I find it wild that apparently there is no law onto which government workers can cling to refuse these requests. Is it all just based on conventions, goodwill and culture?
That is the definition of an unelected bureaucrat
DOGE has 'god mode' access to government data
701–710 of 1001 posts
Re: DOGE has 'god mode' access to government data
#702My two cents. God-mode privilege already existed before DOGE, someone else had (or still has) this privilege. Priority - How to limit power of such privilege in future.
Yes, and the chances of that person being technically smarter than the DOGE is close to zero.
Re: DOGE has 'god mode' access to government data
#703Earlier quoted context omitted.
The "I don't mind, I have nothing to hide" people are cheering this on. They don't know or care about any of the things you just said.
Do you have cause to believe "nothing to hide" is a partisan position? I'd expect that half of such people are on the left and are critical by default of the new administration. Seems to be supported by the second chart here: https://www.pewresearch.org/internet/2023/10/18/how-american...
It’s a position held by extremists on both sides and the natural ally of extermists, the lazy.
Re: DOGE has 'god mode' access to government data
#704Setting politics aside for a moment, I find it fascinating that an audit of this scale is taking place within the government. Has there ever been a historical precedent where an external agency thoroughly reviewed all departments, published its findings for the public, and then based decisions on that analysis? Is it really possible to root out governmental fraud using this approach? Fraud and theft exist at every le…
It's already been a thing for quite some time: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Office_of_Inspector_General_(U... They are independent of the things they review, they find inefficiency, overspending, fraud, and embezzlement. They make their reports public and work with transparency. There are also other similar departments like CIGIE. There have been very substantial results. What DOGE is doing is not finding inefficien…
We are 35 trillion dollars in debt - we are broke. We have go cut costs if we want to avoid catastrophe in the medium term.
Re: DOGE has 'god mode' access to government data
#705I find it wild that apparently there is no law onto which government workers can cling to refuse these requests. Is it all just based on conventions, goodwill and culture?
The enforcement of these laws should be a function of the executive. There are ways for the supreme court or congress to intervene when the executive isn't doing their job. Sadly that requires them to believe a series of checks and balances is necessary. Given that it is down to the voters, and they thought a racist, rapist, conman should be president giving them the power of the executive - which has been growing in…
> [voters want STRONG MAN] which has been growing increasingly powerful for my adult lifetime.
Political scientist Robert D Putnam suggests that this is in part due to the culture fragmenting and isolating.
Watch 10m video https://youtu.be/5cVSR8MSJvw?si=5NxRUnYENhfzTbXe easy interview with him from recently on that. Interesting.
Re: DOGE has 'god mode' access to government data
#706If you think this data won’t be used to disenfranchise and target democratic voters and give the GOP perpetual rule, I have a bridge to sell you.
“Oh no! Big mistake we cancelled hundreds of thousands of people from voting just before the election! It just happens to be 99.9% Democrats in swing states who all happen to be marked as dead in all government systems!”
It will be similar to Cambridge Analytica - with all the US Government’s data on one side, this is a massive advantage for targeting even without direct cheating.
Re: DOGE has 'god mode' access to government data
#707Earlier quoted context omitted.
An audit only needs read access, not God mode. It should be conducted by a neutral third party, not someone on a witch hunt who has conflicts of interest. The people on the ground should have auditing qualifications, clear background checks, and knowledge of specific systems or processes, not a random 19-year-old named "Big Balls" with a history of selling company secrets to a competitor. Their findings should go thr…
Ah, so more bureaucracy, bureaucracy, bureaucracy.
Yes. Democracy's intent is not efficiency. It is to provide a rule of law that is fair enough for most citizens. All other forms of rule are worse. As soon as you have 'efficient government', you no longer have democracy. But something worse.
Re: DOGE has 'god mode' access to government data
#708Earlier quoted context omitted.
Democracy is held together by people willing to follow the rules. In Trump's first administration they realized the trick is to just move so fast that you flood the system and can do whatever you want before anyone sees through all the noise or has a chance to stop you. Steve Bannon was interviewed on camera saying as much.
Here's Bannon's quote verbatim -- "I said, all we have to do is flood the zone. Every day we hit them with three things. They’ll bite on one, and we’ll get all of our stuff done, bang, bang, bang. These guys will never—will never be able to recover. But we’ve got to start with muzzle velocity."
Smells like traitor meat.
Re: DOGE has 'god mode' access to government data
#709This should be very illegal. It’s a huge security risk to let Federal government employees access Federal government systems.
Re: DOGE has 'god mode' access to government data
#710Because 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...
You don’t think they have ill intent? Really? They have made it abundantly clear how much joy they get out of slashing services for everyday citizens, cutting jobs, and outright harassing federal workers. They are full of malicious intent for the people they view as the enemy.