It’s Time to Call Out the National Gourd

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National Guard in DC fighting crime, drugs, and terrorism

Watching the members of the National Guard being deployed in DC has been . . . painful. I’m not talking about the assault on democracy, as bad as that is, but the toll this deployment must be taking on the members of the Guard themselves. As a pastor, I’ve had countless members of the National Guard in my congregations. They’re the modern version of the Minutemen, practicing on the weekends every so often, ready to go at a moment’s notice when the need arises. And when the need passes, they go home.

Now imagine that you are one of these members of the Guard who has been deployed in DC, and you’re about to head back home. Then imagine the conversation you’re going to have with your kid . . .

Kid: Dad, what happened on your deployment?
Dad (looking down at his feet): Oh, you know. We went and did our thing, then came home.
Kid: How many terrorists did you shoot?
Dad: It wasn’t that kind of mission.
Kid: Did you blow up somebody’s headquarters?
Dad: Uh, no.
Kid: Then what *did* you do? Is it so secret you can’t tell me?
long pause
Dad (leaning in really close, and whispering): If I tell you, you can’t tell anyone. Promise?
Kid (excited): Promise!
Dad (dramatically looking left and right, to see who might be listening): We picked up . . . trash.
long pause as the Kid looks at Dad
Kid (grinning): Ok, you got me. Seriously, what did you do?
Dad: I’m serious. We. Picked. Up. Trash.
Kid (grin fades to a frown): Trash? Like you put on a day-glo orange vest over your camo uniforms and scooped up water bottles and french fry cups?
Dad: Yeah. And remember, you promised not to tell anyone about this.
Kid: Don’t worry – no one would believe me. And if they did, they’d all laugh at me all day long if they found out. Your secret is safe with me.

Seriously. This makes Alice’s Restaurant and its Group W bench look like nothing. “Son, are you manly enough and lethal enough to pick up trash?”

Trump did this for the symbolism. He did it to make it look as if he is Strong On . . . something. Whatever it is, he’s Strong, and calling out the National Guard is how he shows it. “Look at me, and how Important and Powerful I am. I, only I, the Greatest President in history, can do this!”

In response, there are all kinds of very serious, very appropriate ways to fight back against this. Mayors and governors are filing lawsuits, and working hard to keep this from happening again. Good. Do it, again and again and again. Pundits are punditing, and historians are describing how unprecedented this all it. Fine. These are necessary parts of a response, but they are not a sufficient response. No, the fullness of a response needs to take Trump on on the battlefield of symbolism, turning his desire to project power into a punch line.

As I’ve pondered this, it suddenly hit me. My friends, it is time to call out the National Gourd. I’m talking pumpkins.

Imagine a bunch of tourists marching east from the Lincoln Memorial with their pumpkins held high, marching past the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, the MLK Jr. memorial, the reflecting pool, the Korean War memorial, and the WWII memorial. Meanwhile, at the other end of the Mall, imagine another bunch of tourists with pumpkins marching west from the Capitol. Imagine them marching past the National Museum of the American Indian, the Air and Space Museum, and the National Museum of African American History and Culture. Imagine these two groups meeting, with their pumpkins held high, at the Washington Monument, then turning north.

Toward the White House.

Imagine the fence around the White House suddenly surrounded by the National Gourd, as the tourists deposit their pumpkins on the sidewalks around Trump’s doorstep.

Imagine the National Gourd appearing along the mansions of Embassy Row.

Imagine the National Gourd filling Lafayette Square, just north of the White House.

Imagine the National Gourd appearing at Blair House, at the US Naval Observatory (home to JD Vance), and on the steps of SCOTUS.

Imagine the National Gourd appearing at the DC Armory, home to the DC National Guard.

Imagine the National Gourd appearing all over DC. Imagine DC businesses putting a member of the National Gourd at their doors and in their windows. Imagine Metro Stations with their own National Gourd presence. Imagine the National Gourd lining The Wall at the Vietnam Memorial. Imagine the National Gourd sitting at the feet of every soldier in the Korean War Memorial. Imagine the National Gourd alongside every figure in the FDR Memorial. Imagine the National Gourd appearing at Dulles Airport and at DC (aka Reagan) National Airport. Imagine the National Gourd appearing at Langley, the Pentagon, and the FBI headquarters.

Imagine the National Gourd showing up at Mar-a-Lago in Florida, Trump Tower in New York, and Trump’s Bedminster golf course in New Jersey.

And then imagine the National Gourd showing up at the Great Lakes Naval Station outside of Chicago, to greet the folks Trump is apparently going to send there.

Imagine the National Gourd appearing at federal buildings and offices around the country. Agricultural extension offices, military recruiting centers, federal courthouses, and post offices. Navy bases and Air Force bases and Army bases and Marine bases. National park entrances and IRS buildings and ICE offices.  Imagine a member of the National Gourd showing up at every federal facility in the country.

Call out the National Gourd, and make Trump weep.

This past week, a certain coffee chain released their annual chemical pumpkin-based weapon: the pumpkin spice latte. All around the country, pumpkin-based artillery units are holding their annual “Punkin Chunkin” events (see here or here or here or here for examples), where trebuchets, catapults, and other devices launch pumpkins enormous distances (unless the pumpkin explodes in mid-air, known as “pumpkin pie”). [If you want to see more, google “punkin chunkin”] The world championships used to be broadcast on various television stations, but perhaps the powers that be realized that they were disclosing military secrets and the broadcasts have ceased in recent years. Even so, these are the regular training events for the National Gourd.

And then there’s the Half Moon Bay Art and Pumpkin Festival.

In six weeks, the little town of Half Moon Bay, California, population 11,795, will be transformed from a sleepy little coastal village to become the epicenter of Pumpkinism as around 200,000 folks come to town for their annual Half Moon Bay Art and Pumpkin Festival.

200,000 people line the streets for a grand parade, and it is the pumpkin equivalent of the USSR’s May Day parades in Red Square, where missiles and tanks were paraded before the Soviet Politburo. In Half Moon Bay, the highlight of the parade is the Mother of All Pumpkins, as growers from all over bring their best to Half Moon Bay, hoping to be crowned the biggest and the best. We’re talking pumpkins in excess of 1000 pounds. When I lived in the Bay Area, the Half Moon Bay Pumpkin Festival was an annual pilgrimage.

This is the parade that Trump wanted for his birthday, and never got.

We are approaching peak pumpkin season, and along with all the serious lawsuits and punditry, maybe the National Gourd can help take Trump’s ego down a notch or two. In a publicity contest between the National Guard and the National Gourd, I’ll bet on the Gourd every day and twice on Sundays. Especially in September and October.

Oh, and while we’re chatting . . .

Like many such events, the Half Moon Bay Art and Pumpkin Festival did not happen during COVID. Even so, the festival made their usual contributions to a bunch of local organizations, as if the festival had continued as usual. While this kept those groups afloat, it hurt the finances of the festival hard. Last April, local media reported that their own sustainability was in jeopardy. This is an amazing local festival, and if you are so inclined, you can help them out here.

Seriously. This is an incredible event, and they can use all the help they can get.

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Happy Flying This Weekend – Who Needs All Those Meteorologists?

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National Airspace System regional air traffic control hubs

From the GAO yesterday, via Government Executive:

National Weather Service meteorologists who assist air traffic controllers are working overtime, skipping leave and taking on more responsibilities due to worsening staff shortages, according to a Government Accountability Office report published Thursday, which criticized the Federal Aviation Administration for not doing enough in response to the problem.

“Not having identified and addressed the risks of the current staffing levels is concerning given the potential safety effects if aviation meteorologists are overworked and the quality of their services to air traffic controllers is diminished,” investigators wrote.

Well *that* doesn’t sound good. What exactly do they mean by “diminished”?

As of June, NWS said the aviation meteorologist workforce is down to 69 employees, partly as a result of the federal hiring freeze and separation incentive programs like deferred resignation. FAA and NWS in February agreed to a cap of 81 full-time equivalents for such positions. (In 2024, prior to the agreement, the report said that the FAA was pushing to lower that number to 71.)

Under a 2016 interagency agreement between FAA and NWS, there are supposed to be three meteorologists and one meteorologist in charge at each of the 21 air route traffic control centers across the U.S. But that is not achievable under the February agreement.

GAO reported that the control center in Oakland, Calif., is down to one meteorologist, another four centers have only two such employees and five centers don’t have a meteorologist in charge.

OK, you’ve got my attention now. I used to live in Oakland and then elsewhere in the East Bay, and this is nuts.

But let’s back up a minute, to make a few things clear. The FAA has facilities in every airport air traffic control tower. These folks handle takeoffs, landings, ground control on the taxiways, and other local issues. These are not the places this report is discussing. The FAA also has 21 regional air traffic control facilities that handle regional air traffic flow (see the map above). These are the facilities that worry the GAO.

Suppose you are flying from Denver to Oakland. When you take off, the Denver tower is in charge. Once you reach a certain altitude/distance from the airport, the pilot switches over to the Denver regional National Airspace System [NAS] hub for instructions and guidance. As you fly west, the Denver hub passes control to the Salt Lake City hub, and eventually to the Oakland regional hub. Finally, as you approach the Oakland airport, the pilot contacts the Oakland airport control tower for the final approach and landing.

Each of these regional NAS hubs, in the course of handling traffic issues, pays a lot of attention to the weather. Ever hit turbulence or storms? The meteorologists can predict where they are likely to appear, and (depending on severity) the NAS controllers then can either warn the pilots to expect minor turbulence in a particular area, or route the flights around that area if it is deemed severe.

So let’s go back to that Denver to Oakland flight.

The Rocky Mountains can create a *lot* of turbulence. Especially in the summer. Like during the Labor Day weekend. As you fly west, you come to other smaller but similar areas, like the Sierra Nevada mountain range in California and ultimately the hills and mountains that surround the San Francisco Bay. Complicating things, the SF Bay has three major commercial airports — SF, Oakland, and San Jose — as well as dozens of smaller municipal fields, private corporate airstrips, and military bases. In other words, there is a lot of air traffic in a relatively small area.

And according to the GAO, the Oakland regional air traffic control hub, instead of having four meteorologists, is down to just one.

One.

And it’s not like that one can clock out at 5pm and tell all the planes to tune in to “weather on the 8’s” on the radio or the 5:15 weather report on the KRON evening news to get updates they need.

I’ve had the pleasure of being the pastor to more than a few NWS meteorologists, and they have told me in detail about their love for their work. I’ve rejoiced with them when their severe weather warnings have saved lives, even when a tornado blows a town to bits. Over the last six months, I’ve also grieved with them as they have seen their agency stretched beyond the breaking point. Some of their friends have been let go as “redundant” or “wasteful”, others are fearing that they may be next to get the axe or be forced to relocate themselves and their families, and *everyone* is working far more than is healthy. We’re talking vacations cancelled, days off postponed, and suddenly having to work a double shift.

And it’s been like this for half a year, with no end in sight.

From the GAO report:

The NAS [National Airspace System] is currently under tremendous strain as air traffic controller shortages and periodic equipment failures in aging air traffic control systems have been leading to delayed and canceled flights. We and others have reported on these challenges, and we currently have ongoing work in these areas.11 Severe weather can exacerbate such strains on the NAS as FAA reports that weather is the leading cause of cancellations and delays.12 Multiple stressors on the NAS can lead to compounded adverse conditions for passengers. For example, the widespread delays and cancellations Southwest Airlines experienced in December 2022 began with weather problems that were compounded by carrier system failures.13

The purpose of this report is to inform you and Congress about another stressor on the NAS—concerns about aviation meteorologist staffing levels—which we identified in our ongoing work on aviation operational preparedness.14 These meteorologists work directly with air traffic controllers in the command center and en route centers, providing face-to-face briefings as necessary, and helping them safely direct flights to avoid severe weather. We recognize that determining the appropriate weather forecasting resources to effectively support the safe and efficient operation of the NAS may take time to examine in depth. However, given the urgency of the issues, and that the interagency agreement is scheduled to expire in September 2025, we are sharing this information with you now.

This report from the GAO is a flashing red light, a bone-chilling siren, trying to get the attention of people with the power to change things. I only hope it works.

Given that we’re talking about a government headed by a guy who thinks he is smarter than all the meteorologists at the National Hurricane Center and the NWS, and can predict the path of hurricanes simply by using his sharpie, I am not confident things will change at all.

Here’s hoping the worst the flying public has to deal with this weekend are baggage problems and seats with cramped leg room.

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CDC Shooting 2.0 – It’s Coming from Inside the House

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Centers For Disease Control and Prevention

I feel like I’m watching a bad sequel to a scary movie from 20 years ago.

Back in 2004, Dick Cheney and the Bush White House were desperate to get the Department of Justice to sign off on an extension to an NSA warrantless wiretapping program. Complicating matters was the fact that AG Ashcroft was in the ICU at George Washington University Hospital and had designated Deputy AG Jim Comey to be the acting AG while he was incapacitated.

And make no mistake: Ashcroft *was* incapacitated. In broad strokes, no one just hangs out in an ICU – you’re there because you are in bad shape and need constant observation and often constant medications/treatments. Most conversations that happen in an ICU are between the staff and the family, and less so with the patient, because the patient is less-than-competent because of their condition, their medications, or both.

Comey was known by the WH to be opposed to extending this program, so the WH tried an end round to induce Ashcroft to sign the relevant documents without Comey’s knowledge. Before Alberto Gonzales (WH Counsel) and Andy Card (WH Chief of Staff) could get to the hospital, word reached Comey of what was up. Bart Gellman described it like this in his book Angler: The Cheney Vice Presidency as excerpted in the WaPo:

In early evening, the phone rang at the makeshift FBI command center at George Washington University Medical Center, where Ashcroft remained in intensive care. According to two officials who saw the FBI logs, the president was on the line. Bush told the ailing Cabinet chief to expect a visit from Gonzales and White House Chief of Staff Andrew H. Card Jr…..

Alerted by Ashcroft’s chief of staff, Comey, Goldsmith and FBI Director Robert S. Mueller III raced toward the hospital, abandoning double-parked vehicles and running up a stairwell as fast as their legs could pump.

Comey reached Ashcroft’s bedside first. Goldsmith and his colleague Patrick F. Philbin were close behind. Now came Card and Gonzales, holding an envelope. If Comey would not sign the papers, maybe Ashcroft would….

Unexpectedly, Ashcroft roused himself. Previous accounts have said he backed his deputy. He did far more than that. Ashcroft told the president’s men he never should have certified the program in the first place.

When everyone left the hospital, Comey, Mueller, and other DOJ folks began writing letters of resignation. Again, from Gellman:

All hell was breaking loose at Justice. Lawyers streamed back from the suburbs, converging on the fourth-floor conference room. Most of them were not cleared to hear the details, but a decision began to coalesce: If Comey quit, none of them were staying.

At the FBI, they called Mueller “Bobby Three Sticks,” playfully tweaking the Roman numerals in his fancy Philadelphia name. Late that evening, word began to spread. It wasn’t only Comey. Bobby Three Sticks was getting ready to turn in his badge.

Justice had filled its top ranks with political loyalists. They hoped to see Bush reelected. Had anyone explained to the president what was at stake?

Whelan pulled out his BlackBerry. He fired off a message to White House staff secretary Brett Kavanaugh, a friend whose position gave him direct access to Bush.

“I knew zilch about what the matter was, but I did know that lots of senior DOJ folks were on the verge of resigning,” Whelan said in an e-mail, declining to discuss the subject further. “I thought it important to make sure that the president was aware of that situation so that he could factor it in as he saw fit.”

Kavanaugh had no more idea than Whelan, but he passed word to Card.

The timing was opportune. Just about then, around 11 p.m., Comey responded to an angry summons from the president’s chief of staff. Whatever Card was planning to say, he had calmed down suddenly.

When faced with mass resignations from high-ranking DOJ officials who stubbornly refused to adjust their principles with respect to the law to fit the preferred WH policy, the WH backed down. Marcy has a big timeline (of course!) of all the stuff around the warrantless wiretapping program memos if you want to dig into the weeds of yester-year.

But I’ll be damned if what’s coming out of the CDC right now doesn’t sound *exactly* like what happened 20 years ago.

Susan Monarez, the CDC director, refuses to change her mind, not on a matter of policy but on a principle of adherence to science. After some back and forth, including various lawyers, it appears the WH has terminated her and named RFK’s deputy as the acting CDC Director. Meanwhile, a raft of Monarez’s very senior deputies submitted their resignations in order to stand with her. Hundreds of other CDC staffers are rallying outside to support their bosses.

This horror movie is magnitudes worse than the Hospital Confrontation of the Bush era, because if RFK Jr. and Trump prevail in this, CDC policies will change in ways that will cost people’s lives. Medical science will take a back seat to political expediency and pseudo-scientific quackery. What once was the organization that set the worldwide standard for a national Public Health agency is fast becoming not a joke but an actual danger to public health. The end result will be deaths – unnecessary yet inevitable deaths – and these CDC officials who resigned want no part of it.

RFK Jr. is no Dick Cheney, and Trump is no George W. Bush. Cheney and Bush recognized when they were outflanked, and so backed up and tried to find another way to do what they wanted to do. RFK Jr. and Trump, on the other hand, are the guys who charge loudly into the doctor’s office and won’t leave until they get an antibiotic to deal with a viral infection. Antibiotics do *not* work on a virus, no matter how loudly you shout, how many quacks you cite, or what your job title is.

A gunman shot up the CDC headquarters a few weeks ago from outside the gates and guards. But like any good horror movie, Trump and RFK Jr. are shooting it up from inside the house.

God help us all.

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John Bolton and the MIHOP Gambit

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[NB: check the byline, thanks. /~Rayne]

Let me throw a minority report opinion at you, based on this video, first released on YouTube two days before the FBI served a dawn warrant on John Bolton’s home:

I doubt former National Security Adviser John Bolton expressed any new personal opinions in the video above with regard to Putin and Russia.

Bolton’s general opinion about Trump’s transactional approach to international relations certainly isn’t new.

But Bolton spent more than 12 minutes airing out his opinions on Trump’s handling of Russia, Ukraine, India-Pakistan, and tariffs.

He also shared his opinion that Trump’s so-called “list of accomplishments” is Trump trying to accrue to obtain a Nobel Peace Prize.

Trump’s handling of the India-Pakistan conflict in May earned an ego-fluffing nomination for a Nobel from Pakistan in June.

US support of Israel’s bombing of Iran in July, supported by Bolton, makes the nomination a joke as does continuing US support of Netanyahu’s genocidal handling of Gaza.

These conflicting approaches to international relations may pose leverage for Putin to pressure Trump on Ukraine, using Trump’s narcissistic desire for a Nobel Peace Prize — a prize former president Jimmy Carter, vice president Al Gore, and the first Black American president Barack Obama have been awarded. Bolton doesn’t make this point but he does say Putin is manipulating Trump.

Bolton’s criticism of Trump isn’t limited to the video above, or his remarks in his 2020 book, In The Room Where It Happened. Bolton has been interviewed by many outlets here and abroad during which his criticisms are laid out and only growing as Trump continues to flog his erratic and transactional foreign policies. Here are a sampling of interviews with Bolton:

John Bolton, whom Trump described as “a very dumb guy”, is worried about Taiwan
60 Minutes Australia, May 4, 2025

Putin Will ‘Take Advantage’ Of Trump Meeting: Fmr. Nat’l. Security Adviser John Bolton
NewsNation via The Hill, August 8, 2025

Trump is in rush to get deal done: John Bolton on Russia-Ukraine talks
Elizabeth Vargas Reports, NewsNation, August 18, 2025

‘Sanctions Don’t Prohibit What India Did’: Ex-Trump NSA John Bolton On U.S. Tariffs On India
Hindustan Times, August 21, 2025

In this excerpt from the Hindustan Times interview above:

10:34 [MATTOO] You know Ambassador Bolton, if I could bring you back to that question of trust uh moving forward in uh the partnership with America. Lots of commentators over the years in India have been skeptical about the relationship with the United States. They’re saying that look this is a country that fundamentally has a lot more leverage than we do. That’s the question you know do you have the cards and the the sense that there is in India is that yes America is willing now to use its leverage in a way that is coercive, is extremely transactional, uh, and is in some ways brutal.

And you’ve seen President Trump speak very appre, in a very appreciatory tone about tariffs, saying that we’re willing to use it time and again for our foreign policy instruments. There’s a sense that defense technology could be something that America uses as well. And for example, our fighter jet uh something like General Electric fighter jet engines which India is co-developing with the United States to use for our fighter jets is something that India took a significant leap of trust in the United States to develop that partnership uh after years and years as you might be familiar with of suspicion about Washington.

What do you think what has happened over the last couple of weeks does to trust in the relationship? And if you’re speaking to an Indian audience as you are now, how do you pitch to them that the American relationship is one that they should still rely on, should still work on, should still continue to develop?

11:45 [BOLTON] Well, unfortunately, what Trump has done on the tariffs generally uh is destroy uh decades of effort with India, but with a lot of other countries as well uh to build up good faith and trust and reliance on the United States and uh it will take time to repair that. That’s that’s the unfortunate reality. But but here’s where I think it’s important to understand that Trump is aberrational. I don’t know anybody else uh Republican or Democrat who ran for president, let’s just say in 2024, who if elected would behave anything like this. Trump’s doing a lot of things domestically in the United States that are cause for great concern for us as well. And I don’t know any other candidate from 2024 who would do that.

12:30 [BOLTON] Uh, Trump doesn’t have a philosophy. Uh so I think ultimately there’s no legacy for him to leave to his successors, whoever they might be. Uh and I believe that the uh the uh the the force of his personality inhibits a lot of people from speaking up, but that doesn’t mean they agree with what he’s doing. That’s very unfortunate in my view.

12:52 [BOLTON] But I think the uh the the the true strategic sense here uh particularly for a country like India with its assets and capabilities and uh and threats that it faces right on its own border uh is is just to take a deep breath and remember that the world’s going to last longer than the next three and a half years. And uh it’s not pleasant to go through this. I’m not not going to try and persuade anybody of that. But uh but our objective should be to keep the damage to the relationship uh at a minimum uh and then to think about how to repair it as quickly as we can thereafter because I think that when Trump walks off the stage uh he will take almost uh the bulk of this history with him.

(emphasis mine)

Bolton calls Trump “aberrational” or an “aberration,” but this is not the only time Bolton has done so. He did so in June 2020 when interviewed by ABC News, in an interview for NPR in August 2023, in March this year in a tweet from his own Xitter account, and in the India Today video (11:52) featured above.

While criticizing Trump and his foreign policy (or lack thereof), Bolton makes a point of calling Trump an aberration so often through so many media outlets that it seems like a campaign slogan.

In the Hindustan Times Bolton also noted Trump’s repression of free speech critical of his geopolitics. Bolton had to know that he would face more aggressive tactics by the Trump administration to squelch his criticism.

But what if this was the point? To egg Trump on with repeated critical comments Bolton knew from experience would hit a nerve with Trump, to goad him into attacking Bolton?

What if Bolton made it — the investigation into him including the raid on his home yesterday — happen on purpose? In other words, a MIHOP gambit?

If so, what are the next moves by Bolton and Trump?

~ ~ ~

During the February 5, 2020 hearing before the House Committee on the Judiciary, there were a couple questions asked of then-FBI Director Chris Wray mentioning John Bolton by name. First, committee chair Rep. Jerry Nadler (D, NY-12):

Chair Nadler. Okay. Now, recent reporting suggests that the
President plans to seek payback against those individuals he
believes crossed him during the impeachment proceedings. I am
sorry to have to ask. Has the President, the Attorney General,
or any other Administration official asked the FBI to open an
investigation into Joe Biden, Hunter Biden, John Bolton, or any
Member of Congress?
Mr. Wray. Mr. Chair, I have assured the Congress and I can
assure the Congress today that the FBI will only open
investigations based on the facts, law, and proper predication.
Chair Nadler. I understand that, and I assume that it is
correct that neither the President, the Attorney General, or
any other Administration official has asked the FBI to open
improper political investigations?
Mr. Wray. No one has asked me to open an investigation
based on anything other than the facts, law, and proper
predication.

Later in the hearing, Rep. Joe Neguse (D, CO-02):

I want to give you an opportunity to clarify earlier part
of your testimony. The Chair had asked a question, and I think
there was some confusion around your answer. So, with respect
to a recent article that alleges that the Administration may be
attempting to initiate political investigations or politically
motivated investigations, rather, into their political
opponents, has the President, the Attorney General, or any
Member of the Administration asked you to initiate an
investigation into John Bolton?
I am not asking whether or not that request would be
improper or proper or whether or not if such a request was
made, if you have initiated such an investigation. I am simply
asking if they have asked you to do so.
Mr. Wray. I understand why you’re asking the question, and
I would just tell you my commitment to doing things by the book
includes not talking about whether any particular investigation
does or does not exist. You shouldn’t read anything into that.
That’s not a hint that anything is happening. It’s just I don’t
think that’s a question that I can responsibly answer if I’m
going to be faithful to my commitment to doing things by the
book.
Mr. Neguse. Well, we appreciate–
Mr. Wray. I will tell you, as I said to the Chair–I will
tell you, as I said to the Chair, that no one has asked me to
open any investigation on anything that’s not consistent with
the facts, the law, and proper predication.
Mr. Neguse. I would just say, Director Wray, with all
respect, as you could probably imagine, these questions, both
the question the Chair posed and the question that I posed, are
not academic or esoteric for us. Seven months ago, Special
Counsel Mueller sat in the same chair that you are in, and we
all know now, that the very next day, the President had his
infamous call with the President of Ukraine, in which he sought
foreign interference in our elections. Of course, as you know,
in just a few hours, the Senate will render judgment in the
impeachment trial of the President.
So, one can ask reasonable questions as we read these
reports that we just over the course of the last few days as to
potentially what other actions this Administration might take.
So, again, I appreciate your earlier answer, and I want to move
on to a different topic, which is election interference.
There was an article just a few weeks ago in the New York
Times, and I would ask for unanimous consent to enter it into
the record. “ `Chaos Is the Point’: Russian Hackers and Trolls
Grow Stealthier in 2020,” by Matthew Rosenberg, Nicole
Perlroth, and David Sanger of the New York Times.
[The information follows:]

MR. NEGUSE FOR THE RECORD

==========================================
[GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

Mr. Neguse. In the article, there are a couple of
references to new developments in terms of the way in which
Russian actors, the intelligence apparatus is engaging in
disinformation in attempted interference in our elections. I
wonder if you could comment about two in particular? I will
just quote.

“One of the two Russian intelligence units that hacked
into Democrats in 2016, `Fancy Bear,’ has shifted some
of its work to servers based in the United States in an
apparent attempt to thwart the NSA, which is limited to
operating abroad. Also, the trolls at the Internet
Research Agency are trying to exploit a hole in
Facebook’s ban on foreigners buying political ads,
paying American users to hand over personal pages and
setting up offshore bank accounts to cover their
financial tracks.”

I wonder if you could expand in greater detail on both of
those two issues and how the FBI, I guess, is addressing both
of those developments.
Mr. Wray. So, certainly, I appreciate the interest. I think
I’d have to be pretty careful about how much detail I could
provide in an open hearing. I would say that we believe–we
assessed that the Russians continue to engage in malign foreign
influence efforts of the sort that I was describing before–
fake personas, trolls, bots, state-sponsored media, the whole
gamut in the bag of tricks.
We also assessed that just like any sophisticated actor,
that they continue to refine their approach. We saw that from
2016-2018. We’ve seen it from 2018 moving forward. Happily,
we’re refining our approach, too, and we’re trying to stay
ahead of it.

(emphasis mine)

In 2020, during Trump’s first administration, neither the Trump DOJ nor the Democratic Party-led House launched investigations into John Bolton as Trump’s NSA, and in the FBI’s case, did not launch an investigation based on politics into Bolton.

Trump has now overseen a massive purge of intelligence and security personnel, many of whom share one or two things in common: they were involved in investigations in which Trump was a central figure, or they were involved in investigations related to Russia.

How will the Trump administration justify investigating Bolton now when his first administration didn’t appear to have done so? What’s Team Trump’s next move? What about Bolton’s?

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Flying Spaghetti Monster = Trump’s Effort to Evade Epstein Files Scandal

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[NB: check the byline, thanks. /~Rayne]

For more than a week I have been watching Google Trends as Trump flings more and more spaghetti at the wall to find something that sticks.

Something with enough adhesion and coverage to hide his failure to produce the Epstein files, a kind of flying spaghetti monster more real than the snarky faux deity — sticky strands like the flip-floppery on tariffs, the unwarranted and unlawful occupation of Washington DC by National Guard, the embarrassing meeting with Putin on US soil.

US media has been helping Trump by allowing itself to be sucked into the noodly vortex with outrage du jour.

Yes, there’s a lot of outrage, and US media has failed to cover it in a way that conveys the depth of outrage. But they also allowed themselves to be led wholly off course by a convicted felon who is a serial liar and a serial business failure.

The one thing Trump has been consistently successful at in his lifetime: leading the media away from his failures.

Australia’s 60 Minutes did what CBS’ 60 Minutes in the US wouldn’t do. It stayed on course and covered the Epstein files scandal with this video aired August 17.

Meanwhile, Google Trends reflects Trump’s success steering US media and their consumers away from the gaping black hole that is the Epstein files Trump promised his base.

Google Trends, August 11, 2025 – search terms Jeffrey Epstein, Ghislaine Maxwell, tariffs, Russia

Google Trends, August 19, 2025 – search terms Jeffrey Epstein, Ghislaine Maxwell, tariffs, Russia

We cannot accept a Manchurian candidate run by Putin. We cannot accept the occupation of our cities at the Manchurian candidate’s orders.

But we absolutely cannot allow this Manchurian candidate to continue to throw tons of pasta to obscure his role in a human trafficking conspiracy.

Yes, his role, because he’s actively hiding the files by way of his proxies at DOJ, while allowing Ghislaine Maxwell privileges she should not have in the form of better detention conditions not permitted to sex offenders.

The conspiracy continues even after Jeffrey Epstein’s death; the victims are no closer to getting explanations about the human trafficking network in which Epstein and Maxwell operated, and the public including Trump’s base have been denied the files Trump promised as part of his campaign.

Press your members of Congress to get the files released. Press media outlets to stop being part of the conspiracy by inaction and to stay on the Epstein files. Don’t get buried under the flying spaghetti. Don’t let up.

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The Republican Hundred Year War On Democracy

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Our democracy is under attack, in a war planned and carried out by generations of filthy rich tight-wingers working primarily through the Republican Party. The war has come into the open under Trump, funded by the latest group of hideously rich dirtbags, the tech bros, and justified by a cadre of anti-intellectual grifters and yakkers like Curtis Yarvin.

We need to see the battlefield. Only then can we decide on how to act. As Marcy pointed out here, our role is explicitly political, as befits people who believe in democracy to our core.

The Battlefield

Introduction

The filthy rich have always held more power in this country than their numbers would support in a functioning democracy. Their control was somewhat restricted during the Progressive Era at the beginning of the 20th C., but SCOTUS did it’s best to beat back progressive laws. The political power of the filthy rich was sharply decreased during the Great Depression. Franklin Delano Roosevelt said this out loud in a 1936 speech in Madison Square Garden:

We had to struggle with the old enemies of peace—business and financial monopoly, speculation, reckless banking, class antagonism, sectionalism, war profiteering.

They had begun to consider the Government of the United States as a mere appendage to their own affairs. We know now that Government by organized money is just as dangerous as Government by organized mob.

Never before in all our history have these forces been so united against one candidate as they stand today. They are unanimous in their hate for me—and I welcome their hatred.

The filthy rich hated FDR, and have spent nearly 100 years trying to destroy his legacy and our way of life. Generations of oligarchs arise over time in different sectors of the economy, and the wealth they control has increased steadily since then. But regardless of background, a significant number have a attacked every institution we have relied on as part of our heritage.

At the same time they have ruthlessly pursued their own interests without regard to the national interest.We know some names, like H.L. Hunt and other Texas Oilmen, and the Koch Brothers, and groups like the John Birch Society. We generally know about other threats, like the Christian Dominionists and White Nationalists.

The Republicans took over congress in 1946. One of their first acts was to pass the Taft-Hartley Act which was intended to undercut the power of organized labor. They continued a long tradition of\ anti-communism and anti-socialism. The Democrats responded by kicking out the Communists, many of whom were active in unions, and with the Civil Rights movement. The Democratic Party tradition of punching left has deep roots.

Trump and his henchmen are the culmination of this campaign. They are openly engaged in a war on every institution that wields power in our society and in or through our government. The success of a decades-long assault reveals the effect of that long-term guerrilla war by the Republicans.

Congress

Republican congressionals are weaklings. This has been a fixture of that party since the mid-90s. Newt Gingrich preached lock-step Republican voting, and Denny Hastert created the Hastert Rule, under which no legislation gets to the floor unless it can pass with only Republican votes.

Mitch McConnell made it his job to make sure that Obama couldn’t pass any legislation. He whipped Republican Senators so viciously they did his bidding. In his first term Trump violently assaulted Republicans who defied his orders. The party internalized fear so completely that it attacked its own members who voted to impeach Trump.

Now Trump simply ignores laws he doesn’t like, including spending laws, and arrests Democratic lawmakers on groundless charges.

The Administrative State

Under FDR, Congress began to empower agencies to carry out specific tasks necessary for a modern government. This gave rise to the administrative state. Republicans hate it. Ever since its inception, they and corporate Democrats have worked to hamstring  agencies.

Conservative legal academics expanded the use of originalism, and created a bullshit  originalist rationale explaining why our 250 year old Constitution doesn’t allow any significant power to agencies. This resulted in SCOTUS decisions on purely partisan grounds over the last few decades that protect the filthy rich and harm normal people. The number of delay and choke points is so great that our nation is drenched in chemicals known to be toxic, and thousands of others whose toxicity, especially in combinations, is unknown.

Trump attacked the entire structure with his firings, closures, and illegal withholding of funds. District Courts tried to stop it, but the SCOTUS anti-democracy majority has dithered or rejected their decisions. Republicans refuse to push back, even to support cancer research, surely a non-partisan issue.

Trump put incompetent people in charge of all agencies and departments. They were confirmed by the Senate, often with (unnecessary) Democratic support. RFK, Jr? Whiskey Pete Hegseth? Linda McMahon? Republicans allowed Elon Musk and a small flock of ignorant coders to terminate critical programs. Without agencies, our ability to govern ourselves is wrecked.

The Judiciary

The attacks on the judiciary began after Brown v. Board. Impeach Earl Warren, screamed billboards all over the South. But it took off under Ronald Reagan, who appointed a host of ideologues to the bench, leading to his failed effort to put the loathsome Robert Bork on SCOTUS.

Republicans responded to the rejection of Bork by pushing even harder to put right-wing ideologues on the bench. George Bush the worst stopped listening to the centrist ABA on judicial nominations. Trump handed judicial nominations to the Federalist Society and to Leo Leonard. McConnell made sure Democrats couldn’t appoint people to SCOTUS. Then Trump appointed a crank, a frat boy, and an dithering academic, none of whom have evidenced any core principles other than obeisance to Trump’s dictates.

The Fifth Circuit is full of nutcases and fools, among whom I single out the odious Matthew Kacsmaryk. The Fifth Circuit refused to rid itself of single-judge districts, and ignores judge-shopping, making this lawless nutcase the most powerful judge in the country.

Then in Trump v. US . John Roberts  crowned Trump king of the nation, and implicitly approved everything Trump and his henchmen have done. See, for example, the ridiculous order allowing Stephen Miller to export human beings to terrorist nations, issued without explanation, and without a full hearing. Roberts can only be compared to Roger Taney.

States

The federal system gives states a central role in assuring the health, safety, and welfare of their citizens. Historically Republicans used what they called states rights to stop federal efforts to enforce the 14th Amendment. They were generally unwilling to attack state action in significant ways. Trump has started this assault on his own.

He hit states whose policies he doesn’t like by cancelling grants, by senseless litigation, and by sending in the National Guard, the Marines and ICE thugs. One of his earliest acts was to file a lawsuit against Illinois, Cook County, and Chicago, alleging that it’s unconstitutional for us to limit the cooperation of local law enforcement with ICE thugs. In other words, we have to use our own resources to fill Stephen Miller’s gulags.

Trump demanded the Republicans pass laws, including the Big Bill, that will harm Blue states. He helps Red States damaged by his tariffs. He attacks states who don’t force colleges and universities to follow his anti-DEI policies, meaning erasing not-White people from history and higher education.

Private Institutions

The Republican war on higher education began with Ronald Reagan’s attacks on California colleges and universities. The attack was two-pronged. He packed the boards of these institutions with Republican loyalists, a philistine group who demanded focus on job training at the expense of education. Public support was reduced dramatically, forcing the system to increase tuition. This led to a massive increase in student loans, and to debt servitude for millions of people.

This two-pronged attack was immediately followed by other states, partly out of spite (Republicans) and partly on financial grounds (centrist Democrats). Republicans, ever the victims, claimed that universities were liberal and quashed conservative viewpoints, whatever those might be. The screaming got louder, and Trump used it to attack higher education a bit in his first term. All this was fomented and paid for by filthy rich monsters and justified by liars.

In his second term Trump directly attacked Harvard and Columbia on utterly specious grounds. He has made life miserable for foreign students studying here on visas, a deranged policy with no benefits to our nation. He has cut off federal support for basic research, the foundation of US leadership in most sciences and most technologies.

The Republican attack on law firms was focused on trial lawyers, a group that fought to protect working people from the depredations of pig-rich corporations. For the rest, the damage was largely self-inflicted. Firms grew to gargantuan size, taking in tens of millions of dollars. To keep that flow of money they surrendered professionalism and became servants of the filthy rich. When I started practicing law, we were bound by the Model Code of Professional Responsibility. The current weakened version of that ethical code is called the Model Code of Professional Conduct. Lawyers relieved themselves of all responsibility to society and the rule of law.

When Trump attacked, many of these behemoths were unprepared to act responsibly, and cravenly kissed the ring.

The attacks on private enterprise are smaller in scope. Primarily Trump seeks to force corporations to dismantle DEI programs, terminate support for LGBT initiatives and outreach, and similar matters. The media have self-policed rather than confront the craziness, a task made easier by their financial weakness.

What is to be done

The battlefield is enormous. Sometimes it seems overwhelming. None of us can deal with all of it. But each of us can deal with some of it. There are a lot more of us than there are of them. When we mass up on any front, we will have an impact.

I go to #TeslaTakedown. Hurting Musk is an indirect attack on Trump, and serves as a warning to the other Tech Bros. We have to keep that going.

Many of us are alumni of colleges under attack. I don’t give money to Notre Dame, even though my education there was sterling. I should have written a letter explaining why I would never contribute again, and why I removed a bequest from my will.

We can’t avoid all collaborating corporations entirely, but my family stopped using Target and cancelled our New York Times subscription. We can all redirect our spending. And then we can write letters saying we did it because they hurt our fellow citizens. Or even something fiercer.

Given the economic chaos and uncertainty, cutting spending, and front-end loading our spending, seem like sensible plans. We can point this out to others in our families and among our friends. As an example, Trump plans to increase tariffs on computers, or does he? Buy now and prepare to live with it for a few years.

Harvard and other major research universities have enormous endowments. They could open branches in Berlin, Paris, Guangzhou, Mumbai, Accra and anywhere they can find brilliant grad students. They can send their own professors, their own lab teams, and their own know-how out of a nation suddenly devoted to stupidity.

Law firms can announce plans to provide pro bono representation to people kidnapped by ICE thugs. Corporations can browbeat the Republican pols they have put in place, demanding sane economic and immigration policies. We can demand that they do so.

Conclusion

Notes: I wrote this from memory with a minimum of fact-checking. Corrections and additions welcome.

Someone should write a book about this war. Is there one I don’t know about?

Finally: In War and Peace, Leo Tolstoy says that Napoleon was successful because he and his subordinates were able to concentrate their forces against the weakest segment of the enemy battle line. He tried to hold a large reserve to send against that weak point. That seems like a good strategy. Trump and the Republicans have spread themselves out over a gigantic battlefield. Let’s try Napoleon’s strategy.
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Featured image is a map of the Battle of Austerlitz won by Napoleon.

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Without a Doubt, Worse than Nixon

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[NB: check the byline, thanks. /~Rayne]

On March 18, 1969, the U.S. military launched a secret program authorized by then-president Richard Nixon. Code named Operation Menu, the U.S. bombed targets in Cambodia until May 26, 1970.

The program was never authorized by Congress; information about the bombings were withheld from both Congress and the American public.

It was a gross abuse of executive power and the basis for drafting an Article of Impeachment against Nixon. The article did not receive adequate support in Congress because a number of members of Congress felt they had not done enough to restrain Nixon with regard to the Vietnam War, and public opinion had not yet shifted firmly against Nixon because of the Watergate scandal.

Three of six Articles of Impeachment did receive approval, however; the unauthorized bombing of Cambodia emphasized the abuses of power delineated in the approved articles.

Fortunately for Nixon, Republican members of Congress took him aside and told him they had the votes to impeach and remove him if he didn’t resign. Nixon resigned on August 9, 1974, avoiding hearings and heightened scrutiny of his abuses of his office.

Donald Trump authorized the bombing of Iran. His secretary of defense did not restrain him by requiring an Authorization for Use of Military Force. Neither of them made much effort to keep the mission secret as it launched Saturday as Trump posted about it to his personal Truth Social account.

Congress was not informed of the operation in order to debate an AUMF. Congress received testimony from Trump’s director of national intelligence Tulsi Gabbard on March 25 in front of the Senate Intelligence Committee, in which she said,

… The IC continues to assess that Iran is not building a nuclear weapon and Supreme Leader Khamenei has not authorized the nuclear weapons program that he suspended in 2003. The IC continues to monitor closely if Tehran decides to reauthorize its nuclear weapons program.

In the past year, we have seen an erosion of a decades-long taboo in Iran on discussing nuclear weapons in public, likely emboldening nuclear weapons advocates within Iran’s decision-making apparatus. Iran’s enriched uranium stockpile is at its highest levels and is unprecedented for a state without nuclear weapons. …

There were exchanges with the media and public between the administration about Gabbard’s statement regarding the enriched uranium stockpile. If the status of that stockpile had changed with a firm move toward arming a weapon occurred, there has been no effort to communicate that with the Senate Intelligence or Armed Services Committees.

The American public was lied to by Trump who announced this past Thursday, “Based on the fact that there’s a substantial chance of negotiations that may or may not take place with Iran in the near future, I will make my decision whether or not to go within the next two weeks.”

Trump waffled publicly about U.S. military action against Iran, saying, ““You don’t know that I’m going to even do it,” Trump told one reporter. “I may do it. I may not do it. Nobody knows what I’m going to do. … “ I have ideas as to what to do, but I haven’t made a final [call] … I like to make a final decision one second before it’s due, you know?”

Trump failed to request approval from Congress before making that final call some time between Thursday and Saturday.

It’s possible the call had already been made and Trump’s apparent indecision was a head fake. An analyst with Haaretz seemed to think this was a possible strategy. EDIT: The Atlantic published an article at 12:29 a.m. ET Sunday in which they reported Trump had already decided to bomb Iran on Wednesday, before his public statement about a two-week window of decision.

Head fake or no, Trump violated the Constitution’s Article I, Section 8 which grants Congress the power to declare war. It is not a power granted to the executive who “shall take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed” under Article II, Section 3.

Trump has already repeatedly failed under the Take Care clause. This first strike against Iran conducted without Congressional approval should be a road too far.

The blowback from this may be enormous, beginning with global economic effects due to instability in the fossil fuels market and may include terrorist or overt military strikes against U.S. targets, perhaps by way of surrogate networks Gabbard also testified about on March 25.

Trump is without a doubt worse than Nixon. He should be impeached — again, yes — and this time removed from office.

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No Kings Rally After Action Report

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I went to the No Kings Rally at the Daley Plaza in downtown Chicago today, with friends and family. The weather was pleasant, temperatures in the upper 60s and hazy, turning mostly sunny. My younger grandchild lasted nearly an hour, in large part because a kind person handed him a red, white, and blue pinwheel. Most of our party left at this point, except my daughter.

We couldn’t hear the speeches, the chanting was too loud. Eventually the crowd started marching. Apparently a large part went north several blocks to the Chicago River where they saluted the Trump Tower with shouts and hand signals. They eventually turned down Michigan Avenue.

We went with another enormous group headed south for several blocks before turning back towards the Lake and then north. At this point, I was slowing down, and my daughter saved me from myself. We walked to Michigan Avenue, where we saw the lead marchers moving south. So we ate lunch outdoors and watched for 40 minutes as the group moved south, chanting and whooping.

When we finished lunch they were going strong, so we went back to the march and did another eight blocks before it petered out. The Red Line was jammed to the doors. As we exited the station, a guy asked if the march was peaceful. It sure was. Huge and peaceful.

Shout-out to the police, who did a good job of coping with what I think was a much larger crowd than they or the organizers expected. Another shout-out to all the people inconvenienced by the enormous crowd, many whom honked and shouted their support, and not one of whom offered suggestions about my life choices.

Lots of great signs. One I liked: No Kings Only Prince with a photo of the musical genius. Another great thing, after we got back, we watched Trump morosely watching his wretched parade in wretched weather.

What did you see and do? Any memorable signs?

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Photo by Artemisia

 

 

 

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Despite Pete Hegseth, Signal is Good

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Why you should use Signal (But maybe ditch Whatsapp?)

Pete Hegseth is Bad at His Job

The Secretary of Defense and Fox Host Pete Hegseth keeps using Signal to talk about war plans with people he’s not supposed to be talking with at his day job. He also gets caught, because he’s bad at security as well as his job. Hegseth uses his personal phone for Department of Defence business, including killing a lot Yemenis.

What Hegseth was supposed to use instead of his consumer cell phone is a SCIF, or Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility. I’ve been in one. I was emphatically invited to leave my phone at the door. There were large men making this point to me, and I took it to heart. A SCIF is secure, but it is as much about control and legal obligations as it is about security, and rightfully so. Secure communications for a national government don’t just require security, they require accountability, integrity, and a durable record. After its classification period, that information belongs to all Americans. Historical accountability is something we’ve decided matters, and encoded into our laws.

On a technical level I wouldn’t be shocked if SCIFs use some of the same technology that’s in Signal to secure communications. It’s good stuff! But SCIFs are SCIFs, and consumer cell phones are cell phones. Your phone is not designed for government records retention, or hardened against specific nation-state threats. But modern, up-to-date phones have very good security, more hardened then most of the government systems that have ever existed. And it’s right there! In your phone without you having to do anything to get it! (Except apply new software updates when they turn up.)

So despite the fact that Hegseth’s phone would be one of the more targeted in the world, and Hegseth himself is an idiot, his phone isn’t necessarily compromised. It might be, but it’s hard to be sure. It’s quite hard to hack a modern phone, especially if the person using the phone updates it every time there’s an update released, and doesn’t click on things they don’t know are OK. There are fancy attacks, called Zero-Click Attacks, that don’t require any user interaction, but they’re hard to build and expensive.

At any given moment, you don’t know whether someone had a working attack against an up-to-date iPhone or Android until it’s discovered and patched. But mostly, the average user doesn’t have to worry about trying to secure their phone. You already secure your phone when you update it. The hackers aren’t in a race with you, or even Pete Hegseth, they’re in a race with large and well-funded security and design teams at Google and Apple — and those people are very good at their jobs. This is why the nerds (like me) always tell you to update software as soon as possible; these updates often patch security holes you never knew were there.

You’re more likely to download a vulnerability in something like Candy Crush, weird social media apps, or random productivity tools you’re tying out. But the folks at Google and Apple have your back there, too. They’ve put every app into its own software-based “container,” and don’t let apps directly interact with the core functions of your phone, or the other apps on it. Hackers try to break out of these containers, but again, it’s not easy. Even if they get a foothold in one, they might know a lot about how good you are at subway surfing, but not much else.

It’s hard out here for a phone hacker.

Sometimes the hackers hit pay dirt, and find some flaw in phone software that lets them take over the phone from the air, with no user interaction — that zero-Ccick attack. This is very scary, but also very precious for the hackers. Unless there’s a very good reason, no one is going to risk burning that bug on you. If an attack like that is found, it will be top priority for those big smart security teams at Google and Apple. There will be long nights. There will also be an update that fixes it; apply updates as soon as you see them. Once a vulnerability is patched, the malware companies have to go back to the drawing board and look for another bug they can exploit to get their revenue stream back.

The high profile malware companies often sell their software, especially if they have a zero-click attack, to governments and corporations. They don’t want normal people using it, because the more it gets used, the faster they will be back at square one after Google and Apple take their toys away.

Nerd’s Delight

Signal LogoSignal is usually the favorite app your exhausting nerd friend keeps badgering you to download. It’s risen to even more prominence due to Pete Hegseth’s repeated idiocy. But this has caused doubt and confusion, because if you found out what Signal was from Hegseth’s leaks and blunders, it doesn’t look so good. Using Signal for DoD high level communications is not only illegal, it is stupid. Signal isn’t meant for government classified communications.

But it is meant for you, and it’s very good at what it does.

Signal is two things: First, an app for Android and iPhone (with a handy desktop client) which encrypts chats and phone calls. That’s the Signal app you see on your phone. second, the other part is the Signal Protocol, Signal’s system of scrambling communications so that people outside of the chat can’t see or hear anything inside the chat.

Signal Protocol, the encryption system Signal uses, is a technology called a Double Ratchet. It is an amazing approach that is pretty much unbreakable in a practical sense. The very short version of how that encryption works is this: Your computer finds a special number on a curve (think of the pretty graphs in trig class) and combines this number with another number the other person has, from a different spot on another curve. These numbers are used to encrypt the messages in a way that only you both can see them. (This number generation is done by your phone and servers on the net in the background of your chat, and you never have to see any of it.) You each use the numbers from picked out these curves to encrypt a message that only the other person can read. Picking out the number from the curve is easy, but guessing it from the outside is functionally impossible. Any attempt to figure out the points on the curve you used is very hard and tiring — meaning it takes the computer a lot of energy to try. In computers, very hard always translates to expensive and slow. The extra trick in Signal’s double ratchet is a mechanism for taking that already hard number to guess and “ratcheting” it to new hard numbers – with every single message. Every Hi, Whatup, and heart emoji get this powerful encryption. Even if someone was using super computers to break into your chat (and they aren’t) every time they broke the encryption, they’d just get that message, and be back at square one.

That’s expensive, frustrating hard work, and your chats aren’t worth the bother.

The Strongest Link, Weakened?

Messenger also uses the Signal protocol

Whatsapp adopted Signal Protocol in 2014, granting encrypted privacy and safety to over a billion people.

Signal is secure. Whatsapp and Facebook Messenger use Signal protocol too, and are also secure, for now… but Meta has made some decisions that complicate things. In a rush to add AI to everything whether you want it or not, Meta has added AI to its Signal Protocol-secured chat rooms. This doesn’t break the Signal Protocol, that works fine. But to have AI in chats means that by definition, there’s another participant listening in your chat. If there wasn’t, it couldn’t reply with AI things. If you’re not comfortable with this, it might be time to ditch Whatsapp and Facebook Messenger for Signal.

I’m personally not comfortable with it, in part because as far as I can tell, there’s nothing technically or legally stopping law enforcement from demanding access to that listening function in any chat room. It may only give the police access to parts of the conversation, but I’d like the chance to defend my data myself if it comes to it. I don’t want to have it picked up from a third party without so much as notice to me.

Meta is in the the room with you, like it or not. Is it recording all your chats somewhere? I doubt it. It’s a bad idea that would make too much trouble for Meta if it got out. But I can’t know for sure. I know there’s no listener in Signal, because the protocol makes hiding a listener functionally impossible. (To be clear, Meta isn’t hiding it, they’re advertising it. But it’s still a listener.)

Encryption for All

Make no mistake, that Whatsapp and Facebook Messenger use Signal’s protocol is wonderful news. It means that, without having to know anything about internet or computer security, one day there was an update, and billions of users got to rely on some of the best encryption ever designed, without even knowing it. This is important both for keeping people safe online, and for making society better, as activists, small businesses, families, and everyone with and internet connection can talk freely and safely to their people and their communities. It doesn’t stop ill-intentioned people from doing bad and deceptive things like lie, cheat, and steal, but it makes it harder for them to enlist the computers into their schemes.

The problem with Pete Hegseth using Signal is two-fold: He has to retain records legally, and ratcheting encryption is intentionally ephemeral. Signal is the worst way to retain records, beyond perhaps toilet paper and sharpie. The second problem is that if he does have a vulnerable app on his phone, or there’s a general vulnerability the teams at Apple and Google haven’t found yet, someone could be listening into what his phone is doing. Maybe even through his Candy Crush Saga, a fun game you will never find in a SCIF, no matter how much you wish you could.

SCIFs are kind of boring. No phones, the windows are weird (to defeat directional mics) and in my case, I had to have security escort me to the bathroom. I imagine that’s why an exciting guy like Hegseth doesn’t use them. But he is not only putting people in danger with his shenanigans, he’s also robbing the American people of a record that is, by law, our right to have. And it’s looking like an era of American history in which we want to be preserving evidence.

The Online Lives of Others

If you’ve never seen the movie The Lives of Others, go watch it. It’s great, and annoyingly relevant right now.

There is another threat coming from the EU and UK that rears its head every few years, and probably from the US soon enough as well. Many governments and law enforcement agencies want, have wanted for years, a scheme digital rights advocates call Chat Control. Law enforcement would have a back door into everyone’s encryption, usually a listener, like the Meta AI, but much worse. It would bug all chats — a spook in every phone. The excuse is always CSAM, or Child Sexual Abuse Material, but the proposal is always the same – to strip every person of privacy and the technical means to protect it, in the name of protecting children. This ignores a lot of of issues that I won’t go into here, but suffice to say the argument is as dishonest as it is ineffectual.

It’s an ongoing fight pitting children against a right of privacy and personal integrity, and it always will be an ongoing fight, because it would give the police and governments nearly limitless power to spy on the entire populous all the time.

Total digital surveillance is simply not a feasible way to run a society. It is the police state the East German Stasi dreamed of having. It must be resisted for human decency and flourishing. Let’s give the totalitarian desire for a spy in every phone no oxygen, it has no decency, no matter who it claims to be protecting.

Even if you never do anything that could be of interest to governments or law enforcement, using encryption creates more freedom for all. If only “criminals” or “enemies” use Signal, then using Signal becomes a red flag. If everyone uses Signal (or Signal protocol in Whatsapp/Messenger), then it’s normal. You get the measure of protection it provides from scammers and hackers, and you help people fighting criminals and resisting tyranny, all over the world. This is one of the reasons adding Signal protocol to the Meta systems was such a great moment in the history of the net. A good portion of humanity gained a real measure of privacy that day.

If activists and people “with something to hide” are the only people using encryption like Signal, it’s grounds for suspicion. But if everyone is using it, the journalists and activists who need it for political reasons don’t stand out. The battered partners and endangered kids can find it and use it safely to get help. And everyone is safer from scams and hacking attacks — because what you do and say has some of the best protection we’ve every conceived of as a society, even if it’s just your shopping list.

 

Correction: A previous version of this article included a description of Diffie–Hellman key exchange in the explanation of how Signal’s encryption works. Signal changed from Diffie–Hellman to Elliptic Curve Cryptography, which is much more efficient, in 2023. I regret the error. 

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