Missouri governor’s office responsible for teacher data leak | Hacker News Reader

Missouri governor’s office responsible for teacher data leak

krebsonsecurity.com

308 pointstodsacerdoti117 comments

The [(redacted) report][1] is worth reading for yourself. Not only does it detail that pretty much everything was done "by the book" on the journalist and researcher side, but just how ridiculous the governor's reaction was.

The interview with Dr. Khan, the University of Missouri-St. Louis professor who helped verify the original vulnerability, he discusses another time when a Missouri State government website had a different vulnerability, and how the reaction was different:

    I asked Dr. Khan if this type of flaw was something commonly seen.
    He indicated this was a common problem. He advised in 2016, he wanted
    to verify his voter registration, so he Googled "check voter registration"
    on his smart phone. He stated he clicked on the Missouri Secretary of
    State's website and as soon as the page loaded, he observed the page was
    loading through "plain http." [...] [T]he website was indexed in Google in
    this way, so anyone who Googled the Secretary of State's website, would be
    routed through that link. [...] [H]e emailed the Chief Security Officer and
    advised them of the problem and the fix for it. He stated he received an
    email thanking him for reporting the issue and was advised they would correct
    the issue.

[1]: https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/21271820/redacted-inf...

Sorry for the tangent, but am I the one who finds it’s odd that this was done by the Highway Patrol? I understand that the scope of that agency probably operates outside of just the highway, but I thought most states had other law enforcement agencies that would seem more appropriate.

When I lived in Indiana, the Indiana State Police (which most residents would consider to be the equivalent to "highway patrol") investigated a lot of things that had nothing to do with patrolling highways. I imagine this situation works the same, but with poor labelling ("highway patrol" serving more like "state police" in at least some situations).

Growing up in Georgia, there was a state law enforcement agency called the GBI (like FBI, but state). There was also a highway patrol. Personally I’d suspect the former would be the one involved in something like this.

Wow, I had no idea American police systems were so numerous. In Canada, we have the RCMP (Royal Canadian Mounted Police). In most parts of the country, that's it—they do everything, from highway patrol to intelligence. Ontario and Quebec chose to take over from the RCMP for provincial policing matters with their own police services, and many cities have their own police services for local matters, but the RCMP is the national police service and has jurisdiction everywhere.

In many U.S. states "highway patrol" is simply the name of the state police agency, sometimes informally and sometimes formally.

Yup. A.k.a., "Staties".

I found the Missouri Department of Public Safety's list of State Law Enforcement Agencies [1] and it does seem like an awkward fit no matter where you would try to put this investigation. That said, I can imagine that in many states, the largest and best-developed law enforcement agency is by necessity the one that spans the entire state for the purposes of enforcing traffic laws.

[1] https://dps.mo.gov/leagencies.php

Some folks here may be too young to remember this, but we used to colloquially call the Internet the "The Information Superhighway".

Those were good times, back before the internet was a series of tubes

Just big trucks!

Or when the secret service was investigating game companies: http://www.sjgames.com/SS/

Parsons was for years a county sheriff of a rural county in Missouri (Polk County, current population ~30,000), so he was head of the Highway Patrol in the county. I suspect that as Governor he has strong relations with the Highway Patrol statewide and views them still as loyal and trustworthy to him, while he may view the more suitable branches of law enforcement (e.g., the cyber crimes division of the Department of Public Safety) as urban desk jockeys who may be less loyal and aligned with him personally, and therefore he'd rather send in his own troops for missions such as this.

As far as I know, there is no particular relationship between a Missouri county sheriff and the Missouri State Highway Patrol. County sheriffs are certainly not the head of any part of the Missouri State Highway Patrol.

But of course as the governor of Missouri he personally appoints the Superintendent of the State Highway Patrol (as well as the Director of the Department of Public Safety of which the State Highway Patrol is one division).

So the sheriff is part of the state highway patrol. Interesting. Not how things are done in many places.

Who else is gonna police the information super highway?

You win the internet today

In the state I live in, there are very, very few statewide law enforcement agencies. By far the largest is the state highway patrol.

State highway patrol officers are the “go to” cops for statewide officials.

> Sorry for the tangent, but am I the one who finds it’s odd that this was done by the Highway Patrol?

In many states, there are some domain specific LE agencies, but also one general competence agency. In several cases (sometimes as a result of a merger between Highway Patrol and State Police where the former name was retained) the general-competence LE agency is the highway patrol.

Related past threads:

Prosecutor won't charge reporter who uncovered database flaw - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30318208 - Feb 2022 (121 comments)

The governor of Missouri still doesn’t know how websites work - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29752259 - Dec 2021 (21 comments)

Reporter may be prosecuted for using “view source” - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29737412 - Dec 2021 (163 comments)

Reporter who told Missouri officials of website flaw did 'nothing out of line' - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29098289 - Nov 2021 (190 comments)

Gov. Parson releases video attacking newspaper for viewing HTML - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28980855 - Oct 2021 (26 comments)

Gov Parson pushes to prosecute reporter who found security flaw in state site - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28946392 - Oct 2021 (525 comments)

Governor vows criminal prosecution of reporter who found flaw in state website - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28866805 - Oct 2021 (678 comments)

As a Missourian, and former Education sector employee, the handling of the situation shoes how terrible Parson is as a governor, and how even after the past two scandals, whether it be the opposing candidate, no one will pull him out of office.

It's a pity there'll be no sanctions for what seems to be a fairly clear case of defamation.

> It's a pity there'll be no sanctions for what seems to be a fairly clear case of defamation

Would a journalist have a legal claim for defamation against the Governor? Seems like a stretch.

Of the four necessary conditions for defamation, they'd likely have the most trouble showing the "damages" condition (since both the journalist and the newspaper have been thoroughly repudiated throughout the entire affair).

The bigger issue is probably the "actual malice" requirement as both the Governor and the reporter are public figures; it'd depend on what you could find in the Governor's emails etc.

It's unfortunate that a public figure - and that's a fairly loosely defined status - can be defamed pretty much at will.

This would need to be decided by an actual court, but I'm not sure if the reporter would qualify as a "public figure" for the purposes of an "actual malice" test, since a "public figure" is generally either (1) an elected official, or (2) the unelected public representative of an elected official.

There is additional lower court jurisprudence for "involuntary public figures" (the canonical example being a private citizen who receives public attention for an act of heroism), but that test hasn't been developed fully and it's unclear if it would even apply here (since the name of the reporter hasn't featured prominently in other reporting).

(The "public figure" nature of the Governor or his office also doesn't apply here, since he's the accused defamer and not the defamee.)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_figure

> A person can become an "involuntary public figure" as the result of publicity, even though that person did not want or invite the public attention. A person can also become a "limited public figure" by engaging in actions which generate publicity within a narrow area of interest. For example, [jokes about] ... Terry Rakolta [an activist who spearheaded a boycott of the show Married ... with Children] were fair comments ... within the confines of her public conduct [and] protected by Ms. Rakolta's status as a "limited public figure".

Celebrites have a hard time suing for defamation due to their status as public figures. The reporter in this case likely qualifies as an "involuntary public figure" due to the coverage of all this, and might be a public figure just by being a reporter.

> The reporter in this case likely qualifies as an "involuntary public figure" due to the coverage of all this, and might be a public figure just by being a reporter.

Maybe. I actually can't find a ton of case law on print reporters as public figures: there's a great deal of case law for television journalists (nearly universally in their favor), but comparatively little for newspaper journalists.

Seems pretty clear to me...

> “We are grateful to the member of the media who brought this to the state’s attention,” was the proposed quote attributed to the state’s education commissioner before Parson began shooting the messenger.

Repudiated?

1. refuse to accept or be associated with. "she has repudiated policies associated with previous party leaders"

2. deny the truth or validity of. "the minister repudiated allegations of human rights abuses"

3. refuse to fulfill or discharge (an agreement, obligation, or debt). "breach of a condition gives the other party the right to repudiate a contract"

Did you mean this word?

Any attorneys' fees and court costs incurred as a result of the governor launching a retaliatory investigation seem like they would be concrete damages.

This scandal is a perfect example of how our political discourse is failing. We cannot simply talk about government budgets and taxes in simple binary terms.

We have to accept that the government needs to spend some money in order fulfill basic functions like protecting sensitive data because anybody that does good work in IT demands far higher pay than what you typically earn in the private sector. I see this all the time.

If billionaires and venture-backed firms are the only ones that can reasonably attract and retain technical talent, we will never solve this problem. The IT pay disparity between the public and private sector is staggering and with inflation, who's gonna take a 60-70% pay cut to work in a public IT job?

It might help if we didn't have the least competent people possible in positions of power

Oversimplifying the problem to deflect from the underlying issues only serves the interests of those that enable scandals like this in the first place.

Couldn't agree more. Having lived overseas really drives home the feeling that fixation on more vs. less is rather crude.

In a lot of ways, it feels like the Ron Swanson schtick from Parks and Recreation: if you're anti-government, you strive to get in power so that you can run government badly, thus proving that government is bad and that we should drown it in the bathtub.

I think you can be a good governor and not know much about technology.

I think you can be a good governor and even possibly be ... not smart.

You just need to be able to find good people to listen to. In fact some folks told him it wasn't the reporter's fault early on.

It seems Mike Parson is the first two, and incapable of the last.

Sadly it seems he does all this at the expense of good governance and the people of Mussouri in order to target people he doesn't like.

This wasn’t targeting people the governor didn’t like, this was a direct attempt to punish publication of a story that showed him in a bad light.

The intent was the chilling effect and the governor got what he wanted. The reporter, subject matter expert & newspaper all had to be involved in a criminal investigation and incur all the costs that go with it.

This was a direct attack on a free press using the full menace of the state and there are unlikely to be an repercussions for it. Quite the opposite there are members of his constituency that believe that the press are enemies and deserve this treatment.

"people he doesn't like"

I use the idea of that generally in a way that IMO fits your description as well.

Reporter, newspaper, another politician, even an institution, any could fall into that category IMO.

While I don't doubt the seriousness of his actions regarding attacking / threatening the press, I think for guys like him he would be happy to target anyone / think that kept him in power.

I see it as another example of a basic clash of cultures - between someone who is competence-oriented, and someone who is status-and-hierarchy oriented.

They're speaking different languages and seeing different things.

Parsons - like many politicians - sees situations exclusively as status and power plays. So when someone with low status says "This is broken", of course he goes on the attack.

It's inconceivable in his world that someone might be trying to warn him about a real problem that needs to be fixed. At best he sees it as an attack on his position, at worst he turns it into a mini-campaign he can use for political gain.

The fact there was a real problem is irrelevant and invisible to him. It's simply not something that interests him.

That's an interesting idea, thank you.

I always wonder what it was that (I don't want to get into politics in detail here) that made Trump respond almost allergically to the news about COVID early on in 2020. There's nothing about him or his general 'platform' that meant he had to reject any news about it at all outright and dig in his heels until it was too late.

He could have even fed his own authoritarian inclination and declared his own great patriotic war on COVID / made it all about him in a way. Had he done so I wonder if he still would be president ...

But he made his call. Was it because he wanted to just reject any 'bad news' or maybe it was more like you're describing? Whatever it was, he perhaps saw it as a status / power play on him in one way or another.

I really don't know but it is an interesting explanation for people's responses at times.

>Parsons - like many politicians - sees situations exclusively as status and power plays. So when someone with low status says "This is broken", of course he goes on the attack.

These are the absolute last people we should ever want in charge of anything

I do not understand how one can qualify Mike Parson as a good governor while also stating that he targets people he does not like (with legal action from taxpayer funded prosecutors).

Nope. I'm saying the opposite. I think maybe my wording confused you (I do that sometimes).

It took a second reading for me to understand but I get your point!

Oh, my bad, I think I understand now.

Indeed, the wording is confusing. If he "is the first two" then he "is a good governor". So with a more generous reading, you must be referring to the second clauses of each of the first two.

TY, yeah that doesn't make sense now.

I kinda meant to indicate the last trumps the good parts of the first but I agree that does seem confusing.

I remember reading the original story and it was bananas. Parsons kept doubling down and all of us were just sitting here going "oh this is not going to end well for him". And here we are...

“The lady doth protest too much.” led us exactly where one might predict it to.

Never change Missouri politics. You get what you vote for.

At the end of the day though, what are the actual consequences for him?

great question. since Missouri is one of a handful of states that are both heavily gerrymandered and impose strict limitations on the freedom to vote, its politics effectively mimic a gerontocratic autocracy....rule by an opaque council of elders elected under such limited conditions and terms they are effectively appointees.

its unlikely he will face any meaningful repercussions for attempting to scapegoat the press.

There are no consequences beyond egg-on-face. I think that's as it should be. He said something stupid and reactionary, from a place of ignorance, likely parroting what some underling of his said. Now he looks silly, the news gets to carp about it for a cycle, and we all move on. This is as things should be. No one was materially hurt by his ignorant claims. Journalists are (or at least should be) thick-skinned enough to handle whatever inconvenience resulted from this, and now they get to publish their followups. Schadenfreude is its own reward.

No one was materially hurt? What about the two people who had to hire legal representation to defend themselves from baseless allegations and a pointless investigation? And the harm to their reputations?

I agree that there isn't much that can be done considering it's unlikely the legislature will hold the Governor accountable, but it's not right to say no one was materially hurt.

I think a lot of people just boldly assume "you won in court, so there was no damage" because they have 1- Never had to win in court and/or 2- Have so much money that going to court doesn't materially inconvenience them.

The legal system is great if you can afford it, but often times you get exactly as much justice as you can afford. There's a reason that, despite the societal harm they individually account for, drug offenses get much more jail time than "white collar crimes".

That said, the State attacking private citizens(this is what court cases are, an attempted attack to inflict financial damages or jail time) for checks notes alerting the State that it isn't properly protecting its citizens, is not something that should be solely handled with a penalty of "possibly not winning reelection".

Really? You don't think "losing his job" or "losing the power he has abused" are desired consequences?

> This is as things should be.

No, things should not be where a politician gets away with baselessly threatening his opponents with taxpayer funded legal action that could easily cost them time, money, and freedom.

> No one was materially hurt

You must be kidding. As governor, Parson is the most powerful person in the state. And he's threatening to prosecute people who turned out to be innocent (arguably were known to be innocent from the word go). When flagrant abuse of power, and evil intent occur, its impossible that "No one was materially hurt".

In the short-term, none. In the long-term, the consequences are that he's a great candidate for a GQP presidential nomination, for being a strong, decisive leader attacked by an unfair lying press.

What is strange is he could have just said "that's bad we'll fix it" and kinda rolled on ... fairly quickly.

And yet, it could have gone to a court victory for him. Glad it didn’t.

I live in Missouri and am a Republican and can safely say - I did not appreciate Parsons going on a political witch hunt.

In light of the actions of the previous Governor [1], does it make you re-think your party affiliation?

[1] https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/congress/eric-greitens-form...

What should I be instead, a Democrat?

The answer to your question is no. Why on earth would I change my party affiliation based solely on the actions of two members of the party?

I'll also add, other than this small stain, Parsons has been good. No major changes or upsets. It's boring here in Missouri politically, and I like that.

You shouldn't. You might want to write a letter to the governor expressing your concern at his lack of acumen, but beyond that, I wouldn't do anything.

It's strange that you say "why on earth would I change my party affiliation based on the actions of two members" as if those two members weren't the two highest elected members of the state party. It's like if the CEO and Chairman of the board of a corporation were embezzling funds and someone replied "Why would I change my opinion of a company based on two random employees?"

I think you did that because it's pretty obvious why someone might sour on an organization whose highest leaders continued in a pattern of bad behavior. In fact, quite the opposite of your claim here, I think it would be common sense to change your opinion on an organization based on a pattern of misbehavior by its top leaders.

The reality of modern American politics, though, as I think you demonstrate as do most people, is that Negative Partisanship is the only factor at all that matters. The people on "your team" can do anything at all, because "the other team" is worse. This is the sentiment that drives all American politics at the state and federal level.

> The reality of modern American politics, though, as I think you demonstrate as do most people, is that Negative Partisanship is the only factor at all that matters. The people on "your team" can do anything at all, because "the other team" is worse. This is the sentiment that drives all American politics at the state and federal level.

Completely and utterly wrong assumption about me on your part. Both parties suck. There is a lesser evil, and that's the evil I unfortunately subscribe to. Wish there was a better way, but there isn't, so I'm stuck with what I got.

In part though that is because you are looking on the micro level. This Republican facing no consequences enables others to act the same, then when it is so widespread that it infects the entire party it becomes acceptable for all of the party. Now they know they can get away with it and the electorate doesnt punish them.

Sounds like you have swallowed their propaganda entirely if you think they are bad but they have convinced you the other guy is worse.

> Sounds like you have swallowed their propaganda entirely if you think they are bad but they have convinced you the other guy is worse.

In this case, it was not a guy but a woman running against Parsons.

(Wow, those are some downvotes! People reacted to this comment like a Missouri voter reacts to a female gubernatorial candidate.)

> This Republican facing no consequences enables others to act the same, then when it is so widespread that it infects the entire party it becomes acceptable for all of the party.

I'm sure we could compile a list of elected officials across a spectrum of political parties where no consequences are faced (for an action, in-action, decision, cover-up, etc) when they may be warranted. I don't think this is a valid argument.

>Completely and utterly wrong assumption about me on your part.

Is it?

>There is a lesser evil, and that's the evil I unfortunately subscribe to. Wish there was a better way, but there isn't, so I'm stuck with what I got.

So, in a sense, by subscribing to a lesser of two evils idea, you're doing the same thing as "the other team is worse" (the thing I said).

It is what it is, negative partisanship does drive everything, and the first step to better politics is admitting we have a problem.

> is that Negative Partisanship is the only factor at all that matter

I couldn't have said it any better.

It's all a political theater. (both sides)

Negative Partisanship, drives anger and fear.

Fear and anger drive donations and votes.

Fear and anger drive views/clicks, news outlets and the media, everybody wins!

Wash, rinse, repeat, circa 1776!

> both sides

You literally just made a both sides argument. I'm not a fan of either party, but I'm also not a supporter of the idea that both sides are both equally bad. Only one side stormed the Capitol in an explicit attempt to reverse en election result they did not like, and persists to this day in insisting that they actually won.

Yes, both sides have some problems, both say and do super annoying things, but 'both sides' is just giving the Republican Party an out, where instead we should hold them to account for trying to tip over the table and destroy our democracy.

I, for one, have embraced my negative partisanship. I'm not a Democrat. I'm an anti-Republican.

> What should I be instead, a Democrat?

I never suggested that. There are plenty of people walking around who are unaffiliated or support 3rd parties. Not being a "Republican" doesn't make you a "Democrat".

> Why on earth would I change my party affiliation based on the actions of two members of the party?

They are not just "two members of the party", they are last two heads of the party in your state. When Republicans stopped doing things I agreed with, I stopped calling myself a Republican.

> Not being a "Republican" doesn't make you a "Democrat".

If only both sides of the fence understood that...

This reads like finger pointing used to justify an existing stance.

I would recommend not being devoted to any political group or party. It's the greatest hack. You can chose policies à la carte, you can decide who you associate yourself with on a case-by-case basis. You can avoid group think errors in judgement.

If you must register for primaries in your state, then that's fine. But that's where the association would end in my book.

Great Missouri facts:

* One abortion clinic in the entire state! It would be zero if not for the pesky courts. If Mike gets his way, Missouri will be "the most Pro-Life state in the country!"

* No permit required for open or concealed carry! Sell or buy your guns with whoever you like. You can even point your guns at filthy liberals with your finger on the trigger and the governor will pardon you of any crimes you may be convicted of

* 54% of the state is fully vaccinated, one of the lowest rates in the country! If you need any more encouragement to visit, masks are optional and actually frowned upon by the better class of Missouri citizens (conservatives)!

* Current Missouri Senator Josh Hawley attempted to overthrow the government on Jan 6!

* No voting by mail! "So if they don’t [feel safe voting in person], then don’t go out and vote". Great words, Mike!

What really sucks is that Greitens at least seemed to give half a damn about responsible governing. I'm very much not a Republican, but I'd much rather have him back, if those are my options. That sort's rare in either party—and, I might suggest, even rarer in the party that's openly anti-government much of the time.

Reminds me of the 1991 Louisiana gubernatorial election, between Edwin Edwards (blatantly corrupt) and David Duke (Klansman). The bumper stickers all over the state said "Vote for the Crook! It's Important!".

The problem is that the grass is not often greener on the other side. In states like Oregon, Texas, and Florida, there very often is significant support to move to the opposing party because the incumbent governor is truly bad. However, the opposition fails to put up a compelling candidate and those states remain stuck with the fools they have.

Consider Florida. A lot of people really don't like DeSantis but the alternative the DNC of Florida put up was...a literal methhead[0]. Oregon has Kate Brown who has signed extremely unpopular legislation in Oregon but the opposition was...a guy who isn't even a Republican anymore[1]. Texas has Greg Abbott who is universally hated in Texas after the energy fiasco of 2021 but his opponent is a guy who failed to win a Senate election[2], let alone the governorship (have fun donating to that).

It's easy to look at the political parties of a state's elected representatives and make assumptions about the people there but it's very important to consider the actual people being elected before you draw conclusions about the politics of the citizens.

[0]https://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/politics/fl-ne-andrew-gill...

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

[2]https://www.shorturl.at/xEKZ3

> It's easy to look at the political parties of a state's elected representatives and make assumptions about the people there but it's very important to consider the actual people being elected before you draw conclusions about the politics of the citizens.

I didn't draw any conclusions, they said they were Republican in Missouri who disagreed with the Governor. I simply asked if that made them "re-think" their their affiliation.

That so many people assumed I was asking them to switch to Democrat is evidence of how dug in our society has become. It contains two big assumptions.

1. Re-assessing your affiliation based on political performance is the same as switching to another party

2. If you aren't a Republican, you must be a Democrat

I am an American as of 2 years ago.

The whole gov/system is by default 2 party system.

Some of the questions that you are asked during your citizenship interview is what are the two main parties.

Im not saying I like it. But it’s a fair assumption to make when literally all voters only consider the two parties.

There is a difference between voting for one of the two parties (althought there are obviously more parties) and choosing to affiliate yourself with a specific party. In the US, the largest political party is "Independent" [1] with 46% of the population identifying that way.

[1] https://news.gallup.com/poll/15370/party-affiliation.aspx

Interesting, Im not sure why that question was picked though.

You are given choices of “identifying” as Rep/Dem/Ind. Only two of them are real parties.

What does it mean to be independent then? Is it more like undecided?

Im not sure you can call that a political party.

> What does it mean to be independent then? Is it more like undecided?

I'm sure it means different things to different people. For me, it means that I don't follow any party's platform in lockstep. I try to judge each candidate and policy based on merits, not team affiliation and have voted for multiple parties over the years (Republican, Democratic, Libertarian, Green).

I was with you until your last example. You appear to be suggesting that people who've lost statewide elections should never run for a statewide position again? History is full of examples of great legislators who didn't win their first elections.

I think the famous one is Lincoln[0] and I agree that his perseverance is inspiring. Nevertheless, campaign funding correlates heavily with election success in the modern era and losers are naturally going to meet with skepticism that they will find success the second time around.

In this particular case, he's running for the exact same set of voters as before for a more prestigious office against a more popular candidate. His policies are less popular than in 2018 and he's done nothing to increase his notoriety in the last four years. This isn't to say he's not a good candidate but I find it reasonable to think that he may struggle for funding this time around more than last.

[0]https://www.abrahamlincolnonline.org/lincoln/education/failu...

> don't like DeSantis but the alternative the DNC of Florida put up was...a literal methhead

At worst an alleged methhead, which he denies.

> officers were called to a West Avenue hotel around 1 a.m. and found Gillum there with two other men, one of whom was being treated for a possible drug overdose. Gillum was too inebriated to speak with officers, though he was later reported in stable condition and with normal vital signs.

...

> "I was in Miami last night for a wedding celebration when first responders were called to assist one of my friends,” Gillum said in the written release. “While I had too much to drink, I want to be clear that I have never used methamphetamines."[0]

[0] https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2020/03/13/andr...

Your mistake is understandable because the media ran with the Gillum-is-a-meth-fiend narrative.

I’m curious - by the same logic should an American re-think their citizenship based on the previous presidents?

How is citizenship related to political party? I didn't ask if they thought about moving, I asked if they thought about who they choose to support going forward?

Please don't take HN threads into tedious partisan flamewars. They're repetitive, off topic, usually turn nasty, and are not what HN is for.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

My comment was very careful to not include partisanship or judgement. It was a question on if events caused them to "re-think" their affiliation. Flagging it, while allowing commenters to spew Russian propaganda for the past 2 weeks doesn't seem to be "what HN is for".

I don't agree; it was a cross-examiney question, which is likely to feel like an attack even if it's carefully phrased, and the implicit point was obviously partisan. If you didn't intend it that way, then you needed to do a better job of disambiguating your intent. There are lots of ways to do that, but if you don't do it, a comment like this will have inflammatory effects on the thread whether you intended that or not.

https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&so...

As for Russian propaganda, that isn't remotely representative of the forum. You may be falling prey to the bias that causes negative data points to stand out more (https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...), as well as the bias that causes internet users to feel that other commenters are foreign agents, astroturfers, spies, shills, bots, etc. On the latter, see https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comme.... If anyone wants an in-depth explanation, https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27398725 is one of many.

> the implicit point was obviously partisan

No, it was not. Partisan would be asking if they were going to switch to a specific different party. I asked if they re-thought their affiliation.

> As for Russian propaganda, that isn't remotely representative of the forum.

I never claimed it was, just that it has increased the past two weeks without much moderation.

> the bias that causes internet users to feel that other commenters are foreign agents, astroturfers, spies, shills, bots, etc.

Another thing I never claimed.

All of these assumptions sound like they may be an example of the Illusion of Asymmetric Insight (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Illusion_of_asymmetric_insight). Is that how this works?

Could be. That's a good link!

It wasn't a witch hunt, it was an orchestrated attempt to shift blame for what is ultimately his responsibility. His behavior is unethical, immoral and costly to taxpayers. Why people still keep wearing political labels is beyond me.

Will you vote for him again? Will other Republicans?

Assuming you think that as bad as Parsons is for this, the Democrat opponent is worse - what is the process in Missouri for replacing Parsons on the Republican side of the ballot in the next election?

Did the governor incur any civil liability? In light of this report, it's hard to see his press conference as a defensible use of his powers and bully pulpit.

Passer by: "Oy mate! D'you know you've left your stable door open?"

Parsons: "You sire are a horse thief. You shall hang for this."

> “A hacker is someone who gains unauthorized access to information or content. This individual did not have permission to do what they did. They had no authorization to convert or decode, so this was clearly a hack.”

So, "view page source," a built in browser function since forever (not even considering various built in inspectors), is illegal according to this very smart politician. That's basically all that was done here, on a publicly accessible website.

The initial charges against the journalist could have been subterfuge to divert media culpability over recently acquired oversight privileges. I'm not suggesting that teachers aren't tech literate but perhaps there are some that will only remember the first headline, "journalist hacked me". Teachers unions also tend to vote in blocks.

Why do we have so many people in politics that seem so hellbent on trying to attack people and find malice in what they do? I don't know much about Pasrson, but I hope this is not his standard MO.

I suspect if a lot of your platform is scapegoating to start with it is SO EASY to just use that when anything you don't like happens / makes you look bad.

Even things that don't really make you look bad... (early on this wasn't even thought to be the governor's office fault directly).

That's the danger in scapegoating and etc it's so easy to do for everything.

Hugo Chávez had a regular national TV show in Venezuela where he would call up his own government officials and berate them and sometimes fire them on live TV. It's a scary viral like thing if you think to do it for everything.

From Missouri, it is his standard MO

"MO" is everyone's standard Missouri.

Convincing people that your opponents are evil is an effective way to get them to vote for you.

Politicians live and die by attacking opponents reputations, instead of the message.

The public, sadly, cares more about not the job done, the track record, but instead on appearances.

I once saw a Canadian politician mocked for his haircut. Another for the way he spoke.

Not how well they did their job.

So yeah, someone says something bad about a politician, well... we keep hiring people that are better at attacking appearances, not policy.

What's that old saying?

    "A lie can travel around the world, while the truth is still putting its boots on."

The fact that the governor will probably face no repercussions from this sickens me. It's bad enough that our elected officials aren't capable of grasping basic tech concepts but this stinks of a coverup or at a minimum shifting the blame from his own office who was responsible for the data leak (for a decade!!!).

What is there to cover up? The existence of a bug? That seems trivial.

It sounds like the guy is a confident idiot.

You don't find it suspicious that the governor's office directly oversaw the group that made the mistake and then were so quick to point at the reporter as the one responsible? I sure do and the governor's office clearly doesn't deserve the benefit of the doubt in this case.

No, it's a bureaucracy. Bureaucracies are dumb by default, but very effective at seeking representation. The other side of that is subject matter expertise, otherwise called a technocracy. A functioning government needs bureaucrats in charge with technocrats that report to them; this forces a balance of the efficacy of a technocracy while avoiding the inherent marginalization technocrats are prone to. To me, it sounds like the guy is a bureaucrat who surrounded himself with other bureaucrats rather than SMEs. Something needs to change for sure, but I don't think it rises to the level of conspiracy that folks are brooding about.

Edit: Most of this take is based on my experience in the military in both highly bureaucratic organization as well as very dynamic organizations that had differing structure.

my my my how the turntables

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