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Comment by lawlessone | Hacker News Reader

They'll do this now and then act shocked when some of these ex nasa people end up working in Europe or China lol

Even without that factor, making deep cuts to research funding right before Cold War II: Electric Boogaloo seems like a bad move.

If you were acting on behalf of the other players in the sequel, these would be great moves.

Turns out people like Trump and Gabbard might be smarter than they appear. It's just a pity that they use that against the US.

They aren’t.

They’re not smart, but both of them have been cultivated by Russia for decades.

For a long time Trump has been repeating Russian talking points like he invented them. The best asset is the one who never sees how he’s being played.

Only recently Trump has realized that Putin doesn’t actually do what he says, and you can tell he is genuinely surprised by this revelation.

Trump is simply a narcissist and socialite who has broad ideas about how he thinks the world should work, but like anyone at a high leadership position, surrounds himself with other people he trusts to execute on the details.

In this case, all of the downsizing that has been happening is right out of the Heritage Foundation playbook, literally.

And those plans are largely a manifestation of Kevin Roberts' political beliefs. He, in his book, has said things such as:

> "many of America's institutions...need to be burned"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dawn%27s_Early_Light:_Taking_B...

This executive has been criticized as using a hatchet and not a scalpel in their downsizing options precisely because their fundamental driving belief is that all of it is waste and abuse. They don't want any of it.

I no longer think he's deliberately acting on their behalf.

He's just so stupid that's equivalent to that.

For those that worked so diligently to put him in place, the result is the same nonetheless.

Absolutely. :/

We've been in Cold War II for awhile now

don't they all sign a document saying it's all classified tech?

Not necessarily. Not all the work for the government is classified, and over classification is technically, which means it still happens and is mostly ignored, against the law.

And having worked on some classified systems doesn't preclude employment in related fields. It does restrict what you can share, of course.

Sure there are probably NDAs to keep specific tech from moving, but that doesn't mean the talent that invented the tech can't move.

Eh. I'm not saying it's a great scheme, but these are almost all people taking retirement a couple years early. China is not interested in stealing 1980s NASA tech, and Europe aerospace is a non-player.

The way you say that more supports the idea these people should have been laid off a while ago.

I bet plenty have that useful "unwritten institutional knowledge" that could help newer programs. (F.ex. instructions for a nuclear waste storage said to use kitty litter, but didn't say it was because it was a cheap source of bentonite clay; someone substituted some modern paper variant and caused a small nuclear incident).

Ageism at its best. Senior folks are stuck in time and only know 80's tech, right ?

That doesn't sound legal.

why wouldn't it be though?

EAR/ITAR restrictions maybe? China at least is ITAR restricted and has a lot of entities on the EAR list. I'm not a lawyer though; no idea what regulations you'd actually be subject to.

For NASA? I dont see why not. Unless they were doing something related to natsec

There is worse going on in other areas, for example "China Recruiting Former R.A.F. Pilots to Train Its Army Pilots, U.K. Says"

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-63293582

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/10/17/world/europe/china-recrui...

https://asiatimes.com/2024/12/what-uk-fighter-pilots-did-and...

And finally, the official response: https://www.gov.uk/government/news/former-armed-forces-perso...

It comes down to money and private interests dominating Western politics. It has bad but also good sides. Human conflict used to be about extermination a few thousand years ago, that is what I think of when I read such headlines, such things can actually also be seen as progress. We now have priorities other than our tribe or nation, that has good sides too. I like the Napoleonic war story where Napoleon gave a medal to a British scientist, Humphry Davy.

While bad for the nation, I try to see it as a mixed bag that people from the top down are... flexible.

The price we pay is, possibly, worse outcomes in conflicts. What we gain is that after conflicts end we get back to normal life - with one another - very quickly and relatively easily.

A lot of your "we" seems to mean literally that your elites aren't loyal to you whereas other elites are loyal to the "us".

That puts you in a uniquely disadvantageous position.

I actually want that guy gone yesterday.

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