(Additional reporting by Andreas Rinke; Editing by Mark Trevelyan)
Posted on 06/11/2013 5:00:28 PM PDT by SunkenCiv
German outrage over a U.S. Internet spying program has broken out ahead of a visit by Barack Obama, with ministers demanding the president provide a full explanation when he lands in Berlin next week and one official likening the tactics to those of the East German Stasi.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel's spokesman has said she will raise the issue with Obama in talks next Wednesday, potentially casting a cloud over a visit that was designed to celebrate U.S.-German ties on the 50th anniversary John F. Kennedy's famous "Ich bin ein Berliner" speech...
In a guest editorial for Spiegel Online on Tuesday, Justice Minister Sabine Leutheusser-Schnarrenberger said reports that the United States could access and track virtually all forms of Internet communication were "deeply disconcerting" and potentially dangerous...
Markus Ferber, a member of Merkel's Bavarian sister party who sits in the European Parliament, went further, accusing Washington of using "American-style Stasi methods".
"I thought this era had ended when the DDR fell," he said, using the German initials for the failed German Democratic Republic.
Opposition parties have jumped on the issue, keen to put a dampener on the Merkel-Obama talks and prevent them from boosting the chancellor as she gears up for a September parliamentary election in which she is seeking a third term.
"This looks to me like it could become one of the biggest data privacy scandals ever," Greens leader Renate Kuenast told Reuters.
(Excerpt) Read more at reuters.com ...
(Additional reporting by Andreas Rinke; Editing by Mark Trevelyan)
Gannett, so linking only:
ACLU sues Obama administration over NSA surveillance
http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2013/06/11/obama-aclu-lawsuit-national-security-agency-surveillance/2412885/
Gettin' close.
Yep.
Is Germany perhaps one of the few adults left on the world stage?
Well since Germany is looking back to Nazism with its tagging of Israeli produced goods maybe they should just get together and compare notes.
They should have gone whole-hog and compared it to the Gestapo or Schutzstaffel. Otherwise, they’re right.
ACLU Sues Over NSA Phone Records Program
Associated Press/ABC News | June 11. 2013 | AP
Posted on 06/11/2013 1:49:48 PM PDT by Do Not Make Fun Of His Ears
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/3030072/posts
The STASI were community organizers too.
I don’t agree with German public opinion much, but they’re right this time.
In case you haven’t seen it, watch “The Lives of Others”: http://tinyurl.com/2qcja3
I guess it’s Ok! for the NSA to listen to phone calls that originate in Germany or the UK that route through the USA, or scoop up the internet foot print of UK citizens, save it in a data base and then give it to the UK’s MI6. No warrant needed says the UK we didn’t gather this info our friend at the NSA gave it to us. So what if this becomes untenable at NSA to continue, they can just give all the technology to the Brit’s and say hey you spy on the American people for us, it not illegal for you to do it, there’s no pesky constitution restricting you form spying on Americans, then had it over to your friends at the NSA.
It has become a small world!!!!!
This is ironic, since Germany’s domestic spying agency, the Bundesamt für Verfassungsschutz, is very active — or supposed to be very active — because extremists of the right and left are more numerous and prominent in public life in Germany (feel free to put “ironic quotation marks” around any of those words, if you like).
Thanks!
Obama has been practicing his “Ich bin ein Hosenscheisser!” speech.
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