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Why discussions on cyber snooping have been so painful for us

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Re: Why discussions on cyber snooping have been so painful for us

#221

Post by sounds »

jacoblyles wrote: post #196
sounds wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, the ability to choose the outcome is still well and truly in our hands. I didn't say when or where, but I do believe that the power to govern invariably flows from the people themselves.

99.999% of government officials aren't close to being touched by elections. Do you honestly believe you can change government significantly while leaving 99.999% of the government unchanged? See my previous comment on the issue: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5842029

5 significant figures? I think you need to provide extensive documentation for your claims.

Re: Why discussions on cyber snooping have been so painful for us

#222

Post by philwelch »

arrrg wrote: post #189
philwelch wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The US Constitution is mostly the same. If you're in the United States, regardless of your nationality, you have the right to free speech, the right to remain silent when questioned by police, the right to demand a search warrant before letting the police into your home or automobile, the right to purchase and possess firearms, the right to espouse whatever political opinions you may have, and even the right to refus…

There is a right to privacy (in case of the German constitution literally, by the way). And I take issue with anyone saying that violating the privacy of non-citizens is totally ok. I do not want to claim any kind of superiority – that is very clearly not the case. The German government consists of many, many people who do not respect privacy at all and are disgusting scumbags. No question about that. I just want to…

If you interpret the right to privacy to entail never having foreign intelligence agencies, you take a position that almost no government in the world actually follows, because almost every national government has foreign intelligence agencies. Holding up Germany as a counterexample on this issue is, in your words, factually wrong.
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