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> One of my children described to me what our problem is in recruiting. She said, “Dad, the problem is you’re the man.” I thought that was a compliment, so I sa

> One of my children described to me what our problem is in recruiting. She said, “Dad, the problem is you’re the man.” I thought that was a compliment, so I said, “Thank you, I really appreciate that.” She said, “Dad, I don’t mean that in a good way. I mean you’re the ‘Man.’ Who would want to work for the ‘Man’?” I think she’s right. But I said to her, “You know, if people saw what this ‘Man’ and ‘Woman’ of the FBI was like, and what we do, and the challenges we face, I think they’d want to come work for us.” Given that even after his daughter explained the term to him, he still doesn't know that 'The' is part of the phrase, I'm not sure if The Director of the FBI knows what the phrase 'The Man' means...

woodman 10y ago
There is no way that he doesn't know what the phrase means, nothing has ever not happened more than that story. "Never let the truth get in the way of a good story." -- Mark Twain
- mattkrause 10y ago
  "You/You're the man" is a phrase that's complimentary. That reading would also fit into the conversation as a sort of commiseration. "But...you the man dad, who wouldn't want to work with you?"
  - RileyKyeden 10y ago
    You're thinking of tha man. This is The Man. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Man https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Man
    - mattkrause 10y ago
      (Note that the article also mentions confusion with complimentary sense)
      - thaumasiotes 10y ago
        The complimentary sense is completely blocked by context here: > The problem is ______.
        mattkrause 10y ago
        Not totally. The problem is [that you're awesome] and people find you intimidating (or something). I suppose it could be made up or embellished, but I don't think it's the most wildly implausible thing ever (unlike @woodman).
        woodman 10y ago
        Well shoot, you keep producing plausible explanations: so now he might be so narcissistic that he thinks the reason he can't find capable subordinates is because people are intimidated by his awesomeness.
  - woodman 10y ago
    Wow, that is a stretch and reads like an advocacy of Bible skip code or Nostradamus predictions. So the best case scenario is that he doesn't understand conversational context? Well I stand corrected: he is either a liar, suffers from a mental disorder, or isn't a native English speaker.
godzillabrennus 10y ago
Faith in federal institutions is at historic lows. Who wants to help an institution perceived as corrupt? Plus they drug test and put your fingerprints into a database.
- iwantagrinder 10y ago
  "This is an enormous challenge for us, as for everybody in the government who’s sitting here, because we do not have the dough. We cannot compete on dough." How are we not funding competitive salaries in this field when it's absolutely crucial to the safety of the nation?
  - ryandrake 10y ago
    If you believe those "tech salary" HN threads, there are top engineers at top tech companies making $400K. That's how much the president of the US makes. Good luck.
    - rdtsc 10y ago
      Exactly. And then there is a long chain of dept. heads, managers and so on in there. There is no way they'll accept making less money than some developer, even if they happen to be very good. Now if they wanted to be creative they could for example build more offices out in other parts of town, make them more accessible, more moderen, allow a lot more vacation time, say start at 6 weeks, allow sabaticals and so on. But I just don't see FBI going that route.
  - woodman 10y ago
    I don't like that I'm paying the salary of people that spy on me, I'd really not like it if they were paid more than me. The USG dedicates very few resources to actual IT defense, the vast majority of the funding goes to attacking and intentionally crippling our own infrastructure.
  - hackuser 10y ago
    > How are we not funding competitive salaries in this field when it's absolutely crucial to the safety of the nation? The same could be asked about soldiers, teachers, and many others. Funding doesn't correlate well at all with to importance to society. Football coaches are the highest paid employees of very many universities in the U.S., more than Nobel prize winning scientists, world-changing artists and social scientists, and life-saving doctors. Bench-riding professional athletes usually make more than the general commanding all U.S. forces in the Mideast.
hawkice 10y ago
This was when I decided to never work for the FBI: http://fortune.com/2015/04/06/fbi-agent-fitness-test/ http://fortune.com/2015/04/06/fbi-agent-fitness-test/ It's important to note that this means handicapped people are no longer allowed desk jobs as analysts at the FBI. Missing a limb? You can't fight crime anymore! That's not my primary concern, though, per se. My concern is that firing and disqualifying people who are otherwise talented MUST reduce clearance rates. It's can't NOT do that. If FBI employees looking fit is more important to Mr. Comey[1] than arresting murderers, I have absolutely no interest in his organization. [1] “I want you to look like the squared-away object of that reverence,” Comey wrote in a memo to agents. “I want the American people to be able to take one glance at you and think, ‘THERE is a special agent of the Federal Bureau of Investigation.’” http://www.vanityfair.com/news/2015/04/fbi-fitness-test http://www.vanityfair.com/news/2015/04/fbi-fitness-test
- phaus 10y ago
  If you read the entire article, he toys with the idea of having teams made up of a few agents and several non-agent technical experts. There are already tons of non-agent IT/Software Engineering/Netsec jobs at the FBI. You can still be a fed, you just don't carry a badge and a gun. Lots of the people I worked with were in awful shape.
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
- DannyB2 10y ago
  The FBI fitness test: hire people who have a higher statistical possibility of being narcissistic. (Wikipedia: "Narcissism is the pursuit of gratification from vanity or egotistic admiration of one's own attributes.") Respect my authority. Bow and be reverent when I question you. Be glad I don't beat you to a bloody pulp right here when nobody is looking.
  - hawkice 10y ago
    This sounds like way too much, but the sibling comment is a bit too little. Saying fatsos don't get a badge and a get a shittier title IS a deliberate status punishment. Reminds me of strong negative opinions I have about high school, where push-up ability translates into pecking order position. Comey's statement does seem at least slightly vainglorious. He certainly has a high opinion of how the FBI should be viewed (exceeding, for instance, 'professional' or 'public servant's), and believes it should be obvious who FBI agents are, which will annihilate their undercover operations. So he is sacrificing a lot in order to get big(ger), dumb(er, due to firing and not hiring good investigators) jocks. But I don't think it is meant to engender obedience or fear in civilians. I think it is just a Bad Decision.
StanislavPetrov 10y ago
>I'm not sure if The Director of the FBI knows what the phrase 'The Man' means... Given Comey's inability to grasp the infeasibility of a mandatory encryption backdoors its a safe bet to say he doesn't.

woodman 10y ago

There is no way that he doesn't know what the phrase means, nothing has ever not happened more than that story. "Never let the truth get in the way of a good story." -- Mark Twain

mattkrause 10y ago
"You/You're the man" is a phrase that's complimentary. That reading would also fit into the conversation as a sort of commiseration. "But...you the man dad, who wouldn't want to work with you?"
- RileyKyeden 10y ago
  You're thinking of tha man. This is The Man. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Man https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Man
  - mattkrause 10y ago
    (Note that the article also mentions confusion with complimentary sense)
    - thaumasiotes 10y ago
      The complimentary sense is completely blocked by context here: > The problem is ______.
      - mattkrause 10y ago
        Not totally. The problem is [that you're awesome] and people find you intimidating (or something). I suppose it could be made up or embellished, but I don't think it's the most wildly implausible thing ever (unlike @woodman).
        woodman 10y ago
        Well shoot, you keep producing plausible explanations: so now he might be so narcissistic that he thinks the reason he can't find capable subordinates is because people are intimidated by his awesomeness.
- woodman 10y ago
  Wow, that is a stretch and reads like an advocacy of Bible skip code or Nostradamus predictions. So the best case scenario is that he doesn't understand conversational context? Well I stand corrected: he is either a liar, suffers from a mental disorder, or isn't a native English speaker.

godzillabrennus 10y ago

Faith in federal institutions is at historic lows. Who wants to help an institution perceived as corrupt? Plus they drug test and put your fingerprints into a database.

iwantagrinder 10y ago
"This is an enormous challenge for us, as for everybody in the government who’s sitting here, because we do not have the dough. We cannot compete on dough." How are we not funding competitive salaries in this field when it's absolutely crucial to the safety of the nation?
- ryandrake 10y ago
  If you believe those "tech salary" HN threads, there are top engineers at top tech companies making $400K. That's how much the president of the US makes. Good luck.
  - rdtsc 10y ago
    Exactly. And then there is a long chain of dept. heads, managers and so on in there. There is no way they'll accept making less money than some developer, even if they happen to be very good. Now if they wanted to be creative they could for example build more offices out in other parts of town, make them more accessible, more moderen, allow a lot more vacation time, say start at 6 weeks, allow sabaticals and so on. But I just don't see FBI going that route.
- woodman 10y ago
  I don't like that I'm paying the salary of people that spy on me, I'd really not like it if they were paid more than me. The USG dedicates very few resources to actual IT defense, the vast majority of the funding goes to attacking and intentionally crippling our own infrastructure.
- hackuser 10y ago
  > How are we not funding competitive salaries in this field when it's absolutely crucial to the safety of the nation? The same could be asked about soldiers, teachers, and many others. Funding doesn't correlate well at all with to importance to society. Football coaches are the highest paid employees of very many universities in the U.S., more than Nobel prize winning scientists, world-changing artists and social scientists, and life-saving doctors. Bench-riding professional athletes usually make more than the general commanding all U.S. forces in the Mideast.

hawkice 10y ago

This was when I decided to never work for the FBI: http://fortune.com/2015/04/06/fbi-agent-fitness-test/ http://fortune.com/2015/04/06/fbi-agent-fitness-test/ It's important to note that this means handicapped people are no longer allowed desk jobs as analysts at the FBI. Missing a limb? You can't fight crime anymore! That's not my primary concern, though, per se. My concern is that firing and disqualifying people who are otherwise talented MUST reduce clearance rates. It's can't NOT do that. If FBI employees looking fit is more important to Mr. Comey[1] than arresting murderers, I have absolutely no interest in his organization. [1] “I want you to look like the squared-away object of that reverence,” Comey wrote in a memo to agents. “I want the American people to be able to take one glance at you and think, ‘THERE is a special agent of the Federal Bureau of Investigation.’” http://www.vanityfair.com/news/2015/04/fbi-fitness-test http://www.vanityfair.com/news/2015/04/fbi-fitness-test

phaus 10y ago
If you read the entire article, he toys with the idea of having teams made up of a few agents and several non-agent technical experts. There are already tons of non-agent IT/Software Engineering/Netsec jobs at the FBI. You can still be a fed, you just don't carry a badge and a gun. Lots of the people I worked with were in awful shape.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
DannyB2 10y ago
The FBI fitness test: hire people who have a higher statistical possibility of being narcissistic. (Wikipedia: "Narcissism is the pursuit of gratification from vanity or egotistic admiration of one's own attributes.") Respect my authority. Bow and be reverent when I question you. Be glad I don't beat you to a bloody pulp right here when nobody is looking.
- hawkice 10y ago
  This sounds like way too much, but the sibling comment is a bit too little. Saying fatsos don't get a badge and a get a shittier title IS a deliberate status punishment. Reminds me of strong negative opinions I have about high school, where push-up ability translates into pecking order position. Comey's statement does seem at least slightly vainglorious. He certainly has a high opinion of how the FBI should be viewed (exceeding, for instance, 'professional' or 'public servant's), and believes it should be obvious who FBI agents are, which will annihilate their undercover operations. So he is sacrificing a lot in order to get big(ger), dumb(er, due to firing and not hiring good investigators) jocks. But I don't think it is meant to engender obedience or fear in civilians. I think it is just a Bad Decision.

StanislavPetrov 10y ago

>I'm not sure if The Director of the FBI knows what the phrase 'The Man' means... Given Comey's inability to grasp the infeasibility of a mandatory encryption backdoors its a safe bet to say he doesn't.