America: Where Bradley Manning goes to jail and General Keith Alexander doesn’t. Is there anyting more that is needed to prove that this country is an autocratic police state?
this is a step in the direction of North Korea. It is impossible to criticize the government or leaders as you never know whether your coversation will be reported. I worry that the next J. Edgar Hoover is out there with better tools at his disposal. Unfortunately the surveiilance state is likely to get worse.
I have viewed Edward Snowden as a whistle blower, but the more that comes out about the NSA the more he looks like a hero and the more it looks like Obama’s administration has violated our constitutional right.s. This needs to be investigated and not by the NSA whitewash committee.
After Abu Ghraib Janis Karpinsky was subjected to a series of humiliations intended to discredit her testimony concerning the unethical and illegal behavior of US intelligence agencies there, which was directed from the White House.
In any honorable nation, her testimony would have been taken and pursued, after which she would have been formally and ceremonially hanged.
The biggest difference between the Bush and Obama administrations is that Obama speaks rather well, and conveys a general impression of intelligence.
████████. ███ █████ ██ █████████-██████!
And I mean it!
Freedoms must always be protected lest they slip away, drop by drop like an ice cream cone melting in the summer sun dripping down into the satanic depths of hell. Use your freedoms or lose them. Stand up for your rights or you will not be allowed to stand ever again.
I think it’s time to lawfully and peacefully dismantle the NSA altogether.
Agreed. Time to get off the internet and get things done.
I just read the UK is starting a criminal inquiry into the materials it seized from David Miranda. Its only a matter of time now before they bring criminal charges against Glenn Greenwald, David Miranda and Laura Poitras, not to mention the Guardian itself.
First western governments and finance corporations conspired to unleash a torrent of financial fraud on the world and succeeded. Now they are succeeding in unleashing their surveillance spooks on all of us as well. Unless the people stand up and demand this stop it will not. Even then it will be a huge fight – they will not give this up without a serious fight. Western governments no longer have legitimacy. What happens when a government no longer has legitimacy is they crack down with military force on the people to show us that regardless of whether we respect their authority we will obey. That is what is going on now. Forget the constitution. It no longer protects us. We have all been deemed potential terrorists so that this can be done under the color of law. Of course that is nonsense, but so are all the secret legal justifications for torture and mass surveillance, and no one has been brought to justice for that lawbreaking either.
We are going to have to decide whether it is worth risking our lives to protest this mass destruction of our rights and civil liberties. Because make no mistake, the crackdown on OWS was a trial run. They know we are fuming and disgusted. They know we don’t trust them and despise them. And they will not give up their power without a nasty fight. Of course their supplicant media will paint us as terrorists and violent malcontents. But I fear we cannot push back on the police state without a lot of death and imprisonment. Unfortunately we have let things run too far without effectively protesting and now our governments feel they are omnipotent.
Just a few years ago, those of us ranting about government surveillance where considered kooks.
Anyone else remember the Sedition Act? “That if any person shall write, print, utter or publish, or shall cause or procure to be written, printed, uttered or published, or shall knowingly and willingly assist or aid in writing, printing, uttering or publishing any false, scandalous and malicious writing or writings against the government of the United States, or either house of the Congress of the United States, or the President of the United States, with intent to defame the said government, or either house of the said Congress, or the said President, or to bring them, or either of them, into contempt or disrepute; or to excite against them, or either or any of them, the hatred of the good people of the United States, or to stir up sedition within the United States, or to excite any unlawful combinations therein, for opposing or resisting any law of the United States, or any act of the President of the United States, done in pursuance of any such law, or of the powers in him vested by the constitution of the United States, or to resist, oppose, or defeat any such law or act, or to aid, encourage or abet any hostile designs of any foreign nation against United States, their people or government, then such person, being thereof convicted before any court of the United States having jurisdiction thereof, shall be punished by a fine not exceeding two thousand dollars, and by imprisonment not exceeding two years.”
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