US Reneges On SWIFT Agreement 394
Windrip writes "It seems the US is not living up to its end of the bargain when it comes to the SWIFT data agreement. When the agreement was signed last year, every EU citizen was guaranteed the right to know if the American authorities had retrieved their banking information, and which authorities had requested the information. Now one European Parliamentarian, Alexander Alvaro says that, once again, the Americans are not honoring their treaties."
A real shame (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm not sure where to find a list of treaties that the United States has failed to honor (did a quick search and nothing obvious popped up), but it seems to me that as time goes on the Americans are losing more and more credibility on the world stage. The start of the real decline seemed to happen with the latest invasion of Iraq and really accelerated through the term of G.W. Bush. This is my perspective as a non-American living outside of the United States, but do the majority of people inside the U.S. realize how much they've lost on the world stage over the past decade?
In a way the decline reminds me of the local police - 30 or 40 years ago the local police were your friend - someone you could go to and talk to and who would be willing to help you out. These days it seems like you're best off staying as far away from the police as possible.
Does anyone else see things in a similar way?
Re:I'm an American... (Score:3, Interesting)
No worries, most people, I believe, understand that the US government does not represent all it's people. Those who do really need to get a clue. I'm European by the way.
But note also that I expect Americans to do something about their government, especially if they claim to be so embarrassed about it. Because either you fix the problem yourselves, or one day I will ask my government to take care of it (for example by not exporting items vital to your industry or by ceasing all police collaboration). It would be better for both of us that you take care of your own government rather than I dictate how your government should behave, but I can't endure your government's awful behavior forever.
I know it's hard for you guys to reclaim your government, I know your gov has become an entity of it's own, that the American people serve their government instead of the other way around. I know your votes don't count because no matter who you vote for, corporations will just bribe the elected people to swing their way. And with so many elected people in various positions of power it's difficult to have a government made mostly of good people.
But if you guys are motivated enough, you can do it. It's going to be tough, that's why you need motivation, but it's possible.
Protest TSA pat-downs by not flying; do not take the train when the government tells you the train is an alternative, instead respond "No, it's not comfortable enough. It's the plane or nothing". When your politicians can't buy whatever they want because business and industry are impaired due to nobody traveling anymore, they'll have to rethink TSA invasive searches.
I know half of Americans are happy about those TSA searches, but this is just an example of how you can change things provided you have the motivation and the willpower to fight long enough. Even if you don't have money and your vote is worth nothing, you can just use something else as leverage. Labor is strong leverage against the people at the top.
"Opt-out Day" was a joke because it was supposed to last only one day - it made those who participated feel like they were doing something, but they were actually not achieving anything. Had Opt-out Day lasted 1 month perhaps things would have changed.
Do you know why some politicians hate Anonymous' DoS attacks so much? Because they last longer than a day and have the potential to last forever. They really don't care about websites being down for a day or two, they can recover from that easily. Customers can't use the service? They'll come back in 3 days when it's working again, no loss at all. But what if the people doing those attacks suddenly decided to make them last 6 months? That's why they try to send these people to jail for as much as a few years when all they did was disrupt a website for 3 days. No matter how much you disapprove of those attacks, you can't deny the punishment far exceeds the crime.
It is possible for Americans to change their government. You have to do it, otherwise other nations will try and you won't like it (and neither will those other nations. I really want to emphasize that I would not take any joy in my country meddling in yours business).
Re:I'm an American... (Score:2, Interesting)
Most Europeans are left wing by US standards. So are most Asians. So is most of the rest of the world.
In any case the objections to Rand, the Tea Party, GWB, and Reagan are shared by most of the right wing outside the US.
Right wing is one thing, stupid right wing is another.
Re:I'm an American... (Score:4, Interesting)
Citation needed.
Hell, absolutely survival level of google-fu would get it for you. Here's anyway [wikipedia.org]. For the "live up to her own values" - read the "Later years" [wikipedia.org] section. For the " more stringent the values that they espouse" start reading from the beginning of the article.
(BTW: don't you dare whining TL;DR, it is not a meme I'd expect from a person at your age).
Re:I'm an American... (Score:4, Interesting)
Here we go: http://atheism.about.com/b/2011/02/06/ayn-rand-welfare-queen-living-high-on-government-assistance.htm [about.com]
Re:Big surprise (Score:4, Interesting)
Gullible? Perhaps that is what you would call it; personally I think it is about being friends - friends don't ask for guarantees cast in iron, they trust each other. We in Europe have tended to see America as friends at least sine WWII.
"Gullible" implies that we should have known better; that America is not a friend, but at best a predator with a false smile, and at worst an enemy. Is that really the case?
Re:I'm an American... (Score:4, Interesting)
You might be mistaken re. westerners. I feel that in Europe, in various countries (at least Switzerland, Germany, the Netherlands) in the past few years the young generation has switched from viewing the US as an ally into viewing it as a threat to the world, potentially even an enemy.
Of course, the US can do what it wants, it is sovereign. But so are we. Don't expect us to take US bribes and threats any longer in the future in order to cooperate with US policies (waging wars, following insane narcotics/drug policies, intellectual property laws).
It is the old generation that is still in power, that (in part) is still following the US dictate. In a few years, this will be over.
And I'm not alone in hoping for an economic downfall into poverty of the US. It may hit us too, but at least the money-bribe-saction bully that the US often is will loose its power.