
Donald Trump will now control drone assassinations and mass surveillance - devy
http://www.salon.com/2016/11/14/donald-trump-will-now-control-drone-assassinations-and-mass-surveillance-still-love-them-democrats/
======
mangeletti
So, Barack Obama's administration has been expanding the drone program, and
illegally murdering people from the air, for years.

But… It's the _next_ president that we should worry about, pertaining these
same drones.

The kind of opposite-speak that the MSM uses has reached ludicrous levels.

This is much like reading, "Ted Bundy fears that the ideas he created will be
used as inspiration by future mass murderers as they kill even more people.",
except that analogy doesn't hold up, because Ted Bundy hasn't murdered
anywhere near the amount of people that the Obama administration has.

~~~
rrmm
Yeah who would have thought that the "wrong person" would ever get their hands
on the drone program and huge domestic spying program. It's inconceivable! /s

This is what all the civil liberties peoples feared: you make a big pot of
juicy data and unilateral executive powers, and it invites expanding their
uses and mis-uses. The misuser may be GWB, Obama, Trump, HRC, or the next guy,
but because they exist they will eventually be mis-used.

It may be rank hypocrisy for everyone to freak out about it now, but I welcome
people getting freaked out about it.

That said many fewer people seem to trust Trump and he is an unknown quantity,
so it's easy to see why the freak-out exists even if in principle it was late
in coming.

~~~
o0-0o
Trump doesn't want to drone people and spy on Americans. Drone strikes will go
down and so will mass surveillance of Americans.

~~~
vinay427
Please don't speak for someone else without at least trying to verify what
they have said.

"Trump said Tuesday that he would be "fine" with restoring provisions of the
Patriot Act to allow for the bulk data collection" [1]

"I think we ought to start [surveillance] up again, and we ought to start it
up this morning. We ought to start it up again and get going. And use your
head. This is a lot of nonsense that we ended that," [2]

[1]: [http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/presidential-
races/26167...](http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/presidential-
races/261673-trump-sides-with-rubio-over-cruz-in-nsa-surveillance)

[2]: [http://www.politico.com/story/2015/11/donald-trump-muslim-
su...](http://www.politico.com/story/2015/11/donald-trump-muslim-
surveillance-216058)

------
TheGirondin
Look, Democrats are suddenly concerned with civil liberties again, after 8
years of a "change" President who continued the "fascist" policies of his
predecessor.

~~~
MrZongle2
I imagine some folks are dusting off Cindy Sheehan at this very moment, now
that criticism of the President will be fashionable again.

~~~
bigtex
I am sure Code Pink is also planning to protest unjust wars again too.

------
aRationalMoose
Turns out the tools used by previous administration and the expansion of
executive power the predecessors created, doesn't disappear but carries over
to the next Administration. Gasp. Shock.

------
hamax
Did anyone here even read the article? It's saying exactly what existing
comments here are complaining about.

~~~
mangeletti
It's not saying exactly what the comments are saying.

It is saying, essentially, "The Obama administration opened Pandora's box, and
now we have an evil, bigoted, fascist dictator inheriting all of it."

~~~
hamax
Apparently our interpretations of the article are very different.

Most of the paragraphs are criticising obama and democrats that supported his
efforts.

------
abritinthebay
In this thread so far: "but, but, Obama!"

Yes, if you actually read the article it's _extremely_ critical of his
policies with drones & surveillance.

That doesn't mean Trump is somehow the same.

We're dealing with a President-elect who has said he knows better than
Generals & intelligence agencies. A man whose lack of temperament for the role
has been apparent his entire life, a man who uses threats and intimidation
along with poor self control, a man who has a history of using political power
to pursue personal vendettas.

... that is - to put it mildly - rather concerning.

(voted down for pointing out the facts of the article, stay classy HN)

------
jonathanstrange
There is hope that Trump will be appalled by drone strikes and the horrible
number of deaths of bystanders they cause. I had the same hope with Obama and
he disappointed me bitterly. Let's see how Trump will do.

------
nobodynoes
This article is impossible to read on my iphone. Page jumping, continue
reading button that keeps moving, ads, turned my music off....

------
sickbeard
I won't be surprised when Bernie runs, there will be a sudden influx of
"emails" showing how they are plotting evil things a typical campaign will do

~~~
gotofritz
Is Bernie going to run at 78 do you think?

~~~
grzm
That's pretty old. Even 45 isn't all that common anymore. It's pretty much all
33 nowadays, isn't it? All hipsters? /s(orry)

~~~
gotofritz
If it's a quote it's passing me by, sorry :-(

~~~
grzm
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gramophone_record](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gramophone_record)

No, it's me who needs to apologize.

~~~
gotofritz
Aaarggghhh you dooooo!!!!

------
gotofritz
The whole article is based on a false premise - that Trump will be able to use
a drone program ONLY because Obama developed it for him. Otherwise he would
have been sitting in the Oval office, wringing his hands, wondering what to
do. Which is patent nonsense - Trump could have (and quite certainly would
have) developed his own drone program even if Obama had banned drone strikes.
The same as with torture. Of course, Obama's work will give him a head start,
but no more than that.

