

Cameron Proves Greenwald Right - mpweiher
http://dish.andrewsullivan.com/2013/08/18/cameron-proves-greenwald-right/

======
emhs
Let's enumerate how wrong this is:

1\. This was done by the British for a slight against the American government.

2\. This is against a member of the media, who are typically considered
noncombatants in political conflicts.

3\. It's really against a family member; doubly noncombatant.

4\. The supposed slight is only the truthful announcement of a criminal act by
the government in question.

5\. This comes after the government recently argued that they could be trusted
with such powers.

~~~
k-mcgrady
>> "1\. This was done by the British for a slight against the American
government."

Not true. He also exposed British spying through GCHQ.

[http://www.theguardian.com/uk/gchq](http://www.theguardian.com/uk/gchq)

>> "2\. This is against a member of the media, who are typically considered
noncombatants in political conflicts."

It was done against a member of the medias partner. He is not a journalist.

NB: I'm not defending any of what happened it's very clearly wrong.

~~~
argumentum
>> He is not a journalist.

Nowadays, _we are all journalists_. We all have means to publish material to a
wide audience.

From the 1st amendment: \- Congress shall make no law ... etc ... abridging
the freedom of speech, or _of_ the press;

There is no distinction granting the "media" or "journalists" special rights
that all of us don't get. We all should have freedom _of_ speech and freedom
_of_ the press.

~~~
eru
What does the 1st amendment to the US constitution have to do with events in
Britain (or anywhere outside the US)?

~~~
argumentum
The post I was replying to mentioned that this may have been done "at the
behest" of the US government. If so, it would be a violation of the 1st
amendment, which states that the State has no ability to abridge speech or
hinder the press, with no reference to any national border.

The UK government acts under it's own laws, and so any 1st amendment violation
depends on the US government's degree of involvement in the proceedings.

------
lhl
So here's an interesting note on the UK Terrorism Act 2000 (available in a
handy-dandy annotated form from the Legislative website:
[http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2000/11/schedule/7/cross...](http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2000/11/schedule/7/crossheading/power-
to-stop-question-and-detain) )

(1) An examining officer may question a person to whom this paragraph applies
for the purpose of determining whether he appears to be a person falling
within section 40(1)(b).

...

(4) An examining officer may exercise his powers under this paragraph _whether
or not he has grounds for suspecting that a person falls within section
40(1)(b)._

Italics mine, of course. One of many laws passed I suspect that makes what
happened entirely legal (and all that much worse when you consider the
implications). I think we need to disabuse ourselves of the ideas of "western
liberal democracies" or "rule of law" protecting our liberties. What is
happening now is the very definition of tyranny.

Maybe if enough people realize this is happening this can be changed? I
suppose only time will tell.

------
mpweiher
Thank you David Cameron for demonstrating so clearly and unambiguously that
"trust us" is not an acceptable answer.

~~~
hipsters_unite
I thought this current government couldn't sicken me further with its conduct
in this ongoing fiasco; clearly I was wrong.

------
marshray
For those who don't follow US politics and editorial writers, Andrew Sullivan
is kind of a big deal to Democrats and the self-identified "left".

If he's changed his mind on the Obama's fundamental credibility on the NSA
domestic spying issue, it could suggest the beginnings of a sea change in
establishment political thought.

~~~
dnautics
he's kind of a big deal because he's a self-described libertarian-leaning
small-c conservative that often produces missives in agreement with the
Democratic party. Contrast this with the libertarian-leaning small-c
conservative Ron Paul, who often worked in conjunction with left-democrats -
but generally not the Democrats (such as Kucinich, Barney Frank), and who is
thus NOT a big deal to Democrats. To a large extent, the fawning over Sullivan
is a sort of a political expediency. Now that the capital D Democrats have
seemingly lost Sullivan, I would not be surprised if his big-deal-ness will
fade, as he dismissed again as just one of those smarmy libertarians.

~~~
Semiapies
Sullivan is fairly far from anything reasonably described as "libertarian".
He's a British conservative and was a _huge_ booster of and apologist for Bush
for most of his administration. He's stayed a big deal because he switched to
being a booster of and apologist for Obama. He has an embarrassing Great
Leader fixation.

But yes, if he stops writing paeans to Obama, he'll stop being nearly as much
a Big Deal.

~~~
dnautics
well - by libertarian leaning, I meant "fiscally conservative, socially
liberal". But yes, his Great Leader fixation would disqualify him from being
libertarian in the philosophical sense (versus the political - as in policy -
or Political - as in Party) senses.

~~~
Semiapies
That's not what "libertarian" means, either.

In the "policy" sense, he's been an aggressive opponent of most libertarian
stances, aside from when Abu Ghraib and PRISM broke. In the "Political - as in
Party" sense, I'm not aware he says much of anything about the Libertarian
Party.

------
dodyg
They grounded President of Bolivia's plane
([http://elpais.com/elpais/2013/07/08/inenglish/1373297508_109...](http://elpais.com/elpais/2013/07/08/inenglish/1373297508_109127.html))
out of 'suspicion of transporting Snowden'.

So a mere citizen is pretty much a kid's play.

~~~
smsm42
Well, I'd say "mere citizen" is worse. Spain owes nothing to Evo Morales. But
the only reason why Prime Minister has his job and why he's not just a random
Joe from the street is because citizens put him there and entrusted him with
enormous power. Abusing this power against the very citizens who are supposed
to be the source of it is much graver crime than disrespecting a foreign
dignitary to whom you owe nothing, it strikes right at the heart of the whole
concept of democratic society. If citizens become routinely abused by the
government, why should they keep giving it their consent? And if government
has no citizen's consent, what is it but a pure tyranny?

~~~
dodyg
I agree with you but the sad fact is this, as long as this abuse only happen
to a few 'others', majority of people don't really much care especially with
abstract issue such as digital surveillance.

A lot of people will simply accept that these massive digital dragnet is a
necessary evil to protect them from the evil terrorists.

edit: I am based in Cairo and you know what? Those bloody crackdowns against
Muslim Brotherhood protesters are popular in the country. The sit-ins have
been labeled as terrorists sit-ins.

------
LordHumungous
Terrorism, criticizing the government, what's the difference?

------
bencollier49
I suspect that it was primarily an excuse to seize all his data. Perhaps they
thought it would look less opportunistic if they held him for nine hours. With
intimidation as a side-benefit.

------
Patient0
Blaming David Cameron personally for this seems a bit of a reach: at this
stage is there anything that actually shows that David Cameron himself knew
about and approved of the detainment? He could still claim he knew nothing
about the events of the last 24 hours...

~~~
rlpb
I think it's perfectly reasonable. His stance is that abuses don't happen, and
the law does not need to be written to protect us from abuses, since his
government will [not abuse the law], and thus we should allow such abuses in
the law as written. We all thought that was unrealistic at the time, but since
this is his position, it is reasonable to attribute the consequences of his
position to him also.

------
gall
Does anyone have experience with corporate policies regarding the movement of
data through airports? I'm curious about the prevalence of the wipe everything
and repopulate the hard drive via sftp at destination approach.

~~~
contingencies
Wiping properly is difficult. You would probably find it easier to simply
purchase a disk at the destination (if you need bare metal performance), or
use encrypted VMs for all work. Better yet, where at all possible, don't
expect your people to move around, and allow them to work remotely from their
chosen location. Good for the planet, good for (many technical) employees
(most of the time), good for the security of corporate data.

~~~
viraptor
Encrypted VMs won't work in the UK. You can be told to give access to them and
have to comply. It could work with deniable encryption, but that's not an
option for current phones / tablets.

~~~
contingencies
Good points.

Personally I ditched mobile devices entirely a few weeks ago when the SIM java
hacks became public. (Amusingly, I've since run in to well known mobile
network provider architects in Europe who were totally unaware of the issue...
but then, what's new?)

------
argumentum
The tide of world opinion is slowly, but _surely_ , turning :)

~~~
mr_spothawk
>"but surely"

let us hope.

------
vzhang
Duh.

