I wonder if we’d do better in discourse to stop pointing at an “administration.” It is a reflection of what a plurality, often majority, of people want.
It does make ones eyes glaze over when American politics is everywhere you look. In every thread, about every topic. And each comment thread has 50 highly emotional comments that you have to scroll through to find the 5 few thoughtful comments near the bottom discussing the article, without going off the rails.
Look at the top thread with 50 comments and count how many are discussing tuberculosis in America. It's just another starting off point for everyone to go in a hundred directions ranting about US politics and ignore the topic
The thread is about a tuberculosis outbreak in the US. Subsequent comments include conversations about a US federal government department agency publishing (or not) data on that outbreak.
This is all taking place on an online forum hosted in the US and managed by US entities.
And you (and like minded individuals) expect to not see US politics?
I appreciate that the US has an outsized presence on the intertubez, but you also need to realize you're first of all talking in the midst of Americans.
The ones that were published in the weeks prior to the current administration weren't talking about the Kansas tuberculosis outbreak either.
So we're not really discussing the "US federal government department agency publishing (or not) data on that outbreak." Someone's implying that's what happened, and then people are spinning off into political discussions without even looking into the link they provided to see if that was actually the case.
It's not just going off topic to discuss politics. People are actively spreading misinformation to justify going off topic to discuss politics, and lots of other people are joining in without bothering to check if what was claimed is actually true. Two-thirds of the comments now are using the claims about the MMWR to discuss politics, and it doesn't look like anyone actually looked at the MMWR to see what it actually is.
I at least didn't read any of the links because I couldn't care less beyond seeing what everyone was talking about in a thread about tuberculosis in the US.
My point still stands that if someone doesn't want to see conversations regarding the US, politics or otherwise, maybe he should stay out of threads regarding the US and maybe also find other forums not hosted in America and managed by Americans where the vast majority of participants will be Americans.
It's like taking a trip to Mars and complaining that all the dirt is red, y'know?
Online communities need constant self checking and introspection to not go off the deepend. This isn’t like Reddit where you can unsubscribe from the crazy big politics subreddits or unfollow people on Twitter. I still think the old ideal of HN where we have some higher goal than yet another US political rant forum is still worth fighting for.
> I couldn't care less beyond seeing what everyone was talking about in a thread about tuberculosis in the US.
I was interested in the issue in Kansas because I read the article. 66 people almost entirely in 2 counties isn’t exactly a national statistics collection issue
This is HN and I'm sure there are all kinds of filters people have made as add-ons if news like this truly bothers you. Users here are more than likely to make their own as well. You can also always reach out to Dang for feature requests. I'm never going to not want more flexibility in my newsfeed.
>. 66 people almost entirely in 2 counties isn’t exactly a national statistics collection issue
Patient zero starts somewhere. It's not national news per se when a few individuals die of an unidentified disease either.
Meh I don’t need 3rd party plugins, I spent years using them on HN and my iPhone doesn’t have browser plugins.
I don’t care enough anyway I just use HN less and less every year like all the old userbase. The only old usernames I recognize at the top of threads these days are the ones who like the politics stuff (I could list at least 4-5). Just my own nostalgia for a dying small community of thoughtful nerds.
I'm sorry to hear that but it seems that's simply a natural part of the internet. Even 4 Chan was susceptible to this cultural shift and it seems the whole point was the gatekeep as much as possible.
>This isn’t like Reddit where you can unsubscribe from the crazy big politics subreddits or unfollow people on Twitter.
Sure it is. This is the internet, Hacker News is just one website someone could choose not to patronize among countless others.
If you don't want to see US centric conversations, don't patronize American websites like Hacker News and certainly centralized American services like Reddit or X.
Around 20% of Americans voted Trump, and from polls most don’t like him, but always vote R. Die hard Trumpers are at best 10% of Americans. Trump didn’t even get 50% of the vote.
His views most certainly aren’t what a majority of people want, and he doesn’t try to expand by doing things the majority want. If anything he paints those not completely in his camp, which is the vast majority of Americans, as an enemy.
> His views most certainly aren’t what a majority of people want
I'm not sure what you gain by telling yourself that.
I could just as easily assert, without any evidence (i.e., like you), that every single person who didn't vote loves Trump and supports all his policies.
> If anything he paints those not completely in his camp, which is the vast majority of Americans, as an enemy.
That has nothing to do with whether people support him. 20 or more (exact number varies on the reporting) women say that he sexually assaulted them, he was convicted of one sexual assault, and yet white women still voted for him.
Experiments consistently and repeatedly show that when given practical descriptions of policy actions and outcomes, the majority of Americans do not choose the ones that republicans promote. BUT when told that they are Republican policies, then about half of Americans do support those policies.
Well then, liberal politicians aren't doing a very good job, are they?
This is like a cliche from the chess world, where the guy who lost the game, then does a postmortem to convince everyone that he was actually winning the whole time. "Except for that one little blunder."
The Dems keep losing losing losing, but rather than figure out how to fight better, you instead try to convince yourself that people support you. And then you go back to debating Israel v Palestine or trans pronouns while our own country descends into tyranny. (Literally - many progressives I know.)
Meanwhile, Trump owns the White House, both houses of Congress, and the Supreme Court!
The only lesson I get is that the segregation of education over 40-50 years or so is finally showing its consequences (well it did so 20 years ago. But it's only more polarized now). A chess player at least has the knowledge and willingness to improve and learn from lost matches. The average American... Not so much.
And you didn't really offer much feedback here. Which is part of the problems. I don't really care to bicker over single issue details like this.
If 80% of Americans didn't vote Trump, you're trying to claim they just as likely love him as those who did, even when polling of those voting for him show many dislike him?
Yeah, I'm not the one unable to read evidence.
Polls also repeatedly show people dislike a large amount of his policies.
And it's a fact he didn't even get 50% of voters to vote for him.
How can someone who couldn't be bothered to vote possibly count in a discussion of how many people support this administration? Putting aside people who were unable to vote, everyone who chose not to, absolutely 100% gave up their relevance in terms of what the people want. They took themselves out of the equation.
It doesn't matter if they did or not. If they supported Trump they would have voted. Ergo the majority of people don't support him. Non voters are still people, last I checked.
Definitely, which is why it's important to identify when politicians put the American public at risk like this. The connections between random high-level government actions don't easily map to real world outcomes for most people.
For sure. What I meant to articulate was that the admin is the only one it makes sense to point to. Saying "the electorate is stupid!" has no utility other than catharsis, though.
More accurate to say "people are selfish" if you want slightly less charged language. The common sentiment I hear is "I was doing better in 2020 than I was in 2024" and that was all the impotous to make people vote "not Biden".
That mindset makes sense on a surface level. So it's not stupidity. But the lack of introspection on if Biden made things worse or simply stopped things from getting much much worse was definitely not taken into account.
I'd personally call it stupidity. But it doesn't mean people are stupid overall.
I think it's incorrect to say "this is what the plurality wanted". I think very few, if any, Trump voters thought "Trump will be worse for public health and tuberculosis is something I want more of in America."
>I think it's fair to say a lot of Trump's apologists and defenders really did not understand the ramifications of his first presidency, and are not in a position to clearly anticipate the ramifications of his second presidency.
Speaking as one Trump voter among many others, I knew exactly what he accomplished in his first term and what a hypothetical second term could look like. I also understood what his campaign platform and promises were and by and large I support them, including significantly reducing the federal government overall across the board.
What we are seeing now with January 6 and pro-life pardons among other pardons, the new United States DOGE Service, exits from Paris Agreement and WHO, mass deportations of illegal aliens and securing of the southern border, tariffs on imports and especially on countries who aren't amicable, removal of DEI and other equity-based programmes from the federal government with extreme prejudice, among many many other policies and mandates are all things I expected and wanted to see when I voted for Trump.
No doubt there are voters who voted Trump simply along party lines or other reasons, but just as much are voters who gave the election some thought and voted Trump.
If you don't agree with me then that's unfortunate, but my vote isn't yours.
I clealrly disagree with a lot of your viewpoints. But I need to laser down on fhis:
>What we are seeing now with January pardons
Why do you expect and want to see this? What about that event resonated with you that you'd excuse those people? I expected this to be a bi+partisan shame on the country, so I just do not see the angle here.
Thank you. I expectedly disagree, but there's no point in arguing. I simply don't get much chance in this atmosphere to get well thought out answers contrary to my own views.
I'll just say this:
>correct this significant, and as far as I'm aware unprecedented, abuse of the judiciary and he delivered on that promise.
This is extremely common because "speedy" was simply never defined. Taking months over minor non-violent crimes like drug usage as an example. Given the chaos in identifying all suspects (IIRC they were never all fully discovered, an atrocity in and of itself in our police system), I'm not too surprised it took years to try everyone caught.
No one's probably chomping at the bit to re-define "speedy" better:
>a trial conducted according to prevailing rules and procedures that takes place without unreasonable or undue delay or within a statutory period.
but I think we both agree this is a very vauge, insufficient definition.
>Thank you. I expectedly disagree, but there's no point in arguing. I simply don't get much chance in this atmosphere to get well thought out answers contrary to my own views.
I also appreciate that we can have a peaceful, friendly, normal conversation about this unlike how these things would usually transpire up until just recently, so thanks.
To be charged with a crime signals the beginning of a trial, a conviction signals the conclusion of a trial with a guilty verdict.
From an archived DoJ page[1] at the year 3 (January 2024) mark, ~1200 defendants were charged and 171 were convicted (32 without a trial). 749 were sentenced in total.
So that's presumably still more than several hundred defendants waiting for what should be a speedy trial.
Again, that is not how we should operate in this country. If you accuse (charge) someone of a crime their trial should be brought as swiftly as possible as mandated by the Constitution. That this was not done is by itself enough cause to pardon them, let alone the exaggeration of the charges presented.
Also, to close things out:
>The 'back the blue' and 'tough on crime' party is a total farce.
Trump and Republicans enjoyed and continue to enjoy the approval and cooperation of law enforcement agencies across the country both before and after the pardons were issued.
> From an archived DoJ page[1] at the year 3 (January 2024) mark, ~1200 defendants were charged and 171 were convicted (32 without a trial). 749 were sentenced in total.
The number sentenced cannot be higher than the number convicted (and the source document, unlike your summary, does not make that impossible claim), since sentencing requires conviction.
> So that's presumably more than several hundred defendants waiting for what should be a speedy trial.
Many of them were charged substantially after the event, “Speedy trial” refers to the time from charging to trial (the time from event to charges is governed by statute of limitations, not speedy trial rights.)
I disagree in part with Trump's idea of Palestinians moving out of Gaza to Egypt and Jordan, not the least because it's violence incarnate. It's akin to the Trail of Tears[1] which was one of the most shameful bits of our history.
Now, why do I say in part? Because I am also appreciative of the sad reality that peace in the Holy Land simply is not possible with more than one sovereign state in it. It simply isn't, there are so many peoples who would kill and die over that piece of land that any multi-state arrangement is practically impossible. I don't care if it ends up being Israel or Palestine or some other country or entity ultimately in charge of the Holy Land, but it's inevitably going to be one and the path to get there will not be pretty.
I also find Trump's executive order on delaying the banning of TikTok legally (IANAL) dubious. His reasoning is that his administration hasn't had enough time to understand it and thus sufficiently execute the law as written, but the law doesn't provide for such an out. The courts can have their say if it comes to that.
As a Japanese(-American), Trump's seemingly apathetic position on Japan is somewhat concerning. However, the Japanese government also has its share of blame to take. Consolation is that Trump has been very cordial with the wife of the late Shinzo Abe and also Softbank CEO Masayoshi Son, which means he at least has some level of care for Japan, and it's not like US-Japan relations would go completely sour anyway.
By and large though, I am satisfied and happy with what Trump has done and accomplished so far. I voted for this and I still stand by my vote. Let's Make America Great Again, any friends and allies who want to tag along are very welcome.
I saw that, and that wasn't a "Nazi salute". Any and all publications and pundits/influencers declaring it as such are wholly disingenuous and should be ashamed of themselves. The sensationalizing was a textbook example of taking things out of context and projecting your(the Left's) own biases.
If you can't understand that, let me put it in simpler terms: That was a "My heart goes out to you!" salute and I am happy for Musk for being happy that we the American people won the election against all odds.
“The Party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command.”
― George Orwell, 1984
One thing you could do to see what other people think the same is to video yourself doing this exact motion, then send it to your co workers telling them your heart goes out to them.
Many other people including many prominent Democrats[1] have also performed similar gestures in the past, granted while saying different things than "my heart goes out to you".
So no, that is not a Nazi salute unless you are going to be fair and count all such gestures from everyone as Nazi salutes.
People are free to hate Musk if they want, that's their prerogative; but if they are going to be disingenuous about it I am going to call them out and lose whatever respect I might have had for them.
>“The Party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command.”
Ironically, it is "The Party" (the Left) telling me to reject the evidence of my eyes and ears and submit to their programming that it's a Nazi salute. Fuck that noise and I hope you realize the irony of your argument.
I won't repeat the stark and damning evidence that was given to you by dragonwriter that these claims are not only obviously false but seem like a desperate attempt to ignore the truth, which is that this is a nazi sieg heil salute being done forcefully and intentionally.
I'll repeat the question you didn't answer - are you comfortable doing this exact motion on video and sending it to your coworkers, family and friends? Do you think there might be fallout or repercussions?
I'll ask another question. Is there anything that he could have been done differently to make it more like a sieg heil? To me, it looks identical. What is missing that would in your mind make it a nazi salute?
Finally, if you did come to the conclusion that this was a nazi salute by the richest man on the planet at a political rally seen by the entire world, would that change anything for you personally?
>are you comfortable doing this exact motion on video and sending it to your coworkers, family and friends?
Sure, why wouldn't I? I'm not fucking Hitler and anyone worth caring about knows that.
>Do you think there might be fallout or repercussions?
No, other than from people looking to deliberately cause problems where there are none.
>Is there anything that he could have been done differently to make it more like a sieg heil? To me, it looks identical. What is missing that would in your mind make it a nazi salute?
Actually think, speak, and act like an actual Nazi.
>if you did come to the conclusion that this was a nazi salute by the richest man on the planet at a political rally seen by the entire world, would that change anything for you personally?
If I thought of this as a Nazi salute that also means he was doing many other things to demonstrate he's a Nazi, so no: Nothing in my thought process would change.
Proper judgments of a man's character are made over a sufficiently long period of time, one singular act isn't going to move the needle in a significant direction one way or another.
If I thought Musk was a Nazi now then I would have come to the conclusion he is a Nazi a long time ago (and to be clear we are speaking in your hypothetical scenario).
So even though Elon Musk went to a rally for the far right party in germany on january 9th, talked about immigration, hitler, said germans need to get over their nazi guilt, and encouraged people to vote for the 'far right' party, then gave a nazi salute in front of the world 11 days later, because you decided he wasn't a nazi a long time ago, he must not be now?
Do you have a description of what kind of evidence would convince you someone is a modern nazi or 'poor character'?
>the far right party in germany on january 9th, talked about immigration,
Yeah, being against rampant immigration(?) is a very Nazi stance. Sure.
Naw. There's nothing Nazi about wanting to control or restrict who comes into your country; entering a country as a foreigner is a privilege, not a right.
As an aside, efforts to exclude AfD from elections is what is actually Nazi about German goings on. It's not really my place to speak about Germany's domestic affairs as an American, but if you want my honest opinion the German Left is projecting on the Right with authoritarian fury.
>said germans need to get over their nazi guilt,
Speaking as a Japanese, in my opinion Germans should indeed get over their Nazi guilt. History should never be forgotten and the lessons should be taught and remembered, but to drag that guilt across generations is ridiculous. Children are not responsible for the sins of their parents, let alone farther back.
Japan needs to get over Imperial Japan guilt and be proud about being Japanese again too; Japan's case isn't quite as bad as Germany's but there's still a ways to go.
>Do you have a description of what kind of evidence would convince you someone is a modern nazi or 'poor character'?
There are many, some that come to mind include:
* Support racism. Hitler was big on elevating what he called Aryans as the One True Race and exterminating Jews with extreme prejudice.
Musk (and Trump, Republicans, as well as most sensible Americans for that matter) advocate for meritocracy, judging people by their character and capabilities without regard to race or other immutable traits because All Men Are Created Equal.
* Advocate for cruel and unusual punishment. The Nazis used gas chambers and other torturous and humiliating methods of maiming and killing.
Literally noone here in America wants that shit, and those who do are rightfully shamed into oblivion (see: Guantanamo, et al.)
* Advocate for and engage in regulation of speech and thought. The Nazis are a textbook on how to control a population to their bidding, even the Soviets drew lessons from them.
Musk has his share of hypocrisy (why aren't you picking those to criticize him over?), but fundamentally he argues and acts for free speech. Likewise Trump and most Republicans, and certainly any American who understands and respects the Constitution. Some Nazis they/we are.
* Gathering and centralizing absolute power.
Musk's job in Federal government is on a strict and temporary schedule set to expire in July 2026, and he doesn't even have any actual authority. That's not a Nazi, let alone a Fuhrer. Likewise Trump who has consistently advocated for States' rights and reducing the Federal government especially the Executive Branch, and Republicans who have always spoken as the party of small government (whether they are is a different matter).
Citing Nazi ideology without invoking Godwin's Law requires actual, real Nazis to be the subject of debate. Please stop calling everyone and everything you don't like Nazis at the first opportunity, you don't realize how hard you are shooting yourself in the foot by doing so.
> Musk has his share of hypocrisy (why aren't you picking those to criticize him over?)
Because I'm not trying to criticize Elon Musk here, I'm trying to understand the cognitive dissonance between seeing two picture perfect sieg heils back to back and denying that that's what happened.
It seems like you agree that the motion is identical, but you are saying that it is a sieg heil but not a 'nazi salute' because elon musk "does not" support racism, advocate for cruelty, regulate speech, or centralize power.
>Because I'm not trying to criticize Elon Musk here,
But you (and others like-minded) are. You're latching on to a Nazi salute you've projected onto him and trying to use it as the point of criticism. You yourself just admitted you "see [a] perfect sieg heil", even.
>It seems like you agree that the motion is identical, but you are saying that it is a sieg heil but not a 'nazi salute'
He did it while shouting "My heart goes out to you!" to the crowd, so it's not a "sieg heil" either. If he's saluting anyone/thing at all, he's saluting the people and the spirit of America.
I couldn't care less if it's identical, though if you really want my honest opinion on judging that: I wouldn't think of Adolf Hitler as the first thing; then again I don't have my mind in the proverbial Progressive gutter either.
>elon musk "does not" support racism, advocate for cruelty, regulate speech, or centralize power.
Yeah, or to rephrase: In what ways is Elon Musk a Nazi? In the true, real, proper sense of the term "Nazi". Not the dirty word "Nazi" that gets thrown around like candy on disagreeables.
What I think you need to ask yourself is: Why is "Nazi!" the first thing that comes to your mind and is that really justifiable?
You're quite welcome to hate Musk if you want to, I have no problem with that and Musk can defend himself if he feels the need. I couldn't care less. But I am concerned for your mental health if you need to scream Nazi allegations to justify it.
> Many other people including many prominent Democrats have also performed similar gestures in the past
Every time someone tries to support this they use stills, and when you pull the video of the events, its clear that—unlile Musk—while there may be similarity of hand position at one point, the actual gesture (which is a movement, not just a momentary position) is not the “Roman”/fascist/Nazi salute, while Musk's is exactly that salute.
>Every time someone tries to support this they use stills
Considering the vast majority of the hit pieces use stills of Musk, onus is on them.
>while Musk's is exactly that salute.
You can make practically anything into Nazi hate speech if you drill down hard enough putting any and all inconvenient factors aside.
There's plenty of valid shit to criticize Musk for, but if you're going to evoke Godwin's Law[1] or Reductio ad Hitlerum[2] to justify your distaste for him then I'm going to roll my eyes and move on. That shit didn't work before and it certainly isn't going to work now.
Yeah, that ain't a Nazi salute unless you hate Musk so much that anything he does is Nazism without regard.
I reiterate: Evoking Godwin's Law or Reductio ad Hitlerum is not going to work.
It didn't work when Harris called Trump a fascist, nor all the times before that, and it won't work now either. It defies context and it's not even funny let alone accurate.
What would it take for you to consider something to be a Nazi salute?
In the first video all the gestures from all the people are so similar that if they had been wearing motion capture suits and you gave any random person that motion capture data and asked them to pick out which one was not a Nazi salute they would do no better than chance.
>What would it take for you to consider something to be a Nazi salute?
The guy doing it would need to be an actual Nazi, for starters. Musk is many things and avenues of criticizing him are plentiful, but a Nazi in the real sense he is not.
People call Musk (and many many others) a "Nazi" simply because they hate him without paying regard to what a Nazi even is. Nazi is a dirty word, you call someone a dirty word to hate on him. It's all meaningless, and even worse the overuse of Nazi in this manner dilutes its meaning that most people eventually stop caring being called one.
Even symbols like the Iron Cross and Jerusalem Cross that have nothing to do with Nazism are labeled Nazi symbols, again diluting the value of calling someone or something a Nazi.
Stop calling everyone and everything you hate or even just slightly disagree with a Nazi. Seriously. It only signals a surrendering of thought given to any better arguments for your cause (Godwin's Law) and alienates you from everyone outside your small echo chamber. The worst chain of events is that if this keeps up, we absolutely will see actual Nazis come into positions of power and nobody will care because the boy cried wolf far too many fucking times.
