Slashdot Mirror
Obama Staffers Followed Palin's Email Lead On Inauguration Day
theodp writes "Using Yahoo's free e-mail service to conduct government business was good enough for Sarah Palin. And now the Washington Times reports that Obama staffers turned to Gmail on Inauguration Day to conduct their business. Those wishing to contact members of the incoming Obama administration were instructed to contact staffers at wh.LASTNAME@gmail.com until official White House e-mail addresses became available."
Are they kicking & screaming about it being a private account or something? I mean it doesn't sound like they are hiding anything by publicly asking people to use it to contact them temporarily.
There is a war going on for your mind.
Will those emails then be transfered to the official email server?
It's not just Republicans using insecure communications? Politicians don't consider or understand IT security? Go fig...
They don't already have e-mail addresses?
Is it me or does it bother anyone else that an institution like the White House doesn't have a dedicated IT staff?
I would like to think that there would be a staff to handle this kind of thing independent of the administration. Having a team who knows the ins and outs from administration to administration would cut down on transition time as well as maintain a set of standards. This also would certainly be a big boost in keeping things on the honest side.
Dedicated Cthulhu Cultist since 4523 BC.
This is clearly a transitional measure, and not a concerted effort to hide communications from mandated records keeping procedures as Bush and Palin are accused of.
whats with every single article on slashdot being tagged with "story" even this??
Mr itepower?
Anyone who works for government for a period of time realizes that there are things you don't want to commit to public record. Maybe they aren't scandalous, but it's just cautionary to keep the official email record as professional looking as possible. Palin got exposed, but I'm sure [favorite politician] has done this too.
(I work for a government entity)
I think it takes 3 minutes to create an account, including exchange.
How long does it take in the head office of the USA?
I'll see your Constitution and raise you a Queen.
It doesn't matter if you are accused of something if the accusation is not credible. Otherwise: I hereby accuse the Obama team of trying to hide information from public record.
In the case of Palin, a single email was found sent from someone on her staff to her account. It was not even shown that she had replied to it using that address. To simply describe this as "she has been accused of using her private email to hide records" is misleading to the extent of trolling. I would argue it should be even less controversial than the incident described here.
Will Obama be punished if a single one of his staff sends a public business to his private blackberry? Palin has been, in the media. I look forward to Obama getting the same punishment - "has been accused of criminal intent" might even make it to his Wikipedia page.
Thank god Obama would never use a Slashdot account to keep in touch, that would be ludicrous!
Btw, how about lunch @ 12.30pm?
Can anyone confirm that Mr. Azzup is a staffer? :o)
And now time for another strangely apropos /. meme
Seriously.. this place is turning into slashkos.
"You must be new here".
I laughed at the weak who considered themselves good because they lacked claws.
We can find political news anyplace else. This stuff really is not news for nerds and does not matter here.
It's a technology story, not just an Obama story (as was the last one involving cookies). E-mail is Internet tech, last I checked. Gmail is a state-of-the-art free Web-based e-mail service. Obama is the most technologically fluent President ever. What's not to like?
My blog
Stupid post =)
I support Obama, even canvassed for him, but I smell poo. This is actually worth considering because...
1) Google was Obama's #1 campaign contributor and has already received a number of "special considerations" that embed them into the Obama administration.
2) Once you start using an email address it is with you forever unless you're willing to dump all of your contacts. Not to mention force of habit.
3) Lame other reason here cause we must speak in threes to sound convincing.
Hate to be the paranoid guy when I'm usually working the opposite angle, but I don't like where this is going.
My poetry site welcomes the unusual.
They should just start calling gmail, "Goverment" Mail instead of "Google" mail.
"Beer is proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy - Benjamin Franklin"
So you are saying that the IT changeover takes the longest amount of time for the transition? Or, the transition is wholly dependent on the IT changeover, and nothing can be done until the changes are made? Either you have some inside information, or your reasoning is flawed.
you suck at the news
The best part is the sheer hypocricy.
Timothy had to spin the headline as "Well Palin did it, so it's okay if Obama did it" when Slashdot a> attacked Palin for it and b>the community went wild about security and email tracking.
But now, oh hey... it's not a big deal and they're using internet technology...oooh Obama's so smart and ahead of the curve.
Hypcorisy as far as the eye can see.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
WHARRGARBL
wharrgarbl
Typically when a Dem gets into hot water, it also has a half dozen strippers in it.
The dangers of knowledge trigger emotional distress in human beings.
Between using a temporary gmail account until your email server is set up and using a Yahoo mail account to conduct government business in secret without accountability or transparency.
GWB's IT Staff managed to "lose" massive amounts of email. These aren't the career professionals that serve one administration after the next.
It looks like we may see a more technologically enlightened administration this time around. The changeover, while painful, at least should function as an effective purge of the incompetent and/or corrupt predecessors.
Palin staff: already had government e-mail accounts, but used Yahoo accounts to conduct business that they did not want to reveal to the public.
Obama staff: losing one e-mail account before they gained their next one, so for a few hours they needed transitional addresses, and Gmail was free and easy to use.
If Obama staff continue to use Gmail for government business, THEN we can equate these two situations. But not until then.
Liberal? Conservative? Compare perspectives at Left-Right
Obama is the most technologically fluent President ever.
You know, this gets tossed around a lot, and it bugs the living hell out of me. Who the fuck cares? It's irrelevant! Praising Obama for using technology is no different than something like praising him because he likes rock music. It's a completely superficial thing, and doesn't affect his ability to be president in the least.
What's not to like?
So far? Lying to us, ranging from the petty ("My grandma survived WWI, which she was born after") to the serious ("I oppose telecom immunity in the wiretapping fiasco"). Spouting elitist bullshit that implies only those pitiable poor people are religious, and favor strong gun rights (and, by extension, implying that these are things which are to be stamped out, rather than the purely personal choice they are). He appointed a man who didn't pay his fucking taxes to be Secretary of the Treasury. If you or I don't pay taxes? We go to jail. If Obama's buddy doesn't pay taxes? He gets appointed to a high government position.
The tragic part about Obama, especially his FISA vote, and Sec. Treas. appointment, is that he's shown us that, contrary to what he'd like us to believe, he's just another politician serving his ends, not ours. And yes, there is stuff to like. I'm happy he ordered the closing of Gitmo (assuming he doesn't quietly back down on that, but we'll see). I'm happy he's been pushing an open government, not a closed one (again, only time will tell if this is sincere, or mere rhetoric that is spouted while the public's eye is focused upon him).
I hope he makes our country a much better one, but so far, there's as much bad as there is good. Let's not pretend the man is unblemished. At the same time, let's not pretend he's worthless either, since he seems to be doing some good. As usual, the die-hards on both sides are wrong.
"16MB (fuck off, MiB fascists)" - The Mighty Buzzard
Reading comprehension, you should try it some time. The headline was more like "Well Palin did it and was ferociously attacked over it, so it's not okay if Obama did it."
Of course we won't get into the fact that it's ALWAYS been legal to have personal (IE unarchived) correspondence.
But hey, we suddenly "trust" the government now because they're Democrats.
Just like Kevin Mitnick did.
The problem with Palin's Yahoo use is that it was secret, for one, and second that the emails involved govt. business but weren't recorded anywhere. So, as long as the mails sent and received using Gmail are subsequently archived somewhere, there's no problem. Whether they will be? Who knows.
Only criminals require privacy. The Obama team has as much clearance as Bush did and should have access to everything.
...the e-mail servers, for which the White House is infamously known, seemed to be down.
Well, duh! You can't really expect a server to boot immediately after someone runs shred /dev/hda.
that was the real problem, you missed it...
This is not about a technical protocol being more secure this is about an organization.
How many employees does google have world wide? how many have been screened to the same level that folks in the federal government have? You are putting mail from executive employees onto a mail server read by people not vetted to be/not to be security threats from more than a half dozen nations...
"Ahh! Arrogance and stupidity in the same package, how efficient of you!" --Londo Molari
I argue, again, that Obama, as does any President, has the right to set up a communications infrastructure that is private and unrecordable. But, even if we put that issue aside, how far up on the priority list is this issue, versus this list.
a) jobs
b) budget deficit
c) looming entitlements meltdown
d) not one, but two wars
e) aligning tax rates and health care with NATO allies
f) trade imbalances with asia
just to throw a couple out there.
If we're going to be political, can we talk about something important?
This is my sig.
they are using google docs for collaboration...
"Ahh! Arrogance and stupidity in the same package, how efficient of you!" --Londo Molari
As you can read in the Washington post the Obama staff walked into the White House and discovered that the whole place was a mess. From the article I posted here: "The team members, accustomed to working on Macintoshes, found computers outfitted with six-year-old versions of Microsoft software.". It doesn't go into details but... 6 year old software? And they claim to uphold strict security standards to prevent any cyber crime?
That smells like a huge dose of incompetence to me. And in relation to that I also hope that the new administration will take a very close look at what the Bush administration has added to the e-mail archives. As this site reported some months (?) ago; the Bush admin. archived approx. 26Gb worth of data, the largest amount ever. Makes you wonder... Quality through quantity perhaps?
It's irrelevant! Praising Obama for using technology is no different than something like praising him because he likes rock music.
You're right, of course, if Rock music permiated the culture, and knowing about it directly impacted an individual's capability to use it.
Technology has an amazing impact on all of us. It deeply pains me to see people com into an IT office and get down on their knees and beg me to help them with their computer because they basically have no idea how to operate this piece of silicon.
So you had me until you decided to say that knowledge of technology was worthless.
what kind of shitty post is this ? the poster tries to show obama administration in a bad light as if they commenced any unethical practice, or violated any laws, trying to show what they did same as palin crookery.
all they did was to create gmail addresses UNTIL WHITE HOUSE EMAILS ARE GIVEN TO THEM, so that people will be able to contact them through those email addresses. not only that, but the addresses were PUBLICLY DISSEMINATED.
is there an option to put all future posts and comments of a user on ignore in slashdot ? so that i can avoid bullcrap ?
Read radical news here
here, meet the new troll ..
Read radical news here
So you had me until you decided to say that knowledge of technology was worthless.
Ah, but I didn't say that. I said that it's irrelevant to the ability of the president to do his job. It's valuable knowledge, but not indicative of ability to lead the country, and should not be used to judge a candidate's worth, as it has been.
"16MB (fuck off, MiB fascists)" - The Mighty Buzzard
that's what you should be typing in the console, if you are unable to perceive the simple logic in your parent post. computers are too dangerous for you to be using.
Read radical news here
Inside Obama's Emails
You know, this gets tossed around a lot, and it bugs the living hell out of me. Who the fuck cares? It's irrelevant! Praising Obama for using technology is no different than something like praising him because he likes rock music. It's a completely superficial thing, and doesn't affect his ability to be president in the least.
oh boy - are you stupid ?
whereas almost all leaders around the world cant tall an email from a messenger pigeon, there is a president at the helm of most powerful country in the world, who is also not only tech affluent, but also an addict of one of its implementations (blackberry).
excuse me, pal, but I do care. if you cant fathom the amount of i.t./tech/nerdiness/geekery/internet culture in this, turn in your geek card on your way out.
Read radical news here
I haven't seen it mentioned yet, but GMail allows any user to put dots (.) in their email address as they want to help filtering and general formatting. So really, anyone with a GMail account starting with "wh" already has an address you could format like this.
whiney@gmail.com == wh.iney@gmail.com == w.h.i.n.e.y@gmail.com
WHARRGARBL is the sound dogs make when they attempt to drink from a lawn sprinkler.
WHARRGARBL is also defined as a representation of what fundamentalist religious ranting sounds like to unbelievers, which is more likely the correct meaning in this case since the story is the kind of thing that right-wingers can get worked up about nowadays.
Putting moderation advice in your
The best part about closing Camp Delta is that another detention facility will have to be built elsewhere in less than a year. So, on top of wasting the money spent on building Camp Delta in the first place, the new facility gets to waste money to do it again. However, this time it will be more expensive because it has to get done faster.
Closing the camp was a PR move and a waste of taxpayer money.
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0109/17831.html Doesn't look like Obama likes to talk unprepared, or without his prompter or the people who answer questions for him as they did at the Gitmo announcement. What a shill!
James Coburn plays the psychiatrist in the movie "the president's analyst". Someone wants to know what the president is thinking so he has to run. When he finally realizes that all his telephone conversations are bugged he asks "who could bug every telephone call in the country".
Who could bug every e-mail conversation in the whitehouse?
Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
I heard that the White House kitchen staff was in disarray so the staffers set up a turkey slaughter house on the White House lawn and Obama did an interview in front of it. Will they ever learn?
You meant "whitehouse.gov" (Office of the POTUS) and "change.gov" (Office of the President-Elect), not "whitehouse.org" (parody site) and "change.org" (activism in general), didn't you?
Palin already had an official government account.
That said, I think this suggests a need for the government to set up some sort of official email system for transition officials. @transition.whitehouse.gov maybe, and set up autoforwarding on the 20th.
And the fact that the republican staff were adults, not vindictive children throwing a temper tantrum.
Hey, you know what's a jerk thing to do? Complain about someone misspeaking during a eulogy to their grandmother the day after she dies.
Obviously, he meant "World War Two" rather than "Two World Wars." I'll give you FISA, but that's about the stupidest complaint about any politician I've ever heard.
Also, by the way, most people do not go to jail for incorrectly filing their taxes. If they are audited and found to be non-compliant, they pay back-taxes plus interest and penalties. This is what Geithner did. There are serious questions about whether he purposefully misfiled; we'll probably never know the whole story. But it's absurd to say anyone else would have gone to jail for this. Also, the IRS audited him and found the problem long before he had any involvement with Obama. The Obama team actually made him pay back taxes that were beyond the statue of limitation, and that he was therefore not legally required to pay.
Just because you sold your soul to the devil that needn't make you a teetotaler. --The Devil and Daniel Webster
Ah, but I didn't say that. I said that it's irrelevant to the ability of the president to do his job. It's valuable knowledge, but not indicative of ability to lead the country, and should not be used to judge a candidate's worth, as it has been.
It's indicative of his willingness to stay on top of issues relevant to this nation. Take ex-Senator Ted Stevens, for instance. He was incredibly uninformed about technology and how it impacted our culture; as a result, he promoted some truly terrible legislation that no competent, informed person would consider. Would you put him at the head of the United States Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation knowing full well that he couldn't tell the difference between a cable modem and a brick?
Now we have a president that is informed on the benefits of open source software and net neutrality; I'd argue that's hugely indicative of his potential to promote sane legislation. Given the fact that he's been charged with enforcing the nation's laws, knowing the technological turf he'll be playing on is pretty important to leading. I'd say that's pretty damn well relevant.
Sure there's people that can take his place in advising him, but the more everyone knows about everything, the better decisions we can make in everything, especially things that have a direct impact on society.
Obviously, he meant "World War Two" rather than "Two World Wars." I'll give you FISA, but that's about the stupidest complaint about any politician I've ever heard.
I did say it was a minor issue. But minor or not, it's still a lie, and shows Obama to be in the same lying, opportunistic political mold we know and love.
Also, the IRS audited him and found the problem long before he had any involvement with Obama. The Obama team actually made him pay back taxes that were beyond the statue of limitation, and that he was therefore not legally required to pay.
It doesn't matter. The fact that the Obama team would appoint someone who is either a) uncaring enough about the law, or b) stupid enough, to somehow not pay multiple years of taxes speaks volumes about their standards for who they work with. I don't care that he's paid the amount. The fact that he let it go untouched for so long shows a lack of either character or intelligence, and either way, he shouldn't be running our treasury!
If they are audited and found to be non-compliant, they pay back-taxes plus interest and penalties.
I know that you have to do that, but I was under the impression that the IRS had a very short leash (a couple of years or so) before they prosecuted you for tax evasion. If I'm wrong, so be it, but it doesn't change the fact that Geithner does not belong in the Cabinet.
"16MB (fuck off, MiB fascists)" - The Mighty Buzzard
At least we dont have to worry about a college student using wikipedia to "hack" into these accounts. ...Or do we?
Why does there need to be much downtime between the change in power? Couldn't the Office of the President Elect establish a ready-to-go e-mail server, that would be slid into place on the government rack at whitehouse.gov at Noon on Tuesday?
I love Gmail, but this is ridiculous. Google has no contract with the government, its terms of service void most liability (that's what "free" means).
It also uses a non-reserved namespace. Right now, within a few minutes, I could sign up for wh.obamma, wh.barrak-obama, wh1te.house and any number of other unclaimed addresses and possibly pick up sensitive email sent to misspelled addresses.
Regardless of whether all email is encrypted or signed (and remember, this is the government, half of which is probably using Outlook), this is a bad idea. Kudos for using Gmail, which is the best webmail service in existence, but this shouldn't have been necessary.
Who the hell is running IT at the White House? Shouldn't they have set up .gov accounts for the entire administrative staff some time back in November? What was the hold-up?
If you were an employer, would you ask someone at an interview "Do you pay your taxes? Do you try to cheat on your tax return?"
And what would you think of a prospective employer if they did ask such questions?
There is actually quite a long between not paying your taxes and getting yourself some time in jail.
For most of us, it isn't a problem because our tax returns are by and large dominated by our job where our employer pays tax on our behalf. Now set yourself up as a contractor where you have the responsibility for paying tax yourself and I'm sure your perspective will change when it comes to writing that check.
Note that in light of the "tax issue" with who he wanted to appoint first up, he ran a very strong vetting of all followup appointees. So the mistake was learnt from - which I consider unfortunate in two ways: his confidence in someone was betrayed by their desire to beat the IRS and he's had to pry deeper into the lives of others because someone chose to cheat.
I get notification from my HR department about new employees at least two weeks prior to their start date. In that time I and my staff create email accounts, domain accounts, set network permissions etc... Then on their first day everything is set and ready to go. Occasionally employees are actually given web access to email before they officially start work (but not before paperwork is signed). Our employee manual specifically forbids using outside email services such as Google, Yahoo, etc... for corporate email. Not so much for security but for auditing and accountability reasons.
There is no reason why the outgoing IT staff at the White House could not, at the very least, create email accounts for the incoming administration prior to their arrival. I sincerely hope that when the time comes for the O-Man and his cohorts to leave office that they don't go through this same mess. Inexcusable.
- SR
This was on the day his grandmother died (Nov 3 - the day before the election). Do you think historical accuracy was on his mind at that point? Do you actually believe that he purposefully lied instead of simply not bothering to fact check his public eulogy of his grandmother?
That is one weakness in his record - he voted on the telecom immunity on the perception that if he didn't Republicans would attack him on being weak on security, which is a bad excuse.
No - he was saying that economic difficulties make it easier to find comfort in those things. Look at where the Bible Belt is and you'll see it corresponds quite well with where people like their guns and where the economy isn't as strong.
Blatantly false. If you don't pay your taxes, at most you'll get your fine. If you evade your taxes (actively seek to not pay them by hiding and whatnot), then you will go to jail.
FISA yes, Sec Treas no (see above).
So far, any criticism of his actual presidency is nonexistant (except for manufactured BS controversy like the Sec Treas thing) and he's already managed to sign some good executive orders (closing Gitmo, strengthening FOIA, freezing salary increases, strong ethics guidelines regarding lobbying, mandatory ethics lectures for his staff).
Also, regarding the Sec Treas thing. He initially repayed whatever the IRS audit specified almost 10 years ago (that's the way audits work). Then the Obama transition team directed him to pay further after they performed their own audit (not sure what timeframe the transition team was talking about). It wasn't even the IRS that said he owed taxes. source
That's true, but he also doesn't need to use the technology to be familiar with it. I'm not gay, but I have a decent understanding of the issues surrounding gay people in our society, for example. If I lacked a nuanced understanding because some issue didn't personally affect me, I know enough that someone closer to the situation could explain to me.
Furthermore, use does not imply understanding, as beleaguered IT workers all over would tell you. Many people use technology and are reasonably comfortable with it, but are complete idiots about it too.
"16MB (fuck off, MiB fascists)" - The Mighty Buzzard
Take ex-Senator Ted Stevens, for instance. He was incredibly uninformed about technology and how it impacted our culture; as a result, he promoted some truly terrible legislation that no competent, informed person would consider. Would you put him at the head of the United States Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation knowing full well that he couldn't tell the difference between a cable modem and a brick?
I appreciate what you're saying, but ol' Ted is a bad example, because, as a member of that committee, he was expected to have specific knowledge of the issue being tackled. The president's scope is more general, so he doesn't need that intimate knowledge.
Now we have a president that is informed on the benefits of open source software and net neutrality; I'd argue that's hugely indicative of his potential to promote sane legislation.
I wouldn't be so ready to believe he has any more understanding of these issues than someone who's computer illiterate. Many PHB's have toys like blackberries, but are complete idiots with respect to technology. Use is not required for understanding (as long as you have a basic level of understanding, someone who knows more can fill you in), and does not imply understanding. So... why get all worked up over his use of technology? It tells us nothing.
"16MB (fuck off, MiB fascists)" - The Mighty Buzzard
So according to you, a "lie" is anything someone states that is untrue, regardless of intent to deceive. According to that definition, you lied earlier when you said you would have gone to jail for failure to pay an obscure tax (this is simply not true). Hope you never want to run for President.
I guess there are people out there who think Obama is some sort of messiah and above all reproach, that nothing he does could possibly be wrong. You are the opposite of those people; you are ready to condemn anyone who doesn't live up to your impossibly high expectations. I don't expect politicians to be perfect, just as I don't expect any human being to be perfect. The perfect, as they say, is the enemy of the good.
I'm really getting tired of all the stupid cynicism around here. It seems more like an excuse to be uninvolved: "hey, don't blame me for the problems we have, I told you Obama was a big fat grandmother-lying politician just like the rest of 'em." If you don't like Geithner, come up with someone better and start writing letters.
Just because you sold your soul to the devil that needn't make you a teetotaler. --The Devil and Daniel Webster
I already got my wh.Lastname address have you? I'm a white house staffer LOL
So according to you, a "lie" is anything someone states that is untrue, regardless of intent to deceive.
No. I did not say that. You're assuming I accept the explanation that Obama made a mistake. I do not. I believe he lied.
You are the opposite of those people; you are ready to condemn anyone who doesn't live up to your impossibly high expectations.
My expectations aren't high. I expect politicians to be honest in what they tell me. I expect them to be willing to protect certain fundamental rights. Obama has failed both of these tests (lied to us, and failed to protect our right to privacy), which is why I anticipate a bad presidency from him. I will be ecstatic, of course, if I'm wrong, but that's my belief based on what is known of him at this time.
If you don't like Geithner, come up with someone better and start writing letters.
I've written letters to my representatives before. I got a form letter response and no action was taken. I've since given up that useless form of action. When I had the chance to take action with my vote, I took it. Experience has taught me that, now, the die is cast and there's nothing I can do.
"16MB (fuck off, MiB fascists)" - The Mighty Buzzard
We have a huge and expensive government. The white house, arguably, is the most powerful single entity (congress by law is more powerful, but that requires agreement - the president only has to agree with himself). And they can't get e-mail setup either 1) before (they had over a month) or 2) during. How long does it take to setup an e-mail account?
As for that, if they are using gmail for non-secure e-mail then it should not be a huge deal. As long as they realize this e-mail account is for work, not personal reasons. The difference between this and sarah palin is that she had a work e-mail they do not have one. They are not using this just for the hell of it, they are using this because they do not have another option.
I mod down so you can mod up. Your welcome.
hahaha, /.rs Republi-nazis and their bs lies. Go back to WoW, you pathetic loser, as you are going to lose your pathetic loser job because of your loved Nazi party policies.
Don't worry, Obama is going to fix it, and give your meth-addict-white-trash-republican-ass a job back.
Even if I feel that democracy is for losers, and we should have the right to shoot all Republi-nazis in the back of their heads, I am not the president, he is, and he is a real democrat...
Since this is another US centric article and from the reads most people don't understand who Palin was and how the USA is setup is here is basic intro.
Palin is the governor of the STATE of Alaska who ran for a FEDERAL position. During the time she ran for the federal position she was still the state governor and did work as the state governor. She did state and political party work on a Yahoo account.
If she had been elected as Vice-President or had been working for the White House work related documents on Yahoo would of been illegal but she was not and was doing state related work and so far no-one has pointed to an Alaskan law saying she could not do it.
Not that this should be a shock, she had many claims put against her that were correct and permitted under Alaska law but members of the opposition political party figured they would use to attack her.
Now in the USA federal and state laws are separate and while many federal laws must be followed by the states, the laws that the article are complaining that governor Palin did not follow do not deal with the states.
Quit being a douche bag. Why would he lie AND give the year of her birth in the same sentence. It's quite obvious he misspoke. Did you see the fucking oath of office? Did he lie then too? I don't even like the guy, but to nit pick on this is completely mindless.
tool - no one goes to jail for Social Security withholding, ever. I would agree that die-hards are totally wrong, but you're well ahead of the game in your criticism. It would appear that you are waiting for his failures to validate your suspicions of him.
Actually, if you look at the Obama crowd, they (Jarret, Axelrod, etc.) are from the UofC/Hyde Park/Harold Washington Party crowd -- the folks that beat the Machine in Chicago, at least for a while.
You could argue that since then, a new and bigger Machine has evolved, I suppose, but I don't think that would be accurate.
- "History shows again and again how nature points out the folly of men" -- Blue Oyster Cult, 'Godzilla'
Comment removed based on user account deletion
remember you are talking about government contractors.
Rules of government contracting
Rule #1 extend contract
Rule #2 everything you do costs money you need more
Rule #3 everything is broken
Rule #4 about to get let go see rules 1-3
the bush administration probably had the servers burned to no one could ever retrieve anything. The white house probably needed new servers and probably had new staff who needed to install everything from scratch.
either that or they are transitioning from exchange to something a little more robust like Linux. Makes sense.
I don't worry, it will catch up the the bush administration. someone is going to jail, though sadly it will probably be the tech who followed directions and purged data.
They're using their grammar skills there.
First off, failure to retain records is not a moral obligation. I would argue that, morally, keeping everyone's secrets written down and then exposed actually undermines the Presidency and significantly so. Before the PRA, if you were a private person and had a secret, and shared it with the President, it would stay secret. Now, after the PRA, anyone with a FOIA can now sue to get your secrets, as they are part of his or her official correspondence, and the only thing that stops that process is the Reagan and Bush executive orders which the House now wants to stop. It's stupid. If the left gets its way, no one in their right mind with any information of consequence would talk to the President in any way, leaving the office flying bind. Sigh.
From a "right" perspective, the right to Presidential privacy is documented in the sense that there is no enumerated power in the Constitution to actually tell the President how to conduct his or her business, or to expropriate the President's property. So, in that sense, the PRA of 1978 is flat out unconstitutional, as is the revision to the PRA coming from the Congress.
As a matter of a technicality, e-mail and chat are not covered by the PRA, because you argue that they are more like a telephone conversation, which is NOT recorded, than they are correspondence. The revision to the House is a law that "fixes this", but again, I would argue that this law is as unconstitutional as the PRA is.
This is my sig.
Praising Obama for using technology is no different than something like praising him because he likes rock music.
No, it's really not. Changes in technology have effectively changed the way the world works. If you don't see that, then either (a) you're too young to remember how it used to work; or (b) you're too old to understand how it's working now.
Technology is a tremendous economic issue, since changes in technology can drastically increase our efficiency, and failure to keep up would cause us to lag behind the rest of the world. It's a social issue in that a lack of access to technology and technology education creates another barrier to the poor working their way out of poverty. It affects issues of justice, as we've all seen with struggles over copyrights and patents, censorship, and net neutrality.
And yes, it's also a cultural issue too, like saying "he likes rock and roll". But that's not entirely superficial and irrelevant. If the chief executive of our country doesn't understand the various cultural shifts going on in our country, then how is he supposed to govern it effectively?
Whoa, forgot to take your prozac this morning, huh?
No. I did not say that. You're assuming I accept the explanation that Obama made a mistake. I do not. I believe he lied.
That's the stupidest thing I've ever heard. You think he deliberately crafted that response in order to mislead, even though the statement itself contained information that trivially disproved the misleading claim. And for what? Because having a grandmother who lived through two World Wars, instead of World War II, means... what exactly? What on earth do you imagine he intended to gain?
You know Bush made plenty of factual gaffs regarding history. I never assumed his intent was to lie, because how could getting a date from a hundred years ago wrong actually help him? Lying is what he did about the evidence for WMD in Iraq, and the danger posed by the insurgency. Lies that actually benefited him. Why would he "lie" and say there's an old Texas saying that ends "fool me twice... you can't get fooled again"?
Obama has failed both of these tests (lied to us, and failed to protect our right to privacy), which is why I anticipate a bad presidency from him. I will be ecstatic, of course, if I'm wrong, but that's my belief based on what is known of him at this time.
He only failed those tests based on your ludicrous and deliberate, calculated attempts to view them in a way where failure is the only option. The lie thing is just ridiculous. And yes, he failed to protect our privacy, but you know that he tried and choose to deliberately ignore the fact.
So no, you would not be ecstatic to be wrong, or you'd have made being wrong a possibility. You can never be wrong. The only way you could be wrong was if Obama was, in fact, perfect in a way that not only meant he never made a mistake, but could also accomplish things well beyond the power of his office with ease.
The enemies of Democracy are
Okay, so we have staffers using non-government email to conduct government business? There is at least one law on the books about archiving WH emails for various purposes. That they are relying on external systems at all for that purpose seems like a clear violation. Whether Palin did it or not does not justify the new WH staff violating the law. "He committed murder, so I can commit murder, too."
That they are using a rationalization means they know they are violating something. But now, they have established a shadow infrastructure that allows them to continue to carry on government business outside government channels. Nothing prevents them from continuing to use this shadow infrastructure after they have legitimate accounts.
I would have thought that most of these accounts could have been created during the transition. It's not like the previous transition, where members of the outgoing administration ripped the letter 'W' off the keyboards and slipped porn into the paper in printers and copiers. If the prior administration here caused any significant delay, you can bet your bippy the press would have informed by the incoming administration.
My point is 1) that the delay is probably a ruse, or at best a minor inconvenience and 2) the new administration has established a way to violate federal law.
Maybe we should all set up gmail accounts with WH....
What those who want activist courts fear is rule by the people.
And yes, he failed to protect our privacy, but you know that he tried and choose to deliberately ignore the fact.
A "fact" which exists purely in your imagination. If he had tried, he wouldn't have used his power to our detriment. That's it. End of story.
So no, you would not be ecstatic to be wrong, or you'd have made being wrong a possibility.
And now we reach new, idiotic, heights of presumption. No, I will be ecstatic if I turn out to be wrong. Why the hell would I actually wish ill upon my country, and by extension, myself? I don't want Obama in office, but since I can't change that, I want to be floored by how wrong I was. I want him to be the best thing since sliced bread. I merely don't think it's going to happen.
The only way you could be wrong was if Obama was, in fact, perfect in a way that not only meant he never made a mistake, but could also accomplish things well beyond the power of his office with ease.
No, I'll be wrong if he's a good president who restores liberties which we have lost in the past 8 years. I'll be wrong if he works to reduce the abuses of power we saw under Bush. If you think I want him to be perfect, you've managed to read what I said without actually understanding a word. I don't want him to be perfect. I expect to disagree with people on things. What I do want is for him to have the fundamentals right, which he's shown he doesn't (so far).
"16MB (fuck off, MiB fascists)" - The Mighty Buzzard
I'm going to start with the part of your post I find most objectionable:
Bullshit. If you make a mistake on your taxes, you think they throw you immediately in the slammer, no questions asked? No, they ask you about it, and give you the opportunity to correct the error. The same opportunity Geitner ought to get.
Looked this up. Looks like a gaffe in a stump speech. Not a big deal. Reminds me of when he said his relative liberated Auschwitz, when in actuality he had liberated a different concentration camp with a less recognizable name. His opponents thought that was a scandal.
I was really disappointed about this at the time. But some of his appointments, early executive orders, and even inaugural address have made it pretty explicit that the administration's position is that these violations of civil liberties were serious and should not be repeated. In retrospect his support of the FISA bill was probably because there wasn't enough political will to block the bill in the Senate, and he didn't want to rock the boat and turn it into a major battle that could cost you an election.
On the face of it it looks to be an honest mistake and I'll be surprised if they haven't corrected it.
User maintains more than a dozen sockpuppet accounts on Slashdot.
A "fact" which exists purely in your imagination. If he had tried, he wouldn't have used his power to our detriment. That's it. End of story.
Ah, so voting for the amendment to remove telco immunity is my imagination. Got it.
No, wait, that was reality. Imagination is where you pretend that the vote on the funding bill was solely a vote on telco immunity and an indication of how he stands on that issue and that issue alone. Deliberately ignoring 1) how he voted on that particular issue and 2) ignoring everything else in the final bill and the reality surrounding the vote.
And now we reach new, idiotic, heights of presumption. No, I will be ecstatic if I turn out to be wrong.
Yes, if Obama turned out to actually be Jesus, I'm sure you'd be happy. If I made a trillion dollars on the stock market tomorrow and found out I was Superman, I'd be happy too. Yet since obviously that's not going to happen, and you and I both know it, any reasonable person would realize that you and I are deliberately setting ourselves up for disappointment by setting the bar impossibly high.
No, I'll be wrong if he's a good president who restores liberties which we have lost in the past 8 years. I'll be wrong if he works to reduce the abuses of power we saw under Bush. If you think I want him to be perfect, you've managed to read what I said without actually understanding a word. I don't want him to be perfect. I expect to disagree with people on things. What I do want is for him to have the fundamentals right, which he's shown he doesn't (so far).
Ah but see, I do understand what you are saying, at a level that goes deeper than just blindly accepting when you say "I don't want him to be perfect". You can't say "I don't want him to be perfect" in one sentence, and then say "He has failed because he didn't do something that would be impossible to do" in the next, and not have the deeper truth come out. Just because you don't want to admit it, doesn't mean I don't understand what you're saying. I understand quite well.
After all, if what you said here was true, then you'd already be admitting you are at least partially wrong, since Obama began rolling back Bush abuses on day one. But, again, you deliberately ignore reality, and people only do that when they have already decided they don't want that reality to be true. You don't want to be wrong about Obama, and you're making it impossible for you personally to ever believe that you were.
So make whatever superficial claim otherwise you wish. The deeper meaning is clear. You want the impossible. I'm sick of people who will only settle for the impossible.
The enemies of Democracy are
Ah, so voting for the amendment to remove telco immunity is my imagination. Got it.
And also a meaningless gesture. It doesn't matter what road he took to get to his final vote, his final vote is what counts. Get that straight, because if you don't, you'll be deceived left and right by politicians for the rest of your life, and they'll screw you over, while you blindly accept it because they took superficial action you supported before they bent you over.
you and I are deliberately setting ourselves up for disappointment by setting the bar impossibly high.
No, I set the bar at a reasonable level: I want the man to be honest with me, and protect my rights. He failed at both of these before he was even elected. That was while he had incentive to do right by the people. Now he has no such incentive, since he got to the office. Just like any other politician, it's only sensible to bet that his behavior will degrade once he gets what he wants, and his behavior was shitty to begin with.
Ah but see, I do understand what you are saying...
No, you don't understand a damn bit of what I'm saying.
ou can't say "I don't want him to be perfect" in one sentence, and then say "He has failed because he didn't do something that would be impossible to do" in the next
I never said he didn't do something that would be impossible to do. He had a vote. He chose to vote against the people on the FISA issue, rather than for them. Would the bill have passed without his vote? Probably, but that's irrelevant. By voting like he did, at the very least, he shows that he's willing to harm us as long as it furthers his political career. Well, fuck him, then. I want a representative who puts my interests ahead of his.
After all, if what you said here was true, then you'd already be admitting you are at least partially wrong...
I already have. Again, you show that you haven't bothered to really pay attention to what I said. To quote myself, from my very first post in this thread: "Let's not pretend the man is unblemished. At the same time, let's not pretend he's worthless either, since he seems to be doing some good." I already recognize that he seems to be doing good so far.
So make whatever superficial claim otherwise you wish. The deeper meaning is clear.
Ah, yes. "I see what you have said but I wish to put other words in your mouth, so I am expressly ignoring what you say." Classic material there. You are reading into my words things that aren't there. You are, as they say, so full of shit your eyes are brown.
"16MB (fuck off, MiB fascists)" - The Mighty Buzzard
Closing the camp was a PR move and a waste of taxpayer money.
And sending those detainees there was a infinite lack of basic morality.
If anyone in government starts using a whitehouse.org email account EVER then you Americans can look forward to a new era in comedic government.
And what does this have to do with Sarah Palin exactly? The title of the story didn't need her name in it, nor is this even news.
Hey look a front page story by Timothy that links to the Washington Times. With their powers combined they form Captain Troll Slashdot Post! I'm honestly surprised there was no mention of Natalie Portman or hot grits.
I'm a loner Dottie, a Rebel.
And also a meaningless gesture. It doesn't matter what road he took to get to his final vote, his final vote is what counts. Get that straight, because if you don't, you'll be deceived left and right by politicians for the rest of your life, and they'll screw you over, while you blindly accept it because they took superficial action you supported before they bent you over.
Actually neither vote counted, both were meaningless gestures, as anyone connected to reality can see. You are picking the "final vote" as being the only true indication of what Obama believes regarding telco immunity, completely ignoring that this was not the only thing in the bill and thus cannot by any reasonable reality-connected person to represent his opinion regarding only that. But you are not reasonable, and cherry-pick whatever you like to show that you're being "bent over".
Even though, as is obvious, if his intent was to deceive with his first vote and then "bend you over", he could have gotten the same effect by voting no in the final vote since the bill still was guaranteed to pass. Which is why it's hilarious having you tell me I need to "get it straight", when you don't even realize that the final vote was equally "superficial".
If he'd voted against removing the immunity provision, and then voted against the final bill, what would you have concluded then? That despite his earlier vote, he was actually against telco immunity?
No, I set the bar at a reasonable level: I want the man to be honest with me, and protect my rights. He failed at both of these before he was even elected.
Yeah, I already know how reasonable a judge of honesty you are. Seriously, that bit about the grandmother was pathetic and sad of you and you should probably never bring it up again. Really, it was sad, and very telling.
And yes, he failed to protect your rights. Explain to me how Obama could have plausibly protected your rights in reality, as in actually stopped passage of the bill, or admit that your expectation here is unreasonable.
No, you don't understand a damn bit of what I'm saying.
But I do, your failure to admit the consequences of what you're saying is leading you to think this. But those consequences exist, admit it or not. You have a completely unreasonable and irrational expectations that are completely divorced from reality.
I never said he didn't do something that would be impossible to do. He had a vote. He chose to vote against the people on the FISA issue, rather than for them. Would the bill have passed without his vote? Probably, but that's irrelevant. By voting like he did, at the very least, he shows that he's willing to harm us as long as it furthers his political career. Well, fuck him, then. I want a representative who puts my interests ahead of his.
Saying it's irrelevant that the bill would have passed anyway shows just how divorced from reality you are. You're saying you would actually be happier with a candidate who deliberately ignored anything in the bill except the one thing you care about, and then made a pointless grandstanding gesture of voting against it even though it would certainly pass anyway, resulting in the same outcome, and causing that person political harm for zero actual benefit to the people.
That's what's so funny. On the one hand you don't count meaningless gestures like the vote against telco immunity, but on the other hand your whole beef with Obama is that he didn't make the meaningless gesture you wanted him to, even though it would have meant no more than the first vote did. In fact if you think his first vote was somehow duplicitous, then obviously (to the reality-connected) so could have been a 'no' vote on the final bill. That you think there's a difference is just proving my point.
What's not so funny is that if the candidate you want was actually running, the kind of candidate who deliberately ignores political reality for the sake of staying "pure" through pointless gestures that
The enemies of Democracy are
Why is there ever, ever any need to link to that sh*tbag of propagandistic swill, the Washington Times? Can't we find something more responsible on this, like, say, a crayon drawing by a small child?
1st reason: you're comment was obnoxious.
2nd reason: you're sig:
if(dislikesApple()||isLibertarian()){$mod--;}//© Slashdot
Here's the thing, I don't disagree with any part of your sig. Part of the reason I'm modding you down is to send a message that you're not going to 'shame' anyone into changing their moderation habits. My mod points are going to be used as I see fit, moderation policy be damned, and if I decide that I don't like you, or some viewpoint you hold, I might choose express myself by bitchslapping your slashdot karma. You can wail and gnash your teeth and throw ashes on your head in sorrow, but when I have mod points burning a hole in my pocket, whiny sigs like this only serve as a flashing, neon bullseye for an otherwise unremarkable comment. HTH.
Get the facts.
I have my doubts about this article. www.doyouwantacake.com has an article about a person who signed up for one of these email addresses and raises a good point that this "wh.lastname@gmail" is probably just a hoax that someone played on this reporter because the emails are already up for grabs. I think this is just something people want to believe and that it is most likely that people just switched from their campaign emails to their new white how emails.