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President of Brazil Lashes Out At NSA Espionage Programs In Speech To UN
Hugh Pickens DOT Com writes "The Guardian reports that Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff launched a blistering attack on US espionage at the UN general assembly, accusing the NSA of violating international law by its indiscriminate collection of personal information of Brazilian citizens and economic espionage targeted on the country's strategic industries. 'Personal data of citizens was intercepted indiscriminately. Corporate information – often of high economic and even strategic value – was at the center of espionage activity,' said Rousseff. 'Brazilian diplomatic missions, among them the permanent mission to the UN and the office of the president of the republic itself, had their communications intercepted.' Rousseff's angry speech was a direct challenge to President Barack Obama, who was waiting in the wings to deliver his own address to the UN general assembly, and represented the most serious diplomatic fallout to date from the revelations by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden. Washington's efforts to smooth over Brazilian outrage over NSA espionage have so far been rebuffed by Rousseff, who has proposed that Brazil build its own internet infrastructure. 'Friendly governments and societies that seek to build a true strategic partnership, as in our case, cannot allow recurring illegal actions to take place as if they were normal. They are unacceptable.'"
Enough said.
I can't wait until Bush is no longer president so all these foreign countries no longer hate the US. Between Iran stil enriching uranium, Syria using chemical weapons daring us to do something, Russia ridiculing the US, and now Brazil making this speech the standing of the US in world view is at an all time low point.
Whats that? Bush isn't president and the DNC has the White House. Nevermind, all of this is acceptable as long as a Democrat is running things.
Carry on.
Commendable, but ultimately wishful thinking unfortunately.
The NSA will just tap the underwater cables or enlist the "help" of technicians at the Brazil data exchanges to split the data feeds. When the adversary has this much money and next to no scruples, the battle is difficult if not impossible.
represented the most serious diplomatic fallout to date from the revelations by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden
Really, "the most serious diplomatic fallout" was a (justifiably) angry speech?
How about when Vladimir "Polonium 209" Putin suddenly became the world's defender of human rights? Or how about when the US and EU countries grounded Evo Morales, President of Bolivia, so they could search his plane for Snowden (a rough equivalent here would be the Chinese stopping and searching Air Force One)?
Rousseff is almost definitely speaking for more than just Brazil: Her government is the strongest of a group of left-wing South American countries that have resisted the US for about a decade. Others in that group include Bolivia, Ecuador, Venezuela, and of course Cuba.
I am officially gone from
Brazil has a lot of things going for it ... but the moral high-ground one of those things. Brazil isn't exactly spotless when it comes to human rights abuse. Sure, it's not wide-spread mass surveillance, it's just regular police state concerns (non-existent rights for both the accused and the convicted, and systemic government corruption), though they're not doing so hot in promoting equality (or addressing their widening income gap and widespread poverty).
But hey, they're not wrong, and that doesn't excuse what the NSA is doing. Has done. Is accused of doing.
- Nec Impar Pluribus, or so I'm told.
Washington's efforts to smooth over Brazilian outrage over NSA espionage have so far been rebuffed by Rousseff
Yeah, talk me more about those "Washington Efforts"...
Obama with a poker face: Well we spy on you to protect the world against Terrorism
Dilma: So I was suspected of terrorism, even if I was the candidate for the ruling party of an country without conflicts with the US.
Obama: But with terror...
Dilma: And If I was suspected of terrorism, the why did you spy on our major petrol company...
Obama: Err terror...
Dilma: Fuck-You.
accusing the NSA of violating international law by [...]
And the rest of the world, doesn't care what is the NSA, for us it's the US that's spying, so no she accused the the US...
She's blowing all this steam and yet they refused asylum for Snowden.
Brought to you by Carl's Junior.
I would much, much rather see Washington DC pay a very high, very personal price for their rampant criminality and violations of the Constitution, as in all of them swinging from the trees that line the national mall and DC itself burnt to the ground with large letters scored in the ground with a bulldozer that say, 'Don't Tread On Me! ---The American People"
An angry speech by the president of Brazil is nice, but there need to be real consequences for these criminals.
Do what you can, with what you have, where you are.
Brazil is about to buy some 36 advanced fighter jets. The three short-listed candidates were Dassault Rafale from France, SAAB Gripen from Sweden and the Boeing-Northrop Super Hornet from the USA. The NSA-Roussef scandal essentially negated the F-18's chances to win the tender worth many billions. Now the race is only about good political relations (Rafale) versus lower price with higher economic offsets (Gripen). Boeing's workforce must be grateful for the NSA's efforts in protecting american jobs...
The policy of saying "If it was anyone else than USA it would be worse" is simply ridiculous. Or even to mention concerns about terrorism to justify such spying.
As many are forgetting, let's summarize the real reason for such anger: industrial spying (towards Petrobras, Brazil's biggest company) and spying over a government with more than a century of friendly relations.
The article points this as well: "As host to the UN headquarters, the US has been attacked from the general assembly many times in the past, but what made Rousseff's denunciation all the more painful diplomatically was the fact that it was delivered on behalf of large, increasingly powerful and historically friendly state."
So they're going to prosecute themselves?
"A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
Let me tell all of you from outside the U.S. that our government's excuse "hey, we're only spying on foreigners, not Americans" would be disgusting even if it weren't a pack of lies.
the end of the Arab Israeli conflict can only be solved in three ways,
- decide that palestine is all arab (and muslim)
- decide that israel is all isrealy (and jewish)
- decide that this vaguely federal country to be named is a democratic country with people of various ethnic and religious back ground who need to live together and the only way this can happen is to totally extirpate any reference to any specific religion, ethnic origin or "nation".
Choice one and two would mean lots of dead people, choice three would be seen as a "bad example" for the neighbours and protectors...
The thing is, that a lot of Americans would like to see choice 2, that Israel, including the entirety of the West Bank and Gaza Strip, be Israeli Jewish territory. This has a lot to do with conservative Christians who believe that the restoration of the Jews to Israel is a precursor to the Second Coming of Jesus, and also believe that Muslims are the Satanic forces they'll be battling at Armageddon. Some also have a goal of matching the borders of modern Israel with the borders described in the Book of Joshua and other texts that would eventually have Israel taking over the Sinai from Egypt, all of Lebanon, about 2/3 of Syria (up to the Euphrates), and a good portion of Jordan, Saudi Arabia, and Iraq, in all cases kicking out or exterminating the Muslims living there and replacing them with Jews.
That kind of religious thinking is a major motivator of US-Israel relations, more than AIPAC (because there are other Jewish-American lobbying groups advocating different policies), more than the potential campaign donations from Jewish-Americans (again, there's significant divides among Jewish-Americans over the best policy for Israel), and more than what the government of Israel wants (the US has not been supportive of Israeli government efforts to remove settlers from the West Bank or Gaza, for example). Sure, their preferred policy would result in a lot of dead people, but from that crowd's point of view those dead people were irredeemably evil and thus should be killed at first opportunity.
I am officially gone from
The US has two main fears historically emerging from a Brazil like country:
Exports outside the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Petrodollar with countries like Japan, China - totally removing the need for any use of US currency.
The formation of views such as a new http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-Aligned_Movement locking up strategic materials and demanding market value.
The CIA and NSA never want the US to lose control of their vision of soft dollar loans. Long term the loans get repaid with interest or the sale of local assets back to US entities by emerging countries.
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
You know, I've read this excuse a million times since Snowden did his thing, and I'm sick of it.
The problem is it's an abuse of language. Saying "Every country spies. It's one of those things governments are supposed to do" is nothing but rhetorical sleight of hand. The word spy conjures up cartoons of men in pork-pie hats and long raincoats following some traitor in a car. The word is loaded with cold war imagery. It reminds people of a time when there was an "us" vs a "them" and spying was a very small scale and targeted activity done against "them" or, at very least, those of "us" working for "them".
We need a new word to describe what's going on in todays world. Spying doesn't even come close to being the right word. How about totalitarian surveillance? But even that isn't strong enough to communicate the reality we are living in.
In today's reality there's no us vs them. There's no good vs evil, capitalism vs communism. There's just bureaucrats and their power, exercised over their own people as readily as over foreigners.
This is not only not "one of those things governments are supposed to do", it's often one of those things governments are expressly prohibited from doing by their own laws. And that's for good reasons!
Please, don't flatter the NSA by calling them spies. They aren't spies at this point. They are real life equivalents of O'Brien, the dedicated agent of totalitarian control in 1984. O'Brien is a far darker and scarier character than anyone who could be described as a spy.
No. Governments are not supposed to commit millions of criminal acts in allied countries. And no, not every country does that.
A good HOSTS file will put an end to war.
Which particular law did the the lady have in mind?
Spying on other countries is what all countries do — to the best of their abilities. Perhaps, Brazil's abilities aren't a match for those of the US — and not just in the field of spying. I can see, how the resulting jealousy — among politicians and ordinary citizens alike — can lead to some fiery speeches, but the audience better remember, there is nothing the US has done, that any other country wouldn't have, if only it were able to.
Now, spying on one's own citizens — that's bad. But that's not a matter for international law, is it?
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
When looking at contracts, in many cases a good test of fairness is to swap the names on the contracts and see if both parties are still happy. I think this test would work well here as well:
United States president, Barack Obama, has launched a blistering attack on Brazilian espionage at the UN general assembly, accusing the ABIN of violating international law by its indiscriminate collection of personal information of US citizens and economic espionage targeted on the country's strategic industries.
Sounds pretty reasonable to me
The problem with large empires collapsing quickly rather than slowly is that those in the audience rarely get to live a life good enough to be able to enjoy it.
I think you are not comprehending what was intended. This summary isn't blaming Snowden, it is crediting him with revealing what was going on.
Right now, Brazil is the world leader in deep sea oil exploration/extraction (way, WAY ahead of any other). Also, it has the most successful alternative fuel program in the world (most successful by any measure you chose, be it price, adoption, w/e). Those two things alone paint a big target mark in the country's back, and make it a prime target for espionage. The USA tried to buy those technologies in the past, and was mostly refused, if I recall correctly.
Some people will say that Brazil once had a nuke program. Who cares? These fuel technologies are a bigger threat to the USA than any patched up nukes would be, by the simple fact Brazil is using them, and they are making a difference. See all the wars that are fought because of oil, and all the anti-ethanol lobbing always going on in the US.
morcego
I suspect its mostly the petrodollar issue. Because lets face it; the US Economy is largely farcical.
If a major non-dollar international trade circuit developed, the following drop in dollar demand would probably be so steep there is nothing the FED could do to control inflation.
Stands to bring down the entire house of cards.
Repeal the 17th Amendment TODAY! Also Please Read http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
It's only funny if you consider it to be untruthful/unlikely hyperbole. Unfortunately, the truth is that the U.S. *HAS* done just this on quite a number of occasions, and it's not so unlikely.