Thread

US sanctions force The Netherlands off Microsoft and toward alternative NixOS

388 points · 396 comments · mywacaday

guidoiaquinti · 1790685221 · focus · HN ↗
Several International Criminal Court (ICC) judges have been unable to access their bank accounts or receive routine salary payments and financial transfers due to financial blockages triggered by United States sanctions. In the country where they live
1. rapsey · 1790686393 · focus · HN ↗
  ICC judges getting the right wing activist treatment, except the activists get it from their own government.
  1. flohofwoe · 1790687230 · focus · HN ↗
    Concrete examples to verify such claims please? Also in civilized countries such things are decided by the justice system, not the government (which to the surprise of many simple minded people - like a certain US president and his fanbase - is independent from the government).
    pc86 · 1790687573 · focus · HN ↗
    In what universe is the judiciary not part of the government?
    bunderbunder · 1790688049 · focus · HN ↗
    Government is a term with multiple senses.
    In the US it’s common to only use it to describe the entire apparatus for holding, administering and enforcing state power.
    But it can also be used to mean the current ruling power in a parliamentary system together with the administrative bodies under its direct control. So something more akin to just the executive branch in the US system. And then certain state agencies such as the judiciary are meant to be independent of the government under that meaning of the term. I believe this is the most common understanding of the word outside the US.
    edgyquant · 1790688456 · focus · HN ↗
    Its a really weird use of the word government to not actually refer to the government but to the executive and saying the “courts are outside of the government” makes it seem like they aren’t a part of the state.
    flohofwoe · 1790689147 · focus · HN ↗
    The important point is that courts have the power to overrule unconstitutional or unlawful government decisions.
    bunderbunder · 1790689559 · focus · HN ↗
    Why is it so weird that a language as widely spoken as English should have dialectical variation?
    Wait ‘til you find out what some of my friends mean when they say “pavement”.
    impossiblefork · 1790692517 · focus · HN ↗
    Consider though system like the Swedish system which existed in the Viking age with Things and a king.
    Things were courts with huge power, and consisted of a gathering of all free men and had basically unlimited power, because they were the people. Meanwhile, the government was the person of the king.
    I think that's an example of a system where the courts (Thing) is clearly not part of the government.
    saulapremium · 1790692712 · focus · HN ↗
    I'd say it's weirder to conflate state and government.
    hunterpayne · 1790742074 · focus · HN ↗
    The Judiciary is one of the 3 branches of the US government. Perhaps English isn't your 1st language, but the courts are always part of the government and the word government would include the courts in English. No, there is no other interpretation of the word government in English.
    flohofwoe · 1790688098 · focus · HN ↗
    Germany for instance? Google "Bundesverfassungsgericht". I don't think such a separated checks and balances system is all that unusual in democratic countries. A major task of a "proper" justice system is to keep the government in check.
    mike_hearn · 1790693075 · focus · HN ↗
    The judiciary is always a part of the government. It may be notionally separate from the executive, but that's (a) a different thing and (b) not always meaningful from the perspective of normal citizens. And it's not at all standard that the judiciary is meant to keep the government in check. Historically that's not been the case at all, and the growth of US Supreme Court style powers to invalidate legislation is a relatively recent phenomenon that governments can decide to end or restrict arbitrarily at any time.
    flohofwoe · 1790694329 · focus · HN ↗
    The word "government" seems to be used differently depending on language and country.
    For instance in Germany, the specific words "Bundesregierung" (Federal Government, or just short "government") and "Landesregierungen" (State Governments) explicitly describe the "executive part" of the "political system".
    The Federal and State Parliaments are the "legislative part" and the courts are the "judiciary part" (with the "Federal Constitutional Court" at the top). This whole idea of strict separation of power is the most important foundation of the German political system.
    When talking about "the government" in Germany, people mean the institutions of the executive (mainly the chancellor and ministries, sometimes also including the president, but never the parliaments and courts).
    And tbh, I would also have a hard time describing the US Democratic Party as the "current US government" just because they're sitting in the Congress.
    mike_hearn · 1790695385 · focus · HN ↗
    The term government is ambiguous in English as well, which is why people who want to talk precisely about statecraft use the words "executive" or "administration" to refer specifically to the part that isn't the parliament or judiciary. Sometimes people use the word "state" to refer to the combination of all of them, but in common parlance the word government can be used interchangeably with the word state and people who aren't especially political would normally do so.
    sholladay · 1790689289 · focus · HN ↗
    It is, but in casual conversation, “government” often means the people/party currently in power (of the executive and/or legislature).
    You can see this when people say “[X] is unable to form a government”. They don’t mean unable to form a judiciary.
    ecshafer · 1790688282 · focus · HN ↗
    The concrete example would be Canada "debanking" the truckers who protested in Ottawa for exercising their GOD given right to free speech. Another concrete example would be Germany having banks close accounts for the AFD and AFD related people.
    flohofwoe · 1790688593 · focus · HN ↗
    Some basic googling would tell you that:
    1. the AfD thing was the decision of individual banks, not of the German government. Basically, in a free world companies can decide who they want to do business with.
    2. the Canadian trucker "debanking" was quickly resolved because the Canadian justice system did their job and overruled the unlawful "emergency" government order
    coredog64 · 1790693167 · focus · HN ↗
    After being heard to exclaim "Will no one rid me of this turbulent priest?", Henry II subsequently explained that the 4 knights each came to their own individual decisions about how best to deploy their swords.
    flohofwoe · 1790693683 · focus · HN ↗
    A poor analogy for democratic countries (spot on for Putin and his merry band of oligarchs though).
    SllX · 1790694088 · focus · HN ↗
    Being a democracy does not make countries immune from the phenomenon where under their own judgment, private actors decide with information provided to them in part by their own government, it’s more often than not in their best interest to be with them rather than against them.
    ecshafer · 1790695344 · focus · HN ↗
    What if the private company is "deciding under their own judgement because the VP's roomate from College is a chief of staff and they were told it would be really helpful if they decided in a beneficial way? We saw from the Twitter files that Twitter had an active relationship with members of the Democratic party and agents of the government to decide under their own judgement to ban or downrank certain people and ideas. This led to another concrete example of major outlets being effectively banned (The New York Post) due to the Hunter Biden Laptop issue. This behind the scene collusion is where the "they are a private company" line falls apart.
    SllX · 1790697261 · focus · HN ↗
    They are private companies. That doesn’t mean it isn’t in their best interest to maintain good relations with the people directing the nation’s sovereign power.
    Never forget: sovereign power outranks corporate power. Corporations are better at making money. Sovereigns are better at violence.
    Y-bar · 1790693312 · focus · HN ↗
    Which _specific_ GOD gave that right and did any of the other gods concur?
    ecshafer · 1790693928 · focus · HN ↗
    There is only one GOD.
    kijashdkujdfhas · 1790694686 · focus · HN ↗
    According to you. Others may believe in values ranging from 0 to some large N.
    benenrjdnz · 1790694864 · focus · HN ↗
    Off by one error.
    flohofwoe · 1790695163 · focus · HN ↗
    Damn right! But I doubt the Flying Spaghetti Monster cares much about the indiviual rights of Canadian truckers (<a href="https://www.spaghettimonster.org/" rel="nofollow">https://www.spaghettimonster.org/).
    Shiggy_ · 1790694248 · focus · HN ↗
    The obvious answer here is "the one that you hate." Or, the Christian god of Abraham.
    The preamble is not subtle: "Canada is founded upon principles that recognize the supremacy of God and the rule of law."
    Now, legally/philosophically speaking, the Canadian concept of free-speech is laughably weak, as is all Canadian rights. Specifically, section one clearly states that rights are subject to "reasonable limits prescribed by law as can be demonstrably justified in a free and democratic society". Effectively, if the government decides that you're "not reasonable," you have no rights.
    The American system is quite clear about their rights being absolute and derived from God, where the idea is that the government is to uphold the existing divine rights afforded to all human beings, as opposed to the British system of which Canada (and the rest of the common-wealth is based off of) is a part of, where the government _grants_ the rights.
    Another example of this is the British crown, in which authority is given by God. Many of the older cities derive their local authority in the same way. If I recall correctly, I believe that the city of London is so old that they actually mixed it up, and derive theirs from "time immemorial."
    Y-bar · 1790694728 · focus · HN ↗
    Serious question: Why would I hate any god?
    Shiggy_ · 1790694865 · focus · HN ↗
    Serious question: Why are you pretending that you don't know which god the western world is referring to in its legal documents?
    Y-bar · 1790695101 · focus · HN ↗
    I don’t regularly read legal documents of nations I don’t live in. Why did you assume I hate any god?
    Edit: the constitution in my country mentions no religion or god. Neither does the Lisbon Treaty or the Treaty on European Union.
    dragonwriter · 1790695375 · focus · HN ↗
    > The American system is quite clear about their rights being absolute and derived from God
    No, the legal system is not; there are non-legal documents which claim both of those things, but being subject to “reasonable limits prescribed by law as can be demonstrably justified in a free and democratic society” is very much how the US elgal system treats them. There is even, in federal Constitutional case law, an established, gradated system of tests (rational basis test, intermediate scrutiny, and strict scrutiny) depending on which right is at issue and for whom it is being limited as to whether there is sufficient justification.
    someonebaggy · 1790696207 · focus · HN ↗
    The same people who will tell you it's wrong to debank truckers for blocking highways will also complain that we don't debank climate protestors who block highways.
    someonebaggy · 1790696279 · focus · HN ↗
    btw Germany doesn't have free speech. It is explicitly illegal there to deny the holocaust (the German one) or to spread racial hatred.
    ecshafer · 1790697949 · focus · HN ↗
    All men, being created by GOD, have certain inalienable rights, like free speech. Whether a country infringes upon those rights or not is a different story. Germany has a history in authoritarianism that seems to persist.
    someonebaggy · 1790701681 · focus · HN ↗
    Personally, I was created by my parents.
    saulapremium · 1790703975 · focus · HN ↗
    Sigh, it's pretty depressing to have to read stuff like this on a place like HN that is otherwise pretty informed and mature.
    mhh__ · 1790688294 · focus · HN ↗
    This is only really true in certain countries that don't really do democracy. In Britain for example parliament is sovereign.
    rapsey · 1790688378 · focus · HN ↗
    Farage was debanked. So was Trump and Melania, AfD politicians, Le Penn in france.
    mhh__ · 1790688544 · focus · HN ↗
    I may have misread the topic of conversation but he was debanked by a private bank - I was arguing against juristocracy but possibly incorrectly aimed
    mike_hearn · 1790692846 · focus · HN ↗
    He was debanked by every bank in the UK, for entirely political reasons, and then they lied about it.
    To what extent this was explicitly coordinated by the government versus people who are merely strongly ideologically aligned with it is unclear; in systems as totalitarian as the UK is becoming it's a distinction without a difference as anyone not so aligned is quickly removed for one plausible reason or another and replaced with someone who is.
    foldr · 1790694029 · focus · HN ↗
    Err, no, he was debanked by the flashy private bank Coutts. A bank that would refuse to give most people an account.
    mike_hearn · 1790695082 · focus · HN ↗
    Err, no, he was debanked by Coutts and then denied accounts at every other bank. You apparently didn't read the statement he made at the time, so here it is:
    > I emailed the chairman, a lackey phoned me to say that it was a commercial decision, which I have to say, I don’t believe for a single moment. So I thought, well, there we are, I’ll have to go and find a different bank. I’ve been to six, no seven banks actually. Ask them all, could I have a personal and a business account? And the answer has been no.
    Denied accounts at seven banks, and in the end he was right - the reason Coutts tried to close his account was simply because some woke committee hated him, it was purely political. There are no legal or commercial reasons to deny him an account, yet somehow, every bank does so. With no bank in the UK he cannot make payments and without that ability he cannot live there, so the banks came very close to ensuring that the British people could not vote for him even though Reform is now the most popular party.
    The British establishment is entirely homogenous on this, because they claim anyone who supports Farage is insufficiently committed to "diversity and inclusion" (leftism) and thus must be forced out. It's indistinguishable from the banks all being directly controlled by the Labour party. The only reason Farage was able to stay is because Coutts were impatient; it was the dying days of the Conservative administration and they suddenly realized what was about to happen to them if they didn't make changes sharpish, so they stuck the FCA on NatWest and some heads rolled. But if Coutts had waited a bit longer until the next Labour government, there would have been no help coming and British democracy would have become even more sickly and fake than it already is (I say this as a British citizen).
    someonebaggy · 1790696399 · focus · HN ↗
    It's ironic because Farage would support every bank having the GOD-given right to deny people to have accounts.
    mike_hearn · 1790697411 · focus · HN ↗
    He launched a (short lived) website and organization to try and support people who had been debanked, so no he wouldn't. Farage is not focused on libertarian politics, if he ever was.
    foldr · 1790697299 · focus · HN ↗
    As far as I can discover, we only have Nigel Farage's word for the seven subsequent refusals from other banks. The issue with Coutts is on the record, as there was subsequent legal and regulatory action, etc. I for one don't believe Farage here. He may have been turned down by some other fancy private banks, but that is not the same thing as being debanked. In fact, NatWest (owners of Coutts) explicitly offered him a standard bank account when they notified him of closure of his Coutts account: <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/uk/nigel-farage-says-set-lose-coutts-account-offered-natwest-one-instead-2023-07-04/" rel="nofollow">https://www.reuters.com/world/uk/nigel-farage-says-set-lose-...
    The notion that banking, of all industries, has been taken over by woke leftists (please supply your own scare quotes for the first of those appellations – I give up) is for the birds. As for the establishment, your own take on this is inconsistent, first saying that the establishment is entirely homogenous and aligned against Farage, and then pointing out that the government of the day helped Farage to get his Coutts account back.
    mhh__ · 1790739259 · focus · HN ↗
    Banking has been taken over by HR and regulators
    foldr · 1790758998 · focus · HN ↗
    >taken over by HR
    Who hasn't?
    > and regulators
    Good! (I wonder why?)
    This is quite different from the claim that Coutts, of all organisations, was in hoc to 'woke leftists' while the country was under a Conservative government.
    mhh__ · 1790786656 · focus · HN ↗
    You don't actually think the Tory party is right wing, surely?
    Theresa May et al instituted net zero basically without a vote, huge liberalisation of various social matters, enormous spending on welfare, locked the country down, and then imported 4 million people!
    foldr · 1790787645 · focus · HN ↗
    I do not think that the Tory party is leftist, or 'woke' (whatever that even means these days).
    mhh__ · 1790791015 · focus · HN ↗
    They are or at least were in those years died in the wool woke. They minted coins with "diversity built Britain" on them, rishi held one up for the camera!
    foldr · 1790792542 · focus · HN ↗
    Again, we run into the fact that 'woke' is now a meaningless term of abuse. Most people would take it as an uncontroversial and largely apolitical observation that ethnic minority communities have made a significant contribution to the history of Britain (which was the point of the coin). If you think that's an example of woke extremism of some kind, it says more about you than about the Conservative party.
    Sunak himself certainly didn't present as a dyed in the wool wokist in the lead up to his permiership:
    > Whether it’s pulling down statues of historic figures, replacing the school curriculum with anti-British propaganda or rewriting the English language so we can’t even use words like ‘man’, ‘woman’ or ‘mother’ without being told we’re offending someone [... etc. etc.]
    <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2022/jul/29/rishi-sunak-liz-truss-culture-war-woke-nonsense" rel="nofollow">https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2022/jul/29/rishi-sunak...
    flohofwoe · 1790690318 · focus · HN ↗
    From what I can read on various news sites, not even LePenn blamed the government directly. All those cases were either business decisions of companies who can freely decide who they want as customers, or quickly overturned as unlawful by judges.
    It would be good if you did at least a minimal amount of due diligence before spreading misinformation (but I guess spreading misinformation is the whole point).
    tremon · 1790699261 · focus · HN ↗
    And all were denied because of the same problem: laundering russian money.
  2. embedding-shape · 1790687373 · focus · HN ↗
    Are you saying the US government been implementing sanctions to make right wing activists not be able to receive bank transfers? That sounds like friendly fire and backwards, are you sure you understood the "source" correctly?
    sebzim4500 · 1790688364 · focus · HN ↗
    Not from the US, but for example anti-lockdown campaigners in Canada had their bank accounts frozen IIRC
    embedding-shape · 1790691231 · focus · HN ↗
    Wow, I think disagreeing with a lockdown in the face of a pandemic is pretty fucking stupid but even so, freezing people's bank accounts is even more messed up and should not happen over any sort of non-violent political actions in a modern democracy. Seems unblocked now, but still that seems like a bananas reaction.
    For reference as I hadn't heard about it before:
    > Isabelle Jacques, assistant deputy minister of finance, told a committee of MPs that up to 210 bank accounts holding about $7.8 million were frozen under the financial measures contained in the Emergencies Act. - <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/emergency-bank-measures-finance-committee-1.6360769" rel="nofollow">https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/emergency-bank-measures-fin...
    someonebaggy · 1790696454 · focus · HN ↗
    They were blocking highways with their trucks, and the same people who criticise this still want to debank climate protestors who block highways with their bodies.
    edgyquant · 1790688495 · focus · HN ↗
    Previous administrations have yes.
  3. bunderbunder · 1790687402 · focus · HN ↗
    I’m trying to remember the last time an international criminal court judge came to my community and brandished a firearm while shouting slurs at me. It has to have been at least a few weeks now.
  4. iAMkenough · 1790687570 · focus · HN ↗
    You mean right-wing terrorists? The ones that forcibly invaded the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021 and attacked police officers in an effort to distrupt democracy?
    neuronexmachina · 1790688175 · focus · HN ↗
    The current admin views right-wing terrorists as brave heroes in service of Dear Leader.
    epistasis · 1790690168 · focus · HN ↗
    Currently in the US, it's not criminal if it's done at the bidding of Trump, or if Trump approves of the violence.
    The federal government is still stymieing the investigation of the ICE/DHS killings of Minneapolis citizens, violating their own policies requiring investigation.
    There's no more federal rule of law until there's a full change in power, and that requires installing a functional DOJ and a new Supreme Court that is more interested in the law than in furthering partisan politics.

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