I think you make a good case for the diversity of approaches to advocacy, but I don't buy that "Machiavellian cleverness" is as infeasible as you seem to think.
Information security is hard, but not that hard, and frankly the AI safety community needs to be better at it anyway. It's really not that difficult for a small org to externally present as highly conservative while many of its staff maintain connections with people in the same field nominally on the other side of the political divide. It mainly takes commitment and deliberate messaging. The information environment is chaotic and denials of evidence are relatively easy - consider how many people who are still in power have pictures together with Jeffrey Epstein.
Worth noting also that this is mainly an American issue; few other countries are so thoroughly and bitterly divided that third party advocacy about literal existential risk, perhaps the only thing where everyone has a common interest.
The real having your cake and eating it too is being able to keep the high level of alignment and low level of costly infighting while also being able to influence any given party in power.
I think you make a good case for the diversity of approaches to advocacy, but I don't buy that "Machiavellian cleverness" is as infeasible as you seem to think.
Information security is hard, but not that hard, and frankly the AI safety community needs to be better at it anyway. It's really not that difficult for a small org to externally present as highly conservative while many of its staff maintain connections with people in the same field nominally on the other side of the political divide. It mainly takes commitment and deliberate messaging. The information environment is chaotic and denials of evidence are relatively easy - consider how many people who are still in power have pictures together with Jeffrey Epstein.
Worth noting also that this is mainly an American issue; few other countries are so thoroughly and bitterly divided that third party advocacy about literal existential risk, perhaps the only thing where everyone has a common interest.
The real having your cake and eating it too is being able to keep the high level of alignment and low level of costly infighting while also being able to influence any given party in power.