Project 2025 is a radical plan organized by The Heritage Foundation, an extremist political organization in the United States that has gained immense power through subversion of constitutional governance.
Trump repeatedly disavowed any knowledge or alignment with Project 2025 during his campaign.
Tracking Project 2025 does not serve to "hold governments to account," Project 2025 is a dramatic and dangerous attack on American Constitutional governance. Given the President's open deception and the sworn oath of all employees of the US Government to uphold and defend the Constitution, Project 2025 clearly represents an attack on American sovereignty, the betrayal of our allies, and a threat to global stability. Thus, tracking Project 2025 enables an understanding of the extent of implementation of this extremist agenda and facilitates more effective response to future destabilizing events (regardless of one's alignment).
> There are plenty of other places to discuss things considered "off-topic" for HN.
Once such place is the "Culture War" threads in https://www.themotte.org/ - but they do demand more level-headedness than what we typically see here on political submissions on HN (especially involving Trump or Musk).
But the stakes of political issues have always been much higher than of those in software engineering threads. Since long before HN was started. There has never been a time in human history so placid that reading about a python library could be considered more important than the pressing issues of the day.
But I can and do read about the pressing issues of the day through a variety of media, most commonly the Economist, the LA times, and various substacks. On the other hand, I more or less have no other outlets—besides HN—to read about software engineering.
A non-insignificant part of the reason of why I am, and I bet many others too are ambivalent about the events is because of this stuff... Not just on hn or even online, but as a general pattern of behavior..
The right-thinking busybodies who want to make EVERYTHING about politics and the current thing.
Believe me, we know where to find or to talk about politics. There's no shortage of places.
Trying to ram it into a site made for, yes, reading about python libraries just makes me loathe you more. And it's entertaining to watch people I loathe shit bricks, even if I also loathe the other side.
> And it's entertaining to watch people I loathe shit bricks
Which means you do not have a modicum of understanding. Your appalling behavior is to turn it into a stupid culture war.
I don't shit bricks my friend. The people that understand things better than you do are raising the alarm, precisely to get decadent and selfish asses like you to pay attention. For your own good.
You are reminded that democracy is not a fringe issue to be compartmentalized, to be redirected to places for people interested in democracy. Yes, it is in your face as it means that there might be 2 or 3 topics out of 30 about the collapse of the largest democracy.
"I am not political" is exactly what an average Russian answers about even the most simple questions. Democracy does not survive indifference.
And if you don't like that democracy flows through all aspects of society, then enjoy the fake elections. You will never have to think about it. But still you can have a chuckle about those who did.
Nah you are missing my point entirely (where did I say I was apolitical?). The fact that you cannot make a distinction just illustrates my point.
First to clear the misconceptions, (1) I am political, in fact I wish I was less so! I just disagree with you. I hate both parties with passion, (2) democracy has nothing to do with bureaucracy/regulation ratchet. And in any case classical liberalism is more important. I think everything even remotely based on the absurd Wickard decision, from war on drugs to medicare, ought to be abolished, hence I am ambivalent about using grey area methods to wreck agencies, I wish it was done cleaner but that seems impossible, (3) as an average former Russian familiar with its history, I hate nothing more than someone doing things for my own good. Between a thief and a true believer, I'll always choose the thief. Even early vs late Putin is a case in point
Now, the main point. I can read / discuss my political stuff elsewhere.
People like you cannot make a distinction between caring about politics, and making everything about politics. I view you as different in degree only from the ranting lady that got shot during the capitol insurrection.
After reading me some politics, I come here to read about python libraries. Get a life.
You, likely unknowingly, just reinforced what I and others are saying.
The fact that you call this "bureaucracy/regulation ratchet" means that we need more submissions like these on the front page.
I feel sorry for your background, and you have a bit more of an excuse than an average American for having twisted beliefs about personal responsibilities. That system weeds out any people that want to do good. They are ridiculed even or actively worked against. Because no one can be good, and someone who tries is an hypocrite. That stuff is toxic, you choose thieves.
The main point is not about you and your wishes of not confronting reality, because you clearly have a lot of homework to do. As I reminded, democracy is an effort by the people for the people. It should be defended on every platform, in every law, in every school, on every forum. Decadence is for autocracy.
What you are saying is "people who disagree with me are wrong and I need to chase them all over the internet (I hope it's online only!), while they are busy doing unrelated things, and tell them so until they learn"
Imagine someone who is earnestly sure that they did their homework and that it is you who is wrong (e.g an enthusiastic maga supporter) doing this to you, and you'll know exactly how you come across.
And how it makes one feel about whatever you are selling.
> What you are saying is "people who disagree with me are wrong and I need to chase them all over the internet
Nope, I don't say that. The HN people did vote on a topic they found important, and it organically came on top. That means that, yes, there is 1 out of 30 topics on front that you might want to skip because you consider yourself informed. There is no way we are chasing you. Victim play.
The way you react shows how effective the toolbox is of those that are currently dismantling democracy. Don't take it personally, we are all targets. It has costed me personally quite some time and reading to understand how the dynamics work, and how our culture has been prepared to tolerate the nonsense. Victim play ("that transgender hurts me"), disinformation, spreading contradicting messages so media is able and will relay confusing info without putting it in a broader context under the guise of "neutrality" and so that the populace can pick the lie they find most convenient, weeding out dangerous people (experts), sado-populism ("look, that immigrant both steals multiple jobs and simultaneously only collect benefits"), etc.
They depend on you to give consent. You can read the other topics.
It doesn't matter what they voted for, this is not a space for that. It's in the rules. It's there for a reason. As a sidenote, it's funny cause it's the same reason you are alarmed, because someone is disregarding established rules after being voted in.
Anyway, you keep missing the point. You keep giving me political arguments, some I might even agree with. You think that the key difference between you and my example is that you are right and they're wrong. Surprise, so do they! I think there's no difference. You are just like a guy posting Breitbart "revelations" into a knitting reddit. It doesn't matter if some of the knitters happen like them. Please go away.
The installment of kleptocracy was meticulously planned in advance, despite Trump making it look chaotic. He creates chaos, but behind the scenes the plan is implemented, by people that are loyal-to-death MAGA (the procedures selected out anyone with a modicum of honesty). The tech oligarchs vowed obedience to Trump. There has been an endless stream of sane-washing, false balance, getting the right nut jobs in the right places, buying twitter, buying the Supreme Court etc.
With god speed they shook out science and institutions, to ensure critical people are gone. This might remind you something about history, and that might trigger the wrong response from you.
Content on social networks is suppressed, eg pro-Ukraine voices has been silenced for a long time now on Twitter. Then suddenly problems with tags on other social networks. Content disappears. Bezos sinks on his knees to save his enterprises.
It has been an enormous project, with many not knowing they worked for it.
It is not insane to imagine that the most influential forum on tech incubation, the breeding ground, is actively being undermined to reach a political and moral understanding of issues that might result in a counter movement.
There can be a group of some genuinely brainwashed people that take this as their identity, sure, but then still. All it tells is that the social system here is politically exploited. Don't tell me that side would absolutely not do that.
Slightly annoying: on mobile, the navbar displays partially in front of the content "Overall Progress". I tried scrolling up to see the content better and since that's top of the page, it triggers a page refresh.
I will assume this is done with the best intentions, but this has also the potential to mislead many, as
- you should consider the cumulative effects of all measures.
- the individual measures are political messages and cited as such, you have to think what the double speak actually means.
The main objective is to take away governance and resources from the people and hand it to a select few with resources and access.
The "deep state", a professional example of projection. The GOP is indebted to the Kremlin. The heirs of the Soviets have developed very effective and powerful playbooks of public messaging, vastly superior of previous versions of propaganda.
We think someone buried the books and the methods.. Alas, they have been improved.
As the Kremlin is a front of transnational crime networks intertwined with Intelligence they seem to have connected with the oligarchy in the USA. All of the CIA employees got an offer to leave already. Deals? Yes, with autocracy.
The USA is meant to become a Russia, and the GOP is indebted to the Kremlin for methods to get there.
------
Btw, I expect quite some terrorist actions in Europe. There have been some already with proven Russian authorship. At the same time Vance mades clear he wants unfettered access to the European information sphere, to deploy the same tools (firehose of falsehoods, chaos, culture wars, disinformation). The goal is to dismantle the rule based order, as those are a hindrance to international crime, and, a free population might give your own people ideas.
So, good to give an overview but do not miss the forest for the trees. The culture war is a means to and end, not where the troops really are.
Look under Department of Transportation. There are two, 'Require the FAA to "operate more like a business"' and 'Separate the Air Traffic Organization from the FAA.'
It is pretty damning for hacker news to remove this from #1. The largest democracy of the world, the tech magnet of the world, is going down in a coup. This is not a fluke nor a desire for sensationalism.
"But-but the Python library discussion!"
Bullshit. It is our collective behavior. And the choice is to contain, to minimize, to pretend this is just something minor. If we morally could, we would all prefer to ignore it. Democracy doesn't have the concept of passive bystanders. It is by the people, for the people. That means involvement in all aspects of life. This, or it dies.
I don't say it lightly, but HN isn't on the side of democracy. For if it was, its actions would have spoken.
"But I didn't know it was really an event larger than a single incident". No one believes this really.
The largest democracy in the world is India, not the United States of America. The former is an (imperfect) democracy, the latter a representative republic. Neither of the two are 'going down in a coup', the latter just happened to have had an election where the majority of voters decided that the previous periods of "democratic" party rule did not lead to better outcomes for them or for things they cared about. They gave their vote to a group of people - not just a person but a group - who clearly outlined what their plans were should they win the elections. Which they did, and - lo and behold - they actually fulfilled many of the promises they made.
People voted for a group of people who promised to radically reduce the size of the federal state, a promise they seem to be intent on keeping.
They voted for a group of people who promised they'd open up the books on "all the malversations and shady dealings" by previous governments. They have started to fulfil their promise, it remains to be seen how much they can and will dig up.
Calling a government which went to the polls with a set of promises which they, after winning the elections, seem to fulfil is not a coup. It is the political process finally working as intended even if you do not like the outcome. Assuming that you would prefer a "democratic" candidate to win the next time it is time for you and the party you support to align yourselves with the zeitgeist and realise you do not get to shape the future exactly the way you please. That, you see, is also what the word democracy means, it is the people - not you and whatever party you happen to support, if any - who get to decide what to aim for. Though imperfect and often messy this remains the best system of government in times of peace. In times of crisis - war, famine, pestilence, natural catastrophes - it can be more effective to limit the influence of the people but as soon as the crisis is dealt with the 'dictator' (from the Roman Republic, a 'temporary magistrate with extraordinary powers, nominated by one of two consuls on the recommendation of the Senate and confirmed by the popular assembly, only t be used in times of crisis') is supposed to step down [1].
[1] this may be one of the reasons for constantly pushing different crises onto the public
If you still think this is about government efficiency, you better wake up FAST.
Efficiency, sure, good! Why would you ignore the law? Why would you fire left and right, creating crisis after crisis? Why do you want billionaires to run your country? Why do you give tax cuts to the super wealthy?
This all has ++ZERO++ relation to efficiency. On the contrary, it will make problems worse. FAR worse. Shooting down expertise, furthering pandemics by installing a total lunatic (RFK jr): a great way to embezzle money, real world consequences damned. Education, health care, it will be for the few, not you.
I urge you to read the news, because this is not a conspiracy theory. It is nuts, yes, but is also reality. Exactly what this submission tracks.
It is very telling that HN chooses to suppress this. Very telling.
«One of the greatest tricks that Donald Trump and Elon Musk ever pulled is to convince millions of people that DOGE, the self-styled Department of Government Efficiency, is about government efficiency.
DOGE isn’t really a department; it’s not an agency; it has no statutory authority; and it has little to do with saving money, streamlining the bureaucracy, or eliminating waste. It is a name that Trump is allowing a favored donor and ally to use in a reckless campaign against various targets in the federal government. The whole enterprise is an attack against civil servants and the very notion of apolitical expertise.»
«As with Trump’s nominations in other departments, the key factors appear to be loyalty, wealth, and ideological fervor, not competence.»
----
All the DOGE chaos will not even create a dent in the deficit problem of the USA. The ==LAST== thing you should do is to give the billionaires even more tax cuts.
I do follow the news but probably not only the 'news' you're referring to assuming you mean the legacy media. The Atlantic is not what I call news but agitprop, a vehicle for agitational propaganda aimed at driving a narrative. If that is 'the news' you are referring to I understand why you are so agitated and I'd advice you to broaden your horizon beyond these types of sources. Look at the entire spectrum of 'news' organisations from Breitbart/Daily Wire/Daily Caller to WaPo/NYT/The Atlantic/The New Yorker/HuffPo/etc and whatever lies in between to get a more complete view, don't let yourself be used as a tool and keep an open mind for a different view - not so open that your brains fall out but open enough to avoid being duped by the likes of The Atlantic.
Calling "The Atlantic" agitprop while considering Breitbart a valid source of news, ouch.
That raises a point though. An American has to work really hard to get a non-distorted view--not only on the world, but primarily on their own home. Like the Soviets think like the Soviets, so is a large part of America drown in a complete clusterfuck of information distortion.
You think NYT is on the end of a spectrum, but no, they will never deliver that damning analysis. Sure, they might sound critical compared to the Breitbarts, the fox news etc. But they will always stop short before dots are connected, they will not deliver that damning conclusion that threatens their position. America has a problem with free and independent journalism. It has always had that problem of media moguls and oligarchs. And the more we normalize the bad and the stupid, the less you will be able to find the real critic.
You might think people are overreacting, being dramatic. I understand, because we have a tendency to perceive things as normal, and the way press won't deliver you a complete picture. Critical news? Sure! Understanding? That goes to far!
-------------------
So in a strange way you remind me to be a bit compassionate. As I realize this is a hard exercise to do, especially if identity and beliefs have formed in such a toxic environment.
There is not a big chance you are waiting for my advice, but nonetheless I offer it in earnest.
1. Never fall into the trap of binary thinking.
2. Always ask yourself if what you observe is what is normal, good, constructive behavior or something else.
3. Do not excuse bad behavior. The theater, the chaos, the culture war, it is meant to get your permission so that who hides behind the Project can go further.
4. The goal is to make you mentally complicit, to lock you in. They need your consent, because the USA is not as advanced as the Soviet Union in this aspect. Yet! But they have the tech now to accelerate.
5. Realize that the goal is turn the clock back. No social democracy, no worker rights, private ownership of public affairs. This is only possible if you step away.
You do notice that I put Breitbart on one side of the spectrum and The Atlantic (et. al.) on the other side? Both have an agenda. You quoted The Atlantic, twice. I did not - and would not - quote Breitbart because I'm aware of their agenda. If they published something worth discussing I would look for other sources to confirm their statements and add those to the discussion. You just quoted The Atlantic without any verification.
It is not just Americans who need to 'work hard to get a non-distorted view', this is true for any nation on the planet. I am not an American but I do read some American media, this includes the ones I mentioned - from Breitbart to HuffPo/The Atlantic/etc. I also read Swedish and Dutch media as well as German and French and British. All of these show the same pattern, in some cases - Swedish and Dutch media in particular - the variety between different 'legacy' outlets is small and shrinking due to either consolidation (nearly all Dutch newspapers are now owned by DPG Media, a Belgian company) or dependency on state financing (Swedish 'presstöd/mediestöd' is supposed to foster a free press but actually produces the opposite).
"Both have an agenda" What you imply is false balance. You claim neutrality whilst being occupied by extreme right viewpoints, given your rants about so called TDS. Those disinformation outlets are meant to influence you, and they do.
If you want, you can read other papers of people well versed in these topics. Anna Applebaum is a lady that is also well versed in these topics, as is Snyder. But there are not many outlets that do allow for these kind of deeper analysis (no, opinion stuff is not the same as analysis, how much some people want to sell it as such). They have written books as well, but I think they publish on the Atlantic as well.
Your confusion is something understandable, because in a way you are right: the way traditional media work, precisely that is abused by those actors we talk about. And they are absolutely ignorant about that. They give literal quotes, they put them into headlines even. They behave like an amnesia patient, when the Kremlin says "A" it will be put in the newspaper. The next day Peskov says "we never mentioned A, you do", it will be put in the newspaper too. On and on.
This way actors can sow distrust and confusion. Some people will pick headline 1, because it fits their beliefs. Some people will pick headline 2, because it fits their beliefs.
Let the media quote stuff related to culture wars and you can select multiple strata of people with different messages. Clever? Yes. Paralyzing? Yes. Divisive? Yes. Ripping apart society? Yes. Death to truth? Also yes.
Also, do not underestimate the way news organizations do almost completely rely on the feeds of press agencies. The critical filtering, selection, wording and timed release happens there.
The consolidation of media is very worrying indeed, DPG media is gobbling everything up. Till now there is a strict separation of editorial boards and corporate interest, but when that dam breaks we are fucked like those Americans are now. But then still, they would not be able to push too idiotic stuff because the public broadcasters do not report to corporate owners, and the disconnect cannot be too large. They keep the ecosystem accountable.
So, now you might understand why right wing populists attack public broadcasters. Why non-loyal scientists and experts are cleaned out immediately. Due to attacks from the lunatic FVD ("the moon landing is fake") and party-with-one-member PVV the Dutch broadcasting service NOS have to go undercover now to do their reporting.
Americans will not get much chance to know about the mechanics at play, the play book of the new autocrats, as topics like this are even on HN closed right away when hitting #1. This must be minimized, this must be normalized.
If you are pro democracy, these days are dark. Really dark. Trump or those other players in the theater are just a distraction. They do the work, they draw all the attention away from what they try to normalize. What kind of people are in for a world that want to install "might makes right", to end the rule based order where smaller players can be autonomous, both on level of society and the world.
With all things that happen, both small and big, ask yourself if this complies with norms, or requires you to look away. If you do the former, those crazies have a hard time to distract you with transgenders and "aliens".
Could you define 'extreme right' for me? It may surprise you to know that I consistently end up the lower left quadrant, slightly left of center and quite a bit down underneath the X axis of the GAL-TAN test which happens to be the opposite of 'extreme right' which lies on the top right. It would be interesting to hear of your definition of the term 'extreme right' which I suspect is nothing more than a repetition of that term as used in the legacy media and by the "democratic" party and as such not at all related to "traditional" extreme right.
Please give us this definition before I go into the other things you said here, it makes it easier to frame your other points.
> Please give us this definition before I go into the other things you said here, it makes it easier to frame your other points.
You are a text book example of a Sea Lion [ref 1]. You have no honest intention to engage.
-----
For the other people to learn to spot these kind of people, some context:
«The sealioner feigns ignorance and politeness while making relentless demands for answers and evidence (while often ignoring or sidestepping any evidence the target has already presented), under the guise of "just trying to have a debate",[5][6][8][11] so that when the target is eventually provoked into an angry response, the sealioner can act as the aggrieved party, and the target presented as closed-minded and unreasonable.[7][12][13] It has been described as "incessant, bad-faith invitations to engage in debate".[9] Sealioning can be performed by an individual or by a group acting in concert.[14]»
«Rhetorically, sealioning fuses persistent questioning—often about basic information, information easily found elsewhere, or unrelated or tangential points—with a loudly-insisted-upon commitment to reasonable debate. It disguises itself as a sincere attempt to learn and communicate. Sealioning thus works both to exhaust a target's patience, attention, and communicative effort, and to portray the target as unreasonable. While the questions of the "sea lion" may seem innocent, they're intended maliciously and have harmful consequence»
What will follow will be victim play and projection, accusing the other of "not playing by the rules". It will likely end with a claim of victory as people will walk out of a discussion with such a person. Do not engage with this kind of people, they feed on it.
That is an ad-hominem, not a definition of the term as I asked for. Now, please, let's hear what you mean when you call people "extreme right" so we can talk clearly instead of throwing epithets and pasting labels.
Not sure what you're on about (though I have my suspicions), looks like a .observer for a nigh-identical URL is $9.76 initially and on renew on Porkbun:
This is an unpopular opinion, but I think they should fire more feds. The amount of love and support the FBI and IRS is receiving is insulting compared to the tech layoffs that the same feds saw as justified. I know so many brilliant people in tech who were hung out to dry and then bullied even more because the media kept blaming them and condescendingly claimed they were overhired.
Tech workers got fired so FBI/IRS workers should also get fired? What is the logic here? As far as I'm aware the FBI/IRS have nothing whatsoever to do with the tech job market, let alone individual employees.
As far as public sentiment wrt the firings go, it isn't super surprising that people are more upset about government employees getting fired. Big tech is becoming increasingly associated with things people don't like. Ads, toxic social media, gig economy, annoying CEOs (admittedly not the fault of the workers), AI in many cases, scams, pricing people out of cities they grew up in, etc. I think if you randomly selected a federal government employee and a tech worker, there's a much better chance the government employee is doing something more helpful for the average American.
If I get fired tomorrow, my family is sad and some corporate projects get delayed or canceled. When USAID gets defunded, tens of thousands of people don't get their HIV treatments. It's a very different kind of situation.
Tech people being more important is an interesting perspective, considering the cost and lack of value provided, broadly speaking. Tech people believe they are important, but the economic evidence does not prove that out.
I assume this will be more evident as the startup ecosystem continues to die in the current interest rate environment, tech salaries continue to decline, etc.
> I know so many brilliant people in tech who were hung out to dry
Politicians didn't lay off those people, businesses did. If you think they need to be punished, then you boycott them or regulate their behavior. You're taking vengeance on the wrong people while letting the real perpetrator get away.
The problem is feds literally cannot get fired, ever, no matter how poorly a job they do. I know a fed who punched his coworker in the face at work, got nothing but a suspension. There has to be a correction at point.
I agree that reform is needed. That is not what the parent was advocating for, and my comment was a response to the nonsense logic behind their irate desire to see the American government suffer.
You will be disappointed if you demand that federal employees reciprocate the consequences that Silicon Valley workers face. They have job security for much different reasons than a SpaceX or FAANG employee.
