It used to be that public officials tried hard to look smart, whether they were or not.
Ironically, now it seems that public officials try to look as dumb as the lowest common denominator of their constituents.
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I look at source code often to learn tips on coding. On some pages the source code doesnāt show very much. They apparently have a way to bringing in code and then resetting. It appears they did some stupid coding such as including the database in the Show Me states Show Me code.
This is a politician speaking without bothering to get any facts firstā¦having this disease is a prerequisite to becoming a politician regardless of party persuasion. I havenāt read the tweet, watched the video, or read the articleā¦so I have no firsthand knowledge but since itās been reported in the news I can almost guarantee that it was taken out of context or had some creative editing applied to it to make him look bad. Same thing happens whenever a āreporterāā¦although thatās a pretty low bar these daysā¦doesnāt believe the same thing as the politician.
That almost sounds to me like our problem these days would be the evil newsmen and not just idiot politicians. People vilify the news all the time, and there is certainly some justification, but if so many politicians werenāt corrupt lying scumbags, this wouldnāt really be an issue because facts would stand out. But when facts become plyable and significant parts of society believe they can make up their own set of suitable facts, well then damnation of the press certainly isnāt going to fix anything.
Absolutely correctā¦and Iām not really damning the press anymore than the politiciansā¦and weāre way, way off topic here I think.
That saidā¦itās clear that we have lots of political divisions nowā¦and both sides lie, obfuscate, and prevaricateā¦and the media against both sides then takes what they say out of context and massages it to meet the political leanings of that particular reporter. I think we all realize that you can tell a politician is lying because his lips are moving. What exacerbates the issue is that journalists as a classā¦and there are exceptions so this is just a generalizationā¦are no longer interested in reporting the news but in making the news, being the news, and getting clicksā¦and thatās a bad thing. Back in the dayā¦you would never have guess from listening to Walter Cronkite on the CBS evening news was a way out liberal and practically a socialist in his personal beliefs. He kept that to himself except for his occasional commentary and even then was extremely measured in his words and careful to not be what would be called click-bait today. And Iām not complaining about the so called mainstream media which some perceive to be biased against themā¦Iām talking about all of the biased/slanted/click-bait things that so called journalists do today.
The vast majority of polsā¦on both sidesā¦are as you sayā¦corrupt lying scumbags. But we do need to damn the press to get them back to being actual journalists instead of being interested in making their political opponents look badā¦and there are very few journalists that are actually interested in the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth these days.
I have to wonder if in this case, the governor is really as ignorant as he appears. It would be one thing if this were the first time this issue was coming up; itās different when thereās been criticism from knowledgeable people as to why a potential prosecution is misguided. Surely, even if the governor is technically illiterate, is everyone around him just as ignorant? And are they all deaf to the criticisms?
This is, of course, a possibility, but Iām more likely to believe this is just a cynical ploy by the governor to try intimidate members of the press from publishing stories which make him look bad. Does he come off looking stupid? Sure, but that doesnāt seem to be much of a hindrance in todayās political climate.
Not all political activity is bad. Nor are all the politicians. Its not a each side are equally bad issue. None of that is present here.
What we witness is willingness of this politician to game partisan media to intimidate a journalist despite the technical advice he almost certainly was made aware of.
What it does raise is the question of the relative shallowness of the grasp most people have of technology. Thatās a vulnerability which will continue to dog society as technology continues its ongoing disruption. We are primates with cellphones and technologyās evolutionary pace could outstrip our collective ability to cope.
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Thatās a reasonable conclusionā¦but I notice that this is a Republican governorā¦and Iām not suggesting that your word choices like āgamingā and āpartisan mediaā and āintimidate a journalistā are intended to be deliberately inflammatory because youāre not a Republicanā¦but they could be taken that way by some and the larger tenor of this entire thread to me seems to be more political bashing than anything else.
The governor might be stupidā¦and he might be gaming the partisan media and all those other thingsā¦but one can easily point out just as many instances of that on the other side of the political aisle. I wonāt list them here because (a) Adam will likely edit them out, (b) theyāre really not material, and (c) the fact that as I stated all politicians lie for political benefitā¦this is almost universally true and while it may apply to Governor Parson of MO in this case depending on political persuasion of the evaluatorā¦it may also apply to AOC, the President, the former President, the Governor of NY and many other political officials on both sides.
Iām just saying that using those kinds of words that could easily be taken as inflammatory gets away from the actual discussion of whether viewing the source of a web page is illegal or whateverā¦and that one can easily point fingers at the other side of the aisle as well. I could easily point out examples on the other side where politicians deliberately try to game the media and inflame partisan media to intimidate journalists.
And just to forestall any comments that Iām being partisan hereā¦Iām not. Iām mostly in the center politically but believe that whatās good for the goose is good for the gander as wellā¦Iām more than happy to point out stupidity on any sideā¦and itās obviously not just the province of one side or the other.
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Alright, I think everything thatās useful to be said on this has been, so Iām going to close the comments.
And the prosecutor has declined to press charges in the end.
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Brian Krebs expands on the story with the detail that the governorās office was in charge of security for the site in question, which had been exposing the teachersā data for over a decade.
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