17 ms·

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

827 points by Libertatea 13y ago

josephagoss 13y 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.
- youngerdryas 13y ago
  You do know that Australia and NZ share intel with your boogie monster don't you?
  - josephagoss 13y ago
    I understand this, and that scares me. :(
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
- euroclydon 13y 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?"
  - belorn 13y 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.
    - rayiner 13y ago
      This is not true. Even US citizens capptured in Afghanistan fighting for the Taliban were transferred out of gitmo.
      - epsylon 13y ago
        But non-US citizens can liberally have their basic human rights denied. 12 years after 9/11. That's the land of the free for you. (Looking at how Bradley Manning was treated even shows that US citizens aren't treated much better. Being denied a lawyer and confined to solitary cells for months is not much different from torture.)
        DannoHung 13y ago
        Manning was a member of the Army. You give up a significant number of rights and freedoms as a US citizen when you become a member of the armed forces. Which is not to say that it is right, but that it is legal.
        eli_gottlieb 13y ago
        At this point, American law is completely corrupt. Who gives a damn about it? What they've done to Bradley Manning isn't right, at all.
        jvictor118 13y ago
        Bradley Manning was a member of the Armed Forces who released classified information to the public. What planet are you living on that his prosecution is unwarranted?
        eli_gottlieb 13y ago
        What planning are you living on where physical and psychological torture is a warranted response to breaking military law?
  - Jacqued 13y 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
  - mtgx 13y 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.
    - Loughla 13y ago
      Citations?
  - vacri 13y 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 13y 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.
    - mpyne 13y ago
      Uh, no to "decades without trial". And, for that matter, to "solitary confinement" as a routine, since we simply don't have that number of empty jail (not prison) cells anyways. It's funny how you mention having a jail cell with no one to bother you as worse than a labor camp though. I think those who have survived gulags or Nazi labor camps might disagree with you on that.
      - euroclydon 13y ago
        There's a lot of evidence to suggest that solitary confinement is a form of torture. See this highly discussed recent thread: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5796790 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5796790
        mpyne 13y ago
        I didn't say people don't find solitary confinement to be a form of torture. I did say it's still better than labor camps, especially for the types of "solitary confinement" usually being discussed, which are "cells or prison wings without other prisoners" and not "dark holes with only a slot on the door". Should I ever go to prison I would greatly prefer the "prison wing without other prisoners", though I understand that's only a personal preference.
        euroclydon 13y ago
        Depends on the labor camp I guess. Gulags were meat grinders, especially during the war and famine years in Russia.
- twoodfin 13y 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 13y 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.
  - tekmate 13y 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
    - onebaddude 13y ago
      >"bails out bankers while promoting austerity for everyone else" How does that work exactly? Do banks operate in a vacuum in the economy? It's my understanding that social program spending (and hence the deficit) over the recession was at all time highs. "Main Street" got its share of the bail out, as it should have.
      - tekmate 13y ago
        like i wrote. it's not about what's really happening in details, but overall perception
      - 13y ago
- gizzlon 13y 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 13y 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.
    - mbesto 13y ago
      CCTV runs like mad across the UK. Well at least London. Almost every street corner here has a CCTV vid cam on it.
      - mixedbit 13y ago
        Right: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Bansky_one_nation_under_cctv.jpg https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Bansky_one_nation_un...
      - vidarh 13y ago
        The vast majority of CCTV in the UK is privately owned, not networked and most of it is not watched live, or ever unless something actually happens. The police often ignores CCTV because figuring out who controls which cameras and whether or not they were working, and if so how to get the footage can be too time consuming to be worth it. So while I can't say I like the amount of CCTV here, it's a lot less sinister than portrayed. Now, some parts of central London is very well covered by live, monitored CCTV, though.
  - gadders 13y ago
    Any country that requires identity cards (such as France) has already lost its claim to be more free.
- StavrosK 13y 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 13y 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.
- stevoski 13y 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 13y ago
    Most of the US populous has jobs, beer and entertainment. Plus they might with the lottery some day and join the 1%.
    - deleted 13y ago
      [deleted]
    - qwerta 13y ago
      1% in prison? :-)
    - alan_cx 13y ago
      Distracted by the various opiates of the masses. And that's the problem, while people have their comforts and believe that bad things only happen to other "guilty" people, or should I say other guilty "Americans", government gets away with what ever it likes.
  - powertower 13y 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.
- taktix 13y 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 13y ago
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/School_attacks_in_China_%282010%E2%80%9312%29 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/School_attacks_in_China_%282010...
- cLeEOGPw 13y 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 13y 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_ 13y 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 13y 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.
  - gadders 13y 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.
    - flyinRyan 13y ago
      You may not have had that feeling but you were obviously under surveillance, even before you entered.
  - xtracto 13y 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.
- shirro 13y 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.
- powertower 13y 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.
  - xtracto 13y 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.
    - jvictor118 13y ago
      What exactly is "all this data" you're worried the government will see? What are you doing on Google and Facebook? I have this funny feeling the NSA doesn't care about your memes or JS plugins or whatever stupid crap you talk about on Facebook.
    - reader5000 13y ago
      You could also develop liver cancer and die, regardless of your cloud data usage!
      - mvaliente2001 13y ago
        That's why you don't care about liver cancer when you use the cloud.
- mbesto 13y 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 13y 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.
  - dspillett 13y 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 13y 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.
- gadders 13y 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.
- skaevola 13y 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-internet-was-expected-help-democratise-china-instead-it-has-enabled http://www.economist.com/news/special-report/21574628-intern...
- stephen_g 13y 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 13y 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.
- rocky1138 13y ago
  Same from Canada.
VLM 13y 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 13y 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.
  - VLM 13y ago
    Could that be a suggestive question? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suggestive_question http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suggestive_question (We're solidly in the realm of (bad) meta-puns now...)
youngerdryas 13y 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.
- deleted 13y ago
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- Andrew_Quentin 13y ago
  Who says it is legal? Is it constitutional?
l33tbro 13y 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
tpatke 13y 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.
- tibbon 13y 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.
  - saalweachter 13y 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.
    - tibbon 13y ago
      I'm not up on my history as much as I should be, but I think some of the influence there conceptually is from the "right to overthrow the government", and the idea that many of the new governments at the time were only lasting a short period of time and then would need revised.
deleted 13y ago
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- pi18n 13y ago
  Or, you know, if one had been linking to videos and/or downloading files by altering numbers in a URL.
- venomsnake 13y ago
  There is this obscure document known as the us constitution that defines treason as Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort. He is definitely not waging war on the US and is not adhering to any enemy, nor giving them aid and comfort. Or he is aiding enemy so secret that the government even cannot tell you who it is.
  - pfortuny 13y ago
    "Aid" as in intelligence. Any piece of it you give to them can be considered treason. To make public is to yield to the enemy...
    - venomsnake 13y ago
      Tell which enemy was aided. And also tell where this entity have been defined as an enemy?
      - pfortuny 13y ago
        (See above, cannot edit). All hinges around the 'war on terror'. I am not defending the Administration (I may have made myself unclear), I am explaining why they are going for him """"lawfully"""" in their words.
    - mtgx 13y ago
      No it's not. Laws function by intention, too. He didn't make it public to aid the "enemy" (who is the enemy anyway? the world?). He did it to protect America. I think he also swore an oath to protect America against enemies both domestic and abroad. And he also swore to defend the Constitution - not the president.
Fuxy 13y 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.
- taktix 13y ago
  Yes, it's becoming a one government world. A New World Order.
  - onebaddude 13y 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?
    - VLM 13y ago
      Absolute power corrupts absolutely, so you're guaranteed to have a 100% fail, a worse outcome than your zero-sum game, which merely fails most of the time. What's most likely is an oligopoly of multinational corps really being in charge, with a thin veneer of democracy as a marketing message to keep the population under control. "You're not really feudal serfs because you get to vote for your overseer, among two candidates selected by the plantation owner who only differ in minor, yet rabble rousing irrelevancies" Or rephrased, the American system, but worldwide. It may not be a good system, but its a stable system. We already have it, to some extent. Is there any real ideological/moral/ethical difference between the neo-cons and the taliban other than minor stuff like selection of holy book (said by a former -R who more or less got kicked out by the extremist fundamentalist neos)?
    - jeffasinger 13y ago
      I think part of the aversion to a one government world is that it makes it impossible to vote with your feet. With the current model, if things get really bad in your country, you can always leave and find a different government.
johnnybegoode 13y ago
short answer: YES
julianozen 13y 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?
- dspillett 13y 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.
BigBalli 13y ago
yes, and it has been for quite some time.
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buo 13y 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_rematch http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bobby_Fischer#1992_Spassky_rema...
- brown9-2 13y ago
  I think you left out the part where he defiantly broke the law at the time against economic activities in Yugoslavia.
  - buo 13y 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.
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ubiq 13y ago
Maybe it's time for a new amendment that explicitly protects the privacy of individuals?
- rocky1138 13y ago
  A law is only as good as the people who follow it. A lock keeps an honest man honest.
Shivetya 13y 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?
Millennium 13y 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 13y 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 13y 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 13y ago
  To be fair, the US in those times was just as crazy as the USSR, they just didn't advertise it internally.
alan_cx 13y 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.
- xtracto 13y 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.
dspillett 13y 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 13y ago
  Sending drones into Chinese airspace, that is really going to fly!
  - dspillett 13y 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...
gadders 13y ago
Well, according to Julian Assange, so is Sweden.
petilon 13y 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 13y 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 13y ago
  Yes, and I wonder if Nazi Germany had laws regarding Jews.
- jaekwon 13y ago
  Yes, and I wonder if Nazi Germany had laws regarding Jews.
- jaekwon 13y ago
  Yes, and I wonder if Nazi Germany had laws regarding Jews.
webXL 13y 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?
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
- erezsh 13y ago
  > why include suicide-prevention as an abuse? Letting someone sleep naked is not suicide-prevention, it's abuse and humiliation.
snowwrestler 13y 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 13y 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 13y 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 13y 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 13y 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 13y ago
To answer the question: Yes.
swethrowaway 13y 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.
- swethrowaway 13y ago
  It should say "2. Safeguard against tyrannical governments". I seem to be unable to update my comment to fix the typo.
ryguytilidie 13y 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 13y 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.
ppplllok 13y ago
Edward Snowden betray the country. If you don't do anything wrong, will you really care the government collect your information? If you didn't trust the bank,why you still deposit your money there? If the bank collect some information to avoid hacking issues , do you think it is unacceptable?
joelrunyon 13y 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 13y ago
All these stories seem to be a journalism ploy to rekindle readership.

827 points by Libertatea 13y 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.

youngerdryas 13y ago
You do know that Australia and NZ share intel with your boogie monster don't you?
- josephagoss 13y ago
  I understand this, and that scares me. :(
deleted 13y ago
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euroclydon 13y 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?"
- belorn 13y 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.
  - rayiner 13y ago
    This is not true. Even US citizens capptured in Afghanistan fighting for the Taliban were transferred out of gitmo.
    - epsylon 13y ago
      But non-US citizens can liberally have their basic human rights denied. 12 years after 9/11. That's the land of the free for you. (Looking at how Bradley Manning was treated even shows that US citizens aren't treated much better. Being denied a lawyer and confined to solitary cells for months is not much different from torture.)
      - DannoHung 13y ago
        Manning was a member of the Army. You give up a significant number of rights and freedoms as a US citizen when you become a member of the armed forces. Which is not to say that it is right, but that it is legal.
        eli_gottlieb 13y ago
        At this point, American law is completely corrupt. Who gives a damn about it? What they've done to Bradley Manning isn't right, at all.
        jvictor118 13y ago
        Bradley Manning was a member of the Armed Forces who released classified information to the public. What planet are you living on that his prosecution is unwarranted?
        eli_gottlieb 13y ago
        What planning are you living on where physical and psychological torture is a warranted response to breaking military law?
- Jacqued 13y 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
- mtgx 13y 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.
  - Loughla 13y ago
    Citations?
- vacri 13y 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 13y 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.
  - mpyne 13y ago
    Uh, no to "decades without trial". And, for that matter, to "solitary confinement" as a routine, since we simply don't have that number of empty jail (not prison) cells anyways. It's funny how you mention having a jail cell with no one to bother you as worse than a labor camp though. I think those who have survived gulags or Nazi labor camps might disagree with you on that.
    - euroclydon 13y ago
      There's a lot of evidence to suggest that solitary confinement is a form of torture. See this highly discussed recent thread: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5796790 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5796790
      - mpyne 13y ago
        I didn't say people don't find solitary confinement to be a form of torture. I did say it's still better than labor camps, especially for the types of "solitary confinement" usually being discussed, which are "cells or prison wings without other prisoners" and not "dark holes with only a slot on the door". Should I ever go to prison I would greatly prefer the "prison wing without other prisoners", though I understand that's only a personal preference.
        euroclydon 13y ago
        Depends on the labor camp I guess. Gulags were meat grinders, especially during the war and famine years in Russia.
twoodfin 13y 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 13y 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.
- tekmate 13y 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
  - onebaddude 13y ago
    >"bails out bankers while promoting austerity for everyone else" How does that work exactly? Do banks operate in a vacuum in the economy? It's my understanding that social program spending (and hence the deficit) over the recession was at all time highs. "Main Street" got its share of the bail out, as it should have.
    - tekmate 13y ago
      like i wrote. it's not about what's really happening in details, but overall perception
    - 13y ago
gizzlon 13y 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 13y 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.
  - mbesto 13y ago
    CCTV runs like mad across the UK. Well at least London. Almost every street corner here has a CCTV vid cam on it.
    - mixedbit 13y ago
      Right: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Bansky_one_nation_under_cctv.jpg https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Bansky_one_nation_un...
    - vidarh 13y ago
      The vast majority of CCTV in the UK is privately owned, not networked and most of it is not watched live, or ever unless something actually happens. The police often ignores CCTV because figuring out who controls which cameras and whether or not they were working, and if so how to get the footage can be too time consuming to be worth it. So while I can't say I like the amount of CCTV here, it's a lot less sinister than portrayed. Now, some parts of central London is very well covered by live, monitored CCTV, though.
- gadders 13y ago
  Any country that requires identity cards (such as France) has already lost its claim to be more free.
StavrosK 13y 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 13y 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.
stevoski 13y 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 13y ago
  Most of the US populous has jobs, beer and entertainment. Plus they might with the lottery some day and join the 1%.
  - deleted 13y ago
    [deleted]
  - qwerta 13y ago
    1% in prison? :-)
  - alan_cx 13y ago
    Distracted by the various opiates of the masses. And that's the problem, while people have their comforts and believe that bad things only happen to other "guilty" people, or should I say other guilty "Americans", government gets away with what ever it likes.
- powertower 13y 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.
taktix 13y 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 13y ago
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/School_attacks_in_China_%282010%E2%80%9312%29 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/School_attacks_in_China_%282010...
cLeEOGPw 13y 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 13y 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_ 13y 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 13y 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.
- gadders 13y 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.
  - flyinRyan 13y ago
    You may not have had that feeling but you were obviously under surveillance, even before you entered.
- xtracto 13y 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.
shirro 13y 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.
powertower 13y 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.
- xtracto 13y 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.
  - jvictor118 13y ago
    What exactly is "all this data" you're worried the government will see? What are you doing on Google and Facebook? I have this funny feeling the NSA doesn't care about your memes or JS plugins or whatever stupid crap you talk about on Facebook.
  - reader5000 13y ago
    You could also develop liver cancer and die, regardless of your cloud data usage!
    - mvaliente2001 13y ago
      That's why you don't care about liver cancer when you use the cloud.
mbesto 13y 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 13y 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.
- dspillett 13y 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 13y 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.
gadders 13y 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.
skaevola 13y 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-internet-was-expected-help-democratise-china-instead-it-has-enabled http://www.economist.com/news/special-report/21574628-intern...
stephen_g 13y 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 13y 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.
rocky1138 13y ago
Same from Canada.

VLM 13y 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 13y 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.
- VLM 13y ago
  Could that be a suggestive question? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suggestive_question http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suggestive_question (We're solidly in the realm of (bad) meta-puns now...)

youngerdryas 13y 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.

deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
Andrew_Quentin 13y ago
Who says it is legal? Is it constitutional?

l33tbro 13y 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

tpatke 13y 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.

tibbon 13y 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.
- saalweachter 13y 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.
  - tibbon 13y ago
    I'm not up on my history as much as I should be, but I think some of the influence there conceptually is from the "right to overthrow the government", and the idea that many of the new governments at the time were only lasting a short period of time and then would need revised.

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pi18n 13y ago
Or, you know, if one had been linking to videos and/or downloading files by altering numbers in a URL.
venomsnake 13y ago
There is this obscure document known as the us constitution that defines treason as Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort. He is definitely not waging war on the US and is not adhering to any enemy, nor giving them aid and comfort. Or he is aiding enemy so secret that the government even cannot tell you who it is.
- pfortuny 13y ago
  "Aid" as in intelligence. Any piece of it you give to them can be considered treason. To make public is to yield to the enemy...
  - venomsnake 13y ago
    Tell which enemy was aided. And also tell where this entity have been defined as an enemy?
    - pfortuny 13y ago
      (See above, cannot edit). All hinges around the 'war on terror'. I am not defending the Administration (I may have made myself unclear), I am explaining why they are going for him """"lawfully"""" in their words.
  - mtgx 13y ago
    No it's not. Laws function by intention, too. He didn't make it public to aid the "enemy" (who is the enemy anyway? the world?). He did it to protect America. I think he also swore an oath to protect America against enemies both domestic and abroad. And he also swore to defend the Constitution - not the president.

Fuxy 13y 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.

taktix 13y ago
Yes, it's becoming a one government world. A New World Order.
- onebaddude 13y 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?
  - VLM 13y ago
    Absolute power corrupts absolutely, so you're guaranteed to have a 100% fail, a worse outcome than your zero-sum game, which merely fails most of the time. What's most likely is an oligopoly of multinational corps really being in charge, with a thin veneer of democracy as a marketing message to keep the population under control. "You're not really feudal serfs because you get to vote for your overseer, among two candidates selected by the plantation owner who only differ in minor, yet rabble rousing irrelevancies" Or rephrased, the American system, but worldwide. It may not be a good system, but its a stable system. We already have it, to some extent. Is there any real ideological/moral/ethical difference between the neo-cons and the taliban other than minor stuff like selection of holy book (said by a former -R who more or less got kicked out by the extremist fundamentalist neos)?
  - jeffasinger 13y ago
    I think part of the aversion to a one government world is that it makes it impossible to vote with your feet. With the current model, if things get really bad in your country, you can always leave and find a different government.

johnnybegoode 13y ago

short answer: YES

julianozen 13y 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?

dspillett 13y 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.

BigBalli 13y ago

yes, and it has been for quite some time.

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buo 13y 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_rematch http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bobby_Fischer#1992_Spassky_rema...

brown9-2 13y ago
I think you left out the part where he defiantly broke the law at the time against economic activities in Yugoslavia.
- buo 13y 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.
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ubiq 13y ago

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

rocky1138 13y ago
A law is only as good as the people who follow it. A lock keeps an honest man honest.

Shivetya 13y 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?

Millennium 13y 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 13y 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 13y 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 13y ago
To be fair, the US in those times was just as crazy as the USSR, they just didn't advertise it internally.

alan_cx 13y 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.

xtracto 13y 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.

dspillett 13y 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 13y ago
Sending drones into Chinese airspace, that is really going to fly!
- dspillett 13y 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...

gadders 13y ago

Well, according to Julian Assange, so is Sweden.

petilon 13y 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 13y 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 13y ago
Yes, and I wonder if Nazi Germany had laws regarding Jews.
jaekwon 13y ago
Yes, and I wonder if Nazi Germany had laws regarding Jews.
jaekwon 13y ago
Yes, and I wonder if Nazi Germany had laws regarding Jews.

webXL 13y 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?

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erezsh 13y ago
> why include suicide-prevention as an abuse? Letting someone sleep naked is not suicide-prevention, it's abuse and humiliation.

snowwrestler 13y 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 13y 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 13y 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 13y 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 13y 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 13y ago

To answer the question: Yes.

swethrowaway 13y 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.

swethrowaway 13y ago
It should say "2. Safeguard against tyrannical governments". I seem to be unable to update my comment to fix the typo.

ryguytilidie 13y 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 13y 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.

ppplllok 13y ago

Edward Snowden betray the country. If you don't do anything wrong, will you really care the government collect your information? If you didn't trust the bank,why you still deposit your money there? If the bank collect some information to avoid hacking issues , do you think it is unacceptable?

joelrunyon 13y 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 13y ago

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