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What's Going on at the FBI?

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Re: What's Going on at the FBI?

#51

Post by stavros »

maeil wrote: post #10
bozhark wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It won’t be.

You're right, it won't be. This is the only positive thing I can currently see. They could've easily pulled it off without resistance (i.e. bloodshed) in most of Europe, but in the US the indoctrination of US exceptionalism regarding "freedom" and "democracy" from an early age results in a non-negligible number of people who would actually put their lives on the line for this and willing to take part in active resist…

> They could've easily pulled it off without resistance (i.e. bloodshed) in most of Europe, but in the US the indoctrination of US exceptionalism regarding "freedom" and "democracy" from an early age results in a non-negligible number of people who would actually put their lives on the line for this and willing to take part in active resistance.

All the Europeans who have died revolting against totalitarian governments are rolling in their graves.

Re: What's Going on at the FBI?

#52

Post by qqqwerty »

bboygravity wrote: post #9
vizzier wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The worst part is, how do you even counter the injected rot? If they demand loyalty tests and infest your institutions how is it countered? do the other side also have to do the same (assuming they have the opportunity)? All feels incredibly illiberal. I hope for the best that the oaths of office specific to these institutions hold.

How is this different from any previous president? Isn't the very reason that the puppets "need replacing" (according to the president) tell you that they are of the wrong (previous president's) political flavor? Honest question, I'm not from US, but on the surface it just looks like more of the same thing that has always been happening? Except with way more media attention?

These organizations consist of political appointees and civil servants. It is customary to replace all of the political appointees. Civil servants however have a lot of job protections and can only be fired for a limited set of reasons. Typically, a new administration would appoint new political appointees to the various departments (many of whom need to be confirmed by the Senate) and those appointees would then exert their influence on the department by shifting priorities around and they could even alter the hiring process to target more "aligned" individuals for the open civil servant roles. But they cannot just do a wholesale house cleaning. The high level purpose and the budget/size of the organization is determined by Congress and the political appointees are constrained by that.

So this is in fact very different from how things normally work.

Re: What's Going on at the FBI?

#53

Post by rob74 »

What's most wild about this is that what's happening at the FBI, while plenty scandalous enough on its own, are mostly eclipsed by everything else that's going on - e.g. this editorial https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/feb/03/the-gu... doesn't even mention the FBI. It's like Trump is setting as many fires at once as he can, hoping that at least some of them will burn out of control...

Re: What's Going on at the FBI?

#54

Post by nyc_data_geek1 »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #32
kragen wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think it's anywhere near that simple. Organizations are ongoing processes, constantly in flux, not structures erected in the past. Like a river, you can never step in the same organization twice. Like ghosts and money, they only exist in people's minds; they consist of belief in them, hyperstitiously. The democracy the FBI is sworn to protect has turned on it. What is left for it to protect? The laws handed d…

> You can count on the FBI to protect itself, but never believe that what it is protecting is democracy. Except the only thing that what makes them different from organized crime is also the shared belief in laws that form and direct them. > will the FBI continue to enforce yesterday's laws? If they don't, i.e. if they start to openly pick and choose which laws are valid and which are not, the whole thing will unrave…

>>openly pick and choose which laws are valid and which are not

ah yes, the same way every major police department in the US has been functioning for most of living memory

Re: What's Going on at the FBI?

#55

Post by SlightlyLeftPad »

DyslexicAtheist wrote: post #33
thih9 wrote: post #20

I’m not from the US and news like this change my perception of that country - it seems unstable; just like I’m not considering a Wordpress blog, I’d think twice before any long term plans that involve the US. The comparison to the Wordpress drama works surprisingly well for me, complete with vendettas and an overzealous leader, just on an even larger scale and affecting more people.

imagine being energy dependent on a regime that bullies you from Washington, and being asked to increase security spending to 5% of GDP by purchasing US weapons systems. while being told by the same regime they might take over Greenland or the Panama canal. when putting US foreign policy into perspective over the past 30 (or more depending where you are) years, then aligning with China suddenly looks a lot less awful…

I think when you look holistically at the promises that China has made, and broken, it still doesn’t make sense to align with China. That could change in the future but the time isn’t now.

An example; look at what they’ve been doing in the South China Sea, Hong Kong or Xinjiang.

Some instability in the U.S. is definitely uncomfortable but the alternative is not better.

Re: What's Going on at the FBI?

#56

Post by cinquemb »

rob74 wrote: post #44
jimkleiber wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One way is for the people in the other branches of government—Congress (legislative) and Courts (judicial)—to stand up for their branches and fight against the executive. The challenge is that people are more loyal to their political parties than their political branches, and the Constitution is built to check and balance branches, not parties.

Well, the supreme representatives of the judicial branch have just last year given the executive (=Trump) a blank check to largely do anything it pleases ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trump_v._United_States_(2024) ). So yes, the US is in big trouble...

Don't forget the repeal of the chevron deference too by the supreme court. Agencies have a lot less power now (at least from a judicial perspective). Big trouble indeed, but its clear that for certain actors, they are experiencing pain they haven't felt before under any administration...

Re: What's Going on at the FBI?

#57

Post by StefanBatory »

whatever1 wrote: post #42
phinnaeus wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have strong doubts they will learn anything, if they were capable of that you could expect them to have learned it already.

We have been told that if you fall head down from high altitude you will hit your self badly and probably die, but what if it is different this time around?

"Heard about the guy who fell off a skyscraper? On his way down past each floor, he kept saying to reassure himself:

So far so good…

so far so good…

How you fall doesn’t matter. It’s how you land!"

Re: What's Going on at the FBI?

#58

Post by gerash »

arunabha wrote: post #8

It's wild to think I'd ever say this, but the next four years will be the stress test of the strength of US institutions against an authoritarian president. If they survive the next four years, they will likely survive pretty much anything.

US institutions aka. bureaucracy isn't without its own issues. I believe that's why people voted in a rather unusual person like Trump whose main feature is being outside the establishment.

It is the US institutions who have happily engaged in endless foreign wars over past several decades. They have also enacted low corporate taxation resulting in high stock prices but even larger wealth gap where few winners take all the profits.

Re: What's Going on at the FBI?

#59

Post by monksy »

phinnaeus wrote: post #36
whatever1 wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Half of the voting population were so fed up with the economy that they went with the nuclear option. It’s just that most of them have not read history and none of them have lived through war or fascism to understand what they are signing up for. They will all learn their lesson.

I have strong doubts they will learn anything, if they were capable of that you could expect them to have learned it already.

Take a look at r/conservative. They're claiming they got wins with the dismantling, the site tear downs, the "folds" in negotiation. They really think they're winning.

Re: What's Going on at the FBI?

#60

Post by bananapub »

arunabha wrote: post #8

It's wild to think I'd ever say this, but the next four years will be the stress test of the strength of US institutions against an authoritarian president. If they survive the next four years, they will likely survive pretty much anything.

I think you're underestimating the damage he's done and will do. semi-permanent changes:

- complete radicalisation of an entire congressional party against functional democracy

- complete politicisation of the entire federal government

- normalisation of just straight up lying to the Senate in confirmation hearings (RFK on everything, Patel on q anon)

- normalisation of just straight up lying during campaigns (no idea what Project 2025 is!)

- making it clear to every single ally of the US that the US cannot be trusted to not be a complete cock

- normalisation of pardoning thousands of criminals who did crimes on TV in your favour

- normalisation of Congress and the top level courts being completely and utterly unwilling to lift a finger to stop autocratic exercise of powers by the president

maybe the next president won't be a sociopath, but the above will still be true and maybe the one after will be.

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