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Beto O'Rourke's membership in America's oldest hacking group

reuters.com

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Re: Beto O'Rourke's membership in America's oldest hacking group

#241

Post by michaelt »

txcwpalpha wrote: post #127
save_ferris wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From the article: Still, it’s unclear whether the United States is ready for a presidential contender who, as a teenager, stole long-distance phone service for his dial-up modem, wrote a murder fantasy in which the narrator drives over children on the street, and mused about a society without money. This doesn't read as very pro-Beto to me.

A single sentence in an otherwise glamorizing and embellishing article does not a anti-Beto piece make. That sentence doesn't even read as not pro-Beto to me, either. It's more of a neutral "this guy is really cool, but is he cool enough?" rhetorical.

"wrote a murder fantasy in which the narrator drives over children on the street" doesn't sound particularly pro-Beto to me?

Re: Beto O'Rourke's membership in America's oldest hacking group

#242

Post by philwelch »

antibland wrote: post #198

Beto has taken more donations from oil and gas companies than any other Democrat. The only politician who's taken more is Republican Ted Cruz. His vagueness on many issues is partly due to how beholden he is to his donors.

Corporations don't directly give money to candidates. Beto has taken donations from employees of oil and gas companies.

Re: Beto O'Rourke's membership in America's oldest hacking group

#243

Post by dragonwriter »

edaemon wrote: post #131
malvosenior wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree the piece isn't very informative and is very scattered. That being said, this is definitely the most questionable thing: > "When he was younger, he was arrested on drunk-driving charges" That will follow him into the campaign far more than his CDC membership.

That will certainly be brought up in the campaign, but it was brought up in his House races and the Senate race and didn't seem to have much of an impact.

> That will certainly be brought up in the campaign, but it was brought up in his House races and the Senate race and didn't seem to have much of an impact.

A very actively contested Presidential primary isn't the same thing as a House or Senate race, and he didn't win the Senate race, either.

Re: Beto O'Rourke's membership in America's oldest hacking group

#244

Post by sctb »

pastor_elm wrote: post #192
spinach wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Uncomfortable truth is uncomfortable. White males are responsible for more mass shootings than any other in America, and down-voting isn't going to make it untrue.

downvoters probably believe they're isolated incidents of mental illness.

Putting words in “downvoters” mouths is a rhetorical move quite below the standards of this site, no matter what kind of bleak subthread we're in. The guidelines ask us not to do it—please don't.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Re: Beto O'Rourke's membership in America's oldest hacking group

#245

Post by nostromo »

paulgb wrote: post #173
dexen wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Somebody is still running Beto's campaign to the old (Clinton/Bush era) standard of use the media to build up brand and brand . Meanwhile there is a crop of new-style politicians, all over the spectrum, that run via the new (AOC/Trump era) standard of use the social media+memes to build up brand and support .

I don't think their style is as new as it appears. Yes, they are more active on social media, but most Americans are not on Twitter directly; there is a whole genre of news story now that revolve around things politicians say on Twitter. AOC didn't really have a national brand until after she won, and she got there mostly through traditional retail politics. Trump had a media brand to begin with so he was able to cre…

The difference is that AOC/Trump use social media to drive the news, bottom up.

Old-school politicians use the news to try and drive social media and public sentiment, top down.

Right now Beto seems a lot like Hillary, using the traditional approach of PR driven puff pieces to try and capture attention. Meanwhile the AOC/Trump populists use a direct channel (Twitter) to bypass the media and have a conversation directly with their hardcore fans. And then that conversation works its way out into the mainstream media.

Re: Beto O'Rourke's membership in America's oldest hacking group

#247

Post by philwelch »

Brakenshire wrote: post #71
Fej wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's in the UK. Such a law would run afoul of the First Amendment in the US.

Do texts that contain bomb-making information really fall under the first amendment in the US?

"Imminent lawless action" is the current constitutional standard.

Re: Beto O'Rourke's membership in America's oldest hacking group

#248

Post by romwell »

usefulcat wrote: post #178
sophacles wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's another side of that "hacking was a bit of a problem in 2016" - namely that tech savvy politicians are in short supply[1]. Associating Beto with a well known hacker group boosts his credibility wrt tech. [1] particularly when combined with tonedeaf and heavy handed legislation/regulation about the internet.

Only among people (as here) who have much greater than average tech knowledge, and probably a far more nuanced understanding of the various possible meanings of "hacker". Elsewhere, the words "hacker" and "hacking" have an almost universally negative connotation.

>Only among people (as here) who have much greater than average tech knowledge

Which might be the whole point of this piece:

>But the political balance allows him to appeal to both main strands of political thought in Silicon Valley – a key source of campaign money and cultural influence.

Re: Beto O'Rourke's membership in America's oldest hacking group

#249

Post by romwell »

michaelt wrote: post #241
txcwpalpha wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A single sentence in an otherwise glamorizing and embellishing article does not a anti-Beto piece make. That sentence doesn't even read as not pro-Beto to me, either. It's more of a neutral "this guy is really cool, but is he cool enough?" rhetorical.

"wrote a murder fantasy in which the narrator drives over children on the street" doesn't sound particularly pro-Beto to me?

"Wrote a fantasy-novel equivalent of GTA", how about that?

Re: Beto O'Rourke's membership in America's oldest hacking group

#250

Post by allemagne »

dragonwriter wrote: post #236
BookmarkSaver wrote: post #235

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He was almost a victorious Senate candidate in Texas, and it's no coincidence that the other person with the most was his opponent. Context matters.

> He was almost a victorious Senate candidate in Texas “He needed the fossil fuel money in order to almost (but still not) win his one campaign for statewide office” is probably not a defense the O'Rourke camp would be well served by when the issue, inevitably, arises.

To be clear, we are talking about donations from employees of the fossil fuel industry, who are just as much citizens and constituents as anyone else.

When I donate to political campaigns as a private citizen who happens to be employed by a software company it does not suddenly make the campaign I donated to a shill for tech companies.

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