Comment by notepad0x90
2 days ago
I think Orwell was prescient and attuned to this sort of thinking in England at his time. Perhaps, it never really went away? e.g.: "crimestop"
https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/725596-crimestop-means-the-...
It isn't precrime or "dissent management" that is the problem, but the engineering of behavior and thought in society where such concepts are acceptable to people.
I don't think we can discuss it in detail here, but with this , chat control, and all sorts of other controversial laws, you'll notice the people of the country actually support that stuff. There is an interesting conversation there about democracy, and the priority of the working class people. Naturally, a person living paycheck-to-paycheck and fighting for healthcare and keeping their job (or getting one) does not care about this stuff. So who does? Not the ruling class. A lot of people (including on HN) who think this stuff is important (rightfully) are not poor people, perhaps middle-class?
Is democracy itself something that can survive, if it is left entirely up to popular vote? Power has gravity, it always wants more. Ideally, there would be institutions that are democratically established and managed that would be trusted to safeguard the people's interests. In the US, there are executive department agencies for example like the FCC, FTC, FDA and more, but they are subject to those in power who are elected by the people.
My "food for thought" here is that similar to supreme courts, there needs to be a regulatory and oversight branch of the government, whose chiefs are apolitical (like actually, not like the US supreme court), well compensated, long-tenured (but not lifetime, more like 20 years), and appointed by confirmation of all other branches of government.
We need to address the problem of power, influence to wield power and incentives for those entrusted with power to act in good faith, but also with good competence. The last part is important, because I have no doubt, a lot of the politicians that come up with this Orwellian nonsense have good intentions, the outcome they seek are noble, just not the means. they just happen to be incompetent when it comes to the subject matter.
This doesn't work. The current POTUS is clearly trying to politicize the chair of the federal reserve who is independent and for his sociopathic fanbase it is working a treat, they do not even understand that Powell is not the sole decision maker of the interest rates
He is able to do that and a whole lot more because the regulators, attorney general, ombudsmans,etc.. report to him. it's a vulnerability in the structure of the US government he's exploiting. Even if he leaves peacefully, and a decent administration comes along, it will only be temporary, he's shown others what can be abused. What maddens me is not him, someone like that has been inevitable. It isn't even his opposition's lack of competence. No one talked about this stuff, constitutional amendments, curbing the executive power, passing laws to clarify limits of powers,etc.. even in the previous admin. No one is talking about now, and they won't even after this one leaves. They don't care, nobody does. They're all just sitting in the house and complaining about the arsonist burning it down.
Even as he's dismantling nato or trying to invade greenland, do you think it's difficult to get a handful of republicans to support a bipartisan law to forbid that? They're just spectators, the lawmakers. The judges are scared sh*#!less, and powerless. Everyone is hoping that problem goes away, or at best they only care about the latest and immediate issue.