Comment by marcusb | Hacker News Reader

Comment by marcusb | Hacker News Reader

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What I'm doing is drawing a reasonable inference based on the evidence available to me. Specifically:

* The group is question (DOGE) is tasked with cutting spending deemed superfluous or wasteful.

* The group in question is actively cutting spending at the agency in question (CISA)

* The group in question is actively cutting spending with the vendor in question (MITRE)

* The leader of the group in question (Elon Musk) has said, more or less explicitly, that they have a bias more towards cutting spending and less towards getting the spending cuts right. They expect mistakes to be made. (If you want to dispute or nitpick this, I'll link you to the video where he laughs about cutting ebola prevention funding.)

* The boss of the group in question (Trump) really doesn't like CISA. See: the Chris Krebs debacle.

So, that's what I'm doing. What are you doing? It seems to me that you are trying to fit the available facts to your preferred narrative, instead of the other way around. And what does the contract having existed for 25 years have to do with anything? DOGE has admitted to cutting programs that have been funded for far longer. It is completely irrelevant.

What I’m doing is applying basic critical thinking instead of building a conspiracy theory on vibes.

Yes, DOGE is slashing budgets. Yes, CISA and MITRE took hits. That’s all true. And still doesn’t prove DOGE made the call to let the CVE contract lapse and then magically reverse it within hours. If this was a top-down DOGE directive, why the immediate reversal? Did DOGE suddenly change its mind? Or is it more likely that DHS made a blunder, got backlash, and scrambled to fix it? You’re calling your chain of assumptions a "reasonable inference" but here’s what it actually is: guilt by proximity. DOGE cuts here, DOGE cuts there, and now suddenly every erratic government decision is DOGE’s fault? That’s lazy logic.

The fact that the contract lasted 25 years _is_ relevant. It shows that this wasn't some minor side project. CVE is foundational infrastructure. You don’t accidentally let something like that expire unless someone either massively screwed up or there was serious internal confusion.

So no, I’m not ignoring the facts. I’m refusing to pretend correlation equals causation just because it fits the narrative everyone loves right now: "blame DOGE for everything". It’s easy, it’s trendy, and it completely bypasses deeper institutional dynamics.

What am I doing? I’m resisting the urge to jump on that bandwagon. You should try it.

> If this was a top-down DOGE directive, why the immediate reversal? Did DOGE suddenly change its mind?

From the man himself:

  “We will make mistakes. We won’t be perfect. But when we make a mistake, we’ll fix it very quickly,” Musk, a Trump-appointed special government employee, said Wednesday in defense of his group’s haphazard cuts while looming over the Cabinet table. “So for example with USAID, one of the things we accidentally canceled—very briefly—was Ebola prevention."[0]

> The fact that the contract lasted 25 years _is_ relevant. It shows that this wasn't some minor side project. CVE is foundational infrastructure. You don’t accidentally let something like that expire unless someone either massively screwed up or there was serious internal confusion.

See previous quote about ebola funding, another long-term government program.

Look, if you want to play this game where because a DOGE spokesperson hasn't directly come out and said "yep, it was us", then I'll point you back to my original post: I said it was reasonable to assume, not that it was proven fact.

But, if you look at the totality of this situation and think 'nope. no way DOGE was involved. This is just people "blaming DOGE for everything"'. Fine. You do you. I don't think there is any point in continuing this conversation.

0 - https://newrepublic.com/post/192082/elon-musk-fact-check-dog...

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