Obama's Soft Totalitarianism: Europe Must Protect Itself from America

[xchrom]

http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/europe-must-stand-up-to-american-cyber-snooping-a-906250.html



On Tuesday, Barack Obama is coming to Germany. But who, really, will be visiting? He is the 44th president of the United States. He is the first African American to hold the office. He is an intelligent lawyer. And he is a Nobel Peace Prize laureate.

But is he a friend? The revelations brought to us by IT expert Edward Snowden have made certain what paranoid computer geeks and left-wing conspiracy theorists have long claimed: that we are being watched. All the time and everywhere. And it is the Americans who are doing the watching.

On Tuesday, the head of the largest and most all-encompassing surveillance system ever invented is coming for a visit. If Barack Obama is our friend, then we really don't need to be terribly worried about our enemies.

It is embarrassing: Barack Obama will be arriving in Berlin for only the second time, but his visit is coming just as we are learning that the US president is a snoop on a colossal scale. German Chancellor Angela Merkel has said that she will speak to the president about the surveillance program run by the National Security Agency, and the Berlin Interior Ministry has sent a set of 16 questions to the US Embassy. But Obama need not be afraid. German Interior Minister Hans Peter Friedrich, to be sure, did say: "That's not how you treat friends." But he wasn't referring to the fact that our trans-Atlantic friends were spying on us. Rather, he meant the criticism of that spying.

[WovenGems]

1. Cool, so cool

"Soft Totalitarianism" is a brand new oxymoron.

[BeyondGeography]

2. The last paragraph is constructive

...The draft for a new data privacy directive has already been presented. It just has to be implemented. Once that happens, American secret services might still be able to walk all over European law, but if US Internet giants like Google, Apple, Microsoft and Facebook want to continue making money off of a half-billion Europeans, then they will have to abide by our laws. Under the new law, companies caught passing on data in ways not permitted are forced to pay fines. You can be sure that these companies would in turn apply pressure to their own government. The proposal envisions setting that fine at 2 percent of a company's worldwide revenues.

That's a lot of money -- and also a language that America understands.

[dipsydoodle]

4. EU fines against those who breach Data Proection Laws

can also be based on per customer. So yes - they can be rather large.

[Major Hogwash]

8. It's a Catch-23 situation.

Which is 1 more worse than a Catch-22 situation.

Just keep that in mind.

It's a matter of mind over matter.
If you don't mind, it doesn't matter.

[dipsydoodle]

9. From Europe's point of view

We don't mind that you don't matter.

[Major Hogwash]

10. Hahahaha!!! Good one.

That was quick.

[Monkie]

25. exactly, this is why google et al were so quick to cry to the US government when this got out

they fear for their profits.
the EU will stop doing business with them step by step, and they will become irrelevant.
sweden has already banned the use of google cloud services by government due to privacy concerns, and these new revelations will only accelerate this process across europe.

[pscot]

44. Like the man said, money

is the only language these people understand.

[Monkie]

16. microsoft was fined $1.9 billion in total by the EU for anti-competitive practices

before it gave up on fighting the EU over these issues.
it is going to take a little time, but these companies will be punished severely for this.
and fined over and over until they comply with the law.
the funny thing is that whistleblower companies, those that come clean and inform on other companies do get reduced fines, or waived fines, this has happened before in anti-trust cases in the EU, so it is in the interest of companies not wanting to lose billions to cooperate.
if they want to do business in the richest economic zone on this planet, they have no choice.

and this is without taking into account the public relations disaster this is for these companies, many europeans know what it is like to live under repressive governments, many of their parents or grandparents lived through it or fought it, google and apple and the other large companies enabling massive surveillance programs will not go down well.

[marions ghost]

22. I hope that

people in other countries will object strenuously. And put big pressure on the companies themselves.

Thanks for the background.

[BenzoDia]

3. EU leaders knew this was going on. The US convinced them to drop parts of their Data Protection

Last edited Tue Jun 18, 2013, 09:21 AM - Edit history (1)

Regulations. They sold their own people out and are now feigning outrage.

edit:
This was dropped from an EC draft of the law and still need to be agreed upon.

[dipsydoodle]

5. What part of our UK/EU Data Protection Laws were dropped ?

Only changes I'm aware of strengthened them - not weakened them.

[BenzoDia]

13. I found this on The Open Rights Group website:

https://www.openrightsgroup.org/blog/2013/how-the-eu-commission-caved-to-us-demands-to-water-down-its-privacy-law

Reports this week revealed that the US successfully pressed the European Commission to drop sections of the Data Protection Regulation that would, as the Financial Times explains, “have nullified any US request for technology and telecoms companies to hand over data on EU citizens.

The article, (as you can read below), would have prohibited transfers of personal information to a third country under a legal request, for example the one used by the NSA for their PRISM programme, unless “expressly authorized by an international agreement or provided for by mutual legal assistance treaties or approved by a supervisory authority.”

The relevant section is Article 42, which you can read in a leaked draft Data Protection Regulation from late 2011, available from State Watch.

[dipsydoodle]

24. Might have been a proposal

which never in fact happened.

[BenzoDia]

30. Yes, it still needs full agreement to be enacted.

However, the US did successfully lobby the EC to drop the rule and we're seeing this level of outrage only after Snowden's leaks.

[Bluenorthwest]

41. Success would involve the enactment of the provisions, not an attempt to do so.

If it is not yet enacted, there has been no successful anything.

[BenzoDia]

46. The US convinced them to drop it from their draft and they did.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/worldviews/wp/2013/06/12/obama-administration-convinced-eu-to-drop-measure-that-would-have-blocked-nsa-spying/

Ultimately, the European Union was persuaded to drop the rule, apparently out of fear that it might complicate a proposed trade deal between the U.S. and EU and that the rule would in any case be too difficult to enforce, as most tech companies that would provide the data are in the United States.

Sorry, but these people sold out quite literally.

[Fumesucker]

6. That's an interesting statement, do you have any proof of this?

[BenzoDia]

31. Guardian link here. For clarity, these are rules that still need to be agreed upon.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jun/14/prism-nsa-surveillance-european-data

Under EU data protection rules tabled 18 months ago but not yet agreed among EU governments, crucial passages have been dropped under strong EU pressure making it easier for the Americans to access data on people in Europe.

Reding's spokeswoman said on Thursday that when drafting the rules, the European commission had been faced with "intense US lobbying". A contentious passage in the original draft set stiff conditions for the transfer of data to third countries. This part was dropped.

The new rules are supposed to be agreed by the end of the year. But it is likely that they will now have to be reviewed because of the Snowden leaks and the global impact.

[Monkie]

11. they were convinced on the basis of lies, the person who negotiated is now VP of the EU

the VP of the EU was very public about her anger, something that is quite "undiplomatic" if the US is our friend.
the EU bent over backwards for the past 10+ years to appease the US and its bloodlust.

yes they sold their own people out, but they also have to answer to those people in the end.
and much of the outrage is coming from those responsible for protecting the laws that countries do have.

[Fumesucker]

7. Ich bin ein Spion

[Art_from_Ark]

14. "I am a spy"

Quite different from "Ich bin ein Berliner!"

[Art_from_Ark]

15. Horseshit?

It's from Der Spiegel, one of Germany's most influential news magazines.

[Buzz Clik]

19. Horseshit happens. It happened here.

[nadinbrzezinski]

58. It must be Obama derangement syndrome right?

Not a history first of nazis and later the Stasi.

If this was not so sad...

[malaise]

17. Huh?

You lost me here. This is an internationally recognized source.

[Buzz Clik]

18. It's an opinion piece. The source is irrelevant.

xchrom pastes way out there opinions on multiple topics every morning. Many of the pieces, like this one, are highly inflammatory, but xchrom will never answer questions about them. As soon as the morning exercise of flinging shit is over, xchrom becomes a normal poster again.

No clue why this is the choice taken for posting this stuff, but I've had a bellyful.

[Art_from_Ark]

21. The source is most definitely relevant

It's from one of Germany's most influential news magazines, not some obscure Internet blog. It's certain to be read widely.

[Monkie]

23. unlike with the poster that complains, people in the real world listen to what der spiegel say.

so dont worry about it, that poster appeared clueless as to who or what der spiegel is, which is ironic really, people that claim to have a interest in world affairs and politics where i live know, and also know or have heard of influential magazines and newspapers in the US.
ignorance worn with pride, so funny.

[Bluenorthwest]

45. So your response is a character attack on a DUer and the claim that one of the

world's leading news magazines is fringe and biased? You really covered the entire Centrist spiel quickly, accuse the source and the poster of being somehow, you know, flawed, because you have no actual counterpoint to the OP.

[Monkie]

20. one of germany's largest magazines, famed for its investigative journalism?

horseshit?
you have some nerve, show some respect, the mainstream press in the US is not fit to lick the boots of der spiegel, which translates into "the mirror" if my schoolboy german is correct.
politicians of all stripes in germany dislike der spiegel, probably the best endorsement a member of the 4th estate can get.

[nadinbrzezinski]

60. Yup. ^^^^____^^^^.

Yiu gotta understand, a real press can be disconcerting.

[99Forever]

26. Kneejerk much?

[Buzz Clik]

27. No. Not at all.

[99Forever]

28. Bwahahahahahahah.

Good story, bro.

[jberryhill]

29. Except most EU governments have their citizens' health data

I know an IT contractor in the UK who works in facial recognition. One of the issues the National Health System has is fraud by people who have their ill foreign relatives visit in order to pass themselves off as a UK resident for the purpose of receiving treatment. They are building a system to link up surveillance cameras with facial recognition in order to automatically identify patients who show up for treatment in order to flag foreigners who are pretending to be UK citizens. It's pretty cool.

[sabrina 1]

32. What is your comment supposed to mean? Are you endorsing spying on the people? Or are you

opposing it, or you saying that it's okay for us to do it if others are doing it?

I'm thrilled that the EU, has begun to put an end to these totalitarian policies. People have said for a long time that the US has gone too far for its own people to be able to stop them and it would take outside intervention to do so.

As the article says at the end, they sure know us well, the money involved in these fines is 'something the US understands'. So true, the spying, the torture, the wars, in the end they were all about money, billions of dollars worth. And the world looking on has been alarmed for quite a while.

But in some ways the past five years have awakened people here to who actually opposed Bush's policies and who opposed them only based on politics. That has been invaluable information.

[jberryhill]

34. I'm fascinated by the interest you take in me,

EU governments, in general, already have more data on their citizens than the US does.

Reducing that down to some sort of silly "are you endorsing..." inquisition is simple minded.

In a lot of EU countries, people bank and get internet service from the post office. You do not just move somewhere without registering your residence with the national government. The types of arguments that we have over whether police departments can use number recognition on license plates on street cameras seem silly to them - they've been doing that for ages.

On the other hand, there is a lot of protection in the EU against private data mining, but it is assumed that the government has access to far more data than people in the US, in general, are comfortable with. But when the government runs the national phone company, then nobody needs anything as quaint as a warrant to get at it, nor do they need to compartmentalize national/international data collection.

There have been postings at DU about hypothetical situations on call data, for example, where one's health condition could be surmised from one's calling pattern. Well people who are worried about that kind of thing are never going to support a national health insurance system, which strikes me as a real head scratcher. I do support a national health care insurance system, and have no idea how we are going to drag the paranoids along in order to get one.

Try checking into a hotel in Europe without giving up your passport number sometime. Why do you think a hotel, which has no access to any passport database, collects that information at the front desk?

[BeyondGeography]

36. Was hitchhiking in Italy many moons ago and my companion left her passport in a vehicle

Oh what a nightmare. A trucker picked us up and we managed to explain our situation to him. So he took us to a, shall we say, "loose" establishment favored by members of his profession. Even there, they demanded both passports in order to check in. We want up at the police station and they got us into a hotel for the night.

Anyway, nice post. Big government inherently means a lot of things that many Americans would equate to Big Brother, so things can get pear-shaped in a hurry in conversations about the public good (to the extent that it's even recognized) here.

[sabrina 1]

37. Have you ever spent any time in Europe?

I am worried about the government collecting data on ALL Americans, without their knowledge. But I support a National HC system.

The problem is money. The privatization of everything. Removing money from the electoral system is a start to weakening the huge Corporations who now run our government. They are accountable to no one. Our government is or should be.

Data collection is all about money. And when we have CEOs of Mega Security Corps who receive billions of dollars from the Government claiming it's to keep us safe, being appointed to powerful positions in our government, like foxes in hen houses, Clapper comes to mind, to make sure the money keeps flowing to his real bosses, we have a problem and it needs to be fixed.

Hotels always asked for passports when a tourist checks in. So long as they don't pass it along to the government, I see no problem with that. People do this voluntarily, if they don't want to do it, they can stay with friends. But when the government is doing it, that is a whole different story.

[jberryhill]

51. At least one to three months a year, yes

And it is clear that you have utterly no idea what is the level of general surveillance in most EU countries.

Is it possible for you to hold a conversation without it devolving into a discussion about the person with whom you are holding it?

[sabrina 1]

52. It's obvious you have no idea what you are talking about. I have family in Europe and they are

horrified by the level of surveillance Americans are subjected to. They have nothing like what is going on here, not to say our 'allies' in their governments aren't trying.

Put it this way, most Europeans I know will not travel here anymore, because of the Bush Spy Programs, the Rapiscans (banned by the EU because of privacy issues, and now after all the insistence that we needed them to be safe, are suddenly gone here too), the disrespect and blanked suspicion of everyone. That does NOT exist in Europe. Yet. Hopefully the people there will not sit back and accept it as fearfully as we have.

[Spider Jerusalem]

49. And?

"you don't just move somewhere without registering your residence with the national government"...and you don't in the US? With the state government, mostly, driving licence, vehicle registration data, and so on, but it's the same principle. European countries are mostly not federal entities, so these things are more centralised. And you'd do it in the US as well if you had single-payer healthcare provided by the government and had to register with a new GP when you moved. These things are pretty basic and the fact that you don't do them in the States says more about the delegation of function to the states and the paucity of services provided by the federal government than anything, honestly. (And the government doesn't run the national phone company in most places; telecommunications have been privatised in the UK, France, Greece, etc.)

[BenzoDia]

38. Yep, if one thinks that telephone data can tell a lot about you, imagine what surveillance cameras

reveal.

[Le Taz Hot]

33. I hope the German people

will get out and protest while he's there. People need to protest him wherever he goes, foreign or domestic.

[Puzzledtraveller]

35. "We didn't like Germany anyway.."

right?

[EC]

39. Do they really believe that their country

isn't doing the same?

[Bluenorthwest]

43. Can you support your assertion that they are doing the same?

No of course you can't.

[EC]

56. Snowden already said the Brits were

doing the same. And I guess you can support the assertion that they don't?

[liberal_at_heart]

40. between drones and the spying we have destroyed our reputation around the world.

[mountain grammy]

47. I think Bush/Cheney did that for us a while back, so not much reputation left to destroy.

[liberal_at_heart]

48. but the world was really hoping Obama would restore it. He hasn't.

[mountain grammy]

50. That's what the right wing propaganda keeps hammering us with..

guess that's where you're getting your information. For sure, the latest "news" is damaging, but, for the most part, it's inaccurate for a blanket "he hasn't" in regard to restoring our reputation in the eyes of the world.

http://www.pewglobal.org/2010/03/05/reviving-americas-global-image/

http://www.hindustantimes.com/world-news/Americas/Obama-has-restored-America-s-reputation-in-the-world-Kerry/Article1-1006327.aspx

http://www.cbsnews.com/2100-500185_162-6848814.html

[liberal_at_heart]

54. yeah, great sources.

[mountain grammy]

57. And yours are?

[liberal_at_heart]

62. here's one.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-21389200

Here is a pew poll that says that while the world is happier with Obama than Bush, Obama's numbers have gone done a lot because of his international policies, and this poll is from 2013 not 2010 like the one you supplied.

http://www.pewglobal.org/2012/06/13/global-opinion-of-obama-slips-international-policies-faulted/

[mountain grammy]

63. Yes, his numbers are slipping and yes, drone strikes and the NSA issue

have hurt. But that said, I am specifically objecting to your blanket statement "he hasn't."
I am not and have never been an Obama apologist, but he's NOT goddam Bush and he HAS improved our standing in the world.
I really feel we have to be realistic about this and not make sweeping observations; that's the job of the right wing.

[Monkie]

55. well kerry and piers morgan saying so does not make it so

and did you actually look at that table on the pew website, in 2007 16% of argentinians viewed the US favourably, so yes, up to 2010 obama did improve the image of the US abroad, but it was rock bottom to start with, and obama's love of droning and spying was not that well known then.

and at least in the UK piers morgan has about as much credibility as, well, to be honest he has none.

[LittleBlue]

59. Great article. "Soft totalitarianism" is the perfect description. nt

[nadinbrzezinski]

61. I call it dictablanda

A soft dictartorship.

I grew up in one.