[paulgb]

This is nuts, 18F was one of the few groups in the federal government that is/was good at making software! (login.gov is a good example of craft you don't generally see in commercial enterprise software, let alone government software)

According to that tweet they were apparently “far left” because they also worked on Direct File, which sought to cut out the middleman (TurboTax et al.) and let Americans file taxes directly. Regardless of where you stand on the political spectrum, unless you're in bed with Intuit, this seems pretty hard to argue against!

[freitasm]

> this seems pretty hard to argue against!

Removing consumer protection would be something hard to argue against too, but yet, here we are: https://news.bloomberglaw.com/banking-law/bessent-pauses-cfp...

"Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has shut down a wide variety of operations inside the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau in his new role as acting director."

Nothing of this makes sense in that all these actions don't seem to make life easier or better for citizens in particular or the world in general.

[altacc]

A significant part of the animosity towards the EU and Trump's threat of tariffs is its consumer protection and preventing US companies, especially US tech companies, from doing whatever the hell they want.

A major difference between the US and EU is what the TikTok nonsense proved: the US is happy for a US company, aligned to Trump's authority, to track, influence and commodify its users at will; whereas the EU doesn't want any company to have that power regardless of location.

[scotty79]

Do you think Trump understands how tarifs work exactly? Or is it just something he learned other countries are afraid of but he has no idea that American importers and their customers are gonna pay them (and he shares this misunderstanding with more than half of the population)?

[milkshakes]

https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/5121390-trump-sa...

[scotty79]

This article doesn't indicate that he knows what tariff mechanistically does. Only that it will take inflict some amount of suffering on American citizens and possibly force manufacturing back into America.

[altacc]

He knows how they work: he threatens them and his supporters cheer, he implements them and people negotiate. There are other, some would say better, ways to get the same effects but tariffs are Trump's go to. In the metaphor "when you have a hammer everything is a nail" maybe Trump is the hammer and tariffs the nail?

[scotty79]

I'd say tariffs are a hammer, every international issue looks like a nail and Trump is the simpleton that keeps swinging.

[hnbad]

While this is true in principle, it's worth adding the caveat that EU countries have also been pushing for backdoors to encrypted communications in order to expand law enforcement access. Of course while this contradicts the stance on privacy the EU put forward with the GDPR (which sneakily redefined the right to privacy and control of your personal data as an indelible human right btw).

But in case anyone thinks this is a dunk on the EU: this is still not as invasive as the US law enforcement's powers of warrantless surveillance which have repeatedly blown up the EU-US frameworks for data sharing (Privacy Shield and its other iterations, which Mr Schrems seems to have personally made a sport of shooting down faster than they get implemented). It's also not entirely contradictory as the focus here is on protecting the rights of people against corporations while still providing means for the state to violate those rights when necessary (similarly to how the state can violate your right to free movement through incarceration or your right to bodily autonomy by shooting you, neither of which seem to upset the people who'd think this one is a gotcha).

Considering the EU's main function is being a transnational economic region (if you ignore all the fluff about shared values and history and instead follow the definition of "a system's function is what it does"), it's absolutely true that the EU is remarkably restrictive on what corporations can do compared to the US - even before Trump.

EDIT: The two sibling comments prove my point: while EU member states have been pushing for legislation like providing backdoors to encrypted communication, this is neither unique to the EU nor a contradiction and the US already has far wider reaching measures in place.

Consider for example the Switzerland-based CIA and BND (Germany) shell company that distributed backdoored encryption to hostile nations which Germany backed out of when the CIA defended distributing the same technology to friendlies without informing them or their intelligence agencies. Or literally any of the Snowden leaks, which described not only mass surveillance of US citizens but also espionage against US allies (infamously including wiretapping then-chancellor Angela Merkel's mobile phone) to a degree none of the EU member states have ever done anything comparable to - and which those mostly didn't act on because of the importance of maintaining good terms with the US. Or the post-9/11 legislation which not only allowed warrantless surveillance with gag orders (which is why "canaries" became popular in cryptography communities) but even literally killing or abducting and indefinitely incarcerating US citizens without a trial - not to mention torture.

You can criticize the EU for state overreach. You can't do so by using the US for grounds of moral superiority - not even moral equivalence. You can argue about different attitudes to free speech, gun ownership or the right to self-defense (e.g. castle doctrine), sure. All of these are valid grounds for debate. But the US government can (according to its own jurisdiction) legally do so many more things to both its own citizens and non-citizens both within and outside its borders that trying to use it for a libertarian "win" against the EU seems farcical at best.

[oblio]

And another factor is that those surveillance laws haven't passed, despite some member states pushing for them since at least 5 years ago.

It's an ongoing war.

[_blk]

...Seems more like the EU reserves that power to itself, which I'd argue is even worse

[ben_w]

Every national government tracks people, including the USA, so Americans get the worst of both worlds.

[tcptomato]

Why would it be worse?

[Sharlin]

Everything about it makes perfect sense because pesky things like consumer protection and occupational safety cut into the profits of the owning class.

[mlinhares]

Looks like we'll have leaded gas back in pumps pretty soon.

[Symbiote]

The target to replace lead water pipes was abandoned by Trump yesterday.

[JumpCrisscross]

> target to replace lead water pipes was abandoned by Trump yesterday

Source?

I'm only finding a Guardian article about Congressional Republicans planning a CRA action [1].

[1] https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/feb/03/republicans-...

[consp]

Got to keep people mad and dumb I guess.

[rayiner]

Slippery slope fallacy. And bad politics. Reflexively defending State department ops to destabilize foreign countries through a putative foreign aid organization by hand having about leaded gas (in the context of a guy who restarted the EV industry) is how you get to this point in history.

[test6554]

I guess I'll just have to become a shareholder

[callc]

Too late the 0.1% took all the cookies and didn’t learn how to share as children

[exe34]

I'm just going to buy cake at this point.

[blindriver]

CFPB was responsible for trying to fine creative ways to control other companies, and by debanking others. This was Elizabeth Warren’s doing and a complete farce. As Zuckerberg said, Meta was brought in front of the CFPB by Warren and he was confused because Meta isn’t a bank.

[hypothesis]

Was it before or after he tried to pull off that Libra thing?

[pavlov]

I worked at Facebook when the Libra thing happened, and it was obviously meant to be a global bank that evades banking regulations by sprinkling crypto magic.

When it launched, employees were told that we'd soon be able to receive a portion of our salaries in Libra. Every practical feature of the system was effectively a Facebook bank account where the unit of currency was tied to a basket of major currencies. The rest was smoke and mirrors.

So yeah, Zuck feigning surprise about being dragged in front of CFPB was just an act (like most of what he does in public).

[oblio]

> When it launched, employees were told that we'd soon be able to receive a portion of our salaries in Libra.

LOL, crypto-company scrip (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Company_scrip) coupled with a touch of pump (and possibly dump).

[unethical_ban]

I'll have to look into that. But giving these people any good faith is quite charitable to say the least.

[turtlesdown11]

> CFPB Warns that Digital Marketing Providers Must Comply with Federal Consumer Finance Protections > Tech firms that use behavioral targeting of individual consumers regarding financial products are liable for violations

Oh, ok.

[justin66]

> This is nuts, 18F was one of the few groups in the federal government that is/was good at making software!

Hopefully it's obvious at this point: Musk and friends not there to do anything but enrich themselves, and destroy.

[scarab92]

Musk usually elevates technical and capable people, and gives them more power, not less.

I suspect 18F would have been adopted by USDS, if it had been less overtly partisan in its hiring practices.

[georgeburdell]

Care to provide an example? I was casually looking at applying, but I am on the conservative side as easily searchable on Google by voter registrations

[ljm]

The only person Musk ‘elevates’ is himself.

People with that kind of wealth have transcended humanity. Not towards greatness but towards total indifference.

[ianburrell]

My brother works for 18F.

18F might also be "far-left" cause it was created by Obama folks. I also wonder if it is also bad in his mind cause conflicts with taken over Digital Service.

[Trasmatta]

>far-left

>Obama folks

Obama was not in any way "far left"

[ianburrell]

I added air quotes to make irony obvious.

[zekrioca]

People these days use /s for that, not quotes..

[emptyfile]

You should understand what putting a word in quotes means, regardless of internet memes.

[zekrioca]

According to Wikipedia [1], and I quote:

"A quotation or quote is the repetition of a sentence, phrase, or passage from speech or text that someone has said or written."

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quotation

[qingcharles]

Especially on the international stage. American "far-left" is totally different to say, European "far-left."

[kragen]

Obama wasn't US far left either though. More center right.

[rob74]

Yes, what's center right in the US is "far left" to the far right currently in power.

[gadders]

Obama would be "far right" by current Democrat standards. He was against gay marriage in 2008, for example.

[matthewmacleod]

Of course, it goes without saying that opposing same-sex marriage doesn't make one "far right". I mean, I know you knew that and are just ragebaiting – but I wanted it to be explicitly clear for others.

[gadders]

I'm not rage-baiting. I'm saying it's a reasonable point that people can disagree on, but if any Republican candidate had had it as a policy position in the last election they would have been labelled as "Far Right".

[matthewmacleod]

Yes, you’re rage-baiting; a republican candidate would have been labeled that way because of the aggregate of their positions, not this one.

Though of course, that is by modern standards quite a conservative right position to take. (And incidentally not one I’d consider reasonable to take; though I’m obviously biased by being directly affected)

[trealira]

And Kamala Harris was labeled far-left for campaigning on a Trump-lite platform on immigration and the economy that appealed to no one.

[trealira]

Funny, because I remember he was a far-left muslim communist from Africa back then by Republican standards.

[stuaxo]

Obama was further to the right than the conservatives in the UK at the time.

[scarab92]

Agree, but when you staff an entire agency with his supporters, the echo chamber effect can result in it becoming a hive of far-left types.

The same would apply to the right too, except that the right tends to shut down agencies, not create them.

[chad_c]

DHS is a counterexample here. It’s huge.

[icameron]

The overreaction is absolutely crazy. In no way are they leftist. They are about as woke as any typical modern progressive company. A lot of my colleagues in both public and private sectors include their pronouns in their signatures. They choose to use inclusive language and policies.

The big hubbub on X was about the Slack bot that recommends inclusive language. https://github.com/18F/charlie/blob/main/CHANGELOG.inclusion...

There is a hit piece article not worth linking that calls out some of the devs who worked there. The comment section of that page is very hateful. As an American it’s shameful to see that level of hate for anything to do with policies of inclusiveness.

The company looks like they hire regular people of all types. A few of the adults are trans or identify as queer and they are acknowledged as equal coworkers. Fairly representative of the tech industry I’d say. What is so bad about that? They seem to write some excellent code and have a good company culture akin to a lot of SV tech companies.

[IncreasePosts]

Ironically, one of the founders of DOGE(nee USDS), Mikey Dickerson, was caught colluding with billionaire Reid Hoffman to spread misinformation ahead of a 2017 election in Alabama in favor of Democrats.

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/19/us/alabama-senate-roy-jon...

[tantalor]

"caught colluding" implies they were doing something illegal

[IncreasePosts]

Not illegal, just nefarious. Which is why they got real embarrassed when what they were doing was revealed and stopped it.

[jahsome]

No, it doesn't.

[stuaxo]

The whole sentence does though.

[jahsome]

Which law is it being implied was broken?

[vizzier]

collusion. noun. col· lu· sion kə-ˈlü-zhən. : secret agreement or cooperation for an illegal or dishonest purpose

[jahsome]

Emphasis on the 'or'

[tiagobraw]

Something can be dishonest without being illegal.

[0xcde4c3db]

Being in bed with tax preparation companies is probably the main thing, but I also vaguely recall a statement by someone years ago (perhaps Grover Norquist or Dick Armey) that filing tax returns should be kept annoying simply for the sake of keeping people angry about taxes in general.

[robocat]

> filing tax returns should be kept annoying

That's just plain stupid. Taxes are already annoying enough.

In New Zealand the government makes it really really simple to pay your taxes (automated tax returns for the majority). You can call our tax department on the phone and they answer and they are helpful and they don't seem to screw you. The idea is to make it simple for people and businesses to pay their taxes so that they pay. The IRD is run like a smart business.

[saagarjha]

Unfortunately a lot of things are just plain stupid.

[pbhjpbhj]

Because paying to build society and help those around you to a better life through shared resources is something you should be angry about?

It's not taxes that are the problem per se it's fuckwits like Boris Johnson's cronies that think taxes are theirs to garnish and use any chance, even a global pandemic, to steal every dime they can lay their hands on.

[coldtea]

>Because paying to build society and help those around you to a better life through shared resources is something you should be angry about?

No, but paying an exorbitant amount, but seeing few things being improved around you, but endless wars funded and cronies getting richer, and useless bureucracy enlarged and making your life or business more difficult, is.

[DangitBobby]

That works until people learn the correct targets to direct their anger.

[jf]

login.gov is amazing software. Highly tested. Expertly implemented. It might be the most tested IdP available today.

[jeffrallen]

Then why did it send me to id.me to send my photo ID to some low cost outsourcer?

[ceejayoz]

Because someone lobbied their bosses.

[jf]

This is exactly right. The capability to do identity proofing via the USPS is in the code and available on GitHub for you to browse.

[emchammer]

I would rather show up at the local post office in order to verify my identity. Such a matter common in another country where I have lived.

[eadler]

This is starting to happen. I had to do this for NIH recently.

Or it would be happening absent the recent chaos.

[threeseed]

I can't imagine many people agreeing with you here.

You need to be (a) able to walk and drive, (b) in driving distance to a post office and (c) able to work around the post office's opening hours and (d) willing to waste the time to drive/line up etc.

Or you can spend less than a minute to upload a photo of your passport.

[ceejayoz]

I think the objection is more that ID.me should be ID.gov.

[amluto]

Which is great until someone impersonates you by spoofing a photo of you that satisfies “liveness” detection. It’s a lot harder to AI up an animated image in person at a post office.

[threeseed]

id.me is valued at $1.8bn and has more than 130m users and has "partnerships with 15 federal agencies, 40 agencies in 30 states and over 600 retailers".

Bit of a stretch to call them a low cost outsourcer. They seem pretty legitimate.

[toomuchtodo]

They are a private business in search of a problem that is unnecessary for federal and state agencies to rely on for idp and identity proofing services.

[threeseed]

Pretty hilarious to think that a $1.8bn business is "searching for a problem".

And given the frosty working relationship between federal and state agencies I am sympathetic to the idea that a private company would be able to deliver a better solution.

[gorgoiler]

There’s a bigger story to tell than just a number.

Is that $1.8B of revenue? Of profit? $1.8B of total funding in the last six months? In the last ten years?

Here’s $100M of funding for a 6% stake, four years ago:

https://siliconangle.com/2021/03/22/digital-identity-network...

Last year: a liquidity event for early investors and employees, none of which helps the ongoing business but instead lets the founders and C-suite buy a private island / holiday home / mobile home / home:

https://thepaypers.com/digital-identity-security-online-frau...

A $275M loan — not an investment, though you get a good deal if they default! — to keep them afloat?:

https://www.investing.com/news/stock-market-news/idme-secure...

The only rung deeper into the hype pit would be valuing them as a unicorn based on a too-big-to-fail government bailout.

[toomuchtodo]

Login.gov is the default idp for the Social Security Administration, supports 200+ federal agencies for identity, and IRS was in the works to onboard Login.gov before this new admin fuckery occurred. They handle over 10 million monthly active users and 40 million monthly sign-ins across nearly 50 agencies and states. Will it still happen? Who knows. id.me will likely IPO based off the ~$130-$150M ARR they have, some folks will get wealthy, and it'll still end up the equivalent of confirming your discount eligibility at Home Depot for veterans.

[zeckalpha]

Who controls the .me tld?

Montenegro.

[__MatrixMan__]

Replacing the government with unaccountable middlemen is sort of their goal, isn't it? Think of the efficiency we could gain once we do away with all of that accountability nonsense...

[chinathrow]

At this point, Elon is doing only damage while he thinks he cleans up. Someone will have to cleanup after the cleanup aka damage doen though, and it won't be pretty.

[intended]

Don’t do clean up.

The biggest mistake the dems can make is to come in and do clean up. This would be paying the bills of the abusive member in a relationship.

[ArnoVW]

People depend on the state. Someone has to be the adult in the room. If your marriage fails what do you do with the kids? You abandon them because you don’t want to clean up?

[throwaheyy]

Dems were already the adult in the room, US voters decided they don’t want one.

[xp84]

Nope, they were in control, spent 4 years focusing most of their attention on things the voting public found various degrees of stupid, then put up two successive candidates in ‘24 that were absolute jokes. The voters decided that the Democrats weren’t serious and sent them a message: “Even this obviously-corrupt buffoon is better than the arrogant elitist that you put up. Do better or be prepared for irrelevance.”

Personally I’m no fan of 90% of the GOP agenda, but my fondest wish is complete dissolution of the DNC, and another party taking over as the party of the non-rich to restore some balance.

[intended]

Right! The dems are stuck doing the responsible boring and non eye catching thing.

Economists, policy makers etc. increasingly have to make the dems carry the weight, in a political and media market which moves so fast that facts can’t even matter.

In this situation, is it a surprise that they could deal with Covid, undo 2008, end nafta, or any number of great things, but still lose faith of the populace because they didn’t hit the populist taking points?

It now very much feels like an era of talking points, and damn the facts.

In which case either making the talking points stick, or change the talking points.

[intended]

Course not. Mine is a horrid take.

It’s a statement on the fact that the children are being held hostage, and that this is how the pattern will be made to continue.

You have to decide whether you are ok with this pattern continuing. If it’s possible to do it without harming the children, then that is what must be done.

If it’s better to let this pattern continue, then thats also an ok choice. But at least the costs must be articulated and accepted. People can know what role they are playing in this relationship; the tradeoffs they found unacceptable.

[tstrimple]

This is all democrats have done my entire politically aware life. It’s like clockwork. Republicans majorly screw things up. Democrats get elected in a wave and start doing the hard work of cleaning up the mess and making tiny steps of progress and then the next election comes around and Republicans win on some culture war nonsense that they created themselves and they get fuck up the system once again. Every single time. Democrats have no opportunity or willingness to enact the agenda of the people who vote for them. They are in perpetual cleanup and maintain the status quo cycle.

The Democratic Party is the conservative one.

[scotty79]

Yeah, Dems should skip the next election, maybe a few and let the people cook themselves.

It still might happen that there won't be any further elections in which anyone but trumpists can actually win.

[maeil]

>while he thinks he cleans up

He doesn't.

[watwut]

If you goal is to make government small, ineffective at consumer protection and such, this is absolutely the first group to target.