2020 US Election

[Nebraska]

^^ finally the truth comes out that brad raffensperger has no idea what's happening in his own state. shame

 

[ignatius]

2 hours ago, Squee said:

Once Trump returns to his civil status again, can't the American population sue him for destroying the economy by neglecting the importance of COVID?

I mean, it's a dumb enough idea.

i predict he'll get sued in florida over mar a lago if he decides to make it his residence. when he opened it as a club the city/county made a deal with him that it couldn't be a residence and had to stay a club and rental place for weddings etc. so, he's technically not supposed to be allowed to live there full time. there's already drama over this and a county commissioner or local representative of some kind.. is trying to press the issue in an official capacity. 

once he's out of office SDNY is going to go after him hard. they've hired forensic accountants to go through his business deals and taxes. if they can gather up the evidence and  present it in a compelling way he very well could be heavily fined and or sent to some kind of country club type federal prison for white collar criminals.  very skeptical about all that actually happening but who knows.. he at a minimum is going to be paying lawyers for years to deal with this shit. 

 

[Rubin Farr]

 

[ignatius]

if only "rally size" determined the presidency trump would've won.

[mister miller]

56 minutes ago, ignatius said:

once he's out of office SDNY is going to go after him hard. they've hired forensic accountants to go through his business deals and taxes. if they can gather up the evidence and  present it in a compelling way he very well could be heavily fined and or sent to some kind of country club type federal prison for white collar criminals.  very skeptical about all that actually happening but who knows.. he at a minimum is going to be paying lawyers for years to deal with this shit. 

I think this is the main reason he's so desperate to stay in office.

Although I think an actual arrest would trigger a civil conflict of some sort.

He's the leader of a massive cult. He has some supporters that seemingly would die for him. In their minds, he's like a god. He can do no wrong. And he's never done anything wrong.

According to them, he's been harassed and accused by the Deep State for 4 years, and now theyve stolen the election from him. If he's actually arrested at some point, it will be a line in the sand for these nut jobs. Hell even a Biden confirmation this Wednesday could be a line for some of them.

 

[ignatius]

I think this is the main reason he's so desperate to stay in office.
Although I think an actual arrest would trigger a civil conflict of some sort.
He's the leader of a massive cult. He has some supporters that seemingly would die for him. In their minds, he's like a god. He can do no wrong. And he's never done anything wrong.
According to them, he's been harassed and accused by the Deep State for 4 years, and now theyve stolen the election from him. If he's actually arrested at some point, it will be a line in the sand for these nut jobs. Hell even a Biden confirmation this Wednesday could be a line for some of them.
 

Probably accurate. They could arrest him with a massive show of force. Troops, federal cops etc. take him away in a helicopter. Or abduct him in the middle of the night and put a black bag over his head. Rendition him to a cia interrogation cell. Live stream it for our pleasure.

Last bit is sarcasm obviously but I do think there’s a way to do it if it comes down to that. Trump’s meltdown would be epic. They could opt to simply bankrupt him with fines and back taxes. Make him dependent on his family. Seize his assets etc. basically do what happens to dan akroyd’s character in Trading Places. Release the pee tapes etc.

I suspect that might make for a decent plan with the end goal being arresting and imprisoning him.


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[ignatius]

So that hour long call is new. From yesterday apparently. He’s doing the same thing in other states but there’s no recordings of those conversations that we know of.


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[may be rude]

yeah. disturbing thing it shows is that he's really going for it, and still.

[zlemflolia]

the modification of history through digital media manipulation is not only disgusting but evil.  i demand now that this thread's title be reverted back to not have the "vote biden pls ffs" market on it anymore since it looks like I wrote that when I did not because biden is a neoliberal piece of shit whose actions resulted in the incarceration and life ruining effects of millions of people

luckily I was able to fix it myself

[may be rude]

biden is a nice guy

[mister miller]

 

Listen JACK. The fact of the matter is, we need UNITY. and when I served as Vice President under Barack Obama, that's exactly what we had. 

[Cryptowen]

the problem with this election is that we were given the choice between the nightcore candidate & the vaporwave candidate, when what america really needs is the Black MIDI candidate

[Braintree]

Nah. It was a turd that stunk up the entire room and a crustier, older turd that didn't stink as bad, but was still shit.

[zero]

what America needs is better vetting process for anyone who decides they want to run for president. there should be at least a job interview or a mental fitness test or something before we let any wannabe autocrat stick their name on the ticket. ffs donald should not have been allowed out of the gate in the first place.

or fuck it. why even have a president? silly question, I know. but donnie has just about proven we'd be better off letting the ship steer itself, as opposed to having someone who plays sides and actually makes things worse for millions who live here, as if it were sport at the rich boys club. this tribal, political one-upmanship crossroads we have been at for some time now I feel is only going to get stupider and much, much worse.

we should come full circle soon, back to caveman days. discussions between R's vs. Dems will soon resemble a bunch of apes jumping up and down, pointing fingers and yelling "bad" at the other side.

it's about time for something else I think...an AI influenced political revolution perhaps?

[zlemflolia]

23 minutes ago, zero said:

what America needs is better vetting process for anyone who decides they want to run for president. there should be at least a job interview or a mental fitness test or something before we let any wannabe autocrat stick their name on the ticket. ffs donald should not have been allowed out of the gate in the first place.

or fuck it. why even have a president? silly question, I know. but donnie has just about proven we'd be better off letting the ship steer itself, as opposed to having someone who plays sides and actually makes things worse for millions who live here, as if it were sport at the rich boys club. this tribal, political one-upmanship crossroads we have been at for some time now I feel is only going to get stupider and much, much worse.

we should come full circle soon, back to caveman days. discussions between R's vs. Dems will soon resemble a bunch of apes jumping up and down, pointing fingers and yelling "bad" at the other side.

it's about time for something else I think...an AI influenced political revolution perhaps?

as someone who works in AI there's no sentence I can read more disgusting than "AI influenced political revolution".  Who controls all the major AI right now? bourgeoisie

almost the entire tech industry class are either technocratic liberals or right wing libertarian shitheads who think their shit tastes good.  the only technological revolution we need right now is the destruction of the vast majority of all technology that currently exists

Edited January 4, 2021 by cyanobacteria

[Enthusiast]

Looking forward to all the toys coming out of the pram at this rally in Georgia tonight.

[zero]

24 minutes ago, cyanobacteria said:

as someone who works in AI there's no sentence I can read more disgusting than "AI influenced political revolution".  Who controls all the major AI right now? bourgeoisie

almost the entire tech industry class are either technocratic liberals or right wing libertarian shitheads who think their shit tastes good.  the only technological revolution we need right now is the destruction of the vast majority of all technology that currently exists

ha! should have known something like that would get your attention. I really didn't put enough thought into that one, I guess. definitely not enough to go down some anti-technology wormhole in this thread.

 

[zlemflolia]

11 minutes ago, zero said:

ha! should have known something like that would get your attention. I really didn't put enough thought into that one, I guess. definitely not enough to go down some anti-technology wormhole in this thread.

 

another issue with using technology to orchestrate a revolution is that the US government has backdoors into all Intel and AMD processors made after the year 2006

https://libreboot.org/faq.html

Intel Management Engine (ME)

Introduced in June 2006 in Intel’s 965 Express Chipset Family of (Graphics and) Memory Controller Hubs, or (G)MCHs, and the ICH8 I/O Controller Family, the Intel Management Engine (ME) is a separate computing environment physically located in the (G)MCH chip. In Q3 2009, the first generation of Intel Core i3/i5/i7 (Nehalem) CPUs and the 5 Series Chipset family of Platform Controller Hubs, or PCHs, brought a more tightly integrated ME (now at version 6.0) inside the PCH chip, which itself replaced the ICH. Thus, the ME is present on all Intel desktop, mobile (laptop), and server systems since mid 2006.

The ME consists of an ARC processor core (replaced with other processor cores in later generations of the ME), code and data caches, a timer, and a secure internal bus to which additional devices are connected, including a cryptography engine, internal ROM and RAM, memory controllers, and a direct memory access (DMA) engine to access the host operating system’s memory as well as to reserve a region of protected external memory to supplement the ME’s limited internal RAM. The ME also has network access with its own MAC address through an Intel Gigabit Ethernet Controller. Its boot program, stored on the internal ROM, loads a firmware “manifest” from the PC’s SPI flash chip. This manifest is signed with a strong cryptographic key, which differs between versions of the ME firmware. If the manifest isn’t signed by a specific Intel key, the boot ROM won’t load and execute the firmware and the ME processor core will be halted.

The ME firmware is compressed and consists of modules that are listed in the manifest along with secure cryptographic hashes of their contents. One module is the operating system kernel, which is based on a proprietary real-time operating system (RTOS) kernel called “ThreadX”. The developer, Express Logic, sells licenses and source code for ThreadX. Customers such as Intel are forbidden from disclosing or sublicensing the ThreadX source code. Another module is the Dynamic Application Loader (DAL), which consists of a Java virtual machine and set of preinstalled Java classes for cryptography, secure storage, etc. The DAL module can load and execute additional ME modules from the PC’s HDD or SSD. The ME firmware also includes a number of native application modules within its flash memory space, including Intel Active Management Technology (AMT), an implementation of a Trusted Platform Module (TPM), Intel Boot Guard, and audio and video DRM systems.

The Active Management Technology (AMT) application, part of the Intel “vPro” brand, is a Web server and application code that enables remote users to power on, power off, view information about, and otherwise manage the PC. It can be used remotely even while the PC is powered off (via Wake-on-Lan). Traffic is encrypted using SSL/TLS libraries, but recall that all of the major SSL/TLS implementations have had highly publicized vulnerabilities. The AMT application itself has known vulnerabilities, which have been exploited to develop rootkits and keyloggers and covertly gain encrypted access to the management features of a PC. Remember that the ME has full access to the PC’s RAM. This means that an attacker exploiting any of these vulnerabilities may gain access to everything on the PC as it runs: all open files, all running applications, all keys pressed, and more.

Intel Boot Guard is an ME application introduced in Q2 2013 with ME firmware version 9.0 on 4th Generation Intel Core i3/i5/i7 (Haswell) CPUs. It allows a PC OEM to generate an asymmetric cryptographic keypair, install the public key in the CPU, and prevent the CPU from executing boot firmware that isn’t signed with their private key. This means that coreboot and libreboot are impossible to port to such PCs, without the OEM’s private signing key. Note that systems assembled from separately purchased mainboard and CPU parts are unaffected, since the vendor of the mainboard (on which the boot firmware is stored) can’t possibly affect the public key stored on the CPU.

ME firmware versions 4.0 and later (Intel 4 Series and later chipsets) include an ME application for audio and video DRM called “Protected Audio Video Path” (PAVP). The ME receives from the host operating system an encrypted media stream and encrypted key, decrypts the key, and sends the encrypted media decrypted key to the GPU, which then decrypts the media. PAVP is also used by another ME application to draw an authentication PIN pad directly onto the screen. In this usage, the PAVP application directly controls the graphics that appear on the PC’s screen in a way that the host OS cannot detect. ME firmware version 7.0 on PCHs with 2nd Generation Intel Core i3/i5/i7 (Sandy Bridge) CPUs replaces PAVP with a similar DRM application called “Intel Insider”. Like the AMT application, these DRM applications, which in themselves are defective by design, demonstrate the omnipotent capabilities of the ME: this hardware and its proprietary firmware can access and control everything that is in RAM and even everything that is shown on the screen.

The Intel Management Engine with its proprietary firmware has complete access to and control over the PC: it can power on or shut down the PC, read all open files, examine all running applications, track all keys pressed and mouse movements, and even capture or display images on the screen. And it has a network interface that is demonstrably insecure, which can allow an attacker on the network to inject rootkits that completely compromise the PC and can report to the attacker all activities performed on the PC. It is a threat to freedom, security, and privacy that can’t be ignored.

Before version 6.0 (that is, on systems from 2008/2009 and earlier), the ME can be disabled by setting a couple of values in the SPI flash memory. The ME firmware can then be removed entirely from the flash memory space. libreboot does this on the Intel 4 Series systems that it supports, such as the Libreboot X200 and Libreboot T400. ME firmware versions 6.0 and later, which are found on all systems with an Intel Core i3/i5/i7 CPU and a PCH, include “ME Ignition” firmware that performs some hardware initialization and power management. If the ME’s boot ROM does not find in the SPI flash memory an ME firmware manifest with a valid Intel signature, the whole PC will shut down after 30 minutes.

Due to the signature verification, developing free replacement firmware for the ME is basically impossible. The only entity capable of replacing the ME firmware is Intel. As previously stated, the ME firmware includes proprietary code licensed from third parties, so Intel couldn’t release the source code even if they wanted to. And even if they developed completely new ME firmware without third-party proprietary code and released its source code, the ME’s boot ROM would reject any modified firmware that isn’t signed by Intel. Thus, the ME firmware is both hopelessly proprietary and “tivoized”.

In summary, the Intel Management Engine and its applications are a backdoor with total access to and control over the rest of the PC. The ME is a threat to freedom, security, and privacy, and the libreboot project strongly recommends avoiding it entirely. Since recent versions of it can’t be removed, this means avoiding all recent generations of Intel hardware.

Edited January 4, 2021 by cyanobacteria

[zero]

@cyanobacteria  imo there are a lot of things in this world that will never happen. pushing the reset button on technological advancements is one of them. I'm no expert here but barring some catastrophic one-time mass casualty event, I can't see this ever happening. I think it would be nice sometimes to go back to "the way things were" before all of us were addicted to screens, but then I check my phone again for new email and push the thought out of mind.

for the record - I agree with a lot of the stuff you post on here. I also agree with a lot of things said in Kaczynski's manifesto (just not the creepy killing part) and some AI futurist theories. but IMO the human element will never allow us to achieve some sort of global utopia. we're too corruptible, the grass is always greener, yadda, yadda. the proletariat taking over will eventually turn to shit as well because of human nature.

and plus, I don't think there's a way to change any political/societal systems currently in place peacefully... and I'm not in favor of large numbers of humans dying.

 

[zlemflolia]

2 hours ago, zero said:

@cyanobacteria  imo there are a lot of things in this world that will never happen. pushing the reset button on technological advancements is one of them. I'm no expert here but barring some catastrophic one-time mass casualty event, I can't see this ever happening. I think it would be nice sometimes to go back to "the way things were" before all of us were addicted to screens, but then I check my phone again for new email and push the thought out of mind.

for the record - I agree with a lot of the stuff you post on here. I also agree with a lot of things said in Kaczynski's manifesto (just not the creepy killing part) and some AI futurist theories. but IMO the human element will never allow us to achieve some sort of global utopia. we're too corruptible, the grass is always greener, yadda, yadda. the proletariat taking over will eventually turn to shit as well because of human nature.

and plus, I don't think there's a way to change any political/societal systems currently in place peacefully... and I'm not in favor of large numbers of humans dying.

 

all I mean is destruction of harmful technologies meant to oppose the working class like mass surveillance, which comprises much of the software we use, and all proprietary software, "destroyed" through conversion to free and open source software.  I am not anti-technology but rather anti-bourgeois technology

[dingformung]

3 hours ago, zero said:

IMO the human element will never allow us to achieve some sort of global utopia. we're too corruptible

I don't know. I think the way humans are is determined by the way the society they live in is organised. Tribal societies that hunt and lead wars against other tribes produce a lot of warriors, capitalist societies produce a lot of corruptible individualists and a new form of organisation will produce a new man that may be better than we are. Existence determines consciousness, innit

[zlemflolia]

4 hours ago, dingformung said:

I don't know. I think the way humans are is determined by the way the society they live in is organised. Tribal societies that hunt and lead wars against other tribes produce a lot of warriors, capitalist societies produce a lot of corruptible individualists and a new form of organisation will produce a new man that may be better than we are. Existence determines consciousness, innit

this

nobody's asking for a utopia

just food, healthcare, and freedom from wage slavery, it's not fucking hard it's just that there are groups of people actively plotting to keep us their wage slaves so they can continue not working for generations.  we need to, uh, do something about it

[zlemflolia]

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1859/critique-pol-economy/preface.htm

In the social production of their existence, men inevitably enter into definite relations, which are independent of their will, namely relations of production appropriate to a given stage in the development of their material forces of production. The totality of these relations of production constitutes the economic structure of society, the real foundation, on which arises a legal and political superstructure and to which correspond definite forms of social consciousness. The mode of production of material life conditions the general process of social, political and intellectual life. It is not the consciousness of men that determines their existence, but their social existence that determines their consciousness. At a certain stage of development, the material productive forces of society come into conflict with the existing relations of production or – this merely expresses the same thing in legal terms – with the property relations within the framework of which they have operated hitherto. From forms of development of the productive forces these relations turn into their fetters. Then begins an era of social revolution. The changes in the economic foundation lead sooner or later to the transformation of the whole immense superstructure.

[dingformung]

5 hours ago, cyanobacteria said:

we need to, uh, do something about it

What do we need to do?

[zero]

14 hours ago, dingformung said:

and a new form of organisation will produce a new man that may be better than we are. 

this is the part I'm not too optimistic about. this is all just personal opinion of course, neither right or wrong, but I just don't see that happening. maybe I've lost faith in humanity somewhere along the way, I dunno... I just feel like that line from that old Paul Simon song "after changes upon changes, we are more or less the same" is pretty accurate. 

 

4 hours ago, dingformung said:

What do we need to do?

I mean c'mon, haven't you seen Fight Club?

kidding. if any of us here on an electronic music forum can answer that correctly, then joyrex needs to start handing out honorary PhD's or something...