681–690 of 1001 posts
What's Elon's beef with USAID? I would think he would go after something like food stamps first owing to his libertarian ethos. Maybe he sees USAID as a completely benevolent handout and a waste of money? I cannot begin to understand why.
‘Libertarian ethos’. The guy who’s hoovering up personal data on behalf of a guy who just claimed to be king, that one? Like, how are we defining ‘libertarian’ here?
/ ˌlɪbəˈtɛərɪən /
noun
1) an idiotEarlier quoted context omitted.
They aren’t auditing or thoroughly reviewing shit. They're stealing the data and then waving their hands about non-existent crimes and nickel and dime levels of misappropriated or weird spending.
I understand you're frustrated because of who and what. Do you have any direct evidence they are stealing data? I see a lot of these responses that are emotional but at a factual basis it doesn't appear that way. Just as raw un restricted read/write access is constantly alleged, but we have in turn found out that isn't the case. I really think we're getting to a point where people are too hyper emotional and sensatio…
> I really think we're getting to a point where people are too hyper emotional and sensational about most topics which further limits real discussion and response.
Maybe, but this has nothing to do with emotion. I'm not a moron. An actual audit would be great, but would take more than the 30 days that Trump has been in office. They are lying, so I am left to speculate as to what.
> This time someone is.
Do you have any direct evidence they are doing something about it? I see several people supporting these actions that are based on emotion, but at a factual basis, it appears you are just regurgitating party propaganda.
Because there are bigger fish to fry, I think people don’t appreciate the sheer cost of the system rebuild that will be required for security reasons later. There’s absolutely no telling what additional software has been installed alongside existing, or which systems have been modified that would require audit. Purging this will be an absolute fucking nightmare to the American taxpayer. This may turn into one of the…
Yes. Even if DOGE is operating without any ill intent, and I don't think they have ill intent, the possibility of errors alone is massive and they need to slow down. https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2025/02/17/trum...
Perhaps you could read their statements? DOGE communications are filled with ill intent, and their publicly stated goal, and the goal for which their supports seem to support them, is the destruction of the bureaucracy. That's ill intent.
That's before we look at their actions.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Idk about the US, but the 'government' fraud that I know of, does not show up in the tax office records or in the foreign aid accounts. The common thing is that civil servants/officials are bribed. At usually on the cheap too, so it'll take a lot of digging to find it, and worse, prove it. But, this kind of corruption is probably even more widespread among companies. If you want to exact justice, that's the place to…
>The common thing is that civil servants/officials are bribed. At usually on the cheap too, so it'll take a lot of digging to find it, and worse, prove it. While no doubt that brazen bribery occurs at all levels and in a large range of dollar amounts, I do not think this is such a serious problem that it requires the nuclear option he is employing. There is a bribery-adjacent phenomenon that is far worse. I don't kno…
At my first gig, I had "god" level access to our production database. All I learned is that nobody should have this level of access unless it is some sort of temporary break glass situation. It is extremely dangerous and even experienced engineers can cause irreparable data loss or some other bad outcome. In our case, some engineer accidentally sent around 10,000 invoices to customers that shouldn't have gotten them.…
I loathe working places where they just give you all the permissions because it's "easier". One risk is if something does happen, and they don't have exceptional tracing and logging, (and let's be honest, at an organization sloppy enough to hand out privileges like candy, what's the chance of that?) it's difficult or impossible to pin down the source to any individual. As a result, both responsibility and suspicion i…
Because there are bigger fish to fry, I think people don’t appreciate the sheer cost of the system rebuild that will be required for security reasons later. There’s absolutely no telling what additional software has been installed alongside existing, or which systems have been modified that would require audit. Purging this will be an absolute fucking nightmare to the American taxpayer. This may turn into one of the…
This kind of thinking is what leads to zero progress. Also I think most people will be surprised how unless a lot of the data is compared to private sector data. I.e, in 2017 Equifax leaked data on 150 million people and no one cared (you get a free 6month credit check). That data went to foreign governments and private databases and it is easy to access on darkweb so real actual scammers and criminals have it. Milli…
The comments here seem mostly against DOGE, but I have seen the waste in these organizations firsthand, and we all pay for it. Musk hopes to cut spending by 10%, but that is only because he is limited in what he can do. A Twitter-style cleanup would at least reduce it by 50%, but it is not feasible. Know that those 10% or 50% directly map to a percentage of your income and lifestyle directly (higher taxes) or indirec…
Perhaps the whole situation will finally convince the "I don't mind, I have nothing to hide" crowd about the need to scrutinize & limit as much as reasonably possible the personal data collection and retention by government and other entities. What good are rules, statutes, checks & balances, passwords and ACLs, if at some point someone you don't like or trust can just come in "as a root" and circumvent everything?