17 ms·

CDC data are disappearing

749 points by doener 2y ago

conartist6 2y ago
The target isn't the people, the target is science. It is becoming clear that the intent is to govern through fear.
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- lefstathiou 2y ago
  [flagged]
  - nehal3m 2y ago
    That’s an art project by Gan Golan and Andrew Boyd and has nothing to do with governing.
  - conartist6 2y ago
    I'm sorry to tell you this, but the sign was lying to you. It is already too late to "turn back the clock" on climate change. The droughts, the floods, the fires: we are already paying the debts of past inaction.
  - plagiarist 2y ago
    I sure as fuck wish we had four years. Unfortunately it is already too late.
- SmirkingRevenge 2y ago
  They're targeting every institution or source of authority that isn't overtly aligned with the party. Academia, science, media, etc. So far it seems to be working, unfortunately.
- tremon 2y ago
  I think you misunderstand the goal. The target is total control of the people -- the means is disrupting every alternative voice and narrative.
Tyrubias 2y ago
It’s terrifying that data US taxpayers paid for, collected and analyzed in the name of public health, can be removed on a whim. While there are a lot of efforts to archive said data, it would still make it unavailable to Americans who are not tech savvy. Unfortunately, that seems to be the idea, I think.
- jagged-chisel 2y ago
  Isn't this data already inaccessible to those who are not tech savvy? My grandma isn’t visiting any of the data download sites provided by the federal government. She doesn’t even know why she would, or even that such data is available. And if I provide it to her, she hasn’t the skills to do anything with it.
  - talldayo 2y ago
    It's a bit like asking whether road signs are effective for Americans who can't read. The signs are there for the people that are using the road, and if you're not using the road you can safely ignore it.
    - whatshisface 2y ago
      It's also a bit like saying that medical school is an elitist institution that only benefits the medical class. :-)
    - seabass-labrax 2y ago
      I'm not sure the analogy works: roads were around long before writing, and there are still road users who can't read. That is why pedestrian crossing signals use lights in the shape of a person rather than written instructions.
    - Sakos 2y ago
      More like asking whether road signs are effective for Americans who are passengers in cars. No, it doesn't directly do her any good that they're technically accessible since she can't act on it, but it sure as hell affects her life that other people have access to the information provided by road signs.
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
CalRobert 2y ago
This is part of a broader rolling catastrophe. Musk is evidently seizing control of the Office of Personnel Management https://www.usnews.com/news/world/articles/2025-01-31/exclusive-musk-aides-lock-government-workers-out-of-computer-systems-at-us-agency-sources-say https://www.usnews.com/news/world/articles/2025-01-31/exclus... Nasa took down their applied sciences page and is evidently scrubbing the data https://www.reddit.com/r/gis/comments/1icqchv/why_is_the_nasa_applied_sciences_website_is_down/ https://www.reddit.com/r/gis/comments/1icqchv/why_is_the_nas... (https://appliedsciences.nasa.gov/ https://appliedsciences.nasa.gov/) Lots of other data sets are disappearing too: https://mashable.com/article/government-datasets-disappear-since-trump-inauguration https://mashable.com/article/government-datasets-disappear-s... There is active discussion of this at https://www.reddit.com/r/DataHoarder/ https://www.reddit.com/r/DataHoarder/ as well as at https://www.reddit.com/r/fednews/ https://www.reddit.com/r/fednews/
- diggan 2y ago
  > Musk is evidently seizing control of the Office of Personnel Management Suddenly I feel out of the loop when it comes to US politics, how come Musk is suddenly seemingly seizing control of parts of the US government? I don't recall him being on any ballots or anything?
  - CalRobert 2y ago
    As it so happens he did not appear on any ballots. But Musk (his aides more specifically) have locked federal employees out of their own systems https://www.reuters.com/world/us/musk-aides-lock-government-workers-out-computer-systems-us-agency-sources-say-2025-01-31/ https://www.reuters.com/world/us/musk-aides-lock-government-... Evidently set up an on-prem email server at the OPM to send out their emails asking disloyal employees to resign https://gizmodo.com/federal-employees-sue-agency-over-new-email-system-allegedly-linked-to-elon-musk-2000556737 https://gizmodo.com/federal-employees-sue-agency-over-new-em... And is attempting to do the same at the US Treasury (edit: I meant to gain access to/control of, not the email server thing) https://www.finance.senate.gov/chairmans-news/wyden-demands-answers-following-report-of-musk-personnel-seeking-access-to-highly-sensitive-us-treasury-payments-system https://www.finance.senate.gov/chairmans-news/wyden-demands-... The twitzkrieg seems to be working.
fabian2k 2y ago
This does not only affect the obvious ideological targets of purging any mention of DEI or gender. One section that is missing seems to be the official vaccine recommendations. Go to the ACIP page (https://www.cdc.gov/acip/ https://www.cdc.gov/acip/) and click on the "Vaccine-specific recommendations". Other affected topics are HIV prevention, birth control/contraception, domestic violence and probably many more.
- Krssst 2y ago
  Maybe it was unintentional but the Long COVID pulse survey page disappeared: https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/covid19/pulse/long-covid.htm https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/covid19/pulse/long-covid.htm (but explanations about long COVID are still available) The page I used to look for mask efficiency disappeared too (https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/71/wr/mm7106e1.htm https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/71/wr/mm7106e1.htm ) but the CDC website still discusses masks so it does not seem to be intentional: https://www.cdc.gov/respiratory-viruses/prevention/masks.html https://www.cdc.gov/respiratory-viruses/prevention/masks.htm...
  - monsieurbanana 2y ago
    That's wishful thinking, sadly. It's much more likely they haven't gotten to it yet.
  - Scoundreller 2y ago
    And the (I thought popular) "Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report" hasn't been published since Jan 16th... https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/index.html https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/index.html Looks to have been an uninterrupted weekly streak since 1982... the (still up) archives: https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/mmwr_wk/wk_pvol.html https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/mmwr_wk/wk_pvol.html
- Applejinx 2y ago
  If there's action by an adversary to try and weaponize naturally occurring disease (never mind the prospect of trying to heighten effectiveness of artificially created disease), that would be expected. Vaccines and healthcare in general are intended as a safeguard against pandemics and mass death. If the goal IS mass death, it makes practical sense to try and delete all health and vaccine information in hopes it's lost forever and the society that uses it is rendered helpless against such events or weapons. I'm interested to note that HN's commentariat hasn't mentioned the extent to which all scientific research of this nature was immediately defunded: my social media had indirect exposure to a lot of healthcare researchers who were freaking out, many days ago. Did you notice that part or is this the first sign of it that's made its way over here? I'd note that defunding medicine isn't strictly HN-type content, though mass deletion of data certainly seems to be HN-adjacent. I would think hackers and entrepreneurs would take that sort of thing personally, as it more or less attacks them by starving them of information that could be useful.
whirlwin 2y ago
Clicked the link and quickly learned it was not about Change Data Capture...
- CalRobert 2y ago
  This would actually be a great place for capturing change data....
- bmacho 2y ago
  I don't think the article ever resolves CDC (I can't find it at least), so it can be about Change Data Capture. edit: It is about this CDC: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Centers_for_Disease_Control_and_Prevention https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Centers_for_Disease_Control_an... "The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is the national public health agency of the United States. It is a United States federal agency under the Department of Health and Human Services, and is headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia. The agency's main goal is the protection of public health and safety through the control and prevention of disease, injury, and disability in the US and worldwide."
- thom 2y ago
  Whether it’s data or things that can kill you, you’re guaranteed at least once delivery either way.
riffraff 2y ago
There's some people organizing to preserve stuff under the "safeguarding research" moniker https://fedihum.org/@SafeguardingResearch https://fedihum.org/@SafeguardingResearch https://safeguarding-research.discourse.group/ https://safeguarding-research.discourse.group/
- bmitc 2y ago
  That doesn't matter anymore. No one believed the CDC data to begin with. You think they're going to believe it when it comes from third-party backups?
  - Insanity 2y ago
    I think the benefit is not just from regular people having access - but other researchers who do need/trust the data.
    - cmxch 2y ago
      The problem is that the provenance of that data will be questioned. It’s one thing that researchers will trust and use that data, but that citing these archive sites will fall flat when their conclusions have to exit academia and be subject to extra scrutiny.
paulyy_y 2y ago
What's more depressing is this was completely predictable, totally avoidable, but half the country welcomed this wave of oppression with open arms.
- diggan 2y ago
  > but half the country welcomed this wave of oppression with open arms. And the other half? They seem to welcome this as well, but with crossed arms. Where are the protests? Seems most people end up writing upset messages on Twitter/Bluesky, but also seems there are no grassroots movements to actually protest the borderline coup that is happening?
  - CalRobert 2y ago
    Protest doesn't do anything. I marched plenty and it accomplished nothing except letting like-minded people blow off a bit of steam and feel like something we did mattered. If anything it was just a distraction.
    - 9283409232 2y ago
      The answer is a general strike. This will never happen in the US though.
      - CalRobert 2y ago
        Hard to strike when your boss can make you and your kid homeless. Housing precarity is a useful tool of control.
        9283409232 2y ago
        According to this[0], they want around 4% of Americans to agree to a general strike. The problem is the people who are most capable of surviving a general strike are not the same group that has the most impact in a general strike. [0] https://generalstrikeus.com/ https://generalstrikeus.com/
linuxftw 2y ago
[flagged]
- bandrami 2y ago
  > I think we can all agree that depending on which administration is in charge, "Government Science" is anything but unbiased. Nope, but you've just made it clear you're susceptible to propaganda.
  - linuxftw 2y ago
    Will you trust the 'science' that is performed via the CDC under the Trump administration? Did you trust the 'science' performed under past administrations? Now, imagine someone holding the reverse position. Who's right? Which government institutions do you find generally trustworthy, and which do you find generally untrustworthy? Has this changed from administration to administration? Do you think your ideological viewpoint has influenced your opinions? Edit: None of the responders answered my questions. Its impossible for most people to admit political bias, as evidenced here.
    - jmward01 2y ago
      These types of false equivalence arguments need to go away. Under Trump norms of career civil servants loyal to doing a good job for the country is being shattered. Institutions that we could trust to be resistant politics are now being weaponized. I would have trusted the CDC under every administration except this one. This administration is demonstrably different.
    - deleted 2y ago
      [deleted]
    - throwworhtthrow 2y ago
      I guess the reason you're fine with the ideological purge that's happening now is because you mistakenly believe the bureaucracies were always operating in ideological lockstep with the current administration. I suddenly pity you for the fear and distrust you must carry at all times for things you don't understand.
hirako2000 2y ago
I recall several heads of the CDC auditioning, their answers to representatives would indicate it is/was (mis) information that undoubtedly the new administration would make sure to "purge". It is becoming very difficult to distinguish justice from crooks in the U.S. The CDC had lost all credibility anyway, dismantling it wouldn't be a bad idea, maybe not all of it, so that's what we are (not) seeing there.
deadbabe 2y ago
If people really cared they would have stored copies of this data, not just relied on a single source.
- duxup 2y ago
  I care, but I don’t download everything I care about, that would be a lot.
- vharuck 2y ago
  That only makes sense if everyone downloads every data set in case they need it one day. I unhappily agree that's the case with private companies' data, because any company's not guaranteed to be around tomorrow. But the government should be a steward of the data it collects. I also wonder how many of these data sets were required by law.
- Insanity 2y ago
  Would be quite expensive when talking about potential petabytes of data.
BSDobelix 2y ago
Brainfart ahead: Is that maybe to prevent (for example china) from getting the data for AI models, but giving it to the "nice" Stargate?
joemazerino 2y ago
Are or is?
- lentil_soup 2y ago
  Both, the word "data" can be used for both singular and plural
- technothrasher 2y ago
  Are. If you are talking about a specific set of information, data is a plural. If you are talking about the concept of information sets, data is a singular. "Data is stored on a computer's hard drive." "The data for the experiment are stored on the computer's hard drive."
nine_zeros 2y ago
America voted for cons, crooks and thugs. And is getting conned, crooked and thugged. Entirely predictable. And well deserved. I say this as someone living and suffering in America. There is no one else to blame but ourselves. The future is bleak.
- jonnycomputer 2y ago
  And they're gonna learn it good and hard.
- reddalo 2y ago
  It's even worse for us of the rest of the world, because the United States influence the whole world, and we can't do anything against this tragedy.
  - nine_zeros 2y ago
    It is bad for the rest of the world but the rest of the world has an exit. Call your representatives and stop using US dollar for trade. Literally, that one action alone will save a lot of grief for people outside the US. This is not a joke. What will sting Elon, Trump and crooks the most is losing their wealth. The rest of the world does not need to suffer for these crooks.
    - oefrha 2y ago
      That’s wishful thinking… One can’t simply stop using USD for trade on a whim. Decoupling will take at least a decade if not longer.
      - marcosdumay 2y ago
        Nah, stop using the US$ for trade is as simply as just stop doing it. There's no lack of infrastructure, and plenty of commerce doesn't use it already. What is hard is desinvesting from the US treasure. You have to sell those somewhere, and if everybody tries, their value will quickly go to 0. But if the US is successful in making their trade-balance positive, this will solve itself without a lot of hardship, it's just a matter of the rest of the world helping them here. Macroeconomics is not what will show you problems here. The US is inserted itself into every supply chain on the world, but you will only notice this if you look at the details. Maybe we should start with an intellectual property reform...
tomohawk 2y ago
It's too early to tell, but I would not be surprised if later at least a portion of this is found to be "malicious compliance". For example, President Truman ordered the US military to be (re)integrated. Through malicious compliance, racist officers put their own spin on the orders. "Well, he didn't say that black officers would get equal access to the officers club, so we won't let them in." It too a former 5 star general (President Eisenhower) to stamp out the malicious compliance and make it stick. There was already a case of malicious compliance with the DEI EO on the part of certain US air force personnel taking down material about the Tuskugee Airmen. The new sec def stomped that out within 4 hours.
- bongodongobob 2y ago
  What? This isn't malicious compliance. This is exactly what Republicans said they were going to do. Destroy everything that doesn't agree with them.
  - honestSysAdmin 2y ago
    [flagged]
  - refurb 2y ago
    No, it's malicious complaince. You can read the EO here: https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/01/defending-women-from-gender-ideology-extremism-and-restoring-biological-truth-to-the-federal-government/ https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/01/defe... Beyond a few specific documents, nothing in there requires the CDC to pull down all this data immediately. There is even a section about "progress updates by 120 days". The CDC is still run by the same people as under Biden. They are the ones that immediately pulled down the data, not Trump hires.
- MisterKent 2y ago
  Malicious Compliance is not the right word. But, I thought about it and am slightly hopeful. Their goal could be obedience such that A) the Musk cronies don't come through and truly delete the data (vs, just taking it offline) B) they don't get fired and can take a stand when "bigger" issues happen. I.e another pandemic. Or y'know, C) they want to keep their jobs and decided to just obey.
tonetheman 2y ago
[dead]
philipwhiuk 2y ago
Don't worry, absolutely no issues have occurred in medicine as a result of a lack of data on how a drug impacts pregnant people.
- PaulRobinson 2y ago
  You'll be pleased to know that multiple countries elsewhere do worry about this, and will continue to publish evidence-based recommendations about appropriate drug usage. Every other member of the G8, NATO, AUKUS, and so on, all publish science for free, so as the US declines into a corruption-fuelled failed state, there will be access to that material still. I saw Mexican emergency services helping in Los Angeles the other week during the fires - more mature and capable countries are always here to help, even in very direct ways like this, where the US public sector is too fragile and broken to support their own citizens. There's been a rich history of this happening across Europe and Africa for decades, so others know what to do. You might think I'm being sarcastic, or patronising or somehow trying to belittle the US. I'm not. That's where the country is now. It's failing in a way we've seen others fail many, many times before. The future is predictable, and it doesn't seem like anybody wants to change it.
  - emmelaich 2y ago
    The person you're responding too was being sarcastic.
agilob 2y ago
They were disappearing 6 years ago too
sega_sai 2y ago
An "interesting" consequence of these type of measures of stopping collecting or publishing data will be that soon it will be impossible to tell how much infant mortality, or number of cases of tuberculosis or similar changed with respect to last year. Maybe that is partially the goal.
- watwut 2y ago
  Well, if your plan is to destroy governmental agencies while being in charge of them, it makes sense to destroy anything that might show you are causing harm first.
- tremon 2y ago
  Yes, that may be part of the same playbook. Those pesky foreign viruses are taking our ill! We must stop that! Glory to the White Death!
- mcguire 2y ago
  See maternal mortality in Texas. https://www.texastribune.org/2024/12/06/texas-maternal-mortality-committee-deaths/ https://www.texastribune.org/2024/12/06/texas-maternal-morta...
emaro 2y ago
I've no doubt things like this will continue to happen. Trump, Musk and co will not stop on their own transforming the US into an authoritarian and likely fascist state. It's now up to the people of the US to stand up and save their democracy. Russia and China must be delighted to see the damage Trump's dealing.
- talldayo 2y ago
  > It's now up to the people of the US to stand up and save their democracy. We weren't able to save our economy from monopolies and tyranny, and now you want us to go stand up against the people with tanks and machine guns!? At this rate I expect you'll tell me to stop importing iPhones and Perrier...
  - emaro 2y ago
    > We weren't able to save our economy from monopolies and tyranny, and now you want us to go stand up against the people with tanks and machine guns!? Yes, because what's the alternative? To give up and watch? I won't be easy, but if you're not even trying, no one can save you. > At this rate I expect you'll tell me to stop importing iPhones and Perrier... No, I won't. I don't tell you what to do at all. It's just my view on the path the US currently is. And I'm hoping, yes, because what happens in/to the US affects the world a great deal.
Insanity 2y ago
Interesting to see how quickly the US is going downhill. I’m sure everyone thought “the Roman Empire is too big to fail” yet here we are with a similar mindset about USA.
- shrillhnpsycho3 2y ago
  [flagged]
cmriversepi 2y ago
I’m an epidemiology professor and I write a weekly “weather report” outbreaks [1]. These communication and data blackouts are coming at a bad time. We’re having an unusual flu season—activity has rebounded unexpectedly. I’ve been having to scramble for data, last week by visiting each state health department website. It’s really troubling and consequential. [1] https://caitlinrivers.substack.com https://caitlinrivers.substack.com
- ocschwar 2y ago
  Reach out to the developer behind 91-DIVOC. That won't cover red states that go dark when and if they do, but it was invaluable to me during the covid pandemic.
- dgacmu 2y ago
  I'm a CS professor who used to write and develop the software behind a daily and weekly Pennsylvania covid report. I get the pain here. It's a messy, incompatible jumble without the CDC. Would you like me to see if there are some CS folks here to provide programming support to help with what you're doing? I -hope- this is transient but I'm not holding my breath either. (feel free to reach out at dga@cs.cmu.edu)
  - dgacmu 2y ago
    Relieved to see it's back online. Hopefully it remains reliable in both senses of the word.
- pjc50 2y ago
  This is intentional. They're mad about the covid response, and want to prevent mask mandates or lockdowns at any cost. At any cost. Including suppressing information about bird flu for as long as possible.
  - repeekad 2y ago
    [flagged]
tlogan 2y ago
Nobody complained about downtimes (at least for Atlas Plus) when they started changing “sex” to “sex or gender” / “gender.” Let’s be honest. I can’t find a single article about this because it was considered normal—they were simply upgrading their system. The level of dishonesty here is astounding. Let’s wait three weeks. If Atlas Plus is still down, I’ll post an update here.
- shrillhnpsycho3 2y ago
  [flagged]
- fn-mote 2y ago
  Please be specific about what you think is dishonest. It sounds like you are conflating a planned information removal with some unspecified amount of upgrade time? Those aren’t equivalent to me.
  - tlogan 2y ago
    The specifics: The data is not disappearing. The data and the related tools have been temporarily removed to be cleaned and brought into compliance with Trump’s executive order (basically removing “gender” or replacing it with “sex”) That should be the intellectually honest title and that is what is happening. So lets check in 3 weeks. If data and tools are not back then we can say and complain about data disappearing.
    - IAmNotACellist 2y ago
      It's The Atlantic. They have no interest in being honest about the topic, telling you why the data is unavailable, or saying when it will be back (once they update the language that bookends the studies). The purpose is to make you angry and think they're burning data because they hate science.
    - deleted 2y ago
      [deleted]
    - nojito 2y ago
dylan604 2y ago
Let's assume that in 4 years, existing limitations are still in place and a new POTUS is in place. It would be interesting if these edits are soft deletes where they are easily reversed with the next administration, or will they need to go to the backups to restore data. This ping ponging from one admin to the next on doesn't actually change the science. "The great thing about science is that it doesn't need you to believe it for it to be true." To me, the thinking that the hiding of data is going to make it go away is just one of those things that shows how unintelligent the person with that notion truly is.
phillipcarter 2y ago
This is a blitzkrieg campaign designed to try and get Musk and his people as much control of the digital government as possible before the roadblocks (legal, systematic, etc.) make things too difficult for him. As it stands, his goal is likely a purge of the federal government akin to what he did with Twitter. And the resulting 80% drop in revenue by Twitter is a similar kind of outcome we can expect from his careless meddling.
- ryandrake 2y ago
  Except of course, instead of a company nobody cares about losing advertisers and money, lives are going to be lost. The stakes are higher when you start dismantling critical institutions and stuffing them full of loyal incompetents.
- neumann 2y ago
  It is very plausible that he is also using it to get all the data he wants from this, not just to scrub it. It would make sense given his desire to compete on AGI that he can both scrub this data for public use and feed it to his own training sets.
  - phillipcarter 2y ago
    I don't think he cares a whole lot about xAI at the moment. He's busy being shadow president.
- computerthings 2y ago
  https://bsky.app/profile/altnps.bsky.social/post/3lh3dl3rkgc2u https://bsky.app/profile/altnps.bsky.social/post/3lh3dl3rkgc... > Elon Musk staff has been caught installing hard drives inside the Office of Personnel Management (OPM), the Treasury Department, and the General Services Administration (GSA). His staff encountered resistance when demanding that Treasury officials grant access to systems managing the flow of more than $6 trillion annually to programs like Social Security and Medicare. Tensions escalated when Musk’s aides were discovered at OPM accessing systems, including a vast database known as the Enterprise Human Resources Integration (EHRI), which contains sensitive information such as dates of birth, Social Security numbers, performance appraisals, home addresses, pay grades, and length of service for government employees. In response to employees speaking out, Musk’s aides locked civil servants out of computer systems and offices, with reports of personal items being searched.
timst4 2y ago
This is the war on Science. Next comes the war on Education. The obliteration of democracy comes next. If you imagine Trump gives up this level of power without bloodshed in the streets you are deluding yourself.
ChrisArchitect 2y ago
Earlier: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42894357 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42894357
perihelions 2y ago
The scope of the scrubbing is broader that datasets. On /r/medicine they're reporting that some treatments guidelines for physicians (100 page+ PDF's) are disappearing, if they're adjacent to the topic of sex: https://old.reddit.com/r/medicine/comments/1iepzln/cdc_has_removed_the_pages_with_sti_treatment_and/ https://old.reddit.com/r/medicine/comments/1iepzln/cdc_has_r... ("CDC has removed the pages with STI treatment and contraceptive guidelines (self.medicine)")
- NelsonMinar 2y ago
  The CDC page on PrEP, a life-saving medicine to protect against HIV, has been removed. This will result in people dying. https://www.cdc.gov/hiv/prevention/prep.html https://www.cdc.gov/hiv/prevention/prep.html
  - beefnugs 2y ago
    Isn't this a worthwhile kick in the pants? No one who actually relies upon real raw data is just downloading a live snapshot from official government hosting on demand are they? Proper data handling procedures is streaming updates, doing your own backups and archiving and sharing where possible and important. Not trusting the everlasting benevolence of whiplash politically controlled resources?
    - llamaimperative 2y ago
      > whiplash politically controlled resources When was the last "whiplash" that did something this catastrophic? Put blame where blame lies.
    - NelsonMinar 2y ago
      what are you on about? The page that was destroyed was consumer health information about a life-saving preventative medication.
      - desumeku 2y ago
        And this was the only website on the internet with information about it? People are going to die because this one website was taken down and there is no other place to possibly read about it?
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
braincat31415 2y ago
I would like to see ALL FDA documents on covid-19 vaccine emergency use authorization. Biden's FDA has been fighting court orders tooth and nail for 4 years. Where were all the Trump haters with their outrage... hypocrisy at its best.
fithisux 2y ago
Cover up by CDC of their past sins?
BlueTemplar 2y ago
Because journalists aren't able to do their jobs : > The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is the national public health agency of the United States.
libertarian1 2y ago
[flagged]
- SV_BubbleTime 2y ago
  That label is unpopular.
dang 2y ago
Related ongoing thread: Archivists work to save disappearing data.gov datasets - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42881367 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42881367 - Jan 2025 (56 comments)
breadwinner 2y ago
Data is the ultimate Fact Check. This is a President that's adamantly opposed to fact checking [1] and has even coerced Facebook to drop fact checking. Of course they don't want data on government sites that disprove their "alternate facts". [1] https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/4920827-60-minutes-trump-cancel/ https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/4920827-60-minutes-tru...
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- calculatte 2y ago
  [flagged]
  - craftsman 2y ago
    I understand you to be saying that these insiders who wanted to remove evidence waited nearly three months after the election, and more than a week after inauguration to do this. Do I understand this correctly?
  - honestSysAdmin 2y ago
    [flagged]
  - lemon_zest 2y ago
    Wait, so they waited until yesterday to remove incriminating evidence? Just when Trump’s staff also came in to purge data? What a coincidence!
- uncomplexity_ 2y ago
  lol if you watch zuck's take on it his problem is the fact checkers ended up being biased.
  - selfmodruntime 2y ago
    They sometimes are. If you're using a biased source to fact-check, you're just transitively applying that bias.
honestSysAdmin 2y ago
[flagged]
- lemon_zest 2y ago
  How is this relevant to OP’s point?
  - honestSysAdmin 2y ago
    [flagged]
    - lemon_zest 2y ago
      What is the argument you are trying to make?
      - mmastrac 2y ago
        It's a "gotcha" question that suggests the poster of it is spending a bit too much time obsessing about it in the circles they run in.
        honestSysAdmin 2y ago
        [flagged]
      - Drakim 2y ago
        Most likely some sort of "liberals get things wrong too, so you shouldn't criticize Trump for lying so much".
        honestSysAdmin 2y ago
        A vicious hoax campaign is not merely "getting things wrong" tho.
  - honestSysAdmin 2y ago
chrishoyle 2y ago
Related ongoing discussion The government information crisis is bigger than you think it is - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42895331 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42895331
angelgonzales 2y ago
This is very similar to when the CDC stopped recording defensive gun use statistics! The pendulum is certainly swinging, on the other hand, I think we should retain data even if it doesn’t align with the current administration. I think it’s important that people should record data that they value, independent of governments, so they can maintain a source of truth throughout time. Articles from Axios, NYT and posts on X can change or be deleted, it’s important to take snapshots to go back and check for deltas.
- jeanlucas 2y ago
  Yeah, we need snapshots of the internet, not just the data
- silverquiet 2y ago
  It seems to me that all uses of guns are defensive.
  - nickff 2y ago
    Assassination and suicide both seem non-defensive, unless you use a very broad definition of defense.
    - timewizard 2y ago
      Suicide is more common than homocide. By a factor of 2 to 1. Murder is more common than self defense. By a factor of 10 to 1. In all cases you are highly likely (>90%) to be on a first name basis with the person that kills you.
      - nickff 2y ago
        It should also be noted that uses of guns in self defense (e.g. “pulling a gun”) not involving any injuries or deaths are not well-tracked (though they’re estimated to be much more frequent than instances involving bodily harm).
ea550ff70a 2y ago
What a disgrace
_blk 2y ago
It's sad to see that data is so politicised. You'd think that empirical data is irrefutable but Mr. Fauci's last-minute pardon ought to put all CDC data produced the last decade under scrutiny. While I agree with the removal of potentially erroneous information, I seriously hope the data is not just removed from the CDC website but remains available for the public (along with who's funds it was produced under) and becomes fact checked by non-pharma sponsored entities. Only this will restore trust and provide a more complete picture.
cs702 2y ago
W.T.F.!? Let us hope this is just a temporary thing. Let us hope the disappearing data will resurface again at some point. Let us hope this isn't driven by ideological motivations. Sigh.
- tclancy 2y ago
  Uh, I’ve got some really bad news.
foresto 2y ago
Maybe useful to someone: https://archive.org/details/20250128-cdc-datasets https://archive.org/details/20250128-cdc-datasets """ An archive of all CDC datasets uploaded to https://data.cdc.gov/browse https://data.cdc.gov/browse before January 28th, 2025. Excludes corrupt datasets and data not publicly accessible. Most datasets are accompanied by an additional file ending in -meta that includes the metadata associated with the data. Attachments referenced in these files can be found in the attachments/ folder. If you would like to seed this data to improve its redundancy please do not use the auto generated torrent, as it is incomplete. Instead use the torrent file labeled "full-20250128-cdc-datasets-USETHIS.torrent" """
- grumple 2y ago
  Thanks, that is useful. Are there any other efforts to archive all the data on government websites? I suppose we could crawl archive.org.
  - abracadaniel 2y ago
    It will only take an order making the data illegal to host to have it removed. More copies are critical.
    - 59nadir 2y ago
      This means nothing if you host it on non-US servers. No one would take it seriously internationally.
- h0l0cube 2y ago
  This highlights why the Internet Archive is so important.
headsman771 2y ago
Seems like there's more than a little malicious compliance happening to try and generate negative headlines.
- jeffgreco 2y ago
  Hardly. Government employees are currently being threatened with punishment for not abiding with wildly illegal instructions.
charles_f 2y ago
What terrifies me this time around compared to the previous one is that people in support of this kind of initiative are either much more vocal, more boosted, or simply more dominant. In his first term, there was still a form of reserve. It even permeates in this comment thread. It now feels like crazy conspiracy theories and idiocy have become an accepted, and either major stance. I just went on Twitter for a minute, and the only response to anything sensible is insults and derogatory calling. It just started and I already feel tired
- llamaimperative 2y ago
  For what it's worth, we have no reason to believe this stuff is actually popular. But yes, the right wing propaganda machine has been shockingly effective, and you have a whole lot of people on this forum now trying to contort themselves into odd shapes to justify a coup because their heroes are either 1) at the helm or 2) cheerleaders for it. Trump won the election by a very slim margin and his popularity will only go down from here. Don't be discouraged by the online stuff. Twitter in particular is just an information weapon now.
baudpunk 2y ago
LLMs have already been trained on all of that data, so it's probably an empty gesture.
- SV_BubbleTime 2y ago
  Language models, not fact models. I’m not sure how this isn’t sinking in yet.
tmshapland 2y ago
Where have I seen this before? Oh right, I remember now... "The books targeted for burning were those viewed as being subversive or as representing ideologies opposed to Nazism. These included books written by Jewish, half-Jewish, communist, socialist, anarchist, liberal, pacifist, and sexologist authors among others." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nazi_book_burnings https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nazi_book_burnings
nblgbg 2y ago
Don't know if whoever voted thought this through! We are undoing years of good governance, like Data.gov and this, now!
timhigins 2y ago
Removing these records from the public internet could likely be considered illegal under the OPEN Government Data Act, 44 U.S.C. § 3506: > (d) With respect to information dissemination, each agency shall— (3) provide adequate notice when initiating, substantially modifying, or terminating significant information dissemination products; (4) not, except where specifically authorized by statute— (A) establish an exclusive, restricted, or other distribution arrangement that interferes with timely and equitable availability of public information to the public; (B) restrict or regulate the use, resale, or redissemination of public information by the public If these datasets were actually permanently deleted then the incident should be investigated by NARA [1]. The people responsible could be charged with a crime under 18 U.S.C. § 2071: > (b) Whoever, having the custody of any such record, proceeding, map, book, document, paper, or other thing, willfully and unlawfully conceals, removes, mutilates, obliterates, falsifies, or destroys the same, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than three years, or both; and shall forfeit his office and be disqualified from holding any office under the United States. As used in this subsection, the term “office” does not include the office held by any person as a retired officer of the Armed Forces of the United States. 1. https://www.archives.gov/records-mgmt/resources/unauthorizeddispositionoffederalrecords https://www.archives.gov/records-mgmt/resources/unauthorized...
- juujian 2y ago
  Damage done, mission accomplished... If you do something illegal and can get away with it relatively unscathed, then it isn't in practice illegal.
  - astrange 2y ago
    How do you know you've gotten away with it? That takes the rest of your life. (Well, statute of limitations.)
    - viraptor 2y ago
      It's going to be a couple months at most. If it's not punished immediately, it's practically legal with the current gov. And the next one will have way bigger things to unfuck than some missing documents.
EchoReflection 2y ago
given the Atlantic's slightly left bias¹ and RFK Jr's stated intentions to shake things up with the FDA and CDC, it makes sense to me that the CDC would be preparing to cover their tracks preemptively.² ¹https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/the-atlantic/ https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/the-atlantic/ ²https://x.com/i/grok/share/GzB1sfssRnPBQlnQbecpFkWbV https://x.com/i/grok/share/GzB1sfssRnPBQlnQbecpFkWbV
po 2y ago
My prediction is that any future data that is published will likely show up in the x.com app. I believe they are trying to privatize all government functions and Musk wants X to be the official government super-app similar to China's system.
- smallerize 2y ago
  NTSB has already said this. https://xcancel.com/NTSB_Newsroom/status/1885734974298435943 https://xcancel.com/NTSB_Newsroom/status/1885734974298435943
  - mikeyouse 2y ago
    Just astonishingly corrupt. Good lord.
  - po 2y ago
    Right... I think it's going to be way more than just data as well. You can expect all gov functions will start to show up in his app. Driver license applications, tax filing, etc...
- dcchambers 2y ago
  So this is how Elon gets his everything app. Jesus Christ, the corruption knows no end. And he might actually pull it off with this administration.
frogperson 2y ago
Is there an organization forming that opposes these fasicts? The Democrats are useless. Can any one point me to a group of organized and motivated individuals?
softwaredoug 2y ago
Is there any legal action happening to prevent removal of legally mandated data publication? Backing up data is useful but it seems if statute has requirements about data reporting, then you would expect some legal action?
refurb 2y ago
Wait a second. The EO in question doesn't require that all mentions of more than two genders be taken down (beyond a few specific policies). The CDC immediately pulls down data that went beyond the requirements of the EO. And now Democrats are saying "this is so scary, data is disappearing!!" But it was Democrats that took the data down without being required to do so?
- andrewflnr 2y ago
  You're assuming the CDC is democrats? You don't think maybe the CDC staff were just rushed and scared by a rampaging executive?
  - refurb 2y ago
    No, I telling you the CDC people are the same ones who were there under Biden. They haven't been replaced. They might be replaced, but they haven't been replaced yet. Sure, they might be "scared", but being scared isn't an excuse for going overboard and doing things that aren't required. They could have just left the data up and complied with the EO through the Director by saying "we are currently reviewing the data and how to comply with the EO, but will leave the existing data up until such time it can be replaced with the updated data". But they score way more political points by yanking it all down and getting the media to fan the flames.
    - icameron 2y ago
      How can we know who is deleting the data? How do we know it’s a long time employee, or know it’s one of the newly appointed loyalists?
      - refurb 2y ago
        Well wait, there isn’t evidence to suggest someone is deleting data, the website is just down. Second, as of last week Trump hasn’t appointed a new Director for the CDC yet. https://www.cbsnews.com/news/cdc-who-is-in-charge-trump-administration/ https://www.cbsnews.com/news/cdc-who-is-in-charge-trump-admi... Third, I’m pretty sure Directors don’t manage the department’s website, the employees do. While the Directors may change, everyone else there is the same as before Trump got elected. They are employed by the Federal government, not appointed. Update: the message on the website now says the website is down temporarily and will be put back up soon.
tehjoker 2y ago
Trump and a section of the conservative elite are like why let COVID or Bird Flu fuck up administration number two? Biden left them this nice present of obfuscating the data on increasing disability until after the election. https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LNU01074597 https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LNU01074597
kmacdough 2y ago
Data is disappearing. Data is a perfectly valid uncountable noun these days. In fact, it's the de facto standard for amorphous collections of digital data, used by most writers, data analysts and laypeople alike. The uncountable form is awkward and out of place in all but the most specific contexts. Language is fluid. Used outdated forms is distracting.
grahamj 2y ago
@dang it's time to throw away the rules and use this site to stand up for what's right.
iancmceachern 2y ago
What else do we need to backup now before it's gone?
iancmceachern 2y ago
When do we start marching in the streets?
kapad 2y ago
https://archive.is/BUyzR https://archive.is/BUyzR
croes 2y ago
Sounds like Gödel was right.
TheRealNGenius 2y ago
[dead]

749 points by doener 2y ago

conartist6 2y ago

The target isn't the people, the target is science. It is becoming clear that the intent is to govern through fear.

deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
lefstathiou 2y ago
[flagged]
- nehal3m 2y ago
  That’s an art project by Gan Golan and Andrew Boyd and has nothing to do with governing.
- conartist6 2y ago
  I'm sorry to tell you this, but the sign was lying to you. It is already too late to "turn back the clock" on climate change. The droughts, the floods, the fires: we are already paying the debts of past inaction.
- plagiarist 2y ago
  I sure as fuck wish we had four years. Unfortunately it is already too late.
SmirkingRevenge 2y ago
They're targeting every institution or source of authority that isn't overtly aligned with the party. Academia, science, media, etc. So far it seems to be working, unfortunately.
tremon 2y ago
I think you misunderstand the goal. The target is total control of the people -- the means is disrupting every alternative voice and narrative.

Tyrubias 2y ago

It’s terrifying that data US taxpayers paid for, collected and analyzed in the name of public health, can be removed on a whim. While there are a lot of efforts to archive said data, it would still make it unavailable to Americans who are not tech savvy. Unfortunately, that seems to be the idea, I think.

jagged-chisel 2y ago
Isn't this data already inaccessible to those who are not tech savvy? My grandma isn’t visiting any of the data download sites provided by the federal government. She doesn’t even know why she would, or even that such data is available. And if I provide it to her, she hasn’t the skills to do anything with it.
- talldayo 2y ago
  It's a bit like asking whether road signs are effective for Americans who can't read. The signs are there for the people that are using the road, and if you're not using the road you can safely ignore it.
  - whatshisface 2y ago
    It's also a bit like saying that medical school is an elitist institution that only benefits the medical class. :-)
  - seabass-labrax 2y ago
    I'm not sure the analogy works: roads were around long before writing, and there are still road users who can't read. That is why pedestrian crossing signals use lights in the shape of a person rather than written instructions.
  - Sakos 2y ago
    More like asking whether road signs are effective for Americans who are passengers in cars. No, it doesn't directly do her any good that they're technically accessible since she can't act on it, but it sure as hell affects her life that other people have access to the information provided by road signs.

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

CalRobert 2y ago

This is part of a broader rolling catastrophe. Musk is evidently seizing control of the Office of Personnel Management https://www.usnews.com/news/world/articles/2025-01-31/exclusive-musk-aides-lock-government-workers-out-of-computer-systems-at-us-agency-sources-say https://www.usnews.com/news/world/articles/2025-01-31/exclus... Nasa took down their applied sciences page and is evidently scrubbing the data https://www.reddit.com/r/gis/comments/1icqchv/why_is_the_nasa_applied_sciences_website_is_down/ https://www.reddit.com/r/gis/comments/1icqchv/why_is_the_nas... (https://appliedsciences.nasa.gov/ https://appliedsciences.nasa.gov/) Lots of other data sets are disappearing too: https://mashable.com/article/government-datasets-disappear-since-trump-inauguration https://mashable.com/article/government-datasets-disappear-s... There is active discussion of this at https://www.reddit.com/r/DataHoarder/ https://www.reddit.com/r/DataHoarder/ as well as at https://www.reddit.com/r/fednews/ https://www.reddit.com/r/fednews/

diggan 2y ago
> Musk is evidently seizing control of the Office of Personnel Management Suddenly I feel out of the loop when it comes to US politics, how come Musk is suddenly seemingly seizing control of parts of the US government? I don't recall him being on any ballots or anything?
- CalRobert 2y ago
  As it so happens he did not appear on any ballots. But Musk (his aides more specifically) have locked federal employees out of their own systems https://www.reuters.com/world/us/musk-aides-lock-government-workers-out-computer-systems-us-agency-sources-say-2025-01-31/ https://www.reuters.com/world/us/musk-aides-lock-government-... Evidently set up an on-prem email server at the OPM to send out their emails asking disloyal employees to resign https://gizmodo.com/federal-employees-sue-agency-over-new-email-system-allegedly-linked-to-elon-musk-2000556737 https://gizmodo.com/federal-employees-sue-agency-over-new-em... And is attempting to do the same at the US Treasury (edit: I meant to gain access to/control of, not the email server thing) https://www.finance.senate.gov/chairmans-news/wyden-demands-answers-following-report-of-musk-personnel-seeking-access-to-highly-sensitive-us-treasury-payments-system https://www.finance.senate.gov/chairmans-news/wyden-demands-... The twitzkrieg seems to be working.

fabian2k 2y ago

This does not only affect the obvious ideological targets of purging any mention of DEI or gender. One section that is missing seems to be the official vaccine recommendations. Go to the ACIP page (https://www.cdc.gov/acip/ https://www.cdc.gov/acip/) and click on the "Vaccine-specific recommendations". Other affected topics are HIV prevention, birth control/contraception, domestic violence and probably many more.

Krssst 2y ago
Maybe it was unintentional but the Long COVID pulse survey page disappeared: https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/covid19/pulse/long-covid.htm https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/covid19/pulse/long-covid.htm (but explanations about long COVID are still available) The page I used to look for mask efficiency disappeared too (https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/71/wr/mm7106e1.htm https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/71/wr/mm7106e1.htm ) but the CDC website still discusses masks so it does not seem to be intentional: https://www.cdc.gov/respiratory-viruses/prevention/masks.html https://www.cdc.gov/respiratory-viruses/prevention/masks.htm...
- monsieurbanana 2y ago
  That's wishful thinking, sadly. It's much more likely they haven't gotten to it yet.
- Scoundreller 2y ago
  And the (I thought popular) "Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report" hasn't been published since Jan 16th... https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/index.html https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/index.html Looks to have been an uninterrupted weekly streak since 1982... the (still up) archives: https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/mmwr_wk/wk_pvol.html https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/mmwr_wk/wk_pvol.html
Applejinx 2y ago
If there's action by an adversary to try and weaponize naturally occurring disease (never mind the prospect of trying to heighten effectiveness of artificially created disease), that would be expected. Vaccines and healthcare in general are intended as a safeguard against pandemics and mass death. If the goal IS mass death, it makes practical sense to try and delete all health and vaccine information in hopes it's lost forever and the society that uses it is rendered helpless against such events or weapons. I'm interested to note that HN's commentariat hasn't mentioned the extent to which all scientific research of this nature was immediately defunded: my social media had indirect exposure to a lot of healthcare researchers who were freaking out, many days ago. Did you notice that part or is this the first sign of it that's made its way over here? I'd note that defunding medicine isn't strictly HN-type content, though mass deletion of data certainly seems to be HN-adjacent. I would think hackers and entrepreneurs would take that sort of thing personally, as it more or less attacks them by starving them of information that could be useful.

whirlwin 2y ago

Clicked the link and quickly learned it was not about Change Data Capture...

CalRobert 2y ago
This would actually be a great place for capturing change data....
bmacho 2y ago
I don't think the article ever resolves CDC (I can't find it at least), so it can be about Change Data Capture. edit: It is about this CDC: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Centers_for_Disease_Control_and_Prevention https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Centers_for_Disease_Control_an... "The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is the national public health agency of the United States. It is a United States federal agency under the Department of Health and Human Services, and is headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia. The agency's main goal is the protection of public health and safety through the control and prevention of disease, injury, and disability in the US and worldwide."
thom 2y ago
Whether it’s data or things that can kill you, you’re guaranteed at least once delivery either way.

riffraff 2y ago

There's some people organizing to preserve stuff under the "safeguarding research" moniker https://fedihum.org/@SafeguardingResearch https://fedihum.org/@SafeguardingResearch https://safeguarding-research.discourse.group/ https://safeguarding-research.discourse.group/

bmitc 2y ago
That doesn't matter anymore. No one believed the CDC data to begin with. You think they're going to believe it when it comes from third-party backups?
- Insanity 2y ago
  I think the benefit is not just from regular people having access - but other researchers who do need/trust the data.
  - cmxch 2y ago
    The problem is that the provenance of that data will be questioned. It’s one thing that researchers will trust and use that data, but that citing these archive sites will fall flat when their conclusions have to exit academia and be subject to extra scrutiny.

paulyy_y 2y ago

What's more depressing is this was completely predictable, totally avoidable, but half the country welcomed this wave of oppression with open arms.

diggan 2y ago
> but half the country welcomed this wave of oppression with open arms. And the other half? They seem to welcome this as well, but with crossed arms. Where are the protests? Seems most people end up writing upset messages on Twitter/Bluesky, but also seems there are no grassroots movements to actually protest the borderline coup that is happening?
- CalRobert 2y ago
  Protest doesn't do anything. I marched plenty and it accomplished nothing except letting like-minded people blow off a bit of steam and feel like something we did mattered. If anything it was just a distraction.
  - 9283409232 2y ago
    The answer is a general strike. This will never happen in the US though.
    - CalRobert 2y ago
      Hard to strike when your boss can make you and your kid homeless. Housing precarity is a useful tool of control.
      - 9283409232 2y ago
        According to this[0], they want around 4% of Americans to agree to a general strike. The problem is the people who are most capable of surviving a general strike are not the same group that has the most impact in a general strike. [0] https://generalstrikeus.com/ https://generalstrikeus.com/

linuxftw 2y ago

[flagged]

bandrami 2y ago
> I think we can all agree that depending on which administration is in charge, "Government Science" is anything but unbiased. Nope, but you've just made it clear you're susceptible to propaganda.
- linuxftw 2y ago
  Will you trust the 'science' that is performed via the CDC under the Trump administration? Did you trust the 'science' performed under past administrations? Now, imagine someone holding the reverse position. Who's right? Which government institutions do you find generally trustworthy, and which do you find generally untrustworthy? Has this changed from administration to administration? Do you think your ideological viewpoint has influenced your opinions? Edit: None of the responders answered my questions. Its impossible for most people to admit political bias, as evidenced here.
  - jmward01 2y ago
    These types of false equivalence arguments need to go away. Under Trump norms of career civil servants loyal to doing a good job for the country is being shattered. Institutions that we could trust to be resistant politics are now being weaponized. I would have trusted the CDC under every administration except this one. This administration is demonstrably different.
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
  - throwworhtthrow 2y ago
    I guess the reason you're fine with the ideological purge that's happening now is because you mistakenly believe the bureaucracies were always operating in ideological lockstep with the current administration. I suddenly pity you for the fear and distrust you must carry at all times for things you don't understand.

hirako2000 2y ago

I recall several heads of the CDC auditioning, their answers to representatives would indicate it is/was (mis) information that undoubtedly the new administration would make sure to "purge". It is becoming very difficult to distinguish justice from crooks in the U.S. The CDC had lost all credibility anyway, dismantling it wouldn't be a bad idea, maybe not all of it, so that's what we are (not) seeing there.

deadbabe 2y ago

If people really cared they would have stored copies of this data, not just relied on a single source.

duxup 2y ago
I care, but I don’t download everything I care about, that would be a lot.
vharuck 2y ago
That only makes sense if everyone downloads every data set in case they need it one day. I unhappily agree that's the case with private companies' data, because any company's not guaranteed to be around tomorrow. But the government should be a steward of the data it collects. I also wonder how many of these data sets were required by law.
Insanity 2y ago
Would be quite expensive when talking about potential petabytes of data.

BSDobelix 2y ago

Brainfart ahead: Is that maybe to prevent (for example china) from getting the data for AI models, but giving it to the "nice" Stargate?

joemazerino 2y ago

Are or is?

lentil_soup 2y ago
Both, the word "data" can be used for both singular and plural
technothrasher 2y ago
Are. If you are talking about a specific set of information, data is a plural. If you are talking about the concept of information sets, data is a singular. "Data is stored on a computer's hard drive." "The data for the experiment are stored on the computer's hard drive."

nine_zeros 2y ago

America voted for cons, crooks and thugs. And is getting conned, crooked and thugged. Entirely predictable. And well deserved. I say this as someone living and suffering in America. There is no one else to blame but ourselves. The future is bleak.

jonnycomputer 2y ago
And they're gonna learn it good and hard.
reddalo 2y ago
It's even worse for us of the rest of the world, because the United States influence the whole world, and we can't do anything against this tragedy.
- nine_zeros 2y ago
  It is bad for the rest of the world but the rest of the world has an exit. Call your representatives and stop using US dollar for trade. Literally, that one action alone will save a lot of grief for people outside the US. This is not a joke. What will sting Elon, Trump and crooks the most is losing their wealth. The rest of the world does not need to suffer for these crooks.
  - oefrha 2y ago
    That’s wishful thinking… One can’t simply stop using USD for trade on a whim. Decoupling will take at least a decade if not longer.
    - marcosdumay 2y ago
      Nah, stop using the US$ for trade is as simply as just stop doing it. There's no lack of infrastructure, and plenty of commerce doesn't use it already. What is hard is desinvesting from the US treasure. You have to sell those somewhere, and if everybody tries, their value will quickly go to 0. But if the US is successful in making their trade-balance positive, this will solve itself without a lot of hardship, it's just a matter of the rest of the world helping them here. Macroeconomics is not what will show you problems here. The US is inserted itself into every supply chain on the world, but you will only notice this if you look at the details. Maybe we should start with an intellectual property reform...

tomohawk 2y ago

It's too early to tell, but I would not be surprised if later at least a portion of this is found to be "malicious compliance". For example, President Truman ordered the US military to be (re)integrated. Through malicious compliance, racist officers put their own spin on the orders. "Well, he didn't say that black officers would get equal access to the officers club, so we won't let them in." It too a former 5 star general (President Eisenhower) to stamp out the malicious compliance and make it stick. There was already a case of malicious compliance with the DEI EO on the part of certain US air force personnel taking down material about the Tuskugee Airmen. The new sec def stomped that out within 4 hours.

bongodongobob 2y ago
What? This isn't malicious compliance. This is exactly what Republicans said they were going to do. Destroy everything that doesn't agree with them.
- honestSysAdmin 2y ago
  [flagged]
- refurb 2y ago
  No, it's malicious complaince. You can read the EO here: https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/01/defending-women-from-gender-ideology-extremism-and-restoring-biological-truth-to-the-federal-government/ https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/01/defe... Beyond a few specific documents, nothing in there requires the CDC to pull down all this data immediately. There is even a section about "progress updates by 120 days". The CDC is still run by the same people as under Biden. They are the ones that immediately pulled down the data, not Trump hires.
MisterKent 2y ago
Malicious Compliance is not the right word. But, I thought about it and am slightly hopeful. Their goal could be obedience such that A) the Musk cronies don't come through and truly delete the data (vs, just taking it offline) B) they don't get fired and can take a stand when "bigger" issues happen. I.e another pandemic. Or y'know, C) they want to keep their jobs and decided to just obey.

tonetheman 2y ago

[dead]

philipwhiuk 2y ago

Don't worry, absolutely no issues have occurred in medicine as a result of a lack of data on how a drug impacts pregnant people.

PaulRobinson 2y ago
You'll be pleased to know that multiple countries elsewhere do worry about this, and will continue to publish evidence-based recommendations about appropriate drug usage. Every other member of the G8, NATO, AUKUS, and so on, all publish science for free, so as the US declines into a corruption-fuelled failed state, there will be access to that material still. I saw Mexican emergency services helping in Los Angeles the other week during the fires - more mature and capable countries are always here to help, even in very direct ways like this, where the US public sector is too fragile and broken to support their own citizens. There's been a rich history of this happening across Europe and Africa for decades, so others know what to do. You might think I'm being sarcastic, or patronising or somehow trying to belittle the US. I'm not. That's where the country is now. It's failing in a way we've seen others fail many, many times before. The future is predictable, and it doesn't seem like anybody wants to change it.
- emmelaich 2y ago
  The person you're responding too was being sarcastic.

agilob 2y ago

They were disappearing 6 years ago too

sega_sai 2y ago

An "interesting" consequence of these type of measures of stopping collecting or publishing data will be that soon it will be impossible to tell how much infant mortality, or number of cases of tuberculosis or similar changed with respect to last year. Maybe that is partially the goal.

watwut 2y ago
Well, if your plan is to destroy governmental agencies while being in charge of them, it makes sense to destroy anything that might show you are causing harm first.
tremon 2y ago
Yes, that may be part of the same playbook. Those pesky foreign viruses are taking our ill! We must stop that! Glory to the White Death!
mcguire 2y ago
See maternal mortality in Texas. https://www.texastribune.org/2024/12/06/texas-maternal-mortality-committee-deaths/ https://www.texastribune.org/2024/12/06/texas-maternal-morta...

emaro 2y ago

I've no doubt things like this will continue to happen. Trump, Musk and co will not stop on their own transforming the US into an authoritarian and likely fascist state. It's now up to the people of the US to stand up and save their democracy. Russia and China must be delighted to see the damage Trump's dealing.

talldayo 2y ago
> It's now up to the people of the US to stand up and save their democracy. We weren't able to save our economy from monopolies and tyranny, and now you want us to go stand up against the people with tanks and machine guns!? At this rate I expect you'll tell me to stop importing iPhones and Perrier...
- emaro 2y ago
  > We weren't able to save our economy from monopolies and tyranny, and now you want us to go stand up against the people with tanks and machine guns!? Yes, because what's the alternative? To give up and watch? I won't be easy, but if you're not even trying, no one can save you. > At this rate I expect you'll tell me to stop importing iPhones and Perrier... No, I won't. I don't tell you what to do at all. It's just my view on the path the US currently is. And I'm hoping, yes, because what happens in/to the US affects the world a great deal.

Insanity 2y ago

Interesting to see how quickly the US is going downhill. I’m sure everyone thought “the Roman Empire is too big to fail” yet here we are with a similar mindset about USA.

shrillhnpsycho3 2y ago
[flagged]

cmriversepi 2y ago

I’m an epidemiology professor and I write a weekly “weather report” outbreaks [1]. These communication and data blackouts are coming at a bad time. We’re having an unusual flu season—activity has rebounded unexpectedly. I’ve been having to scramble for data, last week by visiting each state health department website. It’s really troubling and consequential. [1] https://caitlinrivers.substack.com https://caitlinrivers.substack.com

ocschwar 2y ago
Reach out to the developer behind 91-DIVOC. That won't cover red states that go dark when and if they do, but it was invaluable to me during the covid pandemic.
dgacmu 2y ago
I'm a CS professor who used to write and develop the software behind a daily and weekly Pennsylvania covid report. I get the pain here. It's a messy, incompatible jumble without the CDC. Would you like me to see if there are some CS folks here to provide programming support to help with what you're doing? I -hope- this is transient but I'm not holding my breath either. (feel free to reach out at dga@cs.cmu.edu)
- dgacmu 2y ago
  Relieved to see it's back online. Hopefully it remains reliable in both senses of the word.
pjc50 2y ago
This is intentional. They're mad about the covid response, and want to prevent mask mandates or lockdowns at any cost. At any cost. Including suppressing information about bird flu for as long as possible.
- repeekad 2y ago
  [flagged]

tlogan 2y ago

Nobody complained about downtimes (at least for Atlas Plus) when they started changing “sex” to “sex or gender” / “gender.” Let’s be honest. I can’t find a single article about this because it was considered normal—they were simply upgrading their system. The level of dishonesty here is astounding. Let’s wait three weeks. If Atlas Plus is still down, I’ll post an update here.

shrillhnpsycho3 2y ago
[flagged]
fn-mote 2y ago
Please be specific about what you think is dishonest. It sounds like you are conflating a planned information removal with some unspecified amount of upgrade time? Those aren’t equivalent to me.
- tlogan 2y ago
  The specifics: The data is not disappearing. The data and the related tools have been temporarily removed to be cleaned and brought into compliance with Trump’s executive order (basically removing “gender” or replacing it with “sex”) That should be the intellectually honest title and that is what is happening. So lets check in 3 weeks. If data and tools are not back then we can say and complain about data disappearing.
  - IAmNotACellist 2y ago
    It's The Atlantic. They have no interest in being honest about the topic, telling you why the data is unavailable, or saying when it will be back (once they update the language that bookends the studies). The purpose is to make you angry and think they're burning data because they hate science.
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
  - nojito 2y ago

dylan604 2y ago

Let's assume that in 4 years, existing limitations are still in place and a new POTUS is in place. It would be interesting if these edits are soft deletes where they are easily reversed with the next administration, or will they need to go to the backups to restore data. This ping ponging from one admin to the next on doesn't actually change the science. "The great thing about science is that it doesn't need you to believe it for it to be true." To me, the thinking that the hiding of data is going to make it go away is just one of those things that shows how unintelligent the person with that notion truly is.

phillipcarter 2y ago

This is a blitzkrieg campaign designed to try and get Musk and his people as much control of the digital government as possible before the roadblocks (legal, systematic, etc.) make things too difficult for him. As it stands, his goal is likely a purge of the federal government akin to what he did with Twitter. And the resulting 80% drop in revenue by Twitter is a similar kind of outcome we can expect from his careless meddling.

ryandrake 2y ago
Except of course, instead of a company nobody cares about losing advertisers and money, lives are going to be lost. The stakes are higher when you start dismantling critical institutions and stuffing them full of loyal incompetents.
neumann 2y ago
It is very plausible that he is also using it to get all the data he wants from this, not just to scrub it. It would make sense given his desire to compete on AGI that he can both scrub this data for public use and feed it to his own training sets.
- phillipcarter 2y ago
  I don't think he cares a whole lot about xAI at the moment. He's busy being shadow president.
computerthings 2y ago
https://bsky.app/profile/altnps.bsky.social/post/3lh3dl3rkgc2u https://bsky.app/profile/altnps.bsky.social/post/3lh3dl3rkgc... > Elon Musk staff has been caught installing hard drives inside the Office of Personnel Management (OPM), the Treasury Department, and the General Services Administration (GSA). His staff encountered resistance when demanding that Treasury officials grant access to systems managing the flow of more than $6 trillion annually to programs like Social Security and Medicare. Tensions escalated when Musk’s aides were discovered at OPM accessing systems, including a vast database known as the Enterprise Human Resources Integration (EHRI), which contains sensitive information such as dates of birth, Social Security numbers, performance appraisals, home addresses, pay grades, and length of service for government employees. In response to employees speaking out, Musk’s aides locked civil servants out of computer systems and offices, with reports of personal items being searched.

timst4 2y ago

This is the war on Science. Next comes the war on Education. The obliteration of democracy comes next. If you imagine Trump gives up this level of power without bloodshed in the streets you are deluding yourself.

ChrisArchitect 2y ago

Earlier: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42894357 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42894357

perihelions 2y ago

The scope of the scrubbing is broader that datasets. On /r/medicine they're reporting that some treatments guidelines for physicians (100 page+ PDF's) are disappearing, if they're adjacent to the topic of sex: https://old.reddit.com/r/medicine/comments/1iepzln/cdc_has_removed_the_pages_with_sti_treatment_and/ https://old.reddit.com/r/medicine/comments/1iepzln/cdc_has_r... ("CDC has removed the pages with STI treatment and contraceptive guidelines (self.medicine)")

NelsonMinar 2y ago
The CDC page on PrEP, a life-saving medicine to protect against HIV, has been removed. This will result in people dying. https://www.cdc.gov/hiv/prevention/prep.html https://www.cdc.gov/hiv/prevention/prep.html
- beefnugs 2y ago
  Isn't this a worthwhile kick in the pants? No one who actually relies upon real raw data is just downloading a live snapshot from official government hosting on demand are they? Proper data handling procedures is streaming updates, doing your own backups and archiving and sharing where possible and important. Not trusting the everlasting benevolence of whiplash politically controlled resources?
  - llamaimperative 2y ago
    > whiplash politically controlled resources When was the last "whiplash" that did something this catastrophic? Put blame where blame lies.
  - NelsonMinar 2y ago
    what are you on about? The page that was destroyed was consumer health information about a life-saving preventative medication.
    - desumeku 2y ago
      And this was the only website on the internet with information about it? People are going to die because this one website was taken down and there is no other place to possibly read about it?

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

braincat31415 2y ago

I would like to see ALL FDA documents on covid-19 vaccine emergency use authorization. Biden's FDA has been fighting court orders tooth and nail for 4 years. Where were all the Trump haters with their outrage... hypocrisy at its best.

fithisux 2y ago

Cover up by CDC of their past sins?

BlueTemplar 2y ago

Because journalists aren't able to do their jobs : > The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is the national public health agency of the United States.

libertarian1 2y ago

[flagged]

SV_BubbleTime 2y ago
That label is unpopular.

dang 2y ago

Related ongoing thread: Archivists work to save disappearing data.gov datasets - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42881367 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42881367 - Jan 2025 (56 comments)

breadwinner 2y ago

Data is the ultimate Fact Check. This is a President that's adamantly opposed to fact checking [1] and has even coerced Facebook to drop fact checking. Of course they don't want data on government sites that disprove their "alternate facts". [1] https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/4920827-60-minutes-trump-cancel/ https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/4920827-60-minutes-tru...

deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
calculatte 2y ago
[flagged]
- craftsman 2y ago
  I understand you to be saying that these insiders who wanted to remove evidence waited nearly three months after the election, and more than a week after inauguration to do this. Do I understand this correctly?
- honestSysAdmin 2y ago
  [flagged]
- lemon_zest 2y ago
  Wait, so they waited until yesterday to remove incriminating evidence? Just when Trump’s staff also came in to purge data? What a coincidence!
uncomplexity_ 2y ago
lol if you watch zuck's take on it his problem is the fact checkers ended up being biased.
- selfmodruntime 2y ago
  They sometimes are. If you're using a biased source to fact-check, you're just transitively applying that bias.

honestSysAdmin 2y ago

[flagged]

lemon_zest 2y ago
How is this relevant to OP’s point?
- honestSysAdmin 2y ago
  [flagged]
  - lemon_zest 2y ago
    What is the argument you are trying to make?
    - mmastrac 2y ago
      It's a "gotcha" question that suggests the poster of it is spending a bit too much time obsessing about it in the circles they run in.
      - honestSysAdmin 2y ago
        [flagged]
    - Drakim 2y ago
      Most likely some sort of "liberals get things wrong too, so you shouldn't criticize Trump for lying so much".
      - honestSysAdmin 2y ago
        A vicious hoax campaign is not merely "getting things wrong" tho.
- honestSysAdmin 2y ago

chrishoyle 2y ago

Related ongoing discussion The government information crisis is bigger than you think it is - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42895331 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42895331

angelgonzales 2y ago

This is very similar to when the CDC stopped recording defensive gun use statistics! The pendulum is certainly swinging, on the other hand, I think we should retain data even if it doesn’t align with the current administration. I think it’s important that people should record data that they value, independent of governments, so they can maintain a source of truth throughout time. Articles from Axios, NYT and posts on X can change or be deleted, it’s important to take snapshots to go back and check for deltas.

jeanlucas 2y ago
Yeah, we need snapshots of the internet, not just the data
silverquiet 2y ago
It seems to me that all uses of guns are defensive.
- nickff 2y ago
  Assassination and suicide both seem non-defensive, unless you use a very broad definition of defense.
  - timewizard 2y ago
    Suicide is more common than homocide. By a factor of 2 to 1. Murder is more common than self defense. By a factor of 10 to 1. In all cases you are highly likely (>90%) to be on a first name basis with the person that kills you.
    - nickff 2y ago
      It should also be noted that uses of guns in self defense (e.g. “pulling a gun”) not involving any injuries or deaths are not well-tracked (though they’re estimated to be much more frequent than instances involving bodily harm).

ea550ff70a 2y ago

What a disgrace

_blk 2y ago

It's sad to see that data is so politicised. You'd think that empirical data is irrefutable but Mr. Fauci's last-minute pardon ought to put all CDC data produced the last decade under scrutiny. While I agree with the removal of potentially erroneous information, I seriously hope the data is not just removed from the CDC website but remains available for the public (along with who's funds it was produced under) and becomes fact checked by non-pharma sponsored entities. Only this will restore trust and provide a more complete picture.

cs702 2y ago

W.T.F.!? Let us hope this is just a temporary thing. Let us hope the disappearing data will resurface again at some point. Let us hope this isn't driven by ideological motivations. Sigh.

tclancy 2y ago
Uh, I’ve got some really bad news.

foresto 2y ago

Maybe useful to someone: https://archive.org/details/20250128-cdc-datasets https://archive.org/details/20250128-cdc-datasets """ An archive of all CDC datasets uploaded to https://data.cdc.gov/browse https://data.cdc.gov/browse before January 28th, 2025. Excludes corrupt datasets and data not publicly accessible. Most datasets are accompanied by an additional file ending in -meta that includes the metadata associated with the data. Attachments referenced in these files can be found in the attachments/ folder. If you would like to seed this data to improve its redundancy please do not use the auto generated torrent, as it is incomplete. Instead use the torrent file labeled "full-20250128-cdc-datasets-USETHIS.torrent" """

grumple 2y ago
Thanks, that is useful. Are there any other efforts to archive all the data on government websites? I suppose we could crawl archive.org.
- abracadaniel 2y ago
  It will only take an order making the data illegal to host to have it removed. More copies are critical.
  - 59nadir 2y ago
    This means nothing if you host it on non-US servers. No one would take it seriously internationally.
h0l0cube 2y ago
This highlights why the Internet Archive is so important.

headsman771 2y ago

Seems like there's more than a little malicious compliance happening to try and generate negative headlines.

jeffgreco 2y ago
Hardly. Government employees are currently being threatened with punishment for not abiding with wildly illegal instructions.

charles_f 2y ago

What terrifies me this time around compared to the previous one is that people in support of this kind of initiative are either much more vocal, more boosted, or simply more dominant. In his first term, there was still a form of reserve. It even permeates in this comment thread. It now feels like crazy conspiracy theories and idiocy have become an accepted, and either major stance. I just went on Twitter for a minute, and the only response to anything sensible is insults and derogatory calling. It just started and I already feel tired

llamaimperative 2y ago
For what it's worth, we have no reason to believe this stuff is actually popular. But yes, the right wing propaganda machine has been shockingly effective, and you have a whole lot of people on this forum now trying to contort themselves into odd shapes to justify a coup because their heroes are either 1) at the helm or 2) cheerleaders for it. Trump won the election by a very slim margin and his popularity will only go down from here. Don't be discouraged by the online stuff. Twitter in particular is just an information weapon now.

baudpunk 2y ago

LLMs have already been trained on all of that data, so it's probably an empty gesture.

SV_BubbleTime 2y ago
Language models, not fact models. I’m not sure how this isn’t sinking in yet.

tmshapland 2y ago

Where have I seen this before? Oh right, I remember now... "The books targeted for burning were those viewed as being subversive or as representing ideologies opposed to Nazism. These included books written by Jewish, half-Jewish, communist, socialist, anarchist, liberal, pacifist, and sexologist authors among others." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nazi_book_burnings https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nazi_book_burnings

nblgbg 2y ago

Don't know if whoever voted thought this through! We are undoing years of good governance, like Data.gov and this, now!

timhigins 2y ago

Removing these records from the public internet could likely be considered illegal under the OPEN Government Data Act, 44 U.S.C. § 3506: > (d) With respect to information dissemination, each agency shall— (3) provide adequate notice when initiating, substantially modifying, or terminating significant information dissemination products; (4) not, except where specifically authorized by statute— (A) establish an exclusive, restricted, or other distribution arrangement that interferes with timely and equitable availability of public information to the public; (B) restrict or regulate the use, resale, or redissemination of public information by the public If these datasets were actually permanently deleted then the incident should be investigated by NARA [1]. The people responsible could be charged with a crime under 18 U.S.C. § 2071: > (b) Whoever, having the custody of any such record, proceeding, map, book, document, paper, or other thing, willfully and unlawfully conceals, removes, mutilates, obliterates, falsifies, or destroys the same, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than three years, or both; and shall forfeit his office and be disqualified from holding any office under the United States. As used in this subsection, the term “office” does not include the office held by any person as a retired officer of the Armed Forces of the United States. 1. https://www.archives.gov/records-mgmt/resources/unauthorizeddispositionoffederalrecords https://www.archives.gov/records-mgmt/resources/unauthorized...

juujian 2y ago
Damage done, mission accomplished... If you do something illegal and can get away with it relatively unscathed, then it isn't in practice illegal.
- astrange 2y ago
  How do you know you've gotten away with it? That takes the rest of your life. (Well, statute of limitations.)
  - viraptor 2y ago
    It's going to be a couple months at most. If it's not punished immediately, it's practically legal with the current gov. And the next one will have way bigger things to unfuck than some missing documents.

EchoReflection 2y ago

given the Atlantic's slightly left bias¹ and RFK Jr's stated intentions to shake things up with the FDA and CDC, it makes sense to me that the CDC would be preparing to cover their tracks preemptively.² ¹https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/the-atlantic/ https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/the-atlantic/ ²https://x.com/i/grok/share/GzB1sfssRnPBQlnQbecpFkWbV https://x.com/i/grok/share/GzB1sfssRnPBQlnQbecpFkWbV

po 2y ago

My prediction is that any future data that is published will likely show up in the x.com app. I believe they are trying to privatize all government functions and Musk wants X to be the official government super-app similar to China's system.

smallerize 2y ago
NTSB has already said this. https://xcancel.com/NTSB_Newsroom/status/1885734974298435943 https://xcancel.com/NTSB_Newsroom/status/1885734974298435943
- mikeyouse 2y ago
  Just astonishingly corrupt. Good lord.
- po 2y ago
  Right... I think it's going to be way more than just data as well. You can expect all gov functions will start to show up in his app. Driver license applications, tax filing, etc...
dcchambers 2y ago
So this is how Elon gets his everything app. Jesus Christ, the corruption knows no end. And he might actually pull it off with this administration.

frogperson 2y ago

Is there an organization forming that opposes these fasicts? The Democrats are useless. Can any one point me to a group of organized and motivated individuals?

softwaredoug 2y ago

Is there any legal action happening to prevent removal of legally mandated data publication? Backing up data is useful but it seems if statute has requirements about data reporting, then you would expect some legal action?

refurb 2y ago

Wait a second. The EO in question doesn't require that all mentions of more than two genders be taken down (beyond a few specific policies). The CDC immediately pulls down data that went beyond the requirements of the EO. And now Democrats are saying "this is so scary, data is disappearing!!" But it was Democrats that took the data down without being required to do so?

andrewflnr 2y ago
You're assuming the CDC is democrats? You don't think maybe the CDC staff were just rushed and scared by a rampaging executive?
- refurb 2y ago
  No, I telling you the CDC people are the same ones who were there under Biden. They haven't been replaced. They might be replaced, but they haven't been replaced yet. Sure, they might be "scared", but being scared isn't an excuse for going overboard and doing things that aren't required. They could have just left the data up and complied with the EO through the Director by saying "we are currently reviewing the data and how to comply with the EO, but will leave the existing data up until such time it can be replaced with the updated data". But they score way more political points by yanking it all down and getting the media to fan the flames.
  - icameron 2y ago
    How can we know who is deleting the data? How do we know it’s a long time employee, or know it’s one of the newly appointed loyalists?
    - refurb 2y ago
      Well wait, there isn’t evidence to suggest someone is deleting data, the website is just down. Second, as of last week Trump hasn’t appointed a new Director for the CDC yet. https://www.cbsnews.com/news/cdc-who-is-in-charge-trump-administration/ https://www.cbsnews.com/news/cdc-who-is-in-charge-trump-admi... Third, I’m pretty sure Directors don’t manage the department’s website, the employees do. While the Directors may change, everyone else there is the same as before Trump got elected. They are employed by the Federal government, not appointed. Update: the message on the website now says the website is down temporarily and will be put back up soon.

tehjoker 2y ago

Trump and a section of the conservative elite are like why let COVID or Bird Flu fuck up administration number two? Biden left them this nice present of obfuscating the data on increasing disability until after the election. https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LNU01074597 https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LNU01074597

kmacdough 2y ago

Data is disappearing. Data is a perfectly valid uncountable noun these days. In fact, it's the de facto standard for amorphous collections of digital data, used by most writers, data analysts and laypeople alike. The uncountable form is awkward and out of place in all but the most specific contexts. Language is fluid. Used outdated forms is distracting.

grahamj 2y ago

@dang it's time to throw away the rules and use this site to stand up for what's right.

iancmceachern 2y ago

What else do we need to backup now before it's gone?

iancmceachern 2y ago

When do we start marching in the streets?

kapad 2y ago

https://archive.is/BUyzR https://archive.is/BUyzR

croes 2y ago

Sounds like Gödel was right.

TheRealNGenius 2y ago

[dead]