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- Hacker News
- We are past the point in history where it was hard to tell who the bad guy was.by jmward01
- We're at the point of history where your grandchildren will ask you "Where were you when...?"by vrganj
- > Congress mandated that Stars and Stripes be editorially independent and created the position of ombudsman in 1991 to monitor the situation and report to Congress at least once a year.
Congress, where are you?
by 2OEH8eoCRo0 - > It took four months from the time I applied and went through a series of three interviews before I was selected from a field of 20 applicants and brought onboard. This is a critical time for the newspaper to be without an ombudsman who can fight against censorship and control.
Something tells me the process of finding a replacement ombudsman will be much faster. Hegseth probably already has someone in mind...
by rob74 - Illegality without enforcement is just a suggestion, no matter how strongly worded.
Something we are all coming to realize a little too late
by homeonthemtn - This is deeply disturbing. The terrible, incoherent messaging and strategy around the Iran war (unapproved by Congress) is connected. This is an administration that is seeking less freedom, not more. What entity would sue on behalf of the ombudsman?by system7rocks
- It cannot be "unapproved by Congress".
A US president does not have authority to start a war, Congress has, according to Constitution. The president only serves as a Commander in Chief.
So at any point Congress can stop any military action issuing an immediate ruling preventing the president doing anything. If our congressmen don't do that it means they approve it.
It's our, USA, war, not Trump's war. Because we elected the congressmen.
by deepsun - > What entity would sue on behalf of the ombudsman?
What entity could? Most of the unprecedented madness of the last few years boils down to:
1. The President does something flagrantly illegal.
2. The remedy is Congress impeaching and removing the President from office.
3. Republicans legislators are completely complicit, and have enough votes that #2 doesn't even start to happen.
The crimes will continue until something about #3 changes or until #47 finally succumbs to dementia.
by Terr_ - Trump also fired the Immigration Detention Ombudsman.[1]
[1] https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politic...
by Animats - Did not know this was a thing, kudos to her for speaking out!by timfsu
- You don't get that job without being the type of person who will only ever respond to coercion attempts with an equal amount of indigance. The sole reason for the position to exist is to act as a canary in a coalmine so to speak
She even admits she was due to stand down at the end of the year, they could have just waited her out. Instead it seems her calling a spade a spade was just too intolerable for them to bare
If that's all it takes to provoke the desired reaction from them it doesn't bode well at all. It's no wonder they were so easily led into a war with Iran on a leash
by J0nL - Historically the codified office of the Ombudsman came to Sweden after the Swedish King had to search refuge in Turkey and observed a similar position there.
I love that story, shows you that the world always was quite small and that what we perceive as progressive and backward countries is just a matter of time.
by niemandhier - Can you give some more context? I looked into Wikipedia and the relevant text there is giving different vibe:
> Charles XII was in exile in Turkey and needed a representative in Sweden to ensure that judges and civil servants acted in accordance with the laws and with their duties. If they did not do so, the Supreme Ombudsman had the right to prosecute them for negligence.
by gostsamo - Favouriting this for the next time someone on here tells me we don't have free speech in Europe, only in the USby jimnotgym
- Why? The police aren't at his door and he's not been arrested it's not a good thing but we are still miles away from Europe.
- As an European, you think you actually have free speech? Go say something negative about Muslims or your country being full during any protest, I dare you. Because you will absolutely face criminal charges for that.by moi2388
- JD Vance has to save all of Europe because of checks notes lack of free speech. /sby linohh
- Who's still claiming the US has free speech?by fragmede
- People who say there is no free speech in Europe have never lived in an authoritarian country.by benterix
- See if you can find the US in these rankings:by amelius
- > The House and Senate Armed Services committees have long had an interest in ensuring that unfiltered news went to the troops who are fighting for our country and deserved to read the truth, not propaganda. In the late 1980s Congress was alarmed at attempts of military personnel to “suppress unfavorable news” of the Iran-Contra affair and other issues. Congress mandated that Stars and Stripes be editorially independent and created the position of ombudsman in 1991 to monitor the situation and report to Congress at least once a year.
Funny how the same situations of recent history keep resurfacing. Not only "Iran", but we should recall the details of Iran-Contra: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran%E2%80%93Contra_affair
> further funding of the Contras by legislative appropriations was prohibited by Congress, but the Reagan administration continued funding them secretly using non-appropriated funds
Oh look, it's presidential power contradicting Congress again!
> "what began as a strategic opening to Iran deteriorated, in its implementation, into trading arms for hostages."
US attempts to deal with Iran, has incoherent strategy, gets rolled, lies about it.
> Eleven convictions resulted, some of which were vacated on appeal. The rest of those indicted or convicted were all pardoned in the final days of the presidency of George H. W. Bush
Misuse of the presidential pardon power, again, which enables the president to direct people to commit crimes in the sure knowledge that they will not be held accountable to the law or other branches of government (Americans call this "checks and balances" for some reason).
One of those people was Oliver North, who turned his experience providing arms illegally to enemies of the United States into a long career at propaganda organizations the NRA and Fox news.
And so here you are again.
by pjc50 - It's interesting. Ministers of justice in the Netherlands stopped handing out pardons when they realised it lost them votes.
Not a lot of bleeding hearts over here for criminals lol.
by TitaRusell - The Trump administration is basically Reagan 2.0, but our political process has degraded to the point where the corruption and graft are even more blatant this time. Many of the current cabinet were involved in the Reagan admin too.
Their actions are the same - gutting the administrative state, squashing environmental regulations, persecuting queer people and racial minorities. Mass deportations. These were all hallmarks of the terrible Reagan presidency too. Even "Make America Great Again" is a reused slogan from the Reagan days.
Unfortunately the same uneducated morons who hold Reagan up as a great president are behind Trump right now, cheering this car crash of an administration even as they get us involved in new wars.
by solid_fuel - One would expect that system would learn and change, and we wouldn't have trump fucking up half of global economy so beautifully on his morning whims just to get rich as a side business of being potus (or reverse, probably).
Something tells me that after this dark period is over, there won't be many lessons learned and things changed for the better in the system. 'Great system' not being so great after all (which it isn't, there are much better and more democractic systems implemented all around the world).
Republicans as usually will shield just about anybody including mass rapist and murderer just to not lose face, and democrats will just again have this inept look with 'we couldn't change a damn thing because XYZ but we asked nicely'.
by kakacik