tl;dr "President Obama wants to make it a crime for a reporter to talk to a leaker"
Worth reading it in full.
Worth reading it in full.
I really don't get it and I don't see how a person could change so radically in only a few short years. Unless the whole initial campaign was just a major joke played on the American public, and it was all a set-up, saying that he'll turn things around from the Bush era, while he was actually plotting to continue his surveillance policies all along.
There's also the blackmail possibility, but would the US president really be that dependent on a blackmail to change his policies 180 degrees and also continue the charade for so long? I think the second possibility, that he was lying the whole time, seems more realistic than this.
I do not mean they are cynical; that they are lying or have abandoned their principles, but that their principles are directed solely to getting themselves elected. Any form of lie-detection or telepathy would reveal they truly believe they are doing the best, most moral thing by getting themselves in a position of power. I find this attitude hard to describe; imagine “I am a good person”, “anything that is good for me is good for everyone”, “I should be leader”, “anything that makes me leader is good”, “anything that restricts my leadership is bad for everyone” all merged together into one single thought. Perhaps “I am the state” is the best summary.
This is how you get civil libertarians restricting others’ civil liberties, homosexuals getting elected on anti-homosexual legislation, and drug-users campaigning for harsh penalties for drug use. These people do not see any contradiction between their words and their actions; it is as if words and actions are the same thing to them. If I campaign for civil rights, then I am a civil rights leader, my actions are irrelevant. They do not seem to understand that other people can be good, that they themselves can be evil; or how restricting their own power could possibly be good. They do not seem to understand that arrests, investigations, or invasions, whether of privacy or of nations, which do not harm themselves could harm other people.
Those were not his principles, it was his marketing strategy and it worked. There is no honesty in politics, it's a game of manipulating the masses, not of winning a prize for morals.
I disagree with you on the "no honesty in politics", successful politicians tend to have a degree of honesty that, when it successfully translates into policy and results, helps to make them successful.
See my comments on Reagan and the economy and government financial situation, and ending the Evil Empire.
See G. H. W. Bush repudiating his "Read my lips, no new taxes" and getting booted from office.
See Clinton promising sane economic policies and delivering (ADDED: and after the demonstrable failures of LBJ and Carter). I think in general he was an awful president and no one denies he lies a whole lot, but when the financial guys pointed out what the bond market was saying, he accepted reality. I can't find the good quote from him on that, but here's the great one from James Carville: "I used to think that if there was reincarnation, I wanted to come back as the president or the pope or as a .400 baseball hitter. But now I would like to come back as the bond market. You can intimidate everybody."
ADDED: but that wouldn't seem to explain Obama's successful reelection. There's a more focused explanation which which still hinges on honesty: when there are two candidates, one is running on values, one isn't, the former wins. Obama has been honestly running on (hard Left) values, and beat two opponents who weren't. I think that'll also explain 2004, and it's been noted that if the Republican base voted like it did for W in 2004, McCain would have won; don't know about 2012, but "Hairpiece Q. Mother$*%&^$" as one former resident of Massachusetts conservative friend refers to him is widely thought to be the least principled, "value" free national politician in a long time.
Bush: Ran on humble foreign policy, expanded foreign policy drastically. Obama: Ran on civil liberties, eroded civil liberties drastically.
The crowd that pretends to be outraged on principle depends on the letter behind the politician's name.
Another possibility is that Obama is under a lot of stress (like any president) and those who advise him and were in power before him (NSA, the Fed, etc.) end up persuading him. This is perfectly possible if you are under stress and suffer constant interruptions that don't allow you to think long term. This is another way of saying that he's in fact a puppet, even if he doesn't realize.
Plus a little blackmail if it's on tap.