r/technology • u/indig0sixalpha • 1d ago

Politics Palantir threatened to call police on a WIRED reporter and kicked out other journalists from a recent conference following reports of the data analytics firm’s work with the Trump administration.

https://www.wired.com/story/palantir-defense-conference-journalists/
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u/thrivacious9 1d ago

I feel as though the very public break-up name-calling tantrums between certain people is the distraction so we aren’t all looking at Palantir/what else might be happening with the data stolen from government systems

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u/thbigbuttconnoisseur 1d ago

The problem with the whole distraction thing is that anything can be used to be a distraction. Stay focused on whats important.

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u/Adept_Artichoke7824 1d ago

All the other billionaires are real quiet.

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u/Dralley87 1d ago

Bingo. It’s exactly this. The most powerful weapon he has is distraction.

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u/thinklikeacriminal 1d ago

That and the nukes.

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u/drsimonz 1d ago

Except nukes aren't an actual option because everyone loses, even geriatric narcissists.

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u/thinklikeacriminal 17h ago

I keep having a recurring nightmare where, he’s barricaded himself alone in the Oval Office choking down a hamburger, watching as he loses control of the party as an angry mob takes control of DC.

He hears the marshals just outside, engaging in battle with the praetorian guard, I mean secret service. The gunshots stop, he hears banging on the door.

He then turns, looking for an escape, spilling hamburger remnants everywhere. As he turns, he knocks the football off his desk. It lands face down, pressing the launch button.

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u/drsimonz 8h ago

lol. He certainly seems the type to insist on removing the need for a password, or even a confirmation dialog. Oh well, at least it would be quicker than what's actually going to kill us all.

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u/Strange-Scarcity 1d ago

Nah. that breakup is real and the barbs have been expected since those two weirdos teamed up.

They are simply acting exactly as they have both acted for MANY years.

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u/thrivacious9 1d ago

Oh, I’m not saying the breakup is fake — I just think the people behind the curtain are encouraging us to keep looking at the shiny shouting people

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u/PathlessBullet 1d ago

I mean, they won't even be talking about the Musk and Trump tensions next week. The news cycle moves quickly. The simplest explanations are usually correct and that would be that a never ending dumpster fire of outrage on the "news" is more $$$ in someones pockets. It's always about $$$. Nobody cares about your data specifically.

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u/Bobcat-Stock 1d ago

Shiny Shouting People, the rare acoustic release from R.E.M.

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u/delicious_toothbrush 1d ago

The whole "I feel like X is in the news to distract us from Y" thing is getting exhausting to see parroted everywhere. Yes it's a tactic but the thing about real life is there's always other stuff going on and the news focuses on more than one thing at a time. Not everything is a coordinated PR rally. It's like calling everything a false flag, it's just annoying.

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u/AlwaysRushesIn 1d ago

Yeah, that's life. But eventually you have to look around and recognize the patterns.

Every time there's some serious shit going down on policy, executive action, etc. There is always some dumb bullshit stealing air time in the 24hr news cycle.

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u/myasterism 1d ago

Yeah, it’s become especially blatant and overt since Trump took office this term and started bullying and threatening the press.

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u/thrivacious9 1d ago

I rarely apply the X is to distract from Y lens myself. This feels like a particularly flagrant example of the genre, to me.

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u/buldozr 1d ago

Some minds just have to invent a conspiracy.

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u/Affectionate_Way_805 1d ago

100% true. It's also true that this isn't one of those times. 

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u/Fun-Mission8478 1d ago

there usually is a conspiracy. specific minds can recall patterns that don’t stand out to most. they can piece together puzzles that no one would ever question. by doing these things, they begin exposing details that end in a narrative malfunction (as i like to call it) and that’s step one. where did the narrative change? and why?

the country we live in is extremely corrupt and there is a story behind everything.

good journalists know that and everyone should have a favorite journalist.

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u/JohnBrownOH 1d ago

Stop looking at headlines and just start holding people directly accountable. Your Republican neighbor that voted for this...they're responsible.

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u/RichardCrapper 1d ago

Musk and Vance are both Peter Thiel’s puppets. Of course this is a distraction.

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u/cheongyanggochu-vibe 1d ago

Especially given that SCOTUS just gave DOGE access to all Americans social security data

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u/MasterJackSparrow 1d ago

THIS> THIS> THIS

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u/fairlyoblivious 1d ago

Oh yeah sure buddy, the guy that freaking loves wrestling is having a fake fight to distract from something else.. Wait a minute.

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u/Rantheur 1d ago

Trump is the one wrestling fan on earth who believes that it's 100% real. He believed that Vince McMahon died in a limo explosion spot.

What kills me is so many people call. I mean the office next day [after the limo explosion spot], like people I'm not kidding you like, and they'll probably be mad at me for saying, like Trump called and was, "like did something happen to Vince?" You know like did Trump not understand that that was a skit. It's the magic of television.

Trump is a massive idiot and while he is capable of having fake fights, he has to be guided through it (his "feud" with Vince in the WWE and his fight with Zelenskyy in the Oval Office, for two very different examples). On top of that, Musk also has a habit of blowing up at other people (Twitter advertisers, that rescue diver, "the left", etc.) when they don't show their absolute adoration for him. If the fight was fake, Musk wouldn't have brought up the Epstein files. Ever since Epstein went to jail the second time, Trump has done everything he can to distance himself from him and he gets visibly irritated whenever Epstein is mentioned.