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That Secret Service SIM farm story is bogus

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Re: That Secret Service SIM farm story is bogus

#411

Post by 0xDEAFBEAD »

ceejayoz wrote: post #405
0xDEAFBEAD wrote: post #396

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yep. Imagine I punch you. You say: "Don't punch me". I punch you again. Then you punch me back. I say: "Aren't you being hypocritical? I thought you were against punching." The path forward at this point is for the left to admit they made a mistake, apologize, and work to negotiate a new set of ground rules.

Punch: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McCarthyism Punch: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teletubbies#Tinky_Winky_contro... Punch: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dixie_Chicks_comments_on_Georg... Punch: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_fries Punch: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U.S._national_anthem_kneeling_... Punch: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sin%C3%A9ad_O%27Connor_on_Satu... But sure, the left invented it.

It's not about who "invented" it. It's about who started the most recent round.

We had a big discussion about cancel culture just a few years ago, where the left responded to complaints about it by saying: "cancel culture doesn't exist", "freedom of speech doesn't mean freedom from consequences", "free speech isn't hate speech", "you're just saying that because you're a racist/sexist/etc."

In other words: "Our ideology justifies large-scale, systematic application of public shaming for mild noncompliance with our ideology. We aren't going to stop doing this."

A lot of prominent left-wingers simply lack the moral authority to complain. What goes around comes around.

If you, specifically, were complaining about left-wing cancel culture, I'll grant you have the moral authority to complain about right-wing cancel culture as well.

Re: That Secret Service SIM farm story is bogus

#412

Post by viggity »

ceejayoz wrote: post #213
viggity wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

Except people are often being fired for quoting Charlie Kirk verbatim . The First Amendment doesn't apply to only citizens.

Does the second amendment apply to non-citizens?

I'm against the government jailing a visa holder for their speech, but revoking their visa is not jail.

Re: That Secret Service SIM farm story is bogus

#413

Post by istjohn »

stocksinsmocks wrote: post #351
CommieBobDole wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd like to point out that the student's advice, "of course the news is ridiculous propaganda, just ignore it and go about your life and focus on your friends and family" is the the response desired by the authoritarian Chinese government who has carefully engineered the situation in the first place. The purpose of constantly publishing obvious lies is not for people to believe them (though some always will), it's to…

Regarding the good economy = apathy, my conclusion is the opposite. I think our good economy is the reason a significant portion of the US population with overwhelming outgroup preference exists at all. As quality of life deteriorates I think that behavior will be selected out and those remaining will get back to the basics of tribe survival. I think it is the fundamental fallacy of the modern socialist that if thing…

You're strawmaning the socialist view. The stealman version is that people who are feeling economic pain are more likely to want to do something about it, and may be primed to develop class consciousness and become politically mobilized. Socialists generally consider material conditions to be more important than identitarian concerns, which in their view, are often used as a wedge to divide working class people who might otherwise be united by their common economic interests. They don't think poor people are somehow magically less likely to be bigots.

Re: That Secret Service SIM farm story is bogus

#414

Post by thomastjeffery »

philwelch wrote: post #259
bongodongobob wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And yet people are getting fired over making comments about Charlie Kirk on social media.

There’s something hypocritical about a person who thinks it’s an injustice for them to be fired for expressing their opinions, when that opinion is that they are glad Charlie Kirk was murdered for expressing his opinions. Karl Popper said, “But we should claim the right to suppress them if necessary even by force; for it may easily turn out that they are not prepared to meet us on the level of rational argument, but…

> when that opinion is that they are glad Charlie Kirk was murdered for expressing his opinions.

You are conflating the expression of an opinion with the opinion itself.

Generally, the point people are getting fired for making is that the very circumstances of Charlie Kirk's murder are precisely the circumstances he advocated for. I don't find it hypocritical to draw attention to that irony. I do, however, find it hypocritical to fire someone for expressing dissent about the opinions of a man who literally became famous for directly asking random people in public to enter into arguments with him.

Re: That Secret Service SIM farm story is bogus

#415

Post by dang »

JdeBP wrote: post #2

The https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45345514 discussion has indeed raised all of the same points.

Thanks! Macroexpanded:

Cache of devices capable of crashing cell network is found in NYC - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45345514 - Sept 2025 (283 comments)

I'll put that link in the top text too.

Re: That Secret Service SIM farm story is bogus

#416

Post by ceejayoz »

0xDEAFBEAD wrote: post #411
ceejayoz wrote: post #405

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Punch: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McCarthyism Punch: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teletubbies#Tinky_Winky_contro... Punch: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dixie_Chicks_comments_on_Georg... Punch: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_fries Punch: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U.S._national_anthem_kneeling_... Punch: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sin%C3%A9ad_O%27Connor_on_Satu... But sure, the left invented it.

It's not about who "invented" it. It's about who started the most recent round. We had a big discussion about cancel culture just a few years ago, where the left responded to complaints about it by saying: "cancel culture doesn't exist", "freedom of speech doesn't mean freedom from consequences", "free speech isn't hate speech", "you're just saying that because you're a racist/sexist/etc." In other words: "Our ideolo…

> It's not about who "invented" it. It's about who started the most recent round.

Starting when? Several of the examples are quite recent; there's no point in my life where people of both political persuasions weren't boycotting or criticizing things.

> freedom of speech doesn't mean freedom from consequences

This remains entirely true. The First Amendment protects us from government-applied consequences. Being fired for being an asshole by a private employer has always been kosher. Being fired because the FCC threatens your employer with revocation of their broadcast licenses over protected speech has not.

Re: That Secret Service SIM farm story is bogus

#417

Post by cryptoegorophy »

If this is not a red flag to stop reading the news I don’t know what else is. If you know a little about SIM card industry, calls, spam sms, verification farms then you can clearly tell that this is that kind of farm and seeing that news you start to question all other spoonfed news.

Re: That Secret Service SIM farm story is bogus

#418

Post by f33d5173 »

levocardia wrote: post #379
gaoshan wrote: post #262

There is so much to address in this post but I want to look at just this part: "One of the reasons we know this story is bogus is because of the New York Times story which cites anonymous officials, “speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss an ongoing investigation”. That’s not a thing, that’s not a valid reason to grant anonymity under normal journalistic principles. It’s the “Washington Game” of “official…

Came here to post this. Haven't we learned many times in the last 5 years that, on average, "The Literal New York Times" is a better and more reliable source than "Some Guy on Substack"? Claiming that anonymous sources inside an agency/administration is "not a thing" clearly betrays the fact that this person knows nothing about actual journalism. Heck even a casual NYT reader will know that they cite anonymous source…

News is a good source for facts. If they say the sky is blue, I would have no reason to doubt them. But if they say the sky is turning from blue to pink, and we should all be worried because this might be a sign of the end times, I wouldn't get up from my chair.

I found the focus on the source being anonymous odd as well. I think the correct lesson is that substacks have just as much propensity towards being propaganda as the nyt does.

Re: That Secret Service SIM farm story is bogus

#419

Post by kmoser »

0xDEAFBEAD wrote: post #402
aedocw wrote: post #240

There is a lawyer (Alec Karakatsanis) who has been writing about police driven propaganda for years. His recent book "Copaganda" is fantastic. He carefully breaks down how major papers (NYT is chief among them) create stories that fit a narrative by using very one-sided sources. Like an article on crime written in bad faith where the only people quotes are police, police consultants, and ex-police. It's a really good…

Who else would you have the journalists talk to, in order to get the other side of the story? Criminals?

Who better to talk to about crimes than those who commit those very crimes?
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