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The Pentagon is making a mistake by threatening Anthropic

understandingai.org

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Re: The Pentagon is making a mistake by threatening Anthropic

#151

Post by wrs »

wat10000 wrote: post #148
pavlov wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The US President in 1944 was someone who wanted to have elections. In 2026 this is not the case anymore. How much of a difference it makes, nobody knows.

Elections won't be canceled. They're too important for the perception of legitimacy. Virtually every country on Earth now has elections. Russia, China, even North Korea has elections. The modern playbook isn't to abolish elections, it's a combination of blocking opposition candidates, suppressing votes, intimidating voters, and lying about the results. That's what to watch for.

“Watch for”? That has been actively happening, at an accelerating pace. (Especially if you count “lying about someone else lying about the results”.)

Re: The Pentagon is making a mistake by threatening Anthropic

#152

Post by ksymph »

mediaman wrote: post #73
Eggpants wrote: post #52

What’s interesting is Anthropic being singled out here. That either means: 1- OpenAI, Microsoft, Google, Amazon, etc have no problem with their products being used to kill people so no need to bully them. 2- These other products are so terrible at the task that the clown shoe wearing SecDef is forced to try to bully Anthropic.

It's not either of those. Anthropic put a lot of effort into getting FedRAMP approved so the DOD could use them; they are now being punished for that, and the government at present has no other good options. Other options could of course be developed, but other vendors may question how unreliable and untrustworthy the current DOD leadership is as as customer.

Seems like Microsoft/OpenAI [0] and Google [1] both have FedRAMP approval.

[0] https://devblogs.microsoft.com/azuregov/azure-openai-fedramp...

[1] https://cloud.google.com/blog/topics/public-sector/gemini-in...

Re: The Pentagon is making a mistake by threatening Anthropic

#153

Post by wat10000 »

y-c-o-m-b wrote: post #118

My belief is they are terrified of China and this seems evident when you take into account the moves they're making with Venezuela, Iran, and the increased adoption of authoritarian tactics. We're trying to play catch-up with China's rapid rise as a super-power and the AI infrastructure is one of the few major developments we still have control over, for now. I sympathize with Dario, he's stuck in a very bad position…

If they were terrified of China, they wouldn't be working so hard to alienate so many allies who would naturally be on our side. They're just bullies trying to win approval by looking tough.

Re: The Pentagon is making a mistake by threatening Anthropic

#154

Post by zzzeek »

b112 wrote: post #107
dpkirchner wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is no such thing. That's a fantasy term used by deluded people to signal a particular virtue.

I keep seeing DOW everywhere, and honestly had no idea it wasn't a legal namechange yet (or ever). There's even a webpage for it. So cut the guy some slack. No one knows wtf is actually going on these days.

pretty sure the Constitution doesn't say anything about "make a webpage" as some secret way for the Executive branch to overrule Congress

are you aware of how inept and corrupt the current Executive branch is ?

Re: The Pentagon is making a mistake by threatening Anthropic

#155

Post by viccis »

FrustratedMonky wrote: post #133
dylan604 wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That seems quite optimistic. Or am I just that pessimistic?

No, you are not overly pessimistic. Trump was impeached before and nothing happened. He can continue to ignore congress. I wouldn't be surprised if at this point he abolishes congress, and even jokes at a press conference saying "I am the Senate".

He was impeached by the House but that does nothing without the Senate carrying out its trial, which requires an onerous 2/3rds vote. Obviously without the trial in Senate, nothing happens, and nothing ever will until one party gets 2/3rds control.

Re: The Pentagon is making a mistake by threatening Anthropic

#156

Post by zzzeek »

pavlov wrote: post #128
bhelkey wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is this sarcasm? The US held elections during World War II [1]. [1] https://www.britannica.com/event/United-States-presidential-...

The US President in 1944 was someone who wanted to have elections. In 2026 this is not the case anymore. How much of a difference it makes, nobody knows.

turns out lots of people "know" that the president has no say in the affairs of US states running elections

Re: The Pentagon is making a mistake by threatening Anthropic

#157

Post by Drupon »

wat10000 wrote: post #148
pavlov wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The US President in 1944 was someone who wanted to have elections. In 2026 this is not the case anymore. How much of a difference it makes, nobody knows.

Elections won't be canceled. They're too important for the perception of legitimacy. Virtually every country on Earth now has elections. Russia, China, even North Korea has elections. The modern playbook isn't to abolish elections, it's a combination of blocking opposition candidates, suppressing votes, intimidating voters, and lying about the results. That's what to watch for.

It's fairly easy to abuse a state of exception to cancel elections. Ukraine has done it, and it's been, along with banning opposition parties and attempting to imprison critics (Arestovych, etc.), a critical step in their government consolidating power.

Re: The Pentagon is making a mistake by threatening Anthropic

#158

Post by pavlov »

zzzeek wrote: post #156
pavlov wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The US President in 1944 was someone who wanted to have elections. In 2026 this is not the case anymore. How much of a difference it makes, nobody knows.

turns out lots of people "know" that the president has no say in the affairs of US states running elections

What are the states going to do with their local election results when the officials in Washington ignore them due to some manufactured state of emergency?

He already tried to get specific states' election outcomes discarded from the count on Jan 6, 2021.

Re: The Pentagon is making a mistake by threatening Anthropic

#159

Post by blibble »

delichon wrote: post #11

Anthropic has an excellent balance sheet. It basically has fuck you money that would let it walk away from the federal trough without existential risk. And hopefully extra dollars from users like me could compensate and then some in the fullness of time.

don't look at the profit and loss though

Re: The Pentagon is making a mistake by threatening Anthropic

#160

Post by kgwxd »

y-c-o-m-b wrote: post #118

My belief is they are terrified of China and this seems evident when you take into account the moves they're making with Venezuela, Iran, and the increased adoption of authoritarian tactics. We're trying to play catch-up with China's rapid rise as a super-power and the AI infrastructure is one of the few major developments we still have control over, for now. I sympathize with Dario, he's stuck in a very bad position…

MACBCMAC doesn't roll off the tongue as well as MAGA I guess. If we're going to make America just like China, to get ahead of China, so they can't make us China, I fail to see where American citizens would even notice the difference.
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