ellio

For what it's worth to the people saying "we (as in the US or the international community more generally) have no interest in this and shouldn't trample on sovereign nations," I respect your opinion and your disdain for heavyhanded, imperialistic behavior, but don't ignore the evils that these banks perpetuate. They are opportunistic and protect and facilitate some of the worst people on earth, including arms traffickers and dictators who commit atrocities against their own people. Maybe exerting pressure against these banks isn't the right solution, but I have no sympathy for the sort of people who helped the Sudanese commit genocide, and anything that works against them I'm inclined to support.

http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2015-10-20/shh-credit-...

It's mentioned by another commenter, but being cut off from the US financial system, even for banks with no presence here, is a blow that many institutions cannot recover from. The dollar is the world's reserve currency and it allows the US to exert enormous influence.

Check out the book "The Bankers' New Clothes," which addresses the intentionally obscure language of finance

It matters enormously in financial transactions for regulatory reason. Companies that want to process transactions need to have at least a defensible mechanism for identifying their customers.

This epitomizes why I will never consider Barack Obama a great President. I've seen good arguments that he is above average, even well above-average as a President. I respect a lot that he has done, such as engaging in effective diplomatic relations with Cuba and supporting a form of healthcare that is closer to universal. But I cannot ever look at a man who so openly and willfully jeopardizes the idea of a free republic and think of him as a good leader. Alexander Hamilton wrote,

“It has been frequently remarked that it seems to have been reserved to the people of this country…to decide the important question, whether societies of men are really capable or not of establishing good government from reflection and choice, or whether they are forever destined to depend for their political constitutions on accident and force. If there be any truth in the remark, the crisis at which we are arrived may with propriety be regarded as the era in which that decision is to be made…And a wrong election of the part we shall act may, in this view, deserve to be considered as the general misfortune of mankind.”

Mass surveillance and government secrecy are one of the greatest threats to this ideal ever to face this country. Can we survive with them? Of course. Life will go on, we'll live in our houses and buy nice things and generally lead comfortable lives. But we'll never live as free persons, and even those of us with the most comfortable lives will constantly be looking over our shoulders, burdened by the feeling that something is very wrong.

I'd like to hear your thoughts on how to be a good developer. I fall into this group and I'm entirely self-taught. I've been following the Free Code Camp curriculum while also working through some Linux books and Shaw's "Learn C the Hard Way." It's difficult for me to know what things I might be missing--the classic "unknown unknowns"--and I'd like to close whayever gaps there might be.

I've done money laundering and fraud investigations for financial firms. Never got to use Palantir, but I know a guy who did. He said it's basically for people who don't know how to query or code on any level. I'm not surprised either. I can count the people in my field who want to learn SAS / SQL / R / VBA / Whatever on one hand.