This weekly roundup thread is intended for all culture war posts. 'Culture war' is vaguely defined, but it basically means controversial issues that fall along set tribal lines. Arguments over culture war issues generate a lot of heat and little light, and few deeply entrenched people ever change their minds. This thread is for voicing opinions and analyzing the state of the discussion while trying to optimize for light over heat.
Optimistically, we think that engaging with people you disagree with is worth your time, and so is being nice! Pessimistically, there are many dynamics that can lead discussions on Culture War topics to become unproductive. There's a human tendency to divide along tribal lines, praising your ingroup and vilifying your outgroup - and if you think you find it easy to criticize your ingroup, then it may be that your outgroup is not who you think it is. Extremists with opposing positions can feed off each other, highlighting each other's worst points to justify their own angry rhetoric, which becomes in turn a new example of bad behavior for the other side to highlight.
We would like to avoid these negative dynamics. Accordingly, we ask that you do not use this thread for waging the Culture War. Examples of waging the Culture War:
-
Shaming.
-
Attempting to 'build consensus' or enforce ideological conformity.
-
Making sweeping generalizations to vilify a group you dislike.
-
Recruiting for a cause.
-
Posting links that could be summarized as 'Boo outgroup!' Basically, if your content is 'Can you believe what Those People did this week?' then you should either refrain from posting, or do some very patient work to contextualize and/or steel-man the relevant viewpoint.
In general, you should argue to understand, not to win. This thread is not territory to be claimed by one group or another; indeed, the aim is to have many different viewpoints represented here. Thus, we also ask that you follow some guidelines:
-
Speak plainly. Avoid sarcasm and mockery. When disagreeing with someone, state your objections explicitly.
-
Be as precise and charitable as you can. Don't paraphrase unflatteringly.
-
Don't imply that someone said something they did not say, even if you think it follows from what they said.
-
Write like everyone is reading and you want them to be included in the discussion.
On an ad hoc basis, the mods will try to compile a list of the best posts/comments from the previous week, posted in Quality Contribution threads and archived at /r/TheThread. You may nominate a comment for this list by clicking on 'report' at the bottom of the post and typing 'Actually a quality contribution' as the report reason.
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
Notes -
Watching the press briefing Trump gave... something in me finally broke.
I don't think it matters what you call Trumpism. I think that we've spent all of this time propping up a broken system with a broken man. I recoiled from the accelerationists who said they were using Trump to break the system because that just seems so destructive and vile, no better than the people who break Starbucks windows.
I thought: maybe he's a good man. Maybe we should give him a chance. And the Democrats are so vile in their baseless slander.
But the Dermocrats didn't make him give that speech on January 6th.
Hillary Clinton should have been jailed and she should still be in jail. There is nothing to be gained however from holding on to a tool that has run out of use.
I mean is there anyone out there who didn't understand why Democrats were in shrill hysterics about fascism? The man like to scare them, and I don't know if I believe that he had so much fun terrorizing the libs (it's so easy and someone has to do it) that he fell into it, or if... well, I just can't go down that road yet.
This criminal wasn't worth all of this divisiveness in our politics. Maybe the divisiveness was already there.
I regret my support for former president Trump and I want him to withdraw from public life. Nixon had the decency to step down when his time was up.
Hillary did something that, if I or anyone else with access to classified information had done, would have landed us in prison under the espionage act. I can forgive a former VP or President for having boxes with classified documents in their garage, locked store room, etc. Those guys live, eat, breath, and shit classified information for 4 to 8 years, the changeover is chaotic and shit slips through.
Actively sending classified information to a personally controlled server and effectively making digital copies of massive amounts of classified, export control, CUI, etc information is the kind of stuff they put people away for decades for. Let alone destroying evidence thereof.
What they are accusing Trump of doing would have netted a fine for the overwhelming majority of people and likely not prosecuted in the first place. Hell all of the charges are beyond the statute of limitations anyway and should be tossed on that alone.
It's not a new risk nor do we lack the resources to handle it cleanly. Why don't they have people making sure it's secure? Trump doesn't need to handle it personally, there are probably a dozen people he could get instructions from or fob them off to his staff.
I can forgive a college student for not having an immaculate room. People with money and people to make things happen correctly don't have that excuse.
Because it's difficult, politically sensitive, and low priority. A few boxes of aging classified information in ex-official's homes is not a big problem. Having people with high-level clearances comb through politician's papers looking for things which shouldn't be there is expensive and more importantly annoys the politicians. And expecting them to do it themselves, or hire appropriately-cleared people to do it, is what we have now.
Can you explain what you mean by difficult or politically sensitive?
I understand that it may not be the most pressing concern, but it still needs to be done. Same with a politician's annoyance, that's an irrelevant factor and they should understand the need to have this done correctly if they care about their country.
Ditto with expense, the US wastes lots of money. How much is it going to cost to have some people on hand to deal with this? Even at 150k salary per person doing it, that seems like peanuts.
I've already explained "politically sensitive"; anything that annoys former high-level politicans is going to be politically sensitive. Whether it should be or not.
By "difficult", it's mostly about getting enough people cleared at a high enough level to comb through this stuff. You can't just call up an army of GS-7 clerks to do it. You need fairly expensive individuals cleared at a high level, who then have to be exposed to a politician's ire for doing their job.
For some not very stringent definition of "need". Classified information moldering away in politician's basements and garages is unlikely to be a significant source of leaks.
And who likely have other functions/jobs to be doing as a function of their high clearance and don't want to be sifting through Politicians' papers for briefs that were of actual political sensitivity for 2 weeks 3 years ago and are yet still legally classified
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
Why are you limiting your criticism to Trump, when Biden was caught doing the exact same thing, and probably the only reason they haven't found anything like that on any of the previous presidents is that they haven't bothered looking?
It was my understanding that Biden returned everything as soon as he realised he had it, while his predecessor refused to return documents upon notification by the National Archives, and repeatedly lied about having more things he wasn't supposed to.
Admittedly, I live in a fairly Blue-tribe circle; is my understanding incorrect?
Its roughly correct-adjacent. But it misses a few very important points, and is a generally irrelevant claim:
Biden had documents in less secure locations (Mar A Lago is a decommissioned SCIF) for longer. It is also worse that the government didn't know Biden had the documents. Also, there were documents classified at SCIF level from Joe's Senate days, which means he illegally removed them from the SCIF, or someone else did and gave them to him. Unlike Mar A Lago, where the documents were there, and never moved until the FBI decided to go gangbusters.
The cooperation line is silly because Biden is, essentially, cooperating with himself, while Trump was negotiating with a hostile DOJ.
More options
Context Copy link
And then they found more.
Which, if I understand correctly, he also returned.
Were there any instances in which Mr. Biden either:
A: Denied possessing classified documents which he knew he possessed,
or
B: Refused to return classified documents which he was informed belonged to the government?
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
Can you just ask me why I'm talking about the specifics before accusing me of being a partisan?
I'm talking about Trump because that's what the conversation is about. I said nothing about whether it is or is not okay for Biden to do the same. Gut reaction, no, it's not okay for him. But at least have the decency to phrase your accusation as a question.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
It's kind of an irrelevant comparison. The average State Dept. worker is not the boss of the entire State Department and can not have done what Clinton did. Clinton purposely implemented a system for transporting classified information outside of proper oversight and security channels. She didn't merely mishandle X number of classified documents; she intentionally ignored protocols in order to ensure that all of her classified communications were mishandled because she wanted to hide them.
To bring it back to the Trump/Biden boxes of documents, a more apt comparison would be if it were discovered that either of the Presidents had established an underground railroad that diverted all Top Secret docs away from the correct filing system and into a secret cave, and when the cave was discovered, all of the documents mysteriously caught fire.
More options
Context Copy link
I don't know about the state department but in the DoD or DoE they absolutely would be looking at jail time. I have seen it happen.
More options
Context Copy link
https://www.burnhamgorokhov.com/penalties-of-mishandling-classified-documents-in-the-united-states/
For the average person with access to classified information they would absolutely face prison time, and additional time for every count.
And I'm more pissed about this whole thing because after it happened we had to go through a ton more training and start portion marking every freaking line and paragraph on emails sent over the classified networks. MASSIVE pain in the ass.
More options
Context Copy link
Sandy Berger got a fine and probation for doing worse than what Clinton did.
Has anyone ever been jailed for merely mishandling classified information without improperly disclosing it?
ETA - a quick google found this list of example cases. It looks like big shots like Berger and Petraeus get off with probation and fines, but small fry can get 3 months in prison if they are unlucky. The multi-year sentences all involved at least the appearance of unauthorized disclosure.
I think it is pretty clear Clinton would not have been jailed if she was prosecuted. Similarly, it would be an injustice if Trump gets jailed for mishandling classified information (assuming, of course, that he hasn't been disclosing it).
Clearly did wrong, but not worse than putting classified information on the open Internet.
???
Are you saying that sending classified information over unsecure e-mail is equivalent to putting it on the open Internet? I suppose it might be in terms of possible harm (although in the case of Hillary Clinton's e-mails this would be mitigated by the fact that they were probably never routed outside the US), but in terms of legal culpability it definitely isn't.
Yes. The classified information traveled (quite possibly unencrypted) over the public internet. They may or may not have been routed outside the US; Clinton's people had no control of that.
Actually we know that they were in fact routed outside the US - her private server was compromised and a copy of every email she sent from it was forwarded to a foreign power (most likely China).
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
Until quite recently emails between different domains would have been transmitted in plain text. It’s not persistently available like a website, but any hop between the servers could read the contents of emails.
This is accurate. It's certainly bad but definitely not equivalent in terms of actual expected cost to publishing it on a webpage for everyone to see.
I really don't know why @The_Nybbler thinks otherwise. Is there some law that treats them as equivalent or are they simply remarking on pure cryptography theory? idk
I don't. My words were "putting classified information on the open Internet".
More options
Context Copy link
I mean, it's what we get drilled into us. I don't know if it's law, though.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link