Hacker News Reader

Comment by mindslight | Hacker News Reader

Anybody who considers themselves an American needs to be calling for a full stop to all activities of this administration, including impeachment and conviction. It's clear that our country and our government have many problems. They have festered over years, causing the frustration and pan-society feelings of disenfranchisement that drove Trumpism. But at this point it's clear that regardless of all the "4d chess", there is no reforming going on here - just a wholesale destruction and fire sale of our country at the behest of the same entrenched interests that have been pulling the strings the entire time. This is like going to the hospital for a broken bone, and they start calling surgeons to salvage your organs.

View on HN

Great. I'm "calling for a full stop", and nothing is happening. Now what?

Whatever you do don't start drinking again!

can you stop and read the full article and maybe give some attention to the possibility that this one thing is maybe not a bad idea?

Okay, done. All I saw in the article is the usual hypocritical invocation of austerity to justify destruction and looting. Is there a substantive argument you would like to put forward why this action would be a good thing? Or is this just the same tired projection-based trend of implying that the people opposing the open fire sale of our country are the misinformed ones?

did you miss the part where the biggest contractor on the project was shady as fuck?

> Oshkosh encountered delays and engineering problems during early manufacturing runs, and disagreements — and accusations of corporate dishonesty — among executives plagued the production process, The Washington Post reported in December.

> Oshkosh was supposed to have delivered about 3,000 vehicles by the end of 2024. Instead it had provided roughly 100 and raised its prices as the Postal Service ordered additional EVs

the corporate "looting" as you put it, has already happened. and this part of the omnibus bill stems the bleeding. without any particular judgement on the rest of the omnibus bill, and yes, i believe there is probably looting in the rest of the bill.

you should support this part of the bill, if you believe the things that you claim to, such as not having the nation on open fire sale.

I didn't miss that. I'm just not going to get stuck focusing on mild criticism as a justification for causing another new problem, especially one that is seemingly worse. As I acknowledged in my original comment, our government has massive problems that have festered - like cost overruns and incompetent/incestuous management of private contractors. But despite whatever premium they extracted, they actually did deliver real vehicles which are in use right now. If the unit cost is ridiculous going forward, the USPS should put out a new bidding process for new vehicles compatible with the already built infrastructure. If the additional cost of EV vs gasoline is too high (which I doubt given all of the stop-starts), then they should hold off buying more and prioritize which areas they really make sense for. Whatever the case, they certainly should not be scrapping the current vehicles and the supporting infrastructure that was built!

Scrapping them does nothing to right that wrong (that money is gone), while setting up up the government for the next con job - the USPS still needs vehicles. The graft has not "happened" - it is happening, repeatedly. The only reason there are cost cutting measures in this bill is that it can avoid larger congressional processes by being plausibly "revenue neutral". This is one of the reasons why Trump's championed TCJA included tax increases in subsequent years - to be able to call the whole thing revenue neutral. In this context, whenever "savings" are being championed it is really just making a justification for giving it away somewhere else, and such "savings" are likely going to leave the government in a poorer position and having to spend even more later - akin to a high interest loan, but it's not even in terms of simple finances but rather diminished capabilities putting them even further at the mercy of the next set of contractors.

or... the postal service could use COTS kit.

So then USPS should be working on designing and testing that solution, demonstrating the costs are lower, and then creating an analysis that the costs of maintaining the few bespoke purpose-built vehicles are higher than additional capital spending on replacing them with the newer "COTS" [0] vehicles. And do all of this in-house with USPS/othergov employees to make it so there isn't a private contractor turning the "COTS" solution into another expensive one.

As I've acknowledge twice now, yes there are serious problems with the way the government specs and procures things. The problem here, and why I phrased my comment in terms of a "full stop" to any change rather than merely focusing on this issue, is that naive ideas about how things should be simple are just being used as a cover to enable more brazen looting - this isn't about getting a better vehicle solution for USPS, but rather destroying government assets for cash that can then be pocketed. Talking about progress or reform in the context of anything this administration does is specious. We need to be focusing on not going backwards before we can even think about going forwards.

[0] eg there are no "off the shelf" domestic market vehicles with right hand drive.

Well. That's what Americans voted for. What right do you have to demand them to stop?

We don't have a strategic referendum every four years and shut up otherwise.

Based on Trump's shotgun approach of contradictory positions and statements that promised everything to everyone, plus the completely uninspiring alternative option, it's not clear what Americans actually voted for. I have talked to many people that sheepishly admit they voted for Trump, yet lament that what he is doing is not at all what they thought he would do.

So my point is that the opposition here is not just the usual partisan squabbling. People should not think that waiting for 2/4 years is going to passively solve the problem like the regular changing of the buntings. Rather people need to realize the speed and brazenness these societal arsonists are moving, and demand their congresspeople stand up (versus the stochastic death threats from the social media addled nutsos, bots, etc) and put a stop to this. Congress shouldn't be voting on a big ugly omnibus spending bill written by special interests, rather they should be browbeaten into focusing on impeachment.

> Congress shouldn't be voting on a big ugly omnibus spending bill written by special interests, rather they should be browbeaten into focusing on impeachment.

Not to mention standing up in Congress, and reminding each other to actually read what they're voting on, like MTG a few weeks ago realizing the effects of a bill she voted for but hadn't read.

You know that is offensively ableist to say that she hadn't read the bill just because she cannot read. They have the best children's illustrators on the job.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com