Infosec pros aren't too bothered by Trump – it's his cabinet sidekicks you need to worry about We're less than a month into Donald Trump's reign in America, and so much has already kicked off. Since we're at the BSides San Francisco infosec conference this week, we asked security pro here to "rate my president." And we'll be honest: many attendees see some good in his appointment, although there is concern about who he …
"I didn't vote for Trump or Clinton."
You moron, if you didn't vote for Clinton, you voted for Trump by throwing it away to an (unfortunately) useless "third party." It is known. We're not yet advanced as a society to figure out that the Reporklickin's and the Democrabs are the same side of the coin. THEN you can cast a third party vote and have it mean something.
"OPM stored those unencrypted"
And we didn't, or couldn't, check to see if that was going on. So we all fucked up. Didn't we? It's easy to shift the blame in hindsight! Altogether now!
You moron, if you didn't vote for Clinton, you voted for Trump by throwing it away to an (unfortunately) useless "third party."
This is bullshit. I live in state that historically votes for the Dems.... good, bad, and the ugly whatever. By voting 3rd party, it makes a statement. Also under the rules, for any 3rd party to get Federal funding they must attract a certain percentage of the vote. IF one of them ever gets that funding, they might start fielding respectable and able candidates. Or at a minimum, break the Dem/Repub stranglehold.
In this day and age, if we want change (not the political BS change of this and all previous elections) we have to game the system by their rules.
>if you didn't vote for Clinton, you voted for Trump by throwing it away to an (unfortunately) useless "third party."
And that, ladies and gentlemen, is how you always end up with two rotten candidates from the same two rotten parties.
Actually, as for as the UK parliament goes, I think we should double the number of MPs. Half run as FPtP and the other half as PR. That keeps direct local representation while giving the smaller parties the chance to build support.
Check how well performed countries were something like that was attempted. First, the more the MPs, the less you can control what they do - most of them become just "peones" directed by the party leaders, and they will sell their soul as long as they are handsomely paid for doing nothing - or will sell their vote to the highest bidder. Parliament usually becomes soon chaotic and getting a majority a bet.
Couple that with proportional, and you get politicians who are able to be always elected for decades despite everything - and who are able to get elected whoever they like. Nor you get better politicians giving small parties a chance - again, you just get more lazy people setting up small parties exactly to get a comfortable chair and nothing more. If a third party arises - it may not be what you hope. It could be Grillo in Italy, or Le Pen in France.... in some ways even Trump was a "third option".
That chance of electoral reform was squandered in the UK by the Lib-Dems being useless in the Coalition: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Kingdom_Alternative_Vote_referendum,_2011
It works well in Scotland.
Woah, woah, woah. We got a referendum on some approximation of a proportional system. For reasons too tedious to discuss again, the People Of Britain Spoke: they didn't want representative democracy, thanks, they're happy with an UNrepresentative democracy where it takes 50x more votes to elect an MP from one part than another, just as long as it gives them the reassuring crack of firm government.
Sorry, you can blame us for some things under the coalition, but not the referendum result.
I remember seeing exactly the same thing from people unhappy about Obama winning, blaming anyone who voted third party instead of "correctly" for McCain or Romney for Obama being president. And Bush before him.
It is idiots like these people, who always claim "THIS election is the most important in generation", who are responsible for terrible terrible terrible choices such as that between Trump and Clinton. Fuck you guys, I'm going to continue voting third party, not feeling bad about it, and not giving a shit if you think the "wrong" candidate won. In my mind, the wrong candidate won whether it was Trump or Clinton.
Just to add - the reason why that attitude is responsible for terrible choices is that so long as the democrats and republicans feel the choice is only between them, they can run awful candidates and just assume their followers will swallow mouthfuls of shit and not complain because they'll be told and believe that the other side's candidate is even worse.
If a third party candidate was considered a viable alternative, the republicans couldn't run a Manchurian candidate like Trump, and the democrats couldn't run Hillary with her baggage and investigations, because their supporters would have other options. But so long as weak minded fools believe the "a vote for third party is a vote for the EVIL other side" propaganda, you'll see party machine crap like the democrats swinging the primary to Clinton because she "deserved it", not that interloper Sanders, and the republican party only backing away from similarly stealing it from Trump because the alternative was Cruz, who is probably second only to Clinton herself in being hated by the republican party establishment.
"the People Of Britain Spoke: they didn't want representative democracy, thanks, they're happy with an UNrepresentative democracy"
It was effectively a rigged vote because the PR on offer was the worst possible type of PR. It was no surprise the result was a resounding NO.
> "You moron, if you didn't vote for Clinton, you voted for Trump by throwing it away to an (unfortunately) useless "third party."
So, he didn't vote for Trump, but he failed to correctly vote for Mrs. Clinton. What a tool, eh? All who don't vote Democrat are truly evil at heart, and deserve "what they get," right?
You are correct too, we deserve not to have to listen to the triumphant cackling of Queen Hillary, who would have taken her election as proof that's she's not the major criminal we know she is. It would have been OJ all over again, only a hundred times worse.
@AC: If this is sarcasm, well played.
If not, it's thugs like you who may force me to remove the Johnson 2016 sticker from my car for my own safety but know that your anger and rage is to me as ambrosia.
I may not get the luxury of being Meryl Streep who talks about how courageous she is standing up to Trump in a room full of her elitist clones surrounded by armed guards for fear of being harshly tweeted at by the Donald. No, I get the real world which in some places right after the election we effectively had our very own pogroms targeting folks who weren't perceived as voting your way. We get them still every time anyone but the Hillary team is invited to speak at places like Berkeley. The irony is lost on no one that 1984 is back to being a best seller especially for those of us who live in the wrong section of the country where they are censored by the "safe spaces". Do I have the newspeak definition right? Censorship is safety, I'd hate to get it wrong and commit a thoughtcrime.
"You moron, if you didn't vote for Clinton, you voted for Trump by throwing it away to an (unfortunately) useless "third party." It is known. We're not yet advanced as a society to figure out that the Reporklickin's and the Democrabs are the same side of the coin. THEN you can cast a third party vote and have it mean something."
Guess what? Hillary won the popular vote, 48% over Trump's 45.9%. Trump won the election. Tell me again how my voting for a third party affected the results? Or even counted at all?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electoral_College_(United_States)
(Oh and hey, guess what else? My state of residence, also the state I voted in, cast all its electoral votes for Hillary. Again... how did my vote affect anything?)
And as another commenter noted, enough people voting third party sends a message. But if nobody ever votes third party because they're afraid that they're throwing away their vote, then nothing ever changes.
You're telling me I should vote for the status quo if I want change? What?!
P.S. I didn't want Hillary to win either, so I'm not sure what the point of voting for either would have been.
P.P.S. For the record, yes, I did actually go to the polls and vote.
You will NOT blame myself and folk like myself for voting for *neither* candidate in this last election.
I'm a Director Level, UNIX bad-ass MoFo and was presented with two potential candidates for a position. Neither of those candidates for the position had the character or skills, in my not-so-humble *Analysis* (SysAdmin/Systems Analyst, qurter century), neither were qualified to fill the role required. I threw the resumes in the garbage, where they belonged, and moved on.
I am sorrry your candidate lost, and you are a child with a small grasp of the larger picture: vis.: Your candidate actually won the popular vote after cajoling the DNC, and, the Electorate decided our "Leadership".
I live on The Left Toast. I run from LA to Seattle. My vote IS AND WAS meaningless as the vote from California (duh), Oregon (seriously?), and Washington (makes California look kind of Republican-ish because, damn), THE ELECTORATE around my personal stomping ground is-and-was going to be Democrat votes.
This entire process was subverted and while my countrymen jump up and down about $whateverToday: The Entire Process Was Borked and now you're just being a whiny shit.
You think I like this, mate? I like what seems to be your preferred candidate about as much (which is to say, not a bloody whit). I'm a *Moderate*, and a Geek...not a single fucking candidate represents me or mine, OR groks a damn thing going on and you want to cry like a child over your skinned knee. [The Dems openly rigged an election and while you talk about hackers and EMails, just watch the DNC convention and *watch* the Rig, look at the scam unfold ... and I trust *that*. Not so much actually.
Stow it. The narritave is old and tired. While you cry, I'm building and tossing sand-bags around INet Infrastructure.
Do The Job and Help, or STFU. Really.
Assholes.
Agree with most of what you say, but to go even a bit further, you are wrong about one thing:
"Your candidate actually won the popular vote after cajoling the DNC,"
Not that I mind people picking on Trump's small, er, vote counts, but this is an "alternative fact" pushed by one side. No one won the popular vote; Clinton only got a plurality. In every country I know of with a direct popular vote election of the head of government you need 50%+1 to say you won. The US election needed a second round runoff to find a true popular vote winner.
This was an election where "none of the above" might have won, had it been a choice.
"Not that I mind people picking on Trump's small, er, vote counts, but this is an "alternative fact" pushed by one side. No one won the popular vote; Clinton only got a plurality. In every country I know of with a direct popular vote election of the head of government you need 50%+1 to say you won. The US election needed a second round runoff to find a true popular vote winner."
I suppose you have a point. Only one nitpick back, being: neither majority nor plurality of the popular vote will win you the US Presidency. It takes an Electoral majority, with other mechanisms kicking into place if nobody gets a majority.
So either way, Hillary didn't win anything except a plurality of the popular vote.
If the popular vote had been what had driven the election, and no candidate had gotten a majority, then obviously whatever mechanism was in place to resolve the election would have kicked in. A runoff vote might have been that mechanism. According to the Wikipedia article, the mechanism currently in place in case of an Electoral College tie is a vote in the House for the president and a vote in the Senate for the vice president. But since there's no mechanism in place for a popular vote... OK, now I'm just spinning my wheels. You get the idea.
I guess the way it SHOULD be phrased is: Hillary got more popular votes, but Trump won the election.
The election process is FUBAR.
The proof is in our choices, Hillary or Trump.
I also vote 3rd Party! If more people did, maybe we could get some election reform.
1 Person = 1 Vote (majority wins)
And NO a company is not a F'n person. A person (including the candidate) can donate X amount, not companies, no special interests, no foreign governments (SuperPACs). No billionaires manipulating the elections... Each candidate would be forced to tell the people what they actually think, because they can't afford to spout BS. Third Parties ads & commercials BANNED.
The way it is, I'm not even sure we have a democracy. If you are in any way Patriotic every election should leave you pissed.
Bad: Hillary vs Trump
Worse: Cruz vs Bernie
Evil: Bob vs Ted vs Alice vs Hashim vs Schlomo vs Ito Vs ..........
Majority of what? All voters, just the ones who voted, jst the ones who did not have their voting rights not denied, all voters who voted and were legally entitled to vote? Just those who voted on paper ballots, or online, or or or. Election reform should start with all votes in a Presidental Election being cast on the same type of system, with a fully auditable record, with randomn audits of entire precincts, full audits of precincts that have outlier characteristics. And much much more.
Elections without truly free speech are a sham. Should an individual care about a single issue enough to spend a great deal or small deal of money on trying to raise public awareness of it they should be allowed to.
By the way, it is a REPRESENTATIVE democracy. It even says it on the tin.
Why would Cruz vs Bernie be worse? Cruz may be hated even by most of his own party's establishment, and if you aren't a hardcore conservative you may think his views are terrible, but at least you can't provoke him with a tweet, and he wouldn't think that hiring people off a website for nutjobs to advise him on running on the country is a good idea. You might feel Bernie is worse than Clinton if you don't like hardcore liberals who want to raise taxes to give the money away for free college and rainbows, but with him you wouldn't have to worry about potential investigations and accusations following him around throughout his term, and no one would ever accuse him of being in the pocket of Wall Street or big business.
I think either one would have made a better president than Trump will, or Hillary would have. Too bad we didn't have that choice, and instead of the two party system we had four:
Angry white man party: Trump
Conservatives who claim to have Christian values but don't know what Jesus taught party: Cruz
New world order party: Clinton
1960s hippie dream party: Sanders
American jobs.
If US companies are (for whatever reason) forced to take on more US workers at realistic US rates in big enough numbers he'll get a second term. That's from Devs to people in so called "Rustbelt" towns.
USians will forgive a President damm near anything if they see actual wage growth in their salaries and pay cheques.
Do that, or tell a good story about why he couldn't and he's in for a 2nd term. OTOH...
>>Do that, or tell a good story about why he couldn't and he's in for a 2nd term.
That's the problem. Trump promises the impossible and then blames everyone else for not delivering. All he has to do is keep on spouting bullshit.
Did you see his new acronym? SCROTUS! So Called Ruler Of The United States
https://twitter.com/frostnhstaterep/status/830498558092664832/photo/1
USians will forgive a President damm near anything if they see actual wage growth in their salaries and pay cheques
From 2010 onwards there's been steady wage growth in the US. That didn't shield Obama from the visceral hostility of Trump and his supporters. You underestimate the power of envy, self-interest and hate.
"USians will forgive a President damm near anything if they see actual wage growth in their salaries and pay cheques."
Would that depend on whether the wage growth exceeds inflation of cost of living or is the electorate not able to work that out?
The results of the economy will be almost immaterial to Trump in the 2020 election. If things go south, he's going to blame Obama, blame democrats, blame judges, blame members of his own party, blame business leaders, blame immigrants, blame ISIS, blame China, blame Mexico, blame Rosie O'Donnell. Everyone except himself.
The jobs are never coming back. If tariffs force manufacturing to move back into to the US, the new factories will be highly automated, and create few jobs - none of which will be for the displaced rust belt workers who were his most ardent supporters.
Look at the stats, the US is still the second ranked manufacturer in the world, and our manufacturing output is TWICE what it was 30 years ago in constant dollars. But despite that, manufacturing employment peaked in 1979, almost 40 years ago. Fewer workers make more stuff. Trump needs to make robots illegal as part of his Turn Back the Clock on America Make America Great Again plan if he wants to create jobs for those guys.
Exactly.
There seems to be a very real sense that for a lot of Americans that improvement has not been for them. They feel (rightly or wrongly) that they have not seen this. That a very small group have gotten a shedload richer, and they aren't it.
Perhaps what I meant to say was that after taxes and living expenses they feel they have more in their pockets they will feel Trump has delivered.
I'm not saying that accords with objective reality. I am saying that's what a lot of Trump voters thought.
I don't think a lot of Trump voters really truly believed he had a solution for getting jobs back like they used to have. I think they liked him because they hadn't heard anyone speak to their problems for a long time. The republican party hasn't cared about working class economic issues for ages, except to pay lip service with "trickle down", and the democrats stopped caring about them after getting creamed repeatedly in the 80s and decided being too liberal was the cause and went to a good ol boy southern democrat named Bill.
I don't think his voters expect Trump to do anything about it so much as they KNEW Hillary wouldn't - her early position in favor of TPP gave Trump these voters on a silver platter. They figured even if Trump didn't actually make their lives better he'd shake things up and piss off the establishment. I think Trump might actually be permanently reversing the republican party direction on free trade - it will be pretty hard for a republican to run as a free trader for fear of Trump giving him the Twitter treatment and handing victory to his primary opponent.
Until Bill Clinton came along and promoted and signed NAFTA over the objections of many traditional democrats, they were the party of trade protectionism, and the republicans were free trade. In not much moer than a generation, they look to switch sides with each other. Almost like when the southern racists that had been with the democrats for a century abandoned them en masse for the republicans after LBJ signed the civil rights act.
In the meantime however, Trump’s executive order on immigration doesn’t seem to have had that much of an effect so far. One Hindu British Asian network manager at the conference told The Reg that he’d never had a faster trip through customs than this latest one.
“Sure, they ask about a minute’s worth of extra questions about Syria but I had no problems,” he said. “Mind you, that could change.”
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