Obama gets called out by Merkel

[blueboss]

How is the White House (Obama) getting away with this? Plus they're not very good at it because they keep getting caught.

http://worldnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/10/23/21100534-german-leader-calls-obama-to-discuss-reported-nsa-monitoring-of-her-cell-phone?lite&ocid=msnhp&pos=2

[Doc]

Sorry but I don't have a lot of sympathy for a foreign government that can't provide secure phones for their Chancellor. Granted, nothing that makes this administration look bad bothers me but I find it pretty funny that the Germans would complain about phone tapping. What, can't they figure out how to encrypt? How about the new "enigma phone"?

[CitizenBBN]

I like how he said they are not and will not spy on her, glaringly leaving out "have not".

Part of it is funny, like Germany and other nations don't spy on the US. They spy on us, we do on them, all part of the game. That's not a defense of what we're doing, but I am more concerned about NSA tracking Joe Shhmo in Nebraska b/c he's a US citizen protected by the Constitution, the German head of state isn't. We may not want to spy on her b/c of the obvious political fallout from spying on a close ally, but "political disaster" is still not as bad as stripping people of their Constitutional rights. Of course this administration has the high honor of managing to do both, apparently on a massive and alarming scale.

Obama's doing a whale of a job. For a man starting off wanting to be friends with everyone regardless of cost to our influence and stature he's managed to piss off about every other nation on earth, friend or foe.

[Doc]

On Sunday, the German magazine Der Spiegel

isnt that the magazine of "sprockets"?


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QHZR9SA5pOg

[CitizenBBN]

How about the new "enigma phone"?

I think you just answered your own question. :) The Germans are good at many things, encryption may not be one of them. lol.

[blueboss]

I agree about the US doing it's due diligence, and he has no business violating US citizens constitutional rights, but numb nuts sure has a knack for ticking off the people that are on our side, and at the very least please try to be more discreet in your intelligence gathering from the heads of states from other countries, we look like idiots.

Oh yeah, KEEP YOUR DAMN FEET OFF OF OUR FURNITURE!!!

[Doc]

I think you just answered your own question. :) The Germans are good at many things, encryption may not be one of them. lol.

Actually Iphone has an enigma machine app! :sCo_huhsign:

link (https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/mininigma-enigma-machine-simulator/id334855344?mt=8)

http://cdn1.appato.com/carl-davis/my-enigma-enigma-machine-simulator/screenshot/0

[CitizenBBN]

It wasn't made by a company from Bletchley Park perchance?

[jazyd]

Part funny, part pissed. I can only imagine if that had been Bush that got caufgt

[suncat05]

I think you just answered your own question. :) The Germans are good at many things, encryption may not be one of them. lol.

They are however, very good at making warplanes, tanks, and assorted rifles & handguns. As well as schnitzels, sausages, and various beers.

[suncat05]

Oh, let's not forget the breads, pastries and chocolates too!

[UKHistory]

And women. Very attractive women. No nation should have permanent enemies or allies. In Britain and the other UK (see what I did there) we have as close to a permanent ally we would want to have.

Israel because of the pro Israeli lobby is an ally we are stuck with. And yeah give me an alternative fuel source and I would drop Israel and the Arabs in a heartbeat.

The Promised Land is Miami Beach and Cuba. I personally think that Israel should leave their country and take Cuba for themsevles. Build a big bridge from Miami and call it a day.

The biggest issue is that the Patriot Act and the War on Terror has allowed the NSA and other agencies to turn America into a police state. The latest round started under W and has carried on under Obama. I think it would carry on under just about anyone elected president.

Protecting the rights of American citizens is the issue--not listening to what the German Chancelor is doing for dinner. I don't care about the Germans. Have at it NSA. With that said, the individual rights of Americans have been declining (with excpetion to the Civil Rights Act of 1964) since Woodrow Wilson. No question the FBI under J Edgar Hoover did its best to limit the freedom of Americans.

How Hoover would love today's world of smart phones and cameras and the internet. We are spying on ourselves.

That is where we should be most concerned. It is embarrassing but true that allies spy on one another. Information is power and all countries have an obligation to be as powerful as they can be which means varifying what other countries know and are telling one another.

It just seems that Barry's people kind of trip on themselves a little.

[suncat05]

Most German women are, for the most part, fairly pleasing to the eye. But there were two things that I just couldn't get past while I was stationed there in the Army........1)most of them have no idea what a razor is or what it is for, and 2)their aversion to soap & water more than once every five days or so is rather, shall we say, NASTY? Sorry, but I ain't dating any woman that uses perfume in lieu of hot water & soap for her personal hygiene. Aside from that, and the bitter cold and constant rain/snow, Germany wasn't too bad.

[dan_bgblue]

Most German women are, for the most part, fairly pleasing to the eye. But there were two things that I just couldn't get past while I was stationed there in the Army........1)most of them have no idea what a razor is or what it is for, and 2)their aversion to soap & water more than once every five days or so is rather, shall we say, NASTY? Sorry, but I ain't dating any woman that uses perfume in lieu of hot water & soap for her personal hygiene. Aside from that, and the bitter cold and constant rain/snow, Germany wasn't too bad.

They learned about hygiene in France

[suncat05]

Yeah, those French girls were gorgeous when I visited France, but my God, you could smell them way before you could see them. But the one thing that got to me about France was just the sheer arrogance of the French people. Everyone I met that was French acted like they were the only people in the room.
Germany was okay, France I could've done without, Italy & Sicily were wonderful, Greece & Israel were fun, England was nice but too cold and wet, unfortunately I never got a chance to go to Spain or Switzerland or Portugal.

[blueboss]

Okay, hot, smelly, hairy women aside, these folks are pi##ed. David Gregory said it best yesterday when he said secretive spying has been going on for ever but the key word is "secretive" and this hasn't been a secret. Obama now has Snowden to blame for all of his bonehead moves on this one.

[suncat05]

I just have to wonder that if the Obama administration wasn't so incompetent in the first place, would we have ever had the Snowden situation come to be?

[blueboss]

Probably not, I heard this morning that "now" since Obama knows about the botched spying, he's going to demand that the NSA cease spying on our allies head's of state. Yeah, like it's the first he's heard of it...why is he our president/ I'm embarassed

[UKHistory]

With the claims that Barry didn't know anything about the NSA spying we have two options:

1) The President is lying and our technology is allowing us to increase our intel on others in an easier way; but it is more embarrassing if we are caught.

2) The President didn't know the extent of the NSA's spying and we have an commander in chief that is incompetent and unaware of what a shadow government of unelected officials is doing to citizens and foreigners alike.

Neither scenario makes me feel better.

I am glad we know what Snowden has shown us. But low level contractor should not have this kind of access to what our country's intelligent services are doing. Looking to contract out federal work is showing there is a real negative side to cost saving.

More importantly though American citizens are seeing just what our government has been working towards since J Edgar Hoover came to power.

Information is power and the more the government knows about us and can track the less freedom we have.

[CitizenBBN]

With the claims that Barry didn't know anything about the NSA spying we have two options:

1) The President is lying and our technology is allowing us to increase our intel on others in an easier way; but it is more embarrassing if we are caught.

2) The President didn't know the extent of the NSA's spying and we have an commander in chief that is incompetent and unaware of what a shadow government of unelected officials is doing to citizens and foreigners alike.

Neither scenario makes me feel better.

I am glad we know what Snowden has shown us. But low level contractor should not have this kind of access to what our country's intelligent services are doing. Looking to contract out federal work is showing there is a real negative side to cost saving.

More importantly though American citizens are seeing just what our government has been working towards since J Edgar Hoover came to power.

Information is power and the more the government knows about us and can track the less freedom we have.

Agree with every word History. Some time Obama needs to explain to me how it should make me feel better about him, his Administration or my government that we are spying on our allied leaders and he had no clue.

I also am glad, on the whole, for Snowden b/c it brings to fact what we've suspected all along about our government's level of spying and information gathering on everyone and everything, but it also makes it obvious just how incompetent even those entities are being managed and how cavalierly that information is being treated that a relatively low level guy can get his hands on documented proof of apparently dozens of US intelligence operations.

Of course we all know he knew, and has known, and his immediate staff have known about all of these operations. Like any good believer that the government should be at the center of the universe he has no problem using every means at his disposal to advance it's growth. There's a reason he's simultaneously conducting raids on journalists to seal up the leaks and make sure everyone keeps their mouths shut. You don't have to do that if there aren't any secrets to keep about what the government is doing.