Seems analogous to employees of a missile manufacturer being upset that their missiles were used for their intended purpose.
Except the missiles are being used in a civil war instead of against a foreign adversary.
Palantir employees are starting to wonder if they're the bad guys
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Re: Palantir employees are starting to wonder if they're the bad guys
#272Earlier quoted context omitted.
> How do you reconcile having worked in this capacity mentally? Not being snarky or judgemental, genuinely curious as to the mindset of someone who has been in this position. I don't work at defense contractor, but it would probably help to imagine the situation Ukraine is in. If no one in the West was comfortable working in this capacity, it would all be Russian territory now (and more besides).
Reading this, I was surprised to learn that I now consider the idea of working on old-school conventional weapons almost, like, quaint. What with all the ways our new military/techno-industrial complex is working to automate murder, surveillance and terror at scale ... it makes me nostalgic for that old-fashioned artisanal state-sanctioned murder, made in small batches by real humans.
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Re: Palantir employees are starting to wonder if they're the bad guys
#273Earlier quoted context omitted.
The president isn't empowered to declare war, but as Commander in Chief he is empowered to send the military anywhere he wants and start whatever "conflict" he wants, for whatever reason he wants, including no reason whatsoever. After which Congress can retroactively declare it a war if they so choose. But the US hasn't fought a declared war since WW2, because declarations of war don't really mean anything when the m…
If that’s true, that’s insane. Forgive me, I’m not a PolSci scholar. Nobody in the cabinet can speak up and overrule his whimsy? It always annoys me when the headlines are “Trump invaded this …” or “Trump slapped a tariff on…” while effectively it’s the US government that’s doing that, they are letting him to do as he pleases? Then the fault lies not with him. He’s not a king but surely seems to have absolute discret…
It's not really that insane. Don't overreact to Trump stuff - it leads you to make bad decisions and assumptions.
This archaic and formal "I do declare war upon theee" is not flexible enough for the modern world and so we have found, perhaps an unhappy middle ground where the President can indeed take military action, for a limited period of time (60 days) without congressional authorization. The President is the civilian commander of the military and regardless of whether it is a Democrat or Republican we, like in other cases, give the President the discretion to make these choices. You may not like their exercise of power, but it is legal, Constitutional, and intentional and even if it is Donald Trump (much to my displeasure) we as a society trust him and his office to use this power responsibly and for the good of the American people. Even in the case of Iran and Venezuela, frankly, I think he has used power responsibly (if less effective than it should be) and for the good of the American people. We can't have a nuclear Iran in the Middle East, nor can we or should we accept thugs like Maduro running a country into the ground and causing mass migration to the US and causing problems here and breaking our laws.
There are folks in the cabinet that can take action, or resign, &c., but as the Executive the president selects his cabinet and they serve at his pleasure, once they are confirmed by the Senate. This is true for all presidents and will continue to be so for the foreseeable future.
I think sometimes we forget, these are just people. We give them broad authority and they get to, by virtue of being elected, exercise that power as they see fit though ideally if or when a law is broken we deal with it through the judicial system.
Re: Palantir employees are starting to wonder if they're the bad guys
#274Palantir employees should understand that they are not regular employees at a regular company. They are U.S. defense contractors at an U.S. defense company. Also Palantir customers should understand that by buying Palantir services/products they are doing business with U.S. defense company. I don't say that this is positive or negative, it just clarifies the relationships and it should set the expectations.
It's a U.S. domestic surveillance operation, disguised as a defense contractor. Or really, it's not disguised at all. The company is named after Tolkein's palantíri, so they weren't being shy about it. It's a company that exists solely to exploit a loophole that shouldn't have been upheld, effectively eliminating the fourth amendment.
The way I see it is that sousveillance is the correct response to surveillance.
If people feel threatened by this organization and the people who make it up they should start doing to them what they're doing to everyone else.
Who specifically works at Palantir? What do they look like? Where do they live? What kind of vehicle do they drive? How do they spend their free time? Who do they associate with?
These are all very interesting questions.
Questions that can be answered and answers that can be distributed online, forever.
What's good for the goose is good for the gander.
No secrets.
Re: Palantir employees are starting to wonder if they're the bad guys
#275The title is likely a reference to a sketch: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Are_We_the_Baddies%3F https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ToKcmnrE5oY Although it could be unintentional - the phrase is mainstream now and not hard to produce independently either.
It's clearly intentional, and apt.
Re: Palantir employees are starting to wonder if they're the bad guys
#276Earlier quoted context omitted.
The reasons are very clear: Bibi owns Trump, Israel will unlikely have a US president as supportive again, they want as many facts on the ground as they can get whilst they have him.
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I don't know if Trump could walk and chew bubble gum at the same time, but he sure seems able to screw Ukraine and bomb Iran at the same time. He just finished sending Vance to Hungary to stump for Orban, too. The love affair between far-right authoritarian leaders is not a 2 person relationship.
Re: Palantir employees are starting to wonder if they're the bad guys
#277> ...about working for a company named after J. R. R. Tolkien’s corrupting all-seeing orb. Wasn't the the problem that Sauron had one so he could corrupt the other users through the orb, but the orb itself was not corrupting?
It was, which is why it makes such a perfect analogy. Surveillance has lots of good and bad uses, and is morally neutral itself. Powerful but neutral. The problem comes when the users use it for bad purposes, and in fact it is so tempting that they can't help using it for more and more bad purposes. If every palantir (either one) user was a "good guy" who refused to use it for bad purposes, it would be a potent force…
The palantiri were created by Fëanor. The kinslayer whose pride, rage, and desire for vengeance drove most of his people to their doom. The potential to corrupt was always present in them.
In the LotR, Aragorn bends a palantir to his will and uses it for good with great difficulty. He manages to do that, because he is (in addition to everything else) the trueborn king and the palantiri are his birthright. Denethor, on the other hand, succumbs to corruption. While he is a powerful lord with good intentions, he is only a steward, not a king. The right to use the palantiri is not inherent in his being, because he only wields power in someone else's name.
Re: Palantir employees are starting to wonder if they're the bad guys
#278While I believe it's good that we call it out, there will always be enough people willing to do evil for money. It'll have to be shut down from the outside and that's where our focus should be.
But not competent evil people. For example, most of the Nazis were completely inept, and a great aid to the allies.
Re: Palantir employees are starting to wonder if they're the bad guys
#279yes
Re: Palantir employees are starting to wonder if they're the bad guys
#280If you haven't listened/read it, I think the Ezra Klein interview with Alex Bores (who formerly worked at Palantir) and how he talks about how it was in 2014 vs now. It's also insane that a PAC campaigning against Bores is funded by current Palantir employee Lonsdale. Their critical ads literally criticize him for working for Palantir. https://www.nytimes.com/2026/04/21/opinion/ezra-klein-podcas...
Joe Lonsdale left Palantir in 2009 and moved on to Formation 8 and then 8vc. He was vocally pro-Palantir and used his co-founder status in the press a lot, but was off the board by 2010 and operationally had nothing to do with them since then.