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There needs to be more articles like this that calls them out by name. It’s easy to name Trump and Musk, but call out the cronies too!
Too much credit is given to Trump, which means that if Trump leaves office people will think everything is fixed despite all the other people who steer Trump towards his worst impulses will still be around wreaking havoc.
Trump is 90% a figurehead for the shitty conservatives who wrote Project 2025. He didn't come up with most of this stuff, he is just going along with it. The 10% of the time things are his idea are fucking terrible too, but he definitely doesn't deserve most of the credit.
Yeah but it's MAGA's weird adoration of Trump that makes this all possible. Also Trump did say he wasn't going to do Project 2025 during the campaign. People either believed this (despite him being convicted of 34 counts of fraud) or actually wanted Project 2025.
There will always be ghouls that will want to do these kinds of things. But what needs to happen is for voters to learn that bad things happen when you vote for someone like Trump who enables this kind of thing.
F*cking idiots.
Fucking idiots.
Fucking dumbasses.
Most of us, raised by Hollywood, imagine critical infrastructure has guards and ID checks. Keys. Guys with machine guns. The last 10 years, it's pretty clear the major controls are just that no one tries. "I'm from DOGE" is going to be the penetration tester's go-to social engineering hack for the next four years. Just walk in, press the Big Red Button, and leave.
This instance shows that it is, in fact, how that works, at least in part:
Shang wasn’t an official federal employee yet, meaning he couldn’t access the pump.
No credentials, no access. Most infrastructure like this has physical security like fencing, padlocks, steel doors, and so on. I don't know if there's a break-in alarm, but even if not, they'd still have to figure out how to access the pumps and turn them on. They're probably computer-controlled, so you'd have to get access to the computer system. I'm sure you could override it on the PLC, or just plain hotwire it, but that takes a whole new set of skills.
I would not be the least surprised if the sum total of the "l33t h4x0r skills" of these teenagers boils down to knowing the least bit about whatever the latest Javascript frontend framework is, combined with some LLM to help them with it....this is what happens when a whole lot of idiots think that being young == being tech-savvy.
People hand the tech decisions over to complete morons with no understanding and so much Dunning-Kruger that they not only don't know shit about something like PLCs, and may not have even heard of them, they'll be too fucking arrogant to ask people that DO know, because, gosh, they might be OLD (i.e., > 30 years old) or something.
Uncensor your fucking shit for the love of fuck
These idiots actually thought the only reason the fires were still burning is because someone hasn't opened up a faucet yet, and that no one else but them have thought of it.
It's fortunate that they're so incompetent that they couldn't do any damage.
The damage was ultimately done anyways: They ordered a shitload of water released with no benefit, now the state no longer has that reserve for later, when it is actually needed.
They were never out to help anyone, this was sabotage all along. They knew it wouldn't help and they didn't care because that was never their goal.
Ohhhhh, this makes sense now. The wanted to decimate California out of spite. Now I get it.
Yes, the fire was already nearly contained and also the initial water problem wasn't because of water shortage, but because the infrastructure wasn't able to keep up the demand.
This video explains the problem https://youtu.be/Y1N2BwcAT-s
The water that trump released, won't even get anywhere close to Los Angeles, it goes (went?) to the ocean 100 miles away from the city.
Those dams were build to prevent floods in the area in spring, and are used to provide water for farmers. So this move could cause a food shortage.
This water can't be physically used by Los Angeles, because it isn't even physically connected. Trump thinks that because the dam is on top of the map, it has to go down.
Ya know when you're a teenager and you have these delusions of grandure, and think the world would work just fine if you were allowed to run it, because these "Stupid Adults don't know ANYTHING!"
That's DOGE
The fucking idiots were not just wasting water, they were depleting the reservoirs. That water will be sorely missed in the dry season.
This was all by design. It’s meant to fuck over this year’s harvest and drive food prices up.
You get it.
I’m semi convinced this is a setup to justify a Canadian invasion to acquire water in the summer
Reminder: pronounce DOGE as “doggy” to deny them legitimacy
I've been pronouncing it "doogie" because it makes it seem as silly as it is
Imagine Bryton and Tyler showing up at your workplace in the middle of a crisis to take selfies and tweet about how they fixed your problems.
It feels like the plot of an episode of Parks and Rec, but like, stupider, and not funny at all
They should have been arrested.
They should have ~~been arrested~~ had the absolute shit beat out of them.
First, the power was off due to planned maintenance. Second, Shang wasn’t an official federal employee yet, meaning he couldn’t access the pump. Hassen couldn’t do it either, CNN reports, because he had to fly back before the power would be restored.
“They didn’t get their photo op,” an unnamed source with knowledge of the incident told CNN, adding it represented “what DOGE has been this entire time — this slapstick operation of 20-somethings they’re seeing as whiz kids but have zero knowledge.”
lol that's amazing levels of incompetence.
I'm not clear on why they doubled down on this, when it was apparently clear that the water was not going to go where they wanted it to go?
You think their goal is to help?
Well, I was thinking that at the very least they did not want to broadcast their idiocy, but clearly I need to reevaluate.
Was it idiocy or malice?
Idiocy can explain a lot, but malice makes everything they've done and everything they're trying to do make a lot more sense.
These acts are intentional and, even if these kids don't understand, the people who are calling the shots do and these are not mistakes (even if they claim otherwise); They have been planning this for years and have the backing of multiple billionaires who are clearly more than happy to facilitate all this.
Because they are idiots. They assume that because they might be good at one thing that they're good at everything.
A full department staffed by people who haven’t heard of unknown unknowns.
The problem is the effects of their actions are absolutely known, and quite predictable, as long as you can think more than 1 layer deep.
Too much fire? Easy, release all the water now!... Except we were clearly holding that water for a reason, otherwise the fucking dam wouldn't be there in the first place...
Yelling at various department managers and threatening to call Musk might work for the agencies they’ve gutted, but yeah fucking with any fire department during an active wildfire…I don’t care who you are, you’re gonna have a bad time. Possibly shovel related.
it's not about the water, it's about OBEYING them. If Trump, his oligarchs or their puppets tell you to jump you jump or ask 'how high' but don't question them and surely don't disobey them
And that's the problem. If everyone replied "fuck you, no" when ordered to jump, MAGA would be powerless. It's obedience that empowers them. Resist at every step, force them to expend all their effort on small victories. There are more of us than them and we can grind them down. They're soft.
agree completely. I've been thinking a lot lately about why this simple defiance is so difficult for some people. I figure it's because they fear social consequences (what will people think of me as a rule breaker?!) or they fear economic consequences (I could lose my job and ability to support my family!).
what's interesting is that the solution to both reasons/excuses is having a strong social support network and solidarity with others who would help you when you stumble. modern individualism and desperation has made people so isolated and fearful of being mis-perceived and has made us less powerful to stand up for what we (collectively) know is the right thing to do.
if someone in my circle gets fired or shamed because they said "No" to a fascist, theyre going to get a lot of help if they need it. and i make sure to tell them that.
Flooded farmland, provided 0 help to the wildfires, and now there's less water reserve for the actual agricultural season...
Genius.
I wish I had the confidence of a DOGE tech bro even for a week.
Flying across states for a photo op? Taxpayer money well spent—if you're making satire.
🐱
Assuming the justice system can function again, in theory, how much jail time could they get for tampering with infrastructure and public endangerment?
