8 ms·

The headline belies the utter ridiculousness of the idea. Why would the United States and United Kingdom be singled out to have backdoor access to all communica

by gnu8 11y ago

The headline belies the utter ridiculousness of the idea. Why would the United States and United Kingdom be singled out to have backdoor access to all communications? To hang onto the tattered remnants of their empires while keeping their own people in line despite their declining political legitimacy.

happyscrappy 11y ago
Maybe you think that China is ascendant, but the fact remains that the West is closely aligned and utterly dominant.
- rm_-rf_slash 11y ago
  It is not a simple east/west matter. States themselves are in a period of declining influence after a historically abnormal 400 years of strong states and a state-based order. Their power to influence culture, drive people's decisions, set prices and drive morals is being eaten by multinational corporations, religious institutions, NGO's, online communities like Reddit and HN, name it. State influence is shrinking, and their best answer is to compensate with power.
  - wcummings 11y ago
    Globalization has weakened The State, in general, though not all states equally.
- Sideloader 11y ago
  Yes, the West is still dominant but geopolitical and economic power is shifting South and East and Western influence and power is waning. China and the U.S. both know that at the moment each nation is dependent on the other and the collapse of one would have serious repercussions for the global economy. Hence we get scenarios where China is claiming islands a thousand miles off its coast as domestic territory and while the US Air Force flies overhead and Obama tut-tuts the whole thing is a boundary pushing exercise (no pun intended) and China continues to do what it wants, within reason. China knows that shooting civilians as in Tiananmen Square in 1989 makes for very unflattering optics and jeopardizes the Western trade and investment it needs. Every day articles and blog posts announces the imminent demise of US and Western power or China's impending economic collapse. It's possible of course but for the moment not very probable. But it is clear that the West is no longer *utterly dominant.
  - happyscrappy 11y ago
    > But it is clear that the West is no longer *utterly dominant Economically, militarily and culturally they are, what metric are you using?
DamnYuppie 11y ago
If one looks around they will see most political regimes are very interested in keeping their "constituents" in line and maintaining their political legitimacy. As such it isn't a phenomenon specific to the west, it simply appears to be discussed here as we have slightly more open media than in other countries who would dearly love to have the same access to encrypted data.
jebblue 11y ago
The united States isn't an empire, that's what it was formed to get away from. It's a collection of people, living in different communities called states that strive to stay united to form a more perfect union. It isn't a perfect experiment because people are not perfect but it's the best effort history has seen so far.
- Someone1234 11y ago
  Tell that to the countries the US keeps invading. At the very least Grenada, Iraq (2003), and Panama. But the list is far longer and more complicated (and stretches back fifty years or more). Nobody would call the US an "empire" if all it did was keep in its own territory and stay out of other country's internal affairs. Nobody calls Canada an empire for example. But the US keeps deciding to outright attack other countries or uses the CIA to subvert internal politics (and sometimes to overthrow democratically elected governments e.g. Iran). The US deserves to be accused of having imperial intent, even if just based on their interest in other country's oil.
  - vinceguidry 11y ago
    > The US deserves to be accused of having empirical intent, even if just based on their interest in other country's oil. The word you're looking for is "imperial." "Empirical" means something else entirely.
  - joshuapants 11y ago
    Canada itself isn't an empire, it's just part of one.
  - Zigurd 11y ago
    Heck, tell that to France, who can't manage to root out the US influence in their telcos or their intelligence services, and who are powerless offer asylum to Assange and/or Snowden.
- tinkerrr 11y ago
  Are you sure about that? http://www.globalresearch.ca/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/waddell-usa_intervention_bleu.gif http://www.globalresearch.ca/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/wadd... http://www.theweeklings.com/wp-content/uploads/US-Military-Bases-Around-The-World.jpeg http://www.theweeklings.com/wp-content/uploads/US-Military-B...
higherpurpose 11y ago
I actually wouldn't be surprised at all if the US and UK governments would be perfectly fine with China, Russia and so on being able to hack and spy most of their citizens and companies as long as they could also do that. From their point of view it might be quite a good trade-off, because they probably think it's far more useful for them to spy and hack US and UK citizens than it is for China and Russia. And they also probably think that they, the elites, could use something better than what everyone else uses, too. So there's no negative to this.

by gnu8 11y ago

happyscrappy 11y ago

Maybe you think that China is ascendant, but the fact remains that the West is closely aligned and utterly dominant.

rm_-rf_slash 11y ago
It is not a simple east/west matter. States themselves are in a period of declining influence after a historically abnormal 400 years of strong states and a state-based order. Their power to influence culture, drive people's decisions, set prices and drive morals is being eaten by multinational corporations, religious institutions, NGO's, online communities like Reddit and HN, name it. State influence is shrinking, and their best answer is to compensate with power.
- wcummings 11y ago
  Globalization has weakened The State, in general, though not all states equally.
Sideloader 11y ago
Yes, the West is still dominant but geopolitical and economic power is shifting South and East and Western influence and power is waning. China and the U.S. both know that at the moment each nation is dependent on the other and the collapse of one would have serious repercussions for the global economy. Hence we get scenarios where China is claiming islands a thousand miles off its coast as domestic territory and while the US Air Force flies overhead and Obama tut-tuts the whole thing is a boundary pushing exercise (no pun intended) and China continues to do what it wants, within reason. China knows that shooting civilians as in Tiananmen Square in 1989 makes for very unflattering optics and jeopardizes the Western trade and investment it needs. Every day articles and blog posts announces the imminent demise of US and Western power or China's impending economic collapse. It's possible of course but for the moment not very probable. But it is clear that the West is no longer *utterly dominant.
- happyscrappy 11y ago
  > But it is clear that the West is no longer *utterly dominant Economically, militarily and culturally they are, what metric are you using?

DamnYuppie 11y ago

If one looks around they will see most political regimes are very interested in keeping their "constituents" in line and maintaining their political legitimacy. As such it isn't a phenomenon specific to the west, it simply appears to be discussed here as we have slightly more open media than in other countries who would dearly love to have the same access to encrypted data.

jebblue 11y ago

The united States isn't an empire, that's what it was formed to get away from. It's a collection of people, living in different communities called states that strive to stay united to form a more perfect union. It isn't a perfect experiment because people are not perfect but it's the best effort history has seen so far.

Someone1234 11y ago
Tell that to the countries the US keeps invading. At the very least Grenada, Iraq (2003), and Panama. But the list is far longer and more complicated (and stretches back fifty years or more). Nobody would call the US an "empire" if all it did was keep in its own territory and stay out of other country's internal affairs. Nobody calls Canada an empire for example. But the US keeps deciding to outright attack other countries or uses the CIA to subvert internal politics (and sometimes to overthrow democratically elected governments e.g. Iran). The US deserves to be accused of having imperial intent, even if just based on their interest in other country's oil.
- vinceguidry 11y ago
  > The US deserves to be accused of having empirical intent, even if just based on their interest in other country's oil. The word you're looking for is "imperial." "Empirical" means something else entirely.
- joshuapants 11y ago
  Canada itself isn't an empire, it's just part of one.
- Zigurd 11y ago
  Heck, tell that to France, who can't manage to root out the US influence in their telcos or their intelligence services, and who are powerless offer asylum to Assange and/or Snowden.
tinkerrr 11y ago
Are you sure about that? http://www.globalresearch.ca/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/waddell-usa_intervention_bleu.gif http://www.globalresearch.ca/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/wadd... http://www.theweeklings.com/wp-content/uploads/US-Military-Bases-Around-The-World.jpeg http://www.theweeklings.com/wp-content/uploads/US-Military-B...

higherpurpose 11y ago

I actually wouldn't be surprised at all if the US and UK governments would be perfectly fine with China, Russia and so on being able to hack and spy most of their citizens and companies as long as they could also do that. From their point of view it might be quite a good trade-off, because they probably think it's far more useful for them to spy and hack US and UK citizens than it is for China and Russia. And they also probably think that they, the elites, could use something better than what everyone else uses, too. So there's no negative to this.