Right Wing WSJ Letter Writer Tries To Blame Violence And Rage On The "Radical Left"

It is well known, or ought to be by now, that the resolute faux news Trumpies are not invested in history, facts or objective truth. Look, for example, at all the traction that Alex Jones is getting by featuring a psychotic guest who's claimed there are "child sex slave colonies" on the planet Mars. Then there is the WSJ letter writer, a Mary R. Schneider, from Avon Lake, OH who had her militant letter ('A Double Standard for Violence, Intimidation') published in the June 3rd WSJ.

Schneider's whacked out letter is notable for the gazillion bytes of facts - all well documented- she leaves out to try to make the case the "radical left" are the bad guys in the country, stirring up violence and extremism. This despite the controverting facts that since Trump got in Neo Nazis, Muslim haters, Jew haters and other haters have all been having a heyday - including defiling Jewish cemeteries,  attacking innocents and even good Samaritans on trains -as in Portland, Oregon recently - and scrawling Nazi swastikas all over the damned place, e.g.


All this has been going on, out in the open for the past year, so one wonders what little isolated, right wing cubbyhole Schneider has inhabited . Well, of course if all she watches is FOX News that would explain it. Still, one would have to be deaf, dumb, blind and stupid to miss as many alarm signs as are out there.

Richard Cohen, writing in the SPLC Report ('Welcome To Donald Trump's America', Summer, 2017), notes that what was called "the Trump effect" manifested from a year ago - documented by a survey of 2,000 educators. The gist of the report was that Trump's campaign rhetoric had inflamed racial and ethnic tensions in the classroom leading to a sharp uptick in bullying of minority children. A 2nd survey of 10,000 educators reinforced the original findings, documenting nearly 900 bias-related incidents in the first 10 days after the election. (Many of the perps referenced Trump or his campaign slogans).

Without a doubt, Trump's ascension has really turned the Reich wing nuts loose and now they feel they have a guy in the WH who has their back, so are emboldened to do anything they want.  The SPLC Report (op. cit.) noted especially that "white nationalists and Nazis were enthused" over Trump's first 100 days. Meanwhile, these denizens cheered like drooling morons at every anti-media tweet the Dumpster posted - always hankering for more.

In her letter, Schneider, in answer to a column by Peggy Noonan ('Rage is all the Rage'),  claimed "that If any other Republican had been elected" in 2016, the Left would still have made the person the "target of violent speech".  Which is nonsense in two ways. First, there has not been "violent speech", but rather angry demonstrations such as immediately following Trump's aberrant election including the Women's March. Second, the reason for anger  - which btw is not the same as violence - was clear from months ago when Trump bragged about sexually assaulting women ("you can just grab 'em by the pussy') and then this infamous brag about shooting someone on 5th avenue and not losing voters, See:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iTACH1eVIaA

I am absolutely certain Schneider is one of the voters Trump wouldn't lose if he shot someone dead on Fifth Avenue. Let's also not forget this common thug's own enticement of violent behavior at his rallies, where he actually encouraged Trumpies to punch out protestors, and even go after the media. Then we've seen the latest video, redone from a WWF match, showing Trump beating the daylights out of a suit with a superimposed CNN logo for his head, thereby inciting his more volatile and unstable followers (Schneider?) to take action against the media. Ah yes, following in historical lockstep to Hitler's Sturm Abteilung (S.A.) commissioned to beat the then German reporters to a pulp - especially those that didn't print stories praising the Fuhrer. So, we've seen this act before, also the blindness of followers like Mary Schneider. (See Konrad Heiden's 'The Fuhrer')

Despite all of this, and as the most recent SPLC Intelligence Report notes, "a wave of anti-minority hate crimes washing over the country in the aftermath of Trump's victory" she has the absolute nerve and chutzpah to write:

"The political rage infecting the U.S. is almost exclusively a left-wing phenomenon,"

So I guess she missed all the hateful scenes and instances from the time of Obama, e.g.

But maybe this woman is blind,  lives in a parallel universe or simply doesn't wish to see the ubiquitous rage on the Right.  Maybe she also missed the scene of Montana's thug Greg Gianforte who had left Guardian reporter Ben Jacobs being carted off to an ER after being body slammed, e.g.

See any of that, missy? No? I could post a lot more images but what would be the point? Ordinarily I wouldn't even waste my time rebutting BS like Schneider's but someone has to skewer this type of nonsense and I am damned sure the Journal wouldn't publish any rebuttal letter of mine.

She also demonstrates her historical retardation writing:

"Violence has been part of the radical left's arsenal since the French Revolution"

In fact, the French Revolution disclosed a general popular revolt against a rarefied, entrenched upper crust or French aristocracy,  content to let thousands die of  hunger on the streets and in villages, as embodied in Marie Antoinette's famous put down: "Let them eat cake!"  Well, the entire French populace - not just the "left" (there really was no defined "left" until Karl Marx' 'Communist Manifesto' and  'Das Kapital'  decades later) rose up and put these privileged fools so dedicated to inequality to the guillotine.  It remains an object lesson for nations never to let inequality get too far out of control. (Right now, the Gini coefficient for the U.S. stands at 0.394, the highest it's ever been)

She then adds to this a large dollop of additional ignorance:

"It is the direct result of the hard left's rejection of traditional Christian morality and its embrace of moral relativism in pursuing its agenda, which allows leftists to demonize their political opponents and to use any means to defeat or even eliminate them."

Here she doesn't elaborate what she means by "traditional Christian morality" but in a previous post I already examined that what the left embraces is not moral relativism but moral provisionalism, e.g.

http://brane-space.blogspot.com/2017/05/moral-absolutism-is-trumped-by-moral.html


As for "demonizing" political opponents, this has almost entirely been done by the Right. Obama and Obamacare were a constant victim of this demonization, including depicting him as a witch doctor with a bone through his nose, as well as "Satan's son" , e.g.


If those Reich wing images don't meet the literal definition of "demonization" I don't know what does.

Use any means to defeat them? Here again "Mary, Mary quite contrary"  has her signals crossed. Last I checked it was the Repubs doing all the gerrymandering to ensure they'd never be defeated! As for "eliminating them" it was the Right and its associates in the MIC which eliminated JFK, Martin Luther King, Bobby Kennedy and Malcolm X, last I looked. Maybe the lady needs a course in modern American history. On the other hand, maybe it wouldn't do any good given how many modern American history texts have been converted to pabulum and 'feel good' propaganda..

Schneider, to her minor credit, does acquire a degree of graciousness at the very end, writing:

"Certainly, most liberals in the U.S. don't espouse violence ..."

Gee, thanks a heap, lady! But she goes on to babble:

"but a growing, radicalized minority of them do and often with the tacit approval of their less radical brethren..."

Failing to cite any specific incidents or evidence. If she'd mentioned the Kathy Griffin incident with a prop of Trump's head, I'd have referred her to my previous post on it -


http://brane-space.blogspot.com/2017/06/kathy-griffins-bloody-trump-head-and.html


connected to artistic license and free speech. Was it possibly in poor taste? Yeah, maybe,  but not as much as Ku Kluxers putting up posters of branding and whipping Michelle Obama!

At the very end she bids "mainstream liberals" to reject the "demonization of those who don't share their views", but makes no symmetric demand on the extreme Right, which generated the images above. She then ends with:

"Unless they subordinate their ideology to morality, the rage and violence will get worse."

Indeed, but see, that works both ways: If the Right doesn't subordinate its ideology to a morally refined conscience, then things can only get worse : more bullying and terrorizing of minorities, more instances of Reepos beating up reporters, and more thwarting and threats at minorities trying to vote.

Schneider's missive shows it's damned easy to dictate that others "reject their ideology for morality" and abhor rage and violence . It's much more difficult to issue similar dictates for your own side!

Does Trump Have The Brains To Avoid A Nuclear Confrontation? NO!

"They gotta be taught a BIGLY lesson! That punk Kim Jong Un can't get away with threatening me! I'm gonna bomb 'em back to the stone age!'


The question for the CNN panel yesterday evening was how best to respond to the continuing North Korean threats, including taking out the Carl Vinson and its strike group, while also holding an American hostage. Former New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson offered the most serious warning: "We can't treat  Kim like a normal guy. It would be a huge mistake".

These echoed the words of Denver Post columnist Gregg Dobbs two days earlier who wrote that he didn't believe Trump had the patience, intelligence or emotional equilibrium to deal with the rapidly escalating situation on the Korean Peninsula.   The basic reasons have been echoed many times from the date Trump "won" the farcical 2016 general election, by the likes of David Brooks, Charles Krauthammer, Charles Blow, Eugene Robinson, Richard Cohen and others.  Cohen early on even recommended Trump be removed under the little known 25th amendment - by virtue of his inability to rein in his egoistic petulance, along with his reckless bombast and narcissism. I agreed, and in a subsequent blog post asserted the Donald is barely able to run a dog kennel, far less an administration or the whole nation.

All these concerns have acquired enormous gravitas as the North Korean standoff has now reached the phase it could instantly turn into a blood bath.  With Trump now deploying the Carl Vinson carrier  strike group close to the peninsula along with the U.S.S. Michigan - a nuclear sub outfitted with nuclear missiles - we're now in a situation close the Cuban Missile Crisis of October, 1962. We got through that crisis because we had a man of temperance, intelligence and historical understanding at the helm : John Fitzgerald Kennedy..  Now, we have a "former" failed businessman who actually rode his sleazy real estate empire -  based largely on bankruptcies - to fame and fortune. Oh, after he already got 'nuff millions from daddy via inheritance.


So now we're saddled with a clown:  a bombastic pseudo-business tycoon and former reality TV personality who still thinks he's playing a role on 'The Apprentice' and believes any time he barks he can make lowly staff jump.  But we're in the real world now, not Trump's fantasy world of ego, entitlement and arrogance. And despite multiple warnings from even former military - generals and admirals - Trump can't seem to back off the bellicose rhetoric. This even as the North Koreans have vowed to take down the Vinson using one of their missiles. Rather than pause and reflect, Trump continues to think he's playing 'chicken' or high stakes poker - not that he's playing with the lives of tens of thousands.


As Gregg Dobbs put it, Kim Jong-un is not intimidated by threats, especially hollow ones - and also any pre-emptive strike would be about the worst move  possible. It would ensure the slaughter of tens of thousands of South Koreans as well as U.S. troops stationed there.   There is even the possibility the North Koreans could be spurred to employ one or more of their nuclear weapons, again most likely against South Korea - namely Seoul.

Things might not have reached this malignant stage had the media (most) not done back flips with wet dreams after Trump launched his 59 cruise missiles on a Syrian base. Since then, this deformed mental mutant has been putatively granted the "keys to the kingdom" (read: "respect" from media) by a stupid pack of slobbering suckers and goofballs who'd held their breath for any sign of Trump being "presidential".   Since these sycophantic imbeciles conflate use of force with "being presidential"  it was inevitable we'd now see a guy acting like he's been given his first hit of smack or crack cocaine.

As I wrote before, unless the same media pulls him back to reality - mainly by halting the cheerleading- we may now be in for the "most serious military confrontation since the Korean War" - in the words of one pundit last night.

Except this confrontation may be nuclear and we have a psychotic in charge of the country without the brains, knowledge, forbearance or basic human skills to deal with the situation.

Charles Krauthammer Admits Trump Is His Own Worst Enemy

"Trump simply can't resist playground pushback" - Charles Krauthammer, WaPo, 'What Happened to the Honeymoon?'

"The shortest honeymoon on record is officially over. Normally, newly elected presidents enjoy a wave of goodwill that allows them to fly high at least through their first 100 days. Donald Trump has not yet been sworn in and the honeymoon has already come and gone. "  - Charles Krauthammer

Finally, a Right wing columnist has been able to own up to why Trump's favorable numbers are taking a dump. Well, for the most part. That is WaPo columnist Charles Krauthammer, the guy I once had to hammer (7 years ago) about his bankrupt claim that JFK was a "supply -side tax cutter."

Anyway, in his latest column, 'What Happened to the Honeymoon?'.  after briefly teeing off on the "unbending left" for not falling in line  (accepting Trump's legitimacy)  Krauthammer gets to the real issue. The real reason why Trump has had no genuine "honeymoon" and his numbers have been tanking the past week or ten days.

As Krauty puts it:

"Trump's own instincts and inclinations (are responsible). A thirst for attention that leads to hyperactivity. He needs to dominate every news cycle which feeds a compulsive tweet habit. It has placed him almost continuously at the center of the national conversation and not always to his benefit".

Indeed. And especially as his many tweets - such as in regard to DNI James Clapper's recent comments to him about the Russian exposure (by former MI6 operative Christopher Steele) -   have been found to be bald-faced lies. Thus, Trump's claim that Clapper "denounced" the recent explosive dossier (on Trump's alleged salacious activities in a Moscow hotel)  is absolutely false.

In a statement released after their conversation the director of national intelligence actually said: “The IC [intelligence community] has not made any judgement that the information in this document is reliable, and we did not rely upon it in any way for our conclusions.”

Can Trump not discern the difference between condemning a dossier and withholding any judgment on it? If he can't then we must worry about how Trump will negotiate the parlous waters of state once he gets into the Oval Office. If North Korea or Iran refuses to be signatories to a treaty will Trump take that as an attack?

The next Krauthammer observation is even more illuminating:

 "Trump simply can’t resist playground pushback. His tweets gave Meryl Streep’s Golden Globes screed priceless publicity. His mocking Arnold Schwarzenegger for bad “Apprentice” ratings — compared with “the ratings machine, DJT” — made Trump look small and Arnold (almost) sympathetic.

Nor is this behavior likely to change after the inauguration. It’s part of Trump’s character. Nothing negative goes unanswered because, for Trump, an unanswered slight has the air of concession or surrender"

While diehard Trumpsters may love this sort of reactionary behavior, it doesn't comport with strength especially in a President. What it shows is that any twerp, misfit, or non-political person (without political power) can get under the big man's skin and make him freak out. In other words, it shows he is hostage to any insult that comes down the pike and from any direction. Whereas, as philosopher Alan Watts notes in his book 'Does It Matter?', the truly strong personality is able to rest content in its own fortress of confidence and doesn't need to react to every slight perceived or misperceived. This person- personality, has enough mental and psychological ballast to contain and blunt pure emotional response. But....a personality arrested at the infantile or anal stage (as Hornstein notes) lacks the resources for resilient impulse control.

Not to be too blunt, but Trump would be better suited to be a cage match brawler - or inflated, self important billionaire given to chiseling deals - than President of the U.S.

It also opens Trump to criticism that he'd be the last person we'd want in any nuclear standoff. Unlike JFK, who coolly resisted the Joint Chiefs when they insisted he bomb Cuba, Trump would likely comply - especially if he perceived Raul Castro had somehow challenged him.

The part about the behavior being unlikely to change is also disturbing, as it echoes WaPo's Richard Cohen who wrote that:

"Since winning the election, Trump has not moderated his behavior. He still behaves like a brat ..."

This is truly the sign of an infantile, anal-type personality who perhaps (as psychologist Harvey Hornstein once noted) took a longer than average time to get toilet trained. But again, this may also explain Trump's penchant for toilet bowl humor.   It might be the type of behavior that fascinates pugilistic types and general Vulgarians but definitely has huge disadvantages in the setting of international policy- where mental toughness is as important as physical. And shooting one's yap off via Twitter is not looked on as a sign of mental toughness.

Krauthammer again - remember these are HIS words, not mine:

"Finally, it’s his chronic indiscipline, his jumping randomly from one subject to another without rhyme, reason or larger strategy. In a week packed with confirmation hearings and Russian hacking allegations, what was he doing meeting with Robert Kennedy Jr., an anti-vaccine activist pushing the thoroughly discredited idea that vaccines cause autism?

We know from way back during the Republican debates that Trump himself has dabbled in this dubious territory. One could, however, write it off as one of many campaign oddities that would surely fade away. Not so, apparently."


But come on, Charles! Anyone with a grain of sense or insight knows that a person who spouts or steeps himself in fake news is also going to be prey for whacknut theories.  But I'd say a more stunning defect is just the inability to mount any kind of impulse control or self-discipline. That achievement alone would render Trump less likely to wander off the reservation into all kinds of bull pockey areas, issues.

It is good to know that at least one Right winger has the perceptual ability to see what exactly is wrong with Trump and why his presidency will likely be brief, painful (especially to the millions of Americans it adversely affects) and definitely the nadir in our national history.

Did I say "brief"? Yes, meaning - following Richard Cohen's prescription - Trump is removed under the 25th Amendment to the Constitution.

Let us all hope it happens sooner than later!

See How A REAL President Conducts A Press Conference - vs. A Hollow Pretender -Elect

Watching the spectacle of Trump's first press conference in 168 days yesterday had me wondering why the hell I bothered. Well, let us admit that deep within every person there lurks the desire - every now and then - to watch a 'train wreck'. Because that's what yesterday's fiasco was. A brash, brusque buffoon with no class or intelligence, conducting what was advertised by his lackeys as a "press conference" but was in fact merely another forum to display his authoritarian narcissistic tendencies at the expense of the press corps. No give and take, no humor, only crass bully boy attacks that were designed to appeal to only the crassest natures.

But the starkest takeaway for me had to be how far the quality of press conferences had fallen in the past 50 odd years. From JFK's exuberant, infectiously intellectual and witty displays to the obnoxious snorts and indignant accusations - coupled with sneers - of Donald J. Trump.

Compare Trump's one sided "you are fake news"  ranting crappola e.g.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fAkumy7_Pbc


With any of the excerpts from JFK's press conferences shown here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=twL2wzOf1c4


In particular, note the respect conveyed to the press by JFK, and the boundless wit and intelligence with which he delivers his responses, compared to Trump's petulant, self-absorbed and accusatory exhibition which was more like a dare, and definitely defiant. As if to say, "wait'll I become President you will really find out who's the boss!"

Might Trump improve to the level of JFK after he's inaugurated. Doubtful, because putting lipstick on a pig doesn't alter the nature of the pig. It's still what it is. In the same way, you can't transfer class or intelligence or even humor to a hollow money grubbing, glorified carny barker who lacks it.

During his afternoon broadcast Fox News’ Shephard Smith said, “CNN’s exclusive reporting on the Russian matter was separate and distinctly different from the document dump executed by an online news property. Though we at Fox News cannot confirm CNN’s report, it is our observation that its correspondents follow journalistic standards and that neither they nor any other journalists should be subjected to belittling or delegitimizing by the President-elect of the United States.”

Shep's points were spot on and shouldn't need bolstering. They ought to be evident to any sane and reasonable person.   Certainly, no genuine member of the press corps who witnessed yesterday morning's diatribe -laced event could not come away shaken, and yes, wondering if freedom of the press might be under the gun in the Trump administration.

National Press Club President Thomas Burr called it "dangerous and unhealthy to declare a news item as 'fake news' to distract from facts that you may not like or don't favor your perspective," in a statement issued about the president-elect's press conference. "Our incoming president must treat the news media as the vital cornerstone of our democracy that it is," he said. "To label something as 'fake' in an effort to undermine news outlets endangers the trust granted journalists by the public and is antithetical to our country's values."

And as I pointed out in the previous post, the ultimate irony of it all is that Trump himself is the "godfather" of fake news!  He concocted the BS news that the "Chinese invented global warming", and also the pseudo-conspiracy bilge that Ted Cruz' dad was involved in the Kennedy Assassination. He also invented the hyper-ignorant bollocks that he actually "won" the popular vote - if you subtract all the "illegal voters". Of course, no evidence at all supports this claptrap any more than Trump's other fake news brain farts. They are all the creations of a febrile mind that operates at the level of a hormone -compromised adolescent - of maybe 13.

The biggest outrage apart from marginalizing members of the press yesterday may be when he compared the intelligence community to "Nazi Germany".  But like his other insane balderdash the analogy is wacked. You can't compare an entire national entity to an intelligence agency. The 'apples to apples' comparison is the U.S.  intelligence agencies to the Gestapo.

But even here he fails. Because if the CIA and other agencies were really like the Gestapo, Trump would have been hanging by his thumbs in a rendition site over a month ago, getting bratwurst enemas and electric shocks delivered to ....well.....all the sensitive areas the Gestapo preferred.

In short, Trump is lucky the intelligence agencies in our country aren't like the Gestapo of Nazi Germany.

The best take recently on Trump has been offered by Richard Cohen in his WaPo article, 'How to Remove Trump From Office'. He writes:

"Donald Trump is a one-man basket of deplorables. He is a braggart and a liar. He is a bully and a demagogue. He is an ignoramus and a deadbeat, a chiseler and either a sincere racist or an insincere one, and his love for himself is matched only by my loathing of him. He is about to be president of the United States. A constitutional coup may be in the offing.

Since winning the election, Trump has not moderated his behavior. He still behaves like a brat ...It is folly to think that aides such as Priebus are going to be able to moderate Trump. They are enablers, emptying their consciences and stuffing their egos, and it is even sillier to think that Trump himself will change

He thinks he is infallible, a kind of secular pope. Things will go from bad to worse...  One remote remedy is impeachment by the House and conviction by the Senate...There is, however, another way. Under the 25th Amendment to the Constitution, the vice president, together with a “majority of either the principal officers of the executive departments or of such other body as Congress may by law provide” can remove the president for being “unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office.”

The 25th amendment, hmmm. sounds like a plan to rid ourselves of this ambulatory pestilence.

See also:

http://smirkingchimp.com/thread/richard-eskow/70643/the-dullest-moment-in-trump-s-press-conference-was-also-the-most-shocking

NSA Snooping Now Pisses Off Germans - As Former Snowden Detractor Recants

Edward Snowden after receiving WhistleBlower's Award in Moscow.

Well, by the day it get ever more interesting. Now it turns out the Germans are livid about the never ending, no limits, indiscriminate NSA snooping by an "exceptionalist"  country that fancies itself cop of the world and snoop too. Angela Merkel complained to President Barack Obama on Wednesday after receiving information her cellphone may have been monitored, as well as the communications of millions of other Germans.

Meanwhile, U.S. Ambassador John B. Emerson has been summoned to meet with Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle today - and he will “spell out the position of the German government.” From what I have learned and understood about Germans, given many German friends, it will basically boil down to: "Keep your fucking, snooping eyes and ears out of Deutschland!"

Defense Minister Thomas de Maiziere told German ARD television the alleged surveillance would be “really bad” if confirmed. “The Americans are and remain our best friends, but this is absolutely not right,” he said. The problem with that line is that "best friends" don't open and read the mail of their friends. They respect their privacy instead of pissing all over it. Did the U.S. and NSA really believe they could get away with this shit? Probably, up until Edward Snowden revealed the extent of NSA mass snooping, when all the Neolib pro-market, war & security whores went batshit crazy - castigating Snowden as a "traitor" when he was fulfilling his duty as a righteous citizen protecting his fellow citizens' 4th amendment rights - which our gov't no longer seems to believe in.

But,  interestingly, a former Snowden detractor, WaPo columnist Richard Cohen - as reported several days ago- has now changed his tune, calling Snowden a legitimate whistle blower, as opposed to the epithet "traitor" when the leaks first appeared. He now understands, like most perceptive and intelligent people, that if it were not for Snowden we wouldn't even be aware of the extent of the snoops' reach or how they violated the most sacred core of our Constitution.

Make no mistake that Germans take intrusive snooping, including by companies, very seriously. They have some of the stiffest laws on the planet as opposed to the laissez-faire,  business suck-up U.S. which allows companies to collect any and everything, including access to Social Security numbers and bank accounts. To give an idea how strict the German are regarding protection of their citizens' privacy they won't allow Google to show homes in assorted cities without blurring the image out. Thus, no clear view is afforded.

All of this latest kerfuffle comes in the wake of other exposures of NSA spying into other leaders' affairs- emails, etc.  Earlier, for example, we learned about NSA phone taps applied to Mexico's Enrique Peña Nieto. The other humiliating phone call of the week was on Monday with François Hollande, whose phone was not bugged as far as he knew, but who demanded an explanation for the revelation – once more from the Snowden files – that the NSA had been recording tens of millions of French phone calls a month. The White House was forced to admit that the evidence raised "legitimate questions for our friends and allies".

Before that, Brazil's President Dilma Rousseff went on the warpath. Unlike assorted Neoliberal, anti-4th amendment twerps in the U.S., President Rousseff didn't play games blaming Edward Snowden - but rather the dissembling culprits his revelations exposed: the NSA.

She said:

"Without respect for a nation's sovereignty, there is no basis for proper relations among nations,"

Rousseff added that: "Brazil knows how to protect itself. Brazil ... does not provide shelter to terrorist groups. We are a democratic country."

The Brazilian president, had been so outraged at American spying-  both on her country and on her personal emails and her personal life- that she canceled a state dinner with President Obama. Good for her. She isn't two-faced but consistent. Her privacy was seriously violated, as U.S. citizens' privacy has been, so why should she be seen to be accepting of it, by agreeing to a state dinner - for simple pompous display?

Rousseff addresses the UN and gives the U.S. a piece of her mind on NSA spying

She went on to pointedly note:

"Without the right of privacy, there is no real freedom of speech or freedom of opinion, and so there is no actual democracy."

In other words, people denied this right - by NSA intrusiveness - via XKeyscore, PRISM or whatever, are inhabiting a Potemkin democracy. They have no true freedom of speech because they can't know how their (spied and mass-grabbed) speech is being used against them, or collected and stored for later exploitation. Perhaps even criminalization.

This ought to be a no-brainer. Because to spy on another country (especially one purportedly a "friend") is to display malignant and even paranoid distrust of the spied -on nation. It therefore undermines polity, as well as civility, and in the process destroys any potential for normal relations or mutual respect. I would advance the same regarding the relation between a state and its citizens. If the former intrudes and spies on its people, then it mistrusts them at the core, and the citizen - knowing this - has no choice but to mistrust the state.

What is most puzzling is why it is Obama can't get control of these arrogant NSA troglodytes. As wifey, a firm Obama supporter even asked (after the German revelations broke): 'What is this, the tail wagging the dog? He needs to get them under control!'  Indeed.  So either Mr. Obama is a President who himself calls the shots, or a Puppet. Which is it? By his deeds we shall know the answers, never mind the rhetoric- talk is cheap.

Perhaps Mr. Obama would do well to pay attention to President Rousseff's  global rallying cry against what she portrayed as the overweening power of the US security apparatus, in her same  UN address:

 "Tampering in such a manner in the affairs of other countries is a breach of international law and is an affront of the principles that must guide the relations among them, especially among friendly nations. A sovereign nation can never establish itself to the detriment of another sovereign nation. The right to safety of citizens of one country can never be guaranteed by violating fundamental human rights of citizens of another country."


I again trace the malignancy and desecration of international law of which she speaks to the false belief in American exceptionalism.  It is only such exceptionalism which feeds the insane meme that one country is superior somehow to all other nations, and can therefore do whatever the hell it wants - and follow no international norms.

So, maybe Obama will finally change - and cease blaming Snowden, who he ought to really give another medal to - when he finally ditches the useless exceptionalist meme. It no longer serves any constructive purpose, if it ever did, and is only liable to lead our nation into ever more follies - and a lot more hubris.)

Oh, speaking of hubris, that has emerged in spades following the excuse of an NSA-defender -huckster simpleton (taking the rest of us for simpletons) that "they do it too!". In other words, we need to look the other way because all these other Euro governments are also doing their own snooping on us. But anyone who buys this codswallop is a certified idiot. It's about as dumb as buying into Netanyahu's hand wringing about Iran getting one friggin' nuke when Israel already has 150. Enough to blow the entire Middle East to Armageddon 15 times over. Or the NSA complaining about the Frenchies maybe spying on 10 U.S. emails when the NSA pulls in 70 million from the French! It's the same false equivalence bullshit raised to the power of 10 we've seen in other Neolib PR arenas. As Natasha Lennard has noted on salon.com ('You DO it TOO! A Pathetic Defense of NSA Spying' )

"The logic is profoundly flawed, but it’s worth noting, tacitly pervades the ideology undergirding U.S. imperialism. The U.S. has kidnapped, tortured, indefinitely detained and extrajudicially killed individuals around the world under the auspices that there are groups out there who would do the same to Americans if given the chance. And in this time of borderless wars, ill-defined enemy threats, and highly politicized business interests, strict Straussian goodie/baddie lines are hard to apply. “The enemy” could be anywhere, and the “we” that needs protecting is an equally vague referent in current political rhetoric: NSA dragnets evidence that we’re all treated as potential threats by virtue of communicating. )

International diplomacy is, of course, rife with hypocrisy and finger pointing. That supporters of NSA surveillance activities are relying on this as a public defense is illustration of the scant regard given to very legitimate public concerns (in the U.S. and abroad) about the operations of the surveillance state."