JohnSullivan has two stories from the USA: One is about the goverment checking email and phonecalls without a warrant, and claiming it was due to national security, and two is about a student trying to get a copy of the Red Book by Mao, and who is visited by guys from the department of Homeland Security instead. ¹
This stinks so much it’s hard to believe. A few days later, it seems that John himself no longer knows whether he’s to believe in the story ² and is tracking BoingBoing on it. And the original journalist seems to be speaking up again. ³ And finally, it all ends in the student admitting that he made that up. Phew! 😄 The sad thing is, I guess, that I thought the story was plausible enough in the first place. ⁴
TelePolis also writes about the story more than a week later. ⁵ The best part, hoever, is a quote by BruceSchneier:
I don’t know what the moral is, here. 1) He’s an idiot. 2) Don’t believe everything you read. 3) We live in such an invasive political climate that such stories are easily believable. 4) He’s definitely an idiot. ⁶
TheRegister also reports the NSA spying on US citizens:
[...] according to numerous un-named sources paraphrased in the *Times*, the President signed a secret order authorizing him to intercept phone calls and emails from US persons in communication with persons outside the US, and all without the slightest bit of judicial oversight. ⁷
There’s more in another TelePolis article (”Die NSA durchsucht mit Hintertüren bei den Providern in den USA Telefon- und Internetkommunikation, der Kongress soll der Bush-Regierung ausdrücklich die Ausübung der Kriegsrechte in den USA untersagt haben” ⁸), but nothing really astonishing once you accept that the goverment is trying to fight some of the laws instead of abiding by *all* of them.
Unfortunately, the Swiss and German governments have been doing this for a long time. 🙁 It’s called “der grosse Lauschangriff” in Germany ⁹ and “Onyx” in Switzerland ¹⁰.
TelePolis says that the real problem is that a democratically elected government tries to circumvent control by parliament and courts:
Bedenklich ist vor allem, dass eine demokratisch gewählte, auch sonst zur Heimlichtuerei neigende und mit Lügen einen Krieg legitimierende Regierung angeblich zum Schutz der Menschen und offenbar im Selbstauftrag sowie durch eigentümliche Auslegung von Gesetzen versucht, sich möglichst weitgehend der parlamentarischen und richterlichen Kontrolle zu entziehen, und dass sie damit so lange Zeit durchgekommen ist. ¹¹
#USA