The UK should be kicked out of the EU. Until they learn how to behave.
I'm pretty sure they'd see this as a reward.
Detaining my partner: a failed attempt at intimidation
41–50 of 463 posts
Re: Detaining my partner: a failed attempt at intimidation
#42Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don't think the ability to dispense fear and intimidation around the world at will is a show of fear. Our biggest hope is this becomes a national issue for the next election so we at least have the opportunity to elect the leader who respects our constitutional rights the most.
And which one will that be? The "democrat" or the "republican"? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zTJ0qYR6YFo
I think that a candidate who was not afraid to make the "security state" a campaign issue, and the massive government encroachment in so many other aspects of our lives, and was able to explain the issues and his or her positions without sounding like he was regurgitating focus-group tested talking points, would do quite well in the current climate.
Or it may be that the average person still doesn't care. People who really don't care don't vote though, so all you really have to do is reach the people who are in any way paying attention.
Re: Detaining my partner: a failed attempt at intimidation
#43About two or three years ago I was taken aside when boarding a plane at a London airport back to Belfast by a policeman and held under their terrorism legislation. Being heavily hungover from a night spent funding London's publicans, and a little nervous about flying, I just wanted to board the plane and go home.
Nevertheless, I was questioned by the queue as others boarded the plane, casting nasty looks my way. The cop asked some pretty insulting, at times ignorant, questions. I guess to see if I harboured any anti-British/anti-state/anti-cop feelings. I got the impression if I lost my cool I'd be spending a lot longer in that airport.
I didn't know my rights, that's my fault. Nor did I want to escalate a situation where the odds were stacked against me. I did feel pretty disgusted though, given that I'd done nothing wrong. Even now I feel like I shouldn't share this kind of thing online lest the wrong person read it. I found myself asking; why me? Was it something I said on Twitter or Facebook? Did I just look at him the wrong way without realising?
Luckily he let me go after some thorough questioning and the plane waited for me (although finding my seat was basically a walk of shame). They probably do this day and daily to all kinds of people. And most would never talk about it for fear of receiving worse down the line.
Re: Detaining my partner: a failed attempt at intimidation
#44Earlier quoted context omitted.
Quote: "Even the Mafia had ethical rules against targeting the family members of people they feel threatened by."
Come again? I thought threatening one's family was #1 in the mafia playbook.
Obviously that depends on the mafia, and the era. Hard to make broad statements about "the" mafia.
Re: Detaining my partner: a failed attempt at intimidation
#45This and the fact that Obama is constantly being caught in lies says to me that the U.S. government has no clue what information Edward Snowden has passed off to Greenwald.
This is a really interesting bit of speculation. Obama's consistently "just off" statements (i.e. saying an executive order that hadn't been implemented yet would have protected Snowden) make me think that Obama & his advisers doesn't have a good handle on what the NSA is doing and how the law applies to the "secret state." One could say that "Obama is lying," which may be perfectly true, but it could also be that the politicians are genuinely uninformed and/or think protections exist that don't.
I could see this being the case because politicians train to talk about health care and the economy, while the details of NSA programs are rarely discussed and so politicians have little incentive to be up on the facts.
Re: Detaining my partner: a failed attempt at intimidation
#46Just more evidence that the world is controlled by an oppressive totalitarian Govt that we're effectively powerless to stop. At least with these incidents we get to know which other countries are complicit and under the influence of the NSA.
No, we aren't powerless. That's why these people are so relentless in their intimidation and pursuit of more power. If they thought we were powerless, they wouldn't bother. They are afraid, and they should be. The tide can turn quickly.
Maybe it can still turn, but definitely not quickly. It will take a huge amount of effort and blood to take the power away from the sociopath banksters and their puppet politicians, military and media.
IMHO it is very unlikely as very few people in the developed countries today care about political power and modern weapons, like drones and PRISM, are very anti-democratic in nature.
Re: Detaining my partner: a failed attempt at intimidation
#47Earlier quoted context omitted.
faschism = An authoritarian and nationalistic right-wing system of government and social organization. Which fits the situation. Your genocide reference, an attempt to trivialize the above statement, doesn't even make sense.
You have to accept that not everything happening in the world you dislike qualifies for fascism, genocide or equivalence to Hitler. Overusing these labels dilutes their 'brand', and then you don't have appropriate adjectives for real cases of fascism or genocide.
Over-application of "Godwin's Law" removes our ability to learn lessons from history.
(Not to mention those sort of comments are nothing but unproductive comment sniping. They do absolutely nothing to further the conversation.)
Re: Detaining my partner: a failed attempt at intimidation
#48> Miranda was then released without charge, but officials confiscated electronics equipment including his mobile phone, laptop, camera, memory sticks, DVDs and games consoles. Thievery and intimidation are good indicators of who and what we're dealing with.
As IRC has taught us for two decades, there are probably few things more antagonistic than a butthurt pirate.
That's not even coherent with the government's story. Or are you really claiming that he was detained and had thousands of dollars of equipment confiscated because Greenwald downloaded some Kylie Minogue MP3s?
Re: Detaining my partner: a failed attempt at intimidation
#49The salient quote from Greenwald's article on this: They completely abused their own terrorism law for reasons having nothing whatsoever to do with terrorism: a potent reminder of how often governments lie when they claim that they need powers to stop "the terrorists", and how dangerous it is to vest unchecked power with political officials in its name. [1] This is a great example of why we should treat terrorism lik…
This is the same country that used a slightly later, post-9/11 terrorism act to freeze the assets of an Icelandic bank that were in the country: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Landsbanki_Freezing_Order_2008
Icelanders replied with some good pictures: https://www.google.com/search?q=iceland+terrorism&tbm=isch
Then again this is the country that inspired Nineteen Eighty-Four (Minitrue from Orewell's time at the BBC) and The Prisoner.
Re: Detaining my partner: a failed attempt at intimidation
#50The salient quote from Greenwald's article on this: They completely abused their own terrorism law for reasons having nothing whatsoever to do with terrorism: a potent reminder of how often governments lie when they claim that they need powers to stop "the terrorists", and how dangerous it is to vest unchecked power with political officials in its name. [1] This is a great example of why we should treat terrorism lik…
I wonder from how high up this order came. After all, it's not like Greenwald is going to take this lying down and that's something that they could predict quite accurately ahead of time. To abuse these powers on the partner of the journalist that is reporting the abuses is the worst tactical mistake made by any government to date, short of the diversion of a diplomats plane.
Taking into account that the UK law enforcement and Brazil have a bit of a history when it comes to labelling people terrorist wrongly makes it even worse.