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My Priorities for the Next Four Years

schneier.com

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Re: My Priorities for the Next Four Years

#91

Post by AimHere »

3131s wrote: post #52
AimHere wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One reason for thinking that Trump would be worse is precisely because Hillary and Obama's propaganda machine is good at painting them in a better light. Trump doesn't have to pretend to care about human rights, or war crimes or civil liberties - he outright came out in favour of torture, the killing of innocent people, racial profiling, and said a whole bunch of other heinous things during the campaign. At least wit…

Except that the next Abu Ghraib type scandal has already occurred under Obama many times over, but no one cares anymore. How about the CIA shoving hoses into detainee's rectums and pumping food in as part of so-called rectal 'feeding'? It's rape, plain and simple, and it's lead to rectal prolapse and anal fissure in some of the detainees. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2014/dec/09/cia-report-r...

Sure - bad stuff still happens. It gets found out, some people complain, the people in power modify their behavior (sometimes by not being so evil, sometimes by finding better ways of hiding it - the latter can be useful for at least slowing the bad guys down and making their lives more complicated and difficult).

But we are still in the world where the CIA and the President of the USA can be publicly pressured into not waterboarding people anymore. It's never a cure-all, but there's at least some scope for modifying the behavior of the rulers through public pressure.

That's likely to change on January 21st.

If you want to see what a leader untroubled by public condemnation of lawbreaking is like, you just have to cast your gaze towards the Phillipines, where there's a huge upsurge in state-sanctioned vigilante and police murders. How far Trump takes the USA in that direction is still grounds for speculation.

Re: My Priorities for the Next Four Years

#92

Post by MrZongle2 »

rajangdavis wrote: post #49
aaron-lebo wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

See, I might even be tempted to believe that but he presents it like it's a known thing. Why should we fear a Trump administration more? Why should we fear it so much that it's worth changing our personal focus for the next four years? Doesn't that seem reactionary? If we look at the facts, we know that the Bushes and Clintons are friendly and even share a lot of similar views and the same goes for the Obamas and Cli…

I could be wrong, but I think there is a difference in that with Clinton, there was an expectation of what kind of administration she was going to have. Trump, on the other hand, has been unpredictable since his election (I speak more about his inclusion of Elon Musk into his advisory council as well as Bill Gates comparing him to JFK). I think an administration that is business-minded can yield great economic prospe…

"I think an administration that is business-minded can yield great economic prosperity but might not necessarily have interests in maintaining the rights of American citizens."

I don't think we've seen an administration in the last 25 years that had an interest in maintaining the rights of American citizens.

Re: My Priorities for the Next Four Years

#93

Post by treebeard901 »

MrZongle2 wrote: post #89

Key sentence: "Under a Clinton administration, my list would have looked much the same." I have a lot of respect for Mr. Schneier. But he is fooling himself if he thinks a Clinton administration would be one iota less threatening.

That's exactly the point of the quote... The list would have looked much the same. Or am I missing something?

Re: My Priorities for the Next Four Years

#94

Post by schoen »

idlewords wrote: post #42
karim wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wouldn't read too much into this. People on Hacker News have this pavlovian need to contradict any article they're commenting on. If Schneier was saying the task was too big, you'd have people saying he's giving up too easily.

> People on Hacker News have this pavlovian need to contradict any article they're commenting on. No they don't.

"Look here, this isn't an argument, it's just a contradiction!"

Re: My Priorities for the Next Four Years

#96

Post by rconti »

treebeard901 wrote: post #93
MrZongle2 wrote: post #89

Key sentence: "Under a Clinton administration, my list would have looked much the same." I have a lot of respect for Mr. Schneier. But he is fooling himself if he thinks a Clinton administration would be one iota less threatening.

That's exactly the point of the quote... The list would have looked much the same. Or am I missing something?

Same in content, but less extreme. Which seems like a completely fair assessment, given the cabinet choices so far.

Re: My Priorities for the Next Four Years

#97

Post by schoen »

falcolas wrote: post #54

> we have a defeated majority I take this to mean HRC supporters. It's also important to realize and recognize the pains being endured by the "minority" (I hate that word when it comes to binary politics and the "minority" is only 1-2% smaller than the "majority") that caused them to support Trump in the first place. Failing to do so, or treating them as idiots, is only going to exacerbate the problem. Bruce Schneier…

It might also be more accurate to say "a defeated plurality" (Trump's 46% and Clinton's 48% are both minorities of the electorate).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plurality_(voting)

Re: My Priorities for the Next Four Years

#98

Post by pg314 »

ipunchghosts wrote: post #74
scblock wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This comment makes zero sense.

I will restate my point another way and hopefully it will make sense. The fact that BS was surprised that Trump got elected means in some sense he is not tuned to the issues right in front of him. Scott Adams would say he is living in another reality than half of america (half of america voted for trump). Security is all about prediction. You are most secure when you can predict everyone's movements. Regarding the US…

A small nitpick: a little bit less than half of the voters voted for Trump (63 million people), not half of Americans (which would be 159 million people).

Re: My Priorities for the Next Four Years

#100

Post by greenhatman »

lj3 wrote: post #46
karim wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wouldn't read too much into this. People on Hacker News have this pavlovian need to contradict any article they're commenting on. If Schneier was saying the task was too big, you'd have people saying he's giving up too easily.

I think the negativity comes from the fact that it's hard to watch your heroes fall.

Which heroes? Trump?
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