It's not as if the Clinton Dynasty ever attempted to mandate the use of "clipper chips" (encryption chips with a government backdoor) in mobile phones, or tried to ban strong encryption.
FYI, the primary political folks promoting encryption were small government, libertarian republicans. (These folks mostly don't exist anymore.) John Ashcroft was fairly prominent among them:
John Kerry and John Ashcroft were two of the most prominent opponents of clipper. It is dishonest and inaccurate to claim that the Republicans were against it and the Democrats were for it, both sides were split.
Similarly, it's a bit of a reach to claim that "the Clinton dynasty" tried to mandate usage. The NSA offered the chip without royalties, and Bill Clinton endorsed it and proposed it be added to the NIST crypto standards. It was a strong nudge to make it available for free; but it never really approached the level of an attempted mandate.
Clipper was a horrible horrible idea; and there were (and still are) members of both parties who think that these sort of backdoored crypto schemes are a good idea. Clipper (and similarly flawed proposals) don't typically originate from a politician; they typically originate from the military-industrial complex and are expressed through a politician.
Partisans always have trouble remembering history though... they forget when "their side" does wrong, but they remember clearly the wrongs of the "other" side. And vice versa for good things.
During the 90's I started off as a Clinton-supporting democrat. At that time, support for encryption was primarily a position held by the "black helicopter" crowd. ("Black helicopters" refers to allegedly paranoid fantasies by right wing militias that federal agents will come for them in black helicopters.)
Note that I'm not attempting to promote any particular party - note that I said the folks who promote encryption don't really exist anymore.
If John gets the nomination, it might be entertaining, but would be another example of the LP shooting themselves in the foot (he's great guy, but not a politician). This election cycle is the best chance they've had to date to become a major party, and I hope they pick someone that at least looks and acts mainstream so they get TV airtime (while keeping LP culture close to their heart)
I disagree. Four decades isn't that much, given it's totally achievable for one person to spend that much time in public office. Bernie Sanders has 35.
This is a good discussion to have if everyone can keep our feels to ourselves.
Why do some people seem to have the opinion that authoritarianism (anti-privacy) is a feature of one political party (or ideology) more than another. As far as I can tell, there are only a handful of congresspersons who are strong protectors of the fourth amendment. Amash - R, Wryden - D, Rand Paul - R, Ron Paul - R, Udall - D. and a few others. Most just follow whatever the party whip tells them to do, and then there are a handful of very authoritarian troublemakers: ie: Pete King - R and Dutch Ruppersberger - D, et al.
> Why do some people seem to have the opinion that authoritarianism (anti-privacy) is a feature of one political party (or ideology) more than another
The parties market themselves as anti-authoritarian to their own base, while (correctly) characterizing the other party as authoritarian. The marketing propaganda plays off peoples' varying desires for specific freedoms, and whips them into an aggressive fervor bent on taking away freedom from the other team. The politicians are then free to implement the authoritarian policies purchased by their respective sponsors.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crypto_Wars
https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20151119/18032932868/hilla...
FYI, the primary political folks promoting encryption were small government, libertarian republicans. (These folks mostly don't exist anymore.) John Ashcroft was fairly prominent among them:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Ashcroft#As_U.S._Senator_...
Kids these days don't even remember the 90's.