Britain targets Guardian paper over intelligence leaks related to Edward Snowden
washingtonpost.com
washingtonpost.com
I don't have massively high expectations of Cameron, but the fact that Clegg's Lib Dems haven't broken up the government over this has completely destroyed my respect for them - and any chance of me voting for them in future.
To be clear, my view is not that bulk surveillance trends are something that needs a little adjustment, that one might work within the system to adjust appropriately. I see them as a wholesale betrayal of our society, and the idea that I voted for people who won't take a strong stand against this repels me.
Who are you even talking about here? You can't stand up against authoritarianism by collapsing the government especially when you are a minority partner with no clear better option available.
A party's goal is not (or at least, should not be) to be in government at any cost. It should be to represent an ideology maintained by their voters. If staying in government requires betraying that ideology, what's the point of being in government?
Presumably, your answer would be to exert power on other issues, and under normal circumstances I would agree wholeheartedly. I was initially in favour of the lib-con alliance, because I understand that under normal circumstances, compromise is healthy and necessary - believe it or not, I'm generally a political pragmatist. I just don't see this as an issue that someone could possibly consider compromising on.
Changing things. Honestly I don't think you understand this at all. You're acting as if by collapsing the government it would instantly pass to a more preferential party who would reign in the excesses.
In reality there exists no such party, no such majority. Who would step in to carry out these actions you desire?
I think you don't understand me at all, to be honest. I don't expect a change in the parties in charge to reign in the excesses - why would it? Both the major parties are full of authoritarians.
What I think it might provide is what we don't have in the current situation - a basis for future change. A party that actually stands up for what's right provides a cause for effective protest to coalesce around - as things stand, who does a concerned citizen vote and work for, when no party supports change of substance? You're hardly going to spur on a popular movement with promises of working within the existing government to change the situation from horrifying to very slightly less horrifying.
I do believe there's enough concern over these issues for a talented politician to work with and build on. After all, despite their recent actions, both the lib dems and the cons were elected on a popular mandate to improve civil liberties from the dark days of labour.
You'd think mature democracies in the 21st century would've learned something from the previous century, and wouldn't go back to the previous shameless abuses of power by the leadership, that would normally happen only in countries we'd call "dictatorships" or "communists" or "fascists".
It's like the Internet has made them power mad once again, wiping out any memories of previous abuses and why they happened. I think it was Bruce Schenier who said the Internet is "magnifying" everyone's power, not just the power of the individuals. It's just that it took a while for the governments to catch-up to understanding how they can (ab)use this power.
We need that "secure by default" Internet right about now, to put governments on equal footing with their citizens once again (so they can't abuse the power to know everything about everyone anymore). We need to have real privacy again on the Internet, and real anonymity, too, for those that think they need it. If privacy really is dead from now on, then this century is going to not be a very pleasant one for normal citizens.
The editor has been asked to appear before parliament. He'll be asked some questions. Which may also give him another opportunity complain about the harddrive destruction incident. Parliament regularly summons people, but the worst they will do to these people is ask them awkward questions and make stupid statements.
The destruction of harddrives was downright farcical and distasteful, but of relatively low importance: The Guardian were not forced to.
They were given hints that it might be bad not to destroy the drives. Even after pointing out that of course they had copies, and being given plenty of time to make further copies should they need to. So they decided to go along with it.
There were no thugs forcing their ways into their offices, nor any court orders forcing them to comply. They let some humourless GCHQ people into their offices voluntarily, and destroyed some harddrives everyone involved knew had been copied, and so everyone involved knew they were going through motions because the government officials had no powers to do more, but presumably had orders.
Cameron and ministers have complained loudly, but despite that they've so been totally impotent when it comes to actually do anoything more than inconveniencing Miranda at Heathrow for a few hours and arranging a voluntary ceremonial harddrive destruction that just made them look stupid.
I'm not saying it's not bad. I find it shocking and disgusting to see how politicians have responded to this. Cameron time and time again makes it clear that he has no respect for the public.
But if anything, it has also demonstrated that the UK government appears to only be able to respond to the publication of classified material in a way that is more perplexing and comical, in a way worthy of a Monthy Python sketch, than scary and intimidating.
I almost wish I had secret documents I could publish, so I too could get to experience first hand having GCHQ come to watch me pointlessly smash a harddrive (smashing a harddrive properly without powertools is hard work - I recently had to dispose of a bunch of drives at work...)
So, let's not be hyperbolic here. Well, if we were hyperbolic in the first place, maybe the GQHC (or whatever it is called) and the NSA wouldn't have bugged the entire planet. Who knows?
SERIOUSLY?
The point is the article tried to paint this as if the Guardian was under imminent threat, when the government has been whining for months, and that is the worst they've been able to actually do.
This is true. I hope no one is suggesting that UK authorities kill journalists.
But still, detaining the partner of a journalist who is carrying materials to that journalist is something that the UK must not do. Respect for journalistic materials is written into some UK law.
This kind of thing might be, compared to other countries, not that big a deal. But it's still scummy and sleazy.
Yeah let's not be hyperbolic...
Its GCHQ BTW
After all, maybe Cameron suddenly decides he dares to try execute on all his authoritarian fantasies after all. It's likely an exceedingly small risk, but it is exactly if that threat becomes real an organization like The Guardian would be the most invaluable.
They are also not just facing legal attempts by the UK government, but the real risk of rogue attempts by the agencies they're exposing.
But I think the chance the UK government would risk uniting the press against themselves by taking steps to actually prevent a known media organization from functioning is tiny.
Even less likely that they'd be able to find a British judge that wouldn't take personal affront to the idea of a government trampling all over the press - you can say a lot about British judges, but they do tend to take great pleasure in restraining the government from taking actions they see as power grabs.
Just a advice, next time spend some time on Google before classifying serious events as "Hyperbole" and "Monthy Python sketch".
He was held under the Terrorist Act, section 7, a section which allows the police to hold people for a limited time for the purpose of establishing whether they may be terrorists.
If he had been charged under the Terrorist Act he would have been currently residing in a high security UK prison, not been allowed to continue his flight after a few hours.
And I stand by what I wrote. Greenwald and Miranda has acknowledged that he was carrying data related to the Snowden leaks. While I believe using section 7 is a blatant abuse of the Terrorism Act in this case, and that the Terrorism Act itself is a travesty, he was carrying documents that, regardless whether we think the should be public (I am all for their publication, and I'm a big fan of Greenwald and Snowden), are classified and originated from a high profile leak.
Now despite this, and despite their willingness to abuse the Terrorist Act to detain him and search him and confiscate some equipment, they did not do anything else.
When you can carry confidential intelligence documents through a UK airport and only risk being detained for a few hours and having them taken off you, that is a prime demonstration that the government is still thankfully quite impotent when it comes to touching journalists or those working for them (I'm not willing to assume it'd be safe for someone not linked directly or indirectly to a major media organization to do the same).
You can hire drive shredders which might have been easier.
http://reason.com/blog/2013/08/20/despite-its-battle-with-th...
Mulcaire was no Mitnick, that's for sure.
I'd hoped they'd be more anxious to appear to be doing the right thing here, but it seems Cameron's comments have emboldened them.
If there'd been serious chances of anything coming out of it, they'd have acted by now - they, and everyone else, knows the damage has already been done, in that going after The Guardian now won't stop coverage, and would in fact be pretty much the only thing they could do which would get Guardian plenty of support (out of self interest) from other media organizations that have so far given the NSA/GCHQ revelations very little attention.
Well, we do, technically. We have no written constitution; our "constitution" is statute, legal rulings, and treaties. The Human Rights Act 1998 guarantees freedom of speech.
Or gaming comments? http://www.popehat.com/2013/07/11/the-first-amendment-protec...
Then again, it's nice to at least have it listed in the Constitution.
Guarantees so weak, they lay out at least seven censorship categories under which the Guardian could be anti-freedom-of-speech'd:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Article_10_of_the_European_Con...
"The exercise of these freedoms [of expression], since it carries with it duties and responsibilities, may be subject to such formalities, conditions, restrictions or penalties as are prescribed by law and are necessary in a democratic society, in the interests of national security, territorial integrity or public safety, for the prevention of disorder or crime, for the protection of health or morals, for the protection of the reputation or rights of others, for preventing the disclosure of information received in confidence, or for maintaining the authority and impartiality of the judiciary."
There's so little freedom-guaranteeing here, I'm having a hard time imagining a censorship law that this conventional actually disallows. I can't immediately think of a reason anyone would censor, that's not covered under one of the "necessary in a democratic society" reasons; or think of any historic example of odious censorship that can't be reasonably described as, e.g. "protection of... morals". I'm not sure what the purpose of this declaration of non-rights is, beyond making a show of pretending to have them.
The only thing is there may be a consequence of doing so.
The inner workings of the human rights act pretty much does nothing to prevent any consequences but it doesn't stop you speaking and neither can any law. It might stop you speaking the second time but rarely the first. The internet is a big enabler of speaking to lots of people before you have a chance to be censored.
The Guardian is using that fact to drum up embarrassment and wailing the terms according to those who wish to prevent them from speaking whilst ignoring them.
The government are trying to stop them speaking again and trying to prevent people from speaking before they know they want to speak.
we're sitting here echoing the first words again and again.
Ultimately we don't live by any laws. The law only issues consequences. The law is powerless here and the Guardian know it.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/europe/britain-targets-g...
TANSTAAFL
Having said that: This YouTube clip of Will Ferrel is just disturbing. How many of the audience get the irony? How many are oblivious to it? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mQzkMoEGDGE
To American audiences, that's obviously satire. Standard fare for the actor and the host. It's definitely, deliberately, over the top and uncomfortable in a Sascha Baron-Cohen kind of way, but we know when we are making fun of ourselves. The combination of exceptionalism with schadenfreude is always ugly, and gross exaggerations of both, well, satire.
Outside of the US, where the players aren't as well known...maybe it's not clear satire. Where folks are quick to judge (often rightfully) American bluster...yeah, it makes him and the studio audience sound like colossal jerks, and people might add it to their mental list of examples proving that Americans suck.
But what does that have to do with the UK? :)
YouTube clip mirror for non US viewers:
http://teamcoco.com/video/will-ferrell-hates-russian-gymnast...