anti-war it would not exist or would not have required a whistle blower. War in the middle east has been extended, not ended (Libya, Syria, Egypt, etc...). Surveillance has increased and the executive branch has attacked whistle blowers on a massive scale. I could go on, but believe I have shown my point to be more than valid.
The people in power are currently doing everything possible to keep you from looking at them. They push atheism vs. religion, ethnic hatred, gay vs. straight, and Dem. vs. Rep through a media monopoly which has not been bound to tell you a single truth for nearly a decade. If you don't believe that, compare the AP and what's on corporate owned media to independent reports anywhere in the world. They don't match usually, and on the odd chance that the AP publishes something in a light unfavorable to the people in power you will be inundated with celebrity news on corporate owned media instead of the pertinent "news".
I get that it is easier and more comforting to believe that things are not so bad, but that belief does not change reality. We must demand truthfulness in news and demand that the monopolies are broken up or the masses will never see any truths that are relevant to society. At the same time, we need to follow Socrates' demand and get rid of the political class which is keeping people in the proverbial cave.
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.
People don't want to see this for what it is. There is no need for Deep Throat, or Snowden, or Binney when everything is on the up and up. Whistle blowing isn't from foreign interests trying to harm us. They are patriotic actions that love this country for what it should be. When Putin is pointing out the irony about a US congratulating itself for not wanting to kill the whistle blower who is being persecuted for telling the truth, and it is lost on the bulk of Americans we have a problem. We have lost our way.
True, but is this a "warrant"? It's an "order" for sure, and it looks like a warrant, but when dealing with this, we've left the realm of human language usage behind. The underpinning of this order is the 3d party doctrine which says the 4th doesn't even apply to such metadata. Eliminate that 3d party foundation, and I think this order goes away. That's not to say they wouldn't come up with some other twisted theory, but this particular order would be broken.
What changed under Obama? Nothing Good
The US is still one of the most free countries in the world by a pretty long shot; the drop-off is pretty steep once you get too far east of western Europe.
Your statement is a bit of a dodge and I guess you mean a fairly large group of countries when you say "one of" however it's still pretty misleading. It all depends what and how you try to measure, but the USA is no longer nearly at the top of most lists and it really isn't that free in practice. Look at the world press index and you will see the USA comes in 32nd this year, up from 47th (mostly because other countries did more bad things recently). Look even at the "Index of Freedom In the World" which seems pretty biased towards the kind of economic freedom the US is so famed for and you will see that the US isn't in the top five. Try sorting by "personal freedom" separately from "economic freedom" and you will see that it isn't even in the top 20.
The situation is not terrible and the fact that Americans still believe they are free and believe in freedom is actually a cause for hope, however if people don't start acting now to keep that freedom there is going to be a big problem. Most of all the fact that people just don't seem worried by giving up their freedom to big companies and their data to the government is really dangerous.
=~ s,(.*),<sarcasm>$1</sarcasm>,g if any_point_you_wish();
I'm a liberal and even I find myself in agreement with this principle to an extent. Some jobs are really only meant as a stepping stone for high schoolers to get experience, or college kids to get beer money. At least that was true in the past, certainly when I was getting my first job in the mid-80s.
The problem though, is that our job base is shedding its real jobs at an amazing rate. When real jobs are rare, and most employment is comprised of this "learning wheels" work, then it becomes important to ensure that if these are the jobs that are going to replace real economic activity, that they pay something people can live on.
What changed under Obama? Nothing Good
Please stop wasting pixels and clogging up the internet with this gibberish.
More news coverage about the whistleblower, not about the crimes he uncovered. Journalism is dead.
Oh, and BTW, insurance premiums under Obamacare are skyrocketing:
http://www.indystar.com/article/20130718/BUSINESS/307180100/State-says-Obamacare-will-force-72-percent-increase-individual-insurance-plan-rates
http://thehill.com/blogs/healthwatch/health-reform-implementation/313885-obamacare-premiums-lower-than-expected-in-maryland
Hell, just Google "obamacare rate increase"
Lord help you if you smoke, or happen to be overweight.
Gotta love their fucked-up rationale: "Your freedom is likely to be someone else's harm" Yea, that sounds like what a Stasi dogfucker would say.
An enigma, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded in bacon and cheese
The US is still one of the most free countries in the world by a pretty long shot
I am willing to bet that you have never spent more than a month living outside of the US. Otherwise you wouldn't say such stupid things. Let me list some of the things that many of those other countries don't have.
1. Suspicionless roadblocks/checkpoints on many major highways and secondary roads where you are guilty until proven innocent and must submit to interrogations or arbitrary testing to prove your innocence. If you try to stand up for your so called "rights" or so much as look at the thugs the wrong way you end up some combination of injured, dead, and/or in jail with serious contempt of cop charges against you.
2. Strip searches, electronic or real, and genital fondling and/or sexual molestation must be submitted to in order for the government to grant you the privilege of flying. In most other countries flying is treated as more of a right whatever they might call it on paper. In the US most rights have been converted to privileges kindly granted by daddy government. Even the supreme court refers to them as privileges now.
3. Angry, sociopathic, sadistic police who are just itching to beat you, strangle you, taze you, or even shoot you and kill you. These people have no oversight and are 100% above the law. They effectively even have a license to kill. This is far worse than nearly any country on the planet. I can personally vouch for the fact that it is far worse than Cuba (that's right), Laos, Colombia, or Malaysia. In most countries police are more like normal people just doing a job to get paid and have nothing to prove and are not so much like violent criminals with a badge.
Since the police are the most likely point of contact between citizens and a government representative the fact that the police are dangerous and see citizens as their sworn enemy and see themselves as above any law makes the US seem far less free than virtually any country I have lived or traveled in.
4. Harmless hacking as a major "crime". Ask Aaron Swartz about how free we are compared to other countries. Not many countries go after victimless hacking the way the US does. In the US you can go to jail for many years just for violating the TOS of a web site. Yup. Keep telling yourself how free you are. Ask the innocent people convicted of crimes with no victim being abused by sadistic prison guards and raped by fellow inmates how free they are.
In addition to that we have many harsh prison sentences for what are very minor, harmless acts where not a single person has been harmed. I mention this separately, because many other countries have the same problem. But we are no better than most of them in this respect. I think part of the problem is that Americans are such enthusiastic punishers. We love revenge more than most other cultures I think.
The fact is the US isn't all that free anymore. There is very little real freedom left around here. It has been reinterpreted and just plain stomped out of existence. Perhaps the most important point is that the actual people, the voters, do not value freedom even slightly more than most other countries. Given that none of the loss of our freedom is really very surprising.
Can you give even a single example of a freedom that Americans have that most other countries don't? Or better yet a single freedom that is unique in the world? In the US all of our freedom is on paper. Other countries may fewer paper rights, but more freedoms in real life. I would go so far as to say that most countries feel more free and on a day to day basis are more free than the US is now. A century ago it would have been a very different story, but that was before the government and the American people shat on the constitution, the bill of rights, and everything that the founders of our country believed in.
Quite an experience to live in fear, isn't it? That's what it is to be a slave.
Looking at America from a distance, it appears that it has a one party system with two factions - the Democrat and the Republican factions. The name of the party? The Business Party. The sole purpose is to distract the citizens of the USA away from what really matters. Included in the most accurate definition of "fascism" is a description of how corporate interests write the laws, provide the "politicians", and set the government agenda. The country has been taken over and is run by power-hungry monied-elites (a cleptocracy, me-thinks). It's from this perspective that I completely agree with the attached comment:
Wrong! It has not been a flip, it's been a take over. There is no longer a left or right, or Democrat and Republican. It's one team that plays on people's desire to still believe a left-right paradigm exists.
National Secrets "contracts" are really one way... You sign one to get a job, and Uncle Sam then is free to change the deal at will. Once you sign the oath to keep national secrets they own your ass. The CIA/NSA are legally defined levels above what normal guys like Manning are made to sign.
You are told, upfront, they can and will cut you into pieces and leave you in a ditch with no identifying marks (or worse, and to your family too) for breaking your oath to their agency. The minute Snowden got on a plane and checked in with a foreign power while carrying national secrets he committed High Treason... There's no "whistleblower" provision anywhere allowing you to run to an enemy government.
Boy is dead man walking... Putin gave the NSA several weeks to bag him at the airport before he was actually "inside" Russia... But again, the NSA/CIA are a failure because they are supposed to clean these messes up on their own... Or fall on their swords... That this got left at Obama's feet means they SEVERELY disrespected him. Obama needs to be "Darth Vader" -ing his security chiefs (and families if needed) and fast-tracking promotions till the Snowden problem is fixed... Note, I didn't SAY Obama order Snowden killed... Whatever NSA policies are for this should NEVER REACH the President to make that call.... If it gets in the open... NSA directors fall on their swords and accept responsibility.
The ability granted to spy on everybody comes with the expectation that the NSA/CIA Directors fall on their swords when their agency screws up. Why haven't those directors "terminated" their employment (and yes i mean killed themselves like men) so Obama can replace them already?
The situation is not terrible and the fact that Americans still believe they are free and believe in freedom is actually a cause for hope
The fact that many Americans still believe they are free is anything but encouraging. To me it seems to imply that no matter how much of their freedom they lose they will still believe they are not only free, but the freest country in the world. It means that many Americans simply don't understand what the word 'freedom' means. If you start talking about John Locke or 'Natural Rights' you might then get some honest answers about how much these Americans still believe in actual freedom, as opposed to the pseudo-freedom thing that they seem to have in their heads. Maybe they are thinking freedom is about being able to wave a flag with red and white and blue?
Quite an experience to live in fear, isn't it? That's what it is to be a slave.
I don't even know for sure if that's literally true but it damn well is worth reminding people: a contract has terms for both parties. We know Snowden violated his terms, but do we know he went first?
Was his consideration purely his paychecks? I know a lot of people go into various branches of government service (everywhere from the mundane office work, to the "glory" of being a warrior) merely as a job, but if you ask people why they work where they work, that's not what all (or even most) of them say. I've never talked (knowingly ;-) to NSA people, but I've talked to 19 year-old-army recruits, 40 year old unemployment insurance workers, a few cops (though it's been a long time), etc and damned if I haven't heard some idealism and oldschool civics from time to time. Do you think those people are lying about why joined the organization? Some, maybe, but not most of them.
There's an expectation that the service has a purpose, and that it's a good purpose. I don't give a flying fuck whether or not "the government shall act in good faith to promote the interest of its citizens" is explicitly written in ink on the workers' contracts or not, because if you get that anal about it, then the very idea of any contracts every having any validity itself becomes nebulous.
Whose place is it to decide whether or not the government has violated its contracts? Everyone's. If you don't believe that, then ask anyone their opinion about Nazi war criminals, to get a better explanation within the context of an easy black/white example. Sure, today's examples are harder and blurrier, but the responsibility hasn't moved.
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
Back in the '70s a Soviet general told Farley Mowat, "The difference between Soviet propaganda and American propaganda is that we don't believe ours." A big difference between then and now is that when we tortured people or detained them without trial we pretended it was our ally (South Vietnam, Iran, Israel, etc.) that was doing it and we made polite objections. When we gratuitously invaded other countries we at least had the grace to have one of our puppet government's ask us to do so. We pretended not to be developing biological and chemical weapons and ABM systems contrary to treaties that we had signed.
Today they're not even pretending. They just openly torture prisoners, arrest and murder people without trial, invade on the flimsiest of blatantly false pretenses, and baldly send in taxpayer-paid mercenaries to massacre people resisting corporate theft of their lands. Perhaps the most appalling thing to me is the easy acceptance of all of this by my fellow citizens, most of whom are well aware that the government is doing these things in their name and don't care.
"Think about how stupid the average person is. Now, realise that half of them are dumber than that." - George Carlin
Whether you call it "The Business Party" or follow some interesting conspiracy theories and call it "The Lucifer Party" makes no difference. The end result becomes the same and is what we must be focused on. With bad people in power, the true motives for what they are doing will never become available until they are gone. The end result is a lost society and potentially much more.
Labeling or trying to guess at the motives at this point is a grievous mistake. It gives the people in power enough ammunition to focus on a possibly incorrect point and distract from the problem. To an extent, they don't even need it (see the countless media circus shows betraying OWS as simply a bunch of freeloading pot-heads) but there is no benefit in helping them with a distraction.
The truth about where we are and where we are going is what we currently need, in addition to warning people about the use of agent provocateurs by the administration and a corrupt propaganda system in broadcast media. Hence, we all need to look out for people trying to get the truth out and report all suspicions and wrong doing by the Government and Media.
Some people are foolish enough to believe that Rush Limbaugh, Piers Morgan, and their ilk, are working for them instead of the corrupt people in power. Boycott! Which means not just to stop watching yourself but grass roots get others to follow your lead. If the issue is simply money, the problem will sort itself out economically.
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.
The US is still one of the most free countries in the world by a pretty long shot
I am willing to bet that you have never spent more than a month living outside of the US. Otherwise you wouldn't say such stupid things.
It's not so much a "stupid" thing to say as an, oh, "accurate" thing to say. If you would like to see an (as nearly as possible) objective way to look at the relative freedom of countries you might refer to The Heritage Foundation's annual survey. It says pretty much exactly what LordLimecat said, listing the US at 10 freest out of 177 countries ranked.
~Loyal
I aim to misbehave.
Finally someone that can see and articulate how this was a joint eff up.
The US is one of the most free countries as long as you stay within the guidelines of it's government. As soon as you blow the whistle on any of it's corruptions, you're going to be just as free as you would be in China or Thailand. Will you die? The chance is high in either country. The fact that the US isn't more overt than say China or Russia about what happens to their constituents that don't remain in-line doesn't mean that it's more free.
The US is far from the most free country in the world, in fact on several scales it barely even enters the top 10:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Press_Freedom_Index
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Index_of_Economic_Freedom
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Those are two uniquely American rights that I as a Canadian certainly do not have.
Speech has exceptions here.. lots of them. We put people in jail for saying things - ugly things, but we still put them in jail.
It is also practically, or effectively, impossible to own a handgun and use it for it's intended purpose - defense of one's person - in Canada, and most of the world.
There's two, some some might argue, the most important two to keep. Without those you have no tools to fix the rest of the problem.
..don't panic
At this point, the corruption has infiltrated the NSA and spread. We need some sort of signals intelligence, but we'd need to disband the NSA and re-form it to get back to that now. You're quite right about the FBI.
I am asking for an interpretation of specific data on specific slides, leaked by Snowden, that demonstrate, unequivocally, the NSA are committing egregious acts.
Demanding unequivocal, indisputable proof of a top secret government operation is not reasonable. Surprisingly the NSA, after an initial period of denying everything, has actually admitted to some of it. Their dilemma is that if Snowden is just making it all up then he hasn't broken any US law and their attempts to extradite him are just harrassment.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PRISM_(surveillance_program)#Edward_Snowden
Some of the relevant PRISM slides are on the sidebar to the right. In particular take a look at the second one down.
Quite an experience to live in fear, isn't it? That's what it is to be a slave.
The Heritage Foundation is based in the US. That doesn't prove anything.
First, I'm going to try to prove that you're wrong. I'm going to do that by showing that your argument is flawed, and can be rejected on that basis. Following that I'm going to try to prove that I'm right. I'm going to do that by showing that Argument from Authority is a valid inferential technique. Here's why your argument is flawed. You're saying that the US isn't free because the entity stating that it's free is based in the US. You're arguing against an argument because of some attribute of the entity making the argument. That's flawed because arguments stand on their own. To argue against the entity making the argument is a fallacy known as argumentum ad hominem, which can be translated as "argument against the man" and is sometimes colloquially called an ad hominem argument. You've just committed the ad hominem fallacy. Since your argument is fallacious it can be rejected.
Second, Argument from Authority is a valid inferential technique. In fact, that's the reason authorities exist, to deliver us conclusions that are too difficult for people not schooled in the art to reach. Now, to be a valid Argument from Authority, it must meet four prongs. The first prong is that the Authority must be an actual authority. You can find information about their authority here. Second, the authority must be an authority in a relevant sphere of inquiry. You can find information about relevance at the same site. Third, if the sphere of inquiry is well established then there must be general agreement in the field, and if not then the authority must have a reputation of having made correct predictions. You can find information about agreement at that same site. Finally, the authority must explain, so far as possible, the reason he reached that conclusion. You can find information about methodology at that same site. Therefore, I have made a valid appeal to authority and the conclusion I stated may be relied on with some confidence.
And Singapore is rated 8 steps above the US. Singapore, which has an actual dictator and all kinds of crazy laws.
You can find the reasons Singapore is rated so highly here.
And Chile beats the US in terms of freedom? Well at least they are not aiming high.
You can find the reasons Chile is rated so highly here.
In any case your whole post is basically an Argument from Authority. You are saying, "This is what the Heritage Foundation thinks."
The actual fallacy is called Argument from Inexpert Authority. An Argument from Inexpert Authority is an argument from authority that does not meet one or more of the four prongs I outlined. Since the argument I made meets all four prongs it's a cogent argument.
Try actually making a real argument to support the view that the US is "one of the most free countries in the world by a pretty long shot".
You can find the reasons the United States is rated so highly here.
~Loyal
I aim to misbehave.
There is no longer a left or right, or Democrat and Republican. It's one team
Sorry, this is just flat-out incorrect. People who keep parroting this line tend to be either single-issue voters (where neither party agrees with them) or willfully ignorant. There are very much two parties, and they do want very different things. For example, the US is in the middle of the largest restructuring of its healthcare system ever, and whether you agree with it or not you can't reasonably say that it would have happened had the other party been in power.
Both parties would like to initiate a lot of change, but you're not seeing any because there isn't a supermajority for either party in the Senate to overcome fillibusters and push through anything really controversial. If you ever one party or the other get 60 solid votes in the Senate, boy will you find out fast just how eager they have been for a long time to show their differences and initiate significant change.
It's sad that both parties toe the same line when it comes to national security vs. civil liberties... but please don't try to pretend that both parties are the same. It inspires apathy among the poorly informed and perpetuates the myth that voting doesn't matter.
"95% of all Slashdot
I'm sorry, but you are willfully being ignorant. While I would agree that there are a couple really honest and well intentioned people holding political offices, the Democrat and Republican players have become invalid. When someone claims they will do something, and does the opposite, we call them a liar. The majority of people in office spouting Democrat themes or Republican themes are acting, and liars. Look at _facts_ regarding what they do, not what they say.
And no, it's not a one ticket issue. This is everything from maintenance and upholding the Constitution, to foreign policy. The Republicans and Democrats both denounced and bashed (illegally) Snowden, they both want war with Syria, they both want to spy on us, they both back DHS and TSA expansion even when their parties say that they should not.
Facts do not back what you believe, but you are happy living in an illusion. Goody for you!
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.
Ironically, as a Russian citizen, I am in fact concerned about US, too. Because whenever your government persists in fucking you in the ass, our government uses it as an excuse to do the same. "See, you are talking about freedom and stuff, but Americans are doing it, too - and you've always said that they are a model of a free country."
That heritage foundation index that you linked is a poor source to quote as evidence in this discussion, as they clearly are only measuring economic freedom (it's clearly mentioned in every page of that index), or, in other words, how free you are to rake in the money, and how much the country's economic system facilitates that.
The index does not measure, and has nothing to say, about the main topics at hand - civil liberties and human rights - so it doesn't refute the binary guy's claims even one bit. In fact, it's almost completely unrelated to his claims.