Comment by qwertox | Hacker News Reader

Comment by qwertox | Hacker News Reader

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I have thought for some years now that any country wanting to implement some kind of restrictions or surveillance should start with politicians and authorities first. With some select authorities being exempt from this due to national security.

For example, if a country wants to implement the installation of state-owned anti-harassment "spyware" on their citizens phones, then this would first apply to politicians and those who work for the government, like anyone employed in a city hall or the traffic authority (normal citizens working there) or the like. This would run for 5 years, while citizens have the right to attempt to hack these systems without repercussions, in order to ensure that the security is up to the highest standards.

If after those 5 years the politicians and government employees are ok with it, if no major security concerns exist and the benefit has shown to be an obvious one, then it could be up for debate to implement this new technology.

> With some select authorities being exempt from this due to national security.

I fear your carveout would quickly become an "Inner Party" situation, with those with real power declaring themselves exempt due to "national security" reasons. Imagine then that anyone in any position of authority but not real power would be subject to the surveillance as an "Outer Party" member.

I get that the intent is to show the people in charge the negative consequences of such policies, but I don't think that's the worst that could come of this.

You understand that there is already an inner party, not in a conspiracy sense, but in a privacy sense. Yo have to actually argue why partial transparency is way worse than full obscurity.

That’s exactly the kind of fallacy these politicians would use to argue against this kind of thing ;)

The idea that the powerful would find a way to circumvent or corrupt such a rule is a significant problem; it isn’t a fallacy.

Fallacy =/= thing I don’t like.

If thought of something similar but comprehensive and far reaching, as follows:

Any law voted yes by a politician would have:

A 6mo cool off period, and in that interim periodthe following would apply: the law in question would be Tripled (3x) and both ways (I.e. retroactive and future) to the elected officials, his immediate parents, sons, and siblings, as soon as the law is passed.

So if they pass a tax increase, the entire tax applies immediately to their family before it applies to the public.

Same would be surveillance. Same for healthcare changes. OR draft etc. They would eat their kill.

Its about time no?

Any regulatory body unelected chief + deputy should be subject to the same rules with a tidy bonus: agency rules would also impact the portfolio (materiality can be set at say FV in excess of 300% poverty line), or business relationships past + present for the "czars" and family members.

So If you want to run FDIC and want to make rules for banks, thats swell, but those rules will apply to bank X where your brother works, AND to bank Y where you were CEO. The new rule would apply to those banks first, the changes would be tripled, AND that would be applied retroactively.

Have fun with that revolving door!

This feels just like punishing governments and their families for doing their jobs. We already have elections and law enforcement, thats all we need to "punish" corrupt officials. What we lack to make elections effective is more information available to the public about what they do and why they do it. More accountability and transparency, not punishment for their children if they want to tax big corps. The threat of punishment is never the best incentive to get stuff done.

We should also start to judge them based on outcomes rather than pointless metrics like GDP. How much did poverty decrease during your governments? How about crime? Life expectancy? And so on.

That's what they want you to believe.

Government is NOT a job. Government is Public Service. Emphasis on 'service'

If you are not ready to do your service or duty, you are not fit to work in government.

The honor and duty of being a king came with the downside of the risks (beheading) to you and to your royal family, if you did a particularly bad job.

Current government officials have all the upside (revolving door) with almost zero downside. Some plebs break into congress and they get their pants in a jiffy.

We need to make them accountable. Them, and their families.

> We need to make them accountable

Yes that's exactly what I said. How about we forbid them from ever trading in stocks or participate in any investment where they might even have a remote conflict of interest?

I feel that would be the best way to keep crooks like Pelosi out of politics.

> Them, and their families.

This is nonsense but you must hate politicians apparently. I don't, I hate corruption.

I dont hate politicians.

I hate the kind of people it attracts.

We dont need politicians. We do need statemen.

I think you live fantayland if you think restricting their investment options will result in less politicians. Whats simply going to happen is that they will shift their activities to other income avenues. Less stock trading. More board jobs and speaking fees. The river of corruption keeps flowing even if in a different direction.

Instead, id like less incentives to corruption. That means eat what you kill. Id like more lincolns that take tremendous personal risk to themselves and their families, and declare wars against global superpowers, to then "close shop" and go back to their farm to retire.

Instead we have pelosis, mccains advancing the war lobby, or obamas making bank on "speaking fees"

Stock prohibition wont do a thing. You need to cut the incentive to sell favors. You need to re-introduce risk.

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