[cyberferret]

I am looking for reasonable explanations for this, but keep coming up blank. I grew up in a country where this sort of censorship and fact hiding was the norm, and hated it.

I now live in a country that is much freer, but for the first time since 1938, no longer has an active US ambassador, with no replacement in sight, since President Trump fired all US ambassadors to foreign countries on the afternoon of his inauguration... [0]

[0] - http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/donald-trum...

[DanielBMarkham]

Meta: people say they keep looking for explanations. Explanations are offered. Then the explanations are downvoted and an argument ensues.

It may be fine that you don't understand or like the explanations, but saying "I really don't understand X" and then punishing anybody who tries to explain it isn't much of a way to have a reasonable public discourse. (This wasn't directed at you, just at the community at large. I've seen several of these comment questions and they never end well. Might be time for a politics pause for a day or two)

[throwaway91111]

Maybe I'm reading it wrong but the article does not offer any explanation.

[codeddesign]

Agreed. Anything remotely neutral about the new administration is met with a mob and pitch forks.

Discussion is good. Saying you don't understand because you don't agree with answers is like saying you don't understand why a homosexaul is homosexual.

Last time I checked, that's called "bigotry"

[icanhackit]

> Saying you don't understand because you don't agree

You can't make an assessment about whether you agree if you don't understand - the latter must must happen before the former can come to pass. It would either be the case that you don't understand because the explanation is complex or it contains logical fallacies...the latter applies to your statement above.

> is like saying you don't understand why a homosexaul is homosexual.

It's fine to say you don't understand why a homosexual is homosexual - however it's not fine to impose restrictions, punishment, violence or torment for what goes on between consenting adults. You're allowed to find it odd or not to your taste, but you're expected to live and let live.

> Last time I checked, that's called "bigotry"

Bigotry is intolerance stemming from a preconceived opinion that isn't based on reason or experience. And I'd agree that the liberal/progressive side can exhibit such intolerance - I've been on the receiving end despite considering myself progressive. But if we're going talk about the old classics like racism, homophobia, and sexism -- the conservative side knows the art better than any.

[wooter]

> But if we're going talk about the old classics like racism, homophobia, and sexism -- the conservative side knows the art better than any.

Lincoln, a Republican, abolished slavery. And Roosevelt, a Democrat, interned Japanese Americans.

[learc83]

He said "conservative". You think Lincoln was a conservative? The Democrat's decision to support civil rights and the Republican southern strategy shift to appeal to voters who opposed civil rights radically altered both parties. The Republican party shares a name with the Party of Lincoln, but that's about it.

[talmand]

If you look at the vote totals you'll see that far more Republicans voted for the Civil Rights Act of 1964 than Democrats and that far more Democrats voted against it than Republicans. The Democrats did not suddenly decide to support civil rights since the majority of the opponents of such policies were Democrats. Much of the violence against blacks you see from that era were committed by Democrats. I seriously doubt there were Democrats out beating blacks for demanding civil rights one day and literally the next day they were voting for civil rights.

That situation was far more nuanced than the idea that millions of people with opposing viewpoints across the entirety of the country suddenly agreed with each other to switch parties.

As for the southern strategy, there is the viewpoint that getting people to vote for you doesn't automatically mean you accept and enforce their ideologies. They just become "useful idiots" for your cause. Although, I disagree with the premise of the strategy because it would have the side effect of fostering racial divide. But I have the advantage of hindsight in that matter.

[michaelbuddy]

giving some alternative facts again are we?

[jjaredsimpson]

Because political labels from 150 and 80 years ago are clearly relevant.

[vacri]

On HN, you cannot downvote a direct reply to your comment, so you can't punish an explanation provided to you.

[wallacoloo]

How does one downvote a comment on HN? I thought maybe there was some reputation or age requirement, but I've been here a while now & I still don't see any option to downvote comments.

[cyberferret]

How many Karma points do you have? (top right). I don't think I could downvote until I got to about 1000 or 1500 points, I believe.

[type0]

I feel that it should actually be raised to over 9000.

[nylonstrung]

I'd downvote this if I could

[Semaphor]

I think you need over 500 karma to downvote. I couldn't downvote for my first few years here (and I probably only downvoted posts once or twice since I could)

[bildung]

The threshold is at 500 karma points.

[cyberferret]

I actually upvoted @DanielBMarkham, because I thought his comment added value, and he did explain very well that it wasn't aimed directly at my post! :)

[vacri]

My point was more that if you're being 'punished' for a comment, it's not the person you're replying to that is doing it - that is, it's not the person asking for the explanation that's punishing it.

I think that the GP is being unfair, though. Complaining about arguments specifically on the topic of politics? That's the essence of politics - conflict and how to deal with it. If people didn't disagree on a topic, it wouldn't be political. Outside of political topics, I'd say the bulk of explanations offered on HN are upvoted or at lest left neutral.

[mememachine]

they probably disagree

[nikdaheratik]

The explanation is basically the Trump administration wants to control all media messaging (as most administrations do), but is so far behind on staffing the posts at EPA and others that the secretary level people who should be in place to handle this haven't been nominated in most cases, let alone confirmed.

The fact that their solution to their own failure to get people in place is to make things worse by releasing a blanket gag order is another self-inflicted PR wound. If the "gag order" is in place after they have media people in place, or if it lasts more than a month or so, then I'd be worried.

[dashundchen]

Except it's not just social media. It keeps getting repeated as "social media ban" but there is more to it.

It's also freezing the distribution of grants and any new business of EPA for a week, if not longer. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/20...

This is while Trump attempts to appoint Scott Pruitt to the head of the EPA. He's a noted opponent of the EPA who frequently litigates against it on behalf of the fossil fuel lobby, denies man-made climate change, and would like to dismantle the agency's power altogether. https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/07/us/politics/scott-pruitt-...

[ianai]

That's what makes me think this may mean mass defunding/shutting down of departments. Pruitt is a clear offense to the institution of the EPA. You'd put someone like that over a department and tell that department to "shut up" if it were about to get the axe.

[ianai]

I hope that's "all" that's going on here. That's horrible, but it smells a lot more like signalling complete shutdowns.

[nikdaheratik]

Well that's the thing the administration doesn't seem to get: you shouldn't try and micromanage things if you don't know how it works. And they're so paranoid about their media "image" that they leave the chance for FUD to creep in without encouragement. And not everything in their agenda is acceptable to most Americans, so it's hard to tell what's FUD and what's just their usual policy.

[Amygaz]

Who needs PR people and gag order when every day we get Spicer who barfs everything about what Trump believes is true or not?

[inferiorhuman]

That is his job. Spicer is very explicitly a PR person.

[ra1n85]

Well thought and explained. The sausage making of a (particularly dramatic) presidential transition is on display.

[DrScump]

  but is so far behind on staffing the posts at EPA 

He's been in office five days. How rushed of a hiring process are you seeking?

[Godel_unicode]

For reference, the vast majority of Obama's first cabinet had been nominated (and largely confirmed) January 21st (the day after his inauguration). While certainly not always the case, given the pageantry associated with The First 100 Days, most American Presidents have been similarly prompt with their cabinet nominations.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confirmations_of_Barack_Obam...

[nikdaheratik]

In a parliamentary system, the opposition party already has a shadow government that should be ready to take over in 5 days or less. Since they don't have that in the U.S., they have a transition period to build up the "shadow government" and get it ready to take over. A competent candidate would have it all up and running right now, though with some variance depending on how long the party has been out of power.

[Abekkus]

He's had the job for 72 + 5 days already.

[r00fus]

Exactly. Transition team.

[eh78ssxv2f]

Even if he has been there for only five days, I do not think that he should put a gag order on the employees.

[talmand]

Gag orders are placed on employees all the time, in or out of government. This is nothing new, just something for people to nitpick and go negative before they even know what's going on.

[jquery]

The existing social media managers are openly hostile to the new boss, with irrelevant-to-their-organization tweets going out about the inauguration crowd-size?

To your latter point regarding the fired ambassadors, it's the most scandalous thing since 2008, when Obama did the exact same thing - http://voices.washingtonpost.com/44/2008/12/obama-gives-poli...

[cyberferret]

Point taken, but I believe when Obama did it, there was already someone appointed to take the outgoing ambassadors place immediately (at least, here, it was the case).

A changing of the guard in these roles is (as the article I posted pointed out) the norm.

However, In the current case, no one knows who the replacement is, or when he/she will be taking on the role, thus leaving us officially without an ambassador for the foreseeable future, and also resulting in the longest gap in 70 odd years that we have not had an official ambassador.

[Vivtek]

It's pro forma for the ambassadors from the outgoing administration to proffer their resignation effective noon on Inauguration Day. The incoming president then says, no, no, please stay on until we have your replacement set up.

A transition team who knows these things would have done that - the Trump team, though, since he was not actually expecting a transition, had no idea how to run one. And accepted all the resignations.

This is the same reason the commander of the D.C. National Guard was dismissed at noon on the same day.

Never attribute to malice that which can be explained by incompetence.

[masonic]

  The incoming president then says, no, no, please stay on until we have your replacement set up.

... which constitutes a rejection of the resignation. Later, when a replacement is confirmed, what happens if the offer to resign is not repeated? Do ambassadors get normal Civil Service protections?

[realityking]

Amassadors serve at the pleasure of the president, he can fire them at will.

[John23832]

"Which is more culpable: stupidity or malice?"

[Vivtek]

I wish current events didn't leave us needing to answer that question. I don't have a ready answer.

[gozur88]

I don't think it actually matters in the short run. Career FSOs do the actual work in embassies, which is why you see big campaign donors and mid-level party hacks appointed as ambassadors to all but the most powerful countries.

[candiodari]

> Point taken, but I believe when Obama did it, there was already someone appointed to take the outgoing ambassadors place immediately (at least, here, it was the case).

Unless I'm misremembering, that wasn't the case. Obama was appointing ambassadors regularly for a few months.

[Godel_unicode]

Not an appointee, but it's worth noting that there is a deputy chief of mission at every diplomatic post. This person is always a career diplomat with extensive experience, and is in place for precisely this reason. To take over and run the mission until a politically appointed ambassador is present.

[cyberferret]

> The existing social media managers are openly hostile to the new boss, with irrelevant-to-their-organization tweets going out about the inauguration crowd-size?

But wasn't it the Parks agency that tweeted about the crowd size, not the EPA?

And is the current administration simply going to shut down or fire everyone who shows any form of push back towards the regime? Isn't that what they do in places like, oh say, North Korea?

[LyndsySimon]

If you're an employee of the government, working to publicly undermine the policies of the person elected to lead your branch of government doesn't seem like a good way to keep your job.

I can't think of many instances where Executive Branch employees used official outlets to undermine a sitting President's policies in the past. Can you?

[codedokode]

I guess in North Korea they would not get away with just getting fired.

[rsync]

"To your latter point regarding the fired ambassadors, it's the most scandalous thing since 2008, when Obama did the exact same thing"

Don't all new presidents appoint a fresh new batch of ambassadors ? I assumed it was always done that way ...

Are there cases of cross-presidency ambassadors ?

[sandworm101]

Yes. Where a new admin hasnt lined up a new ambassador, normal practice is to have the old one continue until the replacement is worked out. This admin, for whatever reasons, is months behind the normal schedual. A list of names should have already have been circulated on the hill so that they could be vetted and agreed upon asap. To leave such a post unfilled breaks diplomatic protocols and can be taken as a slight.

[masonic]

   This admin, for whatever reasons, is months behind the normal schedual.

This admin must really suck to be "months behind" after 5 days.

Please describe your process for properly vetting, nominating, debating, and confirming all (or most) ambassadorships in 4+ days, since you see that as "normal practice". Extra credit: name any three administrations that have done so.

I would hope that the Secretary of State would have some say in ambassadorships, in which case the process would also be constrained until the SecState nominee is confirmed.

[learc83]

The administration shouldn't have had every post already filled. What is unusual here is that an incoming administration usually asks the current ambassador to stay until a replacement is appointed.

The Trump team immediately accepted all the ambassadors resignations, which is what is unusual.

[sandworm101]

He was elected months ago. Even so, responsible campaigns start working this stuff out even before the election. Teambuilding should not be left until the last minute.

[prirun]

Who gives a shit? Do ambassadors actually DO anything?

[whyileft]

1. The National Park Service hosted the event. Seems like it would make sense to post public information about the crowd size when there was a lot of public debate and misinformation about it. I understand your frustration thinking they would always look out for the president's best interest, but this was a pretty clear fact they were posting, not some kind of political opinion.

2. December 3, 2008. That's when that article was published about giving notice and starting to find replacements. Same as every other president does.

3. Serious question. Are you paid to do what you are doing right now? I have a really hard time understanding why you would post that link which is specifically framed to spread misinformation as it is about a completely different point in the presidency. Seriously, this is your country. Why would you intentionally attempt to misinform your fellow citizens?

EDIT: I expect a response. You said Obama did the "exact same thing". Which is an outright falsehood and posted an link that is from a different period to intentionally misinform people. In some countries what you just did would be considered a crime.

[nl]

(Non-US citizen. Very Anti-Trump. Unpaid poster. Unhappy I need to state all this.)

To my surprise, jquery is pretty much correct about it being the same thing as Obama did. This[1] is the best summary of the situation I can find:

1) Obama (and all new incoming presidents before him) did ask for the resignations of all non-career, politically appointed ambassadors.

2) Obama (and Bush) did grant extensions to some ambassadors. However, this was a (very) small number. Exactly how many it applied to is unclear, but to quote the the article I linked above:

in the past two inter-party transitions (Clinton-Bush, Bush-Obama) only about 10 political ambassadors have gotten extensions.

Basically, I'd judge that the reporting of The Independent article linked above is misleadingly critical of Trump.

I also think that jquery's point below about Obama literally auctioned off the posts is incomplete. Most ambassadorships are given as rewards (by both US parties). Most countries do the same: ambassadorships to friendly countries are political rewards and the countries actually want someone who is close to the leader of the country they represent. I don't think the moral case against that is entirely clear, but I can see arguments both ways.

[1] https://diplopundit.net/2017/01/06/foreign-service-tradition...

[jquery]

You're right, Obama didn't do the "exact same thing." He literally auctioned off the posts, giving the ambassadorships to campaign contributors and bundlers ( https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/obama-ambassador-nom... ). It's easy to find replacements if you don't care about qualifications and just reward your donor list, I guess. One of the ambassadors was so bad, staffers working for her requested transfers to Iraq and Afghanistan - http://www.politico.com/story/2011/02/report-rips-us-envoy-w...

So, yes, some posts may be left without an immediate replacement, but it's not cause for panic if the alternative is immediately filling the posts with unqualified campaign donors.

EDIT: These are undisputed facts in response to a hostile question accusing me of being a paid actor (ridiculous, my account is 8 years old) posting things that would be a "crime" in other countries. People down-voting this should check the irony considering they're upset at the President for censorship.

[badsock]

You were incorrect and you admitted it, which is good, but then you immediately move the goalposts and then use that to pretend that you were justified in your original assertation.

That's a shady rhetorical technique, and I suspect you're arguing in bad faith. That's worth some downvotes.

[3131s]

Wait, were they incorrect?

My interpretation was that GP meant that Obama did the same thing (firing existing politically appointed ambassadors) and then in addition filled the positions with people who had donated to his campaign (hence not the "exact same thing", but worse).

I really don't know the facts here, but my cursory reading of the Wapo article does seem to suggest that Obama did essentially the same thing in 2008. Or am I missing something?

[jack9]

> You were incorrect and you admitted it, which is good

Ironically, you are incorrect and have strangely doubled down on it in some sort of pyrrhic victory dance of failure.

[scrollaway]

badsock has posted exactly once in this entire thread.

Give your fellow HNers the benefit of the doubt.

[wfunction]

My understanding was that the problem wasn't their termination, which every president does, but the fact that he denied them any sorts of extensions. Am I incorrect? See this article: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/05/us/politics/trump-ambassa...

[Vivtek]

Ambassadorships for campaign contributors! Goodness, the base corruption of such a President!

Good thing Mr. Trump would never do that kind of thing, like with the Department of Education or something.

[3131s]

It is corruption if a president lets campaign contributions influence their choice of appointees to political positions. Whether or not Obama did that is another discussion, but just because Trump will do the same, we should not hold any other president to a lesser standard.

[facetube]

Then you agree that Donald Trump is corrupt?

[whyileft]

You did not answer my question. I expect an answer.

Why would you intentionally attempt to misinform your fellow citizens?

[beaner]

Honestly as a bystander to this conversation it seems like an easy enough mistake to make. The presidents did the same thing but at different times... Doesn't seem like a big deal. Doesn't nearly seem like enough evidence for "intentional attempt to misinform."

As someone who may be influenced by this discussion I am way more interested in why you think his point about nominating donors is not significant enough to discuss. Isn't that a sort of misinformation by non-acknowledgment?

[garrettgrimsley]

Making negative assumptions about the intentions of the poster is not conducive to civil discourse.

[ams6110]

Your expectations aren't compelling on anyone else.

[caseysoftware]

Except that they stopped giving estimates over 20 years ago:

"For decades, the National Park Service provided official crowd estimates for gatherings on the National Mall but no longer does.

The policy changed after the Million Man March in 1995, a gathering of black men meant to show renewed commitment to family and solidarity. The park service estimated 400,000 people attended the march, making it one of the largest demonstrations in history in Washington.

But organizers believed they reached their goal of 1 million participants and threatened legal action. No lawsuit was filed, but the dispute was enough to get the park service out of the head-counting business."

Ref: http://www.denverpost.com/2017/01/21/national-park-service-t...

[dlp211]

Except they didn't give an estimate. They posted a comparison photo.

[13of40]

I wonder if we've had mobile phone saturation long enough that they could measure attendance just by looking at cellular data.

[will_walker]

At the Boston march, networks couldn't handle load - it was the first time I haven't had network access for hours in years. Maybe this wouldn't preclude the network registering my phone's requests (and our phones were reporting signal bars) but it's to be considered that our cellular infrastructure isn't built to handle massive protests at this scale.

[LyndsySimon]

> At the Boston march, networks couldn't handle load

Sounds like the Boston police department needs to order more Stingrays!

:(

[TD-Linux]

>In some countries what you just did would be considered a crime.

I, for one, am happy that I live in a country where I don't have to worry about being prosecuted for making HN comments.

[Gigablah]

I bet those EPA employees are feeling very differently right now.

[garrettgrimsley]

>3. Serious question. Are you paid to do what you are doing right now?

Can we please not do this here?

[timthelion]

It is absolutely reasonable to question good faith on the internet. SPAM, bots, and paid shills have been here almost from day 1. The entirety of web2.0 was jumpstarted by services creating fake accounts to create the illusion of an already existing community.

It is a very interesting question how to fight this fact, and we need to discuss it, not silence any discussion of it.

[masonic]

  Are you paid to do what you are doing right now?

This is beyond the pale. Next comes Godwin?

[linkregister]

Unless you have evidence of jquery's having been paid to post this, please don't make the accusation.

The number of true believers in various viewpoints, willing to lie in order to sway the audience vastly overwhelms the amount any organization's payroll could handle.

jquery, as many conservative and liberal commenters before him, believes that a lie to persuade someone for his noble cause is justified by its outcome. I disagree with this tactic vehemently, but it is used by many earnest believers.

[scrollaway]

Parent asked a question; it's not really an accusation.

I used to be on board and would have defended the mindset that asking the question is an accusation in and of itself. But now, over in /r/france, we have this stuff going on:

https://www.reddit.com/r/france/comments/5pv83r/inside_the_p...

At this point, I think it's sometimes fair to ask that question. There is no doubt that HN does have paid shills; if you turn showdead on, you'll often see some of the more egregious ones. The question is about the subtle ones.

Of course, that's what the current administration wants: For nobody to be certain of anything. Nerdwriter made an excellent video about it a couple of weeks ago: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=geEVwslL-YY

Hm. When was the last time a government wanted its citizens not to be sure of what's true, what's false and each others' affiliations...

[LyndsySimon]

Your post is in gray. Even though I believe the last two sentences in your post justify a downvote, I gave you an upvote because the first two sentences are absolutely true and provide important perspective in this discussion.

[gvd]

I actually think the fact that many people in the US coming from less free/developed countries is a problem (not the fact that they are here). They might come here thinking..wow this is great..this must be how it's supposed to be (together with the existing citizens who constantly hear they live in the greatest/free-est country on the planet). While when e.g. a Northern European comes here they are amazed by what kind of shit-show it sometimes is in this country.

I think it prevents real change from happening. Questioning why things are they way they are. Should some of the fundamental just be changed/replaced? What country do we want to live in? Do we want people worrying about going bankrupt because they got sick or went to school? Do we want to worry about drinking lead poisoned water? etc etc.

Sorry, I went way off topic. Trump apparently also want to defund PBS/NPR. I see a clear pattern here. None of these ideas will save substantial money and will erode democracy. Who else is going to educate the busy citizen about world events? CNN/Fox?

[jakeogh]

NPR is one of the worst propaganda outlets. It insulates it's listeners from opposing viewpoints to a degree that I think is unhealthy, I'm often in awe of the sophistication of it. When they have a opposition expert on, it's very rarely someone I consider credible. They misrepresent the viewpoint of the opposition, and it's hard to believe it's not deliberate. I watched them (along with the rest of the MSM to be fair) lead their flocks to war many times now. Like FOX, xNBC, CNN (worse than even NPR) they represent the global government faction. Each plays it's part, but it's not really different. Government should not be funding the media at all.

http://fair.org/extra/psyops-in-the-newsroom/

[gvd]

I disagree. Government can fund media, without you immediately thinking of Russia. Being Dutch originally, I would refer you to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dutch_public_broadcasting_syst...

Note that this is not a closed system where there is no private news/tv.

Also, look at DW (Deutsche Welle) and BBC. Whatever your opinion, these still provide much better information than whatever you can get in the US (well, you can actually get BBC/DW).

I would love to hear a better approach.

[jakeogh]

Money _is_ influence.

How about letting the media stand on it's own legs? Why should NPR be special? Even their name is a dishonest appeal to authority. It's not random that they have show titles like "Talk of the Nation".

As far as I know, NYT does not receive public funding, but I think this window is instructive on how the "elite" media views themselves:

http://i.imgur.com/VUdcIou.jpg

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CIMxvS-WEAER49I.png

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CINJUoqUwAEkSip.jpg

Fortunately most of them are going down in flames and it's only going to get better as people have access to more unfiltered information.

[gvd]

That's exactly why you need public media. Not everybody can afford NYT

[masonic]

But PBS/NPR are "public" only in the sense they are publicly funded. They aren't balanced in any way, nor do they invite public participation.

What would you consider to be the "conservative" equivalent of the following?:

- To The Contrary

- Latino USA

- Frontline (political topics)

- Democracy Now!

- Charlie Rose

- Tavis Smiley

- John Lewis - Get in the Way

[jakeogh]

We should fund NYT too by your logic.

[DrScump]

Some context for the latter two photos would be helpful.

[barney54]

Here's an explanation--the new management of the agencies want to review the social media policies.

[cyberferret]

In my line of business, I get to inherit web and mobile apps from other developers all the time.

One thing I never do is to completely shut down the app and take it offline while I scour through the code to ensure everything is ok. Not unless there is a glaring problem or security hole that is already evident.

It is ironic that the person giving the orders to restrict his subordinates from tweeting can still continue tweeting his stream of consciousness stuff carte blanche...

[vacri]

> It is ironic that the person giving the orders to restrict his subordinates from tweeting can still continue tweeting his stream of consciousness stuff carte blanche...

Kind've, kind've not. If you're a government agency and you employ a new staffer outside of PR, you're not expecting them to tweet stream-of-consciousness. Trump, on the other hand, was largely elected because he did do this and it's expected of him.

[facetube]

What evidence is there of this? From this vantage point, it looks like he was elected despite his Twitter falsehoods (read: lies) and stream-of-(un)consciousness, not because of it. He lost the popular vote by three million votes. He is historically unpopular.

[vacri]

He did lose the popular vote, and I'm definitely not a Trump apologist. But however you want to carve it, over 60 million people got out there on election day(-ish) and spent effort to vote for him in a non-compulsory election.

I'm first in line to criticise the primitive Electoral College, the cancerous state of US gerrymandering, and the vapidity of the two-party tribal system, but voter turnout was high. Bush and Gore each got 50M votes in the 2000 election. Obama/McCain was 70M/60M (also: McCain's loss was much greater than Trump's). Clinton/Trump was 65M/62M. Unless Trump's numbers were rapaciously Russian-ified, he still put in a solid showing with voluntary voters.

Trump's appeal was his unorthodox, un-polished dog-whistle politics, and his faithful lapped up his 'tell-it-like-it-is' approach, even if the 'like-it-is' part was fabricated out of whole cloth.

[loafa]

Fair enough, but the EPA twitter account isn't exactly mission-critical for anyone, it can afford to not tweet for a little while.

Also I don't think it's particularly ironic that the President of the United States gets certain privileges which his subordinates don't.

[fpgeek]

Except, in the general case, that isn't true. Many of the Park Service social media accounts that were shut down do disseminate emergency information.

That part of the "shutdown" was rolled back once the issues were understood, but in the interim those kinds of Twitter feeds were pointing people to their Facebook page for up-to-date information. I guess we're lucky that no one included Facebook in the shutdown order and even luckier that there was no relevant emergency while the social media policy was being clarified.

[px1999]

I've worked in government (thankfully not US federal) and when departments review their specific operations/policies, they rarely grind to a halt, it's business as usual while things get evaluated/decided and policies built behind the scenes.

The only reason that you'd do something this public is to make it a spectacle and give people the impression that you're doing important busy work at all levels; or to try to assert/show dominance.

[kafkaesq]

The new management of the agencies want to review the social media policies.

With the aim of installing Orwellian-style thought control practices† at every level, affecting every last publicity statement, blog post, and tweet. You forgot that part.

† Based on what his press secretary (and other lackeys) attempted to have us believe about the size of the inaugural day crowds (and the millions of people who voted fraudulently in the past election) -- in addition to things Trump himself has said about climate change, and a whole bunch of other issues -- that's not hyperbole; that's quite literally what's happening.

[jquery]

This is different than every Presidential transition of power, how? I don't see what's Orwellian about it. Presidents have always controlled the official department media their agencies put out.

[kafkaesq]

This is different than every Presidential transition of power, how?

It's the aims of the control, and the utter brazenness with which the new administration attempts to manipulate facts and reality in general that are different.

There's never been an administration (well, maybe in the 19th century; but I mean, not since the dawn of modern journalistic reporting) that blatantly and transparently lied about such publicly known and immediately fact-checkable things as crowd sizes on inaugural day.

I don't see what's Orwellian about it.

This morning the press secretary asked you -- yes, you -- to not see anything wrong with the fact that President still believes that "millions of people voted illegally" in the last election. And that he has "studies and evidence" on which he bases that belief.

You don't see anything Orwellian about that?

[ColanR]

Don't forget that he's press secretary for the one guy who actually made accurate polling assessments prior to the election.

If your source on disproving the "millions of illegal votes" is one of the same sources that thought Hillary was going to win in a landslide, then you have nothing to say.

I'm not going to say I agree there were illegal votes, but I am holding out for better evidence.

[mistersquid]

Predicting election outcomes based on polling (including exit polls) is very different than alleging massive voter fraud.

In the case of Clinton losing the election, the predictions which were based on statistical evidence did not match the actual outcome. Even so, an unlikely outcome is understood as a possibility within the domain of predictive statistical modeling and the wholesale dismissal of the utility of statistical modeling is anti-science at best.

On the other hand, asserting voter fraud without providing a single shred of evidence (regardless of claims to have said evidence) is quite different from evidence-based statistical modeling. So people who "thought Hillary was going to win in a landslide" could actually have quite a bit to say about alleging voter fraud without producing evidence. For example, such people could say that Clinton won the popular vote by a margin of nearly 3 million votes.

To turn your statement on its head, it is in fact the people who allege voter fraud without evidence who have nothing to say.

EDIT: spelling, reduce number of single-sentence paragraphs

[kafkaesq]

Don't forget that he's press secretary for the one guy who actually made accurate polling assessments prior to the election.

So if you met someone on a street corner who pointed at the sky, and told you "Hey look, it's orange with pink polka-dots" -- would you think to yourself, "Hmm, I'm tempted to be skeptical -- but then again, when I asked this guy for the time the other day, he gave a correct enough answer. So maybe he's right this time, too."

If your source on disproving the "millions of illegal votes"...

So are you suggesting that the "millions" claim stands until disproven? Is that really how you see things?

[logandavis]

The Trump team's "polling prescience" has been vastly overstated. Trump himself has admitted that, reading the polls, he thought that he was going to lose the election as late as election night itself [0]. In fact, he says, this is why he rented a smaller ballroom for his end-of-night speech than he would've rented had he thought he was going to win. (Leave it to Mr. Trump to feel the need to defend the size of his ballroom.)

The idea that no outlet which was incorrect in predicting election results can be used as a credible source for post-election reporting is preposterous. Where do you get your news, if you abandon sources the instant that they make an incorrect prediction? Do you ignore meteorologists because they were wrong about that big thunderstorm that one time?

[0] https://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2016-12-14/trump...

[camel_Snake]

So you exclude any pollster that's been wrong once? Doesn't that strike you as very un-statisticianlike?

[justinlaster]

Flip a coin 4 times, all 4 times the coin lands on heads.

You: "Statistics is bullshit."

[ColanR]

Ok, wow. That blew up. Let me see if I can respond to the main points. Seems like I went for shock value more than clarity in how I said things.

The point with the election polling wasn't statistics. I don't have a source, but I read on HN and Hillary's emails that much of the mistake was a misassessment of the voter base due to bias. I'm questioning the likelihood that the news sources that were biased then will be unbiased now.

> So are you suggesting that the "millions" claim stands until disproven? Is that really how you see things? Check my last statement...I'm agnostic until better information shows itself.

[jquery]

Fact-check: There is at least one study that support the President's beliefs on millions of people voting illegally. - http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0261379414...

There is a Harvard rebuttal to that study, but that doesn't change the fact there is a study supporting the President's position.

The inauguration was the most-watched in history (person + tv + live-streaming), yet the "reality" I'm seeing in California is that Obama's was far more popular. Who is bending reality? It depends on the reality you're already pre-disposed to believe.

[kafkaesq]

There is at least one study that support the President's beliefs on millions of people voting illegally. ... There is a Harvard rebuttal to that study...

This rebuttal, you mean?

"This paper documents how low-level measurement error for survey questions generally agreed to be highly reliable can lead to large prediction errors in large sample surveys, such as the CCES. The example for this analysis is Richman, Chattha, and Earnest (2014), which presents a biased estimate of the rate at which non-citizens voted in recent elections. The results, we show, are completely accounted for by very low frequency measurement error; further, the likely percent of non-citizen voters in recent US elections is zero."

...but that doesn't change the fact there is a study supporting the President's position.

Do you realize what you're saying, here? "The study has since been revealed to have been basically bullshit. But that doesn't change the fact it supports the President's position."

It depends on the reality you're already pre-disposed to believe.

If you're already that relativist about about basic events in recent history that were attended by hundreds of thousands in person -- and witnessed on television many many hundreds of millions, worldwide -- as to basically say, "How can ya really know? It all depends on what you're pre-disposed to believe" -- then I'm afraid there's not much I can do for you, pal.

[flukus]

If you want Orwellian you should start at corporations doing the same with private accounts, not with government departments.

Hell, twitter and facebook themselves have become quite orwelian lately, banning wrongthought.

[iainmerrick]

Corporations aren't democracies.

[flukus]

Neither are government departments.

[kafkaesq]

But they aren't supposed to be unflinching propaganda machines in the style of Stalin, Goebbels, or the Kim Il Sung either.

And yet, based on the blatant counterfactuals the President's lieutenants have offered in regard to crowd sizes and fraudulent voters -- and various things that Trump himself has said, since the start of his campaign -- that's precisely what we're up against.

[Avshalom]

> social media policies

social media policies is sci-fi way of saying "people saying things" though.

[barney54]

True, but this isn't a case of people speaking from their own point of view. The social media account represent the Departments in an official capacity.

[nikdaheratik]

Except that there is no management, because they haven't staffed the administration as fast as usual, so they just put out a gag order instead of risking someone going "off message". It's incompetence coupled with ineptitude.

[dashundchen]

Except it's not just social media: It's freezing the grants and business of the EPA. [1] It's stopping the publication of federal ag research [2]

[1] https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/20...

[2] http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-usda-idUSKBN1582...

[drak0n1c]

The firing of ambassadors is not very surprising. WikiLeaks revealed that many of Obama's ambassador appointments were basically sold to the biggest donors as a form of fundraising for the DNC. This became a hot campaign topic.

http://observer.com/2016/09/wikileaks-guccifer-2-0-obama-sol...

[fixxer]

Meh. This is pretty common in the private sector in various forms, either explicit or implicit. I wouldn't call this censorship. They can still, I presume, communicate their concerns with oversight groups.

[kej]

Maybe the government ought to be held to higher standards than the private sector?

[fixxer]

If tweets are the def of high standards, then we're fucked. Seriously, this is idiotic.

[true_religion]

I don't know how saying governemnt officials should speak through a specific medium is 'censorship'.

Any organisation will want to control its message, and having your officials use a channel that's 140 characters maximum leads to only being able to talk about issues in the most flimsy of ways.

Personally, I think there should be less Twitter and more published in-depth reports.

[vhost-]

Why does trump get to use twitter, but the EPA can't?

[true_religion]

Because Trump is the boss. It's the same way that most companies don't allow random department heads to speak directly to investors, but force everything to be filtered through the board meeting notes, and SEC filings.

What the EPA reports may be factual, but the presentation of facts, when they are spoken of, and how often, are all political practices.

Is it important for the EPA to tweet daily "hey guys, you know climate change is caused by humans?". No, we know it is and don't deny it is. What's controversial is: how do we reign in the problem, what are we willing to give up to do so, and how do we coordinate with our allies and competitors ?

The EPA's tweets may not be helpful in getting Chinese support, or encouraging a positive practical debate on how 3rd world nations can both improve their economies with limited technology and still be part of the climate change solution----or even if such a thing is necessary in the short term.

[eli_gottlieb]

>Because Trump is the boss.

Democratic countries have representatives, not bosses. This includes for the civil service.

[true_religion]

I think you must be taking boss to mean something differently from me.

Your direct report, is your boss regardless of if you are in civil service or not---often your 'boss' is not an elected official, but part of the bureaucracy.

Your bosses direct report is also your boss (transitive law), and so on till you hit the pinnacle of the executive branch---Trump.

I'm not saying he's some kind of mob-leader boss.

[nether]

Everyone these days is ostensibly "pro-science," just as many anti-vaxxers claim to be "pro-vaccine." The administration merely wants to review the scientific integrity of the EPA's work, and prevent the likelihood of any erroneous, possibly non-scientific data from being spread.

[bobwaycott]

Who has the administration added to the candidate pool that has the necessary skill and qualifications to verify the scientific integrity of the EPA's work? This is really reaching for a rationalization.