161–170 of 814 posts
Also don't forget about Manning who actually went to prison and is not getting any publicity now.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Not sure it’s a fair argument to exclude dozens of the wealthiest countries in the world because they own definition of socialism —that they practice— does not meet your imagined one. The definition is not complicated: have key industrial assets, notably transport infrastructure, owned by public authorities.
By that definition France is a socialist country. I suppose you could say that to some extent but France isn't what one usually thinks of when it comes to real-world socialism. I think socialists in particular will argue against that notion. Even worse though: Most totalitarian countries fit that description, too.
Consider that Marx and Engels in the Communist Manifesto spent a whole chapter tearing into other socialist ideologies, ranging from ideologies they saw as reactionary and anti-democratic and even feudal, to utopian systems that were basically anarchist.
Socialist ideologies have historically spanned the spectrum from extreme libertarianism (the term libertarian was first used for a political system by a French anarcho-communist that was so anti-authority he criticised Proudhon - a prominent early anarchist - for not going far enough) to systems that basically argued for technocratic feudal systems with welfare.
Using the term without specifying more is meaningless if you are talking about a specific ideology or system rather than generally about systems with certain shared characteristics.
For the record, though, I agree with you that the definition in the comment you reply to doesn't make sense - it would exclude many prominent socialist ideologies.
Doesn't pardoning assume convicting him first? Or does it mean there won't be open trial? I think an open and media covered trial will be more valuable to the public. Not sure about himself.
The assumption is that he has been convicted by a secret court (FISA).
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I'd imagine the US gov will hardly want to encourage whistleblowing of that sort nor a patriotic aire about the act. It is a national security risk regardless of how any individual act pans out.
Stripping whistleblowers from their constitutional rights and condemning them to a lifetime in prison is arguably a worse national security risk. A society needs layers of checks and balances, and whistleblowing is one such layer. When whistleblowing is penalized so harshly you create an environment of unchecked power. Citizens can't do anything because even when they know they're being lied to, they need to know the…
No whistleblowers in this area does not mean no oversight or no checks and balances. It's just that as an audit mechanism, it presents a lot of risk since it leaves what can ultimately effect national security to the discretion of the whistleblower.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
In theory those are different. In practice though there hasn't been a single socialist country that hasn't at least devolved into authoritarianism or even has been so right from the start (Scandinavian Socialism and modern day German Social Market Economy could be considered exceptions but I doubt these can really be considered socialist.). People keep saying: "This isn't true socialism." Well, then true socialism se…
Not sure it’s a fair argument to exclude dozens of the wealthiest countries in the world because they own definition of socialism —that they practice— does not meet your imagined one. The definition is not complicated: have key industrial assets, notably transport infrastructure, owned by public authorities.
Many socialist ideologies reject the very idea of public authorities. Talking about them owned by the public would work better, but would exclude many other socialist ideologies.
E.g. Saint Simons original socialism involved a technocratic society where the actual key change was that people would be paid according to merit.
In Marxism too, that is the key defining aspect of socialism: Marxism sees the capitalist as not contributing work, but capital, and hence he's overpaid if measured by the merit of his work. (Marx was very clear on the distinction between socialism and communism as an end stage of a long period of development here: socialism would not involve full redistribution, but a process of redistribution by first levelling thing by paying people by merit, and then evening things out further by changing to pay based on need).
Public ownership in Marxism, is not a requirement per-se, but is seen as a consequence of the intent of giving everyone control over their own work and ensuring everyone is paid on merit.
This is the same in many other socialist ideologies, and hence you will also find distinctly socialist ideologies that accepts full private ownership, but instead e.g. relied on heavily progressive taxation as a means of reducing the difference.
You would be sort-of right that many socialist ideologies do share that characteristic, but it is not sufficient nor necessary in all instances.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
In theory those are different. In practice though there hasn't been a single socialist country that hasn't at least devolved into authoritarianism or even has been so right from the start (Scandinavian Socialism and modern day German Social Market Economy could be considered exceptions but I doubt these can really be considered socialist.). People keep saying: "This isn't true socialism." Well, then true socialism se…
"Socialist" is too general a descriptor, and has been deliberately ruined by overgeneralisation. The distinction should be between "Social Democrat" and "Communist". The former believe in normal multi-party states with free elections.
A whole lot of the people who consider themselves communist do too. In fact, the Bolsheviks murdered a huge number (tens of thousands is a very low end estimate) of communists who opposed them and who supported multi-party democracy.
Including a whole lot of communists who were members of the socialist parties that beat them in the elections to the constituent assembly shortly before their coup, but they also ended up murdering tens of thousands of members of their own party who opposed the authoritarian turn it took.
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You're allowed your quota of one medium-impact dissident action per week, just like everyone else. As it helps to keep up maintaining the illusion of democracy and free speech, you are actually doing your country a great service. If you start to do more, however... Consider yourself warned. ^^ In this case, I can reassure you though: Online petition clicktivism has been shown to be very ineffective, so it's only cons…
I "love" how China actually tried to formalize this some time ago. Every citizen would get a citizen score, like our credit ratings, but grading how politically loyal they were. There was quite a bit of outrage on the western internet about this. The "funny" thing is, our governments are probably doing very similar things (though still to a lesser degree, and secretly). A big difference is that China often doesn't ha…
North Korea actually did it https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Songbun
I think the problem is, people do not care anymore. The scandal is over, business as usual. Only a small percentage of the population still cares about Snowden. I think the image of the NSA has been hurt and a change in legislation might get you some positive press in the future, but I do not think that pardoning Snowden would be worth the effort for a politician. On the other hand: Obama probably does not have to ca…
And then there are people like me, who don't see the situation as black&white, i.e. I am not signing that petition. In my opinion, for the sake of security, it is necessary to "cache" the whole Internet communication to prevent terrorists attacks and other dangers. Like what the Brits are doing and currently they didn't have any big attack after the London bombings. I am not an American and I don't have a motivation…
The usual justification for invading becomes ridiculous in that context: We need to restrict the people's freedom by spying on them, because we tried to bring freedom to another country.