[BartSimpson]

Thanos Thanos:

1) Once again, eliminate "Obama" from your entire post and I doubt you would have written any of that at all. I expect dead silence from you on this issue and on drone strikes when the next GOP administration inevitably pursues the exact same identical policies.

2) Assorange is being accused by Sweden, one of the most neutral countries in the world and one that cannot ever credibly be called a US puppet. It is also one of the most lenient on crime countries in the world. Assorange's sentence, for which he doesn't even have the courage to face trial for, could range from a severe talking-to by the judge to the Swedish version of probation to a couple of years of light time in a prison with it's own golf course. The Swedes don't even bother to do anything about their rabid Muslim males that regularly gang rape Swedish women in the most violent manner possible. Why would they take extra measures with a punk celebrity like Assorange and risk the embarrassment of seeing him walk on their equivalent of date rape charges, if they weren't sure he was guilty?

And, once again, I doubt you'd be so soft on Assange if the US were under a GOP presidential administration today rather than a Democratic one. Sorry, you haven't convinced me on any of this in the slightest.

Sweden bends to international pressure and they're not so 'neutral' as you would think. We can get into that discussion in a separate topic if you'd like.

As to my outrage about a GOP admin doing the same thing? You forget that I've been critical of the Patriot Act from the get-go and have often been in the odd position of criticizing the GOP over it while Canadians on this site have called me 'paranoid' and etc.

And then some guy like Snowden comes along and validates what I've said all along which is that no one should have so much power.

That also aligns me with one of the US Senate's most ardent liberals: Russ Feingold, who was and is consistently against the Patriot Act and it's renewals despite Obama's ongoing endorsement of it.

[DrCaleb]

BartSimpson BartSimpson:

And then some guy like Snowden comes along and validates what I've said all along which is that no one should have so much power.

That also aligns me with one of the US Senate's most ardent liberals: Russ Feingold, who was and is consistently against the Patriot Act and it's renewals despite Obama's ongoing endorsement of it.

$1:

"I want to deliver a warning this afternoon," Wyden said in 2011. "When the American people find out how their government has secretly interpreted the Patriot Act, they will be stunned and they will be angry."

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2013 ... -sinks-in/

If it weren't for Manning, we wouldn't know all the bullshit that had been going on in the Middle East. He did what he did out of a desire for truth, and he's going to pay for it. Snowdon did the same for the NSA, but his fate is yet to be determined.

I think it's sad that all sorts of countries are condeming the USAs NSA data vaccum cleaner, but refusing Snowdon asylum.

[BartSimpson]

DrCaleb DrCaleb:

I think it's sad that all sorts of countries are condeming the USAs NSA data vaccum cleaner, but refusing Snowdon asylum.

That's because the USA has them scared. That BS with sending F-16's to intercept Evo Morales' airplane crossed a line that smaller countries fear. What cheesed me off about that incident is that the US would absolutely go batshit crazy if some country did that to our President yet here we are doing it to someone else.

Not like I'm a fan of Morales, I'm not, but he is a head of state and his aircraft shold be treated as an Embassy when he's aboard on state business.

Now the US set a precedent and when someone forces Air Force One to land for a similar inspection the US won't have much right to complain about it.

[DrCaleb]

BartSimpson BartSimpson:

DrCaleb DrCaleb:

I think it's sad that all sorts of countries are condeming the USAs NSA data vaccum cleaner, but refusing Snowdon asylum.

That's because the USA has them scared. That BS with sending F-16's to intercept Evo Morales' airplane crossed a line that smaller countries fear. What cheesed me off about that incident is that the US would absolutely go batshit crazy if some country did that to our President yet here we are doing it to someone else.

Not like I'm a fan of Morales, I'm not, but he is a head of state and his aircraft shold be treated as an Embassy when he's aboard on state business.

Now the US set a precedent and when someone forces Air Force One to land for a similar inspection the US won't have much right to complain about it.

Agreed there, it was a ballsy move, and an affront to world diplomacy. I suspect however that AF-1 does not travel with a fighter escort because it does not need a fighter escort. I imagine it has very big teeth, and forcing it to land where it does not want to land would be difficult.