In my understanding, the commonplace interpretation of the first amendment is largely due to a series of landmark cases through the early to mid-20th century. A lot of expansions were provided to the amendment that have been taken for granted since then and we are now going to see challenged. We'll see how many hold in due time but I wouldn't put good odds on it.
Anecdotally I've noticed these sorts of people much less often, at least on here as of late. Methinks their deniability isn't so plausible any more.
The idea that it's somehow suspicious to be in favor of free speech has got to be one of the worst developments in American politics.
And, for whatever it's worth, every vocal "free speech person" I know doesn't like the current administation. Some people actually just have principles!
Plenty of people happy to carry water for the admin as well. I just don't really have a great view of what people actually think about this issue.
[0]: to be clear, I do not believe there are normal people on that website.
I absolutely object to suppressing Gaza protests and banning LGBTQ books, or any other books for that matter.
https://sports.yahoo.com/mlb/article/trump-administration-re...
But yes, a court marshal is a completely different matter. You're speech is restricted if you take steps to work for the government in any capacity. As is your legal channels.
As for “the other way around” - what I saw the right wing complaining about was “being canceled”. Freedom of speech has never meant freedom from consequences for your actions. A private business is well within their rights to fire you if you’re posting racist or homophonic slurs online.
The only thing the first amendment provides is freedom from the government impeding your speech. Doing things like, you know, threatening jail time for journalists who say things they don’t like. Or, in a functioning US government, pulling funding from colleges because they’ve got students protesting over the current situation in the Middle East.
Just saying that it might not be the best model.
Hi there. You are seeing one right now. Well, seeing the words of one.
I am a free speech absolutist. What this administration is doing is abominable. I have always seen anti-Israeli campus posters as idiots, but Trump's crackdown on them is, imho, unconstitutional and immoral.
Exactly the opposite of your claim.
Yes, the current Israeli government is turning authoritarian (though again: not nearly as authoritarian as Palestine's governments), like so many others. That doesn't change reality though.
You say, as you slander your opposition.
If you proudly proclaim your hypocrisy like this, is it really any surprise that the rest of your moral argument falls flat?
You use words like fascism while decrying "framing". This is ridiculous.
But no, I don't advocate you getting banned for a stupid opinion. Perhaps that can be the minimal consensus.
The problem with free speech absolutism is that it leads to the 'paradox of tolerance'. We are now seeing the fruits of that line of thinking.
> The paradox of tolerance is a philosophical concept suggesting that if a society extends tolerance to those who are intolerant, it risks enabling the eventual dominance of intolerance; thereby undermining the very principle of tolerance.
If anything it's a slipperly slope logic. These people are idiots -> these people deserve bad things happening. Unfortuntaely, the admin is proving all those fallacies before us.
These are unfortunately the only circumstances in which I ever see Popper's "paradox" invoked.
An unfortunately overloaded term. 1) free speech absolutist meaning the government should not be censor private citizens speech in any way, 2) or twitter/similar is breaking the law by censoring X speech, 3) or twitter/similar should be considered a defacto public square and therefor the company twitter/similar can not legally censor speech on it, 4) or "I align with Elon Musk who calls himself a free speech absolutist", or etc.
Likely sapphicsnail was talking about the less principled, or not understood by principles by me, variety of people calling themselves free speech absolutist, who seem to dominate, or least be the most vocal, the conversation around "free speech absolutism" in reason years.
I don't think even free-speech absolutists apply it to a general right to share any arbitrary information, such as copyrighted films, classified war plans, trade secrets, doctor-patient or lawyer-client privileged information, or intimate recordings of people taken without consent (or without ability to consent).
Does sharing a non-intimate recording of someone count as speech? Can the government make it illegal for me to share a photo that a government official thinks makes them look ugly? What about a photo of an official committing a crime? What if that photo was taken somewhere private and without their consent? Or what if it was actually an "intimate recordings of people taken without consent", but one of the people involved was the president and they were recorded in a drug fueled fling with a prostitute? Should publishing that be illegal?
How can you define speech so that it can be applied consistently to specific questions like this? Odds are you'll end up with a definition so full of nuances and caveats that the "absolutist" part of the term is rendered meaningless.
Is a free press not part of free speech? Are incriminating photos only protected speech in a court, but not when published in a newspaper?
I'm just trying to underline that people refuse to recognize the difficulty translating the philosophical discussion of free speech into the complexities of legal definitions. And "free speech absolutists" tend to only live in the philosophical sphere.
This is a big claim. The crux of the problem is that it's virtually impossible to set a clear and consistent line. That makes it ripe for abuse by those in power, as we are witnessing right now. I think it's hypocritical to fail to even acknowledge this fact.
The US had a great (not perfect!) system. Free speech with reasonable limits, set by laws and regulations. And helped by a certain amount trust in the system.
When power hungry people, who started abusing the system with misinformation campaigns, ran into those laws and regulations, they claimed the system was treating them unfairly. Those people are now in power.
And trust is now at a minimum.
You could blame the past system for not being able to prevent this regime, but that wouldn’t fit your beliefs. I for one, am happy that we have more stringent rules in the EU.
Laws and regulations aren't a magical solution. You have to think about how they can be abused, or they'll be weaponized to achieve the exact opposite of what you intended. This has been abundantly clear for those who have been paying attention. See for example how lawmakers have been repeatedly pushing laws claiming to "protect children" that does nothing of the sort but does everything to erode civil liberties.
But laws or no laws, the biggest problem is that laws and regulations don't count for the current regime. There's nothing to protect the layman from your government with this conman in charge. Consumer protections have eroded, criminals have been set free and people have been abducted.
Rules don't matter anymore. Nobody trusts your government. It's a jungle now.
I am not inclined to defend any stupid opinion, but especially on topics like the pandemic people were cheering on others getting banned. There is a political cost to this and that does extend to people having little ground to criticise the current US administration on these grounds.
Right now, the government is suppressing free speech according to the very definition of that term.
How can you not see the difference.
I tend to prefer groups that understand the principle of free speech, but it isn't a hard requirement.
Culture formerly forced large commercial internet platforms to adhere to freedom of speech and we have lost that partially. And people are rightfully not too amused about that and it isn't necessarily team Trump they blame for that. That is the reality why he now can claim to defend freedom of speech, even if it isn't really true.
> It just protects you from government prosecution.
The first amendment of the US does, but the principle goes beyond that. It is a necessary requirement for independent research for example. There is no law for it and it still is essential.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_of_speech
Your interpretation is widely spread but also wrong. The government is only a relevant party if we talk about specific laws.
> As a moderator, I also ban people who are just obnoxious and loud without any substance.
You then don't follow the principle of freedom of speech, simple as that. That is no crime, but you aren't liberal in these cases either.
But that is besides the point. The criticism of free speech isn't new, the arguments are always the same and usually those that argue for more restriction do end up being wrong. I don't see the path developing differently here.
To ask why Trump can capitalize on these issues, a careful reading might be appropriate as the result wouldn't be too surprising without needing to much predictive capacities.
This is tiring. Have a good day.
https://popehat.substack.com/p/in-defense-of-free-speech-ped...
Free speech rights - The government shouldn't restrict speech
Free Speech culture - Private institutions shouldn't punish speech
Speech Decency - Individuals should judge others by their speech
Incoherence - Nobody should be judged for anything they say
There are no free speech absolutists. Only realists and hypocrites.
These principles of what is good and age-appropriate for children doesn't seem to be applied consistently.
[0]: <https://edition.cnn.com/2023/06/21/us/utah-davis-school-dist...>
> It’s shunning time in Madison County, Virginia, where the school board recently banished my novel The Handmaid’s Tale from the shelves of the high-school library.
Note: a school library. A student can go to a regular library and check out this book, if they are really interested.
If you want to see what real book banning looks like, read the list: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_books_banned_by_govern...
This involves removing books from public libraries nationwide (not just school libraries of one county), banning of sale, and sometimes criminalizing and prosecuting private possession of the book.
The US is fortunately quite far from such a sorry state.
Thank you for the correction.
If you want to say removing these books from school libraries is an illegitimate constraint on freedom of expression, then so is the school curriculum. So is public education generally.
The people who are saying that excluding books from libraries isn't banning. It's straightforward. Discussing this reminds me of arguing with my narcissist father - he slips through conflict by redefining terms to fit his inability to take accountability and recognize that his actions have consequences.
It really is a bad look to argue like this for a group of people who are trying to accomplish a goal.
It's pretty clear that if the books they are banning from these places were unconditionally banned they wouldn't go to bat for them. Rather the sentiment would be "that's good actually." It doesn't take a genius to recognize that the playbook is to make incremental advances and argue over definitions in order to achieve this goal.
Yes, and most of them do not fit your description in the slightest.
The justification was exactly the same at the time. "It isn't censorship, it is just not recommended anymore". Given, that was/is true for many literary expositions as well.
Or just went totally off the rails in a couple of cases.
Do you have a list of those books so I can check if I see the same kind of inappropriateness?
Does there exist any example of an administration (federal or state) successfully prohibiting the private sale of an LGBTQ book?
Rainbows!
https://www.salon.com/2022/04/15/ohio-school-district-bans-c...
The fact that you have to ask says it all.
Right, but words like `absolutist` mean something really strong that is not achievable in reality, and I don't think you would disagree very much that the majority of self professed free speech absolutists like Musk, do not actually hold anything near such a view.
This is actually due to an attack on the weakness of free speech. The zone is being flooded with shit, as the phrase goes, to the point that words don't mean anything. The moment a term starts having some meaning that people can derive direction from, the propagandists start using the term incorrectly everywhere.
I think you can still believe that any political, religious or economic view is fair to say/publish/broadcast as an ernest expression of perspective, and that even potentially hateful views inevitably come along for that ride. We tolerate the KKK producing literature bc that's the cost for _everyone_ being able to speak. But it's much harder to make the argument that intentional lies and misinformation deserve the same protections as good faith expressions of minority views.
When a person asserts that we need to protect speech which is intended to mislead, isn't it natural to be suspicious?
Some opinions hurt many sensibilities and the result is lacking support for most essential freedoms. This justification might seem more relevant to you, but with perspective it is the same reason others used to prohibit speech.
> When a person asserts that we need to protect speech which is intended to mislead, isn't it natural to be suspicious?
There is enough literature here to really weight this argument and the sad result is that you often defend the speech of scoundrels but it still is the better result.
Some people say it is natural to dislike different skin colors. The logic of your argument would generally be seen as short sighted and it certainly is in regards to freedom of speech. Again, a bit of literature exposure helps.
> That is the usual degradation of freedom of speech and not at all different from other cases before.
That's a really sweeping statement and I think perhaps (fittingly) is an intentional mischaracterization of the history of attacks on free speech in the US. E.g. looking at a pretty generic source, whether someone is lying has basically never been the criteria that the government uses to suppress stuff. From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Censorship_in_the_United_State...
- In the 19th century the postmaster refused to carry abolitionist literature, because of its topic, not whether statements were true or false.
- The Comstock Law forbade the postal service from carrying even personal letters with sexual content -- again, regardless of truth or falsity.
- The Sedition Act of 1918 forbade "disloyal, profane, scurrilous, or abusive language" against the government/flag etc, again regardless of truth or falsity.
- Charles Coughlin lost his ability to broadcast and a newspaper mailing permit b/c of his Nazi-sympathizing views, but not specifically because of lies.
- The Smith Act of 1940 went after communists and others who advocate the overthrow of the government or even to affiliate with an association which so advocates. Again, no requirement of lying required.
- The current emphasis on banning queer books, identifying peace activists who called for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza as being "aligned with terrorists", or forbidding government agencies from mentioning "diversity" are all entirely indifferent on whether a person or agency is telling the truth.
Even in the colonial era, Alexander Hamilton's argument for freedom of the press, when defending newspaper printer John Peter Zenger emphasized the right to tell the truth: "nature and the laws of our country have given us a right to liberty of both exposing and opposing arbitrary power ... by speaking and writing the truth."
We have civil legal mechanisms to fight those who lie in a manner which harms the reputation of a person or company (defamation, libel, slander). We have criminal legal mechanisms to fight those who lie in specific ways to enrich themselves (e.g. wire fraud). To my understanding, we don't have any kind of legal mechanism to bring to bear when someone knowingly lies for purposes of manipulating public discourse -- e.g. claiming that (unnamed) doctors are sitting on death panels, or that a large number of (unnamed) staff in the State Department are communists, or that the 15-minute city is a conspiracy (of no one in particular) to imprison people in their neighborhoods.
If you have literature you care to recommend that makes a compelling argument for why lies/misinformation specifically be protected, please cite specific documents rather than waving at "literature exposure" in general.
The once who claimed there is a speech police implement speech police and all what the vocal free speech persons do is don’t like it?
Did the address it at the president or do they fear consequences?
There's just a cohort of people who claim to be in favor of free speech, but also use it as a defense to associate themselves with people they really don't need to. Even the worst people in the world need _a_ lawyer, your local fascist doesn't need a booster on Twitter. There's a spectrum and subjectivity here of course.
"Free speech" has turned into a fun little bad faith thing to throw into arguments where it (for most people) doesn't belong. And even for fellow travelers, these people arguing in bad faith tend to throw in some other stupid garbage into their arguments! So it gets a bad rap, as an indicator that an argument is about to get stupid.
This isn't really a recent development but I think I understand what you mean. Authoritarians, regardless of their political leanings, try and sow distrust in free speech in order to garner support for advancing their agenda.
Currently, the "right" is using "free speech" as a tool to push back against the "woke agenda." So now "free speech" is becoming faux pas, at least in certain circles. Mentioning it as something you value without some long preface to explain yourself now associates you with a certain group of people, whether that group actually values free speech or not.
They don't need to do any denials anymore because they have won. That was part of arguing in bad faith, they never actually believed the arguments. Nothing being discussed on a message board is going to change that
You're right -- many people who claim to support free speech really mean they favor "free speech for me, not for thee." And typically these people want to be able to say controversial things without consequence. But how people respond to speech is orthogonal to whether or not we are allowed to exercise our rights to it.
The ACLU did "free speech absolutism" right back in the 90's and 00's. They defended everyone's speech, no matter the politics, no matter how socially right or wrong it was [1]. They'd step up to bat for Democrats, Republicans, Christians, Atheists, and Satanists. Your views didn't matter. Defending the rights we all share was the point. Because when someone else's rights are degraded and not defended, it means everyone's rights are up for attack.
Unfortunately the ACLU doesn't hold these same views today. They're batting for one team only.
[1] They defended Westboro Baptist Church and NAMBLA, FFS. I definitely hate both of these organizations, but free speech is free speech. By defending even the most reprehensible speech, it ensures that mine remains free regardless of how the political pendulum swings. That's how it should be, anyway.
Part of Free Speech is that it does not matter to have it if nobody hears you, maybe because your voice is drowned out by powerful media, serving the interests of the few. Therefore we need Equal Rights to free speech for everybody, especially when it comes to elections.
For example if you search for the "ACLU lost its way", you will find a lot about their behavior. I think the opinion pieces are often well argued.
>Therefore we need Equal Rights to free speech for everybody
Freedom of speech doesn't mean you are entitled to a publicly funded megaphone or that anyone is required to listen to you.
Also you're right that we can't give everybody the one hour of free speech on TV, can we?.
But it is in the interest of the country as a whole that all viewpoints are heard. But if one person can buy all TV-stations then he will have free speech and nobody else really does. If nobody can hear you because somebody else is speaking so loudly, it doesn't matter if you have free speech or not.
It used to be law that there are limits to how many millions one person or corporation can use to win elections. But seems that is no longer the case thanks to Supreme Court judges nominated by Republican presidents.
It is supporting their right to freedom of speech, not supporting them, in my view.
>But it is in the interest of the country as a whole that all viewpoints are heard. But if one person can buy all TV-stations then he will have free speech and nobody else really does.
Did nobody have freedom of expression before television? Broadcast media is just one way of communicating ideas, and TV is a decreasingly relevant part of the media. TV is worse than it used to be largely because nobody really watches it anymore except for sports.
>It used to be law that there are limits to how many millions one person or corporation can use to win elections.
There is very little evidence that spending more on election advertising actually does anything. Hillary and Harris both spend much more than Trump and lost. Biden spent more and won. Obama spent less and won. The statistics across a wide range of elections at different scales don't show it having much effect. It is probably important to even be an option, but it doesn't win elections.
Suggesting a group is in some way a failure now because they don't use their speech how you think they should is, of course, at least a bit iffy while we're talking about this :) but FIRE is probably the group you're looking for today.
Without a lot of context from Popper this principle isn't even a very good one and Popper certainly would agree here.
It just displays that you didn't put time into it thinking it through, especially if you just distribute links.
The most frequently quoted text I've seen is Karl Popper's writing, where he states that we must reserve the right to suppress intolerant philosophies, not that we should always suppress them.
Now, some people might have the opinion that we should be completely intolerant to intolerance and that might be a defendable position in its own right, but the paradox of tolerance is not intrinsically condoning that sort of response.
No, that would probably end up in a logical paradox, if one were intolerant of any degree of intolerance.
> It's a concept that has varied views on to what extent should tolerance of intolerance be extended and to what response is appropriate when it extends beyonds that threshold.
I don't know enough to have a particular position on the ACLU, but at least in theory an organisation defending free speech might decide that conditions have become such that defending certain things will lead to the inability to defend other things and choose to proceed differently on that basis.
Been a lot more hysterical on here as of late. Methinks there's less reason to discuss political things now.
Your insinuations isn't really a good faith argument either but I gladly join that group of "these sorts of people" because they are obviously more sensible than the others.
Whenever conservatives talk about "free speech" just substitute "hate speech" because that's what they mean. Elon Musk has called himself a free speech absolutist while banning people from Twitter for hurting his feelings, for being journalists who are remotely critical of him, for making fun of him, for reporting ATC public data on the location of his private jet and for making jokes.
The media is absolutely complicit in not challenging the countless lies told by Republicans.
What didn't get a lot of attention is how Trump sued a bunch of media outlets (eg ABC/Disney) to defamation. These are cases he absolutely could not win on the merits. ABC presenter George Stephanopoulos made the on-air claim Trump was "liable for rape" after he lost the E. Jean Carroll case. Disney agreed to pay ~$16 million in what has all the apperances of a payoff.
Or the de-banking that happens to politicians in the UK.
Or the jailing of whistleblower lawyers that happens in Australia.
The adoption of the "free speech absolutist" brand by certain elements of the Right was never an honest statement of ideology, it was a smokescreen of Orwellian doublespeak for efforts to impose right-wing bias on platforms both by platform owners and by government regulatory efforts.
Those people aren't going to reconsider their support for this administration because it isn't actually committed to free speech, because it is doing what the "free speech absolutist" label they adopted was always cover for.
> In my understanding, the commonplace interpretation of the first amendment is largely due to a series of landmark cases through the early to mid-20th century.
The one thing that the "free speech absolutist" Right-wing crowd was always honest about was that their position had nothing to do with "commonplace interpretation of the first amendment". (
I believe this overall ineptitude will indeed not work in their favor and it is just a form of primitive reactionism.
No. Our criticism is aimed at their inability to defend their own values, leading to fruitless debates and real-world situations where shameless hypocrisy undercuts everything they claim to support.
Perhaps integrity would demand that people speak up and in my experience they indeed still do. But you shouldn't be surprised if the criticism is quite a bit less loud if it concerns speech from a politicized crowd that demanded more content control and censorship just a few weeks before. Petty? Maybe. Wrong? Maybe. But certainly not surprising that bad life decisions in the past do have an effect.
On the flip side, there is something profoundly, undeniably wrong — practically evil — when a government detains peaceful people not for breaking laws but for virally posting about their wish for an immediate cease-fire in the midst of violent conflict. Which is the exact inverse of having sensible limits.
You can rattle off half-baked “maybe” and “perhaps” scenarios all day long and keep twisting definitions beyond recognition. You can continue to argue that governmental abuse of power is an inevitable consequence simply because the world contains some ugly, petty sociopaths that will hold grudges until they die. But by that logic there shouldn't be norms, limits, rules, terms, conditions or laws at all, because it will only inconvenience sociopaths on their rise to power and they'll eventually come after you.
Welcome to the paradox of tolerance. We need rules because it keeps our imperfect society civil.
Bascially because his opposition is that much slower...
If those sounding alarms don't distinguish between political decisions they disagree with and violations of our rights, they will lose credibility ala Boy Who Cried Wolf, and struggle to mobilize people when it really matters.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U.S._Agency_for_Global_Media
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Independent_agencies_of_the_Un...
If USAGM is entitled to funding by act of Congress, I consider that a separate issue from First Amendment freedom of the press.
Doesnt sound very independent to me if the President can exchange the agency head.
https://www.rferl.org/a/obama-signs-law-restructuring-us-int...
With support of the now decried platforms, the slogan "there is no freedom of speech without consequences" comes to mind. Helping corporations "clean house" against all the undesirables, people that "hate".
This again points at the Trump administration and how bad it would be. That isn't really a convincing message, it is that it opposition needs to rethink some arguments of the past.
the best lede is the one where visas are being revoked. clear abuse of the amendment.
even the libel ones, while shitty, seem in line with existing libel laws (and maybe it's worth a discussion if libel is constitutionally protected). just because the president is president does not mean they must relinquish the right to legal redress for existing protections that the rest of us enjoy.
The USA already did: The first amendment literally includes the right to petition one's government, along with the other rights listed in the article as section headers.
> just because the president is president does not mean they must relinquish the right to legal redress for existing protections that the rest of us enjoy.
Libel of public figures literally requires a higher standard than "the rest of us".
you missed my point, clearly. if FOIA protects a current constitutional right, it is at best the tenth amendment, not the first.
> Libel of public figures literally requires a higher standard than "the rest of us".
to the point where the right to redress is abrogated?
This article is about the entire first amendment, not just FOIA or transparency in general.
> to the point where the right to redress is abrogated?
Certainly to the point where it requires a higher standard than "the rest of us".
yes, i read the whole thing. as a general strategy in a persuasive essay you shouldn't include an argument with such a weak association, much less lead with it, because it makes me question the author's judgement and devalues the arguments downpage. if i were less patient i would have quit after the FOIA part.
> Certainly to the point where it requires a higher standard than "the rest of us".
success requires a higher standard. but curtailing the right to redress (the right to initiate the complaining suit) is problematic: eventually someone will extend the curtailment to people with less power.
Read that, please.
I'd consider myself a free speech absolutist and I don't really agree. I feel like most of the list falls into "bad legal takes" category as almost nothing on the list has anything to do with the first amendment at all.
The freedom of the press category basically amounts to slander having never been protected speech. You can sue for slander.
https://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution-conan/amendment-1/d...
The freedom of speech category in the article is largely a big nothing burger. Government employees have never had freedom in what they say while acting as government employees. That can say whatever they want on their own time given they're not releasing protected information. That one's been settled by supreme Court a number of times.
https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/547/410/
The government gets say over what data it releases. There's nothing in in the first amendment guaranteeing government releases of data. That's just bizarre to even think of as a first amendment issue at all. The first amendment protects the people from censorship, nothing in the amendment protects the government from censorship by the government.
I literally struggle to see how just about anything in the article relates to the actual protections the first amendment provides whatsoever.
The freedom of religion section seems like we're moving more in line with the constitution by removing special protections for religious institutions? Religious institutions having special protections seems like a pretty clear violation of the first amendment. I don't see why a church/mosque/temple should be any different as far as the government is involved than a Footlocker. By literal definition religion shouldn't get special treatment. Separation of church and state.
How is "deportation without a trial" not a deliberate attack on people exercising their constitutional right to free speech?
Visas are granted as an extension of this country's good will, and if you violate that good will the visa is revoked. Is your issue that you don't believe the conduct to be worthy of revoking the visa? Honestly, it's a little irritating that people think it's normal for these visas to be so liberally granted in the first place. That's probably why we're in this situation at all.
I'm not entirely sure that someone should be able to come into another country as a non-citizen and go around drumming up support for our foreign enemies. I can tell you no other country on Earth would put up with that.
Whether or not the first amendment applies to non-citizens, especially non-permanent residents is clearly hotly debated. I can see both sides of it.
The almost perfectly clean split across the Federalist/Democratic-Republican line that the founders had on the Alien and Sedition Act I think makes pretty clear that even the founders didn't agree on whether or not it did.
Jury trials are another important constitutional right that's being infringed. Until the facts are resolved fairly, those accusations are suspect.
I will also remind you that some of those affected are (were?) permanent residents. If they can take that away without due process, it's only a matter of time before citizens are also on the chopping block.
Supposed free speech absolutists demand reversals of bans from platforms for people due to hate speech.
Not 1 is demanding the same for spammers or fraudsters.
Beyond that practical matter, the least bad definition I have for spam (and this is just off the top of my head right now) is: advertising that is unsolicited and disseminated in a bad faith style.
Any of us who are being honest with ourselves, maybe with exception to the acutely socially challenged, know spam when we see it.
Well that brings us right back to the moderation free speech absolutists are angry about.
Free speech absolutism shouldn't extend to: advertising that is unsolicited and disseminated in a bad faith style.
Sorry about the state of your reading comprehension (or lack of it). Unfortunate.
We are in a discussion about free speech absolutism. Somebody who says they are a free speech absolutist who supports spam filtering, needs to either justify why spam is not speech (which is my question, why would it not be speech), or acknowledge that they agree there are limits to free speech.
Or is your argument that if it is commerce it's not free speech? That would allow all commerce to be censored (and we just kick the can down the road, what is commerce).
Lots of spam emails are for genuine services. But its generally accepted that because the speech is unwanted and the quanity of it lowers the quality of the platform, that its fine to filter it off.
Free Speech absolutism should incorporate it, but doesnt. (Which sort of indicates its mostly about broadcasting their opinions rather than being in favour of all speech)
*honk honk*
I'm a 3/4 black partially Jewish gay man, so you can imagine where I stand on "Free Speech absolutism". While I am for the most part on your "side", I want to stick to arguments that are persuasive.
Because people allowed this to happen, the current administration is now more emboldened than its recent predecessors ever have been.
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/read-the-full-supreme-...
> Venezuela's Interior Minister Diosdado Cabello said on Friday that none of the hundreds of Venezuelans deported by the U.S. to a Salvadoran prison is a member of Venezuela's Tren de Aragua criminal gang, the reason Washington gave for expelling them.
> "I believe with absolute responsibility that not a single one appears on the organizational chart of the now-extinct Tren de Aragua organization, not a single one," Cabello said on a podcast, saying he had names of the deportees from U.S. media and his own source.
> Venezuela says Tren de Aragua was effectively wiped out in 2023, and that the idea that it still exists is based on a claim from the country's political opposition.
Due process is important for protecting the innocent, but due process is also important because it documents the crimes of the guilty.
Yeah, yeah, Godwin's Law and all that, but the similarities with mid-20th century fascism are undeniable here. The administration specifically started with targeting a small, well-defined minority (that is, people in the US illegally, or at least purported to be here illegally), and then extended to valid visa holders (what's the point of being on legal visa if it can be revoked at any moment with no judicial review and then you can be imprisoned for weeks/months) and now legal permanent residents. It's just classic creeping fascism.
This is what happens when “rule of law” is subverted on the generational scale — eg, by enabling illicit mass migration opposed by the majority of the people. They eventually feel that appeals to “rule of law” are merely emotional manipulation used against them and stop caring in pursuit of a solution to what they perceive as a problem.
What did people expect to happen?
It probably wouldn’t have seemed plausible to them that someone could be impeached twice and convicted of fraud, then win the popular vote.
Or more like there is no solution to this besides telling people to be vigilant about protecting their democracies.
[0] https://constitutioncenter.org/education/classroom-resource-...
Is there a theoretical situation where a single party gaining control is simply the will of the voters? That appears to be a potential valid outcome.
The issue is not that a single party has control; it’s that a single person has control, having purged that party of all disloyalty or contradiction, and is now proceeding to remake the entire government according to their rather erratic whims, with very little effective restraint.
>Is there a theoretical situation where a single party gaining control is simply the will of the voters?
Sure. But not with the current electoral college and its exploits, as well as literal election bribery that is publicly admitted to.
some reverence may simply be patriotism. I suppose it's no different than any other kinds of celebrity style of worship. people like a role model.
I’ve lived in the USA and saw the Iowa caucus and election process up close. For a country that was the self proclaimed arbitrator of democracy all over the world, I’m shocked how fragile their own checks-and-balances system is. The lack of opposition to this complete takeover is astounding. I hope USA survives this phase and comes out stronger and more resilient to further such events.
"President Donald Trump's administration made a calculated decision to ignore a judge's directive to turn around two flights containing hundreds of alleged Venezuelan gang members, sources familiar with the matter told ABC News."[1]
> The article is showing one side.
Please share the other side of the examples given in the article.
1. https://abcnews.go.com/US/trump-admin-ignores-judges-order-b...
Media is the practice of including and excluding voices, and there are distinct trends over time of representing one or another set of voices.
People tab:
"I love our founding fathers": https://x.com/Stephan73992604
"Founding Fathers daily": https://x.com/FFoundersDaily
Someone with [heart] founding fathers: https://x.com/JKernerOT
Top tweets:
Rush Limbaugh: https://x.com/LimbaughLegacy/status/1906424705336180913
"ThePatrioticBlonde": https://x.com/ImBreckWorsham/status/1904301594717651038
And an actual anti-semite: https://x.com/GnoticeUs/status/1906465034823499806
And the most recent:
https://x.com/SwampFox1795/status/1906554560094576889 https://x.com/tablewithannie/status/1906554512472736060 https://x.com/jp_peter51132/status/1906555671040102769
The ultra-nationalists love national myth and imagery. Always have. See the picture: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1939_Nazi_rally_at_Madison_Squ...
Displays of nationalism and patriotism is mostly just a disciplining tactic by authoritarians who want unquestioning loyalty simply by displaying superficial symbols and gestures.
It's a way to claim the authority of the dead, to manufacture legitimacy through association. So now you're questioning the flag as opposed to the person waving it telling you what to do.
The same people supporting Trump, from national thought leaders like Heritage and the Federalist society, to Murdoch publications (Fos, WSJ), to everyday people on social media have long pushed hard for expanded Second Amendment rights, expended freedom of religion which outweighs all other considerations and rights, and freedom of speech, etc. for right-wing hate speech (including their focus on social media moderation) - just as examples.
We need one on attack on working class including all the loss of services esp. education and inflation caused by tariffs.
Everyone should at least watch this video. Taken in America. "Land of the free."
That this is only one of many such videos is terrifying if you know the history of fascist regimes.
I hope everyone here is familiar with the "first they came for the communists..." poem.
https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/unhumans
This is a popular book. I found my own mother reading it. I took the title at face value at first and found the skull disturbing but not threatening what with not being a communist or anything close to it. But then I started reading and I realized that it's not a matter of if they pull the trigger but when, and when they pull the trigger that they would be completely comfortable calling my mild liberal beliefs communist, and that my mother would probably believe them as they stripped me of citizenship and sent me to a labor camp in El Salvador.
She is a Turkish national on a student visa. Those folks do NOT (like it or not) have the same rights as citizens. You cannot, for example, support (not saying she's done this, just saying this is the law) an organization designated as an FTO, as a "green card" holder; you CAN (sigh) as a citizen. /shrug
sees downvotes ... Um, excuse me? Am I not allowed to have a valid dissenting opinion here, now? Why the downvotes, folks? Give me a valid reason please
Anyone who should have payed attention to Project 2025 but "remained calm" instead should now pay attention to the McCarthy II plan from the same source. They are telling us who they are and we should listen to them.
The government revoking a visa based on categories of behavior which are protected by those foundational rights is appalling.
As a citizen, you can verbally support enemies of the state, but you cannot financially support them.
INA § 237(a)(4)(A): If a visa holder engages in activities that endanger public safety or national security, including endorsing terrorist organizations or inciting violence, they can be deported.
Material Support Clause (INA § 212(a)(3)(B)): Even verbal or symbolic support of a designated Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO) can count as “material support,” which is grounds for both inadmissibility and deportation.
Overstay or Status Violation: If someone is already skating close to the edge (e.g., questionable employment, status lapse), political speech supporting enemies of the state can provide the cherry on top for ICE to act.
Discretionary Revocation: The U.S. can revoke a visa for virtually any reason, especially if the person’s presence is deemed “contrary to U.S. interests.” That doesn't require proof of a crime—just bureaucratic will.
It's always been like this... But now it's controversial, apparently.
So yes, it's controversial that a student, participating in a student protest, protesting a war, was deported without due process.
And this is before we mention the government has admitted, in court document, that they illegally deported a visa holder to El Salvador, and "oops" since he's already in a prison overseas there's nothing our court system can do about it.
So yes, controversies abound with the way this administration is "enforcing" immigration law.
Because we should’ve been given the facts already. That’s the law. The fact that we haven’t been given the facts indicates that the people responsible are not reliable and deserve all scrutiny.
All the ways such support would be unlawful would be unlawful for citizens as well. That said we know that the support she has given is writing against the gazan genocide. If they had better cause they would have already spoken them.
Or are you just referring to the more normal (yet still awful) concept of a draft?
> isn't being invaded
According to the White House, there is an invasion: https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/01/prot...
https://www.reuters.com/world/us/us-judge-extends-block-trum...
It's also not "an invasion" as per the Alien Enemies Act as clearly, Tren de Agua is not a government or a nation.
But wait - I can’t reference information shared by the White House because it’s all BS? Look, I’m not saying an executive order is a law, but it’s also not a sticky note. And let’s be honest, a ton of illegals have been coming to the U.S. Trump’s executive order didn’t come out of thin air.
Ukraine has different laws than the US. Under Ukrainian law, drafts are legal in their current situation. Under American law, deporting people without due process is not legal in our current situation. In fact, even if the US were at war where an invocation of the Alien Enemies Act made sense, even then people are owed individualized due process before deportation to ascertain whether they are in fact an Alien Enemy.
Of course you can reference information shared by the White House, but there's a difference between referencing it and asserting that it has legal authority that it doesn't have under our legal system.
In our legal system, the White House's memos cannot overrule people's Constitutional protections, even if they're attempting to solve an actual problem. The "out of thin air"edness of the EO is irrelevant to its legal authority.
Now you're 5 comments deep tying yourself in odd knots like "the US is being invaded by a foreign government" and "Ukraine is not at war" and "executive orders can overrule Constitutional due process rights."
You created your own confusion, my friend. An asinine starting position like your initial equivalence will do that to ya.
I never said "the US is being invaded by a foreign government". I referenced information publicly shared by the White House. That’s a valid source, regardless of who signed the executive order. We don’t get to dismiss official government communication just because we dislike the administration.
Also, I was replying directly to _your_ points, not shifting the topic. You brought up the US legal system, war declarations, and due process. I simply responded to each.
Legally speaking, Ukraine has not declared war on Russia, so saying "Ukraine is not at war" is technically correct.
And finally, I never claimed executive orders can override constitutional rights - that’s a straw man. Let’s focus on what was actually said rather than rewriting it to make it easier to attack.
But keep comparing being arrested by official police for draft dodging in the middle of a war for existence to sending secret hooded officers to arrest a brown-skinned scarf-wearing woman for supposedly antisemitism while your pal Boer Elon is doing Nazi salutes in public.
>we don't know wha tthat woman did.
All she did was write a piece against israel, and either way, her due process was violated, which is the problem here. She was not charged with any crimes... How are you seriously hung up on the video source when there's a video of masked, plain clothes federal agents "arresting" a random PhD student with no warrant, and no crimes committed?
Frightening barometer reading for this community that this is what you focus on...
Perhaps we could have some sort of public trial where some of her peers -- let's say a dozen -- could hear the facts and decide on whether she's committed a crime.
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/doj-says-mahmoud-khalil...
(Read the 5 paragraphs that begin with "He allegedly did not disclose".)
Everyone was up in arms about this guy a few days ago based on "how things looked"; turns out he was willfully hiding multiple affiliations that would have raised red flags against his visa. Which, of course, now raised a giant red flag against it. There is no government on the planet that would have been OK with misrepresenting yourself as a visa applicant (this is also known as "lying"). But because the US did, and because the news is so hyper-polarized, tHe gEsTaPo iS cOmInG yOu gUyS!1!!!!1! /eye-roll
Now you might disagree with me on whether these affiliations had merit with regards to invalidating a visa, but lying or withholding information to give your visa a better chance to pass is something that you must surely understand might be a problem.
There is so far no reason to assume that the woman arrested didn't make similar mistakes. That's all I'm saying.
from your own source
>However, the government will have to prove to the immigration judge that Khalil willfully failed to disclose that information, and whether that disclosure would have impacted his eligibility for permanent residency.
There is a reason we have a court system, and to sort out these issues BEFORE we take violent action against people here legally is entirely the point.
The fascists are using a law from hundreds of years ago that's only been invoked thrice, all while at war, and the last time to wrongfully put the japanese in internment camps, to circumvent due process - that is the forrest you seem to be willingly missing for the trees.
Listen man, whatever causes you to so willingly believe everything that known grifters and con artists are selling you is the same issue that has you convinced that everyone in your life is part of a vast and deep conspiracy to make you look stupid. You view everyone as being incapable of comprehending, in awe of your problem solving skills and media literacy, and well, you're right for very wrong reasons.
1) the "West" is constantly at war with Islamists and their discontents in fights almost exclusively begun by them (I believe they are religion-motivated, based on my research, but that's another debate)
2) we have students on visas in the US who are supporting a widely acknowledged foreign terrorist organization, which goes against the letter of the law (which applies more to green-card holders than citizens)
3) people are assuming the worst about things they literally do not know about here
4) I am simply calling this out and getting downvoted as a result
Oh and the agency already has a well documented history of arresting innocent people? Look up "ice collateral arrests" "autism awareness deportation" or "soccer coach deported for real madrid inspired tattoo" or "tourist arrested" or "tourist held at border" to get a litany of examples. I'm sorry I pay closer attention to the erasure of our civil liberties than you do.
Of course I'm not judging the situation based solely on the video. I actually read about the case, but when I searched for the video that was just the first link.
I (clearly falsely) expected six plainclothes feds tossing a PhD student in to the back of an unmarked van would resonate more with the crowd here... I figured if you cared you'd look more in to it, rather than rush to defend the regime... Silly me, I guess.
And most certainly, baseless accusations like this. There's no such thing as "rationalized emotion" (which you seem to be insinuating with your "He might try to intellectualize it" remark); criticism is either baseless/purely-belief-based/non-factual, or it is at least based on good-faith facts and reason.
That emotion you detect? That has to do with the amount of misinformation and truth-twisting going on out there... And it's growing.
Simple example: https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/doj-says-mahmoud-khalil...
Everyone was up in arms about this guy a few days ago; turns out he was intentionally hiding multiple red-flag affiliations; how would any government, much less the US, tolerate that?
>Baher Azmy, an attorney for Khalil, told NBC News: "These late-breaking, after-the-fact allegations, silly as they are, primarily show that the government must know the supposed 'foreign policy' grounds for Mahmoud’s removal are absurd and unconstitutional."
>Azmy said the government's new claims "cannot change the obvious fact the government has admitted — he is being punished in the most autocratic way for his constitutionally protected speech."
>the government has admitted — he is being punished in the most autocratic way for his constitutionally protected speech.
Gee, almost like we should have a legal system that sorts this stuff out before we take violent action against people here legally.
All I have to offer this forum while I'm a student is politics, which I do know better than at least some here. There is no technology I can really offer a valuable opinion on, more than the experts here.
It's my armchair activism to at least make sure that the left's point of view is not wholly absent on this forum of affluent, insulated tech bros. Plus, my job has a lot of down time, so there are worse ways I could spend it.
Left wing positions, while they control no branches of the government and have no power is literally to raise alarms about what the fascists are doing, and how silly their propagandized reasoning is. That is exactly what I'm doing.
pushing ideology of anti fascists == calling out right wing bs using evidence (climate change, vaccine science, hell, any scientific research at this point all tick both of your boxes)
My last comment had about six sources, but I could find dozens more if you still find yourself blind and tasting fascist boot.
https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2025/03/trump-el-salvad...
https://www.keranews.org/immigration/2025-03-28/dallas-man-m...
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politic...
>ice collateral arrests
https://www.reddit.com/r/law/s/GKVwaG1x1i (fox news video clip of tom Homan - trumps border czar -admitting it)
https://www.cbsnews.com/amp/boston/news/boston-ice-arrests-c...
https://newrepublic.com/post/193142/trump-border-czar-tom-ho...
https://www.wbur.org/news/2025/03/26/massachusetts-ice-colla...
Is straight from the horse's mouth enough for you? I could go on and on and on if you wanna keep getting owned by receipts.
>I'm sorry you see...next time
You're the one who can't even find sources I found in 30 sec, but I'm the one who needs a critical thinking cap? You're a joke and you would've supported the nazis because "cmon, it's just a few cherry picked millions who got caught up in that!" Perhaps your desire to lick the boot outweighs your critical thinking skills. If you knew anything about how fascist regimes work you'd know this is simply stage one, not some anomalous happenstance.
https://www.nbcboston.com/news/local/rumeysa-ozturk-tufts-ic...
Another case is Badar Khan Suni who is here on a valid student visa, and DHS said they targeted for “actively spreading Hamas propaganda and promoting antisemitism on social media.”
Here's DHS itself: https://x.com/TriciaOhio/status/1902524674291966261
https://www.cnn.com/2025/03/21/us/bahar-khan-suri-deportatio... "While the filing does not mention Saleh’s father by name, The New York Times reported that Ahmed Yousef – a former adviser to Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh – confirmed in a voice message that he was Suri’s father-in-law."
It's certainly sus, but I'd agree that if he was actually trying to work for peace, as he claims, and that this was demonstrable, this was pretty unjust at first glance
You literally asked AI to write your argument for you: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43530149
Maybe cool it on the source policing.
The article was worded extremely slantingly. It was at least clear to me. In emotional contexts, it's best to stick to the least biased stories you can find.
Yes, that is the problem.
It would be less concerning if it was not clear to you. Sharing that it was clear to you is evidence of the very deficiency in judgement that everyone is highlighting.
You are woefully ill-equipped to be making such assessments, yet you continue to do it with confidence despite everyone telling you why you're wrong.
The self-defeating behavior of the legislative branch, across both parties, for decades led to the risks going up invisibly. And it turns out, risks usually go up without people noticing.
That is why they are doing their level best to make sure there is no chance they will ever lose the position.
The attacks on freedom of speech are part of it. So are the attacks on voting rights, and the attacks on the legitimacy of voting results.
But it's the definition of virtue signaling. There is absolutely a group of people who think it is virtuous to be "above the fray" and "smarter than everyone else" and it's represented by loudly denouncing "both sides" and implicitly positioning yourself as better than them.
I mean, ultimately I would have preferred you just not post that so I didn't have to read it, but then I went and replied to you and replied to your reply so now I'm hypocritically adding more garbage to the thread.
All that being said, since I'm writing something at all, I am genuinely frustrated at people who say things like "lack of political representation". America has an absolute ton of representation at every level and if you want to be heard, you absolutely can be.
But beyond that, this is a representative democracy which means you need to compromise with other people in order to move forward. Those compromises are called political parties. You're never going to have a massive country wide political party that represents the exact details of your needs and wants, but what you can do is influence the existing ones to move closer to your goals.
So, you know, the next time you're given a choice of people to vote for, think about which one is going to move you closer to your goals and which one is going to move you further away.
Common ground!
From an outsiders perspective, it's wild. But at the same time, there were many warnings.
Since Attention is a finite non growing pool the trap is set.
One day some one gets all the fish and another its someone else. Anyone who has any sense wouldn't waste any energy being part of such a stupid game cause its eventually lose lose.
So the game is of the stupid, by the stupid, for the stupid.
Until all sides agree on a new Attention allocation mechanism everything shall remain cooked.
– we had very dysfunctional legislature for last 20+ years
– quality of life is falling for majority of people
This contributes to feeling of unfairness in the society which pushes authoritarian and populist ideas.
Or many things at the same time? One could be globalisation, making those with resources richer, and making workers unemployed?
> quality of life is falling for majority of people
USA is one of of only three countries to have fallen in the Social Progress Index over the last decade: https://www.usnews.com/news/best-countries/articles/2020-09-...
The US economy has been strong, but almost every other well-being metric has declined: https://www.nytimes.com/2025/02/04/briefing/the-us-economy-i...
Massive rise in income inequality and concentration of wealth: https://www.cbpp.org/research/poverty-and-inequality/a-guide...
Housing affordability is at historic lows, both for home ownership and rentals: https://www.jchs.harvard.edu/state-nations-housing-2023
This trend has been evident in the US since like the 1960s. If you would like to verify, try comparing median income levels and median cost of living levels for some of those year ranges.
Just look at how people's Attention on all sides is being exploited. If no one can remember what they were hysterical about last week, how can they be relied on to solve anything?
People are able to over night get more Attention than Billionaires and then convert that Attention to cash or influence, and its always fleeting as there is someone else around the corner about to capture Attention next.
How can such system do anything useful? I mean people are in la la land that architecture can produce results.
Why do we have central banks that decide what the interest rate is going to be?
Because the govt, banks and the rest of the market is unfit (proven throughout history) to do so.
Social Media/Attention Economy needs a similar mechanism when it comes to Attention.
We can't just go on living in a day dream that Rate at which the population's Attention is switching from one issue to another (thanks to algo's engineering for quarterly profit maximization) can just be left to Fate.
People's Attention both on Demand side and Supply side is being massively squandered more than at any time in history. Its like watching seizures in the brain. And people are like no no the system can function.
It can't. And the choice is to realize is sooner than later.
Has this ever happened, where had some amazing QoL thanks to their countries government.
I expect my government to manage public resources, the economy and defense. It can provide social safety nets for worst case scenarios. But if your eating food and have a home and making money what are people actually expecting from the government?
And yes, government policies can definitely help or hinder in all of these.
One thing I don't see mentioned a lot but Trump has made being a victim a fairly central part of his politics (him thinking all elections are rigged against him is a simple example of this) so this all makes sense as a sort of retribution. You can see the retribution, often personal, against people conspiring against him in a lot of his speeches and policies (he's even blamed immigrants before for bringing drugs and "poisoning the blood of our country" and implied they are conspiring against the US) and there are people that care about that retribution more than rights or other ideals.
I could write pages more about how you can hear how the idea of victimization and retribution is part of his talks on tariffs, foreign policy, immigration, "DEI", law offices, the judicial system, etc but obviously it would be too long for an internet comment. Once I noticed it I started seeing it everywhere with him.
Imagined victimhood and a persecution complex are core, foundational pillars of MAGA. The whole movement is about how they are all the victims of the elite, persecuted by the media, harassed for their beliefs, and that the whole world is against them. Then, the minute they got power, their first priority was griefing others and cruelty to all of their favorite out-groups. There really is nothing more to it than pretend victimhood, leading to retribution.
People are tired of, eg, systemic discrimination being forced on them by elites (euphemized “DIE”) or courts which have outspoken activists refusing to enforce the law against career criminals.
They want it to stop — and since elites refused to onboard that correction, they rallied behind a strongman to punish them.
You can see him pretty clearly expanding on and exploiting those existing currents though. One of the ways he got big in American politics is his support of the "birther" movement where he was convinced Obama wasn't born in the US (which, to be clear, was a ridiculous claim and especially galling to me since my birth certificate is from the same hospital and looks almost exactly like his). His political persona gas always been tied to the idea this idea that people are lying and working against America even if he didn't originate the idea.
Edit: also tone is hard to parse on the internet so I'll clarify that this isn't really meant as an argument, it doesn't seem like we really disagree on what Trump's politics is about (even if we have different opinions on those politics). I mainly just wanted to clarify that I saw this long before Trump, even if he's now emblematic of it.
DEI, just so you know, also covers programmes that help poor communities by providing funding for education.
When the company John Lewis was criticized for a lack of diversity [1], it was because they had too many whites.
When the Academy Awards were criticized for a lack of diversity [2], it was because they had too many whites.
When the EU institutions were criticized for a lack of diversity [3], it was because they had too many whites.
When the BAFTAs were criticized for a lack of diversity [4], it was because they had too many whites.
When investigative journalism in the US was criticized for a lack of diversity [5], it was because they had too many whites.
When the show "Friends" was criticized for a lack of diversity [6], it was because they had too many whites.
After decades and decades of this blatant animosity against people like me I can honestly say I do not care at all what Trump does to these programs or how he goes about destroying them, as long as they are destroyed and the people that supported them punished.
[1] https://www.theguardian.com/business/2020/jun/16/john-lewis-...
[2] https://www.wishtv.com/news/awards-shows-have-been-criticize...
[3] https://www.theparliamentmagazine.eu/news/article/oped-lack-...
[4] https://www.willistonian.org/baftas-criticized-for-lack-of-d...
[5] https://www.poynter.org/business-work/2020/investigative-jou...
[6] https://metro.co.uk/2023/04/02/lack-of-diversity-on-friends-...
Who cares about criticism over inconsequential stuff? Is it that difficult to care about impoverished people?
The meals for kids at schools is a “dei” program, and republicans axed it, well done! The repubs are also sending kids to work overtime and during the night, effectively gutting their future, and of course it’s the impoverished kids who will have to do that.
I have never heard of such a thing, can you link to where such a program existed?
Free or reduced cost school lunch is a very common program, but it's based entirely on income, not race, gender or sexuality, which is what everyone means when they talk about "dei programs".
Exactly, like I said - "it's dressed up in definitions that sound beautiful and moral to the supporters of DEI".
I do not care for theoretical definitions of why your ideology is good and moral, I care about its practical effects on me and the world around me. And somehow, those practical effects always turn out to be "less white people".
And I will NEVER support an ideology that disenfranchises me under the cover of equality!
>And somehow, those practical effects always turn out to be "less white people".
In contrast to your silly and inconsequential examples of just "criticism", I presented examples where DEI has tangible and measurable results which are net positive. What you express, really, just shows confirmation bias, and you remain oblivious to all the positive things that have come out of "DEI" programmes that you have benefited from.
Case in point, women die significantly more in car crashes [1] because law mandates male-sized dummies. Some diversity here in terms of gender would have pointed that out, but until the moment this was written, nothing was done.
DEI programmes exist to avoid discrimination such as that one.
> According to Verity Now, a US-based campaign group striving to achieve equity in vehicle safety, women are 73% more likely to be injured – and 17% more likely to die – in a vehicle crash. Earlier this year, a study of 70,000 patients who had been trapped in vehicles found that women were more frequently trapped than men.
> Part of the problem is that test dummies modeled on the average female body are rarely used in safety tests by car manufacturers – because only “male” dummies are mandated for tests by regulators.
So I don't believe you will ever change or your mind or opinion, and you are discussing in bad faith, rendering this conversation utterly useless. Here's my recommendation, if you are going to try to get me to see your side, instead of emitting strawman arguments, try a steelman one, and avoid sensationalism.
[1] https://edition.cnn.com/2022/12/15/world/female-car-crash-te...
I do agree that the article you posted is a very good implementation of equitable practices and I would think it difficult to find anyone who would disagree with the mandating of female test dummies. Mostly because it's a very simple-to-understand example and the implementation of it doesn't hurt anyone else or take away from one group to give to another.
My problem is the pretending that your example is what DEI actually is and any other examples, like the ones I posted, from a number of mainstream media publications no less, are, for whatever reason, NOT considered DEI or, as you put it, are just "silly and inconsequential examples".
Those "silly and inconsequential examples" are supported by every mainstream DEI proponent, including every single DEI department at every large publicly-traded company. There have been numerous articles posted both here on HN and on the wider web about how these DEI implementations turn out to work in practice when it comes to employment prospects, promotion availability and the issues with general hiring practices (lowering standards to achieve some magic number of "equity" in female/minority representation).
My suggestion - if you truly care about the programs such as the one you listed in your comment, you better make sure that's what DEI actually focuses on. Otherwise, you should not be surprised that it gets swept away along with everything else that people feel falls under the DEI umbrella.
Punish who for what? Can you demonstrably prove white people were harmed by DEIA? White people ran the last administration and this one too. What more do you want? Do you get upset if you see a black person drive a nicer car than you?
This anti-DEIA stuff is just cooked up to distract you from the real problems facing this country.
... Pot, meet kettle.
As for the signal aspect, the last discussion I was a part of devolved into “ MI6 did it to make trump’s team look bad”. There is some bogus ‘news’ article to back this up.
I don’t know how we got here, but it’s devastating and scary.
Political tribalism is the new religious outlet, since the old religions are failing their purpose. It’s in-group/out-group ego feeding behavior. The psychology of the faithful doesn’t change, since the underlying issue isn’t being addressed; the expression of it changes.
Similar to how addiction psychology doesn't go away unless dealt with, addiction psychology just changes how it’s expressed.
Essentially, this is all Steve Job's fault.
Naturally, it did not take too long for other people exploit that newly found dynamic in context of democracy and use tech to manipulate such people with fringe views for own short-term gains.
That said, if there's ever another free and fair US election, the Democrats have a real opportunity to put a candidate that can actually deliver remaking the country, but in a way that lifts all boats, and without throwing out hard-won democratic freedoms. But I'm pretty certain they'll just front up another establishment candidate with a progressive face.
Are there any more doomed two party countries waiting to go authoritarian / fascist?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First-past-the-post_voting#Cou...
I think, though, that the US won't go full top-down authoritarian, because a large enough portion of the population is armed. Should some kind of coup ever be attempted, it could well spark a civil war – which is still doom, but not a subjugating kind of doom.
But yes let's hope there will be elections again
government is going after activists for other political issues, not just palestine protestors
It's because I'm scared that I'm going to protest on April 5 in my state capital.
Free Palestine protesters have been shutting down roads with their protests, this is illegal.
Tesla protesters are vandalizing the vehicles of private citizens and burning down dealerships. This is also illegal, and due to its political goals, it seems to fit the textbook definition of terrorism.
> the calculated use of violence (or the threat of violence) against civilians in order to attain goals that are political or religious or ideological in nature; this is done through intimidation or coercion or instilling fear
Had we not spent years tolerating these illegal forms of protest, maybe people would remember these are in fact illegal, and wouldn’t be so emboldened to keep doing them.
If someone wants to protest, that is their right. If someone is protesting by infringing on the free movement of other people, or using intimidation and violence to stir up fear to get people to comply with their ideology… that crosses well established lines.
If someone does something illegal, they can be charged with a crime and the legal process (access to a lawyer, courts, etc). It's not complicated and should not have any exceptions.
Yeah, and so? Is shutting down roads a "threat to US national security" and therefore warranting arrest without due process and green card revocation? The protesters should be charged with whatever city laws (certainly it's not a federal offense) they broke, and fined or whatever.
The coupist then got elected and freed his minions. The coupist is not giving the same dignity to these protesters, or even some american citizens who just look brown.
What's your point here?
Here's the deal. You want free speech don't intimidate, threaten and vandalize.
I own a Tesla. I bought one because I wanted an EV to reduce my emissions and that was the best one (years ago). Your right to free speech doesn't trump (heh, see what I did there) my right to be safe.
EDIT: FWIW I am not American. Where I live there is no such thing as "free speech" like in America. We also don't all carry guns like in America. You guys do you. But I'm pretty sure the my links are not free speech, even in America.
Either way, these Tesla protests are just idiotic. The vandalism is criminal. If this is the way Americans save their democracy and the rest of us rely on them then we're all doomed.
I agree that vandalizing peoples' cars is illegal, I don't think it is practically useful, and golly gee, we still have a criminal justice system (for now) that can be used to punish those who commit acts of violence.
When somebody uses violence it is not free speech it is suppression of free speech. You can't really speak freely when somebody hits you with a flagpole or pepperspray. Or even just threatens you with violence.
[1] https://www.reuters.com/legal/us-supreme-court-turns-away-ca...
Ps does HN offer the capability of completely deleting the account and all of the comments ?
They claim to allow deleting the account (just the name, they keep the comments up), but in practice they ignore requests. Source: personal experience.
they have 45 days to respond and another 45 days to delete the info.
Why? What happens if not? EU-wide DNS ban? I haven't seen that yet...
I don't think it's accidental; I think people have a plan to bring down institutions, and it's working so far.
If the whole world is governed by say 3 dictators they can easily make peace with each other and share the spoils. But they won't because wars will increase their domestic support. Orwell wrote about this.
That’s been happening from Leftist criticism for generations.
I'm talking about the principles: freedom, rights, and self-determination as self-evident, essential goods; progress as essential and good (real progress, not padding bank accounts); knowledge as the way humans can change their world; and knowledge provided by science and scholarship.
The left has criticized many things as lacking in knowledge and threats to freedom and rights, and the institutions, but not these principles.
> It wasn’t the MAGA movement that started dismantling Western culture in the US.
It was a branch of conservatives before them, but MAGA has fully embraced it. Look at the denial of freedom and human rights, replaced by a naked, aggressive embrace of oppression and cruelty. Look at the contempt for those things and progress, in the name of power. Look at replacing science with ideological disinformation - at even aggressively destroying science - even when it costs millions of lives, such as during a pandemic. How much blood is on their hands - how many needless deaths? Nobody talks about it.
Their impact outside of minor student circles has been 0. And for sure none of those are MAGA or Le Pen or AfD voters...
1. Short term: nothing major because it can't at the moment.
2. Long term: build up a military that is a credible military deterrent to the US, probably abandon NATO if the US doesn't, and form alliances with Canada and the UK.
Do you mean that "the" post-WWII peace settlement didn't last? It seems to have worked very well.
> It wasn’t America's principles that made it the world leader at the time—it was the fact that, unlike other major powers, it emerged from the world wars largely unscathed.
That certainly played a big role. Also, American principles that created a post-war order based on univeral human rights, the rule of law, and free-market capitalism (including free trade). Those principles led to treatment of the losing powers in that image, rather than in retribution, cruelty or oppression (compare to the USSR in Eastern Europe). In fact, Japan surrendered when they did mainly in order to surrender to the US and not to the USSR - those principles had very significant effects. They also led to the Marshall Plan in Europe.
The principles and the resulting actions created 'soft power' which may be unmatched in history. The general alliance with European powers has lasted over 80 years; the NATO military alliance, of mutual self-defense, has lasted almost as long - has there been anything like it?
People around the world fought and struggled for the vision of American freedom. I've spoken to people from different countries who, even in the first Trump administration, still had the American dream; they still saw the 'city on the hill'.
Beyond a doubt, the US also has done plenty of awful things. But what has distingiushed it, beyond every great power in history, are those principles.
To say that some war remains is to make perfection the only standard. Let's reduce it even more, but to claim the post-war order hasn't overseen extraordinary peace, freedom and prosperity is ridiculous.
I'm gonna be honest, the actual founding fathers as individuals aside, most of the people coming over where arguably running away from the Enlightenment rather than towards it, and a superstitious and fantastical isolationism was the norm, not the exception for most of America's history, while the post WWII leadership role was more of an accident. In some ways, this is old habits reasserting themselves
Towards the end of his book, Ricks notes the populist / religious backlash to enlightenment thinking that was already underway by the early 19th century.
It's strange to realize the post WWII America most of us have lived may really be exceptional, and how many either don't understand how big a part the liberal order has played in making America great since FDR, or have a different vision of greatness that requires tearing much of what we've enjoyed down.
That's a claim of its enemies, who look for any rationalization to destroy the greatest success of its kind in human history - when there isn't even a crisis.
Americans from the very beginning started playing on words - "all men are equal, but women aren't men, natives aren't citizens, and negros aren't even humans"
(Does this ring a bell -- as in Dark MAGA?)
2) The Interview Curtis Yarvin Says Democracy Is Done. Powerful Conservatives Are Listening. https://www.nytimes.com/2025/01/18/magazine/curtis-yarvin-in...
3) The philosophy behind Trump’s Dark Enlightenment An English magus of anti-democratic neoreaction has become a touchstone for the alt-right https://archive.is/SWAFE
• DOGE and Fiscal Discipline: The goal of cutting $1 trillion from the federal budget, a major libertarian priority.
• Freedom of Speech: Consistently opposes online censorship. Appointed FCC commissioners like Ajit Pai and Brendan Carr, both strong defenders of free expression. Signed executive orders aimed at ending federal involvement in censorship.
• Deregulation: Slashed hundreds of federal regulations across multiple sectors, reducing government interference in markets and individual enterprise.
• Judicial Restraint: Appointed constitutionalist judges committed to limiting federal overreach and upholding individual rights.
• Non-Interventionist Foreign Policy: Opposed endless wars, pushed to bring troops home, and resisted entangling the U.S. in new conflicts.
• Ross Ulbricht: Publicly pledged to commute the sentence of the Silk Road founder, a major symbolic and substantive gesture for civil liberties and criminal justice reform.
How does one call themselves a classical liberal and not support this?
Is the result all that matters, and not how it is reached? Life-saving funding for various programs around the world through USAID? Cutting the budgets of the NIH, reducing what the National Cancer Research has to work with by $1B? Suspending student loan repayment programs?
I understand that your belief might be that the US government should never have been doing any of these things to begin with. Fine. But since we have been doing them, often for a very long time, and with so many programs, organizations, and literal lives now depending on them, is just yanking all of it with no notice, no time to adapt, practically overnight, really the ideal way to handle it because it saves more money faster?
> Freedom of Speech
Pulling AP's press credentials for not acknowledging the Gulf of America? Detaining/deporting people in the USA legally for expressing pro-Palestinian views? Suing media companies for coverage that you just didn't like? Punishing law firms for once taking up causes against you or that you didn't agree with?
> Non-Interventionist Foreign Policy
We're going to take the Panama Canal, Greenland, and Canada?
> Non-Interventionist Foreign Policy
Mexico, Greenland, Canada, ... there's never been a more interventionist US president.
> DOGE and Fiscal Discipline: The goal of cutting $1 trillion from the federal budget, a major libertarian priority.
That doesn't make it align with classical liberal principles - especially when they discard the rule of law and do it as a dictator. Cutting government is an act of Congress, not the executive.
> Deregulation: Slashed hundreds of federal regulations across multiple sectors, reducing government interference in markets and individual enterprise.
Who intervenes more in business than Trump? For example, he is forcing them to abandon DEI and ESG; he is extorting law firms; he extorts funds and capitulation from other companies.
> Judicial Restraint: Appointed constitutionalist judges committed to limiting federal overreach and upholding individual rights.
The judges have eliminated many legal restraints on government, for example fabricating legal immunities for the President that are not in the Constitution.
> Freedom of Speech: Consistently opposes online censorship.
He's forcing independent, private universities to abandon freedom of speech, arresting people based on their speech - extremes never before seen.
People are widely afraid to criticize Trump for fear of retribution - that's never really happened with an US president.
Nice try. We are not at war with these countries and not even close to it either. Trump is the most non-interventionist president of the last few decades. This is an empirical and historical fact.
> That doesn't make it align with classical liberal principles - especially when they discard the rule of law and do it as a dictator. Cutting government is an act of Congress, not the executive.
Obama in Executive Order 13576: "By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, and in order to cut waste, streamline Government operations, and reinforce the performance and management reform gains my Administration has achieved, it is hereby ordered as follows..."
https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/the-press-office/2011/0...
> He is forcing them to abandon DEI and ESG;
Yes which is great - this is an example of reducing the size and scope of government. This amounted to less rules, smaller gov and undoing gov overreach. Again this is measurable and empirical action that proves a reduction in government power.
> extremes never before seen (freedom of speech)
There is a literally an EO on preventing online censorship. I'm not sure if you were in a Coma during Covid, but social media companies were censoring voices that have now shown to be entirely true.
https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/01/rest...
Trump has only been in office for two months. He's clearly threatening to take intervention to never before seen levels.
> Obama in Executive Order 13576 ...
Obama's executive order and actions were within the rule of law, "By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America". Very many of Trump's are not; Trump openly challenges and disregards any limit from law or the courts.
> [DEI/ESG:] Yes which is great - this is an example of reducing the size and scope of government.
It doesn't matter if you think it's great. It's stopping private organizations from doing what they choose - that is government using its power to compel behavior.
> There is a literally an EO on preventing online censorship
Human rights - freedom - is universal or it's nothing. It's just Trump protecting his friends and persecuting his enemies - the opposite of freedom.
They are arresting people in the street and deporting them for speech, forcing schools to censor students and faculty, forcing leaders of business and journalism to avoid criticism and even to support him - as just one example, look at the law firms he is extorting for representing parties critical of him.
It's also oppressive to force private companies - social media companies - to adopt policies Trump prefers, including about moderation.
This is... not an empirical or historical fact! Trump was not the anti-war president, he presided over US involvement in multiple conflicts with less transparency than any prior president. As of this writing is preparing an EO to increase weapons exports.
> There is a literally an EO on preventing online censorship. I'm not sure if you were in a Coma during Covid, but social media companies were censoring voices that have now shown to be entirely true.
That EO might be what you say it is - but social media companies were hardly censoring voices and that has not been "shown to be entirely true".
I don't see how a someone so clearly deep down the rabbit hole on trumpism could call themselves a classical liberal in good faith!
This is... not an empirical or historical fact! Trump was not the anti-war president, he presided over US involvement in multiple conflicts with less transparency than any prior president. As of this writing is preparing an EO to increase weapons exports.
What matters is this: you can agree that Trump has done good things and still think he's done horrible things as well. A shit sandwich is still a shit sandwich. You shouldn't eat it just because the bread's edible.
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Graham%27s_Hierarchy...
The article everyone's commenting on provides numerous examples of things Trump has done, some of which, such as calling for the use of the government against political rivals, are against libertarian ideals. Rather than address any of those directly, you've resorted to handwaving and providing examples of things you personally approve of. That could reasonably be seen as a failure to engage with reality, which would be delusional.
However, I don't know why the specific person you're responding to thinks you're delusional. I am not them.
I hope the opposition party realizes what an opportunity this is
They do and have been exploiting it for a while.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/thehill.com/homenews/house/5220...
“House Democrats are ramping up their aggressive strategy of conducting town halls in Republican-held districts, vying to exploit the GOP’s advised moratorium on the events to make inroads with frustrated voters, pick up battleground seats, and flip control of the House in next year’s midterms.
“A number of Democrats who ventured this month into GOP territory said they liked what they saw: anxious voters who are up in arms over both President Trump’s dismantling of the federal government and the reluctance of the majority Republicans to provide a check on executive power.
“Encouraged by their experiences, Democrats say they not only intend to return to those battleground districts, they’re also eyeing plans to broaden their range in the weeks and months to come. The Democrats’ campaign arms, in some cases, are helping to coordinate the effort.”
A recent episode of This American Life Ten Things I Don't Want to Hate About You[0] gives just a absolutely mind bending look at just how bad the situation is with a subset of the American public.
The synopsis is that the father in this family has been so taken by conspiracy theories that it's breaking apart a family. To settle things, he makes a $10k bet with his son over a series of 10 events he believes will absolutely happen in 2024. As the clock ticks over to 2025 and not a single prediction came true, he simply moves the goal posts and does not admit any wrong, even as his wife divorces him and his daughter becomes estranged.
It's a showcase of how absolutely lost in the flood of actual fake news some Americans have become and it's scary because these folks that are divorced from reality are typically the highly motivated voter that actually goes out there and votes.
My point here is that if you listen to this and think "Democrats have an opportunity", then you may not understand just how bad it is and that democracy is up against a cult.
[0] https://www.thisamericanlife.org/854/ten-things-i-dont-want-...
People engaged in going to townhalls are absolutely a great measure of what will actually happen at the polls. Especially in non-national elections which often have a small fraction of turnout and a few hundred votes can swing an entire election.
With that kind of context, it's really no wonder there's support from the right for an authoritarian leader. They honestly just think they're playing the democrats game and playing it better.
It _is_ a bit odd there's a complete lack of reflection on some of these moves though, but I suppose so long as the current executive branch veers away from changing the second amendment and manages to carve out enough exceptions for their most ardent supporters, all's good from their standpoint.
I saw this coming years ago. The rhetoric on both sides was never going to end up in anything remotely resembling healthy. Both sides are too busy pointing fingers now to really want to do anything about it.
The full effect that disinformation has had on Americans is probably impossible to measure, but with evidence like the Mueller report, you cannot deny that it has had some tangible effect. With Russia's efforts and the outcome of the 2016 election, I would be surprised if they did not continue and even ramp up their efforts in subsequent elections.
Well yes. it was. This was avoidable, but not by those fooled with fear from lies. It came from the rational people who felt their vote didn't matter, or that fell for obvious distractions as if somehow Trump was better because their aligned candidate wasn't the perfect progressive.
>Both sides are too busy pointing fingers now to really want to do anything about it.
if you only focus on the radicals, it's not surprising you become radical yourself and cast aside the grand majority of moderates. That both sidesing narrative is also a trick.
> some people literally think _every_ one of them is a literal, actual Nazi
I've never heard that. Can you give an example?
I think much of what you say comes from the right-wing disinformation machine - it's their talking points, and doesn't reflect anything I've experienced. Can you provide some evidence for any of it?
Here we are again. It seems to be the default mode for anything that doesn't match the mainstream narrative. Perhaps you've never heard of it because you haven't been misidentified with the right before? As a centrist, it happens a lot, and there have been plenty of instances where I was called a Nazi.
Of course it's impossible for either one of us to prove how regularly this happens. However, it seems silly to be surprised that someone on the left is unaware of it. Of course, they are. It's completely logical, just like someone on the right being completely unaware of how the right often treats left-wing individuals.
"some people literally think _every_ one of them is a literal, actual Nazi"
If that's true in any significant way, there should be plenty of public examples.
Instead of engaging in a serious discussion, you resort to changing the subject, and (effectively) disinformation about me. I take that as a signal that the rest of what you say is equally baseless and only repeats the right-wing talking points.
They love being told what to think.
It's scary just how cult-ish this pattern is.
I’m not saying two wrongs make a right and I’m not justifying the current administration. But if we look to how we got here, that’s a lot of why, if not mostly why.
Also, you can't compare their power to a US president, congressional majority, and Supreme Court justices. How many people live on campuses and how many are in the country? And finally, they didn't seek to take power from others, but to empower them - whether or not you like to see that happen or their strategies.
We are past the point of "everyone has their perspective on this" right and left have their own version of this etc. The system that protected people's right to have different opinions is being dismantled.
Free speech is understood as the ability to express yourself and your beliefs without consequences from the government, it has never meant to practically anyone that it means that as a culture no individual or organization will take action against you. This is personal responsibility in action, you must be prepared to shoulder the consequences of what you say and do.
People losing their jobs in universities and otherwise for expressing certain beliefs is not somehow unique to the American political left of the preceding decade, and it is strange that people have been misled into thinking that it is. Of course it is regrettable that some people may have lost their jobs engaging in good-faith reasoned expression of their beliefs, but you cannot argue that this is somehow the result of "the left".
I intentionally make no judgment here on whether I believe the climate that existed on American college campuses during that time is something desirable, but people doing things that you do not like is not "being actually authoritarian".
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immigration_and_Nationality_Ac...
"The Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952 deemed immigrants who were anarchists or members of or affiliated with the Communist Party or any other totalitarian organizations that plan to overthrow the United States as deportable immigrants. Immigrants who were successors of any association of Communism, regardless of name changes, still fell under the deportable immigrants. Immigrants who advocated, taught, wrote, published in support for communism, a totalitarian dictatorship, and the overthrowing of the United States were also deportable immigrants."
Lucky 10k: https://xkcd.com/1053/
>Yes, the intensity and the breadth is new (for recent generations anyways).
Yes, that is a big factor. Big difference between covert guantanomo bay arrests and outright making which house announcements about El Salvadar. They are saying the quiet part out loud and people can't ignore it any longer.
>my guess is that as soon as we get a new administration, the fervor will be lost and similar actions to these will quietly continue.
Well yes. Policy is a full time+ job and most people don't have the time and energy to watch every action of their government.
It's up to the reps elected to keep that momentum up.
I think a good rule is this: They won't agree to disagree with anybody.
Why? Because they have to suppress free speech of others, to gain and stay in power.
What is nuts to me is there is no liberal project to counter this. Conservatives have this really impressive drive to organize and work together, and liberals just in-fight and throw up their hands and complain. Autocracy is all but guaranteed.
Edit* turns out the comments are still there, just flagged and dead.
If we don't call out abuses by our own tribe (whichever that is), maybe we're part of the attack.
Those Twitter files?
Meanwhile Trump is suing pollsters for publications he doesn't like; extorting law firms for representation as reparation for them representing clients that sued him, who is deporting lawful permenant residents without due process for speech that is protected.
How can you possibly look at these and think they are in any way equivelant?
I'm glad I left the US.
The whole thing was clearly just a partisan smear job in your eyes. Precisely the same reaction as the views of current maga types about the current first am disasters.
It's worth revisiting /precisely/ in relation to fighting the current assault. It's worth noting who publicly opposed /both/.
Look at the spectrum.
1. Someone commits a harm (pick any one of the harms I listed from Trump above)
2. Someone attempts a harm and either hasn't succeeded yet or fails
3. Someone threatens a harm against someone.
4. Someone makes a request that implies they could escalate to a threat of harm if they were to be refused. (This is the worst you can reasonably claim the Twitter files as evidence for)
That is how far apart these two instances are. If you disagree please be specific because this claim that both sides are equivalent is absurd, especially when people refuse to ground out the example when confronted.
No it’s them it’s always them…
Is that ok? Not for them.
Requests were made, no threats. Some were complied with when Twitter agreed, some were denied.
There were no consequences for the refusals.
Please, cite a specific threat. A lawsuit, a link, a source, a quote, anything. And if you link the Twitter files themselves, let's make sure we actually run their sources to ground, because what they present them as and what they actually say are two different things.
https://twitterfiles.substack.com/p/how-twitter-let-the-inte...
From no. 20 but you should really read all of it. The cynic in me expects the goalposts to move and more smear.
20. “Were Twitter a contractor for the FSB… they could not have built a more effective disinformation platform,” Johns Hopkins Professor (and Intel Committee “expert”) Thomas Rid told Politico.
"Were Twitter a contractor for the FSB," the Russian intelligence agency involved in the 2016 campaign to meddle in the US election Rid Said, "They could not have built a more effective disinformation platform."
21. As congress threatened costly legislation, and Twitter began was subject to more bad press fueled by the committees, the company changed its tune about the smallness of its Russia problem.
Republican partisan's probably see it as treason. Democrats partisans pretend it's a "nothingburger." Everyone else who notices is getting despondent which is probably just as bad.
FIRE, Greenwald, Taibbi have stood and continue to stand on principle not partisan and will get relentlessly smeared with insane lies because of it.
edit: sidenote. For me the google search "twitter files taibbi" without quotes returned Tabbi's publication racket on page 4. From there I could get the twitter files separate publication. That seems like a very bad search fail. I wonder why it is like that.
Looming legislation and contracting alone are not a problem.
With all this scrutiny there is no evidence of a quid pro quo.
This is what I was getting at above, that there is room in the Twitter files for a chilling effect on speech when it comes to these competing interests, but what you're comparing it to is so far beyond the pale as to be absurd.
Look at this without the vitriol. There's a lot of stuff that looks weird, but it's been heavily investigated and so far no one has found anything deeper.
When you compare that to measurable harm, I think it's right that people take issue
Or we could skip the whataboutism that tries to go back to a prior administration, and instead focus on the current administration’s actions which are demonstrably far worse.
That's whataboutism nowadays.
Like give me a break. The previous admin took steps towards censoring real information that would be politically harmful to them, and now we're supposed to feel bad about the current admin who is taking productive steps against antagonist agents within our country?
I get that the law in this country is pliable and a nuanced subject but I'd rather deal with the latter issue - where our government is challenging the boundaries of the 1st amendment against our own enemies rather than their own people lol
Sorry but that sounds like out of the fascist playbook.
They all just fought against „enemies“, but they decided who was declared an enemy.
In the end everybody who said anything against them was declared an enemy.
> The POTUS recently issued several executive orders railing against specific law firms with attorneys who worked legal cases against him. On Friday, the president announced that the law firm of Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meager & Flom had agreed to provide $100 million in pro bono work on issues that he supports.
> Trump issued another order naming the firm Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison, which ultimately agreed to pledge $40 million in pro bono legal services to the president’s causes.
I know that's kind of the point, to bombard us with all this shit all at once so that we are exhausted and withdraw, but I kind of just wish that about half of America had just elected a fucking grownup instead of a stupid manchild and his Diablo-cheating South African toadie (or maybe the other way around).
I vote in every election that I am legally allowed to vote in, and I'm not sure what else I can do. I guess just stay informed and prepare for four more years of being exhausted.
- support media, particularly local.
- there are protests to attend if that's your thing. Tesla takedown is one set that's getting a lot of traction. (Note: these are peaceful protests; don't hurt people's cars). There's a broad "hands off" protest April 5, as another example.
- build and stay in touch with community.
- encourage others to do the same. Can you get folks to move off Twitter? Get some web site you're associated with to replace their twitter share icon with a masto/bsky one? Get folks to make a plan to vote in the next election? To themselves support local media or organizations? Perhaps to run for school board or other local office?
Agreed. No argument on that.
> there are protests to attend if that's your thing.
I'm afraid they're not. I'm happy to donate money to causes for people to protest but just being honest, I'm probably not going to do it.
> Tesla takedown is getting a lot of traction
I don't really want to damage strangers' property. I don't own any car as I just take public transportation, so I can't really say I'm "boycotting" Tesla any more than any other brand.
> Can you get folks to move off Twitter?
None of my family or friends were really using Twitter even before Elon bought it.
> To make a plan to vote in the next election?
All my family and friends vote in every election anyway.
> To themselves support local media or organizations?
Again, agreed on that. I'll mention that to parents next time I talk to them.
> Perhaps to run for school board or other local office?
I've debated it, but I think I'm a bit too eccentric to be a good politician. I am also afraid it would turn me evil.
I don't really disagree with anything you said, just that I'm already doing most of what you suggested.
Editorializing: A lot of folks bought Teslas because they wanted to do good in the world. Most of the Tesla drivers out there are allies of sanity. Except maybe those ugly trucks. :) :)
Divest of Tesla. In a 401k move from index funds to other funds without or less TSLA. Or invest in inverse EFTs that essentially short Tesla - TSLS, TSLQ, and TSLZ. Not buying a Tesla or torching a Cybertruck are not the only options.
The core of politics is building coalitions of cooperation that can sustain and grow themselves, ideally around habits of ongoing participation and policy goals that have wide benefits.
That means you have to start by developing habits. You are a political organization of one. What habits of schedule and focus will sustain that? How will you widen them into an organization of two, of six, of twelve, and more?
> I've debated it, but I think I'm a bit too eccentric to be a good politician.
There may be an example or two of people who many would find eccentric who are currently holding elected office. You never know.
> I am also afraid it would turn me evil.
The key is making sure that you don't ever place yourself outside relationships of accountability. As long as you can think of recent conversations where you've engaged in reflective give and take with a personal or public critic that you have sustained relationships with, chances are pretty good you're OK.
You know you can hold up a sign and chant insulting pro-democracy insults at Elon Musk without destroying property, right?
In Russia, you'll probably get thrown in prison if you protest against some of the state-sanctioned oligarchs. That's not the case in the US (i hate that I probably have to say 'yet' here) if you're a citizen. How much good will it do? Hard to measure. Most attempts to resist regimes like this are a matter of trying a lot of things and seeing what sticks.
Call your representatives and senators. Do it at least weekly. They're more responsive to things that take time. Show up to their town halls if they're brave enough to host them. Pick a few issues, learn enough about them to comment intelligently, and get involved. Say, opposing HJ 44 (a proposal that would roll back Biden-era lead water pipe replacement requirements). Your senators and reps can probably be doing more. Encourage them. :)
Sign up with indivisible; work through some of their contact-your-peeps todo items.
Vote your wallet and your retirement account. Divest of TSLA. Bias towards companies that are pushing back.
It's better to have a regular schedule of things you participate in that try to move the needle than to feel helpless. Tyrants rule through helplessness. We're not. We're not even close.
Citizens who practice free speech are being disappeared to El Salvador.
If you organize resistance, you will be targeted by billionaires and their massive media networks.
[1]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EiaU8P9y-wU
[2]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pm5xxlajTW0 (short clip)
[3]https://www.youtube.com/shorts/iTSgL_R1CC4 (another short clip)
Yes, the noise is to make you exhausted/miss the important things. Probably safe to ignore talk about invading Greenland.
Edit: To be clear, my comment is not aimed at you. I mean we’re missing the A in the ABCs of civic duty. It’s each person for themselves.
My point was a play on the word “civil” and how the bare minimum duty of a citizen should be to love thy neighbour.
You can vote against people. To me that's a tacit admission that you're accepting the proffer. As there's no way on your vote to indicate that it's a vote of protest vs. a vote of support. The candidate you vote for will see no difference. You'll have reduced your already meager position even further.
I do not accept this.
I mean if you want to get into the anti-democratic nature of the Unit Rule next I'd be happy to oblige you.
Your position is not automatically "good" just because school and MTV told you it was.
I agree that plurality voting is bad. We should have a system where candidates are ranked, so voter sentiment is better expressed and more than two candidates have a chance at winning.
The system we have now needs to be worked, until we get a new system. If you dislike all options equally, then vote for someone else as a protest. If you have a preference of one major candidate over the other, it is in your interest to express that. Sitting at home and doing nothing is the worst.
I challenge you to at least research ranked-pair or ranked choice voting (or any alternative form of voting) and write your city councilman about it. Or contact a voting reform organization to ask how you can help change your city.
This is a representative democracy. How exactly am I "failing my interests" when I don't vote?
If you have any opinion on the operation of government and you don't express it when asked, please explain how that's beneficial to you.
That is, you could either vote for one candidate, or against one candidate.
If enough people do this then the candidates should be thrown out and a new election held.
This would lead to insane chaos but if everyone where an honest actor it could be beautiful.
Ah so your sense of civics is that easy to depart with?
I take it you think no one could judge you for your position?
I don't really agree with the sentiment of "be nice to people doing stupid stuff" that seems to permeate around here, so it's not really a "gotcha" to point out that I'm being a judgmental asshole.
> I take it you think no one could judge you for your position?
I don't give a shit if people judge me. I have my opinions. You're free to think that position is stupid if you want. There's eight billion other people on this planet, there's always going to be people who think my opinions are stupid. I think yours is stupid. It's a beautiful system.
What is your goal?
> I don't give a shit if people judge me. I have my opinions.
People would hear more of them if they weren't so coarse. Be generous. You'd might be surprised what you're missing.
I don’t even know that I agree with the conclusion that people would hear more of my opinions if I were nicer, but even if I grant that, I also don’t particularly care if my opinions have reach.
I was going to type up a lecture to why I think it’s dumb to not vote, but I am sure you’ve heard it before, and frankly even if I had the most eloquent and amazing argument ever I doubt that it would change your opinion on this, so I can’t really be bothered.
I think we have some very different definitions of words here.
Choosing to do nothing is declaring that you dont care.
From 2017:
* https://www.vox.com/polyarchy/2017/3/7/14844120/how-to-fight...
The firehouse is also a deliberate strategy:
> The firehose of falsehood, also known as firehosing, is a propaganda technique in which a large number of messages are broadcast rapidly, repetitively, and continuously over multiple channels (like news and social media) without regard for truth or consistency. An outgrowth of Soviet propaganda techniques, the firehose of falsehood is a contemporary model for Russian propaganda under Russian President Vladimir Putin.
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Firehose_of_falsehood
* https://www.rand.org/pubs/perspectives/PE198.html
If you need to take a break, certain do so ("touch grass"), but be mindful that everyone's support is needed, and this will be a marathon.
See also recent post on Snyder's book On Tyranny:
But the only defense is to not update your priors. That means that you don't update on things that are actually true, either.
This is basically the death of epistemology. How do you know, and how do you know you know? It's no longer possible in this environment.
Postmodernism talked about a post-truth world. Putin has made it a reality.
A bit more locally; my wife is Mexican and as such I have a lot of Mexican in-laws. I have been helping my brother-in-law deal with immigration lawyers (and paid for them) in hopes that he might be able to get his citizenship soon-ish.
If I felt like anything I did in the grand political scope would do anything, I'd do it. I used to be a lot more active in this stuff, but it's pretty easy to get disillusioned and cynical with this stuff.
https://navigatorresearch.org/2024-post-election-survey-the-...
The democractic party was terrible in regards to many issues many people cared about.
You should stop caring about Trump and care about what people care about.
Not sure what you mean? All I shared was a set of exit polls?
The question is how bad does it have to get before the average Americans start to unite and fight back against this billionaire friendly legislation.
This country started by revolting over taxes on tea.
Most of the time these means people getting killed.
The human rights resolution needed the terror of WW2
This is the revolution gig economy. Don't forget to click that bell so you can be notified of new videos as they come out.
I also find it fascinating that no federal judge has held any Trump administration officers in contempt or imposed sanctions/bans on officers who are continuously hurting constitutional rights.
I assume that Americans have been sleeping at the wheel, unaware of the threat of slide into fascism. But is the voter-base and judiciary just unaware/unwilling to throttle persistent attacks?
The only reliable action by voters has been demonstrations outside Tesla stores. But look at Turkey, Serbia etc. - people have taken over their capitals and are striking en masse.
Are Americans unwilling to protect what makes America special?
Insofar as people do care, I think many people actually prefer executive order-style action because they perceive it as swifter, more direct, and less tied up in debate, dithering, and red tape.
But mostly what people care about is just "are things happening the way I want them to happen". If yes, they won't care about the mechanism that produced that; if no, they will blame whoever they perceive to be responsible, whether or not they actually are.
Most countries with parliamentary systems don't have this problem, where a person votes for a party and that party works with other parties to elect the the head executive. That head executive answers to the legislative. There aren't situations where the legislative and executive branches aren't politically aligned (a divided government) which has become common in the US and basically where nothing can get done.
If you look at other countries that also have Presidential systems, the US is not in very good company:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_system_of...
You can of course say that a reckless executive (like the one we have now) would still run amok, but I think we'd have less of a problem if these matters had been clarified long ago.
Federal judges generally don't prior-constrain the Executive. Hypothetically, the flow of control should be Congress restraining the Executive if it fails to do Congress's will; The judiciary steps in if the Executive tries to do something unconstitutional, but that's restraint of the action; punishment for continued bad behavior should flow from Congress.
Americans are still, overall, quite personally comfortable. I don't anticipate actions at capitals until that comfort is en-masse threatened.
I suspect you are right. It will probably take a full recession, much like COVID, for people to slam brakes at the travesty.
Are voters willing to strike until the President resigns? Or are people ok with the country being sold to third world style corruption that is happening right in front of their faces?
Think about the number of moving parts between a federal job cut and most private-sector individuals feeling it. Or between research and the years before the dried-up pipeline slows down the country's progress. And most Americans don't attend, nor are interested in, town halls.
America is well and truly doomed thanks to apathy of the people.
Can you cite a poll for this? Most Americans have never been asked and likely aren't okay with it but we don't really have a choice in the matter.
When it comes down to it the decision on how executive orders work is based on what a few dozen people think and most of them aren't elected. The general public has no say in the matter.
The one-third of Americans who are republicans put Trump in power, and are indirectly responsible for what’s happening — and the vast majority of them of course wholeheartedly fully support these violations of the First Amendment.
The democrats of course oppose all of these things.
Please stop using “Americans” as if this were one solid group of people who share the same views.
Rank and file workers have protections from firing by the executive because if they didn't, we would have the corrupt patronage systems we had 100 years ago.
Independent watchdogs at each agency are protected because political insulation is a requirement for such a role.
Put simply:
Authoritarianism is strongman politics where courts are ignored, and one/few people exert almost total control over the operation of government, ignoring any legal constraints on their power, and any criticism of the ruling party is inherently fake and illegitimate.
Fascism is the right wing brand of authoritarianism.
Reasonable people can debate spending levels or efficiency. But this administration is not interested in that. They are permanently destroying America's place in the world and at least temporarily, and illegally, destroying parts of the federal government. All while participating in eye watering levels of corruption and judicial self-service (firing prosecutors investigating friends, firing generals without cause, calling for impeachment of every judge they don't like).
Our government's design is broken. Our voting system only permits two parties. Our house districts are geographically manipulated. The electoral college further obfuscates the election or president.
https://www.vox.com/the-highlight/2019/11/11/20882005/accele...
Ok, you're straight up lying about what's happening.
The rest of the article has similar lies.
Put differently: if you feel like no part of the political machine accurately represents you, the most straightforward way to remedy that is by representing yourself.
Good luck with that
Just messing, I really hope genuinely good people run for office instead of LBJ type bullies
At the time, a large bloc of senators said: "We will resist to the bitter end any measure or any movement which would tend to bring about social equality and intermingling and amalgamation of the races in our [Southern] states."
The bill was fillibustered for 60 days.
The former confederate states pretty much all voted against it. The south VIOLENTLY resisted desegregation.
- In 2001, an open socialist, India Walton, won the Democratic primary for mayor. The State Democratic Party united with Republicans to fund a write-in campaign to re-elect Byron Brown as mayor, which was successful [1];
- Adam Schiff and the California Democratic Party spent millions to prop up a Republican to get the second-most votes in the California Senate primary. Why? California has what's called a "jungle primary" where the two candidates with the most votes in the primary, regardless of party, are on the ballot in the general election. The Republican has no chance so Schiff and the California Democrats are just making sure no progressive ends up on the ticket;
- The shenanigans in 2016 to make Hilary Clinton, a terrible candidate, the Democratic nominee for president over Bernie Sanders, including withholding funding, the threat of superdelegates and generally just putting the thumb on the scale at every turn;
- Again in 2020 with Bernie Sanders. Jim Clyburn and the DNC arranged for Biden to take South Carolina. Elizabeth Warren stayed in just long enough to peel off Bernie's votes. Other candidates got out of the way (eg Pete Buttigieg) and were rewarded for it with Cabinet positions;
- When Biden finally withdraw his re-election bid one option on the table was to have a convention primary. Instead Biden and the DNC simply anointed Kamala Harris because they were scared a progressive might win;
- Henry Cuellar, Congressman from Texas, is the (I believe) only anti-choice Democratic in the House. He has twice now faced a stiff primary challenge from progressive Jessica Cisneros who ran a grassroots campaign, the last time only winning by a few hundred votes. Democratic heavyweights like Nancy Pelosi and Jim Clyburn went down to campaign for him in Texas.
If the Democratic Party opposed Trump half as well as they do progressive elements in their own party, we'd be living in a very different country.
[1]: https://apnews.com/article/elections-buffalo-campaigns-elect...
As long as Fox News reports what he says as fact no one does anything
Here's what I see. Spend some time with older people now days (disclosure, I am 54, male, and heartsick). Look at what older people watch. Talk to those that are anywhere near MAGA ideas, you'll find that it has nothing to do with an America that is great again. It has everything to do with "make me great/relevant again."
Now go to Wikipedia, pull out a your favorite scripting language/spreadsheet (you're a programmer, because you read HN, right?). Look at the total popular vote, scroll down to the "by age" group. Figure out how many votes each side got in each group (it will only be a relative approximation, because they don't give sub-percentage values). Now do a running total. You'll see very clearly who was winning by age until the older people in the country showed up (in great numbers) to vote. The people who will be here the least long, and have the least to suffer for the consequences have sold out the country in a colossal fashion.
I wonder if history has every created such a strong case for justified generational angst.
Scare quoting disinformation is for nihilists. Is that where you're aiming?
The article has plenty of examples that go well beyond calling things “disinformation”
The question is "were peoples civil rights ignored because of that?"
In both cases: YES.
Well. There you go. We can argue about degrees between the red and blue ties but where would that get us? It's a ratchet. I can point out the many problems of the past administration and you can point them all out in this one, and in 8 years time, it will be worse.
> I am claiming this is a serious escalation of a new kind of attack on the first amendment.
Okay. Did you do anything different last time because of it?
I generally think this is another of many absurd case of cry bullying, that there's basically no problem here, just that people want to feel bad for themselves & to excuse actual bad acts.
I just don't see that real problem or harm was done to people over disinformation. Meta talked with some people at HHS, and people are flipping their shit that the government talked with social networks, but it seems like a grade a nothingburger from cry bullies, with the big fat 0 of actual interesting claims that the incredibly shallowly obvious manufactured outrage that the Twitter Files amounted to.
Its just so pathetic.
Disappearing people from the streets in broad daylight, on the other hand, will probably have a chilling effect on discussion of the topics they got disappeared over.
As is engaging in discussion about it with people who own or manage them.
Reference Wuhan Labs.
How do we determine when something is true or disinformation? That's what good faith pro-social and pro-truth people ask. They talk process, principles, and reasons.
Personally I found everything in the article to be ludicrous and to have Jack-all to do with the First Amendment, but I am not very smart.
I am sure there are arguments that this behavior is within the bounds of the constitution but the 1A definitely applies.
One of these things is not like the other.
Are you implying that Brian Krebs perpetuated suppression of legitimate dissent? Care to link it?
One is a free market and free association (you know there are many alternative platforms these days?). The other is serfdom.
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/zuckerberg-says-the-wh...
Selective enforcement and ambiguous rules are the very effective sticks that governments use all the time against whomever doesn't fall in line.
By design there's not going to be a direct link to a refusal and the retaliation.
For example, the government has a lot of discretion with something like this: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_Trade_Commission_v._....
You don't want to be fighting an antitrust lawsuit against an administration that has a personal vendetta against you.
What you are suggesting is that the government cannot communicate anything of substance. If say an administration was against advertising medications and publicly said so, this could be viewed as coercing networks to not air such ads for fear of being on the wrong side of the admin.
The idea that the government could bankrupt your company isn't something that matters. What matters is if they do based on your speech or make threats to based on your speech.
But in practice it surely can happen that a government can try to bankrupt your company without any visible evidence of retaliation. And while you'll have no legal recourse, it obviously matters to you very much.
https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/23pdf/23-411_3dq3.pdf
There's a ton of legal cases referenced from there. The current EOs against law firms would be an excellent example of real and immediate threat.
A) the Trump administration isn’t doing the exact same thing
B) the media companies are painting a totally honest picture of the kind of government pressure vs showing loyalty to Trump by supporting his narrative.
The concept of blaming the Jews on everything wrong in one's country is not new, and it never ends well.
Very Freudian of you to equate pro-Israeli zionist lobby with the "Jew".
Jewish being targeted is like canary in a mine, never ends well.
As for Adelson, just look up her Wikipedia... she owns Israel Hayom, Israel's largest newspaper, and is a major supporter of current Israeli government and has advocated for explosion of Palestinians from Gaza, annexation of WestBank and paid for expansion of illegal Settlements. She conditioned her financial support of Trump on moving US embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.
Covering up for war crimes and war criminals never ends well, either.
She is a Jew. There are much more Muslims running around with connections to other Muslims countries and businessness and you don't go around and calling it the Muslims kabal on every move any Muslim does.
As I said, the fact the your post is not yet flagged is the biggest indicator to the coming collapse. You are an antisemite, despite your lack of understanding of it.
anti-zionism is being against Jews living in their homeland, promotion of terror against them and pushing for them being ethnically cleansed. Connecting that goal to the aftermath of the genocide attempt by Palestinian and the recent war in 7 fronts to against Israel is most definitely anti-semitism.
While the examples in his article are valid & concerning, especially as talks of a third Trump term have started, I truly can't see anyone changing their mind because the response to it has been completely ineffective and tone-deaf:
Instead of a solid, modern, coherent plan to keep the democratic party alive in a time of populism and radicalization in response to a crumbling economy and cronyism, it has solely been a "look at all the bad stuff Trump is doing!" and "oh me oh my how outrageous!" which does nothing but fall on deaf ears after 2020.
This is because most of the people writing these "why you should be outraged" posts are in a bubble of educated, traditional-news-consuming, upper-middle class skilled workers -- all groups that are very quickly falling out of power and favor with the majority of the population.
I hope the democratic party finds a way to become a real contender again. While not everyone on the right is a boogeyman, there are plenty of Project 2025 supporters, much worse than anyone we know about, who will steamroll this country if left unchecked. If the right doesn't have a viable opposition party with strong messaging, we're in for a bumpy ride.
Heck, it's not even political despite the screeching to the contrary.
You're right that action must be taken too, but action does require an understanding of the battlefield one is entering.
Action has to be taken, but by people with the power to change things -- namely democratic leadership, who have the funds & influence (albeit dwindling). Do they understand the battlefield they're entering? I don't think so, as I think they're sticking to that same outrage strategy.
But there's no effort to convince swing voters to vote against Trump. The midterms will be here before anyone knows it and it's going to be the first big chance to push back on the current administration, but I see so little work that's being done to create a coherent opposition party. Ezra Klein's book on Abundance was a great starting point. In Dem spaces though, reaction to the book was pretty much absent. Most of Dem base temporarily got busy trying to come up with ways that Klein has failed some progressive purity test (centrists are fascists, environmental injustice, etc etc.) Then after that, most just ignored his vision and went back to crying about the current administration.
IMO the Dems cranky, upper middle class news addicted base is its worst feature. They continue to kneecap the Dems from being a real opposition party. Telling people how bad the administration is won't make a good opposition party. It worked just enough for 2020 but ran out of steam by 2024. Dems need to create a vision of the future under Dem rule.
I suspect it's because the coalition that kept the Democratic party together has failed and its current base is just too small to win votes in elections. They've lost their bonafides among the trade unions, they've lost their appeal to the technology class, their strongest supporters remain the social-progress bloc which may be overrepresented online but is just too small of a force to win in elections.
So there's a fundamental tension. You can focus on the current situation to the exclusion of swing voters and their interests, or focus on swing voter interests and sound like you're lamely ignoring what's happening right now. It's a hard balance to strike, and while people make noise about it online I think most elected Dems understand everyone's trying as best they can.
People by and large do not want "solid, modern, coherent plans". Both kamala and hillary clinton had those.
People want to be told the strong man will make everything better if you just give up a few rights.
Can the democratic party play that game? Sure. Should they? Maybe? I mean, it would be nice to have someone with an iq over 80 and at least a shred of morality and self-respect somewhere in our elected officials.
Does your post, in specific, say anything meaningful? Not really, you just throw out some vapid complaints and then tell us you hope the world will change.
Surely a mother-knows-best attitude will work.
> Both kamala and hillary clinton had those.
Surely denying massive campaign problems, such as "basket of deplorables" and not distancing herself from Biden, will work.
> People want to be told the strong man will make everything better if you just give up a few rights.
Surely strawmanning any solid, modern, coherent plan as stripping away rights will work.
>Does your post, in specific, say anything meaningful? Not really, you just throw out some vapid complaints and then tell us you hope the world will change.
Did you want me to go say some full-time working-class person working paycheck to paycheck can just go run for office and singlehandedly defeat Trump in a landslide victory?
Yeah, those are totally "massive campaign problems". Massive. Gigantic. Career ending.
Oh wait, Trump constantly throws out insults and associated with morally repugnant people. He insults christians and veterans and still got elected. I don't think these are the real issues.
He insults christians and veterans, and yet they vote for him overwhelmingly. The rules and issues are obviously different for the left and the right, and whataboutism just doesn't work. Fighting the "fair fight" instead of the actual fight won't end well.
They will not be daunted by an electoral setback. They control the Supreme Court, and will for decades. They control a majority of state legislatures -- which control how voting and districting work.
We've been past the point of no return since 2016. If you still had hope then, it should have died the same day Ruth Bader Ginsburg did. At this point it's all just telling ourselves fairy stories. It gets monotonically worse from here, and there is no longer anything we can do about it.
Actually making things better is hard. A lot of people legitimately disagree with Bernie Sanders. He simply does not have majority support.
For the rest of my life, the Democrats' policy is going to be "trying to get back the rights you lost in 2024”.
That very well may be, but considering all his policies do[0], the question must be asked, why?
Maybe we should ask ourselves why, when the american majority supported his entire policy agenda, did they not support him?
Could it be perhaps the billionaire owned media misrepresenting him and his positions? His own party conspiring to take him out of the primary running? Or just average voter ignorance? No one has ever contended that americans always vote in their best interest, after all.
[0] https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2020/feb/25/pete-butti...
https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2022/09/19/modest-decli...
https://www.vox.com/2016/1/28/10853502/bernie-sanders-politi...
I agree, part of it may be his extreme language off-putting those who don't really know what socialism even means, ie the average american. Keep in mind the average american has reading comprehension at or below that of an average sixth grader. Try selling any complex idea or radical change (even for the better) to a sixth grader, it's going to be tough.
Yeah, fair point, I hadn't really thought about it that way. You're absolutely right, that is obviously a policy, and one that people don't agree with, woe unto them...
I guess it's like that author said: "It's easier to envision the end of the world than the end of capitalism." I fell in to that trap of assumption, taking that not as a policy prescription, but as a far off amorphous aspiration.
I guess because it's obvious to me that even if he had had a super-majority that "ending capitalism" would still be a decades long reconstruction of the economy, not something one could put in to a bill put to congress. Plus I always saw him more as opposed to unrestrained capitalism in segments of our life that were basic needs, rather than opposition to capitalism as an idea. I must admit I do still hold some rose colored glasses, I guess.
>I should acknowledge, they were all boomers.
haha. unsurprising. I know first hand the type you describe, as someone who campaigned for him twice and is involved in local politics.
Then he went out and sold America on some social democrat ideas. He did ok in 2020, but lost, partially because Democratic voters were afraid that Republicans would see him as a crazy leftist, and partially because Biden had more support from some demographics.
Yeah, there's some billionaire pushback, but Bernie chaired the budget committee. It's not like he was whacked by some billionaire hit squad, he just wasn't quite popular enough to win the presidential primaries.
I don't have all the historical polling data to say this with certainty, but his policies were pretty much always supported by a majority of the american public from a cursory perplexity search (grain of salt and all that, but seriously, can you think of one policy of his that wasn't popular?)
The more important question, to me at least, than "in 2016 did america think bernie was a crazy leftist?" is, "why, when his policies all had majority voter support, did the candidate himself carry the McCarthy era veil of 'crazy leftist' and 'communist'"?
And I think the answer is the same as in my original comment, a concerted effort from the billionaire class (who own all our media) to do anything BUT accurately portray the guy who vocally wanted to cost them money in favor of those who wanted to enrich them. I think the billionaire class almost always plays a bigger role than we think, but that might just be all the books I read about the machinations of the rich and powerful to manufacture consent. I'm no expert.
Consider how Obama got piled on for a minor tweak to healthcare laws, and gets called a socialist for ever mentioning that maybe the rich aren't helping out enough.
I've gotta be skeptical that Bernie's policies were majority supported at the time, and any investigation would have to look at the evidence, and especially the polling questions, really carefully.
Wholly agreed, and I'm unfortunately way too lazy to do that. But I did look at and cite one snapshot in time where all his policy positions had a majority support (except 15$ min wage because it was framed with "risk of job losses")
>consider how Obama...helping out enough
Yeah, agreed, which I think is more evidence that reality, unfortunately, holds less water than whatever the tv/ipad/iphone tells you to believe about the world. That plus the average american reading comprehension being at or below sixth grade level makes for a tough sell of anything but very simple language, very simple policy. And just in general, an uneducated populace tends to be more susceptible to voting against their own interests.
Obviously that's a worse choice (at best it's just corrupt crony-capitalism under a veneer of caring about the little guy, at worst outright fascism) but we all have to admit that parties like the Democrats (and Labor in the UK and Australia, etc.) haven't had policy platforms to make changes that really and substantially help the struggling working-class for decades.
It's hard for us to see, because most people commenting on hacker news are in the professional class and the status-quo works quite well for us.
Inflation-adjusted median real income is up 20% since 1990 in the US. Unemployment is lower. Life expectancy is higher. Air pollution is lower. Crime is lower. Gay marriage is now legal.
The living standards of the many in the US have demonstrably improved dramatically over the last 30-40 years.
Housing affordability is worse, but that is largely due to local rather than national politics, and the policies that have lead to unaffordable housing are largely non-partisan (in that homeowners across the political spectrum are for restrictive zoning and against development).
It's true that many people feel that living standards have not improved. I don't have an answer for that beyond speculation.
There are many things this statistic masks. How many households were dual income vs single income over that same time span? This also doesn't take in to account cost of living changes, which I'm confident have risen more than 20%. Sorry in advance if I'm wrong. Inflation erosion, how CPI is calculated to make things look better than they are (too much to get in to), but my point is that statistic is not the holy grail of progress.
>unemployment is lower
Won't argue that one
>life expectancy is higher
As would be expected with 35 years of progress in medicine? Plus, that statistic hides we've actually plateaued and even declined compared to other OECD nations.
>Air pollution... gay marriage is legal
Won't argue with those, though I wonder how much longer the air will be cleaner when the current admin has severely weakened the EPA and clean air/water regulations.
>The living standards...30-40 years.
Are you deriving that from the median real income? Even assuming it's true, why are a growing percentage of american's living paycheck to paycheck?
>Housing affordability is worse...local
That's... a pretty big one... I'd argue it could be greatly helped by federal policy against oh idk, stopping private equity from buying up homes and apartments, severe taxes on 2nd or 3rd properties, unoccupied property, etc.
All I'm saying is, there's a reason average americans aren't pickin up what you are puttin down. I don't think it's just a feeling.
And the establishment refusing to run new candidates. If there is a single person to blame for Trump 2.0, it’s Biden.
The democrats should move to 90's style triangulation, it works.
For decades now, government policy has had approximately nothing to do with the will of the public. (https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/perspectives-on-poli...)
This situation is now being corrected. Anyone who sees this as a catastrophe, as getting "monotonically worse", is no fan of a republican form of government
Well, partly because travel and communications were extremely slow when the constitution was written, but mostly because the rich land owners (and white males) were the ones writing it.
Seems like a low bar to hurdle, yet here we are.
Legally speaking, I think an outright challenge to the 22nd amendment will be interesting. As a 20th century amendment the language is pretty clear. But once again we look to what would actually enforce it?
But in other common law countries, like India, whose legal system is very similar to the U.S., have had cases where the Supreme Court struck down a constitutional amendment.
For more on this, see: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_structure_doctrine
With regard to the Indian case above: while I support the goal of judgement, as the goal of the judgment itself is good, the idea of a Supreme Court overriding a constitutional amendment is quite startling.
The supreme courts of several other countries, including Bangladesh, Pakistan, and Uganda have copied this doctrine.
Who knows when the U.S. Supreme Court will decide to copy this doctrine as well.
And even then, term limits would be a weird hill to die on, since it would open the door for future courts to strike down constitutional amendments.
Even seemingly-friendly southern states may have state governments that will take a dim view of Trump attempting to get on the ballot. Kentucky, for example, has a Democrat as governor who is very popular. Kentucky has also had its bourbon industry devastated by Trump's senseless trade war. I would be shocked if Trump managed to illegally get on the ballot in Kentucky in 2028.
Many people think that the conservative majority on the court would automatically side with him and rubber-stamp his candidacy. I highly doubt that. He has already been publicly repudiated by Roberts (chief justice nominated by GW Bush) for his attacks on federal courts [1]. I am confident Roberts would not support any attempt by Trump to ignore the 22nd amendment.
[1] https://www.politico.com/news/2025/03/18/john-roberts-donald...
If they added 10 young MAGA judges to the supreme Court this year, that would be the biggest legacy of the administration. All the XO can just be undone on day one, assuming we have another pro-democracy president.
America has 4 years to set things right, it had better make it count.
I think people consistently misinterpret the overturning of Roe (a calculated, focused effort that took decades and overturned specific judicial precedent that basically had created a right-to-privacy from whole cloth) with "Trump has SCOTUS in his pocket." He doesn't. The GOP got the two things they wanted from tilting the SCOTUS in their direction; there's no reason to believe this SCOTUS is about to start looking at the bare-face text of the Twenty Second Amendment and decide there aren't any words there.
The incentives just aren't there. Especially because it's pretty obvious that if they do ignore that text, it becomes pitchfork time and their necks are no less vulnerable than the President's.
(ETA: And that's ignoring that individual states are not obligated to put him on the ballot if he's inelligible to run for a third term, and by-and-large, Americans do not vote for names not on the ballot because they don't know their own civil rights).
I think we can understand why SCOTUS would ban Colorado from making that decision themselves, for much the same reason it bans Mississippi from having its own interpretation of the parts of the 14th Amendment about due process or citizenship.
In contrast, the 22nd Amendment is plain-letter law, so obvious that it brooks no interpretation.
And as as far as the 12th Amendment goes, "But no person constitutionally ineligible to the office of President shall be eligible to that of Vice-President of the United States."
The 22nd amendment doesn't explicitly say he cannot serve as President, it just says "no person shall be _elected_ to the office of President".
Yes, the spirit of the constitution clearly prevents a 3rd term, but it could be possible to employ a very literal interpretation that allows the above.
> Trump, 78, said in the interview that he was serious about seeking a third term in office.
> "A lot of people want me to do it," Trump said, according to NBC News. "But we have – my thinking is, we have a long way to go. I'm focused on the current."
> When asked about specific plans for seeking a third term, Trump confirmed one method — Vice President JD Vance wins the White House in a future election and then hands over the presidency. Trump said there were other plans, but he refused to say what they wer
Technically illegal due to the Twelfth Amendment: “no person constitutionally ineligible to the office of President shall be eligible to that of Vice-President of the United States” [1].
Simpler: run two randos, have the House choose Trump as Speaker [2], have the randos resign [3].
[1] https://constitution.congress.gov/constitution/amendment-12/
[2] https://www.cbsnews.com/news/house-speaker-non-member-of-con...
Here's a Constitutional law professor arguing 25 years ago that Bill Clinton was constitutionally eligible to run again as VP: https://web.archive.org/web/20051001004410/http://archives.c...
It's easy to claim that Trump running as VP would violate the spirit of the 12th amendment, but I think there is genuine doubt as to how the Supreme Court might rule.
Separately, could you contact me by the email in my profile? I've got a (mostly unrelated) question I've been meaning to ask you. No hurry.
> But no person constitutionally ineligible to the office of President shall be eligible to that of Vice-President of the United States.
This would have to be decided by the Supreme Court.
John Adams might agree with you though. He said the constitution was intended for a moral (and religious) people. Maybe Americans are simply out of virtue, and don't deserve the Constitution anymore?
Sounds pretty expensive.
Nayib Bukele is limited to one term by the Salvadoran constitution. He’s currently on his second. Turns out that if nobody stops you, you can just do whatever you want.
No it isn't. People have power because people with guns follow their orders, not because of what a piece of paper says.
That was just earlier today. https://apnews.com/article/trump-third-term-constitution-22n...
We've had ten years of "Trump can't do X."
This is what these people do.
> The third presidential term of Franklin D. Roosevelt began on January 20, 1941, when he was once again inaugurated as the 32nd president of the United States, and the fourth term of his presidency ended with his death on April 12, 1945
There's already precedent.
[1] https://constitution.congress.gov/constitution/amendment-22/
FDR was seen as getting America out of the Great Depression and navigating America through WW2 successfully. Oh and alcohol became legal again so you could celebrate the roaring manufacturing economy and military victories with a beer. Trump is no FDR.
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/donald-trump/trump-third-te...
Trump seeking a third term will be out of the ordinary, and if he were to “win” the election and be recognized as the president, it would mean the end of the constitution. And that could happen.
Trump merely happened to be far gone prior to stepping into office for the first time.
If you think that can't happen, think about this: the Constitution already prohibited him from running as an insurrectionist. Multiple states found that he committed insurrection and the US Supreme Court forced him on their ballots anyway. The reason: they assert that the amendment isn't self-enforcing, and congress must proactively write a law in order to create enforcement measures for the 14th amendment's prohibition on insurrectionists. They didn't, so he was allowed to run and take office.
That same logical jiu-jitsu the GOP used to successfully violate the 14th amendment could just as easily be used on the 22nd.
[1] https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/trump-third-term-president-con...
1. He’ll have to change some rules to run again. There will be a lot of resistance.
2. Midterm elections (November of 2026) could take away majorities in the house and the senate, and hopefully bring impeachment back into the picture.
3. There are special elections next Tuesday - 2 house seats in Florida and a Supreme Court justice in Wisconsin. It’s encouraging that Republicans are worried about these, the apartheid billionaire is spraying money all over Wisconsin.
Yes it’s dark and depressing, but things can be changed long before the next Presidential election.
In Rome, Cezar didn't become the dictator for life, he got stabbed to death. What happened is that his successor, Octavian, took control of real power while pretending that the republic was fine.
In reality Republic died before Cezar, while Octavian played Weekend at Bernie's.
Edit: Born June 14, 1946 - you do the math.
`Trump "claims" they selectively edited`. This is intellectually dishonest of the OP to say this. It is clear from the published original transcript, it is clear that they did in fact swap out Harris' nonsensical reply to some critical questions with something else she spoke 20-30 mins prior to make it sound like she gave a coherent answer. This is obvious for anyone looking at the original raw footage published by PBS.
Why is the OP saying "Trump claims" when it has in fact been proven to be true? He makes it sound like PBS folks did real journalistic work and Trump is trying to use his power in government to intimidate well-meaning journalists. That is not true.
It's the same reason news articles always use "alleged".
People _didn't_ vote for kamala because shes a milquetoast unqualified candidate that represents a party that has lost touch with it's base. It turns out, "just vote (for whoever we decide on at the dnc)." Is not a viable strategy.
Obviously policy matters very little here; personality is king and many Americans love Trump’s personality. It’s why none of the policy arguments do much to sway anything.
People like the man, and they can dislike his policies separately, but they only dislike the policies that really impact them personally in a negative way. They like the man enough to just support whatever less visible policies he has.
I think race, gender, class, and culture have a lot to do with these preferences.
Its more common for right wing parties to elect a female leader than for left wing parties to, so if you look at leaders of countries most women are right wing. So if anything it is the left that has an issue with female leaders, not the right.
If we define "leader" as executive or legislative positions at the federal or state level, definitely not true in the US, by a pretty large margin.
I think there were just a series of events that led to nobody getting excited by D in the election, allowing Trump to win. Especially when you consider that moderates and NPAs always decide the elections.
Inflation was out of control(by US standards) for Biden's entire term. In fairness this started at the end of Trump1 but carried on for years. Will Trump fix it? Who knows, I think most expect tariffs to make it even worse.
Immigration seemed unchecked, which itself probably wouldn't have been a huge issue, but news and social media 'investigators' came out about how much the gov was giving them - money, housing, healthcare, etc. Struggling and newly struggling people got really, really angry about money being spent there. That was a super easy play for R's all election season.
But the nail in the coffin IMO was the debate disaster, CNN turning on Biden as not fit to be president overnight, then last minute odd resignation letter via Twitter. Then injected with a candidate nobody had a say in, to boot.
So in short, a combination of people angry at 'the system' rebelling, and a candidate without much real support. I don't feel like R's won the election as much as I feel like D's imploded themselves. For the sake of not having an uniparty, I hope they rethink things. I feel like Newsom making a more moderate shift is a play in that direction, we'll see.
Just my .02.
Unfortunately it was hard to convince people that was a terrible reason because not countering Trump votes with votes for Harris was just ensuring a Trump win. Which of course meant the same outcome or worse for Palestinians and also awful shit for Americans and other countries that rely on the US.
"free-speech does not mean freedom from consequences",
"free speech does not apply to hate-speech",
"we must suppress and limit the spread of misinformation",
It really seems that people do not believe in free speech anymore, and only appeal to it as a principle to defend themselves, never to defend those they disagree with.
This is a actually a slogan in support of free speech. Of course people are allowed to say transphobic things online or downtown, but that would surely make some of their coworkers uncomfortable and that's pretty disqualifying from most employment. You're allowed to say things, but colleagues are allowed to respond in kind within the law.
Opposition to LGBT is typically rooted in the very rational and well-evidenced fear...
This used to be the biggest argument against hiring women into all-male teams. Nowadays it's the biggest argument against hiring men into all-female teams.
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_of_speech
"Consequences" are to be understood as sanctions or censorship, or does it mean something different to you? Then please elaborate.
Doesn't make a popular XKCD wrong, but it makes some ideas rather stupid.
Whereas, your PRIVATE employer deciding they don't want to pay you money because you are an asshole (whether that's because you hate LGBTQ people, or aggressively defend their rights with your speech) is THEIR first amendment rights.
The 1st is about: Freedom of speech, press, religion, and association. Limiting a private company's ability to fire you for your speech is against their 1st amendment rights! Indeed, several attempts to build a civil rights framework in the US failed judicial review for this exact reason, and the one we eventually got had to make great efforts to justify that it's limited "protected class" framework was acceptable. I predict it gets overturned.
The inverse is also true: The government CAN limit the speech of people in their government jobs. Teachers can legally be prevented from saying things as teachers, without it being an infringement on their speech rights.
As a European, I can confirm it’s at least as bad here, if not worse. We’re just gagged by a different set of taboo ideas.
I bought into Trump’s campaign promise to 'restore free speech' — partly because he’d been censored so aggressively himself. I figured he’d get its value. But I didn’t see the Israel exception coming: apparently, Israel and its actions are untouchable, no matter the cost.
Otherwise the speech of one can silent the speech of orhers.
Wasn't the full video released and it established that they did edit the video? The article is making it sound like they are being forced to settle a false allegation?
edit: the response was edited, not just the video. details: https://x.com/i/grok/share/KODjBWCrzF8oPmKyPCFuVj1c7
Original Transcript: https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/2v8g39z2ab1jo0waj6tn4/AJhMeQd...
MR. BILL WHITAKER: And yet Prime Minister Netanyahu seems to be charting his own course. The Biden-Harris Administration has pressed him to agree to a ceasefire, he's resisted. You urged him not to go into Lebanon, he went in anyway. Does the U.S. have no sway over Prime Minister Netanyahu? VICE PRESIDENT KAMALA HARRIS: The aid that we have given Israel allowed Israel to defend itself against 200 ballistic missiles that were just meant to attack the Israelis, and the people of Israel. And when we think about the threat that Hamas, Hezbollah presents Iran, I think that it is without any question our imperative to do what we can to allow Israel to defend itself against those kinds of attacks. Now, the work that we do diplomatically with the leadership of Israel is an ongoing pursuit around making clear our principles, which include the need for humanitarian aid, the need for this war to end, the need for a deal to be done which would release the hostages, and create a ceasefire. And we're not going to stop in terms of putting that pressure on Israel, and in the region, including Arab leaders.
Edited Transcript: https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/2v8g39z2ab1jo0waj6tn4/AJhMeQd...
MR. BILL WHITAKER: And yet Prime Minister Netanyahu seems to be charting his own course. The Biden-Harris Administration has pressed him to agree to a ceasefire, he's resisted. You urged him not to go into Lebanon, he went in anyway. Does the U.S. have no sway over Prime Minister Netanyahu? VICE PRESIDENT KAMALA HARRIS: The work that we do diplomatically with the leadership of Israel is an ongoing pursuit around making clear our principles.
PS: The above transcripts were linked from CBS site: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/60-minutes-publishes-transcript...
Original Transcript: https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/2v8g39z2ab1jo0waj6tn4/AJhMeQd...
MR. BILL WHITAKER: And yet Prime Minister Netanyahu seems to be charting his own course. The Biden-Harris Administration has pressed him to agree to a ceasefire, he's resisted. You urged him not to go into Lebanon, he went in anyway. Does the U.S. have no sway over Prime Minister Netanyahu? VICE PRESIDENT KAMALA HARRIS: The aid that we have given Israel allowed Israel to defend itself against 200 ballistic missiles that were just meant to attack the Israelis, and the people of Israel. And when we think about the threat that Hamas, Hezbollah presents Iran, I think that it is without any question our imperative to do what we can to allow Israel to defend itself against those kinds of attacks. Now, the work that we do diplomatically with the leadership of Israel is an ongoing pursuit around making clear our principles, which include the need for humanitarian aid, the need for this war to end, the need for a deal to be done which would release the hostages, and create a ceasefire. And we're not going to stop in terms of putting that pressure on Israel, and in the region, including Arab leaders.
Edited Transcript: https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/2v8g39z2ab1jo0waj6tn4/AJhMeQd...
MR. BILL WHITAKER: And yet Prime Minister Netanyahu seems to be charting his own course. The Biden-Harris Administration has pressed him to agree to a ceasefire, he's resisted. You urged him not to go into Lebanon, he went in anyway. Does the U.S. have no sway over Prime Minister Netanyahu? VICE PRESIDENT KAMALA HARRIS: The work that we do diplomatically with the leadership of Israel is an ongoing pursuit around making clear our principles.
PS: The above transcripts were linked from CBS site: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/60-minutes-publishes-transcript...
Could you try making your point directly? You seem to be expecting me to have the video memorized or something so I can pick out the difference from the transcript.
> Someone is trying to make a point about edited interviews without explaining what they believe the edit was and why it's important.
To get someone to better explain their point about edited interviews:
1. Ask directly what specific edit they're referring to. 2. Request time stamps or examples from the interview 3. Ask them to describe what they believe was removed/altered 4. Question what impact they think this edit has on the message 5. Inquire why they find this edit significant
If you ask Grok, it will point you to the source. But let me do that for you below.
Original Transcript: https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/2v8g39z2ab1jo0waj6tn4/AJhMeQd...
MR. BILL WHITAKER: And yet Prime Minister Netanyahu seems to be charting his own course. The Biden-Harris Administration has pressed him to agree to a ceasefire, he's resisted. You urged him not to go into Lebanon, he went in anyway. Does the U.S. have no sway over Prime Minister Netanyahu? VICE PRESIDENT KAMALA HARRIS: The aid that we have given Israel allowed Israel to defend itself against 200 ballistic missiles that were just meant to attack the Israelis, and the people of Israel. And when we think about the threat that Hamas, Hezbollah presents Iran, I think that it is without any question our imperative to do what we can to allow Israel to defend itself against those kinds of attacks. Now, the work that we do diplomatically with the leadership of Israel is an ongoing pursuit around making clear our principles, which include the need for humanitarian aid, the need for this war to end, the need for a deal to be done which would release the hostages, and create a ceasefire. And we're not going to stop in terms of putting that pressure on Israel, and in the region, including Arab leaders.
Edited Transcript: https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/2v8g39z2ab1jo0waj6tn4/AJhMeQd...
MR. BILL WHITAKER: And yet Prime Minister Netanyahu seems to be charting his own course. The Biden-Harris Administration has pressed him to agree to a ceasefire, he's resisted. You urged him not to go into Lebanon, he went in anyway. Does the U.S. have no sway over Prime Minister Netanyahu? VICE PRESIDENT KAMALA HARRIS: The work that we do diplomatically with the leadership of Israel is an ongoing pursuit around making clear our principles.
PS: The above transcripts were linked from CBS site: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/60-minutes-publishes-transcript...
No, the transcript you pasted shows it's part of her answer from the same question.
Original Transcript: https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/2v8g39z2ab1jo0waj6tn4/AJhMeQd...
MR. BILL WHITAKER: And yet Prime Minister Netanyahu seems to be charting his own course. The Biden-Harris Administration has pressed him to agree to a ceasefire, he's resisted. You urged him not to go into Lebanon, he went in anyway. Does the U.S. have no sway over Prime Minister Netanyahu? VICE PRESIDENT KAMALA HARRIS: The aid that we have given Israel allowed Israel to defend itself against 200 ballistic missiles that were just meant to attack the Israelis, and the people of Israel. And when we think about the threat that Hamas, Hezbollah presents Iran, I think that it is without any question our imperative to do what we can to allow Israel to defend itself against those kinds of attacks. Now, the work that we do diplomatically with the leadership of Israel is an ongoing pursuit around making clear our principles, which include the need for humanitarian aid, the need for this war to end, the need for a deal to be done which would release the hostages, and create a ceasefire. And we're not going to stop in terms of putting that pressure on Israel, and in the region, including Arab leaders.
Edited Transcript: https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/2v8g39z2ab1jo0waj6tn4/AJhMeQd...
MR. BILL WHITAKER: And yet Prime Minister Netanyahu seems to be charting his own course. The Biden-Harris Administration has pressed him to agree to a ceasefire, he's resisted. You urged him not to go into Lebanon, he went in anyway. Does the U.S. have no sway over Prime Minister Netanyahu? VICE PRESIDENT KAMALA HARRIS: The work that we do diplomatically with the leadership of Israel is an ongoing pursuit around making clear our principles.
PS: The above transcripts were linked from CBS site: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/60-minutes-publishes-transcript...
How do either of those help or hurt Trump?
RE: How do either of those help or hurt Trump? I am not going to speculate that. But looking at the diff of the edit, anything of "substance" is removed from the response, and what remains is a non-answer.
That CBS should owe trump money or face any sort of repercussions over the perceived sleight is absolutely ridiculous. This is the behavior of a narcissistic snowflake, not grown man and last of all a president.
Original Transcript: https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/2v8g39z2ab1jo0waj6tn4/AJhMeQd...
MR. BILL WHITAKER: And yet Prime Minister Netanyahu seems to be charting his own course. The Biden-Harris Administration has pressed him to agree to a ceasefire, he's resisted. You urged him not to go into Lebanon, he went in anyway. Does the U.S. have no sway over Prime Minister Netanyahu? VICE PRESIDENT KAMALA HARRIS: The aid that we have given Israel allowed Israel to defend itself against 200 ballistic missiles that were just meant to attack the Israelis, and the people of Israel. And when we think about the threat that Hamas, Hezbollah presents Iran, I think that it is without any question our imperative to do what we can to allow Israel to defend itself against those kinds of attacks. Now, the work that we do diplomatically with the leadership of Israel is an ongoing pursuit around making clear our principles, which include the need for humanitarian aid, the need for this war to end, the need for a deal to be done which would release the hostages, and create a ceasefire. And we're not going to stop in terms of putting that pressure on Israel, and in the region, including Arab leaders.
Edited Transcript: https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/2v8g39z2ab1jo0waj6tn4/AJhMeQd...
MR. BILL WHITAKER: And yet Prime Minister Netanyahu seems to be charting his own course. The Biden-Harris Administration has pressed him to agree to a ceasefire, he's resisted. You urged him not to go into Lebanon, he went in anyway. Does the U.S. have no sway over Prime Minister Netanyahu? VICE PRESIDENT KAMALA HARRIS: The work that we do diplomatically with the leadership of Israel is an ongoing pursuit around making clear our principles.
PS: The above transcripts were linked from CBS site: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/60-minutes-publishes-transcript...
If it's about the leak which was inadvertent even if a sack-able offence then that's nothing to do with 1st or any amendment.
If it's about free speech in general, to have any trace of integrity, objectivity & not sound like propaganda it must discuss the censorship and cancel culture and its inventors
I know this comment will be unpopular given the general trend in this forum but it needs to be said. In fact how's it's received itself will itself be a good mirror.
As a company employee that's what you're supposed to do if copied wrongly on an email. In fact that's the usual disclaimer that appears in many email footers.
> As a company employee that's what you're supposed to do if copied wrongly on an email. In fact that's the usual disclaimer that appears in many email footers.
This analogy would make sense if the messages went to an employee of the federal government, but they didn’t.
It’s mind-bending that someone could be so bought into a bad situation that they try to shift blame to outside parties like this.
That's reckless.
Repeat - revealing sensitive info even if you come across by accident or someone's mistake is a crime. Esp national ones not just corporate secrets.
Kind of defeats the argument that content of messages will set back relations, affect future intelligence collection etc we kept hearing endlessly?!
Make up your mind. It's either important or not.
The article is quite clear: It’s about exactly what the title explains. I’m not sure how you would find it unclear unless you were skimming too fast to read it or you went in trying to find an angle to push a different agenda.
> If it's about using Signal app to escape FoIA it's odd not to discuss who actually started that or use of personal servers in basements & shredding mails when caught.
This is just “whataboutism”. If you want to play the whataboutism game, then what about all of the theatrics and threats that came with the email server story? Why have the rules suddenly changed so that something far worse is suddenly no big deal?
> If it's about the leak which was inadvertent even if a sack-able offence then that's nothing to do with 1st or any amendment.
If the best complaint you can muster is that it’s a different issue than the headline issue, that’s hardly a defense.
> If it's about free speech in general, to have any trace of integrity, objectivity & not sound like propaganda it must discuss the censorship and cancel culture and its inventors
Again, a weak attempt at whataboutism.
And again, it doesn’t make sense for you to try to defend one thing by comparing it to another perceived thing you don’t like (“cancel culture”).
Is your biggest concern with your article that it focused on current events instead of dwelling on these past issues? It’s an article about the current administration. Trying to drudge up past grievances is irrelevant.
> I know this comment will be unpopular given the general trend in this forum but it needs to be said. In fact how's it's received itself will itself be a good mirror.
I suspect your comment will be poorly received because it’s a weak attempt at whataboutism. It’s also logically inconsistent, given that you’re trying to downplay the current administration’s actions by comparing them to prior administration’s actions or vague culture war material. If you’re determined to dismiss any criticisms as a mirror of something, maybe pause and take some time to first think about how your own arguments could be made without reaching for whataboutism or past grievances. Try focusing on the matter at hand and who’s currently in charge, because it’s not Hilary Clinton or your “cancel culture” bogeymen making any of these decisions or lawsuits, but that’s all you want us to look at.
It's not wrong to mention past given that past has great chances of returning as future. Not just in US context, but in most electoral democracies.
By not discussing issues objectively the article just reads like another NYT, MSNBC rant. Sure be my guest and go ahead but we know what the credibility of that approach is.
The article discusses issues objectively.
The article is about current events. The discussion is objective.
Your desire to bring past events into the discussion is irrelevant. That’s not what objective means. Comparing things to other things is relativism, not objectivity.
You’re just grasping at straws, but your arguments aren’t even logically consistent. I really don’t understand how someone can get in so deep that their thought process starts trying to rationalize things away like this.
When there's two big parties both enjoying power in cycles, pretending that issues started on 21st Jan 2025 is not a clever way of convincing anyone other than the already converted.
As I mentioned, be my guest.
Some examples, file metadata for Seth Rich's laptop, and obviously files related to the JFK assassination.
This certainly isn't something that means you should ignore the fact that people are being abducted by plainclothes agents who refuse to identify themselves, and sent to Salvadorean prison camps without any chance for appeal.
That's not what people are concluding in the information spaces I'm in at all. Many of the CIA documents show highly suspicious travel, activities, and statements, particularly for James Angleton, William King Harvey, and a few others who's names escape me. They lend credence to the theory that Allen Dulles possibly conspired to kill JFK, putting into action henchmen of his still at the CIA after he was fired. You should care if the unelected bureaucrats that run our global intelligence agency can act with such impunity that they can murder a sitting President and cover it up for decades.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F1bbdOgIzrI
We had a Senator say on mainstream news "the intelligence community has 6 ways to get back at you" (in reference to Trump having an antagonistic relationship with the intel community) and nobody batted an eye. Why the fuck would it ever be ok for the CIA to have ways to "get back at" the Commander-in-Chief? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6OYyXv2l4-I
This was and perhaps still is the modus operandi of some public figures. To ignore it is strange at least.
If there were it would still be irrelevant. They specifically used the settings to delete messages after a few weeks.
"...But barely two months into his second term, the president has waged an unprecedented attack on the First Amendment rights of journalists, students, universities, government workers, lawyers and judges."
Should journalists who make a career destroying lives with false narratives not have consequences?
Should students who hate America be allowed to study here?
Should employees who don't work be fired?
Should we hinder innovation and progress with frivolous lawsuits?
If it is within the legal framework to impeach a judge, why can't the president call for it, but other elected officials can call for his impeachment?
You can't deny this has been the most effective first 100 days in decades. That upsets you. This is what we voted for.
The winning will continue.
-2008: Obama -2012: Obama -2016: Hillary -2020: Biden -2024: Trump
A circus isn't effective, but it's entertaining at least.
Establishing Government (perplexity): "No president has moved faster than Donald Trump in 2024 to appoint Cabinet members and agency heads. By November 23, 2024, just over two weeks after Election Day, Trump had announced nominees for all 15 executive agencies, far outpacing his first term and other recent presidents like Barack Obama and Joe Biden, who took nearly 40 days to reach similar milestones. Additionally, the Senate has confirmed Trump’s nominees at a faster rate compared to his first term and Biden’s early days in office."
Illegal immigration: down to near 0
DOGE: Cut $260B in spending as of this post: https://www.usdebtclock.org/
Is there a counterpoint to this?
Something Obama, Biden, Clinton, or GW Bush did in first 100 days?
I want prices to be lower. An immigration crackdown and tariff threats seem contradictory to this purpose.
DOGE's numbers are extremely optimistic. I have not seen anything substantiating them anywhere near $260B. Realistic estimates put in the range of $10B. Worth the chaos and destruction of institutions that exist to help ensure our way of life?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Separation_of_powers#Checks_an...
https://www.dataforprogress.org/blog/2024/10/22/many-voters-...
He is feeling out of place, his stock is down, his popularity has tanked.
He probably got what he wants from the current admin.
Hope it doesn’t get late.
They did, but with some information only described, but then they were called liars so they released the content that showed those accusing them of lying were in fact lying.
> Perhaps they would not even reveal the method of the info was obtained
The idiocy that led to them obtaining the info was very much part of the story.
Yep. It’s the whole story.
You are not the "free speech" people you pretend to be.
As it stands most people associate it with the right to behave like a dick in public.
In a country without free speech protections, expressing an unpopular opinion about a political party or hot topic can get you thrown in prison. Look at the Syrian Assad regime or the current Chinese administration. People are arrested for merely being negative in social media posts. I can totally see the US going in that direction.
You can be nonchalant about this if you want, be there are very good reasons people are getting up in arms about this erosion of our protections.
At least in prison they'll feed me or kill me, two things they'll otherwise refuse to do until you commit a crime.
Frankly, I would prefer a world where everyone agreed the government was shit but nobody could complain. It's better than people openly defending evil people and calling it the height of democracy. If that's democracy give me the PRC any day.
"Free speech" as a right seems pretty useless without material rights. Complaining about it isn't going to change anything. What does that even look like?
But we can trace all this crappy formulation of civics to the brain rot that is worshiping the enlightenment and founding fathers. Why is this still a thing in 2025? Nobody is putting a gun to your head to care about Jefferson or Locke or the actual basis of our society, Hobbes. We can chuck the entire concept of rights out the window and come up with agreements surrounding social behavior that actually reflect the society and culture we have today or want tomorrow.
What, exactly, do you think a right even is, if not an agreement that something cannot be done to people or cannot be taken away from them?
Without the right to say something, there is no legal way to organize or to demand any other right.
Edited to remove an unwarranted statement at the beginning of this comment.
Americans don't do this, though. They don't demand better. They accept shitty governance and say "at least I voted". And frankly I don't think they ever will.
So I say, fuck it, let's just all accept that government is shitty and mostly exists to squeeze us for money. We can finally stop acting like it's representative of us. When y'all finally have had enough riots will work just as fine as they did before.
That is an obviously wrong statement even if we only look at protests within the past 5 years.
It’s a stupid question easily dismissed with a modicum of research. (Most papers aren’t public.)
The problem with the original assertion is that most media outlets, including an overwhelming majority of newspapers, are privately owned. Notoriously, among the biggest ones, by billionaires.
Nope [1].
[1] https://thewaltdisneycompany.com/walt-disney-company-acquire...
How much control do they have? Have you heard of the Murdochs?
> At this point you should realize my question isn't naive or "stupid"
If you said television media, it would have still been wrong, but not stupid. (Because it depends on understanding how voting control and passive vs active investing works, none of which is common knowledge.) Generalising to all media, most of which isn’t publicly owned, is.
You are engaging in behavior that is explicitly against the rules here. You should stop.
https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu...
To say biggest "private equities" in the world own large portions of each other is absolutely correct. It's nitpicking to resort to technicalities of what arm of Blackrock owns what arm of Vanguard, not at all the point and it only distracts from the main point about conflicts of interest when it comes to the control of publicly traded media, NBC, CNN, newscorp (almost all media that matters) and thus suppression of free speech.
You're wrong.
No, they’re not. (They have private equity arms. Those are not the arms that own e.g. public stock in NBCUniversal.)
> Do you work for them as an employee or consultant?
No, I never have.
Not relevant to whether they’re private equity firms.
Large institutional asset managers own shares in everything publicly traded. For most of their funds, they don’t vote and have no choice as to what they buy or sell. They can’t threaten to sell because they don’t like something because that isn’t how index funds work.
They also run discretionary funds, but those funds aren’t the ones that have large holdings in either each other nor TV media outlets.
Does that make any of this acceptable? No. And a good deal of this is even more concerning.
