On whom was Germany's spy spying when US supposedly used that spy to spy?...
U.S. officials are alerting some foreign intelligence services that documents detailing their secret cooperation with the United States have been obtained by former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden, according to government officials. Snowden, U.S. officials said, took tens of thousands of documents containing sensitive material about collection programs against adversaries such as Iran, Russia and China, operations that in some cases involve countries not publicly allied with the United States. The process of informing officials in capital after capital about the risk of disclosure they face has been painful and delicate. In some cases, one part of the cooperating government may know about the collaboration while others — such as the foreign ministry — may not, the officials said. The documents, if disclosed, could compromise operations, officials said.The duty of informing these other intelligence services, according to the Post, has fallen to the the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. This news comes as the administration is on the defensive about allegations that the NSA monitored the cell phone of German chancellor Angela Merkel. President Obama spoke with Merkel on Wednesday, where he "assured the chancellor that the United States is not monitoring and will not monitor the communications of the chancellor," according to Politico.
The European Union is in deep water but that, thankfully, hasn't stopped the Europeans from laughing at themselves. einige Schadenfreude (some Schadenfreude): "Dinner for One" (with subtitles) There are apparently a series of videos with Merkel and Sarko dubbed over discussing the Euro Crisis. It's pretty funny ...
Over at the DailyBeast, Stefan Theil has a really great write-up about rich nations interacting with poor nations, using a comparison of Texas/Louisiana/Florida & Greece/Italy/Spain. Imagine 27 Barack Obamas and John Boehners trying to get a debt and banking crisis under control. That, in essence,...
Consider me a fan of Norway. I traveled there extensively in my youth, and still have friends there. It is a beautiful country, with a traditionally pro-American foreign policy. It saddens me to see Norway have its version of the London bus bombings. Former congressional candidate...
KathleenDespite the fact that it is nowhere near a tsunami-prone area, the German government announced that it will phase out nuclear power over the next decade. Currently, Germany receives roughly a quarter of their energy from nuclear sources and no alternatives were cited in the...
In the past two weeks or so, everyone has been discussing the tragedy in Japan. In addition to the death toll, news headlines have been relentlessly speculating the impact of the Fukushima reactors. Matthew Shaffer's latest piece in NRO helps amalgamate some of the...
David Cameron has generated a stir in Europe by giving a speech in which he said that state-sponsored multiculturalism has failed:Note that Cameron was not criticizing multi-racial or multi-ethnic societies; he was proclaiming the failure of policies which sought to segregate and separate groups in the...
What a great day, the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall. That symbol of tyranny and oppression fell after decades of U.S. and West European refusal to give in to what at the time was proclaimed by the left to be the...
