When it comes to spouting hypocrisy about the NSA’s spying, the Europeans have no equals.

When it comes to spouting hypocrisy about the NSA’s spying, the Europeans have no equals.

BY DENIS MACSHANE |JULY 2, 2013

In 1929, U.S. Secretary of State Henry L. Stimson closed down the State Department's codebreaking department with a famously laconic justification: "Gentlemen do not read each others' mail."  Now, all of Europe is in a great tizzy over revelations that the United States hoovers up emails, Skype calls, and most cell phone traffic in its relentless pursuit of bad guys. But for every terrorist or human trafficker, there are a million blameless citizens (and probably a few gentlemen) who feel a sense of -- if not outrage, then deep unease -- that privacy has seemingly been abolished under President Barack Obama.

Some of the anger is synthetic. When I was Tony Blair's Europe minister, I was given very clear instructions that I should not use my cell phone in Paris because a transcript of what I said would be on a French minister's desk within 15 minutes.

I ignored the advice not because I doubted it was true but because I couldn't think of a more efficient way to convey Her Majesty's Government's line to the French. Yet French President François Hollande has nonetheless condemned the alleged U.S. eavesdropping, protesting that "We cannot accept this kind of behavior from partners and allies." Hollande's trade minister, meanwhile, hinted that the snooping could endanger the EU-U.S. transatlantic trade negotiations due to open in Washington next week. Paris had clearly forgotten the 2005 trial of a dozen Elysée officials who, at the behest of President Francois Mitterrand, listened in on the phone calls of political opponents and journalists in the 1980s…..To Read More….

My Take - I have been seeing all this rightous indignation for days now and.....chuckling.  He's right!  The Euros are so hypocritical that I don't even think anyone really cares what they're spouting publically.  So....let me say this so that even Francois Hollande could understand it.  Every government on the planet spies on every other government on the planet and most of them spy on their own citizens and especially those in positions of power or responsibility.  It may be illegal in some countries, as it is in the U.S., but that's what's going on........ everywhere! 

So then, here are the rules.  You know something that's secret.  The governments of the world want to know what it is.  You are doing things they may not like.  The governments of the world  want to know all about it.  So telling the world that this is wrong is only okay if you're not doing it.  So, I want to be fair about this; let's hear from all those who have eschewed all this .....nasty spy stuff......and have pruified themselves before the world.  It's time for all those who are truly pure to speak up! 

Tick...tick....tick....tick....tick....tick....tick......I'm waiting ..... tick.... tick....tick.... tick.... tick....  tick ....tick.....I'm still waiting........Okay, this may take some time so while we're waiting perhaps we should contemplate The Sounds of Silence.

Hello darkness, my old friend
I've come to talk with you again
Because a vision softly creeping
Left its seeds while I was sleeping
And the vision that was planted in my brain
Still remains

Within the sound of silence

In restless dreams I walked alone
Narrow streets of cobblestone
'Neath the halo of a street lamp
I turned my collar to the cold and damp
When my eyes were stabbed by the flash of a neon light
That split the night

And touched the sound of silence

And in the naked light I saw
Ten thousand people, maybe more
People talking without speaking
People hearing without listening
People writing songs that voices never share
And no one dared

Disturb the sound of silence

"Fools", said I, "You do not know
Silence like a cancer grows
Hear my words that I might teach you
Take my arms that I might reach you"
But my words, like silent raindrops fell
And echoed

In the wells of silence

And the people bowed and prayed
To the neon god they made
And the sign flashed out its warning
In the words that it was forming
And the sign said, "The words of the prophets are written on the subway walls
And tenement halls"

And whispered in the sounds of silence

Tick.....tick.....tick.....tick.....tick..... I'm still waiting!