NSA caught spying on 3 previous French leaders

Surveillance powers are about, wait for it, power. You can’t help but understand this as you read the newly revealed top secret transcripts typed out by some NSA pencil pusher listening in on the French president’s phone calls. Just put yourself in the shoes of the French president knowing that any nearby cellphone could be recording you at all times–even when you aren’t using the phone. What you’re reading here is presumably the report sent back to be read by high U.S. officials.

French President Francois Hollande has approved holding secret meetings in Paris to discuss the eurozone crisis, particularly the consequences of a Greek exit from the eurozone. On 18 May, Hollande directed Prime Minister (PM) Jean-Marc Ayrault to set up a meeting at the Office of the President (the Elysee) for the following week….Hollande stressed that the meeting would be secret. (COMMENT: The French president seems worried that if word were to get out that Paris is seriously considering the possibility of a Greek exit, it would deepen the crisis.) In addition, secret meetings are to be held in Paris between French [officials] and members of the German Social Democratic Party (SPD). Hollande assured the PM that hosting the meeting at the Elysee was “doable,” although Ayrault warned the president to keep the event a secret so as to avoid diplomatic problems. (COMMENT: By “diplomatic problems,” Ayrault is referring to what could happen if German Chancellor Angela Merkel finds out that Hollande is going behind her back to meet with the German opposition.) …This made Hollande very worried for Greece and the Greek people, who might react by voting for an extremist party… Released by Wikileaks: https://wikileaks.org/nsa-france/intercepts/

Details:

(PARIS) — France’s prime minister says the U.S. must do everything it can, and quickly, to repair “damage” to U.S.-French relations from revelations that the National Security Agency eavesdropped on French presidents and senior officials.

Manuel Valls told legislators Wednesday that the release of WikiLeaks documents describing NSA intercepts were “inadmissible” between allies.

Valls says U.S. Ambassador Jane Hartley was summoned to the French Foreign Ministry later Wednesday for an “official explanation” of the NSA’s activities.

He says French President Francois Hollande is expected to speak with President Barack Obama in the coming hours. Senior French intelligence officials are also heading to the U.S. soon.

The disclosures, which emerged late Tuesday in French daily newspaper Liberation and investigative website Mediapart, mean that France has joined Germany on the list of U.S. allies targeted by the National Security Agency…

More: http://time.com/3933518/france-wikileaks-us-ambassador-nsa/

Any kid understands the urge to spy on your ‘enemies’ (parents, siblings and friends)…

In questions of powers, then, let no more be heard of confidence in man, but bind him down from mischief by the chains of the Constitution. — Thomas Jefferson