
Germans Loved Obama. Now We Don’t Trust Him - mxfh
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/30/opinion/sunday/germans-loved-obama-now-we-dont-trust-him.html
======
DoubleMalt
Well written. Being myself an Austrian (not only by economic affiliation) with
ties to the USA I just today contemplated that in a way Obama will do much
more damage to the American reputation than Bush (2) ever could.

Bush could be seen as an anomaly. He was not elected by a majority of the
American people for his first turn, and even if everybody shook their head
about the obvious oilgrab in the Iraq based on blatant lies, people could
somehow understand that you don't change an administration amidst a war.

Obama was seen as a return of the USA that was always admired by many if not
most people in Europe.

Like someone coming to their senses after a violent fit, Europe was ready to
embrace an America that put effort in preserving and spreading civil rights,
peace and democracy with means that did not involve letting countries descend
in mayhem that bloody dictators would envy.

Then \- he did not shut down Guantanamo (and he could have done it if he had
acted fast and spent time to convince his party)

\- he did not Veto a continuation of the Patriot Act

\- he let his administration spy on the press to an unprecedented extent

\- he defends spying on everybody outside or with ties to outside the country

If this is the rational, the civilized America, then we are in deep trouble.

~~~
mpyne
While I agree in essence with your characterization of the job done by Obama,
I do want to point out (again) that it will take quite some advances in
physics before we're able to locate the parallel universe where Obama may have
been able to shut down the prison at Gitmo.

I think it's hard to imagine the sheer and total resistance to shutting down
that prison if you haven't been in the country to see it yourself. I still
don't understand the reasoning to this day. But there was never a chance, with
the Congresses Obama was handed with, that the prison would be completely shut
down.

I don't know whether it's a bunch of representatives attempting to look 'Tough
on Terror' or what... but you have to pin Guantanamo on the people as a whole.

~~~
gruseom
_But there was never a chance, with the Congresses Obama was handed with, that
the prison would be completely shut down._

You've added a critical word there with "completely".

Congress blocked Obama from bringing Guantanamo inmates to the US for
imprisonment or trial. But 86 of the 166 inmates are never going to be tried.
They're already cleared for immediate release. Everyone (CIA, DoD) has agreed
to this. Obama has the power to release them with the stroke of a pen, and the
State Dept. apparently has a plan to do it and is just waiting for the go-
ahead. So while Obama may not have the power to close Guantanamo completely,
he does have the power to free more than half of the prisoners there, the ones
who are not accused of anything. Yet there they stay, for no discernable
(other than political) reasons.

Pinning the blame on Congress has worked for Obama politically, but if it's
true that he's the one keeping more than half of the prisoners there, and with
weaker justification since they are the ones unanimously agreed to be
innocent, then it seems fair to say that Obama is more at fault than Congress
is.

Source:
[http://ianmasters.com/sites/default/files/mp3/bbriefing_2013...](http://ianmasters.com/sites/default/files/mp3/bbriefing_2013_05_23a_carlos%20warner.mp3),
which is an interview (starting at 1:36) with one of the public defenders
involved.

~~~
res0nat0r
Release them to where? Their home countries don't even want to take them back
now I believe.

~~~
iuguy
In that case, given that the United States government forcibly removed them
from where they were beforehand, it would make sense that the United States
hosts them if they can't go home. After all, many of them have been there long
enough to potentially qualify for US citizenship.

~~~
seclorum
The problem is that not only have a lot of them been there long enough to
qualify for US citizenship, but they've experienced enough torture and
fundamental violation of their human rights that they also qualify as avid
haters of America and its citizens.

So the US has created a monster, and is not willing to let that monster live
in its neighborhood, and nobody else wants it either, so .. there they stay.

Don't worry though, a lot of the Gitmo detainees know the situation is dire,
and thus: the hunger strike. For some of them, death will be the only escape.

~~~
bad_user
A sincere apology, along with providing counselling, free housing and a stable
pension to take care of their living expenses - would go a long way.

Also, hatred grows exponentially, with each day they spend in prison and is
multiplied by the international audience that's watching the story unfold. If
you fear their hatred, the most rational thing to do is to release them and
package their misfortune in tale with a happy ending.

Not doing that will lead to even more hatred and even bigger monsters.

------
iaskwhy
The infographic linked in the article is amazing:
[http://www.zeit.de/datenschutz/malte-spitz-data-
retention](http://www.zeit.de/datenschutz/malte-spitz-data-retention)

For those who don't want to read it, it's six months of the author's metadata
gathered by T-Mobile being displayed on a map.

~~~
digitalengineer
Have an up-vote! I came to the comments to place this link. The level of
detail is incredible and scary. Combine this with the actual _content_ of the
mails, social media, _search queries_ and you have basically injected yourself
into the mind of people.

------
criley2
As Germans feign outrage for the actions of the Five Eyes, specifically the UK
and America, they rubber stamp the same style laws that amusingly, went into
effect very recently:

[http://translate.google.de/translate?sl=de&tl=en&js=n&prev=_...](http://translate.google.de/translate?sl=de&tl=en&js=n&prev=_t&hl=de&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.zeit.de%2Fdigital%2Fdatenschutz%2F2013-03%2Fbestandsdaten-
breyer-bundestag)

Forcing telecoms to keep data available for on demand searches of intensely
personal citizens information.

~~~
DoubleMalt
Well the German supreme court declared these laws partly unconstitutional. In
Austria the supreme court has still to decide.

Of course these laws should be abolished.

But these cases show an important difference: These laws while outrageous,
were created transparently and published. This enabled citizens to take
actions against them, and hopefully at some point they will be abolished.

In the case of the NSA everything was covered by gag orders under the penalty
of committing a felony. That is way more insidious.

~~~
mpyne
The laws underlying those gag orders are also public, transparent, debated
beforehand, etc.

The principle of the gag order comes from the implementation of the law.
Obviously the public law itself _allows_ gag orders, otherwise Google's
lawyers would tell Google to go ahead and publish them. Gag orders have been
around in America, at all levels of law enforcement and security, since
waaaaay before all this.

~~~
DoubleMalt
This is a big defect in the American justice system imho.

~~~
mpyne
Nothing more than OPSEC, really.

The big defect is allowing long-duration (or even permanent) gag orders, and
not just for the NSA-style stuff. There's been quite a few court cases where
parties settle on something which is public-interest but the judge seals the
whole damn case forever.

------
ianstallings
It blows my mind that people fall for political windbaggery. Europe seems
especially starry-eyed for Obama. It's kind of strange.

~~~
ninjin
Given the eight years of the Bush administration Europe was as desperate for
change as the American left and I think this accounts for most of the initial
excitement about him. In hindsight this may seem foolish, but looking back I
can remember exactly how great the divide was (not that it seems to be getting
any better).

------
ajtaylor
The standout quote for me is on the second page: "When courts and judges
negotiate secretly, when direct data transfers occur without limits, when huge
data storage rather than targeted pursuit of individuals becomes the norm, all
sense of proportionality and accountability is lost." This sums up the current
situation quite nicely. Absolute power always corrupts absolutely. Always.

------
RexRollman
Not just the Germans.

------
galaktor
Highlight from the article: The guy published [1] the meta-data T-Mobile
collected from his phone as a practical example of the information that can be
extracted from it.

[1] [http://www.zeit.de/datenschutz/malte-spitz-data-
retention](http://www.zeit.de/datenschutz/malte-spitz-data-retention)

------
vor_
I have to admit I was never a fan of Obama and didn't understand those who
trusted his promises as a candidate. Every candidate makes promises they
rarely keep, but Obama was well known for the level of change he claimed he
would bring. None of this administration's scandals have surprised me.

------
graycat
Once my (bright, Valedictorian, PBK, 'Summa Cum Laude', Woodrow Wilson, NSF,
Ph.D.) wife gave me a question:

We were running a little consulting company, and one of our clients was from a
wealthy family. My wife asked me about that client, "What has he actually done
himself?" that is, that he didn't mostly get just handed to him from his
position in the wealth and power of his family?

That was a good question. Prescient. Indeed, when he started making decisions
really on his own, he made just awful decisions and lost again and again, in
total a bundle, a big fraction of his share of the family's wealth. Not
unexpected: The great American novel is rags to rags in three generations!

Okay, look at Ohama: What has he actually done besides have several smart
and/or wealthy people help him ride a wave to get elected?

From what I can see, generally his approach is when there is an issue in the
news, have his writers formulate some cliches on the issue, mouth the cliches,
and then do nothing or nothing significant and wait until the MSM, etc. forget
about the issue.

In one step more detail, he has in mind a coalition -- that's one role of a
politician, to form a winning coalition. So, e.g., one of the groups he wants
in his coalition are the _greenies_. So, back early in 2008 he gave an
interview with the San Francisco Chronicle where he said that his idea was to
have carbon "cap and trade" and slowly "ratchet up" the standards until the
coal fired electric generating plants were "bankrupt". When I read that, I
went into orbit somewhere in the outer planets before returning to earth. Why?
Easy enough to find in Department of Energy reports was that then 49% of all
of our electric power and, as I recall, 23% of all our energy was coming from
coal. So, in simple, stark terms, his "bankrupt", taken literally, would do
more damage to the US economy than Hitler, Stalin, and Mao ever hoped. And
Obama admitted the effect, that electric rates would "skyrocket".

But eventually I understood that I had gotten all excited over next to
nothing: Yes, apparently some old coal fired plants have been shut down -- a
good report would be of interest but I don't have a reference to one. But
electric rates have not gone up like a "skyrocket". I doubt that the coal
plant shutdowns have amounted to much. Indeed, Buffett recently bought
Burlington Northern Railroad which is big in hauling coal to coal plants. So,
no doubt Buffett took Obama's SF Chronicle interview as, to quote the movie
_All the President 's Men_, "total BS".

So, what the heck did he do? Well, he got some greenies all happy for a while
and likely got some political donations. With the happy greenies, he got
freedom to aim some of the TARP II and _stimulus_ money (supposedly $92
billion and later another $45 billion) to _green_ projects that likely
resulted in some political power and campaign donations.

Big, huge waste, right? Well, yes, but maybe not totally useless: Heck in WWII
we got out of The Great Depression in about 90 days by pouring money into guns
and bullets that were junk by 1945 (suddenly had 1-3 jobs for everyone who
could work, women included, especially if they could learn to use a rivet
gun). So, maybe pouring $92 billion plus $45 billion into projects that might,
unfortunately, be just junk soon enough might help get the economy going,
e.g., as that money soon gets spent for the usual things -- food, clothing,
shelter, transportation, medical care, education, .... Or, it was like the
_helicopter_ solution -- fly over the US and drop money until the economy is
going again.

Maybe the greenies are less than 20% of the population. So, what about the
80+% of the population not greenies who don't want to see 49% of our electric
utility industry destroyed? Well, apparently that 80+% just didn't pay
attention to the Obama greenie remarks and otherwise didn't take him
seriously. And one step more, as soon as shutting down our electric power
started to pinch, people would scream bloody murder and the situation would be
turned around.

So, net, curiously, the 20-% get all excited and contribute to a coalition
long enough to win an election; the 80+% mostly pay no attention; and soon
enough everyone forgets about the issue.

So, can build a coalition, say, long enough to get elected: (1) Pick a list of
controversial issues and, for each, pick a small group of highly concerned
citizens. (2) In some speeches, feed each group some radical raw meat cliches
that they will really like. (3) In reality, do next to nothing or nothing on
the cliches. (4) Let time pass, new issues dominate the news, and the old
issues fade into the background.

Then what about the real work? (1) Wait until others propose solutions. (2)
Wait until some such solutions get some _traction_. (3a) If the solution is
really popular in the country, then support it. (3b) If the solution is just
to be implemented in the Executive Branch, then let it but don't publicly
support it; if the solution flops, blame the lower level people who
implemented it; if the solution is successful, take credit.

But, mostly don't actually have a _vision_ and push it and bet own _political
capital_ on it.

If Obama has a vision, then my guess is that he just wants as much more money
and power in DC as he can bring there so that DC can take the US by the horns
and lead it somewhere, say, to _social justice_. Otherwise he gets time to
work on his golf game and jump shot.

What's wrong? He's not really leading. He's not really out in front with
solutions. He mostly is just letting things happen from others and avoiding
being close enough to get blamed. So, there's not much _coordination_. Mostly
he's avoiding blame.

Why don't people notice what he's doing? Because things, especially the
economy and wars, are not bad enough for people to be interrupting the rest of
their lives to raise hell insisting on something better. And, people do pay a
lot of attention to the MSM, and the MSM has a very short attention span.

E.g., for the Benghazi controversy? The NSA controversy pushed that out of the
headlines. For the NSA controversy? Issue cliches and otherwise let Clapper,
General Alexander, and Biden meet the public. For Snowden, mostly just f'get
about him.

Back to the golf game and jump shot.

Or, "How to be President without Really Trying". Works as long as the voters
put up with it and there's no crisis that demands more.

Crisis? What about hurricane Sandy? As at

    
    
      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hurricane_Sandy
    

"Hurricane Sandy was the deadliest and most destructive hurricane of the 2012
Atlantic hurricane season, as well as the second-costliest hurricane in United
States history."

So, with hurricane Katrina, W got excoriated, eviscerated, drawn, quartered,
etc. With hurricane Sandy Governor Christie got some publicity, Mayor
Bloomberg was busy, but Obama got no blame. Cute.

~~~
npalli
Yeah, for instance the biggest overhaul of the healthcare system (Obamacare)
happened without really trying. Imagine what he would have done if he was in
office not playing golf. Also, looks like you are a time traveller from
October 2012. So a flashback for you

[http://whatthefuckhasobamadonesofar.com/](http://whatthefuckhasobamadonesofar.com/)

~~~
graycat
> Yeah, for instance the biggest overhaul of the healthcare system (Obamacare)
> happened without really trying.

I was watching during the selling before the voting for _Obamacare_ , and I
concluded that Obama did next to nothing.

What did happen? The Dems had both houses of Congress. Senator Kennedy had
long had a team working on healthcare overhaul and had a plan on the shelf.
That plan got pulled off the shelf, modified, and then rammed through, e.g.,
by Pelosi, Reid, and Emanuel.

For Obama, when he went to a town hall to support the bill, he made some
remarks about the costs of an amputation, got his facts badly wrong, got
slapped down by the American College of Surgeons for saying things that were
"uninformed, misinformed, just plain wrong, dangerous"

    
    
      http://www.facs.org/news/obama081209.html
    

Then Obama essentially quit efforts at public support of Obamacare.

When a team of Republicans went to the White House to try to draft a better
bill, Obama was not really engaged.

Obama signed Obamacare, but he had next to nothing to do with getting it
passed.

Obama didn't have to work to get Obamacare passed: Kennedy's old plan, Pelosi,
Reid, Emanuel, and the Dem majority were enough. That's just the way it was.

------
AlexeiSadeski
Sounds like the Germans are getting a genuine American experience.

------
ck2
Now imagine you live in the USA and double that before/after feeling.

Not saying there was a better alternative but what have we done.

------
luka1413
For now, the whole world don't trust US, or any cloud service provided by US.

------
edwardunknown
First: what does this have to do with technology? Second: damn right Germany
shouldn't trust us, because the world doesn't trust Germany and hopefully it
never will. It doesn't bother me in the least that we're keeping an eye on
them, I'd be nervous if we weren't.

------
mynameishere
Getting kind-of tired of this. When the Snowden "revelations" came out, my
thought was "And...?"

Everybody paying attention knew the US government, and all governments, were
sucking down all the data they could get. If you don't like it, AES-256 is
widely available. Problem solved. If you think bitching or voting (Ha!) is
more powerful than encryption, think again.

