661–670 of 1001 posts
This is a coup and we are calmly debating budgets. Debating the % of budget and how useful organization x is and if y will still get grant money, and, and, and... All of this is ignoring the big elephant in the room that there is one single person deciding everything that happens in government as if they were a king. The right thing to be debating is how we can stop this from continuing and how we can hold those resp…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> The thing about democracy is, every person is going to sometimes wildly disagree with what the elected officials do. Declaring it a 'coup' is as silly as [...] The reason people are calling this a coup is not (only) because they disagree with what Trump/Musk are doing, but because their actions are illegal. A president is still expected to follow the rule of law and respect separation of powers. If there are no mor…
Who says they are illegal? Can you cite some sources please? Like actual legal experts, not the guardian. As far as I know, the chevron deference ruling makes it easily arguable that these agencies don't necessarily have any legal standing anyway. The 8 month buyout was completely legal, Clinton did the same. I actually find it highly unlikely any of this is illegal, it's just completely unbearable to anyone who is p…
Shutting down an agency like USAID require congressional approval, but was done by executive order.
Withholding congressionally approved funding for government agencies is illegal.
Sharing sensitive documents from the fiscal service with (Doge) team members who do not have the appropriate security clearances is illegal.
Giving Elon Musk an unofficial seat and allowing him unfettered access to the entire federal government without any congressional confirmation is illegal and basically amounts to setting up a shadow government.
The list goes on...
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> The thing about democracy is, every person is going to sometimes wildly disagree with what the elected officials do. Declaring it a 'coup' is as silly as [...] The reason people are calling this a coup is not (only) because they disagree with what Trump/Musk are doing, but because their actions are illegal. A president is still expected to follow the rule of law and respect separation of powers. If there are no mor…
Who says they are illegal? Can you cite some sources please? Like actual legal experts, not the guardian. As far as I know, the chevron deference ruling makes it easily arguable that these agencies don't necessarily have any legal standing anyway. The 8 month buyout was completely legal, Clinton did the same. I actually find it highly unlikely any of this is illegal, it's just completely unbearable to anyone who is p…
[flagged]
I just flag these posts because I know the top N comments are going to be just outrage with no substance. Which is mindless and boring.
An outcome could be a greater diversity of voices influencing research, rather than the NSF and NIH continuing to serve as monoliths.
The NIH is the dominant force in medical research. Remember how theories for Alzheimer’s having an infectious etiology were sidelined for decades? And, to this day, for autoimmune conditions?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I have a suggestion - at least one of several, which is to understand why we got here. The fact that this is escalating since cable TV, Murdoch, and the internet is not a coincidences. Democracies globally are facing a similar problem, which is an abuse of a core democractic principle: Free speech. Free speech is often valued in and of itself. However, free speech in itself is only a tool that serves a greater purpos…
The problem is, in America, both magnets pull to the right. We have a far right republican party and a center right democratic party. There is no leftwing party to provide balance. There’s not a single democrat who would be considered a leftist outside America.
Also - this used to be hacker news. As in who gives a shit about what is, its about what needs to change.
Think of it this way - this is just a puzzle that needs to be cracked. Take it as a job application problem, and see how it can be dissected over the weekend.
Come up with some theories, then go see if you can disprove them.
Fixing anything, comes from defining the right problem anyway.
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I don't think you can call a democratically elected president doing what he promised to do a coup.
So first he lied about Project 2025 and then, "whatever the president does is democratic" is just an obvious sophism, no democracy works like that. Democraties work with checks and balances, which are being broken right now. On a final note, historically a lot of coup came from elected presidents
I didn't claim everything he does is democratic. I claimed that what he is doing is as promised to voters. Don't take my word for it. He is now at the highest approval rating he has ever had in office (https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/polls/favorability/dona...). People obviously feel he is delivering what he promised.
I don't think any checks and balances are being broken. Trump and the Republicans won the popular vote (which is kind of insane in an of itself), the Electoral College, the House, and the Senate. They have an unprecedented mandate to carry out unprecedented change by voters who were obviously VERY unhappy with the Democrat Party.
> On a final note, historically a lot of coup came from elected presidents
I can't fathom what you're trying to argue with this. That we should stop elections because the people might elect an authoritarian?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
There’s not that many jobs going in academia in other countries, and you’ll be looking at a significant pay cut due to the strong US dollar. Most likely, people who leave academia will be leaving for industry instead. I do feel for those in the hard sciences, they have become collateral damage in what is mostly a battle between politicians and humanities departments.
I've been suspicious that the quality of life cut is distinct from the pay cut. Living in a dense European city, you do not need a car, healthcare is free, and you are generally afforded more time off and a stricter wlb compromise compared to the US. One doesn't need to eat takeout as often if there is time to cook. Depending on the country, rent/housing costs are more or less under control. On the other hand swiss/N…
You do need a car if you care about personal safety. A lot of the public transport network in many big cities are not safe for women anymore.
>healthcare is free
Can we stop with this lie that healthcare is free in the EU? It is not. You pay for it through your taxes and those taxes are downright confiscatory.
> Depending on the country, rent/housing costs are more or less under control.
There is an ongoing housing crisis in many European countries so I am not sure how you can say that housing costs are under control.
This hurts, but it also presents an opportunity for rebuilding. An outcome could be a greater diversity of voices influencing research, rather than the NSF and NIH continuing to serve as monoliths. The NIH is the dominant force in medical research. Remember how theories for Alzheimer’s having an infectious etiology were sidelined for decades? And, to this day, for autoimmune conditions?
This is a coup and we are calmly debating budgets. Debating the % of budget and how useful organization x is and if y will still get grant money, and, and, and... All of this is ignoring the big elephant in the room that there is one single person deciding everything that happens in government as if they were a king. The right thing to be debating is how we can stop this from continuing and how we can hold those resp…
As far as I can tell, Trump is doing things he openly announced he would do for at least a year. So all of this is either a result of robust public support for his policies, or, (my preferred explanation) an even more robust public repudiation of the only alternative that was put forward by the other party, a candidate famous for dropping out before Iowa in 2020 but somehow was coronated the nominee without any voter…
> You don't win by insulting, by dunking on the other guys on ~Twitter~ bluesky
The guy who won did exactly all that
And what on earth did Trump do to convince the “reasonable middle” that he shares their values?
Who are these reasonable people who decide that Kamala spends too much time insulting people, so they’re better off voting for Donald Trump?