10 ms·

I would have agreed with you before November 2016. Now, I'm being completely honest in saying I'm not so sure.

refurb 9y ago
Really? If I recall, HN was blowing up at all the surveillance and privacy concerns under Obama. Is it really worse under Trump?
- hrktb 9y ago
  From a non US POV, under Obama people seemed disappointed and betrayed by how a man that they saw as on their side was not doing the right things in their eyes. Under Trump it feels like those same people mostly gave up.
- adventured 9y ago
  No. Nothing has fundamentally changed. That's merely partisan wishful dreaming, it makes people feel better to think their side isn't nearly so bad on eg privacy. The machine that has been consistently moving these things along for 40-50 years now, transcends the parties. The parties have their marching orders, they largely obey. Politicians come and go. Feinstein for one example, if she gets replaced (which she will eventually, she's 84 years old), the anti-privacy pushers will find a replacement vessel.
drb91 9y ago
Oh come on, neoliberals aren’t much better. They’re two feet to the left of the right wingers when it comes to surveillance, policing, funding the military & pro-military nationalistic rhetoric, with industry hands in their pocket, and their own hands in the media. The seeds for fascism, authoritarianism, and cults of personality are well rooted in the senior offices of congress on both sides. It has been ripe for abuse and we have seen only a small bit of this in 2016. Pinning any change here on trump is like blaming the crash on a pilot who took charge after the engines already blew. There is little to no recognition of the abuses of federal government in the government itself, and not for a while. If any authoritarian power rises, it will be because the democrats are too busy shoveling their shit out of view to put up any real fight. Just look at how blame for a mediocre-at-best platform was shifted to russian propaganda, as if it could have possibly moved the needle more than the hundreds of millions of “legit” propaganda spent by the democrats, as if Bernie Sander's continued popularity doesn't point to a way to strong support in the future that they continue to reject for more unpopular, centrist, neoliberals.
- EggsOnToast 9y ago
  This. Obama radically expanded the surveillance state as did Bush and arguably Clinton abided it even if he didn't outright affect it in the same way as his successors. I'm not going to make the statement that the Chinese surveillance state is wrong, because in this instance I think it's irrelevant to the greater point that its execution is a totally different beast from the government surveillance that takes place in the USA. Whether or not one party in the USA is worse than another, neither is comparable in this context to the CPC.
- sjg007 9y ago
  I think the issue is that Trump and the State department are not going to do anything about a strongman in China. Trump likes strongmen and hasn't doing anything to curb Duerte, Putin and now Xi in China.
  - drb91 9y ago
    Well, that may be true. I'm not sure what another state department might have done in this position against Xi, though; this is a continuation of politics that hardly offered Obama straightforward leverage either.
    - forapurpose 9y ago
      > I'm not sure what another state department might have done The US State Department, and the entire US government, has for generations made human rights central to US foreign policy. It's believed that people with freedom and opportunity become vibrant trade partners and allies, not enemies in war. Democracies don't start wars against other democracies, as an historical rule. That historic policy is widely believed to have given the US enormous influence, as people generally feel favorably towards others whose central goal is freedom and opportunity for all. The current State Dept (including the Secretary of State) and other leading government officials have openly forewarn support for human rights. The Secretary of State said making money is more important (which fits the approach of many in the oil industry, and he was CEO of Exxon). Others deemphasize it for no given reason, and advocate even eliminating the State Dept in favor of military power. > a continuation of politics that hardly offered Obama straightforward leverage A lack of straightforward leverage is pretty normal for international relations; it's the sea in which diplomats swim. Almost every great thing that has been accomplished in that field was done in that environment.

Really? If I recall, HN was blowing up at all the surveillance and privacy concerns under Obama. Is it really worse under Trump?

hrktb 9y ago
From a non US POV, under Obama people seemed disappointed and betrayed by how a man that they saw as on their side was not doing the right things in their eyes. Under Trump it feels like those same people mostly gave up.
adventured 9y ago
No. Nothing has fundamentally changed. That's merely partisan wishful dreaming, it makes people feel better to think their side isn't nearly so bad on eg privacy. The machine that has been consistently moving these things along for 40-50 years now, transcends the parties. The parties have their marching orders, they largely obey. Politicians come and go. Feinstein for one example, if she gets replaced (which she will eventually, she's 84 years old), the anti-privacy pushers will find a replacement vessel.

drb91 9y ago

Oh come on, neoliberals aren’t much better. They’re two feet to the left of the right wingers when it comes to surveillance, policing, funding the military & pro-military nationalistic rhetoric, with industry hands in their pocket, and their own hands in the media. The seeds for fascism, authoritarianism, and cults of personality are well rooted in the senior offices of congress on both sides. It has been ripe for abuse and we have seen only a small bit of this in 2016. Pinning any change here on trump is like blaming the crash on a pilot who took charge after the engines already blew. There is little to no recognition of the abuses of federal government in the government itself, and not for a while. If any authoritarian power rises, it will be because the democrats are too busy shoveling their shit out of view to put up any real fight. Just look at how blame for a mediocre-at-best platform was shifted to russian propaganda, as if it could have possibly moved the needle more than the hundreds of millions of “legit” propaganda spent by the democrats, as if Bernie Sander's continued popularity doesn't point to a way to strong support in the future that they continue to reject for more unpopular, centrist, neoliberals.

EggsOnToast 9y ago
This. Obama radically expanded the surveillance state as did Bush and arguably Clinton abided it even if he didn't outright affect it in the same way as his successors. I'm not going to make the statement that the Chinese surveillance state is wrong, because in this instance I think it's irrelevant to the greater point that its execution is a totally different beast from the government surveillance that takes place in the USA. Whether or not one party in the USA is worse than another, neither is comparable in this context to the CPC.
sjg007 9y ago
I think the issue is that Trump and the State department are not going to do anything about a strongman in China. Trump likes strongmen and hasn't doing anything to curb Duerte, Putin and now Xi in China.
- drb91 9y ago
  Well, that may be true. I'm not sure what another state department might have done in this position against Xi, though; this is a continuation of politics that hardly offered Obama straightforward leverage either.
  - forapurpose 9y ago
    > I'm not sure what another state department might have done The US State Department, and the entire US government, has for generations made human rights central to US foreign policy. It's believed that people with freedom and opportunity become vibrant trade partners and allies, not enemies in war. Democracies don't start wars against other democracies, as an historical rule. That historic policy is widely believed to have given the US enormous influence, as people generally feel favorably towards others whose central goal is freedom and opportunity for all. The current State Dept (including the Secretary of State) and other leading government officials have openly forewarn support for human rights. The Secretary of State said making money is more important (which fits the approach of many in the oil industry, and he was CEO of Exxon). Others deemphasize it for no given reason, and advocate even eliminating the State Dept in favor of military power. > a continuation of politics that hardly offered Obama straightforward leverage A lack of straightforward leverage is pretty normal for international relations; it's the sea in which diplomats swim. Almost every great thing that has been accomplished in that field was done in that environment.