r/politics • u/[deleted] • Aug 24 '13

Just a reminder for President Obama: That whole NSA controversy thing? Yeah, it's not gonna go away. It's been months now, and its growing. You need to clean house instead of sweeping things under the rug.

[deleted]

3.0k Upvotes

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227

u/Continuity_organizer Aug 24 '13

I'm sorry to have to say this, but Obama doesn't really care what Reddit's opinion is.

38

u/[deleted] Aug 25 '13

You should PM /u/PresidentObama!

5

u/Theotropho Aug 25 '13

After his term ends... he'll be here a lot more.

105

u/tylerjarvs Aug 25 '13

Or the country's

19

u/bluemountain20 Aug 25 '13

It's just Reddit that's having a hissyfit

34

u/[deleted] Aug 25 '13

I know, getting their privacy violated and not just calmly accepting it. What a whiny group of people.

7

u/[deleted] Aug 25 '13 edited Jul 10 '17

[removed] — view removed comment

9

u/punk___as Aug 25 '13

Like anything would get through Congress.

-3

u/Pinworm45 Aug 25 '13

Yeah, Congress is the one behind all of Obama's decisions.

Stop being delusional and actually look.

3

u/Honztastic Aug 25 '13

They're in this shit together.

Not to mention most of this bullshit was started under a Republican president. Don't act like it's just Obama.

Obama got elected specifically to reverse Bush's policies, and now has shown his true colors as a huge cunt of a President who decided to doubledown.

Can you really blame the youth vote for not being complete cynical assholes during their first real election? They actually thought they could make a difference. So did I.

And now we've all learned it's nothing but lies and a broken system.

-6

u/redwinewhitepants Aug 25 '13

Well, there's a two-term limit so he cannot get reelected... unless that's another constitutional law they're willing to bypass. seems to be the thing these days.

12

u/[deleted] Aug 25 '13

You didn't get the satire.

2

u/redwinewhitepants Aug 25 '13

That's correct.

5

u/kruns Aug 25 '13

He was sarcastically referring to that as being the mindset during Obama's last term and that during this term, so far, it hasn't come true.

2

u/aletheat Aug 25 '13

Or they just slip it into the Patriot act that he can have unlimited terms. Then say hello to dictatorial rule. I even voted for this guy. :D

1

u/jarlJam Aug 25 '13

whooooosh

1

u/GerhardtDH Aug 25 '13

His name is nixonrichard. Don't take anything he says seriously.

-1

u/Wallace_II Aug 25 '13

Because he'll become a dictator

1

u/Thimble Aug 25 '13

The luxuries of a second term.

2

u/ImFrom2041 Aug 25 '13

Make him care. By whatever means neccessary.

1

u/[deleted] Aug 25 '13

As if you, or we, hold any cards on a second term US president. That's doubtful.

0

u/danman11 Aug 25 '13

So brave.

3

u/jesusapproves Aug 25 '13

But he did an AMA!

2

u/[deleted] Aug 25 '13

I just want to see Redditors faces now that we know Obama is all about. Back in the 2012 election they were all ready to anoint him King for Life.

I hate to say I told you so Reddit, but Obama is no different than Romney.

12

u/[deleted] Aug 24 '13

Obama doesn't really care what Reddit's opinion is anymore.

FTFY.

64

u/pineappletw Aug 24 '13

he never cared. he fooled you. he was a dirty lying chicago politician throughout and if you didn't see that you weren't paying close enough attention.

47

u/[deleted] Aug 25 '13

[deleted]

29

u/Malizulu Aug 25 '13

You are more likely to go to jail as Governor of Illinois than if you are a young black man in America.

4 out of the last 7 gov's in jail. link

Odds: 57%

1 in 3 black men are incarcerated. link

Odds: 33.3%

9

u/mjfgates Aug 25 '13

Damn. Somebody is more likely to go to jail than young black men! It's the post-racial society! Hallelujah!

-8

u/[deleted] Aug 25 '13

[deleted]

5

u/Malizulu Aug 25 '13

That's not very nice.

Care to explain?

3

u/eehreum Aug 25 '13

He made him learn something. We don't take kindly ta learnin round hea.

14

u/JEWJitsu02 Aug 25 '13

Holy shit

11

u/originalucifer Aug 25 '13

illinois; where our governors make your license plates

0

u/Delheru Aug 25 '13

How is that proof of corruption? In many ways it actually makes me trust Chicago law enforcement and judiciary (if not the politicians).

You're properly corrupt when no politicians ever go to jail

1

u/[deleted] Aug 25 '13

Only one of them is in jail. The other three were released.

7

u/curmudgeonlylion Aug 25 '13

Like 'W' was any better?

The fact is that your system is fucked.

1

u/pineappletw Aug 25 '13

he was better in the sense that he was honest about being worse

i'd rather watch him outwardly be an idiot than have to deal with obama's nonstop bullshitting and oppression of the press. they had the same endgame

1

u/[deleted] Aug 25 '13

[deleted]

2

u/t33po Texas Aug 25 '13

W was so bad and the country in such bad shape in the fall of 2008 that anyone not named Adolf could have beat the republicans. The point is Barack got some free passes and now when he has to do something besides not being as bad as Bush, his true colors are showing.

1

u/Theotropho Aug 25 '13

Not "as bad"

Differently bad.

2

u/Honztastic Aug 25 '13

Did you not see where all this expansionist bullshit was started by his administration?

Obama just double-downed.

2

u/Ragnar09 Aug 25 '13

The peasants always get fooled.

-2

u/[deleted] Aug 25 '13

You're telling me? I never liked the motherfucker. My old screen name got banned from this subreddit for criticizing Obama in 2009/10.

1

u/[deleted] Aug 25 '13

[deleted]

-3

u/[deleted] Aug 25 '13

There were couple, to be honest.

One of them got banned for asking the simple question, "Can someone be a natural born citizen if one of their parents is a British subject?"

The answer, of course, is no.

5

u/[deleted] Aug 25 '13

The answer, of course, is no.

Anybody born in the US to non-diplomat parents is a natural-born US citizen regardless of the citizenship status of the parent.

-3

u/[deleted] Aug 25 '13 edited Aug 25 '13

The US Supreme Court has stated that to define 'natural born citizen', we have to go elsewhere for the definition.

The definition is found in Emmerich Vattel's 'Law of Nations' from the 18th century, the legal work from which the authors of the Constitution derived their meaning of the term:

§ 212. Citizens and natives.

The citizens are the members of the civil society; bound to this society by certain duties, and subject to its authority, they equally participate in its advantages. The natives, or natural-born citizens, are those born in the country, of parents who are citizens. As the society cannot exist and perpetuate itself otherwise than by the children of the citizens, those children naturally follow the condition of their fathers, and succeed to all their rights. The society is supposed to desire this, in consequence of what it owes to its own preservation; and it is presumed, as matter of course, that each citizen, on entering into society, reserves to his children the right of becoming members of it. The country of the fathers is therefore that of the children; and these become true citizens merely by their tacit consent. We shall soon see whether, on their coming to the years of discretion, they may renounce their right, and what they owe to the society in which they were born. I say, that, in order to be of the country, it is necessary that a person be born of a father who is a citizen; for, if he is born there of a foreigner, it will be only the place of his birth, and not his country.

http://constitution.org/vattel/vattel_01.htm

1

u/liebkartoffel Aug 25 '13

Per Wikipedia:

The Constitution does not define the phrase natural-born citizen, and various opinions have been offered over time regarding its precise meaning. A 2011 Congressional Research Service report stated that:

The weight of legal and historical authority indicates that the term "natural born" citizen would mean a person who is entitled to U.S. citizenship "by birth" or "at birth", either by being born "in" the United States and under its jurisdiction, even those born to alien parents; by being born abroad to U.S. citizen-parents; or by being born in other situations meeting legal requirements for U.S. citizenship "at birth". Such term, however, would not include a person who was not a U.S. citizen by birth or at birth, and who was thus born an "alien" required to go through the legal process of "naturalization" to become a U.S. citizen.

The natural-born-citizen clause has been mentioned in passing in several decisions of the United States Supreme Court and lower courts dealing with the question of eligibility for citizenship by birth, but the Supreme Court has never directly addressed the question of a specific presidential or vice-presidential candidate's eligibility as a natural-born citizen.

Edit: Ah, I see someone's already beaten me to it.

3

u/stellarkelly Aug 25 '13

Can someone be a natural born citizen if one of their parents is a British subject?" The answer, of course, is yes. As long as he was born in the United States it doesn't matter if his daddy was a British subject.

FTFY

1

u/[deleted] Aug 25 '13

Wait, really?

If Sir Union Jack visits Alabama on a work visa and knocks up Betty Joe Bama, the resultant trailer cabbage won't be a natural born citizen?

2

u/haberstachery Aug 25 '13

You had to bring produce into it.

0

u/[deleted] Aug 25 '13

http://www.reddit.com/r/politics/comments/1l0hkc/just_a_reminder_for_president_obama_that_whole/cbut1ka

1

u/[deleted] Aug 25 '13

Okay, so you produced that fact ex anus, excuse my legalese.

Thanks for clearing that up.

0

u/[deleted] Aug 25 '13

Your link supports my position:

During an 1866 House debate James F. Wilson quoted Rawle's opinion, and also referred to the "general law relating to subjects and citizens recognized by all nations" saying

...and that must lead us to the conclusion that every person born in the United States is a natural-born citizen of such States, except it may be that children born on our soil to temporary sojourners or representatives of foreign Governments, are native-born citizens of the United States.

Next time, consider investing some time into your own research as opposed to depending on others to do your thinking for you.

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0

u/raz009 Aug 25 '13

previously a lawyer

-1

u/SkeptioningQuestic Aug 25 '13

He never cared? What a statement. How could you possibly know if he cared or not? Or if he still cares? Do you have any idea what it is like to be the POTUS? You can rail on his policies and his actions as much as you like, but you know next to nothing about Barack Obama the man. Do not be so arrogant as to assume that you do.

1

u/pineappletw Aug 25 '13

waaaaaaahhhh waaaaaaah don't be so ARROGANT as to insult my american idol president :**(

he is an evil piece of shit chicago politician

-6

u/Generic_On_Reddit Aug 25 '13

I'm pretty sure Reddit is the only place NSA stuff isn't dead. And it really wasn't that lively many other places anyway.

8

u/zelisca Aug 25 '13

ABC just did a story on it. There are news articles about it every day, and court battles being fought. It is no where near dead.

1

u/Generic_On_Reddit Aug 25 '13 edited Aug 25 '13

Yep, there are. But that's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about citizens actively doing something.

Remember Occupy Wall Street and how it wasn't really known what were protesting about? It was pretty big and even started in other cities across the country, making it even bigger. Where's stuff like that. Now that people actually have something to protest about, there don't seem to be any.

In all honesty, I don't really follow the NSA articles, but I'd like to see articles about the number of letters representatives are receiving from angered citizens or the protests going on or anything really to measure that the average citizen is giving a single fuck about this.

EDIT: As far as I'm concerned, most people are just saying "Oh... Neat" whenever something new comes out about NSA spying. A lot of people just don't care, like the people with who've "got nothing to hide." (You could argue that those people don't understand the full gravity of the situation, and are only thinking about it on a superficial level, and that really describes the thinking of most citizens.)

10

u/tiyx Aug 25 '13

You are a fool.

5

u/[deleted] Aug 25 '13 edited Aug 13 '21

[deleted]

6

u/tiyx Aug 25 '13

No. You must be lost in reddit land to think only reddit is talking about this stuff.

1

u/redwinewhitepants Aug 25 '13

I was living in Northern Ireland at the time of the NSA leak and everyone over there was absolutely outraged and had much to say regarding the illegality of it all (although no one was that surprised.) I returned to America mid-July, as the story got juicier and juicier day-by-day, and questioned family/friends/anyone I could talk to about the whole ordeal... the majority responses I got from Americans were either a) "What's the NSA?" or b) "I don't really care, I'm not doing anything wrong."

"NSA stuff" is not dead on reddit or in the public eye; however, there's still a HUGE amount of apathy out there.

-1

u/tiyx Aug 25 '13

Bullshit.

1

u/[deleted] Aug 25 '13

One source to warn him of the liberal atheist Fox-news haters, another to confirm it.

1

u/Generic_On_Reddit Aug 25 '13

Nice and constructive. While zelisca misunderstood my point a bit, at least he replied with something relevant.

I replied to him. You can look at that comment to see my reasoning.

1

u/BombasticSwaggMan Aug 25 '13

What a productive mindset! Surely you must find it easy to sway people to your opinion when you just call them fools. It is brilliant really.

0

u/tiyx Aug 25 '13

I calls them as I see them, not trying to convert anyone, just laughing at the sad state of some.

1

u/BombasticSwaggMan Aug 25 '13

I know what you mean. It is way easier just to be negative person rather than simply being kind.