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It is striking how moronic and ill informed it is. When I think of all Ambassadors with grace and favour appointments it makes me grimace. The extraordinary te

It is striking how moronic and ill informed it is. When I think of all Ambassadors with grace and favour appointments it makes me grimace. The extraordinary testimony from Fiona Hill and Alex Vindman was at least reassuring that competent people were in government, even if they were being ignored.

commentrix 6y ago
IC has always attracted the best and brightest gossips, deviants and liars. They love to "know more than" even if they have to make it all up. The paradox is their assessments are supposed to be reliable. How can anyone trust a word any of them ever say? That's the stupidity. They're all very "bright", they just don't have any scruples at all. It's basically a social club for sociopaths, wannabe "unlanded" social-climbers and insecure narcissists who just gotta find a way they can pretend to be better than anyone else. I don't think this unprofessionalism applies to military/signals intelligence which is too strict and results focused, only the other "human" types. But the reality is you need people like that, you need people that are easy to control. That's why so many of them have some sort of dirty secret, because the organizations can more easily rely on people they can blackmail. The obsession with secrecy is not just an occupational requirement, it's a deep seated psychology issue for many of the people, that becomes an organizational psychology issue, because of all the twisted crazies they have roaming around in their ranks.
readarticle 6y ago
If it’s any consolation, the US has increasingly moved its diplomatic channels out of their traditional venues into the Pentagon over the past few decades, and it’s absolutely packed to the gills with Vindmans and Hills. While the State Department might get a new coat of paint under Biden, it’s been being “gutted” for decades.
andybak 6y ago
> It is striking how moronic and ill informed it is. I didn't get that at all. Maybe it's discourteous and flippant. The humour is broad rather than refined but I still chuckled. Hard to evaluate "ill informed" due to distance in time and the fact that I lack insight into the context. It wasn't aiming to be comprehensive and insightful. It was a tongue in cheek crib sheet between people that appeared to know and get where each other was coming from.
engineer_22 6y ago
An intelligent person can communicate important information through jest. In this ability is found charisma and charm - important characteristics for a diplomat. We wouldn't want our adversaries to think us dull.
- angry_octet 6y ago
  I found it incredibly dull and far from charismatic.
  - cpach 6y ago
    It’s quite hard to produce humour that is enjoyed by everyone. To each their own. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
  - engineer_22 6y ago
    I found the Russian. Cheers! :)
dash2 6y ago
Read the footnotes. It was an internally produced joke.

commentrix 6y ago

IC has always attracted the best and brightest gossips, deviants and liars. They love to "know more than" even if they have to make it all up. The paradox is their assessments are supposed to be reliable. How can anyone trust a word any of them ever say? That's the stupidity. They're all very "bright", they just don't have any scruples at all. It's basically a social club for sociopaths, wannabe "unlanded" social-climbers and insecure narcissists who just gotta find a way they can pretend to be better than anyone else. I don't think this unprofessionalism applies to military/signals intelligence which is too strict and results focused, only the other "human" types. But the reality is you need people like that, you need people that are easy to control. That's why so many of them have some sort of dirty secret, because the organizations can more easily rely on people they can blackmail. The obsession with secrecy is not just an occupational requirement, it's a deep seated psychology issue for many of the people, that becomes an organizational psychology issue, because of all the twisted crazies they have roaming around in their ranks.

readarticle 6y ago

If it’s any consolation, the US has increasingly moved its diplomatic channels out of their traditional venues into the Pentagon over the past few decades, and it’s absolutely packed to the gills with Vindmans and Hills. While the State Department might get a new coat of paint under Biden, it’s been being “gutted” for decades.

andybak 6y ago

> It is striking how moronic and ill informed it is. I didn't get that at all. Maybe it's discourteous and flippant. The humour is broad rather than refined but I still chuckled. Hard to evaluate "ill informed" due to distance in time and the fact that I lack insight into the context. It wasn't aiming to be comprehensive and insightful. It was a tongue in cheek crib sheet between people that appeared to know and get where each other was coming from.

engineer_22 6y ago

An intelligent person can communicate important information through jest. In this ability is found charisma and charm - important characteristics for a diplomat. We wouldn't want our adversaries to think us dull.

angry_octet 6y ago
I found it incredibly dull and far from charismatic.
- cpach 6y ago
  It’s quite hard to produce humour that is enjoyed by everyone. To each their own. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
- engineer_22 6y ago
  I found the Russian. Cheers! :)

dash2 6y ago

Read the footnotes. It was an internally produced joke.