This can be classified as a mutated variation of Enterprise Software Syndrome, the disease that makes enterprise software suck so badly.
We work with, spend time with, and collaborate with people we trust. That trust usually comes from repeated, direct, human interaction or as a referral from someone who has that long-built trust.
That applies to the vendors we choose, the babysitters we hire, and the doctors we visit.
Asking someone to choose someone they don't trust is inherently risky, even if it works out.
Barring actual corruption, oftentimes ability to eventually get it done is more important to the buyer than features.
Maybe it's just generally a hand grenade to hire any company that does political IT. Or maybe there's an opportunity for a truly neutral company to make inroads there.
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/how-microsoft-is-changing-this-...
Because they tend to be motivated, they (are assumed to) have congruent motives, and they tend to understand the landscape. They also tend to be cheaper, relatively speaking.
(These developers also tend to mostly work on campaign, rather than electoral, infrastructure, which makes them a poor fit here. I don't consider it a defensible decision by the DNC, but it's very defensible for most candidates to want to hire people who want to see them elected.)
Maybe for more complex projects this might be true, but any moderately competent developer could have built this.
I believe the Iowa DNC paid around ~$50K for this app. I have a hard time believing that isn't something any good dev shop would bid for given how simple the app is.
They were probably picked, to be frank, because they're the people that the folks in charge of picking a developer already had in their rolodex. Private organizations can do RFPs, but don't have to, and if you don't fully understand how bad a software project can go sideways, it's not going to be something you care too much about.
I think that's the concern people have about handing over control of anything remotely electoral in nature to them.
And really, you see this in lots of sectors where they want developers with experience in that domain even if it's not really necessary. Or at least, nowhere near as important as being a good developer is.
Everybody has a political tilt. Even somebody who doesn't vote, read the news, etc will still have opinions that are the political spectrum. Have you ever met a person (not just a developer) that doesn't have a political tilt?
Individuals make up companies/organizations so no matter what you will have a company that has somebody working on it who is not completely impartial.
Truly neutral companies are hard to find; most companies of any proven competence have well-known political preferences, and those that don't there is going to be a concern of unknown and hostile-to-the-customer leanings, which you really don't want to discover after they've manifested.
I don't think the problem is ideology here, I think it's "consulting firm."
Remind me how that worked in the last presidential primary.. I appreciate the aspirational “supposed to” comment but they don’t have a good track record of neutrality. As the problems are never dealt with, I’m not sure why expectations would be different.
This year they have just recently changed the debate rules to allow Bloomberg to get in. If I were one of the other candidates, I would be ticked.
I think the DNC is anything but neutral. They seem to strongly put their thumb on the scale.
And now you see why so many non-Democrats have a fear of them getting elected. If the DNC can't give equal treatment to its own people with whom they disagree, what of the rest of the country for whom they have apparent disdain?
Either way, the app broke, so even a shop with "experience" here completely failed at their job.
That is exactly the kind of attitude that leads to a disastrous rollout like this. You're applying a brand-new app and process to help with complex rules changes, and now you have a new organizational problem.
As someone who has had skin in the game with keeping political web tools working, this type of thing is terrifying. Nobody should be depending on new, single-use, day-of, tools. You can't test them or train them well enough.
That's not really true; the winner of the general election becomes effective head of their party; a primary winner who loses the general generally has less (but significant) influence. Hillary Clinton has less control of the DNC after the 2016 election than before it (she had unusual influence before the election for a number of reasons); the reform eliminating first-ballot superdelegate voting rights was due to influence gained by the Sanders-aligned faction.
This company produces the textbanking software that the Buttigieg campaign uses. It's frustrating to watch people repeating the phrase "received money from the Buttigieg campaign" with the implication that it's a bribe when the actual situation is that both the Iowa Democratic Party and the Buttigieg campaign used the same contractor for some software.
Whether or not that's true is debatable, but I think it's a compelling point.
That's why it's called a swamp.
I would want to see how much other campaigns paid for textbanking software but that seems unusually expensive.
Thinking all the way through here, any momentum buttigieg gathers in iowa and new hampshire will be lost is south carolina and nevada, and then bloomberg will be a factor competing for his voters on super teusday.
Buttigieg's path to the nomination is having it given to him by superdelegates if no one gets a majority.
I understand that his chances are low regardless, but they're non-existent if he can't build a media narrative off of actually winning Iowa. That's been his plan from the start, and why he's sunk so much money into winning the state. It makes absolutely 0 sense to me that anyone thinks he would want to sabotage the caucus.
Shadow provides peer to peer engagement software, which is being used by the Buttigieg campaign. Just because the same software is being used in Iowa doesn't mean there is a conflict of interest.
As it stands, this is a blatant attempt to discredit the app developer, the Buttigieg campaign, and the DNC.
You're not even using the word 'conspiring' correctly.
An implication (by the speaker) is inferred (by the listener).
Sometimes people are wrong. If you don't like getting callled out, argue your position.
Is a vastly more broad statement. All I'm pointing out is that anti-vaxx people would say the exact same thing. Answer challenges with facts and arguments, not useless bold claims.
"The wedding of Tara Elizabeth McGowan and Michael Mackay Halle took place Sept. 5 [2015]…"
"Strategist for @Petebuttigieg… Maximizing time with @taraemcg in the Ocean State"
> ACRONYM’s CEO, Tara McGowan, is married to Michael Halle, a strategist for Pete Buttigieg.
- always test your code - always test your code with people - never ever succumb to the temptation to ironically name your organization no matter how funny it is to you
What buffoons.
It is such a scam; makes working on Wall Street feel cleaner and more moral.
It's full steam ahead to another cycle of divisiveness, extreme polarization and getting nothing done.
The wealth inequality that accelerated after the 2007 crisis has added a class warfare aspect to national politics where one did not exist before. Trump has largely eviscerated the Republican party by playing on this, and I think we're seeing this dynamic on the Democrat side this election cycle.
Progressives are tired of Corporate Democrats running their party.
:)
Yes, but not for the reason you stated. It's conspiracy theories like the GP posted that have led to the rise of Sanders and Trump.
You can hate Hillary, but she was probably the smartest, most experienced, and best qualified for the job as a maintainer of the status quo. I think we need to go beyond the status quo, but politics is (or was) the art of compromise.
Unfortunately politics is at its core a popularity contest and people vote with their emotions rather than their brains, which is why we have the current administration.
No, she wasn't. She had very little of either electoral or executive experience for a Presidential candidate, but lots of experience as a less-accountable figure around politics and policy.
Whether as maintainer of the status quo or otherwise she was only modestly qualified.
I’m not sure rejection of her should be chalked up to “hate”, so much as sensible evaluation.
Citation needed.
> She had the DNC stack the previous primary for her.
Citation needed. She got millions more votes than her opponent.
This is exactly the sort of conspiracy-minded nonsense that Sanders and Trump thrive on.
Her opponent has taken that to new levels and if we are to discuss this topic it requires openness to the flaws of all involved, including our preferred candidates. To not do so is to engage in partisan bickering which is not appropriate here.
Citation needed about pay to play. Also, foundations pay their directors. Why is that surprising?
> the media were funneling debate questions to her
One person funneled one question to her. The Sanders campaign also said that same person helped their campaign, with one aide saying, "If Bernie Sanders had been the nominee of the party and the Russians hacked my emails instead of John [Podesta]’s, we'd be reading all these notes between Donna and I and they'd say Donna was cozying up to the Bernie campaign."
https://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/presidential-races/3038...
> Separately, when she knew her records were about to be subpoenaed she destroyed data (the 30k emails) claiming they were personal - she didn't make a claim that they were privileged or irrelevant to the matter, much less let a judge determine this - she preemptively destroyed the information
Again, citation needed that she did this on purpose. The person who actually did it says otherwise.
> This is called spoliation of evidence and is a crime
It would be a crime if it happened as you said, but the investigation came to the opposite conclusion.
> at this point it's pretty disingenuous to be talking about Hillary as somebody who doesn't thrive on peddling conspiracy theories.
I never said Clinton doesn't, but now that you mention it, she clearly doesn't anywhere near as much as Sanders and Trump supporters.
After he lost the primaries to Clinton (a process I personally think was gamed by the DNC), he publicly supported her and encouraged his supporters to do the same.
We're discussing politics on HN and I don't want to incur dang's admonishment again. We are in very uncertain times these days so I think it's important to discuss key issues in a cogent and concise manner.
The key difference between Sanders and other politicians like McCain, Obama, etc. is that Sanders doesn't push against the fringe elements of his supporters, which encouraged them to grow into a large portion of his supporters.
Look at Sanders's early education policy for example. It's just a single line. Getting early education and childcare right will benefit far more people and in a far more egalitarian way than getting postsecondary education right, but if you even suggest it, some "emotional" Sanders supporters will say you must be part of a banking conspiracy.
Platforms are not policies, they're goals. There's nothing wrong with having ambitious goals and then adjusting to reality whilst trying to implement them.
The Sanders camp clearly attracts a lot of emotional people as well, but at least they're emotional for a perceived good rather than perceived grievances -- to put a charitable spin on it :-)
Nor is telling flat earthers that their beliefs are based in conspiracy theory a good way to win their support. I am not trying to win their support by that comment, as this is not the proper forum for that conversation. I am simply stating a fact.
Citation needed. It is a known fact that Shadow is one of the few software contractors that works for cheap for Democratic candidates. The fact that Buttigieg also used them for cheap projects does not mean there is a conflict of interest, and immediately jumping to that conclusion indicates conspiracy-minded thinking.
Citation needed. The only people this has been widely accepted among are conspiracy theorists.
The "rigging" possibility is just a maybe on top of that.
They ended up being almost literally bang on, ironically enough.
I'm seeing on Twitter that the app interface wasn't very intuitive and officials there were confused on how to use it.
Well other than there is no evidence of that and would that have even helped? My understanding of how the Iowa caucuses work ... what you describe would not advantage anyone. As I understand it the campaigns themselves are not reporting "I got X votes" directly.
I've not been to Iowa but I've been to some caucuses.. what you describe would not advantage anyone in my experience.
Buttigieg's comms director tweeted worksheets with the pin number to login to the app on Twitter https://twitter.com/bhalle87/status/1224558925946793985?s=20
If you don't know how the app works, how are you familiar with its security model?
Also, what’s your source for Buttigeg’s $100K payment to the CEO of acronym? I head about $42K the buttegieg campaign paid to shadow, but that appears to be legitimate text messaging services.
It’s dirty politics to pedal conspiracy theories. I hope you can refrain around here.
(Also, I know some people in Newtown — conspiracy theories can get down right evil quickly. Be careful not to down a dark path because you don’t know where it’s going to end.)
That Buttigieg pays $100,000 for software he doesn't need to cover up a bribe used to "rig" the preliminary results of the caucus? If that's the case, wouldn't it backfire horribly once the paper ballots get manually tabulated? Especially since that would probably happen around the time of the next (NH?) primary. A story like that ("Buttigieg didn't actually win in Iowa!") would totally derail any momentum (since the actual # of delegates in Iowa is fairly insignificant, about 1% of the total, my understanding is that the main value of the Iowa caucuses is to construct media narratives)
I guess you should let Hillary know she should not have been in control of a foundation that was receiving millions of dollars in donations from foreign leaders while she was the head of the department in charge of US foreign policy.
The whole country knows about Trump's most recent cronyism, and both his voters and his congress have made clear that they intend to do exactly nothing about it.
He probably is also hurt by Biden’s bad finish being lost in the chaos.