Trump is the best president/leader in the last 150 years.

Brought in tons of job, made the world afraid of us/respect us again, expose obama for wiretapping, exposed hillary and the democrat party for being socialists/communists, stopped terrorists attacks, is going to build the wall, the list is endless...

The budget for the year is still Obama's administration's work. Obama didn't order the wiretapping as far as I know. Even though he(trump) was wiretapped. The world still respect US, but perhaps not the current leader. But he is new in the game so things will probably improve. The democrats are socialists/communists for having different goals for US for the next few years? Even though by the standard in the rest of western, they are quite far right.

I believe those terrorists attacks would be stopped anyway. It's not directly his work, now is it?

Trump was not wiretapped. Even Devin Nunes stated as much.

There was incidental collection of Trump staffers, that's about it. That means it was on the other end, they were talking to "bad dudes" who were legally tapped.

Stop being in denial of Obama's war atrocities.

N64DD is still having a melt down? God damn

You're Canadian. You don't know what a great leader is :X

Pretty good Onion article

I must have mixed my facts up. =/

Who knew that N64DD's view of the best President was a corpulent caucasian version of Tiger Woods?

Yeah, in today's media climate that isn't really your fault.

What's now being discussed is if the unmasking of American names caught up while wiretapping "bad dudes" was legal or not. It likely was legal, as even those unmasked names remain under extreme protection and secrecy. Trump tower, Trump, direct wire-tapping of any American, and Obama are not involved.

You're going to be hating yourself after the massive backlash that occurs.

The only ones that are backlashing are those on the left. It didn't matter what candidate we had or what they were doing, they'd be against him/her no matter what. Look at what happened with the Supreme Court judge. Case in point.

I couldn't play along anymore when you said America is the greatest country on earth. It's really not

What an utterly repugnant thing to say. Which country is better?

@jointed: Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Switzerland, Norway, Denmark, Japan, Germany, Austria, and I'm sure plenty others.

Pretty much what this dude said.

This isn't defending Trump but this entire view point is absolutely ignorant.. Both parties have been bending over for the fossil fuels industries for decades.. The only difference is Democrats pretended to be actually pro environment.. Take a look at Clinton's platform.. She was pro fracking, pro fossil fuels industry.. Her VP was basically bought and paid for by the fossil coal industry in his home state.. If people actually cared about the environment they would be throwing both parties under the bus, because outside of a few limp wristed policies, and "promises" the Democrats have done jack shit in environmental policy.

If Clinton were in power the exact same shit would be happening because the establishment Democrats toed the establishment line in keeping fossil fuels happy for decades now. The first step to improving our environment is getting money out of politics, because at this point regardless of the party they are all heavily funded by fossil fuels.

Having lived in several of those countries and being a citizen of two of them, I can safely say that they're authoritarian shitholes. Possibly with the exception of Denmark, Japan and Norway. To even include Canada and Germany is actually quite hilarious.

lol authoritarian shit holes lol.

Delusional, maybe you and the rest of the white nationalists on this site should band together and start your own utopia.

Hmm, do even know what I'm referring to?

"White nationalist".....I wonder what you communists will do when you meet people real white nationalists. Hint: calling them white nationalists won't help you.

I love how you don't specifically state which countries you've been in, you just leave it at several.

Canada and Australia are authoritative states? Jesus fucking christ dude, if you're going to troll, at least put some fucking effort into it.

As opposed to your overuse of communist and Marxist at every turn?

Go ahead, leave the western world behind and found your little empire of freedom. Unless of course your hyperbole is really complete nonsense.

Hmm, ok. We have a guy claiming that all these countries are better than the US...and since I know marxist Americans like the back of my own hand, I'm certain that he's never visited any of these countries himself. I claim, based on the fact that I come from Europe, that several of them are authoritarian in nature.

...and I'm the one trolling? Nice one mate.

@HoolaHoopMan:The difference is that several of the leftists on these boards have marxist/communist views while I've flat out denied the existence of race on many occasions.

The most ironic thing is that this kind of labelling back and forth would be illegal in most of the countries on that list since it's criminalized as slander. Germany and Sweden even have special internet task forces that track down people and fine them. Hence why I'm calling them authoritarian shitholes.

I believe in Sweden they had for short while, part of a TV program I think, someone or a group of people trying to track down people who were trolling online and confront them with it in real life. No one who could fine them though. Got a source for that?

Another war lover president of united states of America

The "group" you are talking about is a stalinist activist group called "Researchgruppen". They hack people and then hand them over to the government and the government then uses the following provisions on them:

Chapter 5, section 1 of the Swedish penal code:
"A person who points out someone as being a criminal or as having a reprehensible way of living or otherwise furnishes information intended to cause exposure to the disrespect of others, shall be sentenced for defamation to a fine."

Chapter 5, section 3 of the Swedish penal code:
"A person who vilifies another by an insulting epithet or accusation or by other infamous conduct towards him, shall be sentenced, if the act is not punishable under Section 1 or 2, for insulting behaviour to a fine."

@jointed:

Yeah, I don't think you know what authoritarianism means.

By your logic, the U.S. is authoritarian considering that our laws encourage the state in taking property from its citizen, even if they're innocent. Our congress is supporting a measure that would eliminate internet privacy and Donald Trump has voiced support for strengthening libel laws. Is drowning in debt due to healthcare and education truly making us free, despite needing the two? Do I even need to mention Jim Crow and HUAC from the 50s to 70s?

No country is perfect or truly free. There are always going to be a set of restrictions in one aspect or another, depending on the country itself. Would and should Germany allow anti-holocaust propaganda to fester because of free speech? Considering Germany's role and the power the of denial, no. Hell, the Nordic states aren't entirely perfect due to their drug laws but it doesn't take away that they are successful with their education and healthcare systems compared to our capitalistic approach.

Hmm, let's see, having laws against "insulting behaviour" is not the same as libel laws. Also, these laws are just the tip of the iceberg. If you combine them with massive surveillance and political agendas, they become exponentially intrusive. You don't really know what it's like if you haven't lived there.

How exactly are countries like Australia and Canada authoritative, you're not expanding on your statements, you're calling them shitholes and your explanation is merely "just trust me on this one."

Doesn't matter if the link would be in Swedish. Norwegian here ;) Apparently we had this researchgruppen as well. But only for TV, short lived. I don't think anyone was jailed because of it. Or even fined.

Swedish here,

Had sweden been an authorative shithole, I would be in jail a long time ago.

Is Sweden a better than the US? In some ways, yes, just like how the US is better than Sweden in other ways. But no, Sweden is not an authorative shithole. When it comes to freedom of speech, Sweden is ranked 8th in the world according to reporters without borders. The issues with freedom of the press is not perfect of course. But the biggest threats seem to come from certain individuals more than anything.

https://rsf.org/en/ranking

Don't really care about your personal anecdotes since you have next to no credibility. Those countries I've listed all rank higher in the US in many categories including freedom.

The underlined statement all but blares, "I'm not evaluating the countries objectively," in bright flashing letters.

Freedom is a rather nebulous term. Please explain the criterion for freedom to back up your assertion.

I assumed he was referring to this link which was posted a short while ago: https://rsf.org/en/ranking

I'm sure he'll let me know if I'm wrong, though :-P

That is merely press freedom, that is all I see, at least.

Let's not get side tracked here. You blatantly called several countries which have some of the highest standards of living, freedom of press, and democratic political institutions as being 'totalitarian shit holes'.

Normally I'd ask someone to explain themselves, but I'm sure I'd get nothing more than anecdotal ramblings as a response. Look, you can have grievances to the way countries are run in comparison to one another, but NONE of the countries that were originally brought up fit the description you're describing. You're telling me they have a task force to track people down for what.....posting questionable opinions and posts online? Guess what, the US does that as well when they follow and track e-information shared online. At what line do you consider something totalitarian? If that's your red line then the US is public enemy #1.

(shrug) then I'm not sure what he was referring to

There was a press freedom link earlier in the thread, here's another similar ranking: https://freedomhouse.org/report/fiw-2017-table-country-scores

Plenty more out there you just need to Google it. Cato puts out the Human Freedom Index: https://object.cato.org/sites/cato.org/files/human-freedom-index-files/human-freedom-index-2016.pdf

Ok, thanks for clearing that up.

Press freedom is not the same as freedom of speech...actually in Sweden's case its the complete opposite since it's the press that plays a huge role in silencing citizens. Examples of this have already been provided. All the big newspapers in the country are owned by the same people, and therefore they have the same leftist political agenda...and on top of this they have no problem whatsoever with going after individuals. Have fun going toe to toe with a billion dollar corporation.

In the end the only "legit" existing platform that can be used to criticize the swedish press are the newspapers themselves, everything else is either "hate speech" or right wing extremism...unless you're accusing them of not being leftist enough. If you do that, it's regarded as "an interesting critique".

It's like American mainstream media without Fox News. Sure, leftists dislike Fox News, but imagine if there wasn't ANY right wing media platform in a country where at least 50 % of the population is right wing and the rest of the media corporations actively works to keep new platforms from forming.

So yeah, technically the press in Sweden is free and independent in relations to the government...this doesn't mean anything though.

Sounds to me like you're describing the invisible hand of the free market and capitalism working how it should. The irony of someone who can't stop calling others Marxists whining about private corporation monopolies is truly astounding. Do you have any self awareness? Typical of right-wingers to go after free enterprise and the free market if they disagree with who is using it.

First of all, you ought to read up on basic political philosophy. I suggest you start with Adam Smith.

Monopoly-control is a core aspect of the free market. I believe it's called "antitrust laws" in the US, and all of the original pro-capitalist ideologues supported them. They're essential for the existence of fair competition. Sweden has these laws as well, but the media corporations were founded during the 1800s, before they entered into force, and since laws can't act retroactively.....yeah you know the deal.

Secondly....what? Complaining about the behavior of private actors is not the same as complaining about their principal right to exist. Private actors having TOTAL control of a given market whilst simultaneously stopping new actors from forming is not "capitalism working as it should", actually it's the definition of the opposite. It's one of the main dangers with capitalism and the only solution is antitrust laws. This is acknowledged by all classical liberals on the spectrum, from Hayek to Friedman. The fact that you even brought this up is very telling of how much you know...

<img src="https://68.media.tumblr.com/7e87f06fd6f49e15b90e24bb725b929d/tumblr_nwi2h92tYt1uj1zxso1_400.gif.jpg">

I am aware of Adam Smith - he is pretty tame when it comes to other economists you mentioned (smart dude). And no, it is not "acknowledged by all classical liberals" that anti-trust laws and monopoly busting are legitimate. Friedman for example believed they did more harm than good. The state breaking up a monopoly is a clear government intrusion in their eyes and even with monopolies the situation will fix itself, according to classical liberalism.

I think it was pretty clear what I meant. If the media in Sweden was right-wing and not liberal you'd be a-okay with it. Only when it supports liberal-leaning individuals do conservatives have an issue with the free market.

The thread (at least now, originally it was about Trump lol) in any case was about freedom as dictated by the governments. Ironically, if Sweden's government did more to silence the so-called liberal-leaning media it would then actually be the authoritarian shit hole you claim it is.

Sometimes I don't even know if you're trolling or serious. Whatever the case, give me some of what you're smoking.