President Trump 2.0

Originally Posted by Chris

Trump’s Razor can surely be the only way of understanding how:

- Senior defence and security officials discussed their latest bombing run on the Huthis on an insecure Signal chat group.
- Someone added the Editor-in-Chief of The Atlantic to the chat group, leaving them no possible means of denying it.

The Atlantic, predictably, ran a very long-form expose, with screenshots, in its online edition last night. I will be reading it shortly with a large coffee.

(Edit). Also predictably, the article is out from behind the paywall. Read it and weep:
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics...-plans/682151/

What I think is also extraordinary is that we can expect little consequences for this.

Hopefully I am wrong. I would think even under Trump this would be a firing offense but you do question if he'll go.

[ianch99]

Originally Posted by Damien

What I think is also extraordinary is that we can expect little consequences for this.

Hopefully I am wrong. I would think even under Trump this would be a firing offense but you do question if he'll go.

Don't worry, they have clearly stated what will happen



Untitled.png

Originally Posted by ianch99

Don't worry, they have clearly stated what will happen



Attachment 31351

---------- Post added at 12:13 ---------- Previous post was at 12:05 ----------

DoGE - Department of Government Efficiency

Social Security Agency, after DoGE go in...

https://wapo.st/4hM5MAn

Long waits, waves of calls, web crashes: Social Security is breaking down

A flood of cuts led by Elon Musk has sent the agency into chaos as a new commissioner prepares to take charge.

The Social Security Administration website crashed four times in 10 days this month, blocking millions of retirees and disabled Americans from logging in to their online accounts because the servers were overloaded. In the field, office managers have resorted to answering phones at the front desk as receptionists because so many employees have been pushed out. But the agency no longer has a system to monitor customers’ experience with these services, because that office was eliminated as part of the cost-cutting efforts led by Elon Musk.

And the phones keep ringing. And ringing.

The federal agency that delivers $1.5 trillion a year in earned benefits to 73 million retired workers, their survivors and poor and disabled Americans is engulfed in crisis — further undermining its ability to provide reliable and quick service to vulnerable customers, according to internal documents and more than two dozen current and former agency employees and officials, customers and others who interact with Social Security.

Financial services executive Frank Bisignano is scheduled to face lawmakers Tuesday during a Senate confirmation hearing as President Donald Trump’s pick to become the permanent commissioner. For now, the agency is run by a caretaker leader in his sixth week on the job who has raced to push out more than 12 percent of the staff of 57,000. He has conceded that the agency’s phone service “sucks” and acknowledged that Musk’s U.S. DOGE Service is really in charge, pushing a single-minded mission to find benefits fraud despite vast evidence that the problem is overstated.

The turmoil is leaving many retirees, disabled claimants and legal immigrants who need Social Security cards with less access or shut out of the system altogether, according to those familiar with the problems.

“What’s going on is the destruction of the agency from the inside out, and it’s accelerating,” Sen. Angus King (I-Maine) said in an interview. “I have people approaching me all the time in their 70s and 80s, and they’re beside themselves. They don’t know what’s coming.”

They're setting the building on fire, and use the fact it's on fire to privatise it, and then charge to fix and run it...

[jfman]

Hopefully it doesn’t inspire Labour over here, any more so than what has already been failed by privatisation.

Originally Posted by Damien

What I think is also extraordinary is that we can expect little consequences for this.

Hopefully I am wrong. I would think even under Trump this would be a firing offense but you do question if he'll go.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/cg70...88b345cc5#post

In fresh comments to NBC News, the president is standing by National Security Advisor Mike Waltz, who allegedly admitted journalist Jeffrey Goldberg into the Signal group chat.

"Michael Waltz has learned a lesson, and he’s a good man," he says.

Trump called it a "glitch" that Goldberg was added, and said a staffer of Waltz is to blame.

Goldberg's presence in the chat had "no impact at all" on the operation, Trump adds.

How very different from just over eight years ago…

[Pierre]

Originally Posted by Hugh

Social Security Agency, after DoGE go in...

https://wapo.st/4hM5MAn

pushing a single-minded mission to find benefits fraud despite vast evidence that the problem is overstated.


They're setting the building on fire, and use the fact it's on fire to privatise it, and then charge to fix and run it...

I’m sure they printed the evidence and didn’t just make an unverifiable comment………..

In any event, I’d welcome such an intervention and investigation into U.K. benefits fraud by anyone with the will.

Originally Posted by Pierre

I’m sure they printed the evidence and didn’t just make an unverifiable comment………..

In any event, I’d welcome such an intervention and investigation into U.K. benefits fraud by anyone with the will.

Oh, the irony...

Musk has been making unverifiable/false statements consistently, but you never seem to question those...

https://factcheck.afp.com/doc.afp.com.36Y83WL

Elon Musk suggested Social Security data shows millions of improbably and impossibly old people collecting benefits, amounting to massive fraud in the retirement program. But the billionaire's claims about payments to dead people lack evidence -- and experts say his figures appear to count past-issued Social Security cards, not how many people are cashing checks.

Although Musk did not specify a source for the figures he posted, Wolfers and other experts told AFP they appear to come from the Numident, an internal database of Social Security card holders.

Social Security numbers are usually given to Americans shortly after birth and may also be issued to new immigrants, visiting workers and others.

"The most likely explanation is that he is looking at the number of Social Security numbers, not the number of beneficiaries," University of Illinois professor Jeffrey Brown, who served on the Social Security Advisory Board under former Republican president George W. Bush, told AFP (archived here).

Andrew Biggs, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute who was the SSA's principal deputy commissioner under Bush, agreed (archived here).

"Musk confused the existence of a Social Security number with benefits being paid on that number," Biggs told AFP. "They're not the same."

[Pierre]

Originally Posted by Hugh

Oh, the irony...

Oh……..the deflection.

Did they put forward the “vast evidence” for scrutiny or not? Or was it an unverifiable statement?

Your answer?

Originally Posted by Pierre

Oh……..the deflection.

Did they put forward the “vast evidence” for scrutiny or not? Or was it an unverifiable statement?

Your answer?

https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/doge...y?id=119564143

Concerns that DOGE might mistake legitimate payments as fraudulent was evident earlier this week when Trump declared in his speech to Congress that there were millions of dead people still collecting Social Security checks.

But that isn't accurate.

According to a 2023 report by the SSA inspector general, there are millions of people older than 100 included in a separate "master death file," but "almost none" of them still receive benefits. The agency said fixing the file would cost between $5 million and $10 million.

https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/musk...y?id=118960821

Musk misreads Social Security data, millions of dead people not getting benefits, experts say

Musk has implied 150-year-olds are getting checks but experts say he’s mistaken.

https://wapo.st/4iZPRiP

Why DOGE is struggling to find fraud in Social Security

Claims of massive problems by Elon Musk and President Trump are at odds with the agency’s audits and reports.

Elon Musk put a big target on the Social Security Administration in the first weeks of the Trump administration, claiming it is plagued by “immense waste” and promising audits to root out “the extreme levels of fraud.” President Donald Trump said during his joint address to Congress earlier this month that Musk’s U.S. DOGE Service was already “identifying shocking levels of incompetence and probable fraud” at the agency.

But some of the biggest examples of allegedly wasteful spending held up by Musk and DOGE so far have been overblown or inaccurate. Musk’s assertion that tens of millions of dead people over 100 years old are receiving Social Security benefits was so off-base that it had to be tamped down by the agency’s acting head, who had been promoted because of his willingness to cooperate with DOGE. “These individuals are not necessarily receiving benefits,” acting Social Security commissioner Lee Dudek said.

But less than 1 percent of Social Security’s payments in recent years were determined to be improper — often the result of an accidental oversight or change in benefit status, according to a report last year by the agency’s inspector general. That works out to about $9 billion a year, and more than two-thirds of the mistaken payments were eventually clawed back. Another agency audit, which looked only at payments to retired workers, survivors and people with disabilities, found fraud was listed as the cause behind just 3 percent of improper benefit payments.

Despite the flood of money flowing through it, Social Security didn’t make a 2024 list by the Government Accountability Office, the legislative branch’s nonpartisan watchdog, detailing the 16 agencies with improper payment rates of at least 10 percent. That report further found that 80 percent of all improper payments were due to just five government programs, including Medicare and Medicaid — but not Social Security.

“The wild claims they are making — I’ve never seen anything like this,” Kathleen Romig, a former analyst and senior adviser at the agency, said of DOGE and Musk.

Social Security is among the most scrutinized and audited agencies in government, with frequent probes by its 500-person Office of Inspector General. It pays outside auditors to examine its books. Congress grills agency officials. Last year, a major focus in congressional hearings led by the GOP wasn’t waste or fraud — it was about Social Security being too aggressive in clawing back accidental benefit overpayments

On social media, Musk alleged that more than 20 million Americans over age 100 receive Social Security checks, derisively describing it as “a lot of vampires collecting Social Security.”

But those claims are not backed up by agency data. Officials said they showed a misunderstanding of Social Security’s databases.

The agency has millions of people in its databases who lack recorded dates of death — the result of old computer systems and events that are decades in the past. That doesn’t mean they are getting checks. Social Security auditors in 2023 reported that 98 percent of those without recorded dates of death were not receiving agency benefits and were known to be deceased. Agency officials said it was costlier and riskier to update the records than to do nothing.

https://www.wired.com/story/elon-mus...-old-benefits/

Musk, during the Oval Office press conference which was attended by his son, claimed the payments to 150-year-olds was part of the billions, maybe even tens of billions, in corruption and waste that his DOGE effort had already uncovered.

But just like condom shipments to Gaza or payments to Politico, Musk’s claims of Social Security fraud seems to be a gross misrepresentation of what’s actually happening and why.

In the same press conference where he made the remarks about 150-year-olds collecting Social Security benefits, Musk said his DOGE project would be “maximally transparent” with all savings being made posted to its website.

But when the site came online last week, not only was it just a repurposed Twitter feed with terrible security, it also lacked any details in a section dedicated to savings.

At the time, the site’s administrators claimed the savings section would be updated no later than Valentine’s Day. When that deadline came and went without any update, the administrator wrote: “Receipts coming over the weekend!” The page was briefly populated on Saturday before being taken down; at the time of publication on Monday, no receipts were posted.

Feel free to provide evidence of the "widespread fraud and abuse" in the SSA that Musk speaks of…

[Pierre]

Originally Posted by Hugh

https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/doge...y?id=119564143



https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/musk...y?id=118960821



https://wapo.st/4iZPRiP







https://www.wired.com/story/elon-mus...-old-benefits/




Feel free to provide evidence of the "widespread fraud and abuse" in the SSA that Musk speaks of…

No thanks, I just like making you work.

Seems to be a lot of “experts say” or Gov depts marking their own work or “not necessarily” the case.

It looks to me that the reality of the situation is still to be determined.

Looks like there will be no consequence for the Signal security leak: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cp8vgr0p8n6o

These people have no standards at all.

[TheDaddy]

Originally Posted by Hugh

[

Feel free to provide evidence of the "widespread fraud and abuse" in the SSA that Musk speaks of…

I saw a piece the other day where Musk was boasting that he'd found people aged between 6 and 10 receiving payments from social security and stopped them, only problem was they were orphans who were legitimately receiving them

[1andrew1]

Originally Posted by TheDaddy

I saw a piece the other day where Musk was boasting that he'd found people aged between 6 and 10 receiving payments from social security and stopped them, only problem was they were orphans who were legitimately receiving them

A disgrace that those children ever extracted benefits from the state. They should be in the workhouses helping make America great again!

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Originally Posted by Damien

Looks like there will be no consequence for the Signal security leak: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cp8vgr0p8n6o

These people have no standards at all.

Loyalty to Trump is their solo standard. Anything else is by the by.

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Originally Posted by Pierre

It looks to me that the reality of the situation is still to be determined.

It may never be determined, but it won't stop Trump and Musk claiming otherwise, and half the US believing them.

And some on here…

[ianch99]

Originally Posted by 1andrew1

A disgrace that those children ever extracted benefits from the state. They should be in the workhouses helping make America great again!

And yet you jest ....

Florida debates lifting some child labor laws to fill jobs vacated by undocumented immigrants

The state’s legislature on Tuesday advanced a bill that would loosen child labor laws, allowing children as young as 14 years old to work overnight shifts. If the new law is passed, teenagers would be able to work overnight jobs on school days. They are currently prevented from working earlier than 6:30 am or later than 11 pm per state law.

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Originally Posted by Hugh

https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/doge...y?id=119564143



https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/musk...y?id=118960821



https://wapo.st/4iZPRiP

https://www.wired.com/story/elon-mus...-old-benefits/

Feel free to provide evidence of the "widespread fraud and abuse" in the SSA that Musk speaks of…

You are wasting your time. Objective reasoning & critical thinking have to be abandoned on admission to the cult.