Of course, every country in the world should be suspending contracts with the US over NSA spying, torture, unjustified wars, going against the UN, etc. etc.
That is a bit like saying Mexico is as heavily armed as the US. No. They're not. They're not even close to having a proportionally large military. Most other nations have no trans-ocean logistics. No blue-water navy. No fighter jets. No heavy bombers. No main battle tanks.
You seem to be ignoring China, Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the UK and several other powerful nations in your assertion that the US is the only credible power player on the world stage. The biggest, perhaps, but certainly not the only one - and not the only one taking advantage of American military and intelligence assets because they find it in their own political interests to do so.
You realize that all nations you listed but China are pretty much "one and the same" as the US when it comes to NSA spying? You only underlined how disproportionally powerful that intelligence alliance is.
The NSA only kinda cares about US law when operating against US citizens inside US borders. Outside of this, the gloves are fully off and from what we've seen, pretty much everything goes. Billions of people outside of the US live in a much higher resolution panopticon than those living in it.
Speaking in general, the "big deal" of criminal/immoral behavior is in the extent of it, and in the borders it crosses, specifically referring to acts that everyone does.
Everyone does (at least) minor law breakages during life, but that doesn't mean that if somebody, say, evades taxes for millions of dollars is not a big deal just because everybody does that for a few hundred bucks.
Some activies, for example torture and mass surveillance, are definitely crossing moral borders - at the very least, the way have been applied (and this is quite a generous statement).
I think his point is when YOU are waterboarding people, why would you even bother breaking ties with other countries that also waterboard people? Aside from as part of an elaborate ploy to pretend you don't?
Oh I get his point quite clearly, and was responding with what I thought were appropriate levels of irony. Apparently HN is running in literal mode today.
Sadly enough, booting out democratically elected leaders in other countries just counts as business as usual. (The USSR played the same game, back when it existed and had the clout for that.)
They're absolutely comparable. If anything at least Russia is being upfront about its imperial ambitions by using its own military. US just outsources its imperial projects (mostly, though Iraq, Afghanistan are counterexamples) by fomenting political disruption or destroying economies until demands are met.
Same ends, different means. One's just more covert.
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Of course, every country in the world should be suspending contracts with the US over NSA spying, torture, unjustified wars, going against the UN, etc. etc.
To some extent it is already happening: http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/12/20/us-boeing-brazil-i...
Absolutely. It would only be fitting given that the rest of the world stopped engaging in any such activities ages ago.
That is a bit like saying Mexico is as heavily armed as the US. No. They're not. They're not even close to having a proportionally large military. Most other nations have no trans-ocean logistics. No blue-water navy. No fighter jets. No heavy bombers. No main battle tanks.
So what gives you the idea they have an NSA?
You seem to be ignoring China, Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the UK and several other powerful nations in your assertion that the US is the only credible power player on the world stage. The biggest, perhaps, but certainly not the only one - and not the only one taking advantage of American military and intelligence assets because they find it in their own political interests to do so.
You realize that all nations you listed but China are pretty much "one and the same" as the US when it comes to NSA spying? You only underlined how disproportionally powerful that intelligence alliance is.
Yes - that was my point, that a moral line between the "rest of the world" and the US can't be clearly drawn.
What is not clear about five eyes? Then you have China, maybe Russia. That's it. That leaves "rest of the world". Seems like pretty clear lines to me.
There are ~195 sovereign nations on the planet. Billions of people don't live in a US-style panopticon.
The NSA only kinda cares about US law when operating against US citizens inside US borders. Outside of this, the gloves are fully off and from what we've seen, pretty much everything goes. Billions of people outside of the US live in a much higher resolution panopticon than those living in it.
I don't see what the big deal is, everyone's doing it.
Speaking in general, the "big deal" of criminal/immoral behavior is in the extent of it, and in the borders it crosses, specifically referring to acts that everyone does.
Everyone does (at least) minor law breakages during life, but that doesn't mean that if somebody, say, evades taxes for millions of dollars is not a big deal just because everybody does that for a few hundred bucks.
Some activies, for example torture and mass surveillance, are definitely crossing moral borders - at the very least, the way have been applied (and this is quite a generous statement).
I think his point is when YOU are waterboarding people, why would you even bother breaking ties with other countries that also waterboard people? Aside from as part of an elaborate ploy to pretend you don't?
Oh I get his point quite clearly, and was responding with what I thought were appropriate levels of irony. Apparently HN is running in literal mode today.
You missed an "A". It's a common mistake. NSA does the spying, NASA explores space.
It'd be a shame if someone accidentally boycotted the wrong one.
Hasn't NASA been flying the spy satellites and top secret spaceplanes up into orbit to begin with, though?
We didn't annex a sovereign nation.
Na, you just threw out democratically elected leaders, multiple times.
Sadly enough, booting out democratically elected leaders in other countries just counts as business as usual. (The USSR played the same game, back when it existed and had the clout for that.)
They're both bad, but they're not comparable.
They're absolutely comparable. If anything at least Russia is being upfront about its imperial ambitions by using its own military. US just outsources its imperial projects (mostly, though Iraq, Afghanistan are counterexamples) by fomenting political disruption or destroying economies until demands are met.
Same ends, different means. One's just more covert.
Ha! We didn't annex a sovereign nation, TODAY.
You didn't annex THAT sovereign nation...
What about Hawaii? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Hawaii#American_terr...
And Texas: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_Annexation
not in the traditional sense. the US is more subtle.