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DOGE has 'god mode' access to government data

theatlantic.com

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Re: DOGE has 'god mode' access to government data

#891

Post by TeaBrain »

1970-01-01 wrote: post #625

What should happen, and nobody is talking about this, is the USA is severely downgraded in its overall credit rating due to an unhinged and ongoing "fire, aim, ready" self-audit. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_federal_governme...

The last credit downgrade of the US by a major ratings agency was by Fitch in 2023. They cited projections for the US deficit to continue to rise, due to projected weaker revenues and increased spending.

https://www.fitchratings.com/research/sovereigns/united-stat...

Re: DOGE has 'god mode' access to government data

#892

Post by jghn »

jart wrote: post #862
simpaticoder wrote: post #811

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've worked with older governmental systems, and chances are they are running a wide variety of systems, some of which, the oldest and most critical, are probably written in COBOL running on IBM mainframe hardware. In those environments, there is no real distinction between "database" and "application". COBOL systems are very file- and batch-oriented, and are "monolithic" in the extremist sense. The technology itself…

[flagged]

You know that annoying thing where someone joins a new team, looks around, declares all their friction points to be easily solvable, dives in & starts making changes, and turns out to make a big giant mess?

And the reason is they don't understand the specific domain & context well enough to know what the actual hard problems are. Instead they're just pattern matching to things they do know and extrapolating. And it usually doesn't go well.

Dealing with a system that's replicating 50 years of regulatory rules is going to be that times infinity.

Re: DOGE has 'god mode' access to government data

#893

Post by mrtesthah »

jart wrote: post #862
simpaticoder wrote: post #811

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've worked with older governmental systems, and chances are they are running a wide variety of systems, some of which, the oldest and most critical, are probably written in COBOL running on IBM mainframe hardware. In those environments, there is no real distinction between "database" and "application". COBOL systems are very file- and batch-oriented, and are "monolithic" in the extremist sense. The technology itself…

[flagged]

DOGE literally took over the agency that competently modernized and integrated US gov technology (United States Digital Service), gutted it, and is now using that agency's pretense of needing access to data to now pilfer citizens' private information and grossly violate the constitutional separation of powers.

This is the mechanism by which this administrative coup (declared here in https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/02/ensu...) is being enacted. None of this is legal or constitutional in any way.

The rule of law is not a partisan issue nor a matter of "government efficiency". Those who aid this coup should be considered traitors.

Re: DOGE has 'god mode' access to government data

#894

Post by chipsrafferty »

cobertos wrote: post #59
pyrale wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would you want a prospective employer to have access to your past tax returns when negociating salary? The article also mentions information about employees operating in conflict zones.

Salary information is already easy to get thanks to The Work Number

A lot of jobs don't use TWN. None of the ones I've had did so.

Re: DOGE has 'god mode' access to government data

#895

Post by insane_dreamer »

cryptonector wrote: post #871
insane_dreamer wrote: post #814

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lets assume for a minute that what's going on is a good faith comprehensive audit of these agencies. (It's not, but lets just say it is.) 1) How long do you think it takes to perform a comprehensive audit of an agency in order to accurately determine waste, corruption and fraud. If you've ever audited a large corporation, you know what that takes -- it is not something you whip up in a week or two. 2) Who do you thin…

Presumably Elon and hist staff were planning this and -maybe?- training for this for months, perhaps since before the election.

Planning without any access to or knowledge of all these difference agencies and their systems and processes (you do know there are many processes in place to prevent fraud and corruption, and Inspector Generals responsible for auditing)? Almost impossible. Again, these are not software problems.

Re: DOGE has 'god mode' access to government data

#896

Post by insane_dreamer »

whymeogod wrote: post #735
insane_dreamer wrote: post #633

A huge problem with this is that from all accounts, these engineers going in don't seem to have any accountability. No one knows who is in charge and making the decisions (presumably Musk though official statements say he's not the DOGE administrator, but no one knows who is), they come into offices like an FBI raid demanding access but won't give reasons, say who is in charge, what they are doing, or even their name…

> official statements say he's (Musk) not the DOGE administrator, but no one knows who is That's because they believe in maximum transparency.

s/max/min/g

Re: DOGE has 'god mode' access to government data

#897

Post by 2OEH8eoCRo0 »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #890
mempko wrote: post #832

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The deficit hawks don't understand how money works. Everything about DOGE and their mission has a fundamental deep misunderstanding of why governments with their own currency must have deficits. Literal accounting 101. Unfortunately Elon has an economics degree, which means he is completely uneducated in accounting.

> Everything about DOGE and their mission has a fundamental deep misunderstanding of why governments with their own currency must have deficits DOGE has nothing to do with deficits, they're not even bothering to count it properly [1]. DOGE will remake the federal government for Musk's benefit. That's why he's using cannon-fodder DOGE bros instead of his best and brightest. That's why the collateral damage isn't of pr…

What does he think will happen after four years? Trump is old and can escape accountability by dying but most of these toadies are middle-aged.

Re: DOGE has 'god mode' access to government data

#898

Post by sepositus »

gattr wrote: post #451

Perhaps the whole situation will finally convince the "I don't mind, I have nothing to hide" crowd about the need to scrutinize & limit as much as reasonably possible the personal data collection and retention by government and other entities. What good are rules, statutes, checks & balances, passwords and ACLs, if at some point someone you don't like or trust can just come in "as a root" and circumvent everything?

For some people, it literally changes based on the administration. We need to teach people to always be skeptical of government overreach, no matter who is in office.

Re: DOGE has 'god mode' access to government data

#899

Post by TeaBrain »

electrondood wrote: post #548
kardianos wrote: post #334

I actually believe the executive branch should actually control the executive branch.

Then you should likewise believe that the legislative branch should continue to determine how funds are allocated, and which agencies and departments are created and continue to function. Let's not be disingenuous.

I don't think these two things necessarily go hand in hand. If the head of the executive branch should have absolute control over the branch, as the above user suggested, then if congress wants to control government agencies that are currently in the executive branch, those agencies should be placed outside of the executive into a different category that is either under the legislative branch or shared with the executive. In the status quo, all of the large government agencies being cut by DOGE are technically under the executive.

Re: DOGE has 'god mode' access to government data

#900

Post by maronato »

calebm wrote: post #809
willis936 wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You personally are cool with me personally knowing your salary and where you live? Please just post that here right now.

Employers almost always know the salary and location of their employees. Government workers are (in theory) employees of the citizens.

> Government workers are (in theory) employees of the citizens.

Not in theory nor in practice, for the same reason a teacher isn’t the employee of a student’s parents.

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