Has the US become the type of nation from which you have to seek asylum?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2013/06/09/has-the-us-become-the-kind-of-nation-from-which-you-have-to-seek-asylum/

by Libertatea • 13 years ago

827 326 13 years ago

washingtonpost.com

josephagoss2• 13 years ago

Americans might not realise this but we see the USA in the same light as China and Russia when it comes to freedoms. We might be wrong, but thats the perception myself and many other people from outside the USA see the current state of the situation.

To think anyone would feel safe in the USA is ridiculous, the USA is one of the last places anyone should seek refuge in modern times. What scares me most is the United States influence inside Australia.

youngerdryas5• 13 years ago

You do know that Australia and NZ share intel with your boogie monster don't you?

josephagoss2• 13 years ago

I understand this, and that scares me. :(

euroclydon3• 13 years ago

You certainly do not speak for everyone outside the U.S. who has asked themselves the question: "Can I name a U.S. reporter who has disappeared or been murdered for producing material critical of the government?" or "Are U.S. citizens routinely arrested and placed in re-education by labor camps for a year without a trial?"

belorn2• 13 years ago

"Are U.S. citizens routinely arrested and placed in re-education by labor camps for a year without a trial?"

No, people are just sent to Gitmo to be waterboarded and held indefinite without a trial. They don't even care the nationality of where you come from.

Jacqued• 13 years ago

To be fair, nobody thinks the U.S. has reached the same level in practice against U.S. citizens than Beijing against chinese citizens or Moscow against russian reporters. U.S. citizens are still somewhat protected by the Bill of Rights (well, other than the 4th and soon the 5th).

Now when it comes to foreigners there's not much that can be said for the U.S - although the border can be somewhat thin with extraordinary renditions and withdrawal of nationality to allow for arbitrary executions. Also, it seems that the will to deconstruct civil liberties is nowhere as strong as it is in Washington DC (except in Pyongyang), so that doesn't help. And the american people do not seem to care at all (but then again, the same is happening in Europe to a smaller extent, and the people don't care either)

So I'd say this perception is more linked to the direction you're headed to than to the place where you are right now (although that is scary in its own right too)

Some days I just think I should move to Iceland

mtgx2• 13 years ago

Journalists are starting to be arrested, protesting is becoming increasingly harder, when the police starts arresting them as soon as they seem them, on BS grounds, and as others mentioned there's Gitmo and the torture, and the CIA kidnappings.

vacri• 13 years ago

You may not want to wave your "people in the US aren't incarcerated unjustly" flag too hard, not to mention that prison labour is a quickly growing industry in the US.

mcherm• 13 years ago

Are U.S. citizens routinely arrested and placed in re-education by labor camps for a year without a trial?

No. But US citizens are routinely arrested and placed in solitary confinement (widely held to be worse than a labor camp) for decades without a trial (guilt is nearly always resolved via plea bargains using the threat of even more years). And by "routinely" I mean the highest incarceration rate in the world: about 0.75% of the population.

twoodfin• 13 years ago

I can't even begin to comprehend how bad your sources of information are if you think the levels of freedom in the U.S. and China are more closely comparable than those of the U.S. and Australia.

onli• 13 years ago

Killing prisoners -> check

imprisonment of people opposing the regime, especially the intelligence agencies -> check

Torture of prisoners -> check

Overly broad powers of the government without checks and balances -> check

Intelligence agencies spying on all citizens -> check.

Yeah, surely an incomprehensible comparison.

tekmate2• 13 years ago

it's more about the perception than actual levels of freedom, the US is a country that tortures, detains people from all over the world indefinitely without trial in an offshore location, bails out bankers while promoting austerity for everyone else, spies on people worldwide, starts wars all over the world, uses remotely controlled killing machines

and most of that isn't even new, the veil of the american dream has been ripped apart.

what is most depressing is that in the next election cycle, the american people will just run back to the republicans instead of finally giving up on the charade that are political parties

youngerdryas5• 13 years ago

If he is sitting in Australia in fear of the US I think he needs more help than a few words will offer.

gizzlon• 13 years ago

I live in Scandinavia and I don't think most people here see the US in the same light as China and Russia.

But, OTOTH, I do think most people see Europe as more open than the US. It's not like it's a unique and magical "land of the free" like some people seem to believe.

Jare• 13 years ago

My overall, fact-less impression is that the UK has already cast a pretty wide public surveillance net. They don't seem to be actually using it for enforcing anything, however. I don't think I would blink twice if it turns out they have a PRISM-like operation going on.

gadders5• 13 years ago

Any country that requires identity cards (such as France) has already lost its claim to be more free.

StavrosK• 13 years ago

Okay, josephagoss's comparison to China and Russia is a bit too much, but the point still stands. I've thought about moving to the US, but the lack of freedoms, even in everyday life (visiting a friend who recently moved to LA and seeing him scared of the police was very new to me (and him, when he moved there)) is a big deterrent.

dagw• 13 years ago

I live in Sweden and while most people here are pretty critical to US, most people also realize that they are not in the same league as China and Russia.

stevoski2• 13 years ago

I agree, as a New Zealander living in Spain. I've been staggered over the last decade or so to hear of the USA performing:

* "extraordinary renditions" (kidnapping), sometimes of the wrong person who after months gets dumped in Albania.

* "enhanced interrogation techniques" such as waterboarding (torture)

* holding people indefinitely without charge or trial in Guantanamo Bay

* killing people remotely in foreign countries, including their own citizens based on the president's decision. Sometimes through mistaken identity or bad intel or pure human error the wrong person is killed, or the right person is killed with their children

* The "Kids for Cash Scandal" where a judge received kickbacks from a prison owner to give juveniles harsher sentences.

* And finally, spying at an enormous degree on the US population at large.

These are astonishing things and I'm even more staggered that people en masse don't get outraged by these things and demand change.

xradionut• 13 years ago

Most of the US populous has jobs, beer and entertainment. Plus they might with the lottery some day and join the 1%.

powertower7• 13 years ago

What you posted are a few negative events. What you did not post are the few million or billion positive events that happened at the same time.

What you're reading/seeing is an ever increasingly opinionated and vocal crowd that think they possess the truth and are right about everything. They want a perfect system. And a simple system. And worst of all, they don't know what they don't know (how utterly destructive their actions and changes would be). So this negativity parade continues... Where they hold a magnifying glass on the few negative events while pretending what they are seeing is the entire picture.

jvictor1186• 13 years ago

As an American living an America, I have to disagree with you.

First of all, if you really didn't know the U.S. government and military had some creepy capabilities, you're not living on planet earth. Anyone with a brainstem and a basic interest in security and crypto can decipher this basic truth. Many even believe they can crack RSA and similar encryption schemes.

Second of all, I don't begrudge any country their right to choose their principles and their form of government - that includes the Iranians and the rest of the Islamic world. In the U.S., we have a much stronger defense backbone than most countries. That's because we're a bigger target than most countries. You may have heard the U.S. is a major world superpower. New Zealand isn't. Neither is Spain. For a "New Zealander living in Spain" to cast this judgment on us is, as I see it, unfair. Our elected officials, elected according to our chosen system of government, voted for these measures. What more can you ask of a democratic system?

These "whistleblowers" everyone sympathizes so much with -- they broke the laws of our country. They released classified information to the public. Why not just release the nuke launch codes on Twitter while you're at it? Free speech has limitations. Si vis pacem, para bellum.

As an American, I have no problem with the NSA using large-scale statistical methods to filter my private communications out as "not related to terrorism." After all, it's not like Carrie from Homeland is chillin' at the CIA reading my texts with my girlfriend. They have neither time nor inclination for that. On the other hand, I very much do mind New York City being used for another terrorist attack. If these measures can keep me and my loved ones safe, I applaud them.

If you don't like the way we do business in this country, fine. Stay in Spain and use your own social networks and search engines and mail platforms. The beauty of the world is there's something for everyone, from Sharia law to Scandinavia.

And if you don't like the way we treat combattants in our wars -- which included, by the way, the right to appeal to the Supreme Court, and many judicial and legislative battles over the rights of non-military combattants -- don't fight the U.S. military. It's a pretty simple equation. It seems to me, the people with the most to fear here also have the most to hide.

Let the flamefest begin.

taktix2• 13 years ago

In China, the government is predictable and the streets are safe. In the US, the government is the enemy of the people and young school children are massacred while in public school for no reason.

America, you have NOTHING to brag about.

pessimizer• 13 years ago

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/School_attacks_in_China_%282010...

cLeEOGPw• 13 years ago

Have to agree on this. USA has lost it's appeal for me for quite some time now. For me the countries that I'd like to live in the most are Switzerland, Canada, Australia (I don't know about the US influence there much though), maybe Germany or other similar Western European state, but certainly not US. I live in Eastern Europe btw.

honzzz• 13 years ago

I live in Eastern Europe too and I remember the times when the US was really perceived as "land of free" here. I believe that now we have way more freedom than the Americans. I personally feel uncomfortable enough to avoid travelling to the US which is a shame because I had spent months over there before 9/11 and shortly after and I had great times.

zmb_• 13 years ago

As a European I wouldn't say I see the USA in the same light as China and Russia, but I definitely feel uncomfortable when I have to travel to the US for work. Given the US's recent track record with human rights and the ongoing mass surveillance, I just can't be sure some innocent comment on some website I've made at some point won't flag me and cause me to be indefinitely detained. I know it's probably not likely, but the possibility is real enough that it makes me uncomfortable. I'd rather work in countries where I know I have rights that will be strongly upheld.

When I traveled to the US first time with a new passport (Chicago, year 200X) I was taken to a police station at the airport and made to answer various questions (I'm a whiter than white male from Northern Europe). The answers were entered into what I assume is some monster database, and I was never explained why this was done or what would be done with the data. It certainly didn't make me feel like I was entering the "land of the free", rather I felt like I was entering a police state.

dawkins• 13 years ago

I'm european too and while I don't consider the US in the same league as China or Russia I had the same feeling the last time I traveled to US.

gadders5• 13 years ago

As a contrary anecdote, I've travelled to the US many times for business and pleasure. I've never had any feeling I was under surveillance, about to be detained tec.

xtracto3• 13 years ago

Did you have to take a photograph and save your 10 fingerprints and disclose all your personal and economic information to get into the USA?

I had to... because it seems for the USA, any Mexican that dares to enter the country is a potential criminal, so there I am in the huge Mexa database. Just because I needed to spend a week in the USA for work.

Whereas the 7 years I lived in Europe (UK and Germany) I did not feel as "guilty". Even with Germany's Rathaus compulsory city registrations.

mpyne8• 13 years ago

The U.S. can't assume that a white male from a friendly European nation is any less likely to be a terrorist though, as that would be discriminatory against Muslims and quite a few other ethnicities.

Kind of a damned-if-you-do/damned-if-you-don't thing, I fear.

jvictor1186• 13 years ago

Hey, then why don't you stay the hell out of our country. Thanks, love and kisses, Jason

DrJokepu• 13 years ago

I'm also European, I travel to the United States at least once a year and I have never spent longer than 60 seconds at the US border, and that includes scanning my fingerprints. The officers doing passport checks have only ever asked fairly reasonable questions such as how long I am staying for, what the purpose of my travel is and occasionally asking about my occupation.

However, my (US citizen) wife gets harassed here at the UK border all the time; a couple of months ago she was detained at London Heathrow Airport for several hours by the UK Border Agency for no particular reason.

shirro• 13 years ago

I don't think the USA is comparable to the worst offenders unless you are looking at a list of bullet points instead of the big picture. But it is hard not to feel the USA is heading down the wrong path. As allies we are compelled by our national interests to follow down the same rabbit hole to some extent and to me it feels our country is morally compromised pushing for data retention laws comparable to Prism when we have no demonstrated domestic need for such things. However Aussies, Swedes, New Zealanders, many small countries rely heavily on the US for our security and there really isn't much option but to tough it out and hope the US turns it around from within.

powertower7• 13 years ago

To think anyone would feel safe in the USA is ridiculous

I feel perfectly safe. This whole entire issue about the government collecting meta-data is overblown IMO. And comparing it to tyranny and demanding rioting on the streets is literally self-destructive and utmost retarded.

Maybe you need to compare it to a country like the Republic of Congo to get an idea of what's safe and what's not. But instead the majority of people here sit in their comfortable chair in front of the computer fantasizing about how much they hate the government and how much the government must hate them.

xtracto3• 13 years ago

Good for you that you feel safe.

An American colleague of mine (doing a 2nd PhD in Liverpool while I was doing my first/only one) told me he did not create accounts in Google/Yahoo/Hot mail not because of what could happen at this time, but at what the people with that information could do in the future.

Right now, you feel perfectly safe in your comfortable chair, having all your information in Google, Facebook, and other servers. But after a small wrong turn of events (that I hope do not happen), you might find yourself in the wrong place and the wrong time, and all your innocently shared information (shared with google, microsoft, facebook, etc) will be used by your government to condemn you.

flyinRyan4• 13 years ago

Maybe you need to compare it to a country like the Republic of Congo to get an idea of what's safe and what's not.

Modern US patriotism at its finest: find the shittiest place you can think of and compare the US to that to show how great it is.

betterunix• 13 years ago

Well excuse me for wanting my country to be held to a higher standard than Congo.

madaxe2• 13 years ago

Ever been to Congo? Either one? It's fine. And this is coming from a white man who spent a week hitchhiking and walking around with zero security.

I get hassled a lot more by LE in the US on trips there than anywhere else. Hell, I made it across eurasia with a grand total of one brush with the law, which went away with a bribe.

I feel unsafe in the US. Not because of "the terrorists", but because of the jackbooted thugs that you call your government and her agencies.

mbesto2• 13 years ago

Let's be fair, you don't speak on behalf of your whole country, nor the "many other people from outside the USA" so I can only take your comment "we see the USA in the same light as China and Russia" with a fine grain of salt...as should others. I say this on top of the fact that I'm someone who lives in London, where I interact with Aussies, Brits, Kiwis, Americans, and Europeans (amongst many others) on a daily basis. I haven't had an even seen an inkling of what you're describing, but again, you and I are just one and two data points.

To think anyone would feel safe in the USA is ridiculous

I'm not sure what your background is, but for 99% of the population of the world, the US is a comparatively very safe place to live.

cema• 13 years ago

  we see the USA in the same light as China and Russia
  when it comes to freedoms

I think I understand where it is coming from. Perception is there, and perception is important. There is however a big difference between China and Russia on one hand and USA on the other: the openness of the US society is, among other things, manifested in noticing and magnifying dirty spots.

Other countries with Western European cultural traditions or influences (this includes Australia and NZ but also Japan and Israel, for example) are on the same "other hand". One reason the focus is often on the USA is how it positions itself in the ideological space, as a pinnacle of liberty and freedoms and so on. Personally, while I avoid ideologies and ideologues as much as I can, I think there is a positive side to it, which is precisely the level of scrutiny typical for the US.

dspillett4• 13 years ago

There is however a big difference between China and Russia on one hand and USA on the other: the openness of the US society is, among other things, manifested in noticing and magnifying dirty spots.

True, but that just means that the people are more (but far from completely) able to be aware of what is being done to them and more free to talk about it. It doesn't change the spirit behind the government agency's actions, and even then "able to be more aware" covers a lot of ground as things like the recent revelations are only heresay (and ignored by most) until good evidence somehow becomes public knowledge.

jckt• 13 years ago

I agree with you, but I'd also like to point out that, despite the ridiculous censorship and corruption in China and Russia, it's not like the DPRK where everyone is mind-controlled (exaggeration) and there's no real dissidence. I might even say that the "culture of dissidence" in Russia and China is more healthy than the typical Westerner is aware of (simple language barriers, etc), and has improved over time.

On the other hand, yes, the USA is much better right now. However, one can say that the important distinction is that, while China in particular seems to have improved over the last 20 years, the USA has gotten worse (w.r.t. freedoms). But of course, this is up for debate.

gadders5• 13 years ago

This is ridiculous.

I don't see much chance of Obama and Biden swapping roles to get round term limits (Russia).

America doesn't also have 1,000s of dissidents in jail and widespread censoring and firewalling of external objectionable content.

Have you even been to America lately? And I'm saying this as a Brit.

skaevola3• 13 years ago

The fact that we're having this conversation proves how wrong you are.

If you honestly see the world this way, you might take the time learn more about China's internet. A good starting point are the 9 articles in the economist's special report:

http://www.economist.com/news/special-report/21574628-intern...

stephen_g• 13 years ago

As an Australian, I'd say that comparing them to China and Russia is too far, but the general feeling is that the US is far less free than Australia, NZ or most European countries.

For example, the fact that you call yourself the land of the free whilst having the largest number of people in prison both by number and proportion of the population, the whole Guantanamo Bay thing, and the constant electronic surveillance, the crazy overreach of the TSA (I couldn't believe it when I had to take off my shoes and jacket at an airport when I passed through the US a few years ago - crazy!) etc.

hopeless• 13 years ago

(grew up in the UK, live in Ireland)

I don't consider the U.S. as the same as China or Russia (or North Korea, etc) but I don't consider them in the same league as any European country either.

Having said that, I think the U.S. is more of a danger outside its borders than China/Russia/N. Korea.

I haven't travelled to the U.S. in the last 10yrs, despite wanting to for conferences or meetings or a wedding, because I consider it to be a hostile environment.

rocky11382• 13 years ago

Same from Canada.

VLM4• 13 years ago

The real news is a rare violation of Betteridge's Law Of Headlines was spotted in today's Washington Post, a sight that shocked pundits worldwide.

raverbashing• 13 years ago

Yes, I agree.

But to be fair sometimes the question is constructed so the answer is "yes" and not no (while still being obvious).

Can't remember an example now.

VLM4• 13 years ago

Could that be a suggestive question?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suggestive_question

(We're solidly in the realm of (bad) meta-puns now...)

youngerdryas5• 13 years ago

The problem is Ellsburg released evidence of government officials doing something illegal which meant he was shielded. The NSA story, which is not even fully known yet, though classified is apparently legal and has congressional as well as judicial oversight. The IRS and reporter wire taps are far more likely to take down the presidency.

l33tbro• 13 years ago

I think many countries well outside the oecd perimeter would happily grant refugee status for dissidents. The obvious example is Assange. Disgusting how the US has gone from a soft terrorist state (signature drone strikes) to a surveillence state. The national narrative of freedom and liberty has become farcicle

_airh• 13 years ago

It is strange that the same country which cherishes its 'right to bear arms' on the grounds that it gives them a level of protection that the government is unable to provide is 'happy' to build the infrastructure which allows the same government to peek into their lives.

On the one hand, we don't trust the government with the basics (physical security). On the other, we trust them with information we don't want our parents to see (facebook profiles, etc). ...strange.

Edit: When I say 'the country' I mean the people in aggregate. Obviously, some people are outraged about this issue, just as some people were outraged when a gunman killed 30 children. Techies seem to be particularly concerned about this issue but, on the whole, most people are indifferent.

newbie12• 13 years ago

The right to bear arms is also, explicitly, a protection against tyranny BY the government. Thomas Jefferson: ""When governments fear the people, there is liberty. When the people fear the government, there is tyranny. The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government."

Yver• 13 years ago

No offense to Thomas Jefferson but a government that is afraid of its own people is a pretty peculiar definition of "liberty."

mtgx2• 13 years ago

So is the 4th amendment, and look how much that one is abused. In the end the Constitution really is "just a piece of paper", if not the government, not the judges, not the media, and ultimately not even the people respect it, live by it, and try to protect it as soon as it's endangered by people trying to accumulate too much power. Where are all the street protests?!

I also fail to understand people who so viciously defend the 2nd amendment "because of potential tyranny", but don't try to defend the 1st and 4th amendments with the same aggressiveness, when in fact those amendments are the first line of defense against that encroaching tyranny, and if they fail, it's the first clue the country is slipping into tyranny. Would you rather wait until the very last moment, until people can't take it anymore but to rise up against the government with violence and starting a massacre, all just to remove the government? Or would you try to fix things while you still can do it peacefully, by protecting the 1st and 4th amendments, so it doesn't have to come to "using the 2nd amendment right to defend against the government with guns"?

Or maybe it all comes down to who has more money to raise the awareness about it. NRA is a powerful lobby. ACLU and EFF less so.

lemming• 13 years ago

When governments fear the people, there is liberty. When the people fear the government, there is tyranny.

It's pretty clear from the last couple of days that the balance in the US is pretty firmly tipped towards tyranny by that definition. Certainly I doubt anyone in the government is at all worried about the people being able to do anything about this scandal. There have been several comments on here and elsewhere from people who are thinking twice about publicly supporting Snowden, or are at least aware that that support is probably logged somewhere and might have repercussions in the future. This would have been ridiculous paranoia not that long ago.

anonymfus• 13 years ago

"But when people fear each another they start to want tyranny." — anonymfus.

weego• 13 years ago

Which is useful only while tyranny is physical.

randomsearch2• 13 years ago

Interesting. But, how does owning a gun provide protection against the US military?

jpdoctor3• 13 years ago

Thomas Jefferson: ""When governments fear the people, there is liberty.

Looks like false attribution according to wikiquote. (Why do people feel the need to use proof by authority anyway? Either a thing is right, or it is insightful, but attributing it to dead 18th century rebels does not bolster the case.)

________________________________

When governments fear the people, there is liberty. When the people fear the government, there is tyranny. Falsely attributed to Thomas Jefferson; first attributed to Jefferson in Gyeorgos C. Hatonn, It's All in the Game: Butterflies, Mind Control--The Razor's Edge‎ (1994), p. 214. A 1912 issue of The American Anti-socialist attributes the re-ordered form, "Where the people fear the government you have tyranny. Where the government fears the people you have liberty", to John Basil Barnhill.

http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Second_Amendment_to_the_United_...

chrischen• 13 years ago

Back then having to bear arms against your government was a much more likely scenario than it is now. Of course it would lead to something like the civil war. The democratic system is supposed to prevent that anyways.

However in modern times we've moved quite a bit away from the possibility of armed rebellions. It's something that happens in less developed countries like Iraq.

umumum• 13 years ago

Fake Thomas Jefferson quote alert:

http://www.monticello.org/site/jefferson/when-government-fea...

temp453463343• 13 years ago

The world Jefferson lived in is infinitely different from ours. There is absolutely no chance that the government of the US will turn tyrannical. none. zero. if you think there is you're nuts.

There is all sorts of talk in this comment section about how people would fight the US military and stuff like that. There people are in la-la land. I'm not going to elaborate on this but: I think it's closely tied with the American obsession with the apocalypse (see zombie/post-apocalyptic movies)

People have very very different expectations from the government now than they did even 50 years ago. No first world country (even ones that don't cherish liberty as much as us) in the past 50 years has turned to tyranny. There are studies about how past a certain GDP tyranny becomes unsustainable - and we're well past that point.

I do what to clarify that I'm not against the second amendment at all. But the argument that it's to fight the government is absolutely absurd.

jlarocco• 13 years ago

That's not really true any more.

When Thomas Jefferson was alive it was feasible for the people to protect themselves from tyranny by fighting the government because the technology available to "normal" people was the same as available to the military.

Today it would be impossible. Even the police are 10000x better equipped than any group of civilian can be. And then there's the military...

Besides that, I'm skeptical there will ever be an issue where enough people are angry enough to start a revolt against the government. Right now people are outraged because the government is massively violating our rights, but nobody's talking about an armed revolution.

lostlogin• 13 years ago

You also end up with people fearing the people unfortunately. Not sure how that was missing from the original equation.

youngerdryas5• 13 years ago

Not exactly. A lot of people voted for Obama because he promised more transparency. He appears to be breaking his promises. If he was smart, which he hasn't seemed lately, he would use this crisis to try to regain some credibility.

zanny3• 13 years ago

He is the president of the United States. He is smart. A lot of background characters love it when you question the intellect of your leaders because you see intended aggression and depravity as incompetance and stupidity. Never blame a goverments wrongs on incompetance, blame them on those responsible and expect them to have a functional brain, because to get into the positions they have, they do have working brains, and know exactly what they are doing.

MatthewPhillips• 13 years ago

Seriously HN, this is the top comment? Using a political controversy as an opportunity to dismiss some unrelated political topic is about as low brow as you can get and contributes nothing to mature discussion.

nthj• 13 years ago

It's interesting to note that in neither case (physical security OR information security) has the government accepted responsibility to protect you.

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/06/28/politics/28scotus.html

tibbon2• 13 years ago

Interestingly enough though, that 'right to bear arms' actually gives zero protection from the government as theorized- even if the gov't is acting in a corrupt manner.

If this guy was in Texas holed up with a small armory, the FBI would still bust in there and arrest him. If he tried to use that small armory (and wasn't killed) it wouldn't have just been him 'exercising his right' of course.

saalweachter4• 13 years ago

You know, you are on to something there.

What we really have in this country is literally a "right to bear arms". You have no right to fire or wield or use your arms.

I can think of no situation where you could fire upon an agent of the government that would not end badly for you, unless there was a total dissolution of Federal and probably State government. Even acting in self defense, even against a corrupt agent of the government, I can't imagine it ending any way but badly for you. You can't shoot the government a little to make a small change. Either you completely overthrow the government, so that there is no one left to hang you, or you go to jail in the best case, and be executed lawfully or gunned down in the street in the worst case.

gyardley• 13 years ago

While the right to bear arms doesn't give one person the natural ability to resist overwhelming force, it does make imposing tyranny on larger numbers of people rather expensive for the tyrants.

Let's say the government wants to send my family to a death camp - perhaps for a racial, ethnic, or religious affiliation. (Historically, this does happen from time to time, even in countries that were 'liberal democracies' in the recent past.)

The government would absolutely be able to do so - I've got no fantasies about my ability to resist a government agency. However, I could certainly try to make it expensive for them, and I might succeed. If enough people are similarly inclined to make things expensive for them, the price may grow to be too high for the government to pay.

rdl2• 13 years ago

A lot of cypherpunk type people (who are generally pro 2a/guns to a great degree) believe anonymous and secure communication through cryptography is more of a 2A issue than a 1A or 4A issue.

A "CALEA 3", key escrow requirement, ban on the Internet, etc would cross my red line. Banning all guns would, too, although unclear exactly where the line is (a total handgun ban probably wouldn't be enough). Obviously legal and political challenges first.

theklub• 13 years ago

People aren't happy about this. Most don't even know about it. The one's that do know about it can't do anything. There simply aren't enough politically active people in this country and far less young ones. Don't confuse what the media says with what people actually feel or want.

robg• 13 years ago

Imagine if with the simple act of buying a firearm, you agreed to increased government monitoring of your online activities.

pinaceae• 13 years ago

a lot of the people that don't want to ban guns because of freedom do want to ban abortions.

you're looking for logic in this? buhaha.

forgiveme10k8• 13 years ago

Sure, guns protect life and provide a great equalizer to those who may not have physical strength.

IOW, give anyone who can legally sign a contract and wants one a gun, no matter where they live (notice, this also deals with mental instability). That provides a level playing field when it comes to physical force.

As to abortions, once they have a working brain stem, they kind of are human beings that can feel pain.

mindcrime9• 13 years ago

I think part of the issue is that this kind of electronic surveillance, and the corresponding awareness of the issue, is relatively new (compared to, say, the firearms issue). I mean, I don't think a lot of people were thinking about the government capturing emails and cellphone records, 100 years ago (or probably 50 years ago, or 20 years ago, or maybe even 10 years ago). But 200+ years ago, private firearms ownership was already a big deal.

forgiveme10k8• 13 years ago

There's another plausible explanation for what you have observed re: outrage.

Indifferent isn't the right word, it is outright drooling ignorance. That, and some of them may still not use any electronic means of communication, but those are pretty well dying off. The limit of their outrage would be to Echelon.

Encryption and modems. Oh, and anything to slow down those NLP MR jobs, like screwing with spelling and word boundaries. (Yes, immature and and likely ultimately futile)

aluhut• 13 years ago

Both laws are based on fear. Fear after 9/11 brought you (and many other western countries) those laws. Now your only chance is to turn the fear around so people fear the tools that have been brought in to fight their fear of terrorists. What is actually happening in some media and on the net.

I'm not sure if this will work out as a long time strategy...

Fuxy• 13 years ago

I doubt there is a country on this planet the US government can't strike a deal with to get his ass back and into prison.

However we all have to be grateful for what he did regardless I sure it wasn't an easy decision to make.

Good luck Edward and don't make any mistakes.

taktix2• 13 years ago

Yes, it's becoming a one government world. A New World Order.

onebaddude2• 13 years ago

I'll never understand the opposition to a single, global, government entity. It seems like the most logical plan.

Otherwise, you get multiple countries playing the zero-sum game of gaining at the expense of other countries. Exactly what we have now. You know, like exploiting the resources of poor countries so we can have cheap gasoline. Good system?

chunkyslink• 13 years ago

Ecuador?

johnnybegoode• 13 years ago

short answer: YES

BigBalli• 13 years ago

yes, and it has been for quite some time.

buo2• 13 years ago

An American that had to seek asylum from the US government was Bobby Fischer, one of the best chess players in history. His offense: playing a chess match against Boris Spassky in Yugoslavia (he also owed taxes).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bobby_Fischer#1992_Spassky_rema...

brown9-2• 13 years ago

I think you left out the part where he defiantly broke the law at the time against economic activities in Yugoslavia.

buo2• 13 years ago

Sorry -- I didn't mean to be unclear about that. The point I wanted to make is that, while he violated a UN embargo, it was just a chess match, and nevertheless he was relentlessly persecuted and had to seek asylum.

ubiq• 13 years ago

Maybe it's time for a new amendment that explicitly protects the privacy of individuals?

rocky11382• 13 years ago

A law is only as good as the people who follow it. A lock keeps an honest man honest.

Shivetya• 13 years ago

Considering the changes this Administration made regarding who it can 'legally' target with drones, would being outside of this country, asylum or not, be safe?

Which countries large enough to not allow our use of their airspace don't have extradition treaties? Russia?

julianozen• 13 years ago

Serious question: Now that he's a US citizen on foreign soil, and an enemy of the state, is it now legal to call a drone strike against him?

dspillett4• 13 years ago

Not quite by my understanding. He would need to be in an area officially classed as a war zone for that.

They could send them to surveil and intimidate him though, but there are less costly ways to do that which won't upset the people in the country he is currently living in nearly as much.

Millennium• 13 years ago

Not yet, but they're sure putting a lot of effort into laying the sort of infrastructure that would make it easy to become such.

squozzer• 13 years ago

If you like what is happening, do nothing. If you don't, do something.

The best way to hurt a rich person is to make them a poor person.

The best way to hurt a megalomaniac is to make them helpless.

mariuolo• 13 years ago

What is scary to me, having grown up in the 80s, is how accepting people are of things that used to be considered typical of the USSR.

gboudrias• 13 years ago

To be fair, the US in those times was just as crazy as the USSR, they just didn't advertise it internally.

alan_cx2• 13 years ago

I believe that in the UK, and probably the EU, you cant extradite people, I think including Americans, if there is a chance the death penalty will be given. Not 100% sure, but I think that is the case.

So, in some ways, the US has been a place form which one can seek asylum for ages. Or at the very least, be very careful in considering extradition application. Assuming the US government bothers with the legal inconvenience and doesn't just sent the CIA in to render them.

xtracto3• 13 years ago

I believe that in the UK, and probably the EU, you cant extradite people, I think including Americans, if there is a chance the death penalty will be given. Not 100% sure, but I think that is the case.

That is also the case even in Mexico. To think that in a country (my country) where deaths by beheading, bar mass shootouts and rampant corruption still stands on a 'higher moral ground' that the USA really amazes me.

dspillett4• 13 years ago

Serious question: Now that he's a US citizen on foreign soil, and an enemy of the state, is it now legal to call a drone strike against him?

Not quite by my understanding. He would need to be in an area officially classed as a war zone for that.

They could send them to surveil and intimidate him though, but there are less costly ways to do that which won't upset the people in the country he is currently living in nearly as much.

(the parent comment seems to have been deleted while I was responding, hence breaking flow as I have and replying to the top)

resu• 13 years ago

Sending drones into Chinese airspace, that is really going to fly!

dspillett4• 13 years ago

The drones currently unofficially over china are not carrying weapons so couldn't "take him out" as the OP I was responding to was talking about. Of course their might be something else the US are doing that we don't know about...

gadders5• 13 years ago

Well, according to Julian Assange, so is Sweden.

petilon• 13 years ago

Anyone who knows my real name can search the internet and find out where I work, my home address, my spouse's name, my home phone number and my age. I didn't put any of this information on the internet, in fact I don't even have a facebook account. Private companies collected and aggregated this information and put it on the internet. Some of the information came from public records (for example, home address from property ownership records), but some was very private (such as my home phone number, which is not even in my name and rarely given out). This is a huge violation of privacy and I have no way of stopping it.

I am not worried about the government spying on me. I am very worried about these for-profit businesses spying on me and outing my information on the internet. Why isn't anyone writing stories about that instead?

thetwiceler• 13 years ago

I think this is really hyperbolic. The fact is that Snowden violated the conditions of his Top Secret security clearance, which is a crime that is subject to criminal prosecution.

Now, I'd argue the leak that Snowden made was much more acceptable than, if he had revealed the identities of CIA spies to foreign countries and caused them to be killed.

Nevertheless, we are a nation guided by rule of law, and it would be unreasonable to expect that Snowden wouldn't be prosecuted. Just because he did something which many people consider was a good thing, does not mean that he didn't do something illegal.

jaekwon• 13 years ago

Yes, and I wonder if Nazi Germany had laws regarding Jews.

webXL• 13 years ago

Bradley Manning, a soldier who released classified documents to WikiLeaks in 2010, has had a very different experience. Manning was held for three years without trial, including 11 months when he was held in de facto solitary confinement. During some of this period, he was forced to sleep naked at night, allegedly as a way to prevent him from committing suicide. The United Nations’ special rapporteur on torture has condemned this as “cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment in violation of Article 16 of the convention against torture.”

I don't know all that much about the case, but why include suicide-prevention as an abuse? I'd probably want to kill myself in his situation, but I think it's humane to actually try to prevent someone from doing it.

And wasn't Manning's leak much more dangerous since it named foreign informants of hostile governments and terrorist organizations? Why lump that in the same category as Snowden letting Americans know how they are being spied on?

erezsh• 13 years ago

why include suicide-prevention as an abuse?

Letting someone sleep naked is not suicide-prevention, it's abuse and humiliation.

snowwrestler• 13 years ago

Many people have sought asylum from the U.S. over the years. Does no one else remember the Vietnam draft-dodgers who departed to Canada? The communist sympathizers or agents who defected to USSR?

That said, I disagree with the notion that because the U.S. implementation of personal freedoms is not perfect, then we are as bad as any other country. Freedom is not measured binarily.

vijayboyapati• 13 years ago

As a libertarian, this travesty has given me some hope that my liberal friends will be somewhat more sketpical of the government as benevolent provider. For years and years I have seen people online belittle libertarians as crackpots and "tin foil hat conspiracy theorists". One wonders when the average joe will stop and come to terms with the fact that these "crackpots" were far more insightful about the nature of the state than they were.

Sadly, I think the answer is they will never come to terms with it.

NikaJessenia• 13 years ago

The issue is with BAD government, not all government. America has a bad government because the government has been co-opted by a corporate elite.

Government should be a meritocracy where the smartest minds in the country elect representatives from their field of expertise. So instead of having the dumb public elect one or two figurehead politicians, you have well-educated people electing top minds in their own field, who represent the scientifically and intellectually validated viewpoint of those well-educated people.

Cronyism, nepotism and super-rich corporate privilege are what has destroyed the American government.

Libertarianism would also seek to destroy the American government, reverting to a state of anarchy where the super-rich corporatists simply rule everyone by virtue of their superior wealth, manpower, and organization.

cwp• 13 years ago

Wow. This is the first time I've encountered an exception to Betteridge's law. The article makes a pretty strong argument that the answer to the headline is "yes".

freepipi• 13 years ago

There is no absolutely liberty and absolutely privacy, isn't it? if the government didn't collection people's information, the hackers from other countries will do so. which one do you prefer?

freddealmeida• 13 years ago

To answer the question: Yes.

swethrowaway2• 13 years ago

People seem to speak in favor of guns (outside of stuff like hunting, sports, etc, which is not really relevant here) for two reasons:

1. Self defense against common criminals 2. Safeguard against tyranni

I would like to add a third reason:

3. Because I am a free man. Because I am sovereign. Because I hold inalienable rights. Because I harm no one by keeping arms.

I think the first and second arguments hold some weight[1] but really to me this is a freedom issue. I really don't think I NEED to provide a reason why I should be allowed to own a gun, same as I don't need to provide a reason why I am allowed to exist. It's very simple: no one - be it my neighbor or more abstract entities - has the right to infringe on my right to life and liberty. Part of that right to exist is the right to keep instruments of self-defense.

Now, there are a tons of gray zones (eg I don't think individuals have the right to build nuclear weapons in their back yard) but for guns it's very simple. No need to throw out the baby with the bathwater here.

Can we really trust individuals to own guns? I'd say it's the opposite: the government is WAY less mature and responsible than individuals. The occasional misbehaving individual is a fart in the wind compared to the systematic, egregious misconduct of pretty much every government ever. Seriously, look at the track record of governments in the 20th century - not exactly a rosy picture. And if you look at history, it's always the nobility and such that are allowed to bear arms, and the unfree classes that are deprived.

I do believe in a minimal state, though, so I'm not an anarchist.

I am born and raised in Scandinavia btw, so I guess I'm a bit of an odd duck as pro-gun and libertarian :)

Posting as throwaway because this is somewhat controversial and I see no reason to incur negative social status in my social circles over something that is purely an academic issue in Sweden anyway (ie there is no pro-gun movement whatsoever here and anyone who espouses those kinds of views is insta-pigeonholed as a radical kook).

Anyway, I felt I needed to vent a little bit. I expect to be downvoted into oblivion. But, hey, at least provide a counter-argument, will ya? :)

[1] But I think some people are overestimating guns as a tyranny deterrent. The US military allowed each Iraqi household to have one Kalashnikov, for instance. That should tell you something.

swethrowaway2• 13 years ago

It should say "2. Safeguard against tyrannical governments". I seem to be unable to update my comment to fix the typo.

ryguytilidie• 13 years ago

Well we made a law to protect whistleblowers, so we as a nation clearly understand that whistleblowers are quite important.

...Then the law was simply amended to exclude people who worked for the agencies that had the power to do the most damage.

So, unfortunately the answer is yes, we are the type of nation where you now have to seek asylum.

dalke• 13 years ago

To be complete, there are other historical cases of other countries granting asylum to US citizen, or people who didn't want to be US citizens.

Bobby Fischer was granted asylum by Iceland. Assata Shakur and roughly 100 other Americans have been granted asylum in Cuba. Norwood Peter DuBerg and family were granted asylum by Switzerland. Chere Lyn Tomayko was granted asylum by Costa Rica. Holly Collins was granted asylum by the Netherlands. Various people were granted asylum by the Soviet Union, but I can find no names.

joelrunyon• 13 years ago

Has the US become the type of nation from which you have to seek asylum?

It's a little sad we even have to ask this question...

raymondduke• 13 years ago

All these stories seem to be a journalism ploy to rekindle readership.

Has the US become the type of nation from which you have to seek asylum?

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