6 ms·

If they're engaged in doing illegal stuff, at the federal level, I fully expect Trump to just pardon everyone involved. Maybe they're too deep in the Yarvin /

If they're engaged in doing illegal stuff, at the federal level, I fully expect Trump to just pardon everyone involved. Maybe they're too deep in the Yarvin / Thield / Musk (Kool-Aid) sauce, but they should know better. This stuff will follow them for life.

Terr_ 2y ago
> to just pardon More likely Trump continue to fire prosecutors that try to do their jobs upholding the literal law. No prosecution, no pardon needed. The check on that is for Congress to impeach and remove a corrupt President from office, but that will be difficult with how many Republicans are complicit.
- nullocator 2y ago
  Based on what we've seen this past week it seems the next administration would have an obligation to fire them all, in much the way Trump is firing anyone who looked into or investigated him. And extrapolating to the next few months I'd say the next administration will likely have an obligation to attempt to send anyone associated with DOGE to prison for the rest of their lives. At least this appears to be the type of government Donald Trump and his voters believe America should have.
  - ModernMech 2y ago
    A lot of people are acting like the end of history is here.
    - rbanffy 2y ago
      It seems clear the US turned a page in its history.
    - Terr_ 2y ago
      Do you remember when Presidents disclosed their finances and avoided things that could look like gifts/bribes? When they didn't fire prosecutors for getting too close to their business? When trial-balloons about becoming "President For Life" were taboo? When their lawyers didn't argue they had presumptive immunity to literally assassinate the other candidate? This news item is just one more previously-unthinkable line crossed in an unambiguous trend towards more-crazy. ___________ > "But the one great shocking occasion, when tens or hundreds or thousands will join with you, never comes. That’s the difficulty. If the last and worst act of the whole regime had come immediately after the first and smallest, thousands, yes, millions would have been sufficiently shocked—if, let us say, the gassing of the Jews in ’43 had come immediately after the ‘German Firm’ stickers on the windows of non-Jewish shops in ’33. But of course this isn’t the way it happens. In between come all the hundreds of little steps, some of them imperceptible, each of them preparing you not to be shocked by the next." -- They Thought They Were Free: The Germans The Germans, 1933-45* by Milton Meyer, published 1955.
      - throwaway141728 2y ago
        I want to add here that the Holocaust required a war (the Wannsee conference was in 1942), massive censorship (easy during a war) and misdirection like model concentration camps (Theresienstadt), where international agencies could look around and see how "humane" everyone was treated. There was no Internet, only official propaganda. Sometimes the truth leaked via the Swedish embassy or railway workers, but it cannot spread far if those who spread it are killed themselves. But I agree that people all over the world have been docile and compliant since 2020 on all sorts of issues, so the danger is there even if it should be harder today.
      - matwood 2y ago
        > Do you remember when Presidents disclosed their finances and avoided things that could look like gifts/bribes? So quaint. Now bribes are out in the open and no one even bats an eye. Trump coin, Trump media, never released anything about tax returns, selling merch, etc... It's comical to me that his followers think he's dismantling the deep state grifters, when he is a deep state grifter. I have to give some credit to Trump and the media around him for being masters at the narrative. Hillary's emails and Hunter on a board of a company requires investigations and congressional involvement, but Trump and his family casually take 100's of millions if not billions in bribes and no one thinks twice.
    - chairmansteve 2y ago
      It is the end of democracy in the United States.
      - theonething 2y ago
        yeah, that's what people said about his first administration too. yawn
    - kccoder 2y ago
      And a lot of people are downplaying the severity of what is currently happening.
      - zelphirkalt 2y ago
        And are thereby enabling it, knowingly or unknowingly becoming part of it.
    - Whatarethese 2y ago
      The goalposts will be moved until our country is a husk of its former self. Thats literally how constitutional republics die.
    - varjag 2y ago
      Quite the opposite, it's a lot of history in the making. But most likely it is the undignified end of Pax Americana.
      - jauntywundrkind 2y ago
        *Unmaking. But yes. Some real collapse of the republic scale shit, take over by Orban style autocratic political men. Pax Americana & our influence in the world abroad for sure. This is potentially falling of the Soviet Union bad. Not that we will dissolve the union (still hopefully a very low chance) but that the system of government collapses & the various business-mafias squabble to claim what they can in the power vacuum that follows; a loss of national integrity.
    - throw0101c 2y ago
      > A lot of people are acting like the end of history is here. Would you rather: * 'over react' about the end of history, and be wrong (i.e. things turn out fine), or * 'under react' and end up with a bunch of thugs in charge? It's possible this is a situation where you're crying "wolf" when there isn't one, but given Trump's erratic mind, and the stated plans of the political right * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_2025 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_2025 which side to you want to err of? And with regards to "over reacting" and nothing happening: a lot of folks said Y2K was an over reaction because nothing happened, but nothing happened because people did a much reacting. That nothing burger was a success, not a sign of over reaction.
  - throw0101c 2y ago
    > And extrapolating to the next few months I'd say the next administration will likely have an obligation to attempt to send anyone associated with DOGE to prison for the rest of their lives. If they get pre-emptive Presidential pardons, nothing can be done (unless you go with state-level charges).
    - bagels 2y ago
      Supreme court has made president king. They can just ignore the pardons.
Shekelphile 2y ago
They're directly attacking government infrastructure, including our intelligence apparatuses. Even if they escape legal consequences they could become targeted for extrajudicial killings by intelligence agencies of the US and allies.
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- Vecr 2y ago
  I assume these are US citizens. The US constitution isn't set up to protect intelligence agencies if they attempt that kind of thing on US soil.
- ctrlp 2y ago
  [flagged]
  - pessimizer 2y ago
    HN is filled with people who work for intelligence agencies and military contractors. Defending US abuses as well-meant mistakes, or framing any professional consequences or exposure of bad things the US does as treasonous is how they sleep at night. They may seem nice and thoughtful when discussing other subjects, but when it comes to surveillance, censorship, subverting elections, or misleading the public, they think it's the most heroic possible thing. I get the impression that they think that they're heroically sacrificing their own morality for the greater good, and if you told them they'd go to hell for what they've done, they would be proud. Meanwhile, outside of that mental drama, they're collecting huge checks and have never missed a meal in their lives. Same vibe you get from people who work in extremely polluting industries who think of themselves as lovers of nature. They're doing what is necessary to save what is possible to save. Also incidentally collecting huge checks.
- electriclove 2y ago
  What attack?? They are working for our government.
antifa 2y ago
[flagged]
- aswanson 2y ago
  [flagged]
- giraffe_lady 2y ago
  Why? He's an american citizen. We have a name for the crime of attacking a state to whom one owes allegiance, and normative punishments for it.
  - antifa 2y ago
    Would love to see Musk tried for treason.
    - trallnag 2y ago
      Would love to float in the dead sea slurping on a pina colada right now.
  - leptons 2y ago
    I hope you don't think that this administration wouldn't deport a citizen. They have said they would deport people that were born here - birthright citizenship which is outlined in the constitution, based on their parents status.
    - giraffe_lady 2y ago
      I'm saying we can dream a little bigger here is all.
  - thinkcontext 2y ago
    There is a process to revoke citizenship for people that lied as part of the process. Some are arguing that Musk did lie, his brother publicly said that weren't intending to enroll when they were on student visas. Trump revives push to denaturalize US citizens https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2025/01/27/trump-resumes-threat-to-denaturalize-citizens/77905612007/ https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2025/01/27/trum...
xdennis 2y ago
> If they're engaged in doing illegal stuff, at the federal level, I fully expect Trump to just pardon everyone involved. Not trying to both-sides this, but the fact that Biden did that makes it more likely that Trump will do it too. It's a terrible precedent.
- ric2b 2y ago
  As if Trump cares about precedent. It makes no difference.

Terr_ 2y ago

> to just pardon More likely Trump continue to fire prosecutors that try to do their jobs upholding the literal law. No prosecution, no pardon needed. The check on that is for Congress to impeach and remove a corrupt President from office, but that will be difficult with how many Republicans are complicit.

nullocator 2y ago
Based on what we've seen this past week it seems the next administration would have an obligation to fire them all, in much the way Trump is firing anyone who looked into or investigated him. And extrapolating to the next few months I'd say the next administration will likely have an obligation to attempt to send anyone associated with DOGE to prison for the rest of their lives. At least this appears to be the type of government Donald Trump and his voters believe America should have.
- ModernMech 2y ago
  A lot of people are acting like the end of history is here.
  - rbanffy 2y ago
    It seems clear the US turned a page in its history.
  - Terr_ 2y ago
    Do you remember when Presidents disclosed their finances and avoided things that could look like gifts/bribes? When they didn't fire prosecutors for getting too close to their business? When trial-balloons about becoming "President For Life" were taboo? When their lawyers didn't argue they had presumptive immunity to literally assassinate the other candidate? This news item is just one more previously-unthinkable line crossed in an unambiguous trend towards more-crazy. ___________ > "But the one great shocking occasion, when tens or hundreds or thousands will join with you, never comes. That’s the difficulty. If the last and worst act of the whole regime had come immediately after the first and smallest, thousands, yes, millions would have been sufficiently shocked—if, let us say, the gassing of the Jews in ’43 had come immediately after the ‘German Firm’ stickers on the windows of non-Jewish shops in ’33. But of course this isn’t the way it happens. In between come all the hundreds of little steps, some of them imperceptible, each of them preparing you not to be shocked by the next." -- They Thought They Were Free: The Germans The Germans, 1933-45* by Milton Meyer, published 1955.
    - throwaway141728 2y ago
      I want to add here that the Holocaust required a war (the Wannsee conference was in 1942), massive censorship (easy during a war) and misdirection like model concentration camps (Theresienstadt), where international agencies could look around and see how "humane" everyone was treated. There was no Internet, only official propaganda. Sometimes the truth leaked via the Swedish embassy or railway workers, but it cannot spread far if those who spread it are killed themselves. But I agree that people all over the world have been docile and compliant since 2020 on all sorts of issues, so the danger is there even if it should be harder today.
    - matwood 2y ago
      > Do you remember when Presidents disclosed their finances and avoided things that could look like gifts/bribes? So quaint. Now bribes are out in the open and no one even bats an eye. Trump coin, Trump media, never released anything about tax returns, selling merch, etc... It's comical to me that his followers think he's dismantling the deep state grifters, when he is a deep state grifter. I have to give some credit to Trump and the media around him for being masters at the narrative. Hillary's emails and Hunter on a board of a company requires investigations and congressional involvement, but Trump and his family casually take 100's of millions if not billions in bribes and no one thinks twice.
  - chairmansteve 2y ago
    It is the end of democracy in the United States.
    - theonething 2y ago
      yeah, that's what people said about his first administration too. yawn
  - kccoder 2y ago
    And a lot of people are downplaying the severity of what is currently happening.
    - zelphirkalt 2y ago
      And are thereby enabling it, knowingly or unknowingly becoming part of it.
  - Whatarethese 2y ago
    The goalposts will be moved until our country is a husk of its former self. Thats literally how constitutional republics die.
  - varjag 2y ago
    Quite the opposite, it's a lot of history in the making. But most likely it is the undignified end of Pax Americana.
    - jauntywundrkind 2y ago
      *Unmaking. But yes. Some real collapse of the republic scale shit, take over by Orban style autocratic political men. Pax Americana & our influence in the world abroad for sure. This is potentially falling of the Soviet Union bad. Not that we will dissolve the union (still hopefully a very low chance) but that the system of government collapses & the various business-mafias squabble to claim what they can in the power vacuum that follows; a loss of national integrity.
  - throw0101c 2y ago
    > A lot of people are acting like the end of history is here. Would you rather: * 'over react' about the end of history, and be wrong (i.e. things turn out fine), or * 'under react' and end up with a bunch of thugs in charge? It's possible this is a situation where you're crying "wolf" when there isn't one, but given Trump's erratic mind, and the stated plans of the political right * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_2025 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_2025 which side to you want to err of? And with regards to "over reacting" and nothing happening: a lot of folks said Y2K was an over reaction because nothing happened, but nothing happened because people did a much reacting. That nothing burger was a success, not a sign of over reaction.
- throw0101c 2y ago
  > And extrapolating to the next few months I'd say the next administration will likely have an obligation to attempt to send anyone associated with DOGE to prison for the rest of their lives. If they get pre-emptive Presidential pardons, nothing can be done (unless you go with state-level charges).
  - bagels 2y ago
    Supreme court has made president king. They can just ignore the pardons.

Shekelphile 2y ago

They're directly attacking government infrastructure, including our intelligence apparatuses. Even if they escape legal consequences they could become targeted for extrajudicial killings by intelligence agencies of the US and allies.

deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
Vecr 2y ago
I assume these are US citizens. The US constitution isn't set up to protect intelligence agencies if they attempt that kind of thing on US soil.
ctrlp 2y ago
[flagged]
- pessimizer 2y ago
  HN is filled with people who work for intelligence agencies and military contractors. Defending US abuses as well-meant mistakes, or framing any professional consequences or exposure of bad things the US does as treasonous is how they sleep at night. They may seem nice and thoughtful when discussing other subjects, but when it comes to surveillance, censorship, subverting elections, or misleading the public, they think it's the most heroic possible thing. I get the impression that they think that they're heroically sacrificing their own morality for the greater good, and if you told them they'd go to hell for what they've done, they would be proud. Meanwhile, outside of that mental drama, they're collecting huge checks and have never missed a meal in their lives. Same vibe you get from people who work in extremely polluting industries who think of themselves as lovers of nature. They're doing what is necessary to save what is possible to save. Also incidentally collecting huge checks.
electriclove 2y ago
What attack?? They are working for our government.

antifa 2y ago

[flagged]

aswanson 2y ago
[flagged]
giraffe_lady 2y ago
Why? He's an american citizen. We have a name for the crime of attacking a state to whom one owes allegiance, and normative punishments for it.
- antifa 2y ago
  Would love to see Musk tried for treason.
  - trallnag 2y ago
    Would love to float in the dead sea slurping on a pina colada right now.
- leptons 2y ago
  I hope you don't think that this administration wouldn't deport a citizen. They have said they would deport people that were born here - birthright citizenship which is outlined in the constitution, based on their parents status.
  - giraffe_lady 2y ago
    I'm saying we can dream a little bigger here is all.
- thinkcontext 2y ago
  There is a process to revoke citizenship for people that lied as part of the process. Some are arguing that Musk did lie, his brother publicly said that weren't intending to enroll when they were on student visas. Trump revives push to denaturalize US citizens https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2025/01/27/trump-resumes-threat-to-denaturalize-citizens/77905612007/ https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2025/01/27/trum...

xdennis 2y ago

> If they're engaged in doing illegal stuff, at the federal level, I fully expect Trump to just pardon everyone involved. Not trying to both-sides this, but the fact that Biden did that makes it more likely that Trump will do it too. It's a terrible precedent.

ric2b 2y ago
As if Trump cares about precedent. It makes no difference.