7 ms·
Why is this a political hit piece instead of an article? Thanks for the two facts about the agency, but were half dozen or so attacks on the POTUS really necess
by ccrush 10y ago
Why is this a political hit piece instead of an article? Thanks for the two facts about the agency, but were half dozen or so attacks on the POTUS really necessary? If anything, the previous POTUS, a constitutional scholar that campaigned on ending domestic surveillance, has recently relaxed the rules on espionage by allowing non-intelligence agencies to access surveillance data. Furthermore, I don't think it's fair to turn an article about a little-known government agency into bullshit click bait propaganda. Either title the post "look at what Trump can do with the nation's aerial and spatial espionage agency" or make it substantially about that. This is pure click bait garbage, and it is disguised as being of interest to this community to spread propaganda. I would be fine with an opinion or two thrown in there, but making the first two paragraphs about the agency and the rest of it an opinion and hit piece is just a waste of everyone's time. Thanks for the garbage post.
- lucio 10y agoVery well put.
- jakeogh 10y agoedit: Not the CFR, I had the mag name mixed up.
- repples 10y agoIt's a reasonable concern that Trump may try to abuse his power in this area as well, given his rhetoric and behavior so far. Nothing wrong with pointing that concern out, to give the article some context about the potential domestic power of this agency.
- liquidise 10y agoIs that speculation the duty of these articles, though? It's clear they seem to think so, but the politicizing of otherwise informative articles grows tiresome to me. Why is providing facts so difficult these days?
- dsfyu404ed 10y agoFacts don't drive clicks.
- jameskegel 10y agoTo me, this much conjecture just serves to deride the rest of the article. I couldn't get past the unprofessional tone.
- meowface 10y agoI agree the post is overly politicized and biased towards Trump, but I think a strong argument could be made that Obama's reasons for and uses of expanded intelligence capabilities may turn out to be less concerning than Trump's. (Not to defend Obama's intelligence expansion.)
- oh_sigh 10y agoWhy would you assume that? Is it more than just you like Obama, and don't like Trump?
- meowface 10y agoI suppose in some sense it amounts to that at a very fundamental level (though I wouldn't really say I "like" Obama). But, worded more eloquently, I think that Trump's ego, insecurity, arrogance, and overall personality makes him more likely to abuse his power; especially for petty or vindictive reasons. Not incredibly more likely. I don't think he's going to call the NSA director and ask him to spy on an ex-wife or something (probably...). I just think Obama respected the gravitas of his position more.
- maxmin123 10y agoIt's difficult to validate all of your claims. >Trump's ego, insecurity, arrogance Successful multi-billionaire compared to a community organizer, who would be more insecure? >abuse his power Sending 400 million in cash in form of Swiss currency in middle of night, is more like abusing power. Catch and release policy for last 7 years of illegal immigrants, ICE not allowed to do their job, that could be called abusing power and can also be called, acting not in interests of America. And this is just the tip of iceberg. I could keep going. Compare that to someone who is using the force to make America safe again. There is difference between abusing power and using power for good. >don't think he's going to call the NSA director Are you even slightly aware of current state of affairs, NSA under previous president has been caught spying on our POTUS during elections. It'd be helpful to you and everyone here if you did bit looking around before spewing things out or be honest about saying things.
- mirimir 10y agoWell, it focuses on him because he's President now. Sure, Obama was an authoritarian bastard. But why do we think that Trump won't be one? Has he, for example, stopped assassinating random foreigners based on often iffy metadata?
- reddytowns 10y ago> Has he, for example, stopped assassinating random foreigners based on often iffy metadata? There is no way you or anyone else besides those within the agencies themselves would be able to qualify on what data and for what reasons the US assassinates anybody.
- igk 10y agoWe do know, they assassinate people though. And I'd argued that is already incompatible with democratic and humanist values
- reddytowns 10y agoYou can't stop them, so any argument of whether it's right or not is mute.
- DerpyBaby123 10y agoThat's a defeatist attitude. If you care about changing something, you must discuss it and take action against it.
- reddytowns 10y agoThere are some things which fighting against is not worth the effort. Concentrating on things which can create significant positive change is much more fruitful.
- cryptarch 10y ago
- partiallypro 10y agoI agree with you, but I did think the article was still good. You can ignore the talking points in it and it stands on its own. It's possible that this was revised number of times, and the author was either more or less heavy handed on the political side. FP Magazine hates Trump, if you've read their publication, so this is no surprise. The biggest eye roll moment for me was Trump targeting "Black Lives Matter" like he would foreign terrorists.
- kelnos 10y agoTrump might not target BLM, but I wouldn't put it past Bannon.
- spoiledtechie 10y agoWhy is that? Because you have heard bad things about Bannon? What bad things have you heard that make you believe that? Facts, not opinions.
- lukifer 10y agoThe quotes about "Leninist", "Darth Vader", and "Fourth Turning" are sufficient to justify this suspicion.
- downandout 10y agoWell over half of the article is nothing but speculation designed for fearmongering among their audience (who are undoubtedly extremely liberal, judging from the other Trump articles on their site).
- dmix 10y agoIt depends on the author and subject, FP has some decent writing and some excellent geopolitical analysis. Although I haven't been reading it as much since the election - maybe the editors are pushing the anti-Trump angle hard like NYTimes has been shamelessly doing recently. It's writers are very 'internationalist' and focused on geopolitical diplomacy so a lot of them are falling under the 'I'm appalled at Trump and must bring it up at every moment to show that America is still okay'. It's tough being a news junkie and not being a typical foaming at the mouth US mainstream liberal these days (which to the surprise of many in that category does not make one a right wing Trump supporter, nor American for that matter).
- heymijo 10y ago"...the previous POTUS, a constitutional scholar that campaigned on ending domestic surveillance..." 1) This line reminded me how fallible my memory is. I held a view of Obama as always toeing the line on government surveillance. Then senator Obama's 2008 vote in favor of the FISA Amendments Act and pro-surveillance actions as POTUS dominate my memory. I had completely forgotten his anti-surveillance rhetoric and actions from '04 - '07 [1][2]. 2) How incredible would it be to candidly hear answers from Obama about what changed his mind? 3) I also wonder what it would be like to hear his candid thoughts now about handing over a surveillance state, that he directly entrenched as POTUS, to our current president. Wishful thinking, I know, but it's something so few have any direct information about aside from conjecture. [1] http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/article/obama-on-mass-government-surveillance-then-and-now/ http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/article/obama-on-mass-gove... [2] https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/jun/03/barack-obama-surveillance-reform-vacillation-caution-fear https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/jun/03/barack-obama...
- naasking 10y ago> 2) How incredible would it be to candidly hear answers from Obama about what changed his mind? It would be biased bullshit anyway. If they had any examples of real attacks being thwarted, they would have presented this evidence just to stop the criticisms. The surveillance is effective for political and economic reasons, and possibly for law enforcement's domestic use, which is borderline unconstitutional.
- leereeves 10y agoThe surveillance went as far as spying on members of Trump's campaign, which is eerily similar to Watergate. http://www.politico.com/story/2017/03/devin-nunes-donald-trump-surveillance-obama-236366 http://www.politico.com/story/2017/03/devin-nunes-donald-tru... https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/19/us/politics/trump-russia-associates-investigation.html?_r=2 https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/19/us/politics/trump-russia-...
- naasking 10y ago
- spoiledtechie 10y agoYou said it! Political hit piece. Full of glaring, what ifs.