New Zealand Government About To Legalize Spying On NZ Citizens 216
Flere Imsaho writes "After admitting they have illegally spied on NZ citizens or residents 88 times (PDF) since 2003, the government, in a stunning example of arse covering, is about to grant the GCSB the right to intercept the communications of New Zealanders in its role as the national cyber security agency, rather than examine the role the GCSB should play and then look at the laws. There has been strong criticism from many avenues. The bill is being opposed by Labor and the Greens, but it looks like National now have the numbers to get this passed. Of course, the front page story is all about the royal baby, with this huge erosion of privacy relegated to a small article near the bottom of the front page. Three cheers, the monarchy is secure, never mind the rights of the people. More bread and circuses anyone?"
Is Sauron in the gov there? (Score:5, Funny)
--A concerned Hobbit.
New Zealand is always in the forefront (Score:3, Funny)
From time immemorial nation-states have always been spying on their own citizens.
New Zealand, being one of the most progressive nations on Earth, is again taking the lead in making this ancient practice LEGAL.
As this has come to pass, wonder what New Zealand will do next ...
Re:New Zealand is always in the forefront (Score:5, Insightful)
I think you spoke too soon (Score:4, Informative)
At the very least they already collect the metadata for all postage communications.
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/04/us/monitoring-of-snail-mail.html?pagewanted=all&_r=1& [nytimes.com]
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Sauron is the gov everywhere now. Where have you been?
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It seems we've had Sauron in charge for some time now. He looks different, Old white dude, Hick white dude, Goofy white dude and Smooth black dude. Different looks, same old Sauron. The all seeing eye.
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Sorry, those are just the front men.
Re:Is Sauron in the gov there? (Score:4, Funny)
"Is Sauron in the gov there?"
Sauron has been the US president for some time. "One Spy-Ring to rule them all", etc, etc.
I think John Key is better compared with Gríma Wormtongue. Which would make David Cameron Saruman.
Still illegal under NZ Constitution (Score:5, Insightful)
But, hey, that doesn't stop the UK, Canada, Britain, or Germany from doing the same thing in violation of their Constitutions, either.
Re:Still illegal under NZ Constitution (Score:4, Informative)
sad news for you, the UK does not have a constitution; anything that Parliament makes law goes
Re:Still illegal under NZ Constitution (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Still illegal under NZ Constitution (Score:5, Informative)
No, no, no - the Queen has her morning constitution pretty regulalry, then wipes with Royal constitution paper!
The Constitution of the United Kingdom is the set of laws and principles under which the United Kingdom is governed.[1]
Unlike many other nations, the UK has no single constitutional document. This is sometimes expressed by stating that it has an uncodified or "unwritten" constitution.
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I'm fairly certain the Barons would disagree with you, as they did at Hastings, sir.
But, technically, it is a series of documents, and then there is the EU constitution, which itself is more of a treaty, somewhat like how Canada had the BNA (British North American Act, in the British Parliament) until 1967.
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...until 1982
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You still have the right to breath. I think there's a tax coming for that though.
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Yeah, and the US government has violated the US constitution many times, and continues to do so; governments seem to derive pleasure from doing that sort of thing.
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The US Constitution has always been and will continue to be a work in process. The original writers had no conception of how much life would change through time due to technological progression. Computer technology alone would look like magic to someone living in 1776. Collecting data is not in itself a violation of constitutional rights. It's how the data is used against the citizenry that counts and the harm caused by the use of such data. Electronic surveillance is not limited to just the government and
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A work in progress? So in other words, they can do whatever they want; that's a nice way of thinking, and it benefits them, too!
Computer technology alone would look like magic to someone living in 1776.
Irrelevant.
Collecting data is not in itself a violation of constitutional rights.
No, it's not, and no one said so. The way they're doing it and how they're doing it, however, does violate the constitution.
Electronic surveillance is not limited to just the government and right now private companies and determined criminals represent more of a danger than the government.
That's completely irrelevant, even if true (Which I doubt, because the chances of an individual getting killed by a terrorist are minuscule, and almost everything else is petty compared to what the government is able to do. Even if that weren't so,
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Society is always changing. Sometimes in a good way and sometimes in a bad way. Laws and acceptable behavioral standards also change with the society and the laws and rules that govern the society need to be reviewed and updated to keep pace.
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Society is always changing. Sometimes in a good way and sometimes in a bad way.
I had no idea. Really.
Laws and acceptable behavioral standards also change with the society and the laws and rules that govern the society need to be reviewed and updated to keep pace.
But it becomes a problem for me when the government blatantly violates the constitution, as it is now.
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Next time I will use simpler words to aid in your comprehension. And exactly what way is the government violating the constitution? I don't recall seeing any of the government programs being declared illegal in a judicial proceeding. In the future it may happen but someone will have initiate a court case to enable an in depth judicial review. Or is something unconstitutional just because you say so? Laws are made and passed by the executive and legislative branches which may be vetted by legal experts prio
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He's probably quoting the Traitor in Chief when he mentioned how he thought the Constitution was outdated and such.
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You are using slavery as your example? Are you a refuge from a special ed class or what? That was resolved a long time ago, don't you have something to go color with crayons?
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Of course you can't fight them straight up, it's the most advanced police state and military in the world. Of course discussing revolutionary tactics will most likely get you a free trip to a more temperate climate for a contest of how well you can breath with a towel over your face and water being poured on it.
Re:Still illegal under NZ Constitution (Score:4, Interesting)
What NZ Constitution are you talking about?
Re:Still illegal under NZ Constitution (Score:4, Informative)
New Zealand has constitutional documents (The Treaty of Waitangi, The New Zealand Bill Of Rights Act etc) just not a single Constitution because we copied England's system.
HAVING a constitution would be a good idea, then we could entrench things like protection from being spied on, environmental protection (including not mining conservation land) etc... Although we'd probably need to do something to stop the people like the current government from editing it under """urgency""".
Warning: off topic. (Score:3)
NZ Maori got some cell phone spectrum for a bargain price from the Treaty. They made a network provider called 2degrees using this discounted spectrum, which is now more foreign owned than Telecom.
Re:Still illegal under NZ Constitution (Score:4, Insightful)
"But, hey, that doesn't stop the UK, Canada, Britain, or Germany from doing the same thing in violation of their Constitutions, either."
Why are you excluding the United States? The US government has been doing its own astounding circumventions of our Constitution as well.
Take just for one very relevant example: the illegal, retroactive immunity granted telcos for illegally allowing the government to listen in on your communications.
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"No bill of attainder or ex post facto Law shall be passed." -- U.S. Constitution, Article 1, Sec. 9.
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I think they were just sticking to first-world countries. It would take too long to include every petty third-world dictatorship in that list.
Re:Still illegal under NZ Constitution (Score:4, Insightful)
Their constitutions/laws generally have fewer restrictions than US laws, and NSA-like spying has been commonplace in Europe.
http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/how_they_do_it/2006/02/wiretapping_europeanstyle.html [slate.com]
The outrage in the US is over the fact that the NSA and the president are trying to get around the letter and intent of the Constitution and the law. In many other countries, it's more a policy issue, not a question of legality.
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Yes, warrentless wiretapping is a problem. (I'll not talk about Britain here)
But spot the difference between allowing police to track specific phones for investigations and the NSA recording all communications for everyone, forever.
The police can be held accountable. There is a paper trail of who accessed what and how often. These stats are made available. That's the difference.
Yes, the Data Retention Directive is problematic, and we should push to limit the storage time limit to 2 weeks. The fight against
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Oh, there's indeed a big difference.
The US situation used to be that the only way to wiretap US citizens in the US was with a specific court order; the NSA and CIA were not permitted to do it. That was based on Constitutional protections. The uproar is over the NSA violating this.
European nations never had such protections in the first place. Many nationa
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Re:Still illegal under NZ Constitution (Score:5, Funny)
Or the US.
Well, yes, but we're insane, so we don't count.
Re:Still illegal under NZ Constitution (Score:5, Interesting)
Someday we'll realize all these divisions and patriotism only help to keep us occupied and divided instead of trying to find a way to avoid the corruption of those with power/money.
We're all humans after all, no matter what religion, ideology or place of birth.
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Someday we'll realize all these divisions and patriotism only help to keep us occupied and divided
You can pry the Designated Hitter rule out of my cold dead hands.
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Blasphemer!!!
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That's the problem. We're all human. Insane by birth.
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Ashamed (Score:5, Interesting)
I've been a Kiwi all my life and have had some bad moments, and some moments when I'm damn proud to be one.
This however, is the first time I'm outright ashamed.
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I've been a Kiwi for about 18 months (do you get to adopt the nomenclature? Alright NZ citizen). You take the ups with the downs, we just legalised gay marriage, an up in my opinion. This is a down. I don't think many here care about this issue. On the up side though I think most people view our security service as somewhat inept blunders.
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>On the up side though I think most people view our security service as somewhat inept blunders.
How exactly is that an up side? I just means you get easily abusable invasive surveillance, without much realistic chance that anything beneficial will come of it.
Dialog (Score:3)
NZ - I don't like this
US - sorry
NZ - won't
US - but you must
NZ - get stuffed
US - ok but don't call us when China comes to your door
NZ - oh all right
Re:Dialog (Score:4, Insightful)
NZ is not worried about China. China is a better neighbor to us here in NZ than the USA. NZ does far more trade with China than the USA. Kiwi's general opinion of China & the Chinese is higher than the general opinion of USA & Americans. For obvious reasons, I might add.
Re:Dialog (Score:4, Interesting)
China is a better neighbor to us here in NZ than the USA
For the Kiwis, it's not "US or China," it's "US or Fiji" or even "US or France." Most of the South Pacific (i.e. New Zealand's neighborhood) isn't a very fun place to live, and the folks in Wellington would like to keep that from happening to their own (surprisingly expansive [wikipedia.org]) corner of it.
The Chinese really don't care who's in power in any particular non-Sinosphere country (if anybody) so long as they have buyers. In contrast, the US (and Australia and France and...) has actual people and territory at stake in the region and have a vested interest in things like local coups, fishing rights, pollution, high-seas piracy, etc.
In that respect, the US government has been relatively consistent (for better or for worse) and has helped to establish order (for better or for worse) in the region. In that respect, the US is at least a known evil, and isn't the one currently trying to "test" nuclear weapons in American Samoa.
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How has the US helped establish order since helping to win WWII ?
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How has the US helped establish order since helping to win WWII ?
You seem to be assuming that "establishing order" is limited to actively killing people and breaking things. Try thinking less "Pentagon" and more "Foggy Bottom."
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Interesting that Murder basically went unpunished even though it was openly admitted to. Bizarre. Blowing up a ship in a foreign harbor used to be considered an act of war.
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The US does not pressure, it allows better trade deals and more international standing if you are "good".
The NZ SAS also get to play with quality toys and generations of NZ spies felt happy that no Soviet agent was safe in NZ.
Re: The "blame the US for everything bad that happens" - Moscow and Washington have swapped out so many govs and protected a lot of bad groups over so many years.
The NSA "news" has been around since the 1970
Re:Dialog (Score:4, Informative)
This has already happened, except it ended up differently from how you envision it. Specifically:
NZ - I don't like this [wikipedia.org]
FR - fuck off [wikipedia.org]
US - sorry, but we need the passage rights anyway
NZ - you guys are both dicks, go away [wikipedia.org]
US - but you must!
NZ - get stuffed [wikipedia.org]
US - ok but don't call us when China comes to your door
NZ - zomg we're so scared [wikipedia.org]
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NZ - I don't like this
US - sorry
NZ - won't
US - but you must
NZ - get stuffed
US - ok but don't call us when China comes to your door
NZ - oh all right
Erm, UnZud tore up the ANZUS treaty years ago (ANZUS = Australia, New Zealand, United States mutual defence pact). They haven't relied on US military support in decades.
Really it's just the AnUS treaty now.
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Then what's this about?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Zealand%E2%80%93United_States_relations#Washington_Declaration [wikipedia.org]
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I assume by "They can just buy New Zealand" you really mean "They are currently buying New Zealand".
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That shouldn't cost much.
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Who will in turn outsource their own spying back.
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Somebody has to listen in to all those boring phone calls.
Apologies (Score:5, Insightful)
As a New Zealand Citizen I would like to offer my deep heartfelt apologies to every other country of the world for expanding the powers of our secret police and destroying and semblance of privacy in New Zealand. I offer these apologies as this is not who we are as a society. Our Government is not representing the will of it's citizens, as was indicated in a recent poll which indicated that a vast majority of New Zealanders did not support the legislation. It is legislation being put in place to wipe out the balance of power; to enable tyranny in our country. They cannot permit people to stand up to them as Kim Dotcom did. This is not the example I want to make to the world. We pride ourselves on our integrity and independence. This legislation is submission to power, it is a disgrace and a treason against the national interest.
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We have become a country for the rich and by the rich, subject to foriegn powers. Our property is being sold out from underneath us, our laws have become mutable. There is little responsibilty in government, and even less in the corporate sector [nzherald.co.nz].
Well, seriously, you New Zealanders did vote for this (like every other country facing this same shit). Face the music or change it at the next election. Of course sheeple will just continue to vote for whoever the rich tell us to vote for (via their mass media channels).
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You can literally throw out your current government, if you wish.
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Bread and circus (Score:5, Insightful)
The real bread and circus is not the royal baby, it is the war.. the "war on terror". George Orwell was a genius in predicting that a perpetual war would be the excuse to bring in the police state. Even 10 years ago, I thought Orwell's idea of the perpetual war was a bit fantastic. Now it is so on the money, it is scarily prescient.
Not so much prescient... (Score:3)
...as self-fulfilling prophecy. The trouble is that the leaders of the world read books like 1984 and Brave New World and see them as instruction manuals rather than warnings.
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I love.....Big Brother!
Worlds best practice surveillance (Score:2)
Make sure your elected officials get a hold of the Administration 12 Stasi operations manual. No sense re-inventing the wheel.
Fighting back (Score:2)
New Zealand seems as good a place as any to make a stand. The unhalted expansion of the surveillance state reminds me of a malignant tumor: if left untreated it will consume the entire host.
Is there a foundation where donations can be sent to accomplish one of the following goals:
* Raise awareness of the situation among the NZ populace with a no-holds-barred propaganda campaign
* Shame the politicians involved
* Fund the relevant opposition parties
Let NZ be the high water mark.
"Circuses", eh? (Score:2)
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Complaining about the potential abuse of a government's surveillance power is all well and good, but their actual results may well be quite good — they just wouldn't tell us so as not tell the ene
Re:jesus H christ. (Score:5, Insightful)
I think I am going to be violently ill.
It isn't "potential abuse of power", when it is being reported AFTER THE FACT!
Giving those people MORE power to abuse, after they have already demonstrated that they cannot be trusted with the powers they have already obtained, is beyond incomprehensible!
Seriously, all NZ has to do is point a few of those major headlines out, and say "No thank you USA. We would be happy to assist you, LEGALLY, in any LEGAL investigation you may have, but the requests you send us must obey OUR soveriegn rights and laws. Since you seem to have a hard time following even your own laws, we can't really honor your requests for additional intelligence at this time, since the requests you keep sending us are clearly illegal and unconsionable."
But NO! The line of the day? Handwringing, squirming in their chairs like they have super 'roids, sweating, and heatedly whispering among themselves asking each other how they can break the law!
WTF!
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It does not matter, when it is reported. What makes it a potential abuse of power is that — unlike, for example, the IRS' power to grant or deny tax-exempt status [dailycaller.com], or the Labor Department's power to conduct audits [drudge.com] — it has not been abused yet.
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That actual prevention worked well at the Boston Marathon, didn't it? I was dumb founded at the government's efficiency on that one!
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So, what were you trying to say, again?
Re:jesus H christ. (Score:4)
"There is very little difference between NZ, Australia, Spain, or United States in the jihaddists' eyes"
Kind of like there's little difference between putting on a massive stage spectacular at the West End, Broadway, Vegas Strip, or the Aleutian Islands.
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I do not. I'm just pointing out, things aren't as clear-cut as some claim. For example, if there were fewer roadblocks between FBI and CIA communicating back in the day, the 9/11 attack could, very likely, have been prevented. And then we, likely, would've never seen the Patriot Act appear on the books — for just one example...
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The US is the 2000lb bull elephant in the room, and it's the one that prefers to do the stuffing.
That said, yeah, the smell of sycophancy is awful.
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2000lb is a pretty tiny bull elephant....
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Good point. Would need an extra zero to be properly monstrous.
There's probably some sort of unintentional irony in there somewhere.
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They can't deny US request publicly, when the whole Kim Dotcom thing brought it all out. We have the "Official Information Act" that brings these hidden things out to the media, who lodge OIA request constantly in the hopes of finding a scandal.
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You are misunderstanding:
What they do, is make a big show of "cracking down" on the "illegal activities exposed" by the dotcom case, but in reality, the institute their own secret courts, and spy on their own citizens stazi style.
That way when the NZ media goes fishing, they can rightfully deny the snooping done "for US interests", since it is for domestic interests!
NZ just oh so politely GIVES the information away for free! It doesn't have to, but chooses to do so anyway. If ever asked about the documents
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The Yanks, for instance, are currently bombing the hell out of natural Australian resources...
Uh, four inert bombs on a small section of the GBR is "bombing the hell out of your natural resources"? After listening to Aussie lesbians drone on and on about how horrible the US is at a party once in Tokyo its no surprise to me that some subjects of the common wealth tend to over-blow anything that has to do with the US. Especially when its bad, of course. I'm not saying the jettison was a great idea, but COME ON.
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That bomb drop thing was a case of "drop them somewhere or the plane will crash and explode when it lands".
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Two were concrete-filled dummy bombs, the other two had explosives but no detonator. But, this doesn't equate to "the US bombing the hell out of Australian natural resources". It's a joint military practice exercise where some inactive munitions were dumped in the greater area of the national park known as the "Great Barrier Reef". They're also likely to be recovered - the ones with explosives in, at the very least. Also, OP appears to be mostly crazy.
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Cut to shot of black helicopters...
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Only America was allowed to 'break away'
And now it's enslaved by corporations.
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What the fuck are you blabbering about? New Zealand is under the monarchy of Queen Elizabeth II.
Every member of the armed forces swear allegiance to the Queen, not the government or the citizens of New Zealand.
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laughably, NZ once 'banned' visits by vessels carrying nuclear weapons- a hilariously naive concept but one the powers-that-be were prepared to allow the population to think was true
And what US military ship has docked at NZ since? The US even claimed to go so far as to have no presence in NZ (so said an old newspaper article), despite a current US military base in Christchurch as a jumping off point for US Antarctic operations.
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Controlled how? With America's secret mind control rays? Get real.
NZ and Australia are cozy with the US for one simple reason: it's economically beneficial. If NZ or Australia would like to be "truly independent", they could choose to become like North Korea. But if they want to take advantage of the global economic and political system that exists
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Which is fine, because even most Americans admit the current US system seems to be doing a spectacular job of collapsing as well.
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Fortunately, it's not what people believe that matters, but what's actually happening.
And who is going to challenge the current system? And are you really so naive to think that voters would go for any change? Why should they?
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you are wrong.
US or not the US; each country WANTS to spy on its people.
the genie is out of the bottle and there's nothing that can be done (short of world wide revolution, which is pretty unlikely) to put it back.
don't blame any one country. this is about human nature and the concept that 'absolute power corrupts absolutely'.
if you think your country (name any one) isn't in posession or in want of this kind of spying power, you're sadly mistaken.
typical humans: they don't bother asking 'should we?' when a
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What's Israel got to do with it? Are they spying on New Zealand citizens too?
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Heh. Such a tiny place to have such a massive impact.
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Many of the European nations complaining bitterly about US spying have extensive domestic spying and surveillance programs themselves, and they keep large databases on their citizens. I don't know about the situation in Iceland, and Iceland is a nice place, but I'd not jump to conclusions over it.
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There is one amazing reason my most countries try and keep their foreign, military grade staff well away from any domestic crime operations.
Police talk to the press for fame or cash, police talk to criminals due to cash or blackmail or obscure links that where never uncovered.
Organised crime and embassies may not be able to blackmail or entrap clandestine agency staff but police servic
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