The Pentagon Leaker

[HomerJS]

This guy wasn't old enough to know if he could be trusted. Are TS clearances that easy? I suspect someone greased those skids.

 

[nakedfrog]

We shouldn't be allowing children to make life-altering decisions like getting a security clearance before age 25, as their brains are not yet fully developed.

 

[Heartbreaker]

Yup. A fine, upstanding, white, male, anti-Semitic, racist Christian. Just MTG's cup of tea.

Confirmed to be fine examples of young Republicans:

https://www.npr.org/2023/04/14/1169952771/jack-teixeira-background-pentagon-document-leak

NPR found that many users of the Discord channel where Teixeira leaked information were fascinated by Orthodox Catholicism, guns, as well as racist, vile memes.

 

[hal2kilo]

This guy wasn't old enough to know if he could be trusted. Are TS clearances that easy? I suspect someone greased those skids.

They must have interviewed several acquaintances, and neighbors. It's not fool proof though. Going through your initial clearance in no walk in the park, and at TS you are supposed to get a Periodic Review (PR) every 5 years. Unfortunately, at the time I retired, my people were backed up like 2 years for their supposed 5 year review, I guess, due to lack of personnel.

 

[Pens1566]

This guy wasn't old enough to know if he could be trusted. Are TS clearances that easy? I suspect someone greased those skids.

They must have interviewed several acquaintances, and neighbors. It's not fool proof though. Going through your initial clearance in no walk in the park, and at TS you are supposed to get a Periodic Review (PR) every 5 years. Unfortunately, at the time I retired, my people were backed up like 2 years for their supposed 5 year review, I guess, due to lack of personnel.

As someone else already said, easier to get cleared when you're young. Less of a history to investigate. Not uncommon to be cleared as a civilian contractor as an immediate new grad. No skids typically greased.

And yes, all investigations are backed up. Always have been. This dude was on his initial one though.

 

[Vic]

I'm fascinated by the narrative that a guy who leaked classified documents to impress his small group of online friends is some kind of Snowden-esque hero whistleblower.
The Republican party is like a fantasy role-playing game now, where the goal is who can come up with the biggest self-aggrandizing bullshit.

 

[Pens1566]

I'm fascinated by the narrative that a guy who leaked classified documents to impress his small group of online friends is some kind of Snowden-esque hero whistleblower.
The Republican party is like a fantasy role-playing game now, where the goal is who can come up with the biggest self-aggrandizing bullshit.

Nothing strange about it to me, he's their base. Your typical "Y'all-qaeda" foot soldier.

 

[HomerJS]

As someone else already said, easier to get cleared when you're young. Less of a history to investigate. Not uncommon to be cleared as a civilian contractor as an immediate new grad. No skids typically greased.

And yes, all investigations are backed up. Always have been. This dude was on his initial one though.

There's no way they investigated him without checking his online posts/profiles. His antisemitism and racism should have been disqualifying.

 

[HomerJS]

I need to work for the FBI. Why am I so good at predicting the actions of these people?

It's not hard, just imagine the worst in human kind and there's your answer.

MSN

www.msn.com

I agree with Liz. Get that process started. we have to get our security locked down.

Liz Cheney says Greene should lose security clearance for defending suspect in Pentagon docs leak

 

[hal2kilo]

I'm fascinated by the narrative that a guy who leaked classified documents to impress his small group of online friends is some kind of Snowden-esque hero whistleblower.
The Republican party is like a fantasy role-playing game now, where the goal is who can come up with the biggest self-aggrandizing bullshit.

It's all performative, 24/7.

 

[Pens1566]

There's no way they investigated him without checking his online posts/profiles. His antisemitism and racism should have been disqualifying.

It's entirely possible. One, they don't typically ask any questions specifically about online habits. Two, those posts could have come after his investigation was completed and his clearance granted. After that, it's up to any adverse reporting ... which would have been highly unlikely in this scenario.

 

[VRAMdemon]

I need to work for the FBI. Why am I so good at predicting the actions of these people?

It's not hard, just imagine the worst in human kind and there's your answer.

MSN

www.msn.com

In some conservative circles Pro-Russia = Anti-War even though the war started when Russia invaded Ukraine without provocation, and only ends when Russia stops.

Also note the white persecution cries.

Greene said, "He told the truth about troops being on the ground in Ukraine and a lot more. Ask yourself who is the real enemy?"

‘Who is the real enemy?’ Hmm… I’m pretty sure it’s the traitor who disclosed classified information to enemy and adversary nations, and the people who support him.

Way to protect that Homeland Security, Marge.

 

[Vic]

Nothing strange about it to me, he's their base. Your typical "Y'all-qaeda" foot soldier.

I just marvel at their capacity for self-deception.

 

[HomerJS]

I bet the leaker subscribed to this ideology...

MSN

www.msn.com

 

[Vic]

I bet the leaker subscribed to this ideology...

MSN

www.msn.com

I question if his definition of citizens includes anyone besides those he agrees with. He doesn't think that (for example) antifa or blm has a right to violently overthrow the govt, does he? Of course not.
In which case, he's not saying that "citizens" have the right to overthrow the govt, but that that his group of citizens has the "right" to violently impose its form of govt on the majority of citizens. Which the real reason right-wing extremists love their guns. Not for the 2a and freedom, but for intimidating anyone they don't like or disagree with.

 

[[DHT]Osiris]

There's no way they investigated him without checking his online posts/profiles. His antisemitism and racism should have been disqualifying.

I uh, don't know if those are strictly disqualifying. Compromised, potentially compromised/compromise-able, or untrustworthy. I think those are the things they care about.

 

[HomerJS]

I need to work for the FBI. Why am I so good at predicting the actions of these people?

It's not hard, just imagine the worst in human kind and there's your answer.

MSN

www.msn.com

BTW - I don't ever want to hear again anybody on the right bitching about crime. Why? My axiom gets proven over and over. Pubs are cool with crime if the perps look like them.

 

[Pohemi]

Background checks are more likely to flag someone for having been a protesting pacifist than for confirmed overt racism and bigotry, membership in a militia, etc.

 

[woolfe9998]

They must have interviewed several acquaintances, and neighbors. It's not fool proof though. Going through your initial clearance in no walk in the park, and at TS you are supposed to get a Periodic Review (PR) every 5 years. Unfortunately, at the time I retired, my people were backed up like 2 years for their supposed 5 year review, I guess, due to lack of personnel.

Never had to get one myself, but when I was in my late teens, a friend of mine was applying for a job at a defense contractor in Silicon Valley. I got at least two calls, I think from different agencies, asking me all kinds of questions about him, including highly personal questions. I recall struggling with whether I should tell him that the guy had smoked weed or not. I didn't want to kill the clearance but I was afraid I'd get in trouble if I lied.

 

[repoman0]

I recall struggling with whether I should tell him that the guy had smoked weed or not. I didn't want to kill the clearance but I was afraid I'd get in trouble if I lied.

Doesn’t necessarily kill the clearance unless he lied about it on his paperwork. I know people who have sailed through admitting it (myself included 🙄) and others who had to go to an adjudication hearing, and got the clearance in each case. Doubt anyone would have told me if they lied and got caught though. The decisions and hearing results are all public record, you can search through and read them, anonymized of course.

Plenty of young people have TS, SCI and special programs clearances and handle it just fine. At my workplaces JWICS has always been tightly guarded, really surprised he was able to casually browse and pull info out. Anyone with a clearance gets many grave warnings about the consequences of mishandling information and documents.

 

[Moonbeam]

Never had to get one myself, but when I was in my late teens, a friend of mine was applying for a job at a defense contractor in Silicon Valley. I got at least two calls, I think from different agencies, asking me all kinds of questions about him, including highly personal questions. I recall struggling with whether I should tell him that the guy had smoked weed or not. I didn't want to kill the clearance but I was afraid I'd get in trouble if I lied.

It can be expensive if you tell the truth as you believe it to be. In your case I would have lied because I believe my judgment on whether I would consider a person a risk to national security would have only a tangential relationship to whether he had smoked weed. He might have smoked it but decided it wasn’t for him, as one example. If pot and national security have any diagnostic counter indications at all, I would say a person who knows it’s not for him would be safer with secrets than one who could take it up.

 

[nakedfrog]

Anyone with a clearance gets many grave warnings about the consequences of mishandling information and documents.

Hence, at the risk of using a phrase that is rapidly becoming trite, he has reached the "find out" phase.

 

[pcgeek11]

Doesn’t everyone on a nuclear sub have a TSC?

BTW, who cleans the toilets on a sub?

Most probably do esp these days, but in my time many did not. For example a Cook, Seaman Gang, A Gang Machinist, Engineman ... etc

On a Submarine ( at least during my time ) everybody gets a turn scrubbing the shitter. Well except the officers.

We also used to load stores by hand where everybody passed food hand to hand into the boat.

 

[[DHT]Osiris]

Most probably do esp these days, but in my time many did not. For example a Cook, Seaman Gang, A Gang Machinist, Engineman ... etc

On a Submarine ( at least during my time ) everybody gets a turn scrubbing the shitter. Well except the officers.

We also used to load stores by hand where everybody passed food hand to hand into the boat.

Funny, me and my group of idiot children got (verbal) commendation from our basic field training instructors for cracking the code on that one all on our lonesome. Like 60 of us and a trailer full of pallets to unload that became a clusterfuck so we self-organized quickly. Apparently everyone else just did it onesey-twosey.

 

[Zorba]

There's no way they investigated him without checking his online posts/profiles. His antisemitism and racism should have been disqualifying.

I think you have much higher expectations for backgrounds than reality. I have a Russian speaking coworker, with family somewhere over there, and goes to Russian telegram channels. He was approved in less than 3 weeks. For a secret, not TS.