Britain detains Glenn Grenwald's partner under the terrorism act

[Gandalf]

David Miranda's detention at Heathrow 'extraordinary', says Keith Vaz | World news | theguardian.com

I guess one thing this story shows is just how far in bed with America the UK truly is. They detained a journalists partner for several hours, confiscated his possessions, and all clearly because Britain/America have incredibly red faces for being shown up as the dictatorial, oppressors of freedom and privacy that they are. Basically, the terrorist act will be used in a personal, pathetic way in order to intimidate and scare. I find it an incredibly brazen and stupid move on the part of the UK as it is only going to make more and more people question their motivations and transparency.

The UK knows that David Miranda is hardly a terrorist, but used the act as a bully boy tactic to shake him down and search for Snowden clues and information. I doubt Miranda would have been so silly though. So, another black mark on the faux 'free' British. They are lapdog yes men and just as culpable for spying as the US and are willing to detain you for 8 hours and search through everything you have in order to scare you.

[Gandalf]

Reading through the Guardian update page, I saw a quote from this blog which I thought was really well put and so here is a link to that blog. It succinctly summarises the Miranda detention and quite accurately makes the argument that Britain now is really no different to somewhere like Russia in terms of freedoms.

Cameron Proves Greenwald Right « The Dish

When things like this start to happen and Cameron himself is filling in time by waffling on about cyber bullying. Well, this is intimidation just as bad as any of that. You can go to a British airport, be detained as a 'terrorist', they will steal your possessions, extract all of your private information, and give you a bloody hard time. It is a joke and sure, some might make the predictable argument that it is bad, but better than other places. Is that really good enough though? 'Oh, but at at least we only kettle protestors and arrest any that don't ask for permission first. We don't just shoot them like some other states'. It just gets silly when you go down those paths. So country B is bad, but as long as we don't quite go so far then in the great scheme of things we as country A are still pretty good. 'You know in Libya they would just torture him' they say. Well, I guess we should just detain everybody and steal their items and duplicate the information, just as long as we don't torture them. After all torture is just what we do in illegal invasions of other states, not to the partners of journalists.

[Kirkland Laing]

Nice one Britain. Even the fucking Mafia don't target each other's families.

They hate us for our freedoms you know.

[Gandalf]

Nice one Britain. Even the fucking Mafia don't target each other's families.

They hate us for our freedoms you know.

The justification for the behavior is ridiciculous. It's almost they have a pre written script of 'Lives will be put in danger, it is a matter of urgent national security' etc. Right, so you can storm around like the stormtroopers, smash up computers, detain people randomly and for something nothing to do with terrorism.

If these fuckers in charge would just stop lying, manipulating and just be a bit more transparent, then dialogue can happen and progress, but made. But they dig their heels in with the 'many people will die' spiel and no line of discussion can be made.

Any ideas I had of just going home for a trip are gone, I would much rather ask my family to come out here instead where you get none of the hassle of travelling through a British airport.

Currently we have the Guardian being told to destroy evidence on harddrives, Manning who revealed war crimes in jail for 90 years, Snowden in Russia because a fair trial is impossible in such a loaded environment, and of course Assange locked in an embassy, with a permanent convoy of police paid for by the general public.

What a fucking charade we have and all because the agencies, using British taxpayers money think they have a right to snoop on everything you do. Nobody agrees with that. Britain survived the IRA and with less surveillance I am sure we can survive a pretty invisible Al Quaeda. However, that is if you believe that is why we are being spied on so blanketly.

[Kirkland Laing]

Nice one Britain. Even the fucking Mafia don't target each other's families.

They hate us for our freedoms you know.

The justification for the behavior is ridiciculous. It's almost they have a pre written script of 'Lives will be put in danger, it is a matter of urgent national security' etc. Right, so you can storm around like the stormtroopers, smash up computers, detain people randomly and for something nothing to do with terrorism.

If these fuckers in charge would just stop lying, manipulating and just be a bit more transparent, then dialogue can happen and progress, but made. But they dig their heels in with the 'many people will die' spiel and no line of discussion can be made.

Any ideas I had of just going home for a trip are gone, I would much rather ask my family to come out here instead where you get none of the hassle of travelling through a British airport.

Currently we have the Guardian being told to destroy evidence on harddrives, Manning who revealed war crimes in jail for 90 years, Snowden in Russia because a fair trial is impossible in such a loaded environment, and of course Assange locked in an embassy, with a permanent convoy of police paid for by the general public.

What a fucking charade we have and all because the agencies, using British taxpayers money think they have a right to snoop on everything you do. Nobody agrees with that. Britain survived the IRA and with less surveillance I am sure we can survive a pretty invisible Al Quaeda. However, that is if you believe that is why we are being spied on so blanketly.

It's all bullshit. Jounalism is now a terrorist act. You've got media corporations in America now pushing the US government to class people torrenting Game of Thrones as terrorists, because terrorists are making money from online piracy thus anybody pirating is helping terrorism.

Every single piece of internet communication is being recorded and stored indefinitely. It's only a matter of time till governments have total access to everybody's information at any time.

[Kirkland Laing]

European corporations too :

Copyright Infringement Is Being Treated as Terrorism | The Big Picture

[Gandalf]

It seems that The Independent newspaper is embroiling itself in black propaganda and is acting as a British government mouthpiece. It's a shame as the Independent has always presented itself as one of the better British mainstream publications. However, with this latest muckraking it seems that they have either been duped or are acting with the government in a damage limitation exercise. Either way, I don't think I trust them. Make up your own minds. Here is the Independent article and what The Guardian had to say in response.

Exclusive: UK’s secret Mid-East internet surveillance base is revealed in Edward Snowden leaks - UK Politics - UK - The Independent

Snowden: UK government now leaking documents about itself | Glenn Greenwald | Comment is free | theguardian.com

Quite frankly, I don't think you can believe a single word that the British or American governments have to say on these issues. They exist on a temerous fiber and they will lie and manipulate in order to prevent tremors within the fiber. It boggles my mind why the rebellion is still waiting to kick off. They will do anything to maintain strict control and just like in America, the media in the UK is, to an unhealthy degree, an obedient and compliant one. Unfortunately, the Independent has likely shown itself to be much like the rest. It isn't just the Independent that has been having crafty digs at the work The Guardian has been doing and The Guardian needs to be applauded and commended and encouraged.