Fed Goes Hunting For Malcontents 193
snydeq writes "The wake of State Department document leaks to WikiLeaks may have the unhappy rousted from government agencies' 'privileged insiders' ranks, thanks to a recent memo from the US OMB asking agencies to spell out their strategies for minimizing insider risk. 'It's likely that federal contractors and government suppliers will also find themselves responding to this list of questions (PDF) and the central issue of preventing the unauthorized disclosure of sensitive and classified materials. In a key section of the memo, the OMB requests information on whether organizations are measuring the "trustworthiness" of their employees and whether they use a psychiatrist or sociologist to measure the unhappiness of an employee as a measure of trustworthiness.'"
Bad Idea (Score:4, Insightful)
Ignore the real problem (Score:5, Insightful)
They are ignoring the real problem. Why did this guy have access to all of that? Why was the data not walled off some? Seems he had the ability to access and download data that was irrelevant for his job and THAT was the issue that made this such a problem.
unhappiness != untrustworthy (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Bad Idea (Score:3, Insightful)
Exactly that. If you treat me with implicit trust, I have an obligation to be worthy of it. If you don't, I don't owe a damn thing, and you may not get anything more than what you can make me do, which is inevitably a lot less than i would have done on my own.
Re:Malcontents? (Score:3, Insightful)
"Malcontents" and "ne'er do wells"? Jesus Christ, this is America. The line forms over here.
odd... (Score:4, Insightful)
I thought the REAL problem was that the government is violating its own laws/treaties, lying to its citizens, etc...
I do agree, though, that going on a witch hunt for people who MIGHT not "go along w/the program" is definitely ignoring the real problem...
petition...Government for...redress of grievances (Score:4, Insightful)
OF COURSE the abusers of power in government don't want these people to have a place to speak, or anything substantive to say when they do speak. That's WHY this right is protected!
Who else but the people who are pissed off against you are going to petition for grievances?
And they have a right to do it, and they have a right to KNOW you're screwing them over--so that they CAN call you on your BS.
If you specifically select against malcontents, you're not protecting yourself against security risks. You're abridging a fundamental right.
Here's the text if you don't feel like looking it up. It's not like anybody got killed so you could have it:
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
Re:Thought Police (Score:2, Insightful)
Excuse me, but it's been this way in private industry for quite some time.
"We're wondering if you're happy in your job here with Megacorp."?
""Happy"? You've just asked me to work an additional 2 hours a day for no extra pay and weekends and you've increased my health insurance co-pays, and laid off half of my department and put their work on me, and I'm sitting in a fucking cubicle with fluorescent lights above my head that are strobing at a frequency guaranteed to make give me a psychotic break and I just spent 3 hours in a fucking team-building meeting while I've got a stack of work on my desk and deadlines that will keep me here all day Saturday and half of Sunday and I just read in Business Week that the CEO has been given a bigger stock option plan because of the company's record profits after telling me that due to "cost-cutting" I won't be getting a raise for the sixth year in a row. You want to know if I'm FUCKING HAPPY??? I'll show you fucking happy..." [takes out Glock 9mm with extended magazine as seen on TV]
Disgruntled != Unhappy (Score:5, Insightful)
Obviously the summary (and the story) use the word "unhappy" to make it seem (more?) unreasonable than it is, as usual.
Re:Doesn't Figure (Score:2, Insightful)
They are not talking about generic unhappiness, they are talking about being unhappy with your job/management.
So, complaining about your boss might get you fired? Now there's a recipe for mismanagement waiting to happen.
There's a demotivational poster [despair.com] in there somewhere...
Too bad, so sad (Score:3, Insightful)
Funny to see how the US government is reacting to the Cablegate events in all the wrong ways. Instead of taking the opportunity to show the American people that it is a democratic government, and demonstrate for a change some measure of honesty and willingness to take a stand for people's freedom and rights, it simply makes it clearer by the minute what its intent is: grab the power, keep the power, perpetuate that situation and screw those who oppose it.
By these actions, this government, like those of most other countries, is making itself the enemy of the people. This may be a bleak world, but that's the only one we've got.
Re:Ignore the real problem (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Doesn't Figure (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes, it is. It means that someone who is unhappy will simply hide his opinions, which of course gives him more reasons to be unhappy: "I'll be fired if I don't toe the party line! I'm being oppressed!" And of course he's quite right, whether his original problem had any basis in reality or not. This means that not only does this not solve the problem, but will actually make it worse, as well as puts a chilling effect on freedom of expression.
Yet another bright idea from our brave leaders worthy of a Dilbert Award.
Re:Happy Workers! (Score:5, Insightful)
Tell them to stop spending so much time watching Fox News.
Re:unhappiness != untrustworthy (Score:5, Insightful)
What will you do if, while working for the government, you come up with evidence of highly illegal activities by your higher-ups? You'll either publish the evidence and violate their trust, or not publish and thus help cover their crimes, thus violating the trust of the public who ultimately pay your paycheck.
Not violating trust is a fine principle, but it also allows corruption to continue unhindered. It also allows corporations to kill people through neglect like BP did. It allowed the Catholic Church to keep on protecting pdeophile priests for decades and pretend that this was a good thing. Or, to stop beating around the bush, it allowed Nazi death camps to operate despite every participant knowing perfectly well - judging by their own letters - that they were doing a horrible, vile thing.
Every organization needs people who are ready to betray it. Otherwise there's nothing stopping it from rotting to the very core.
Re:That's not what this is (Score:5, Insightful)
And what are they going to do when they find unhappy employees? Are they going to find out why they are unhappy and see what they are going to do to help? Or are they going to fire them? If it's the latter, then we've got unhappy employees with an incentive to lie to keep their jobs. Now you *can't* trust your employees anymore.
Re:Ignore the real problem (Score:4, Insightful)
Besides, if the government hasn't done anything wrong, it should have nothing to hide? I mean, those rules work for citizens, why wouldn't they work for the government?