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Comment by myrmidon | Hacker News Reader

Having the government manipulate mass-media material is frankly insane.

Everyone involved in something like this should be sacked immediately, but I have very little hope that voters are going to punish egregious misbehavior like this as long as it's "their" side doing it.

If you had told republican voters in 2016 that within the decade, there were going to be widespread searches/arrests by federal agents without warrant or trial, unapologetic image falsification by the White House and even killings of unarmed civilian protesters: They would have gone absolutely ballistic- rightfully so.

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>They would have gone absolutely ballistic- rightfully so

Sadly, I disagree here. They would have qualified their reaction by asking who would be in power. If it was a GOP held white house, they'd probably rationalize it and say it's good.

Partisanship rot goes very deep on the republican side. Granted, the democrats suck, but the republicans fall in line every time without question.

As someone who has a largely republican family, ironically they say the same thing: “the republicans suck, but the democrats fall in line every time without question.”

While a generalization has the flaws of being, well, a generalization; I've noticed that this trope is at least more true than not when you qualify what TYPE of Democrats and Republicans you're talking about.

I think one is true of the representatives - Democrat constituents generally fall in line without question; whereas I think the other is true of the people - Republican voters generally fall in line without question.

The rot is deep for the constituents on either side, however. There's a LOT of incentive to preserve party/ideological status quo regardless of where you land.

well, what do the facts say? Thinking back to the last powerful Dem politician to get in trouble, Senator Bob Menendez of New Jersey, I don't recall any outpouring of support from him from his colleagues or diehard Dem voters.

The situation we're in today has obvious roots in the aftermath of 9/11 and the PATRIOT act, and the relative lack of voter outcry after the Snowden leaks. Voters seem all too glad to trade in freedom for fear of boogiemen & have a reverence for LEO that is wholly unearned. I honestly think the reaction would be closer to something like, "well, what did they do to deserve it?" (until it happens exactly to them, of course)

> Having the government manipulate mass-media material is frankly insane.

It’s repeating history. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Censorship_of_images_in_the_So... with, for example

“On May 5, 1920, Lenin gave a famous speech to a crowd of Soviet troops in Sverdlov Square, Moscow. In the foreground were Leon Trotsky and Lev Kamenev. The photo was later altered and both were removed by censors.”

No, they wouldn't, because they didn't care when this happened during Trump's first term, Trump said this would happen during his 2nd term, AND THEY STILL VOTED FOR HIM.

This is what America voted for.

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