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EU: Definition of "potential terrorists" opens door to broad information-sharing

statewatch.org

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Re: EU: Definition of "potential terrorists" opens door to broad information-sharing

#211

Post by ajb »

ThalesX wrote: post #27
generic92034 wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That stance ("ever been democratic") is a bit too strong for my taste. There are definitely issues with the EU parliament having no rights to propose laws or the amount of indirection between voters and some powerful institutions. But calling the EU not being democratic is going too far, in my eyes. Especially considering the setup as a confederation of sovereign countries, so the comparison to individual countries'…

> But calling the EU not being democratic is going too far I'm an EU citizen. I have minimal saying in who our commissioner is and what members of the cabinet get chosen. I have a vote which I give to whatever party. After that, the vote for commissioner is secret; I have no idea who voted for what. After that, the negociations for the cabinet are secret; I have no idea what the criteria are and what the plans are. I…

Are you aware of the history of the US Senate? It had exactly the same problem. Senators were appointed by the political elite of each state.

But, once one or two states decided to elect their senator, it was game over. The other states gave up, and now all the senators are elected.

It's true that both the commission and (perhaps even more powerful) the council of ministers are not democratic. But this is in the hands of each individual country to change. And it's national level politicians who are currently the obstacle. All find it easier to blame the EU than to take responsibility for change. But if one country takes action to increase , even a small one, the public in the others will realise they all can.

Re: EU: Definition of "potential terrorists" opens door to broad information-sharing

#212

Post by ThalesX »

buildfocus wrote: post #85
ThalesX wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But calling the EU not being democratic is going too far I'm an EU citizen. I have minimal saying in who our commissioner is and what members of the cabinet get chosen. I have a vote which I give to whatever party. After that, the vote for commissioner is secret; I have no idea who voted for what. After that, the negociations for the cabinet are secret; I have no idea what the criteria are and what the plans are. I…

Is this not similar to ministerial roles and civil servant positions in most governments? You don't vote for the commissioners directly, but your elected representative (leader of your government) does, and that's your path to express preferences & drive accountability. If you don't like the selection, take it up with them. In the UK for example, the people elect members of parliament as their representatives, but MP…

A big difference is that in my neck of the woods, each party or coalition needs to come up with a governing document where they sort of tell you what their priorities are for the next 5 years.

In the EU we find about it after we vote, after they discuss in secrecy.

Re: EU: Definition of "potential terrorists" opens door to broad information-sharing

#213

Post by ThalesX »

medstrom wrote: post #80
ThalesX wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But calling the EU not being democratic is going too far I'm an EU citizen. I have minimal saying in who our commissioner is and what members of the cabinet get chosen. I have a vote which I give to whatever party. After that, the vote for commissioner is secret; I have no idea who voted for what. After that, the negociations for the cabinet are secret; I have no idea what the criteria are and what the plans are. I…

Is this different from your own government?

Yes, in that we find out what we voted for after the vote instead of before.

Re: EU: Definition of "potential terrorists" opens door to broad information-sharing

#214

Post by gruez »

yunohn wrote: post #147
llm_trw wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is no need to bring in agent provocateurs in this day and age. Both anti-fa and fa are a bunch of meth heads looking for an excuse to bash someone's head in. They are perfectly happy to start violence if the police doesn't actively stop them.

Wait, you seriously think that agent provocateurs are a hoax? Literally not sure how to reply, you could just google it?

I think the claim isn't that agent provocateurs don't exist, it's that jumping to it as first explanation is lazy and slightly cranky. Just because the government has killed civil rights activists in the past, doesn't mean the next civil rights activist who dies was a government assassination.

Re: EU: Definition of "potential terrorists" opens door to broad information-sharing

#215

Post by A4ET8a8uTh0 »

giraffe_lady wrote: post #190
A4ET8a8uTh0 wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The point of the comment is that there is no such thing as 'good violence' just as there is no such thing as 'hate speech'. There is just violence. There is just speech. You try to muddle those simple things and you end up with where are today: confused population unable to reason through their way through otherwise simple reality.

Taking black and white thinking so far you're considering dropping one of those colors even! > the wise man bowed his head solemnly and spoke: "theres actually zero difference between good & bad things. you imbecile. you fucking moron"

I want to offer you a moment to reconsider this comment. It adds nothing to this discussion. It does not refute my point. It does not undermine it. It does nothing really except maybe confuse the reader.

Unless the latter is the point, consider an edit that addresses my point directly. I am only human. It is possible that there is a flaw in my reasoning. It is possible coffee did not hit me yet.

As written, this is not an argument at all.

Re: EU: Definition of "potential terrorists" opens door to broad information-sharing

#216

Post by mppm »

logicchains wrote: post #81
OKRainbowKid wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"uni party" is AFD lingo. And when that "outlet" has, in parts, goals that are incompatible with our constitution, then a discussion (and it's not much more at this stage) about a Verbotsprozess seems appropriate. To give some more context, the possibility to forbid parties that work against the foundations of our democracy is explicitly defined in the constitution, it is not a purely political move to silence opposi…

I'm curious what goals the AfD has that are incompatible with the German constitution.

Nothing in particular. European media work hard to paint the AfD as a fringe-right party, but its stated agenda is basically to prioritize national interests. This is something that the current government in Germany has failed at very badly, and the populace is not alltogether blind to this fact. In all recent elections, the AfD is now the top or second party, with 30%+ overall support, despite persistent attempts at political marginalization.

Re: EU: Definition of "potential terrorists" opens door to broad information-sharing

#217

Post by aniviacat »

amiga386 wrote: post #64
aldsfh wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is currently an initiative to forbid a political party, the AfD in Germany. This is not supported by the CDU, but by others. While I do not like the AfD, forbidding political parties that serve as an outlet for people who do not support the uniparty and their essentially identical policies seems to be one of the most totalitarian measures in postwar Germany. The SPD should instead examine why they themselves ar…

Remember the last time Germany banned membership of specific political parties? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reichstag_Fire_Decree

Yeah, it was pretty bad when the Germans voted a totalitarian party into power.

We should prevent that from happening again. Now... how would we go about that?

By doing the same thing as last time; wait until the party takes over?

Re: EU: Definition of "potential terrorists" opens door to broad information-sharing

#218

Post by giraffe_lady »

A4ET8a8uTh0 wrote: post #215
giraffe_lady wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Taking black and white thinking so far you're considering dropping one of those colors even! > the wise man bowed his head solemnly and spoke: "theres actually zero difference between good & bad things. you imbecile. you fucking moron"

I want to offer you a moment to reconsider this comment. It adds nothing to this discussion. It does not refute my point. It does not undermine it. It does nothing really except maybe confuse the reader. Unless the latter is the point, consider an edit that addresses my point directly. I am only human. It is possible that there is a flaw in my reasoning. It is possible coffee did not hit me yet. As written, this is n…

Thank you for your generous offer but I will decline.

What the comment does in its original form is draw attention to the nonsensical cowardice of refusing to take a stand on any issue. "There's no such thing as good violence" has you condemning slave revolutions for example. "There's no such thing as hate speech" refuses to acknowledge the forces and choices that led to historical atrocities and abdicates power to notice and prevent them. There's no future in this enlightened centrism, nothing to refute because it refuses to take a stand.

Re: EU: Definition of "potential terrorists" opens door to broad information-sharing

#219

Post by gruez »

smashah wrote: post #161
johndunne wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think politicians are skirting democratic accountability because they can, and not enough people are protesting the lack of this accountability. The most concerning thing about this proposed legislation is the fact that it can be used to further skirt accountability, by labeling protesters under the broad terms the bill covers.

Back in the day, in a more localized times (i.e your life was somewhat controlled by those within your vicinity), if our "leaders" were tratiours, we would get the torches and pitchforks and march to their homes as the citizen's form of keeping leaders accountable. Post-enlightenment, we put down the torches and pitchforks, we outsourced the accountability function to the media/press. Shame and transparency were the…

>As soon as the likes of Rupert Murdoch/Roger Ailes etc. got involved in media, the press no longer wields the people's power, which was delegated to them, for the people. Instead the press selectively uses that power for ulterior aims - whether that's the Oil & Gas industry, the war machine, or for foreign interests.

How does this square with the rise of insurgents like donald trump? He was basically snubbed by the GOP political establishment in 2016, but now the republican party is now enthralled to him. There was even a period where he tried to fight fox news and urged his supporters to watch OAN instead. Some of Trump's populist policies were so successful that even the democratic party copied it, eg. his anti-china policy. That's despite such policies being arguably anti-business, which under your framework shouldn't have happened.

Re: EU: Definition of "potential terrorists" opens door to broad information-sharing

#220

Post by buildfocus »

timrichard wrote: post #111
buildfocus wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is this not similar to ministerial roles and civil servant positions in most governments? You don't vote for the commissioners directly, but your elected representative (leader of your government) does, and that's your path to express preferences & drive accountability. If you don't like the selection, take it up with them. In the UK for example, the people elect members of parliament as their representatives, but MP…

In the UK, politicians will often U-turn if they sense that a policy will make them unpopular and make the next election harder to fight. Governments can and do get punished on polling day every five years. Sunak paid for his unpopularity and the record of his government. Could any EU voters do anything about Ursula getting a second term? (and once again she was the only name on the ballot and then only just scraped…

Again, this is not different to local democratic processes.

Voters typically cannot directly stop somebody being named leader of their party or given a specific role within government for multiple terms. If you dislike them, you pressure your elected representative to change that.

Almost all representative democracy is accountability through a representative, not directly through control of government internals & positions.

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