9 ms·
Trump: "Long Live the King"
- sijourneyweezer 2y ago[flagged]
- TheAlchemist 2y agoI can. This is Hacker News. Currently, world's top tech entrepreneur is hacking the United States of America.
- sijourneyweezer 2y agoBut this is a trump tweet about NYC congestion pricing. Did DOGE have anything to do with this?
- TheAlchemist 2y agoTrump calls himself King in this tweet. I repeat - The White House publishes a quote from the sitting president calling himself King. This has nothing to do with DOGE, which is a mirage anyway. It has everything to do with Musk, who enabled and is actively helping this King. Or more probably he's actively trying to become the King himself, by first getting rid of Democracy, then getting rid of the current King.
- nunez 2y agoBesides the platform it was posted on being owned by the leader of DOGE?
- lynndotpy 2y agoThe president of the United States -- which is a very big part of the internet and the worldwide tech industry -- is using both actions and words to claim to be an absolute authority. What's happening inside the US is currently also one of the most relevant things to HackerNews. Despite that, it's also one of the things quickest topics to be censored, so you can probably avoid seeing these things by just staying off /new.
- babelfish 2y agoFortunately you don’t have to click the link or comment! Hope this helps
- BoredPositron 2y agoI have to save your comment so I can write it under every thread I am not interested in. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
- TheAlchemist 2y agoThis is tweeted from the official White House account. To Americans, please WAKE up. To all people reading this site and working for Musk companies - can you please explain how do you feel about it ? Don't mix work and politics argument ? Edit: By 'it' I mean an unprecedented power grab by Trump / Musk. They are trying to cut every agency and institution that could limit them, in a blantantly illegal way, and using tech-enabled propaganda machine to achieve their goals. This is very much a tech topic we should massively be discussing on HN, but for some reason it's being silenced. We used to say 'software is eating the world'. Software is currently turning USA into a dictatorship.
- nunez 2y agoCouldn't agree more. That this was posted from the official White House Twitter handle (that has been used for official announcements in the past) is disgusting and speaks volumes about how social media has developed for the worse over the years. That the image in the post is (likely) AI generated speaks volumes about what the real intent of this technology is, as well.
- nicolas_t 2y agoI regret deeply investing in some of Musk companies (xAI, spaceX) in the past. Especially for the last investment xAI, I should have had a wake up call before that.
- throwaway5752 2y agoBeyond being just immature and a national embarrassment, this is the most un-patriotic thing a US president has ever said. And where are the libertarians? Reason.org has a few posts on New Mexico labor relations (arguing on the side of federalism and NLRB control, no less) and nothing about this. No principles whatsoever. It will be less than months, maybe weeks, before this begins impacting tech. Are you not paying attention? https://www.wired.com/story/brendan-carr-fcc-trump-speech-social-media-moderation/ https://www.wired.com/story/brendan-carr-fcc-trump-speech-so... "Carr authored the Project 2025 chapter on the FCC, writing that the agency needed to prioritize issues like “reining in Big tech” and “promoting national security.” Specifically on his to-do list, Carr says that the FCC should issue an order that reinterprets Section 230 to eliminate the “expansive” liability immunities it provides to social platforms. Section 230 is part of the Communications Decency Act passed in 1996, which protects internet companies from being sued over content that appears on their platforms and has given companies the ability to decide what content can or cannot be posted. But there is no precedent for the FCC governing online speech, and experts tell WIRED that the agency has no authority to act on Trump and Carr’s speech prescriptions." This is coming for you next
- artistic_regard 2y ago[dead]
- throwawayforare 2y agoI left China two decades ago, believing America held itself to higher moral standards. But now, I’m watching it turn into another China—and the reality is a slap in the face.
- throwawayforare 2y agoYou know, there are plenty of so-called "patriotic" influencers on the Chinese innernet who eagerly flatter the government, selling their souls. But they usually do it in a more subtle and calculated way. I've never heard of anyone outright worshipping Xi as a king or suggesting that his birthday should become a national holiday. In contrast, the decline of America feels both faster and more destructive—after all, China mostly harms its own people, while the U.S. brings chaos on a much larger scale.
- nobankai 2y ago[dead]
- quantified 2y agoAmericans are just people. No better or worse than others, no different in their behavior given the same inputs.
- throwawayforare 2y agoI suppose broader access to education and free information should influence people's behavior. Perhaps that's why people in the medieval era were less civil. Even today, some societies still deny women the right to education—clearly, some are better, and some are worse.
- quantified 2y agoInfluence, yes, but American Nazis are as free to influence as any local church. Free is not better, think of the quality of anything given for free. And education is only as good as the content and teachers. There is outright antipathy to learning in the current ruling party and its supporters. The supporters don't like being "looked down on" by the more-educated and that's valid. But they don't mind being looked down on and treated badly by the wealthy, which is weird.
- Atreiden 2y agoIn case you think this is just showboating -- it isn't. The things he is saying and doing are not a joke, and should not be treated as one. The facade of "he's just messing around to make the left angry" is false and thin. He is telling you exactly what he aspires to be. Or, more accurately, he is attempting to assert that he already is one. If you believe in the ideals that America was founded upon, you should be angry. Fascism is here, and it's up to us to resist it. Please.
- Bostonian 2y ago[flagged]
- Juliate 2y agoLet’s call it “trumpism” then. And his supporters and enablers “trumpis”. It’s not really “better” but at least, it’s specific to what he does.
- quantified 2y agoHis helpers are DOGE-stylists? I think the G is a hard G sound.
- Atreiden 2y agoI'm not addressing whatever policy was changed here. I don't care, and it isn't the problem. The problem is, very clearly, that our President is declaring himself a King. The hallmark of a King, or any monarch, is absolute ruling power. His actions have spoken well enough for themselves, but posting "LONG LIVE THE KING" from the official White House account, with a graphic depicting him in a crown (and an accompanying, identical caption), cannot possibly be interpreted any other way except in bad faith.
- inverted_flag 2y ago> It's true the President should not refer to himself as king, even as a joke. He's not joking, he's testing the waters. He's seeing how far he can push his power and rhetoric before he faces concrete consequences.
- ChrisArchitect 2y ago[flagged]
- AnimalMuppet 2y agoThat's perhaps context for this. It's not really "related". The issue here is Trump calling himself "king", from the official White House account. That is not a title that is given out for ending congestion pricing.
- rsynnott 2y agoThough it is precisely the sort of arbitrary and inappropriate meddling that monarchs used to get up to in the bad old days, before democracy broke out (virtually all monarchs today are powerless constitutional monarchs, essentially figureheads).
- nobankai 2y ago[flagged]
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- dpicco 2y ago[dead]
- bediger4000 2y agoThis strikes me as impeachable behavior. Where are the folks who preached checks and balances 2009-2016, and decried rule by executive order now? Where are the state's rights people right now?
- krapp 2y ago>Where are the folks who preached checks and balances 2009-2016, and decried rule by executive order now? Rule by executive order is obviously only a problem when Democrats do it. Also why bother with impeachment? He's already been impeached twice. It's nothing more than a strongly worded reprimand, it doesn't accomplish anything.
- bediger4000 2y agoImpeachment and a conviction is the legal way to remove him from office therefore that's what should be done. Even if the impeachment vote were to fail in the House, or conviction vote fail in the Senate, it would underline that ironically name Republicans have abdicated their entire ideology. Rub their noses in it. Make them take responsibility for a dictatorship.
- jmye 2y agoWhy on earth do you think they care? They won. Their voters will never hold them accountable, and non-voters are sniveling, feckless trash who won’t say a word as long as they’re not required to get off of TikTok or Facebook. No one cares what anyone thinks, anymore. It’s why these “protests” are so laughable. Who do they think is listening?
- lamontcg 2y ago> Rule by executive order is obviously only a problem when Democrats do it. That is false equivalence. Obama's EOs would wind up going through the court system and getting overturned and ruled unconstitutional. The courts would tell him that he had committed executive overreach, and that what he wanted was the provenance of Congress, and that he needed to go do the hard work to get a law passed through that body. Trump has already had EOs rules unconstitutional, and he's announced his intentions of ignoring the courts entirely. That violates our system of checks and balances, and is the comic-villian interpretation of what Obama was doing (he wasn't ever doing that). What we have now is a CEO-President. And Companies don't have a representative Congress or Courts. The top-down hierarchical structure of the typical corporation would be called a dictatorship in the political sphere (particularly if the CEO owns >%50 of the voting shares). That isn't what our system of government is supposed to be. Arguably we shouldn't accept that in corporations, either, but at least we have some kind of freedom of association to quit and find another job. Half the country has forgotten basic High School Civics 101 and "Separate but Equal" along with "Checks and Balances" and think this is entirely normal. But we aren't supposed to have one person who makes up the laws and enforces them, with no checks on their power. That would _accurately_ be described as a Dictator/King/Fascism or some other term in that general universe. The Constitution was written to prevent _exactly_ that. And to reiterate, Obama was regularly checked by the Court system. Trump has indicated that he will ignore the Courts. That really is "crossing the Rubicon". The only thing providing a check on Trump right now seems to be the stock market.
- inverted_flag 2y agoSic semper tyrannis
- beardyw 2y agoI am British, we have a real king. He cannot do any of this kind of stuff. I am so glad we have him, though it is only recently I have come to understand his value, which is to increase the accountability of those who do make decisions. Long may he reign (first time I ever said that!)
- rsynnott 2y ago> He cannot do any of this kind of stuff. In large part because the last one to seriously try it, ah, ended up a bit lacking in the head department.
- tim333 2y agoAlso a Brit and I've also come to see that value more over time. It helps keep elected would be dictators in check.
- ashoeafoot 2y agoA figurehead king or emperor also makes wannabe dictators look like usurpers , thus splitting the conservatives from the autoritarian base.
- ChumpGPT 2y ago[dead]
- AnimalMuppet 2y agoBetween this and Vance saying that the president can ignore the courts, it's getting harder and harder to think that this is joking, just narcissism, or just spur-of-the-moment shooting his mouth off.
- Tadpole9181 2y agoGonna be mean here: why in the fuck would anyone think it could be those? Someone tells you "I will murder you" while asking for a knife and they genuinely think it's a joke? Are they actually stupid? Or are they fascist liars?
- quonn 2y agoMaybe it’s like measuring the detonating fuse and give them matches: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Fire_Raisers_(play) https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Fire_Raisers_(play)
- toomuchtodo 2y agohttps://archive.today/SfZUv https://archive.today/SfZUv
- kccoder 2y ago“A republic, if you can keep it.” --Benjamin Franklin's response to Elizabeth Willing Powel's question: "Well, Doctor, what have we got, a republic or a monarchy?" https://www.nps.gov/articles/000/constitutionalconvention-september17.htm https://www.nps.gov/articles/000/constitutionalconvention-se...
- readyplayernull 2y agohttps://www.congress.gov/bill/119th-congress/house-bill/792 https://www.congress.gov/bill/119th-congress/house-bill/792
- timeon 2y agoPeople flagging whitehouse post apparently do not respect US president.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- amai 2y agoBack to the 17th century! But this time with more AI and nuclear bombs.
- tim333 2y agoNY governor: >“We are a nation of laws, not ruled by a king,” she said in a written statement. “We’ll see you in court.” We shall see.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]