Suppose you think USAID is more about official cover for intelligence work than aid. I think that’s exaggerated, untrue, but OK.
Then it is more outrageous its classified docs shld be compromised. Agents in the field don’t determine US intelligence policy but it is they whom these leaks may kill.
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@interfluidity So far the documents have not been comprimised. and what if the "intelligence" work is not authorized?
And if it's just about aid and development, why would it have any classified documents?
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@Phil when USAID funds democracy activism in Cuba, do you think there might be a reason for the names of the activists to be classified?
maybe USAID shouldn’t fund activities to which host governments object. that’s a policy call. but so far Congress has supported that sort of work. until they don’t, some documents really do need to be classified and remain secure.
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@interfluidity @Phil To secretly take US money to advance US interests in your country, is bad. Really bad. I think it's "you need to stop that immediately and saving your own skin isn't an excuse" bad.
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@Harald_Korneliussen @Phil Maybe so! I broadly think financing covert (as to open, overt) “civil society” is a bad thing we shouldn’t do. I’m not going to arrogate any right to make or judge the tradeoffs faced by activists who consider accepting those funds. You can make a broad, general case for why they shouldn’t. You can imagine particular circumstances under which perhaps they shouldn’t. 1/
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@Harald_Korneliussen @Phil What I will say, with great certainty, is so long as the US, via lawful processes, chooses to finance covert civil society support, it is the duty of the US government to maintain strict confidence about the details of that activity. It might be a bad call, by us as donor, by the recipient. 2/
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@interfluidity @Harald_Korneliussen USAID is based on the Foreign assistance act of 1961. Nowhere in this act are such activities authorized.
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@Phil @Harald_Korneliussen I'm glad to see a President pare back agency activity to what he perceives is within the lawful, Congressionally mandated scope, or for outside parties to sue if they believe the President has overly narrowed the scope. That doesn't affect the fact that USAID has provided aid on terms that are importantly confidential, and its entirely unethical and contrary to US interests to treat those confidences incautiously.
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So you're saying that secret aid is important and under the purview of USAID and not something like CIA? Or are you just making stupid excuses for bloat, grift and corruption?
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@freemayonnaise @Phil @Harald_Korneliussen i'm saying confidential aid has been part of what USAID has done, and whether you think it's a good idea or not (i'm mostly on the not side), it's ethically and practically critical that we maintain the confidences we've promised, however we might decide to narrow the practice going forward.
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Yep, you're pretending like covert aids under their purview and making lame excuses about digging out corruption. Got it.
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@freemayonnaise @Phil @Harald_Korneliussen you, my friend, are free to have whatever opinion of me or anything else you like. and i enjoy the same privilege with respect to you! it's a free country. let's keep it that way.
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@interfluidity @freemayonnaise @Harald_Korneliussen Depends on who WE is.
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@Phil @freemayonnaise @Harald_Korneliussen i'd say the "we" in this case is the government of the United States, a formal institution that promised discretion under high stakes to some of the people it financed. that "we", and its obligations, survive changes of administration, just like Boeing survives (for now) its many CEO changes.
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What a shitty apologist for unelected career derpcabal govt officials and a garbage analogy unless you're talking about murder of whistleblowers.
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@freemayonnaise the issue is that, since (rightly or wrongly, it's actually not a practice i favor) the US sometimes does provide aid to people or organizations without their country's government's knowledge or approval, what we are talking about risking is, yes, murder, the murder of people USAID has covertly assisted, if that information is disclosed to the wrong people or made public.
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I guess the pickle "you're" (the equivalent of "we") is in a-roof-of-the-Saigon-embassy situation then isn't it. And who got "us" there? Yeah, no. I pick transparency and accountability instead of your bullshit highly abstracted justification of no accountability and oversight of USAID.
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@freemayonnaise you can have plenty of accountability and oversight. we have a whole army of people with security clearances, and you can clear more if you don't like their politics. Congress can ban USAID from the practice of covert aid. i'd favor that. but you—yes, you too if you're an american—can't ethically welch on obligations with life and death stakes that predecessors took on, no matter how shitty you think the predecessors.
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Yeah sorry, that's not accountability, that's the million person clearance derpcabal with its corporate tentacles asking to police itself. We've seen where that's lead for a decade and a half since Obama crushed any notions of whistleblowing.
You act as though leaving Saigon or Biden's billion dollar dump and run in Afghanistan aren't recent examples of the USG doing exactly what you're saying isn't to be done.
Your luke warm defense of unaccounted budgets for derp isn't convincing.
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@freemayonnaise the US owes all the people with whom we collaborated in Afghanistan refuge, and all of the politicians who deny or prevent that, who gum up the works, have their future blood on their hands and besmirch our nation's honor. you make too light, walk away too easily, from things that are not light, easy, or frankly yours to walk away from, whatever you personally agreed or disagreed with.
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You're talking bullshit, we all know the problem in USAID is internal not external. This mole hill is not a mountain. 56 officials getting shut out isn't over protecting foreign nationals. I just wanted to see how long you'd peddle this bullshit but it's indefinite and with the weakest of moral argument.
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@freemayonnaise dude, they are accessing the files, reportedly including classified files. no, i don't know the details, i hope they are less bad than they might be, but that's problematic as fuck.
again, you take this shit far too lightly. it is a different topic, but not remotely a "molehill" that Musk talks about "shutting down" an agency when our Costitutional system permits that only of Congress.
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It's like you don't know or don't care to understand how govt works. The administration's domain is exactly the workings of agencies. If Congress doesn't like it then insert checks and balances. You're griping like a derpcabal insider about chickens coming home to roost.
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@freemayonnaise the administration has a lot of flexibility about the working of agencies!
but it has zero flexibility over the existence of any agency, and at least in some form pursuing the objectives for which Congress constituted it.
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@interfluidity @freemayonnaise congress never authorized covert aid thru USAID. So they don't need to revoke it.
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@interfluidity @freemayonnaise @Harald_Korneliussen this is only true if any promises were properly authorized and made by people authorized to me them on behalf of the US. If they were just promises made by rogue operators, they are meaningless.
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Running covert foreign financial influence ops through USAID sounds like sloppy rogue operators to me, something you'd find in a bloated corrupted security state which deems itself above reproach.
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@freemayonnaise @Phil @Harald_Korneliussen Congress could absolutely forbid covert aid. (I'd support that.) If @Phil interpretation is right, someone could sue to get the practice enjoined without further work by Congress. But what is done is already done.
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We're not talking about "covert aid" we're talking "covert aid run through USAID" here. The amount of weak backpeddling is laughable.
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@freemayonnaise @Phil @Harald_Korneliussen if you say so.
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Your entire discourse here has been a pleading for an obligation to secrecy, nothing more, with a transference to abstract foreign entities bamboozled by bad apples. It's laughable even if I couldn't picture the beads of sweat on your forehead.
The big picture is that agencies and their unelected officials feel they can supercede the EOs and directives of POTUS and can hide behind clearance and secrecy and weak sauce "ethical standards" when they see fit, but at the end of the day you just have to follow the money and the cards collapse.
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@freemayonnaise @Phil @Harald_Korneliussen i agree secrecy is overused and abused by the bureaucracy.
that doesn't mean secrecy never has a role, or that it's legit and not evil to undo it basically randomly.
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I accept your surrender but note your retarded "basically randomly" whimper.
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@freemayonnaise @Phil @Harald_Korneliussen if you say so. you are really a delightful person to share a discussion with.
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We're not discussing, you're an abhorrent apologist who's been dismantled.
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@freemayonnaise @Phil @Harald_Korneliussen truly a pleasure! i think so well of you too, my dear interlocutor who is fine with people who worked with USAID in good faith getting tortured so Elon can play USAID files, thinks that would serve a larger, noble purpose.
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Fuck off with your contrived examples. Use some of that blackops budget to save who needs to be saved, according to your high principles and stop pretending at this partisan "muh Musk le bad".
Unaccountability is a helluva drug.
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@freemayonnaise @Phil @Harald_Korneliussen okay then.
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@interfluidity @freemayonnaise @Harald_Korneliussen no need to sue. Trump is stopping it with a completely legitimate exercise of his executive power and in keeping with his oath of office
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@Phil @freemayonnaise @Harald_Korneliussen he absolutely can stop any further covert aid (unless Congress has mandated it, which i doubt). he just shouldn't fuck over people who relied in good faith on a promise of discretion from prior administrations. and it'd be a more permanent change if Congress did it.
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@interfluidity @freemayonnaise @Harald_Korneliussen so far he hasn't but I wonder how much really is good faith
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@Phil @freemayonnaise @Harald_Korneliussen my view i'm not so optimistic... i agree we'd be better off with a new regime that made administrations budget their secrecy more carefully, made it scarce. but that again would be work for Congress, if it is to outlast an administration.
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@Phil @freemayonnaise @Harald_Korneliussen not true in law. if a "rogue operator" is presented in such a way by an organization that a reasonable counterparty would consider them to be acting in the name of the organization, the organization often finds itself on the hook. as a matter of ethics, stipulating your interpretation of nonauthorization, if someone accepted support from a real USG agent on promise of discretion that shouldn't have been made, your ethical view is "oops! sucks for you!"?
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Pretty much. Maybe glowniggers shouldn't play so fast and loose and expect anyone to care about the targets of their ops? Who's necks are you really trying to save here?
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@freemayonnaise @Phil @Harald_Korneliussen People in general who have worked in good faith with my government. I have no more specific knowledge.
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@interfluidity @freemayonnaise @Harald_Korneliussen sorry but if you believe any person can obligate all of us (the entire country) to some crooked enterprise or evil undertaking, and we are bound to it, you are a crackpot.
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@Phil @freemayonnaise @Harald_Korneliussen if the enterprise is crooked, by all means get out of it. but if you've promised discretion, keep your promise.
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@interfluidity @freemayonnaise @Harald_Korneliussen I disagree. Such an approach just leaves the door open for other bad actors. Bring it all to light, so such promises are taken with a grain of salt in the future.
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@Phil @freemayonnaise @Harald_Korneliussen i guess i can't disagree with "it's virtuous to screw people over because they should know better than to trust me because i don't trust myself to act well." it's a case you can make, but i think we need a capable government which means we actually have to act well.
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@interfluidity @freemayonnaise @Harald_Korneliussen secrets promised in conjunction with the executive and government directives should be kept. Secrets promised in contravention of executive directives should not be kept. Its that simple and necessary or bad people will have illegitimate power over the US.
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@Phil @freemayonnaise @Harald_Korneliussen if players are rogue, i think the accountability has to be imposed on those players, rather than the people they dupe.
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@interfluidity @freemayonnaise @Harald_Korneliussen I see that point, but think its better for those duped to pay the price publicly so future such promises are treated with an abundance of skepticism. If this hampers the us from future meddling, that's just an added bonus
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@Phil @freemayonnaise @Harald_Korneliussen we'll disagree that that's the best way to go. i still want a state that can, say, participate credibly in alliances. tbf, we've fucked it up pretty badly already.
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