Australia 'spied on Indonesia President Yudhoyono' | Hacker News Reader

Australia 'spied on Indonesia President Yudhoyono'

bbc.co.uk

25 pointspeterkelly21 comments

I am Indonesian. Look, we know other governments are spying on our President. This comes with the job - however, tapping the personal phone of the First Lady is pretty much beyond the pale. She's not an elected official. This is done in a bad taste.

It's difficult, to my mind. If you consider it acceptable to tap his phone for a purpose he'd rather not communicate to the Australians and there's a clear line that says her phone must not be tapped but his is ok, guess which phone he's going to use for that purpose?

Well that's just fine. He's a President, not the most wanted terrorist in the world. Are they tapping the phones of his children/relatives as well?

Probably.

If it would be rather awkward if instead of more peace and transparency, the Snowden files would lead to more open animosity and even war.

Of course blame should never fall on Snowden, but I think it is a given that close countries spy on each other. Nations act on self interest, it is very important to know what other nations are doing around you, or you could be caught unawares, like Europe was when the Blitzkrieg started.

I appreciate the leaks discussing spying programs aimed domestically, but the leaks regarding international spying make no sense to me. It's like the person who makes a social situation weird by pointing out an awkward fact that everyone knows but sensibly doesn't say out loud.

Of course blame should never fall on Snowden

Why not? I'm not wanting to make the case that it should necessarily, but the idea that some blame shouldn't fall on him if international catastrophe comes from his actions doesn't seem obviously justified. If his actions seem to lead to peace and transparency, I'd expect history to give him some of the credit.

I guess that's just my ethical system. He alone is not capable of initiating national conflicts, he simply does not have the power.

He has (had) the power to influence the decisions of those with power, but in any circumstance, as long as those in power have control over their own emotions/actions, they should be solely responsible for the actions they take.

Example where some people might disagree with me: If the Hamas launches rockets on an Israeli settlement, killing hundreds, and in return Netanyahu orders a retaliation, killing one Palestinian civilian. Then I believe Netanyahu is responsible for that death, and Hamas is not. Because Netanyahu made the conscious decision to attack.

Responsibility is not zero-sum - it's perfectly possible for multiple people to share different degrees of responsibility for an outcome.

Sure, the solder who pulled the trigger, the commanding officer who gave the order, the general who made the mission on direction of the prime minister all share in the responsibility as well.

aka "intelligence agency of random country does its job"

As I understood it, Snowden saw excessive (and illegal?) spying by the NSA on American citizens. He then spent time collecting information on these activities which he intended to leak. I find it interesting that somehow slides disclosing Australia's spying on Indonesia met his document collection criteria. The timing of the release of this particular part of his document collection is also highly suspect, as our newly elected government was working hard and well with Indonesian authorities to shutdown the people smugglers.

I really don't understand why HN tolerates these political articles.

Newsflash: Countries have always and will always spy on each other. It's human nature.

Countries are not humans.

Countries are human fancy. The nature of the fancier is somewhat pertinent.

In other news, "Dog Bites Man".

In other other news, HN does not erupt into self righteous indignation that a country spies on another country.

So politicians are all a bunch of teenagers in adult bodies. Who would have thought?

No calls to boycott Australian products, hmmm.

Ugg boots?

Ha. Not for a while now, though. Deckers has 95% world market share. I can remember the trademark battle a decade or so ago.

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

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