"Gods: Into the Wonderful" is perhaps the most amazing and inspiring game of the early 90s that literally blew my mind the first time I played it. Been playing it on and off for more than 15 years afterwards. It is a shame that publisher went down, they also released some other good games, but GODs is the legend among them.
Besides, if it wasn't for BBSs and pirated software, we'd never be ever able to put hands on it, as my country was going through regime change in 1989 and in 1992 the economy was completely mashed down and the game's price was half my mother's salary at the time. What a time to be alive. Of course it was not dad, but a friend who dug it from some BBS or perhaps the eraly tucows archive.
The naivete of some of the comments here is astounding. It doesn't matter whether you're right, it doesn't matter whether it's the law, it's irrelevant that you have rights, etc. Those things are of the past now, for the US.
I think it would be easier to understand the playing field and choose your actions accordingly, if you accept the US has entered its East Germany / late 20th century Soviet era -- except of course with 1000x more invasive and effective surveillance tech.
The social dynamics are the same - the abuses, the selective enforcement, the lack of recourse, the same characters in the roles of various levels of "law enforcement" and "politics". I'm so very sorry, but the best you can do from here is speedrun the collapse.
With all due respect, this is a wild take. Things aren't great in the U.S. right now, but they're not even in the same universe as what the Stasi was doing.
> I think it would be easier to understand the playing field and choose your actions accordingly, if you accept the US has entered its East Germany / late 20th century Soviet era -- except of course with 1000x more invasive and effective surveillance tech.
The US being the 'free-st' place on earth at anytime is quite the misnomer. Sure, you can be 'free' if you are white, wealthy, oh and land owning. Tale as old as time. Sure, you can protest, but many many other countries have far surpassed the US on that one, and have been doing it a whole lot longer.
As a successful nonwhite person in the US, AbsurdCensor made an infantilizing comment. Non white people have flocked here in droves because of the freedom afforded to anyone to become wealthy. I agree that we are back sliding (tax burden, regulatory burden, political repression, etc.) but it is absurd to make it about race and say that it wasn't once the freest place to start a business and even express yourself.
Then why are so many non-white, non-Christians still flocking here? Why would anyone want to come to this country if it's such a hellhole?
I'm not buying it. Turn off the news and go out into society, preferably one of those small so-called racist communities. You'll find out the truth, one way or the other.
You are arguing the slippery slope, which may play out or may not. Instead, argue today, with the facts as they are not as you imagine they will be at some future point.
> With all due respect, this is a wild take. Things aren't great in the U.S. right now, but they're not even in the same universe as what the Stasi was doing.
Don't kid yourself. That's what they want. They're slowly testing to find out how much they can get away with. Would you have imagined that the nation would quietly sit back and allow what's been done so far ten or twenty years ago? Just because there have been large protests doesn't mean anything. Congress should have been outraged on both sides at this madness, but one side only cares about winning (so they like it) and the other is completely feckless.
Winning arguments and solving problems are two different skillsets. And the US Congress is mostly people with the former. Not to say that winning arguments doesn't help when choosing a solution, but it is very different.
Or “To summarize the summary: anyone who is capable of getting themselves made President should on no account be allowed to do the job.” - Douglas Adams
its only with the benefit of hindsight (and being on the winning side- thus the propaganda was never dispelled) that we consider the stasi and so on the way we do.
If it walks like a duck, and quacks like a duck.. might just be a duck.
I don’t believe those living “normal lives” in East Germany or the Soviet era considered the police to be evil and invasive the way we do today.
> I don’t believe those living “normal lives” in East Germany or the Soviet era considered the police to be evil and invasive the way we do today.
"normal life" under the Stasi was constant political terror and suppression.
The death counts are low because they thought death too little of a penalty for opposing them - they used psychological warfare (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zersetzung) and torture instead.
The International Rehabilitation Council for Torture Victims states that there were between 300,000 and 500,000 victims of the Stasi's use of psychological warfare, direct physical torture and gross human rights violations: https://web.archive.org/web/20210909114942/https://irct.org/....
I sometimes wonder what the tipping point is for people, or whether there actually is one for many.
It's as if they are looking for an exacting duplicate of previous regimes before they become concerned—the agency name must be "Stasi" and uniforms must be of the same color.
The moment never happens. It happened in all other descents to fascism, just like this one, that people kept waiting for the moment to protest and it never came and eventually it was too late.
Great example! Rosa Parks was an organised effort by an organised resistance group. She was not just one woman who decided to get on the wrong end of the bus one day.
Yeah, I wrote about this on HN before. Americans tend to imagine that WW2 ends and then East Germany immediately puts up a wall and now nobody can leave but it was way more gradual than that. The year the European war ended you could just walk across the border, you'd need to show some ID but you have ID because it was the war and Germans issued everybody with ID in the war. The Allies are manning the borders, they want to arrest Nazis, so ID saying you're a Nazi is a bad idea, but if you're just some farmer from outside Leipzig (so East Germany) you can easily cross. More than a Million people flee West. Are they foolish? You already know the answer.
By the end of the 1940s, things are tightening up, there are now armed "police" who in effect work for the Soviets "protecting" East Germany at the border, barbed wire and deep trenches now block unofficial crossings, but it is still definitely possible to leave, in the worst case maybe you bribe a guard. Hundreds of thousands are able to flee by "just" walking (or driving) West.
In 1952 the "Special Regime" begins to "keep out spies". Most of the border is sealed, you can't bribe your way when there is no official crossing, the remaining guards are told to shoot people who try to cross, after all none of them are legitimate. However since Berlin still has a crossing, and the West still seems hell bent on holding their half despite the fact it's cut off from the world, you could travel to East Berlin and sneak across to West Berlin. Over the next decade or so millions do, East Germany tried very hard to stop this, but because it was physically possible it seemed like there wasn't much they could do...
In 1961 they built the wall. It was no longer physically possible to escape.
I was told the famous Berlin crossing is called Checkpoint Charlie because checkpoint Alpha was on the Iron Wall (the one dividing Germany) and checkpoint Bravo was midway. At each checkpoint they would note the time. If you didn't make it to each checkpoint at exactly the right time they would consider that you'd stopped to do something illegal in between (you were only allowed to drive straight from the iron wall to Berlin), and you would be disappeared.
Not quite. Alpha is at the edge of West Germany, once past Alpha you are on an Autobahn (a highway) to Berlin and physically in East Germany but the Soviets have agreed that they won't do anything so long as you never stop until you reach Bravo at the border between East Germany and West Berlin. The route between Bravo and Charlie is inside West Berlin. Charlie's significance is that the Soviets will not (by the time Charlie is created) allow non-Germans to enter East Germany legally except via this point. The West has argued that this isn't what they agreed, but have eventually relented because it's apparent that arguing isn't helping.
Definitely it can always be worse and I think we need to break ridiculous laws. I know nothing about Mark Bray but that is a ridiculous thing that should adjudicated.
Be that as it may, observe that the directions are opposite.
Planning, attempting to, or helping people escape (not stay) was the #1 reason for Stasi arrests.
Specifically, the most frequent Stasi arrest charges were Republikflucht ("fleeing the republic") and Fluchthelfer ("helping others flee")
Also, the Stasi ran on roughly 1 informant per 60–180 residents. Your network of friends, family, co-workers, and neighbors would have several. They officially criminalized private speech, correspondence and travel. The US surveillance system is bad, but the Stasi informant network and set of official consequences was at such a level as to cause constant fear and dread for everyone.
So it's not the same unless it's the exact same? Like, with such good technology now, why would they waste time on so many informants? A Flock camera can replace several informants.
To repurpose an old epigram: “the man who pushes the old lady into the way of an oncoming bus, and the man who pushes the old lady out of the way of an oncoming bus, are both people who push old ladies around.”
Have you ever traveled internationally? Every country I've ever been to especially in Europe had strict rules about how long I could stay.
Iceland and the UK in particular. They wouldn't even let me in at London Heathrow without a printed out return ticket (I had to run over to the British Airways desk to get a copy).
Either way - I was not allowed to stay longer than a few weeks.
That's not a wrong thing, it's very normal. If you want to stay, you have to apply for residency.
U.S. reliance on immigrant labour is key to this discussion, and strongly colours all elements. It is a direct legacy of early slave labour (Blacks in the East, native Americans in the West) as well as indentured servitude. Importation of an underprivileged labour class dates to the first days of the Republic as well, and includes the Germans, Irish, Italians, Greeks, Chinese ("coolies"), Mexicans ("Braceros"), and in the post-WWII era an increasing number of Central and Latin American immigrants.
By 1) relying on such labour and 2) denying either lawful entry or any plausible path to permanent status for the vast majority of these workers and their families, not to mention many, many, many broken promises along the way (asylum, DREAM Act, don't get me started on Native American treaties), the U.S. has de facto maintained a legally-underprivileged and disadvantaged working class long after the statutory prohibition of (most) slavery and indentured servitude.
Yes, there are also economic and political circumstances within the US geopolitical orbit which encourage inward migration. That too cannot be separated from long-standing U.S. foreign, economic, and military policies within the region.
Two of the most notable recent status enhancement laws in the US have been DREAM (previously mentioned) and DACA (deferred action for childhood arrivals). Both were passed under and with the strong support of Democratic administrations.
Both have seen repeated attempts at repeal by the GOP and present US Administration, and effective status rescinded.
The GOP has embraced the historical Democratic position with enthusiasm. The Democratic party has stood for civil rights since the 1960s, with former segregationists and white nationalists first joining, then taking over, the GOP. See: <https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49402261>.
Attempting to resurrect long-dead, long-irrelevant, and now fully-reversed political descriptions can be taken as a prima facie declaration of bad faith.
Not so fast. The victimhood/systemic-inequality mentality has a perhaps counterintuitive effect: while on the surface it does seem to help individuals, collectively it perpetuates an underclass.
25 years ago, no one thought twice if a minority member or person of color was in a prestigious position. Now, many people silently wonder if the desire to manipulate the distribution of various previously-protected categories contributed to the decision to hire that person.
"Among black students in colleges and universities, those admitted under lower standards face a higher failure rate and those admitted under the same standards as other students graduate with their credentials under a cloud of suspicion because of double standards for minority students in general." -- Thomas Sowell
As others point out, in the DDR one could not LEAVE. The main reason we have to have large sweeps for people coming here illegally is because administrations other than Obama and Trump turned a blind eye and did little enforcement. The Biden admin went to far as being negligent in their enforcement, so now there is a lot of backlog.
There are very few if any country that does not enforce immigration rules. Let any American try to live illegally in Canada. Sure, they can live under the radar like you can in Mexico too, but if they catch up to you, goodbye. Mexico doesn’t even treat its own returning citizens well. If you have not been a taxpayer you have to assume many things tax paying Mexicans get for free like education and healthcare. People act like we’re an aberration for enforcing immigration laws. We’re not. Go check out South Africa and see how they treat illegals.
I prefer the Japanese way and the Swiss way. Their citizens come first, foreigners come second. The needs of citizens come before the need for cheap labor. Every job is a decent job. No job is so bad that they can only get illegals to do them.
Yes we can have legal immigrants that fill skills gaps. Thats not an issue for 95% of Americans so long as it’s done justly (and not simply a way to pay workers less).
What country does not have immigration laws? We’re not unique in having them nor in enforcing them. Check out Taiwan, China, Singapore, Japan, Egypt, South Africa, Chile, Peru, Canada, etc.
Well, if previous presidencies hadn’t been derelict in their duties (e-verify, timely removals, ineligibility to benefits etc) we would not have been in this pickle. But, especially the Biden admin they _removed_ existing barriers, worked with NGOs to up the numbers of migrants arriving, many ending up illegal, means that there is a large backlog that normally would not need those measures had previous admins not been derelict. In the last 30 years only Obama and Trump enforced immigration laws.
He explained why he escaped from the DDR. And they ALL knew that the cops were
sniffing on them. Of course they considered the cops as evil and invasive, even by today standards.
But I consider what the US/UK are doing to be invasive, and if the governments fell I might be proven right (hell, Snowden already proved it over a decade ago- yet here we are).
He was not a “normal person”, normal people are like your neighbour who lives simply and doesn’t engage in politics except to share their discomfort about some relatively trivial grievance like the price of eggs.
"It is estimated that 5.7 to 8.7 million people died from starvation across the Soviet Union. In addition, 50 to 70 million Soviet citizens starved during the famine but ultimately survived."
We blame the Soviet government for famine, but that’s not necessarily the opinion of people living at the time. Famine tended to occur every ~10 years due to natural weather variability so while 1930-1933 was unusually brutal it was just one of a very long string of famine. For example the Russian famine of 1921–1922 killed 5 million from a drought + WWI. Which was preceded by the famine of 1906-1908 which was preceded by the famine of 1901–1902, though these where less significant.
Famine was so common you need extreme outliers like 1601–1603 which killed ~1/3 of the population before they tend to show up in history books.
The regions of the USSR (the Volga region, the Central Black Earth Region, the North Caucasus, the Urals, the Crimea, part of Western Siberia), Kazakhstan, Ukraine, and Belarus have suffered from the result of the famine caused by forced collectivization. About 7 million people were killed by hunger and illnesses associated with malnutrition in 1932–1933.
This tragedy does not have and cannot have internationally established signs of genocide and should not be the subject of contemporary political speculation.
Deputies of the State Duma, honoring the victims of the 1930s famine on the territory of the USSR, strongly condemn the regime that has neglected the lives of people for the achievement of economic and political goals, and proclaim the inadmissibility of the revival in the formerly included in the Soviet Union, totalitarian regimes that neglected the rights and lives of their citizens.
"The causes of the Holodomor, which was a famine in Soviet Ukraine during 1932 and 1933 that resulted in the death of around 3–5 million people, are the subject of scholarly and political debate, particularly surrounding the Holodomor genocide question. Soviet historians Stephen Wheatcroft and J. Arch Getty believe the famine was the unintended consequence of problems arising from Soviet agricultural collectivization which was designed to accelerate the program of industrialization in the Soviet Union under Joseph Stalin. Other academics conclude policies were intentionally designed to cause the famine. Some scholars and political leaders claim that the famine may be classified as a genocide under the definition of genocide that entered international law with the 1948 Genocide Convention."
You might not realise it, but you're proving my point to some extent.
We don't look at the deaths of our own people as "oppressive" despite the fact that the circumstances that caused them to die was our system.
I'm not some bleeding heart liberal or anti-capitalist... I just have an open mind to the idea that we're not necessarily the good guys just because we are us and I look at what is factually true - as in, how could we be described by a non-sympathetic entity.
Everyone is their own hero. Nobody believes sincerely that they're the baddie.
Chronic lower respiratory diseases account for 145k people a year in the US, and that is a consequence (largely) of car dependence...
Or, more directly, 20,000 people a year die due to malnutrition and starvation, tallied over years (as most do) that can rapidly rise to over 100k in a half-decade.
I get that the numbers were talking about are much higher, but it doesn't follow logically to me that ordinary citizens knew that their government was the "bad" one with its actions.
Hell, I know Russian families who genuinely believe Putin is doing the right thing right now. So, I don't blindly accept that my government is right just because I think "we're the goodies".
I can't comment on the state of UK healthcare, but regarding the last paragraph, I too know Russian families who genuinely believe Putin is doing the right thing right now.
I know Russians who want to have nothing to do with Putin and want to live their life.
I have worked with both Russians and Ukrainians who fled Russia and Ukraine to escape mobilization (Personal note: it was interesting to see how good cooperation they had).
the stasi were spying on people and putting them in jail. what exactly is your claim about the difference? is it a difference in distinction or a difference in degree?
If we're trying to find a difference in distinction, that has never been the case in the US. The police I've always been able to surveil and put people in jail.
You're right that the US is not in the same universe as the Stasi was.
The US steals more data and conducts more illicit monitoring of people in a day than the Stasi ever could in a year. Its just that the Stasi lived in an analog world, so you had lots of PHYSICAL material leftover for people to point at in faux horror.
Even now, the US is busily deploying electric shock gloves whose main selling point, DIRECT FROM THE MOUTHS OF LAW ENFORCEMENT, is that they allow pain to be administered to enforce "compliance", without leaving any real evidence.
And they are being trialed in Nebraska. On ... SCHOOL CHILDREN.
(and to complete the dystopian joke, check out the name of the company selling these Dr Doom gloves)
Whats that you hear? Howls of outrage & dissaproval from the denizens of "The Land of the Free" (tm)?
Err, no. Its just the wind blowing leaves around.
You sir are the proverbial frog who has been in the pan so long, he doesn't realise he's being boiled alive
> but they're not even in the same universe as what the Stasi was doing
At what point? It's easy to say when we mention the Stasi or the Nazis that we're comparing it to the end game they had going, but the transformation was a bit of process.
The very big difference to the Stasi is, people back then were really afraid to speak their mind, as there were real consequences fast, for doing things as stating your opinion about ghe government. And not creating attention while saying, I cannot speak up anymore! while speaking up all the time.
And yes, there are also consequences today .. but on a whole different level. So the US might head into a Stasi regime (or rather Gestapo) .. but they ain't there, not even close.
On the other hand, they had on average someone in every appartment block and every company directly reporting to them and doing on request other things. The human touch of spycraft.
Nowdays spying on the population is automated.
At this moment there are right wing conspiracies from people like Owens and Tucker that Charlie Kirk was killed by Israel because he was getting critical of them and would be against the war.
I am not saying that these conspiracies are true, but this is how fascism looks like. Putin doesn't arrest all of his political challengers, but he gets rid of the ones that are viable opponents. In case of Kirk, he is popular enough to make it big in politics and in the short term he could break the party narrative.
Companies like Flock and Palantir are explicitly an automated Stasi, and the advertising industry has already built another automated Stasi but it's not quite what the government wants (e.g. no ALPRs since they're useless for advertising).
I challenge you on falsifiability. What evidence would it take for you admit the US is Stasi level?
> if you accept the US has entered its East Germany / late 20th century Soviet era -- except of course with 1000x more invasive and effective surveillance tech.
I'm pretty optimistic that after the next general America will be ready to give up on the extremity of late turn over a new leaf. I fully expect a new president to be ushered in, whether R or D, and for some level of normalcy to start creeping back.
The Soviets lost eventually, I don't think America can lose. Canadians like myself have watched America win for our country's entire existence; I am unconvinced that a decade of silliness is enough to compare America to East Germany.
In 2016 I remember Americans saying this was the end of the line and the country was doomed. 10y later they're richer than ever and its companies have global dominance of the most world-changing technology of the last 20y. I just don't think "the collapse" is coming anytime soon.
If anyone's interested in a friendly wager, my email is open. I'll happily go 1:1 odds that America will have a new president come 2029 and the country will still remain the world's richest and most powerful.
It just takes a bit of reading about American history to know that we have had authoritarian phases pretty much since our independence. John Adams and Thomas Jefferson policies against freedom of speech, native Americans and international trade, Fillmore and Buchanan fugitive slave act and Dred Scott, Lincoln suspension of Habeas Corpus, Cleveland using the military against unions, Johnson military expansion in Vietnam, Nixon secret bombings and using CIA/FBI against protesters. The nation was heavily polarized during each of these periods as much or more than it is today.
Interesting you say that, because as another Canadian, I would say that the sentiment in our country is the opposite of you describe. The actions of our government reflect it.
Canada is moving further from US, not closer. Canadians who support Americans are in the minority at the moment.
I'm not sure how a new US president would be able to turn it around.. further more, what's to say that the president thereafter will follow suit? How about the next 5?
The simple answer is we need constitutional reform. Term limits on SCOTUS, codification of norms (eg releasing presidential candidate tax returns, not blocking appointee confirmations indefinitely to steal the position for the next admin), anti corruption laws with teeth. Also things like reigning in the absurd executive power bloat that’s gone on since Lincoln. POTUS was never meant to be a king. There should never be a case where the executive can start a war (conventional, trade or otherwise) without even CONSULTING Congress.
If being an insurrectionist and convicted felon and neck-deep in the Epstein ring wasn't enough to sink the guy, I don't think anyone who voted for him (or anyone who for good or bad reason, abstained) would give a single flying fuck about his tax returns.
What matters is the taxi, not the checkers. Stuff like tax returns is window dressing.
This is all just reshuffling deck chairs on the Titanic.
You can't turn corrupt officials into honest ones by changing the laws they're already turning a blind eye to. And you can't use systems (such as the political parties and their donors/owners) that exist to further corruption to reign it in.
Americans need to want honest governance, and be willing to go to the mat for it. Until and unless there's a substantial engaged minority will to do so, changing the rules is just theater. And if the government was honest, the existing laws are sufficient. Nothing stops Congress from removing Trump and the Supreme Court tomorrow, save their own lack of interest in doing so.
No. That might be what our current leaders deserve, but it won't fix the problem of grossly dysfunctional governance, particularly at the highest levels. Which makes it just a dangerous (to everyone) waste of effort. (And I do not mean just the current government. The whole kit & kaboodle, going back decades, has comprehensively failed.)
Personally, I think the best solution is to abandon the federal government as unfit for the purpose. Build a new one to handle what may actually be needed from the states and other existing and new interstate and international organizations. This will not be easy (gross understatement) but I think it is still more likely to succeed than any attempt to fix the current Constitutional government.
You realize that it;'s not exactly democratic to change the rules just because you don't like who was elected democratically? That's the opposite of democracy.
America dominance on the world is ending, it's a fact. East Asia is at least on par, India is china from 25 years ago.
It's becoming more obvious every day. And yeah, people in 1910 watched Europe dominate the world for about 1500 years. Yet it came to an end.
If you want to Speedrun the collapse, vote for trump. He sure is making a good job right now with diplomacy, lack of long term planning and just getting all your allies to hate you.
Just pick up and leave. Literally. And do not feel bad about it. Also ignore other people opinions. There is like a dozen of places to go to. The easiest? UAE freelancer visa. Yes I know, I know: "... but but the drones! The collapse!" It's all BS. When / if something happens there – go to Panama. Then Costa Rica. You are not alone on this route - but only if you really committed to your freedom. If not - just sit there and vote democrats. LOL.
Why would I want to move to an objectively more subjugated place?
Besides that, you say to just pick up and leave as if it were that easy. And I suppose if I followed your advice, it could be. Get a divorce, not care about the kids (sorry, but I'm not bringing my daughters there), ignore the fact my parents are in their 80s, server all my friendships, likely end my career.
Not all freedoms are good. Or rather some bindings, like family and other loved ones, are worth it.
I think this got flagged for the hyperbolic tone but you are directionally correct and I vouched this because I believe more people need to see it. Yes, leaving is hard. So is living under fascism. Do it anyway. You have a community? Bring the community. Yes it's very hard and not always possible. You have to try hard.
Your other morally correct option is to stand and fight.
Moving on from being a unipolar power does not necessitate societal collapse. The UK is still around and their empire fell a long time ago.
> If you want to Speedrun the collapse, vote for trump.
This nonsense needs to stop. You can’t vote for him again unless he deigns to run for a lower office (unlikely). Term limits are real. America needs to start planning for the post-Trump era and hopefully mitigate further damage with a blue wave in the midterms. Or with non-MAGA republicans who might even return to actual fiscal conservatism.
> This nonsense needs to stop. You can’t vote for him again unless he deigns to run for a lower office
Oh he will run again, and people will vote for him. The theory underpinning this is the fact that he did not serve consecutive terms and if you think that won’t work; all it takes is one party going along with it. And fuck you for downplaying what he is capable of.
His cognitive decline is increasingly evident, his approval rating is the lowest on record (for any president), he ran again last time because it was his best chance to stay out of jail. If he wants a peaceful dotage and doesn't want his legacy torn down, he's better to endorse Don Jr or Marco Rubio and rig the election at the margins if need be.
You keep saying it and it’ll happen. Stop saying it. You give credence to the idea by speaking it into existence. Stop believing and repeating their bullshit and letting them win.
If he tries, some states will keep him off the ballot and likely threaten secession if the feds attempt to force him through. That’s the point when doomers like you can decide to get your shit together and forge a compromise, or let the oligarchs have their way and light off a civil war.
Yes and I caused Jan 6 by calling out my local Rep. in December 2025 for telling his constituents to storm the Capitol and steal back the election. What compromise on this issue are you looking for?
The problem is talking about it like a foregone conclusion. You have already accepted he is going to run and are ready to convince the rest of America that he will be on the ballot. You are doing their job for them.
The compromise is that corrupt officials on both sides need punished. Both sides need reform. Neither party should have the kind of power Trump has seized. We don’t fix this by voting in a Dem who goes on a GOP witch hunt without also rooting out corruption in the DNC. There has to be enough consensus to pass constitutional reform, and you don’t get there with extremism or hate.
We don’t need “both sides”, we need to punish corruption, period. What’s happening in the Trump administration and Republican Party isn’t remotely comparable to what came before it. Open corruption and bald face lies repeated all the way down to the individual. So there is no “one for one” fairness bullshit as you are trying to present it here - the reckoning needs to come regardless of how the corruption is distributed.
Because his party is already going along with it? This is playing out now, not some future hypothetical. There are already Trump 2028 signs. Already elected Republicans officials making the case for it. I know you’d like for people to shut up and go along, or better yet laugh it off.
> The UK is still around and their empire fell a long time ago.
America is not an Empire. When America collapses it will definitely lead to societal collapse. The racial tensions are kept under control only because of the mirage of prosperity and equal opportunity. And when the mirage clears it will turn real ugly really fast.
> hopefully mitigate further damage with a blue wave in the midterms. Or with non-MAGA republicans who might even return to actual fiscal conservatism.
I don't think it is possible to fix this as it is a systemic issue. Irrespective of whether the next President is from D or R. All of the elite at the top know that it is a sinking ship, primarily due to the insane debt that has accumulated. There is absolutely no way to clear it the way it is going. Once AI bubble pops that is when downfall accelerates.
American imperialism is well documented. We have military outposts all over the world. Puerto Rico is still in essence a colony.
> When America collapses it will definitely lead to societal collapse. The racial tensions are kept under control only because of the mirage of prosperity and equal opportunity. And when the mirage clears it will turn real ugly really fast.
You say that like you want it to happen. Continuing to harp on that future is a self fulfilling prophecy. If you want a better America first you have to envision it instead of tearing it down.
It has already started [1]. It has increased 100% since 2015. Just in the past decade alone. This is only reported hate crimes.
> If you want a better America first you have to envision it instead of tearing it down.
That ship has sailed long ago.
> American imperialism is well documented. We have military outposts all over the world. Puerto Rico is still in essence a colony.
Still not an Empire. You can call it an outward expansion or projection of power but not direct control. An Empire has direct control over colonies that send back tributes which run the Kingdom and give its residents prosperity, at the expense of residents of colonies who are taxed and deprived of their wealth. The tributes outweigh whatever growth is happening within the Kingdom itself. Puerto Rico or any of the military outposts are not equivalent. Puerto Rico does not run USA. USA losing Puerto Rico will not do anything to its economic or military power.
good grief. people said this about the USSR right up until it collapsed. they also said it about Japan. this website is ridiculous. you people know this is an echo chamber, right? go outside
Your day to day is still pretty much normal. If you turned off the news and never read about Felony charges for citizen deleting phone data [1] you'd just in your head remember there are tens of millions of folks flying, going through customs and border security and all that with 0 issues. What you wrote I think regarding the decade of silliness precisely supports the point, in my opinion.
[1] I'm not defending the behavior of border control here, but I also don't think we need to overreact to this one example which is exactly what is happening.
You have no real rights when police can kill, maim, or otherwise fuck you up with impunity even when you have done nothing wrong. Philando Castile and others demonstrate this. You may win in court but your life can be fucked up if the police decide to inflict non judicial punishment.
This is precisely the time to “overreact”. The government is clearly targeting dissidents and if we don’t “overreact” shit will get much worse.
We have kids sent to concentration camps. We have illegally deported U.S. citizens. The President has canceled monies allocated by Congress and signed into law. He is waging war against Iran without Congressional approval. He is openly selling pardons. The list goes on.
> You have no real rights when police can kill, maim, or otherwise fuck you up with impunity even when you have done nothing wrong.
Really? You have no rights now!? Jeez. When did that start? Was it on Inauguration Day or was it like, the day after Trump was elected? Or does it go back to the Obama years? Did you lose your rights when the police could kill, main, or otherwise fuck you up in 2017 or so when Trump was elected the first time and then gain them back when Biden was elected? Or have you never had rights since you were born? I can't seem to recall when police had this special power to officially take away your rights but maybe you know?
It's strange. I also lost my rights as you mentioned yet the other day I prayed to the Flying Spaghetti Monster in public in front of a police cruiser and nothing happened. Can you believe it?
That doesn’t mean you have rights. It just means you haven’t yet been targeted.
EDIT: Being in the position of not belonging to a group targeted for retribution by the government isn’t an indication of having rights. When black men who are legally carrying guns are murdered by police without consequence then we don’t truly have the right to own guns. It shows that if one ever becomes part of an out group then you too can be targeted.
Clearly you are not part of a targeted group so you feel safe and naively think nothing is amiss. This is ignorant foolishness.
Yeah, that's awful. As far as federal overreach of power goes, that's pretty inexcusable. I'd probably posit that COINTELPRO in the 60s was more insidious, but that doesn't discount this story individually being terrible.
I still maintain that America is not in the midst of its own demise and a comparison to East Germany is inaccurate.
> As far as federal overreach of power goes, that's pretty inexcusable.
Selectively detaining this guy, likely overreach.
Trying to get his phone's unlock code to go on a fishing expedition for whatever they can find, absolutely overreach.
But this guy catching felony charges for giving federal border police a duress PIN to wipe his phone when they asked for an unlock PIN? Not actually overreach.
You have the right to remain silent, not to lie to the police when detained (18 USC § 1001, and many state-level laws to the same effect also exist). Our justice system could not function if people had a right to lie to the police. Once you are detained, whether or not that detention is eventually determined to be lawful, destroying or disposing of your possessions to prevent police from accessing them is also generally a crime.
You fight abuses later, in court. Or, if you're going to use a duress PIN in the moment, you accept the legal consequences.
And yes, giving a duress PIN to wipe a phone when asked for an unlock PIN is a lie which may result in destruction of evidence. And no, the law does not care about "I'm not touching you"-level rationalizations of whether something is a lie or whether it was technically the police who entered the code to wipe the phone. Proximate cause is a longstanding legal concept.
> But this guy catching felony charges for giving federal border police a duress PIN to wipe his phone when they asked for an unlock PIN? Not actually overreach.
I think it's an interesting case that will get litigated in the courts. It seems they'll have to prove that the phone contained "evidence"; it could have just had embarrassing personal photos that he didn't want shared. When a house is raided and someone flushes a toilet, can courts assume they flushed drugs, or does that have to be proven?
I hope he's found not guilty, but either way this definitely is not the "sky is falling", "we're almost a police state" case that folks here are making it out to be. It's a very narrow and novel line.
> When a house is raided and someone flushes a toilet, can courts assume they flushed drugs, or does that have to be proven?
Game it out at the systems level. If the prosecution had to prove beyond the shadow of a doubt that what was destroyed would have been evidence, then destruction of evidence would be functionally permissible whenever done competently.
> ...either way this definitely is not the "sky is falling", "we're almost a police state" case that folks here are making it out to be. It's a very narrow and novel line.
Agreed. And activists should generally work with lawyers in order to be familiar with areas of the law they are likely to encounter in the course of their activism. Especially activists who travel internationally.
> then destruction of evidence would be functionally permissible whenever done competently.
Well yes, but ... is that not the case? Game out the opposite. If the prosection doesn't have to demonstrate that something was valid evidence beyond a shadow of doubt that's rife for all sorts of abuse.
In general I don't believe I can catch a (legitimate) felony for locking myself in the bathroom and flushing the toilet during a police raid.
> In general I don't believe I can catch a (legitimate) felony for locking myself in the bathroom and flushing the toilet during a police raid.
Most juristictions have a duty to preserve or not to spoil evidence once you are clearly detained or a search is clearly imminent (i.e. the police are knocking on your door), or when litigation can be reasonably anticipated. Behavior like locking the door and then burning/shredding papers, wiping a phone, or even flushing a toilet can absolutely be considered destruction-of/tampering-with evidence past that point, even (and especially) if the evidence is impossible to recover.
I feel like you aren't responding to what I wrote there. My point was that there's presumably no clear evidence that I was destroying evidence in that example even if I was. The example was in regards to the point made in the preceding paragraph.
> If the prosection doesn't have to demonstrate that something was valid evidence beyond a shadow of doubt that's rife for all sorts of abuse.
Assuming that is the preceding paragraph you reference, then there is nothing to respond to because the law is clear. As zugi mentions, obstruction of a federal investigation by tampering with evidence (i.e. potentially anything in the scope of a particular search of which you are aware) in just about any sort of way is illegal under 18 USC § 1519 (and again, most states have similar laws with regard to state officials/departments and searches).
This subthread, the general thread, the linked article, and the original event it covers are all within the context of someone aware they are detained or under investigation. In that context, the prosecution doesn't need to demonstrate that what was destroyed is evidence. Just that the suspect obstructed the search by destroying, altering, or tampering with something in the search's lawful scope.
This state of affairs isn't any more or less rife for abuse than the general process for obtaining a warrant or the standards for an officer assessing probably cause.
Right fair point "evidence" versus "lawful scope". Precision and accuracy of terminology aside, surely you can see the core point I was making there that unless all details (the act of destruction, scope, intent, etc) are demonstrated beyond doubt there's huge potential for abuse.
The details you mention are all hammered out to death and back as a regular part of the legal process, before and during a trial, and by both prosecution and defense. One can only imagine a huge potential for abuse by suspending any and all familiarity with that legal process.
You can't, but you can if you flushed the cocaine. You should also be worried they can prove beyond a reasonable doubt that you flushed cocaine, even if you only flushed your urine.
So it turns out destroying a record to obstruct an investigation is also a crime under 18 U.S. Code § 1519. For that they wouldn't need to prove that it was "evidence" or even that it was relevant.
So as much as I sympathize with the guy a d wabt to cheer him on, he's probably screwed.
I'd generally agree that the police shouldn't be able to lie to a detained suspect, or at least that such deception should be more constrained than it is in the context but, in general, the law as practiced hinges on the question, "does police deception render a detained suspect's confession or statements involuntary?"
If yes, then those confessions or statements could become inadmissable (i.e. the suspect was effectively compelled to testify against himself, in violation of the 5th Amendment). When police combine deception with coercion or threats, the answer to that question leans toward yes, but it will depend on the juristiction and the judge and is often assessed on a case-by-case basis. Police in any given juristiction probably have a reasonably good sense (from their own accumulated experience and local training) of what kind of deception results in the produced evidence becoming inadmissable in the courts where the defendant will appear.
> And yes, giving a duress PIN to wipe a phone when asked for an unlock PIN is a lie which may result in destruction of evidence.
I was distressed and got confused and gave the wrong PIN. Anyway there was no evidence on the phone just a few embarrassing photos.
Also I just so happened to catch a bad case of indigestion right as the police knocked down my door. There were absolutely no drugs in the toilet when I flushed it.
To me the far more concerning fact is that this is getting any pushback at all. The response described is what everyone ought to do without exception when asked for their PIN by law enforcement. The right not to be forced to provide access to your own devices needs to be staunchly defended. These devices serve as extensions of ourselves at this point.
> I was distressed and got confused and gave the wrong PIN. Anyway there was no evidence on the phone just a few embarrassing photos.
> Also I just so happened to catch a bad case of indigestion right as the police knocked down my door. There were absolutely no drugs in the toilet when I flushed it.
To repeat, for emphasis: the law does not care about "I'm not touching you"-level rationalizations.
> The response described is what everyone ought to do without exception when asked for their PIN by law enforcement. The right not to be forced to provide access to your own devices needs to be staunchly defended.
If by "response described" you mean "remain silent," then absolutely. Not 100% clear from your last paragraph.
> the law does not care about "I'm not touching you"-level rationalizations.
But it does AFAIK care about plausible deniability. Whether or not any given instance of denial is plausible must of course ultimately be determined by a judge.
> Not 100% clear from your last paragraph.
The "response described" was (I think quite clearly) "provide a duress PIN that wipes the device in violation of the law". I am advocating for civil disobedience in defense of privacy and the right not to self incriminate. These devices have become extensions of ourselves but the law does not currently treat them as such which I see as a violation of my fundamental rights.
Actually even if they were recognized as an extension I don't believe there's any prohibition against reading people's minds. It's just that the technology doesn't exist yet. But it likely will soon so we badly need to update the law to account for that IMO.
> But it does AFAIK care about plausible deniability. Whether or not any given instance of denial is plausible must of course ultimately be determined by a judge.
There is near zero chance that a judge or jury will decide you have plausible deniability for providing a duress PIN when asked by police for an unlock PIN. It is your phone, you had to configure the duress PIN when setting up the phone, knowing what it does, and provide it to police instead of the unlock PIN.
> I am advocating for civil disobedience in defense of privacy and the right not to self incriminate.
You have a right to silence, not a right to lie, and certainly not a right to lie in a way that is the proximate cause of destruction of evidence during a lawful search. Call the lie civil disobedience all you like, but expect totally avoidable federal felony charges in cases like then one at hand, when all you had to do was remain silent (especially as in this case with a GrapheneOS device).
> I don't believe there's any prohibition against reading people's minds
Common law often doesn't require specific prohibitions (or specific updates in the manner of computer code) because the practice of common law has long functioned on the good faith application of human reason and common sense by jurists. Consider the relevant language of the 5th Amendment: "...nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself..." I think it's extremely likely that, when mind-reading tech is invented, it will be treated as a form of compelled testimony, and therefore impermissible against a defendant (though potentially permissible against a witness with immunity).
I disagree. Back then it was all a big secret. Officially the US was pretending.
Now? It is all out in the open. They're BOASTING about it. The baddies do whatever they want and noone is going to do anything about it besides write a blog. There will be no 1970s backlash with progressive Supreme Court judges and a senate committee investigating Hover.
Despite the normalization of masked federal gunmen kidnapping people based on the color of their skin and the language they speak.... Not even breaking a law in the process, the supreme court legalized racial profiling.
One can just argue about the normalization of people breaking the law by overstaying visas or hopping the border or whatever being the Supreme Court (or whoever you feel like blaming) legalized some other concept that most Americans also find disagreeable.
We don't have to have brown shirts pulling people off the street, and we also don't need to have this stupid fight over simply enforcing our borders like every other country on the planet. Extremists on both sides are as always, simply incorrect. Reject MAGA, reject DSA.
In context to my OP, none of this stuff or policy really affects most people's day to day lives. If you turned the news off you'd probably have no clue people were jumping the border en masse and you'd likely have no clue that those very same people were being arrested and deported.
… very same people were being arrested and deported.
This is an indication you don’t understand what is going on. Some illegals have been deported but amongst those illegals are U.S. citizens and people who are legally allowed to be here. They are being deported without judicial oversight and in some cases in direct violation of judicial orders.
… none of this stuff or policy really affects most people's day to day lives.
Man. What a profoundly immoral thing to say and believe. This illegal shit going on doesn’t affect more than 49.999% of the population so… no big deal.
It is people like you that Martin Luther King described in his letter:
I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro's great stumbling block in the stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen's Council-er or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate who is more devoted to "order" than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says "I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I can't agree with your methods of direct action;" who paternalistically feels he can set the timetable for another man's freedom; who lives by the myth of time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait until a "more convenient season."
> This illegal shit going on doesn’t affect more than 49.999% of the population so… no big deal.
Well it’s more like 95%, and you’re also injecting a false distinction here to suggest 49% of folks think one thing and 51% think another when most Americans have more nuanced views on immigration policy and broadly agree that a legal process must be followed.
I’m ignoring the righteous pearl-clutching (MLK/don’t know what you’re talking about/immoral whatever). I really don’t care.
You are the one who said “doesn’t affect most people”.
But now, what you write is it’s only 5% of the people being affected. Damn. So you acknowledge 5% are affected but that’s ok. It’s only 5%. It is profoundly immoral to think nothing is amiss because it only affects 15 million or so people. It’s not righteous pearl clutching to be alarmed when my neighbors are being illegally targeted. Having a conscience and an ounce of empathy is not righteous pearl clutching. As Edmund Burke said, all that is necessary for evil to prevail is that good men do nothing.
Illegal wars, illegal deportations, illegal cancellation of appropriated funds, illegal bribes to give pardons, etc. and your response is that the people alarmed by this are engaging in righteous pearl clutching. You are the problem.
I’ll read any response you wrote but won’t respond further. Those who remain silent while others are terrorized are dispicable.
> You are the one who said “doesn’t affect most people”.
Because it’s true.
> But now, what you write is it’s only 5% of the people being affected.
Well you wrote it was 49% or something. Me saying 5% is still in the bounds of “vast majority not affected”. I’m being generous here as the number is likely even lower and that’s accounting for folks who hired folks or extended family or whatnot.
> It’s not righteous pearl clutching to be alarmed when my neighbors are being illegally targeted.
Are they here illegally? I would expect (aside from heavy handed tactics which I broadly disagree with) that they would eventually be found and deported just like anyone else in any other country. What exactly are you suggesting is “being illegally targeted”?
> Illegal wars, illegal deportations, illegal cancellation of appropriated funds, illegal bribes to give pardons, etc. and your response is that the people alarmed by this are engaging in righteous pearl clutching.
Don’t accuse me of pearl clutching though. You just have to accept my declaration that things are illegal and anyone who disagrees must be immoral and part of the problem. In the words of some famous person, I declare famous saying!!
That’s the argument you’re making and as an independent who can’t stand MAGA or DSA + associates it’s very tiresome. I reject illegal immigration, and I reject heavy handed policing especially by untrained wannabe-be tough guys. If you’re going to turn that into all of these other accusations you’re extremism is the actual problem, not me.
>We don't have to have brown shirts pulling people off the street
That is literally the stage we are in now. You sent it because you are in support of it and to cowardly to admit it. It's the same cowardice that motivated them to wear masks
>In context to my OP, none of this stuff or policy really affects most people's day to day lives
The fact that this doesn't bother you speaks volumes about the kind of person you are
No we're not, and when it started to look like we were heading that way in some limited fashion the public fought back and stopped it, people were fired, and the heavy-handed tactics mostly stopped. In true brown shirt regimes (Iran, China, Russia, North Korea, Cuba, &c.) they don't stop the heavy handed tactics. In Iran they murdered over 30,000 people for it point blank with automatic weapons.
> You sent it because you are in support of it and to cowardly to admit it. It's the same cowardice that motivated them to wear masks
I don't support it. And I've said that multiple times. I also don't think they should wear masks.
I also have no cowardice about saying anything on the Internet. When you write things like that you sound silly. What's going to happen? Do you think I'm going to get in trouble like it's high school or something for saying an opinion that you happen to disagree with that the public by and large agrees with?
We should control our borders and deport people who violate our laws. Also we shouldn't do all these bad things and treat people inhumanely. The horror! The cowardice! Give me a break.
> The fact that this doesn't bother you speaks volumes about the kind of person you are
I didn't say it doesn't bother me, I said that it doesn't affect most people's day-to-day lives. There's a key difference and if you spent less time grandstanding and more time reading what I actually wrote you would realize that difference.
Its the same in Russia. Ignore the news go through life, don't say anything about the government. Once in a while people will fall down from windows and die of radiation poisoning of course but thats ignorable.
Normal day of a normal person living in dictatorship ... is normal. There are sometimes periods where a lot of people are at risk at the same time, but they pass.
Many people lived their normal lives through communism with no issue. They ignored bad stuff and abuses just like your tv turning off person.
And yet, they were living in dictatorship. And found out if they tried to do something different.
Well, all might be fine, you might be a little obedient drone, not angering your masters, making sure to be apolitical - only to be mobilized & send to die in a ditch in a useless war.
"Pshhhtt, the regime isn't oppresive. Sure, there is the securitate, but it's much better now, see, they released the political prisoners. Yes, some people got killed, but they were stirring waves, going around saying shit. You got to mind your business and go to work and not mind all the political stuff and you're fine. Ez-pz. Not sure what the fuss is about we are a great country, look how much stuff we make!"
It's honestly insulting to people who have actually lived and died under dictatorial regimes, communist regimes, and other barbaric forms of government and those who, and many times they've been Americans, who fought and died to preserve liberty for others in the United States and elsewhere, for you to sit here and say that they now live in the United States which is also a dictatorship.
Anyone who has experienced anything like real suffering would tell you the United States is a wonderful country and is a land of freedom and prosperity, even if at times it is flawed and imperfect. Tell the Filipino bakery that just opened in my home town that they live in a dictatorship, go tell the Iranian dissidents in Los Angelas that they had more freedom under the Iranians, go tell the folks in Hong Kong that the US is a brutal dictatorship. You'll get laughed out of the parking lot.
Your dislike of Donald Trump or whatever (he should be in jail because of Jan 6 - uh oh I hope the gestapo doesn't come get me for insulting dear leader - interesting how they can't, isn't it?) doesn't change anything. Was it a dictatorship for the 4 years under Biden's term? Or only a dictatorship while Trump is the elected president? Not only is your characterization incorrect from a philosophical standpoint, it's functionally incorrect too. If we lived in a dictatorship we wouldn't even have elections let alone any number of other constitutional checks. Or have you not been paying attention when the Trump administration loses a court case and quietly accepts the consequences? What dictatorship is bound by the rule of law, can be removed from power by an election, and has to respect Constitutional rights?
I was born in a country while under the communist regime. My grandfather was killed by the communists. I, myself, did not live very much under the communist regime, but I vividly remember the 90's, which, while not politically oppressive in the way the communist regime was, were in some ways, much worse economically. What I did see is how people remember the communist regime and how they seem to have perceived it from within. Yes, they were afraid, but they did continue their lives and in some ways, quite happy lives.
I think I failed to convey some critical parts with my post. The _feeling_ I describe is the actual outlook that most people had during that time. I am not saying that the US is at that point yet, what I am trying to say is people don't usually wake up one morning and just say "Ah, ok, now I'm living under an oppressive regime" things just change and many times they will defend said regime. Just sample asking a bunch of Chinese people what they think about their current regime. I bet many of them will be quite happy with the arrangement and how things are going although they are clearly living under authoritarianism.
Yes, in many ways the US has many institutions that still work, but they have been eroding at an astonishing speed under the cheers of 1/3 of the population. If I use the same logic of projecting into the future the rate of change that... AI proponents use for example... How free do you think the US will be in 5, 10 years? You're not there yet, but factoring all the things going on, your country has done a capital mistake.
I personally am a bit frightened of what will happen in November since you have a president that has been consistently eroding the rule of law, put sycophants in positions of leadership, showed disdain for the rule of law, and elections and institutions, allies, general competency.
You might confuse my emotion with one of disdain or hatred for the US or, competitive aggression or impotent denial and projecting for dissatisfaction in my own country. ? But that's not it. My emotional state relative to the US is one of someone grieving after a personal hero I used to look up to who got brain damage and now goes down the street with a loaded gun yelling incoherent ramblings.
> I fully expect a new president to be ushered in, whether R or D, and for some level of normalcy to start creeping back.
I'm pretty sure that barring shenanigans we'll get an D president next time. I'm also pretty sure that we're kicking many cans (economic and otherwise) down the road that are set to blow up during the next administration so that we'll likely be back here again in 2032 with an R. Remember, after Watergate Carter was able to win in 1976 because people were tired of corruption - at the time most people thought that another R administration wouldn't happen for a couple of decades at least. But Reagan(R) won just 4 years later in 1980.
I'm also pretty sure that given the goldfish memory that most American voters have that a hereditary Trump dynasty isn't at all off the table. Look at the Philippines: they have a Marcos in power again. Look at Peru: they've got a Fujimori in power again.
Counter point is, throughout history America didn’t have a competition that surpassed it across many standards. Japan got very close, but got contained in some ways. China doesn’t need to play ball.
I’ve mentioned it in the past as well - all actions look like a knee-jerk reactions and hail marys to try to regain the power.
It has already lost. America lost in Vietnam. Lost in Afghanistan. Turned Middle East into a humongous mess. Now losing badly in Iran. The only "wins" it had were against Countries where odds were already heavily in its favor (in other words invading tiny countries that did not have the technological wherewithal or the will necessary to fight back).
> 10y later they're richer than ever
The rich are richer than ever yes. Ask any common American citizen and he/she will come chasing after you for saying this.
> its companies have global dominance of the most world-changing technology of the last 20y. I just don't think "the collapse" is coming anytime soon.
That dominance is fast eroding. America itself has ended globalization. It is retreating from many crucial positions: like when it comes to cross-border payments, protecting freedom of navigation in high seas, deals that it had previously negotiated with all countries of the World, unable to protect allies in the Middle East and even in South East Asia, not delivering on defense commitments with partner nations... the list goes on and on.
> If anyone's interested in a friendly wager, my email is open. I'll happily go 1:1 odds that America will have a new president come 2029 and the country will still remain the world's richest and most powerful.
None of us believe America will collapse by 2029 and that there wouldn't be another President (unless Trump is really stupid enough to go down that route which I don't think he will). But by 2045? Yeah absolutely is possible.
You are undoubtedly correct that at some point there will be new leadership in the US.
Politics makes leadership change a possibility. Biology makes it an inevitability.
But I don't think the evidence is very strong that switching from one man to a different man, even if the new man wears a blue hat instead of a red hat, will make that much difference against capital and its surveillance state.
This isn't a false equivalence "both sides" argument. I'd greatly prefer the blue hat over the red hat.
But the blue hat only makes the underlying forces of late capitalism a little slower and a little less vicious, while simultaneously legitimizing that system.
Yeah, mostly agree but playing devils advocate, PRISM was authorized under bush, implemented under Obama, and is being abused by Trump. Obama promised safeguards, but it’s pretty clear those were just a ruse. It’s only going to get worse. The well deserved controversy around Flock is the perfect example.
“Silliness” I have masked federal agents in unmarked vehicles barking orders at US citizens in my neighborhood and zip-tying minors who did nothing but run away and cry. I have neighbors cheering it on. Not silly at all when you see it up close.
If they are masked men in unmarked vehicles, how do you know they’re federal agents? Aren’t they just criminals that you should call the police to stop?
And you have the Attorney General of the United States, and the Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security saying "it doesn't matter, if they tell you they're federal agents, you need to comply."
But excuse me, Mr Masked Man, let me call the local police just in case you're not actually federal agents... is probably going to get the same reaction whether they're criminals or ICE agents.
I don’t understand this. Obviously you don’t call the police when the masked men are holding you up. You call the police when they hold someone else up.
Has it truly become widespread enough that you can safely assume that masked men in unmarked vans are federal agents? That’s absurd.
> Has it truly become widespread enough that you can safely assume that masked men in unmarked vans are federal agents? That’s absurd.
Sadly, in very many places, yes - if you see masked men piling out of a van odds are they're not there to rob a bank but to detain people they suspect of being undocumented or problematic to ICE.
I agree. It's actually quite insulting to other countries whose actual atrocities were measured in lives lost. I voted for Kamala but Trump Derangement Syndrome is real. He's just a loser, he's not even remotely brave enough to be Hitler Jr.
The guy doesn't have the stomach for real totalitarianism. Just populism, corruption, and weakening the country.
Trump Derangement Syndrome is just another word for "describing Trump actions in honest realistic terms rather then whitewashing them".
And considering how right talks about Mandani, Biden, Harris ... it is ridiculous that the derogatory term goes only toward ... people who talk about Trump.
The USA started from and has come back from way worse in the past.
Some dark, dark things happened in the USA, and almost every progression had a corresponding backslide - but the tick-tock has always ticked further towards a freer, more equal, and more equitable society.
I’m willing to hope this era is another ‘tock’. But that does require people to not just give up (or even work to accelerate the backslide?!) as you seem to be suggesting is the best course of action.
You can make a credible argument that the American society is less free, less equal, and less equitable than it was at its founding?
There are just so many ways in which this seems crazy to me. I feel like you think you’re luring me into some sort of rhetorical trap - but to pick the two elephants in the room, a large proportion of the population was literally owned by other people, and only white male landowners could vote.
I don’t think any reasonable person would think I am claiming that every ‘tick’ makes things better along every possible axis for every possible person. It’s pretty obvious that judging whether America’s ‘ticks’ have been towards ‘a freer, more equal, and more equitable society’ means considering the state of society in aggregate.
On your particular example, there are lots of debates to be had about forms of taxation and which kinds are ‘fairer’ - but more importantly, and more overwhelmingly: eighteen percent of the population of America was literally owned by other people in 1790. They couldn’t ‘spend freely from the fruits of one's labor’ to any extent at all.
Your line of argumentation asserts that freedom has increased over time with allowances for any form of subjugation by the government short of enslavement. I don't doubt that you're making a good faith argument, but it doesn't engage with the real problem of abuse of power and disenfranchisement of the people because no matter how bad it gets for the average citizen it will never be as bad as chattel slavery. It's hard to argue in good faith on a nuanced issue with someone who has a one liner mic drop response to everything.
Do you honestly think that our society was more (or as) equal 200 years ago than it is today?
Or even 50 years ago? Even in the 1970s, there were places in the United States that women couldn't get a checking account without a man co-signing on the loan.
We can certainly take issue with how rich countries oppress and exploit poor countries today, but you can't honestly say it is worse today than it was during colonialism.
Prior to the enclosure period of English common law, land was assumed to be available to the private use of government subjects. The American West was the same before it was swallowed by the US government. The current situation is provably less free along this dimension. You could argue that this is not important relative to other things (this is a value judgement), or that things done outside of the state are outside of the discussion (this is a a fallacy, a lot of things once outside of the state find themselves inside it today), or you could say that this does not account for intra-community conflict between settlers and natives (this is a straw man)
We have unprecedented corruption in the White House but much of the other stuff is not new territory. It’s bad and a regression I hate to see. But we can always improve when the people demand better. The people always have the power, even if they don’t realize it.
I remain hopeful that we will react to this latest test by improving the guardrails again. The current regime does not by any means have the popular support of the citizenry, so there is every reason to expect some backlash and consequences on the other end of this. It'll take years, though, to work through.
And to add to that, a very loyal set of voters who will literally vote for more of the same even when it directly and empirically makes their lives worse.
Obviously yes. Imagine for a second that you're a MAGA supporter, anti-abortion, stick it to the liberals type of person. Would you say that voting has been effective to get the things you care about passed into law (or repealed)?
In law school we skipped border search cases because the border crosser cases can basically be summed up with “you have no right to privacy at the border.” This has been the common law for 5000 years. It has nothing to do with Trump, or cell phones, or anything other than the notion that a sovereign has an absolute right to know what is crossing its borders.
Not OP but generally states are considered to be a central political organization that maintains a monopoly on violence within a defined area.
The border is the thing that makes the state and have been since states first emerged about 5,000 years ago. If the state cannot preserve its border it is no longer a state.
The tendency to describe things that are so essentially characteristic of the capitalist imperial core as resembling the Soviet Union is always so funny
> US has entered its East Germany / late 20th century Soviet era
> The social dynamics are the same - the abuses, the selective enforcement, the lack of recourse, the same characters in the roles of various levels of "law enforcement" and "politics"
What you're describing is politics in general. The question is not whether abuses occur (they do, everywhere), but whether the system is built to be resilient and course-correct over time.
The thing about freedom is not just that it's less miserable than the alternative; more importantly, freedom enables a feedback loop where people's individual choices carry corrective information: what they buy, what they sell, how much, at what price, who they vote for, what they write/publish, what they read, what they say etc. The system at large can correct itself over time if (a) these choices are allowed to have power to influence the system, and (b) the courts enforce justice without interference by the ruling party.
Not a single communist country in the 20th century stayed communist for more than a few years when only 2 freedoms were allowed: (1) freedom of the press, and (2) freedom of the courts from control by the ruling party.
The Soviets and East Germans suppressed every form of freedom that carried information or potential corrective power, because they maxxed on staying in power above all - they effectively had to. No one wants to be under real communism/socialism[0], so for it to be stable it has to be maximally suppressive.
It's been this way in the UK for years now. Always interesting to hear how far the rest of the West the US is.
If you come to the UK the police are allowed to stop you without suspicion and force you to answer their questions honestly or be charged with a crime for remaining silent or lying. You must also give them access to all of your devices if asked, or again face criminal charges.
Most people here are okay with it though. Ultimately if you're not doing anything wrong you'll probably be okay.
This has been legal since long before Trump, if you don't like it there's laws in motion to ban it you can support, but entering across a border you've been allowed to be searched without a warrant for decades at least. And if you're being searched and then you destroy what they're trying to search... Here you are.
“ he has been ensnared by National Security Presidential Memorandum-7, or NSPM-7, a sweeping directive issued by President Trump last September that expanded the definition of domestic terrorism to include crimes like getting in the way of immigration enforcement.
His prosecution is one of the earliest known instances of the federal authorities charging a person with destroying evidence using a program designed to wipe a device clean after a specific code is entered.”
So, while “no privacy at the border” has always been a thing, the re-categorisation of this as “domestic terrorism” is new.
Quite possibly the worst take I’ve ever read on hacker news. “Things are generally bad now so the entire country should roll over and get fucked.” What are you even thinking dude? Maybe take a walk outside or something..
> I'm so very sorry, but the best you can do from here is speedrun the collapse.
This is a pretty silly take. If you actually follow the news, all of these issues are getting pushback. It's not at all clear that even a competent fascist-leaning government would be able to push through what the current one is trying to do, and sadly for them, competence in their ranks is in short supply.
The bigger issue has nothing to do with the faddish concerns of the current government. The era we should be looking to is not East Germany/late Soviet - it's more like the Gilded Age. Robber barons need to be dealt with from time to time.
The US has it's mid-term elections this november, and it's possible, and even likely, that the Democratic candidates will win overwhealmingly. The Democrats are not a monolith, either, the Democratic Socialists of America political group is the very progressive part of the Democratic party, they are the ones that are not accepting dark money campaign donations. I do not agree with a lot of the unrealistic things that some DSA candidates have said, but those or the candidates that aren't winning the primaries. There is a giant blue tidal wave coming in November. Trump will become nothing more than a lame duck "president", and he'll likely be impeached in the House and convicted in the Senate and the Justice System will probably be the final arbiter of his fate. That's the way I see it. And I never believed I would be saying what I just said, but the fact is that since trump was elected, the democrats have flipped 31 (at last count) formorly Republican held seats, and the republicans have flipped exactly zero seats from democrat to republican. The American People are not their goverment, especially right now, even though that's not how it was meant to be, but I know one thing, they are fed up and enough is enough.
I was referring specifically to the US Senate "convicting" chump, not a court. That can only happen if he is succuessfully prosecuted by the US House of Representatives.
I agree that the courts are not predictable in that way, and what I'm talking about will be based on which party controls the house and senate. If the dems win enough seats in both, it's entirely possible for him to be impeached in the house and convicted in the senate. We won't know what the makeup of the house and senate will be after the midterms, so that remains to be seen.
People have no idea. They’re destroying old books. Just like the last time (1), and the time before that (2), and the time before that(3), which were:
1) Nazi Germany, following debt/inflationary collapse of Weimar Republic.
2) Bolshevik Revolution, following WWI induced debt collapse of Tsars.
3) French Revolution, following debt collapse of Monarchy.
Now where are we? 40 trillion in debt. The interest is $1.1 trillion the amount added to it yearly is $2.1 trillion. The entirety of a government spending would need to be wiped out just to keep it where it is.
If you had the books that got burned, you’d know the cycle, and the fact that electing democrats isn’t gonna change a damn thing.
These AI companies know by now that there is no real monetization path that will recoup the over 1 trillion dollars invested by these companies. There is a circular spending spree among large corporations paying each other massive amounts of money to try to make the promise of AI real. It's not. Is it neat? Yeah. Is it reliable? No.
Where the money is not coming from are consumers. There is no consumer market for AI that stands a chance of making these companies profitable.
It's a bubble. Just like the sub-prime mortgage loan debacle of 2008. It's going to burst. These companies are large enough that the government will declare them necessary, and will give a large portion of the taxes we pay to these companies to keep them afloat.
Ah yes, the government bailout, and the government will decide who pays the real price. And that will be me, and you and the rest of us that aren't rich.
These AI companies are aware of this, or they wouldn't take the gamble. So I would have to disagree and say that the government is and will be involved in how all of this plays out.
> Where the money is not coming from are consumers.
This is 100% wrong.
Look at Anthropic's quarterly revenue from AI sales ($11B), OpenAI (6.7B) and XAI ($5B). That's $23B a quarter or $100B annualized. And it's still growing.
Inesting $1T when your revenue is 10% annually and growing quickly is not unusual.
I think the best case scenario is that the democrats win sufficient control of congress that they can both stop the legislative agenda (to the extent it even exists) and interfere enough with presidential executive actions that everything stalls until we reach the next presidential election.
I have exactly zero expectations of real consequences to Trump. He has far too much popular support for that to be realistic. But I will say that everybody else in his regime better hope he writes them a broad preemptive pardon before he leaves office because the teflon only works for him.
> I have exactly zero expectations of real consequences to Trump. He has far too much popular support for that to be realistic.
That's the problem. He has wide support despite gestures around. The thing a large part of the population supports _this_. It's not going away. This is the reason that people are bearish on US future.
Trump knows a lot of dirt on a lot of very powerful people, and he likely has dementia. One thing about dementia is that it can cause people to say things they normally would not say. That's a huge risk to those that are afraid he's going to start blurting out these secrets. That makes him a liability to the kind of people that can make anyone worth more dead than alive.
This is obviously pure speculation on my part, but I think it's quite plausible.
Border control can't stop you from entering the country. Please do not spread misinformation.
If you mean non-citizens? Well, I invite you to check out many other places all across the world who also pick and choose who they will allow to visit.
It's a temporary situation, it isn't necessarily a permanent situation.
Tell me how you think East Germany is doing these days.
And no, it doesn't have to take 40 years to right the ship, so long as people get their heads out of their asses and vote. Things are likely to change by the end of this year, and in another 2 years we could have a very different government that could undo a lot of the bullshit going on right now.
Tens of millions have voted for this 3 times in the past 10 years, it succeeded twice. This is not going away, half the voting population of the US wants to live under authoritarian rule and will do anything to take the whole country with them.
Republicans are in every way trying to turn this into an authoritarian hellhole. "Cruelty is the point" is a phrase used with regards to right-wing politics in America. We're heading in the worst direction possible, but it takes a bit longer and more work to get a country the size of America with different states to become fully authoritarian. It doesn't happen overnight like it can in small countries.
Voter preferences can change with time, as voters observe the effects of their previous selections. Most voters don't want and didn't vote for authoritarian rule. They are humans with many diverse challenges & concerns in their lives. Their votes are an attempt to balance/compromise among those.
Only a small part, maybe 1/3 of the US wanted this. Not the whole population. Sadly 1/3 of eligible voters don't vote - they are the ones who didn't want this but don't have enough sense to vote, and that's different than wanting trump.
Voters change their mind all the time. Sure, there are still plenty in the US who want all this, but Trump's approval ratings are at or near all-time lows, and at least some people who voted for him finally see his lies for what they are, and have regrets.
It's still worrying! His supporters still number lots of people who a) are still somehow too gullible to realize Trump and the MAGA crowd are not going to make their lives better, and b) actively want what's going on. But there are easily more eligible voters in the US who wouldn't vote for a Republican with a gun to their head, or who are finally starting to understand that "sticking it to the libs" is hurting themselves.
It's not going away, but it's likely that it's declining, and possible it will continue to do so. Whether or not it declines quickly enough, before these jackasses consolidate power and break what's left of our institutions... well, that remains to be seen.
I take some solace for how there is such a hard floor of support for Trump. Counterintuitively, I consider that good news. Because any regular politician would be so far underwater at this point that they might well fear for their life. What Trump has is a solid 1/3 of the population that are so far up his ass they can't see daylight. That works out great for him, and poorly for every other GOP politician. He's achieved demagogue status, which is easier said than done. Vance ain't got it, Rubio ain't got it, there's not really anybody on the sidelines who looks like they may have it either. So when Trump is gone, the GOP is going to undergo another wild gyration in ideology after the infighting settles down. And if they don't find another halfway plausible demagogue, they might be a back into minority party status for the next two decades. There is precedent for this.
But the dems are almost certainly getting ready for their own come to jesus moment, their base is pretty pissed off too. Could get interesting. A boring candidate will probably be the preferred choice after the chaos of these years, but after that I think it might get wild.
You can rage against Trump and republicans as much as you want but in the end the democrats must learn to formulate why anybody should vote FOR them. Even in the current chaos they aren’t able to bring up a coherent message and follow through when they are in power. I see the same in Germany. AfD is getting stronger while the established parties get nothing done.
It reminds me somewhat of the state of the Weimar Republic. The democratic parties failed which gave an opening to the nazis.
Somehow, no one votes for nazi because they believe that stuff. Rhetorically. They are always victims with no agency.
They do believe in stuff. And their soft supporters succesfully manage to turm the blame to others.
Trump situation is result of years of hard work of heritage foundation, conservative preachers, tech bros, supreme court and so on. He represents their project being succesfull.
The Democratic party started, fought, and lost a culture war almost before Republicans even responded. They alienated their voters. Heritage Foundation didn't need to do anything. And fringe groups got more ammo.
I don't even think Trump was the Republicans' best shot, only popular enough to beat Clinton and Harris (and lose to Biden), and probably tanking his party now.
It's both. Why did the Nazis win ethe election instead of the liberals? Two reasons play equal part. One, many people are Nazis. Two, liberals didn't give any reason to vote for them, except for "we're not Nazis" and people who've voted on that basis for the last six elections and continued to see life get worse are now fed up - at best they don't vote and at worst they switch to voting Nazi.
The US is not the first country to fall into this trap. The exact same happened in Germany. The non-Nazi party offered nothing to anyone besides not being Nazi.
Liberals gave plenty of reasons to vote for them. But, those reasons did not mattered, because none of that was about what democratic party actually do. And also importantly, the difference between the parties was actually small. The narrative of nazi winning a lot is false.
The reasons for Trump vote were conservatives enflamed panic about trans and wish to harm them. It was hate of non-white immigrants.
And above all, it was vote for male supremacy. It was based on lies and wish to enact harm and cruelty. Openly so.
If you want to win next time, you need to stop closing eyes from that. Stop idealizing and projecting motivations on republican voters. Stop whitewashing them and listen to what they are saying and when.
>half the voting population of the US wants to live under authoritarian rule
That's half the people who showed up to vote, not "half the voting population". 1/3 of the eligible voters simply didn't vote, and from the people I've encountered that don't vote, they are mostly left-leaning.
No, stupidity and self-harm aren't going away, those are human traits. The current admin is actively hurting everyone, with tariffs and stupid wars he campaigned that he wouldn't start, ICE in every city everywhere causing chaos even to right-wing supporter-owned businesses (they wanted immigration reform but not like that!). This admin has shit the bed, and even his supporters are feeling that. They are now in the "finding out" phase, and the next phase doesn't look so good for republicans in the next election because of it.
On a long enough timeline, nothing is permanent. The question is how long it lasts and how bad it gets before it gets better.
In terms of the ending, East Germany was nearly an ideal case. The state just sort of gently fell over. The country got absorbed into a friendly neighbor. There wasn't much loss of life, no widespread destruction.
Then there's East Germany's predecessor state, which ended because it decided to wage war on half the world, and its people bore the consequences. Millions dead, cities wrecked, occupation by foreign armies, the country carved up. "This too shall pass" isn't always a good thing.
Or look at the state that created and sustained East Germany. Borne out of violent revolution, decades of repression, collapse, turmoil, economic hardship, brief flirtation with democracy, de facto dictatorship, no end in sight.
My biggest worry with the US right now isn't the government itself. It's that so many people want this government. Voting doesn't help when the voters want the bad stuff. We could have a very different government in another two years if the people want it. I'm not convinced they do. If they do I'm not convinced that sentiment will last. We already went through this once, and the "actually, let's not give the shitheads power" sentiment fell apart by the next election.
The people want this administration and their right-wing politics gone, and the right-wing knows it - if the people really wanted the current shitstorm to continue the right-wing wouldn't be so desperate to suppress the vote, gerrymander like madmen, and use every questionable lever to prevent people to vote like trying to extinguish all mail-in voting, etc.
I'm sure a big group of people want that, but I wouldn't call it "the people" when the president has a ~38% approval rating. That's low enough to lose an election but still way too high for me to be comfortable with it. And "the people" have extremely short memories, as we saw last time around.
Does anyone on the other side have a credible plan to undo the damage?
Where's the Project 2028 book?
Is there anyone credible putting together the Executive Orders to undo the stack of shit, is anyone putting together a short list of District Attorneys to interview on January 21, etc?
That's the thing that worries me. The Democratic party just doesn't have their shit together in that way. They absolutely should be developing this sort of plan. I expect there is some plan, but I doubt it's as comprehensive or in-depth as Project 2025. And it needs to be.
> Tell me how you think East Germany is doing these days.
> And no, it doesn't have to take 40 years to right the ship, so long as people get their heads out of their asses and vote.
so then you admit the outcome here is contingent/conditional. do you understand that means we are already in dire circumstances if the outcome isn't certain?
You don't need to go to other countries to play your fears, lest we forget our constitution is a pro-slavery document and one of the first acts of congress was the fugitive slave laws.
I think it's more effective to stick to our own history because this country has always been a struggle for workers outside of a small very respite after WW2 that has been actively fought against and weakened since.
It's interesting that (as per the article) the work pumped out by this synthetic think tank does not seem to align / disfavours the official party line of the country. You'd imagine if this was propaganda, it would be supportive of the official stance. I wonder what the objective is then, reputation-building for later influence? Something else?
> the work pumped out by this synthetic think tank does not seem to align / disfavours the official party line of the country
The article DOES NOT say this- it says that sometimes this seems to be the case, but reports exactly one example of extremely little significance. In the meanwhile,
"Piro, Inc, the firm that created the Hanover Institute, has received $900,000 from the Israeli government for its work."
Opening the linked example, one sees that the article is basically dedicated to laundering the idea that there were many "antisemitic incidents" at Columbia University.
The article doesn't say that the work disfavors the party line, just that they don't always align perfectly. Which isn't that surprising considering that governments make self-contradictory statements all the time (consider Trump, for example).
My employer is encouraging AI adoption across the board, to the point of basically making tokenmaxing part of performance KPIs. I think they're pushing headlong into disaster, but they are not the kind of people to take advice, or admit mistakes.
I use AI coding tools both at work and in my hobby projects. It very clear to me they're nuclear-powered footguns, and we have a long, long way yet in developing practices, structures and workflows that will enable true benefits while minimizing the absolutely toxic baggage/fallout/side effects.
I look at the big corp push for AI adoption as another instance of boards of directors choosing the large investors / their own personal gain over the success of the corporations they govern (first instance being the "back to the office" push in attempt to shore up commercial real estate). I think the circular economy of the AI bubble has spread far and wide, and we're watching a lot of invested players trying to keep it going.
Ok so, all the appliances and cars and TVs and who knows what other embedded electronics sold in Illinois will require the user (?) to verify their age?
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