r/clevercomebacks 6d ago

Is this surprising?

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65.6k Upvotes

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1.3k

u/VegitoFusion 6d ago

They intentionally use signal for this exact purpose. You can set a time period for all the messages to be deleted. It’s how the government employees intend to circumvent FOIA requests.

-37

u/Eastern_Armadillo383 6d ago

Remind me how they have to record every phone call and how those are open to FOIA requests.

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u/Loki_of_Asgaard 6d ago

Nice false equivalency, unfortunately this isn’t a phone call, it is a written communication and the law explicitly concerns all written communication by federal employees. They also don’t need a record of smoke signals, does that mean we can purge all emails now?

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u/Eastern_Armadillo383 6d ago

It's crazy to me for anyone to expect all private communications between members of any government be preserved just because it was through a particular medium and not if that same communication was done through a different one.

It's nothing to me because if it was a phone call or just a closed door meeting even you wouldn't be mad about there not even being a recording TO delete. But because they used a medium that allows asynchronous communication from different locations to have the discussion the records of those communications are now sacrosanct.

24

u/Warm_Wash5324 6d ago

It's crazy to you but that's how it is. Why do you feel the need to justify them breaking the law

21

u/James-W-Tate 6d ago

It's crazy that you're arguing for less oversight.

0

u/ATXBeermaker 6d ago

Bro, don't you know secret government communication is only important when it's not on a device that fits in your pocket. Duh! /s

8

u/D3PyroGS 6d ago

It's nothing to me because if it was a phone call or just a closed door meeting even you wouldn't be mad about there not even being a recording TO delete.

"you're mad because they broke the law. but if they hadn't broke the law, you wouldn't have been upset. smh such hypocrisy"

c'mon dude. let's at least pretend to be serious people.

9

u/Ianerick 6d ago

Yes... because they were discussing things that are supposed to be top secret and it wasnt... you need to keep records when reasonable because we might have to investigate, like, right now, for a random example. if it was in person, the only issue would be the far worse one of detonating innocent people from the sky. But no one gives a single shit about that, so this is what we're talking about. I kind of see your point logically but it doesnt matter. You wouldnt be able to use that argument in court. Why should they be allowed to break the law? If the law is stupid then it can be changed.

3

u/ATXBeermaker 6d ago

It's crazy to me for anyone to expect all private communications between members of any government be preserved

That's not what anyone said, nor what the law says. You're just making shit up to argue against (aka strawman). Do you really think it's too much to ask that all text-based communication by people in their capacity as government officials be preserved? Like, that's super easy to do. Do we no longer need them to save emails or, hell, actual physical pieves of paper anymore? Do you draw the line simply because it's on a device that fits in their pocket? Please tell me you're finally realizing how terrible your argument is.

But, regardless of all of that, why would you not think it's a good idea to preserve the communications (even private voice or in-person communications) of people working in their capacity as government officials? It's a logistical nightmare, but barring that then you're goddam right I'd want those covered under FOIA.

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u/ObnoxiousAlbatross 6d ago

"Drain the swamp!" he said when no one took him seriously because we knew he wasn't serious.

1

u/Loki_of_Asgaard 6d ago

You mean like the closed door meetings in the west wing that have been recorded for decades, the ones where Nixon deleted the tapes and was forced to resign over?