Hacker News Reader

Comment by deanclatworthy | Hacker News Reader

It's worth pointing out that since the incident Iran has arrested those responsible for downing the jet - in an attempt to place blame on to individuals - who I'm certain are devastated at accidentally killing their countryman. I suspect they will be labelled traitors and never seen again.

They have also arrested the person who filmed this video [2]. Whilst we might celebrate this investigative journalism, this video changed the course of the narrative and forced Iran to come clean, we should also be aware of the consequences of it.

[2] https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-51114945

View on HN

> we should also be aware of the consequences of it.

which is that an authoritarian regime is never a good thing.

Society requires that bad actors be publicly visible and called out, as this creates a pressure for them to act sensibly. The first thing an authoritarian regime implements is censorship and apply any chilling effect they can, because they know this is the only way they can hide their acts from the public at large.

The West is just better at obfuscating via softer power.

What's happening with Epstien's case now? Who in the press will continue to follow that up? Some guy might try to keep on it, and then get told at the end of the year that he's been cut due to a profit warning or whatever. Who's going to keep on writing about Prince Andrew not being arrested?

Different methods but pretty-much the same lack of visibility.

bad timing on this one lol:

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2...

Let's see. Nobody went to jail for 2008, they just stonewalled it.

Genuine question: what laws were broken in 2008 (assuming you are referencing the ‘Great Recession’)?

In fact, people did go to jail.

Here's just one example, but there are others...

https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/seven-defendants-mortgage-ori...

Also, the CEOs and employees of the banks like Lehman Brothers and Merrill Lynch in question large portions of their life savings.

The CEO of Lehman, for example, lost 50% of his net worth - over 4 Billion dollars. ...and obviously destroyed his reputation. Well deserved, of course, but it's hardly "no punishment".

...the same was true with most if not all senior employees. All of them had large portions of their compensation in equity stock options. I'm, unfortunately, speaking from experience.

It's one thing to say the people "responsible" didn't get punished enough - that's true. But most people at these banks definitely suffered, materially.

when people argue that they didn't go to jail, i take it to mean that those who were "responsible" didn't suffer "enough". Where enough is taken to mean an eye for an eye.

Whether you subscribe to this sort of thinking is up to you - i don't, but the result is that the people who suffered don't feel they've been vindicated nor made whole, and the world has moved on since.

Next time please link to your actual content instead of a parasitic ad company skimming off the top.

if anyone is the parasite it is me, aggressively adblocking on all devices

> Who in the press will continue to follow that up?

Dr. Oz, today at 1300 hours.

"Jeffrey Epstein had burst capillaries in his eyeballs after he died which pathologist tells Dr. Oz suggests he was STRANGLED and did not hang himself"

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7894685/The-burst-c...

How does that contradict what I said? Until it's put to trial successfully, with full information and prosecutions of some very, very well known people, they all got away with it.

Come on, you know you're moving the goalposts here. There's a big difference between "no visibility, nobody in the media will talk about it" and "in the media constantly but Epstein's friends don't get prosecuted".

The difference is much more stark than that. Iran has murdered perhaps a thousand protestors in the last year. [1]

> "Verified video footage indicates severe violence was used against protesters, including armed members of security forces shooting from the roof of a justice department building in one city, and from helicopters in another," Bachelet said in a statement. "We have also received footage which appears to show security forces shooting unarmed demonstrators from behind while they were running away, and shooting others directly in the face and vital organs – in other words shooting to kill."

There is no equivalency here at all. Iran is a failed and murderous regime.

Here’s hoping that Iran’s disastrous response and capitulation in the face of the US killing Suleimani will weaken the Ayatollah enough in the eyes of the people and provoke further rebellion. The Iranian people have incredible potential but they have been choked under the boot of Khamenei for so long.

[1] - https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/u-s-says-iran-may-have-ki...

That's the soft power part. We are "free" in the West!

I also like that you quoted me with

> "no visibility, nobody in the media will talk about it"

And I didn't write that.

> Who in the press will continue to follow that up?

You said this, which is pretty much the same.

In the West there's a heck of a lot better chance / freedom to actually continue looking into cases.

Not much different from a Senate willfully ignoring witnesses to a crime.

> which is that an authoritarian regime is never a good thing.

Yes, it is better for a superpower to fabricate evidence for a war [1] resulting in an estimated six hundred thousand dead [2] (and a few corporate-friendly laws [3]), than letting an authoritarian regime stand. But I'm sure this time, things will work out better.

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

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casualties_of_the_Iraq_War

[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/100_Orders

Add Saudi Arabia to that list... who knows how much the folks they're going to execute after the Khashoggi events had anything to do with it / what happens to anyone else approving it.

The end result is that particularly with oppressive governments the truth has costs.... but I"m not sure of any other alternative.

This really strikes me as analogous to a blame-the-programmer situation, when what is really needed is a process improvement or change.

Programmers are no less responsible than architects and craftsmen when building bad things, or even indeterminate things for bad people.

Why did BBC put quotes around the word arrested in the title?

Probably because there's a dispute over whether anyone was actually arrested, or if they arrested the wrong person, because the journalist who received the video says his source has not been arrested.

Generally when newspapers put quotes around a word like that it means they are using a word quoted directly from a source.

BBC's style guide puts quotes around any part of a headline that is reporting on what others have said.

Chelsea Manning probably takes comfort that this does not happen in the US

If someone shot a missile at a plane in America they would unquestionably be arrested. You don't need a political motive for this arrest.

Additionally, videotaping military actions deemed vital to national security is a crime in the US.

I agree that all those arrested are unlikely to get a fair trial, but arresting these people is standard action.

>Additionally, videotaping military actions deemed vital to national security is a crime in the US.

Interesting, I'm curious which law says filming in a public location the downing of an airliner by the military would be a crime? Can you please give me a link or citation so I can read more about this?

In addition, the Grand Parent comment didn't mention that in the article the BBC is saying that the person who filmed the video is SAFE, and that is taking the blame.

So Iran has arrested an innocent person in order to shift public anger onto them, for something that shouldn't have been a crime in the first place.

>So Iran has arrested an innocent person in order to shift public anger onto them,

Or they mistakenly arrested the wrong person to ensure the cameraman was not filming the missile at the command of an enemy nation. Arresting an innocent person is a necessary evil worldwide, convicting them would be forcing them to take the blame.

You can't "ensure they aren't working for an enemy nation" if it's the wrong person. Your presuming it was an accident they got the wrong person. I'm presuming it wasn't.

Both are presumptions, but based on the the rest of their actions it seems like my presumption is more likely.

So you think they took the public relations hit of arresting the journalist but intentionally arrested some random person? Why?

https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/part-I/chapter-37

Several ordinance's in this chapter could certainly be used to arrest the individual. Whether the case would see a conviction is not certain, hopefully not, but more than enough to file charges.

I don't think you are familiar with the law. It's not espionage for a US citizen to photograph something from a public area that is out in public. Such a charge would not withstand a 1st amendment challenge IMO.

It can be barred for reasons of national security if it is nt espionage. And first amendment challenges would only matter at conviction. A person in the US having filmed a missile shot at a plane could be arrested like may have happened in Iran.

Many people have filmed terrorist attacks in the USA.

They may be compelled to turn over the footage to law enforcement, but they would not be arrested merely for taping.

People get arrested for filming cops on a regular basis, why do you find it inconceivable that someone would be arrested for filming a military operation?

The Americans who shot down the Iran's plane in 1988 didn't see a trial.

They were in Iran at the time, and I'm sure Iran would have tried them if allowed.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com