Monday, October 31, 2022
Mars, Bitches
It would be useful to have some published reflection about why, for years, Elon Musk's every technology promise was treated with minimal skepticism, if any, by most reporters covering him. Many of his claims were used to support defrauding the government in various ways (such frauds are often "forgotten" because it makes the politicians look bad).
Just one example.
Just one example.
And then Tesla started talking about battery swap. And it was very strange because Better Place’s business model was built around swap, and it made sense for them. With Tesla, it didn’t really make sense because if you own the car, and you own the battery, and you’ve taken care of that battery, do you want it swapped out with some battery whose provenance you’re not familiar with? Probably not. And so I became really intrigued by it. And I couldn’t find anybody describing actually using the station. They unveiled it. There was all this fanfare. Musk said it was all automated. But it was all happening behind a curtain. This was 2015. So there’s been a lot of water under the bridge now in Tesla world since then. And long story short, on a whim one Memorial Day weekend, I went down to the swap station, which is in a cow stockyard in the middle of the California Central Valley. And what I found there was that it was a busy holiday weekend, and Tesla had not opened it. It had not invited, as it claimed, the people who were using its vehicles to drive between LA and San Francisco. They said they were targeting the people with invites to use the station. There were long lines of people at the superchargers. People I was interviewing were saying, We would happily pay hundreds of dollars to just swap out our batteries and go now. Kids were crying in the backseat. What Tesla did do, instead of making that station open as it had told the public it was—and, by the way, they told the California Air Resources Board, which was subsidizing it quite heavily—was ship in some extra superchargers and hook them up to diesel generators. Instead of seeing this cutting edge future battery swap technology, I saw Tesla—literally the long tail pipe problem, as it’s called—become very, very short, as these diesel generators puffed out emissions and recharged these Teslas.The fraud was using claims about battery swap technology to get tax credits.
Affirmative Action
The Law is an ass and it's a waste of my beautiful mind to spend time on the legal arguments which are all Calvinball, but not only will the SUPREMOS overturn affirmative action, they will leave any race neutral efforts efforts to enhance student body diversity under such a cloud that any accepted black person will be evidence of a violation. Admitting "too many" black people will be proof of violation, and right wing legal groups will be constantly taking universities to court.
Which is the point of all of this.
Which is the point of all of this.
The Way We Play
Sometimes IRL friends ask me to predict elections and, well, I got nothin'. You can look at polls, you can take polls and average them, you can take polls and average them with some extra special sauce, you can consult your vibes, you can combine vibes with polls, and, well, it's all basically bullshit except the looking at the basic raw poll numbers. I have no special insight, and find the election prediction industry to be especially annoying, especially as I suspect a big chunk of the polls are just made up.
I don't mean news orgs are faking them, but every leak to journalists about "internal polling" are likely nonsense, designed to MANIPULATIVE THE NARRATIVE. We'll find out soon!
I don't mean news orgs are faking them, but every leak to journalists about "internal polling" are likely nonsense, designed to MANIPULATIVE THE NARRATIVE. We'll find out soon!
Quiet Quitting
The police reputation of actually solving crimes that don't happen right in front of their faces (or that they don't instigate) has been a bit overblown to say the least, but "everybody knows" since 2020 that cops nationally have basically stopped doing their jobs at all because they got their feefees hurt. This piece is better than most.
Later:
In Portland, Ore., vehicle thefts have soared, and the police say they are focused on other crimes. Now victims are helping each other track down their own cars.In that subhed we have the rare "police say" rather than an assertion of fact.
Later:
In Portland, the brazenness of the crimes, inattention from the police and desperation of residents who suddenly find themselves missing one of their most valuable possessions have led many to take matters into their own hands.Doesn't ever come out and say it, but at least a bit of reporter skepticism towards the basic police line of, "WE ARE SO BUSY BATTLING ANTIFA AND BEING HOSPITALIZED FROM RAINBOW FENTANYL EXPOSURE THAT WE CAN'T POSSIBLE SOLVE NON-IMAGINARY CRIMES."
Lula
The politics of other countries are generally pretty inscrutable to outsiders, but Bolsonaro certainly seemed quite bad for some very obvious reasons that didn't require an understanding of complicated nuance.
Good Lula won in Brazil, good there doesn't seem to be an unfolding coup, and as importantly, good that it seems that the Western Blob was not actually trying to undermine Lula. A rare thing when there's a leftist politician in Central/South America!
Biden's foreign policy leans towards do the right thing more than any president in my lifetime, as far as I can tell. Interesting the usual suspects weren't screeching against Lula this time, nonetheless. The Blob is better understood as an entity with its own preferred outcomes, not one that the US president necessarily controls.
Good Lula won in Brazil, good there doesn't seem to be an unfolding coup, and as importantly, good that it seems that the Western Blob was not actually trying to undermine Lula. A rare thing when there's a leftist politician in Central/South America!
Biden's foreign policy leans towards do the right thing more than any president in my lifetime, as far as I can tell. Interesting the usual suspects weren't screeching against Lula this time, nonetheless. The Blob is better understood as an entity with its own preferred outcomes, not one that the US president necessarily controls.
Sunday, October 30, 2022
Afternoon Thread
Somewhat torn, as I feel as Elon has been one of my longtime obsessions I have more justification than most to focus on him, but also "every time Elon tweets" should not be major news.
Hippie Shit
"Billionaires shouldn't exist" will soon be another more generally accepted idea that The Left was prematurely correct about, for the wrong reasons.
Elon's Bots
Don't think it's been said enought that the reason Elon was convinced that Twitter was filled with Bots is that he probably paid for most of them.
I spent years telling you that Elon was a dumb asshole fraud. Did any of you listen? NOOOOOOOOOOO (ok maybe some of you did).
Now he's spreading insane right wing homophobic conspiracy theories on twitter. Gonna have to start contacting his advertisers when the election is over.
Predicting The Sunday Shows
"Someone intended to kill Nancy Pelosi because people on Both Sides are mean on the internet."
Saturday, October 29, 2022
HOW DAREST THOU, SIRRAH, HAVETH YOUEST NO HONOR?!!?!?!?
Democrats have to learn that this is not the right response to Republicans being assholes, or if they really want to do it that way they have to learn the full Lindsay Graham hissy fit technique.
Don't appeal to their better natures. Make clear they don't have them.
Don't appeal to their better natures. Make clear they don't have them.
Tech Bros And Pundits And Donald Trump Have A Lot In Common
NYT did a big splash with Bretbug dishonestly claiming he was a climate change "agnostic" previously (he was a flat out climate change denier, his editors don't care if he lies), but after an all expenses paid trip to Greenland he's a believer. Still we shouldn't do anything about it because "markets" will fix it.
Just a ridiculous person at a ridiculous newspaper. Celebrate my wrongness! Celebrate this guy we hired despite his wrongness! Celebrate his intellectual journey from being completely wrong to mostly wrong! Let our elite pundits just lie to our readers! It's just like, opinion, man. Buy a newspaper, for democracy!
The common theme is, I am an expert in this thing I have spent 10 minutes thinking about, and if I ever change my mind, I was right to be wrong and you were wrong to be right. My vibes are perfect, they provide the answers to every question.
Also lying is okay, if the right people are doing it.
Just a ridiculous person at a ridiculous newspaper. Celebrate my wrongness! Celebrate this guy we hired despite his wrongness! Celebrate his intellectual journey from being completely wrong to mostly wrong! Let our elite pundits just lie to our readers! It's just like, opinion, man. Buy a newspaper, for democracy!
The common theme is, I am an expert in this thing I have spent 10 minutes thinking about, and if I ever change my mind, I was right to be wrong and you were wrong to be right. My vibes are perfect, they provide the answers to every question.
Also lying is okay, if the right people are doing it.
Actually Bret Stephens was worse than an agnostic -- which, given the facts available, would be bad enough. Stephens compared climate scientists to Stalin. And then, *after he did that,* the New York Times hired him, and published a climate falsehood in his very first column.
— Jamison Foser (@jamisonfoser) October 28, 2022
Stupidest Man Alive
Christ, what a dumbass.
Here it is: Twitter engineers were told today to *print out* their last 30 to 60 days of code, so they could show it to Elon Musk himself.
— Casey Newton (@CaseyNewton) October 28, 2022
Then they were told wait, no, actually, please shred all that code you just printed out.
Subscribe to read ➡️https://t.co/ad9XTdVQhJ pic.twitter.com/sbO8tD8hGN
This is Elon pretending he's a software engineer, and then someone pointing out that this is the stupidest fucking idea ever and no real software engineer would ask it.Happy Friday all. pic.twitter.com/Rk9m1v1hmu
— Leah Culver (@leahculver) October 28, 2022
Council Of Wankers
Musk is doing the tech bro thing, assuming the people who have thought long and hard about issues (which doesn't make them always right!) have nothing to offer, and is going to convene a GRAND COUNCIL OF MODERATION, which will probably be made up of a bunch of Nazi freaks and one fake left wing person.
I have become mildly obsessed with this issue, not necessarily because it matters, but because it's one of those places where there are actually people with expertise and "nobody" cares. We had years of newspaper comments sections being racist trash fires, with the responses basically being nothing but, "shut them down."
It's fine to shut them down, but you could also hire someone to sensibly run them instead of some failson intern. Sure most newspapers have no money now, but that wasn't true 17 years ago.
Anyway, everyone who has dealt with internet community moderation comes to the same basic conclusions of what needs to be done. Plenty of people who worked for Reddit or Slashdot or any number of communities over the years know the score.
Musk has the additional issue of big brand advertisers to worry about, but the solutions are the same.
Even corners of the internet filled with the worst people have active moderation, even if the focus is different.
Whenever I write about this I actually resist writing about what those solutions are, because I'm not giving away those secrets for free!!!
After finalizing his takeover and ousting senior leadership, Musk declared on Friday that he would be forming a new “content moderation council” that would bring together “diverse views” on the issue.I'll bet those "diverse views" include precisely no one who has ever dealt with online moderation, just a bunch of Nazis arguing over whether the N-word gets you a ban or not (no!).
I have become mildly obsessed with this issue, not necessarily because it matters, but because it's one of those places where there are actually people with expertise and "nobody" cares. We had years of newspaper comments sections being racist trash fires, with the responses basically being nothing but, "shut them down."
It's fine to shut them down, but you could also hire someone to sensibly run them instead of some failson intern. Sure most newspapers have no money now, but that wasn't true 17 years ago.
Anyway, everyone who has dealt with internet community moderation comes to the same basic conclusions of what needs to be done. Plenty of people who worked for Reddit or Slashdot or any number of communities over the years know the score.
Musk has the additional issue of big brand advertisers to worry about, but the solutions are the same.
Even corners of the internet filled with the worst people have active moderation, even if the focus is different.
Whenever I write about this I actually resist writing about what those solutions are, because I'm not giving away those secrets for free!!!
Friday, October 28, 2022
No I Am Not A Priority
Fundraising week is over, but I did forget to mention one thing: Please, please, don't feel any guilt about not adding some cash to my Madeira vacation fund. Keeping this place "free" isn't just a business decision.
Elon Musk's Bird App
As I've said before, being in charge of moderating an internet community is a good thing to wish on your worst enemy.
Even if Musk doesn't like the current approach to things, it was really dumb to fire the person responsible for setting it up. I mean, it's probably really dumb to fire anyone important on your "first day."
Internet community moderation is one of those highly skilled tasks that only people who have done it have any understanding of. I'm not saying it's so difficult that you need an advanced degree in troll hunting to do it, but it's on the list of things everyone imagines is easy and, well, nope.
Elon, pay me a bunch of money and I'll explain it to you.
An emboldened cast of anonymous trolls spewed racist slurs and Nazi memes onto Twitter in the hours after billionaire industrialist Elon Musk took over the social network Thursday, raising fears of how his pledge of unrestricted free speech could fuel a new wave of online hate.
Even if Musk doesn't like the current approach to things, it was really dumb to fire the person responsible for setting it up. I mean, it's probably really dumb to fire anyone important on your "first day."
Internet community moderation is one of those highly skilled tasks that only people who have done it have any understanding of. I'm not saying it's so difficult that you need an advanced degree in troll hunting to do it, but it's on the list of things everyone imagines is easy and, well, nope.
Elon, pay me a bunch of money and I'll explain it to you.
Age
John Kerry is going to be 79 soon. When he ran for president he was 60. Howard Dean is almost 74. Whatever the merits of either, it's funny that Kerry was the "old guy" in that race and Dean was the youngster.
Sounds Bad
Was waiting to see if this was "random" or if they were targeted.
WASHINGTON (AP) — AP sources: Suspect who attacked Paul Pelosi, House speaker's husband, specifically targeted their home.
— David Mack (@davidmackau) October 28, 2022
META
I think my very simple view of "virtual reality" is: if it isn't as good as the holodeck, it isn't going to work as its proponents want. A bit like self-driving cars, really, in that if they don't work perfectly (and I don't just mean safety) they don't really work in the way people would want.
Though Zuck's vision of his virtual reality of "like reality, but with the shittier parts made shittier" is extra funny. The virtual reality office! Amazing stuff.
Though Zuck's vision of his virtual reality of "like reality, but with the shittier parts made shittier" is extra funny. The virtual reality office! Amazing stuff.
What A Strange Piece
From that Fucking Newspaper:
What does Nate Cohn have to say about Nate Cohn's piece?
A new series of House polls by The New York Times and Siena College across four archetypal swing districts offers fresh evidence that Republicans are poised to retake Congress this fall as the party dominated among voters who care most about the economy.Sounds bad for Democrats!
Democrats continue to show resilience in places where abortion is still high on the minds of voters, and where popular incumbents are on the ballot. Indeed, the Democrats were still tied or ahead in all four districts — three of which were carried by Mr. Biden in 2020. But the party’s slim majority — control could flip if just five seats change hands — demands that it essentially run the table everywhere, at a moment when the economy has emerged as the driving issue in all but the country’s wealthier enclaves.Wait, What? Computer, enhance:
So he had some vibes, the polls didn't agree with the vibes, so he wrote up the vibes anyway.Obviously, four districts can't say a ton about the battle for the House.
— Nate Cohn (@Nate_Cohn) October 28, 2022
But on balance, the polls are better for Democrats than I would have guessed given our national polling (yes, the methodology is identical), esp in KS-03 -- which feels like a possible outlier
Religion As A Weapon
One thing I have shed with age is any impulse to grant religious fakery any respect. Tucker's about as much as a believer as I am, unless belief in his own divinity counts. This is true of almost everybody who invokes religion in politics.
The specific claim is, of course, absurd, but persecution complexes are the under acknowledged great attraction of Christianity.
The specific claim is, of course, absurd, but persecution complexes are the under acknowledged great attraction of Christianity.
Thursday, October 27, 2022
The Rough Streets Of The Main Line
Haley's kid goes to Villanova, which is in the old money Philly suburbs. The Main Line. I mean, I'm frightened by the suburbs, but walking off of Villanova's campus doesn't take you to the kinds places which are coded "dangerous" to Americans, whatever the reality.My son goes to school here in Pennsylvania. And as a mom, I worry about his safety every single time he steps foot off campus.
— Nikki Haley (@NikkiHaley) October 26, 2022
I know @DrOz will have the backs of law enforcement and keep our kids safe—and that's why I'm asking you all to vote for him on Election Day. pic.twitter.com/Khp6wFN0Fp
If we're meant to understand that PHILLY IS SCARY, Villanova is 6 miles from the border of Philly. I walk a lot, but probably the kid isn't doing that walk.
Objectivity
Regarding this: you can argue both fairly represent the story (as written or actual), or one or the other, or neither, which really is the point. There is no such thing as "objective journalism" beyond listing the box scores and similar.
FALL FUNDRAISING DAY THE LAST
I used to think I'd do this blogging thing as long as it paid the bills, and at some point I'd have to figure out what to do with the rest of my life. Truth is, though, I'm no longer sure what I could do with the rest of my life! Once upon a time I imagined a variety of possibilities - and turned down a few - but the career opportunities for 'that guy who was portrayed on West Wing for 7 seconds' aren't what they used to be!
Anyway, point is, I greatly appreciate the support!
Patreon:
Become a Patron!
There were a few years when this blog made "good money," since then I'd say it's been, "fine." All the advertising went from being the primary revenue to being more a bit of extra, with contributions/subscriptions/patrons/whateverImcalling them being most of the revenue.
Thanks to all! Off to Madeira for a month now (joke).
Anyway, point is, I greatly appreciate the support!
Paypal:
Patreon:
Become a Patron!
There were a few years when this blog made "good money," since then I'd say it's been, "fine." All the advertising went from being the primary revenue to being more a bit of extra, with contributions/subscriptions/patrons/whateverImcalling them being most of the revenue.
Thanks to all! Off to Madeira for a month now (joke).
Even Worse
They win and immediately start trying to co-opt and neutralize any independent actors and spend half their time distancing themselves from them, and not in a productive way.the insane complacency that set in because biden won was something i worried about for a long time, cause i saw this same thing back in 2009. democrats win an election and they think that's the whole ball game, so they just lean back and relax. and we get fucked.
— Oliver Willis (@owillis) October 27, 2022
The productive way is to say, "Those guys are nuts, but we are reasonable, here's our reasonable version." Not "those guys are nuts fuck them we are not them we hate them we are not the party of doing that horrible thing we love working with our good friends the Republicans!!!
We can argue about who "they" refers to, precisely, but it is a pattern. When out of power there is some openness.
What If I'm The Only Sane One
It is somewhat mentally taxing when everyone is running around insisting that 2+2=5 and you're pretty sure (some doubts!) that 2+2=4. My mental health at the time was not the most important thing, but having the overwhelming weight of public discourse in favor of the Iraq war, based on some pretty obviously not true things and transparently ridiculous propaganda, was actually quite the strain.
I suppose the second time I felt that way was in the post-financial crisis Era of Austerity. Watching economists just chuck everything they had claimed they knew out the window, justified in part by a silly paper with an excel error (it was silly even without the error!), and then when the error was uncovered, saying, essentially, "nonetheless, the point still stands."
Now I suppose it isn't one big thing precisely, but a whole mess of small obviously wrong things that The Discourse agrees are True.
I'm not saying I'm right about everything and if people disagree then the world has gone mad. Just that there are moments when elite opinion coalesces around nonsense (crime surge!) and no amount of furious blogging can combat it.
Increasingly I realize this is because a lot of people do pretend to believe things they don't, and pretend not to know things they do know, because for various reasons it's easier that way. That boat isn't going to repair itself.
I don't have grand delusions about being The Last Trutheller or nonsense like that, but I don't have to keep The Boss happy, and don't even do anything resembling "networking" anymore. I used to hobnob in DC a bit but it's been a long long time.
I suppose the second time I felt that way was in the post-financial crisis Era of Austerity. Watching economists just chuck everything they had claimed they knew out the window, justified in part by a silly paper with an excel error (it was silly even without the error!), and then when the error was uncovered, saying, essentially, "nonetheless, the point still stands."
Now I suppose it isn't one big thing precisely, but a whole mess of small obviously wrong things that The Discourse agrees are True.
I'm not saying I'm right about everything and if people disagree then the world has gone mad. Just that there are moments when elite opinion coalesces around nonsense (crime surge!) and no amount of furious blogging can combat it.
Increasingly I realize this is because a lot of people do pretend to believe things they don't, and pretend not to know things they do know, because for various reasons it's easier that way. That boat isn't going to repair itself.
I don't have grand delusions about being The Last Trutheller or nonsense like that, but I don't have to keep The Boss happy, and don't even do anything resembling "networking" anymore. I used to hobnob in DC a bit but it's been a long long time.
Objectitudinal Journalism
How the reporter tweets her story, how her colleague does.
a wapo reporter & editor inadvertently showing off how framing in an objectivity driven newsroom can lead readers to view the same story from radically different perspectives pic.twitter.com/ElxurqpkhB
— dell cameron (@dellcam) October 26, 2022
Wednesday, October 26, 2022
Fuck Off, Glenn
Good stuff.
RICHMOND, Va. (WRIC) — Richmond Public Schools formally rejected Gov. Glenn Youngkin’s proposed transgender policies at a school board meeting Monday night.Congrats to all the DC journalists who elevated this sensible moderate governor.
We're Not Perfect, But Imagine What Garbage Other People Must Be
I keep returning to this, but whenever you see elite political journalists and pundits just assume Real Americans are completely sociopathic garbage people, and do objective debate analysis, or similar, based on that assumption, it stems partially from beliefs they have about their own class of wealthy elite educated numpties.
Basically, we are the best America has to offer - smartest, most moral, most considerate - and if my friends and I are a bunch of racist assholes, just imagine what Cletus down at the diner must be like!
Basically, we are the best America has to offer - smartest, most moral, most considerate - and if my friends and I are a bunch of racist assholes, just imagine what Cletus down at the diner must be like!
Violating The Sacred Rules Of The Federal Justice System
Two weeks before an election, that new insidery Republican DC news outlet, spawned from the various other insidery Republican DC news outlets, is reporting that a sitting Democratic senator is UNDER FEDERAL INVESTIGATION.
I don't think journalists are obligated to obey these fake rules about not announcing such things or taking visible actions close to elections, of course, but I do think more of them should not pretend they are actually rules that are followed. We have a couple VERY RECENT examples highlighting how silly this notion is.
I don't think journalists are obligated to obey these fake rules about not announcing such things or taking visible actions close to elections, of course, but I do think more of them should not pretend they are actually rules that are followed. We have a couple VERY RECENT examples highlighting how silly this notion is.
Local Politicians Showing Their Love For Women
I suppose the utility of this is a clear demonstration of how absurd the very common Sensible Centrist belief that ending Roe and letting states decided was.
Local politicians should decide if you should die from an ectopic pregnancy! Genius stuff, really.
Local politicians should decide if you should die from an ectopic pregnancy! Genius stuff, really.
Open Embrace of Anti-Semitism
For awhile it was the "unacceptable bigotry." Not that it didn't exist, of course, even among people who decried it, but it was unacceptable to be an anti-Semite in public life, and just bumping up against certain tropes was condemnation worthy.
I think arguably this was in part due to the fact that it was another tool used to beat the Left, but not just.
Watching that taboo fade away, with people arguing that Akshually, the real intolerance is not platforming ant-Semites, is quite disturbing!
I think arguably this was in part due to the fact that it was another tool used to beat the Left, but not just.
Watching that taboo fade away, with people arguing that Akshually, the real intolerance is not platforming ant-Semites, is quite disturbing!
Great Moments In Political Journalism
Nuzzi continues to be one of the worst human beings in it!
Reminded that journalists absolutely fucking hated blogs, spat venom when hearing the word, until blogs that were basically "gossiping about DC in a seemingly acid way, but actually just kissed up and punched down, respecting the hierarchy, plus racism" showed up. They loved those bloggers. Like Betsy.
I don't think all observations about Fetterman's stroke-impacted performance are off limits, but "eww the stroke victim makes me feel icky and gross just watching him" is not good!There is no amount of empathy for and understanding about Fetterman’s health and recovery that changes the fact that this is absolutely painful to watch.
— Olivia Nuzzi (@Olivianuzzi) October 26, 2022
"Empathy, don't think that's a real thing."Receipts pic.twitter.com/TLbQbV4aEX
— Oliver Willis (@owillis) October 26, 2022
Reminded that journalists absolutely fucking hated blogs, spat venom when hearing the word, until blogs that were basically "gossiping about DC in a seemingly acid way, but actually just kissed up and punched down, respecting the hierarchy, plus racism" showed up. They loved those bloggers. Like Betsy.
Tuesday, October 25, 2022
Parking Math
I do wish more people would actually think about urban parking for a minute when they're busy getting mad about the lack of on street parking. When urban storefronts are maybe (often not) 2 parking spots wide, and there's a block filled with storefronts, just how many people can park there? And how much will removing a few of spots for bike parking, or an improved pedestrian crosswalk, or streeteries really impact "your" ability to park nearby. Not at all, really. You weren't going to be able to, anyway.
Now, the economic impact of the initiative is being measured for the first time in a new city report that finds that restaurants and bars on the most successful Open Streets reported stronger sales than those on similar commercial streets with car traffic — and in some cases, did better than they did before the pandemic.New York City, as everywhere, has the enraged parking people who see every lost parking spot as a threat to their existence. Don't listen to them.
Abortion Is Health Care
Like all slogans or pithy statements of fact, it could have been criticized for its political utility, but The Very Sensible Centrists mocked it as being untrue. Abortion isn't health care, it's what sluts choose to do when they can't keep their legs closed and they're too irresponsible to raise a child.
Alito body count.
But access to pre- and post-natal care dwindled in Mississippi since the June ruling, making childbirth even more dangerous for poor women and children. The only neonatal intensive care unit in the state’s impoverished Delta region closed in July under financial pressures, moving lifesaving care for ill or premature newborn babies about two hours away by car.You'd have to be nuts to try to practice in these places, and it isn't enough to be a kindly saintly doctor in our glorious modern medical care system, as they don't have the authority to make decisions.
Alito body count.
Uncle Milton
I wouldn't mind a real economist explaining this basic point a bit better than I have been trying to, but I haven't seen any try! Maybe I am dumb!
My take is that Friedman wasn't correct here, but "we" think about inflation as if he was. That is, there is a basic conceptual model of "persistent increases in the price level" which essentially we define as a "monetary phenomenon," but not all increases in the price level are a monetary phenomenon. Fed intervention in this case isn't just about adjusting the knobs and levers a bit. It's more curing the pain in your leg by chopping it off. Yes, if your goal was to stop the leg pain this will (eventually) work, but.
Anyway, the lefty view on this is something like:
1) Modest inflation isn't that big of a deal, and the inflation target should be higher than it has been, though people might believe it is even if their real wages are keeping up.
2) People who want to "cure" the actual ills of inflation (falling real wages) by taking actions which (by their own admission!) by slowing wage growth or worse perhaps aren't too concerned about falling real wages!!!
3) A big chunk of of "inflation" now is due to vertical supply curves! Pick your reasons: shipping bottlenecks, market power abuse, general struggles with turning the economy off (and firing a bunch of skilled workers) and turning it on again (hey where did all the skilled workers go). The big profits are the clue!!
4) Cutting off the leg might cure the pain, but also might cause gangrene!
My take is that Friedman wasn't correct here, but "we" think about inflation as if he was. That is, there is a basic conceptual model of "persistent increases in the price level" which essentially we define as a "monetary phenomenon," but not all increases in the price level are a monetary phenomenon. Fed intervention in this case isn't just about adjusting the knobs and levers a bit. It's more curing the pain in your leg by chopping it off. Yes, if your goal was to stop the leg pain this will (eventually) work, but.
Anyway, the lefty view on this is something like:
1) Modest inflation isn't that big of a deal, and the inflation target should be higher than it has been, though people might believe it is even if their real wages are keeping up.
2) People who want to "cure" the actual ills of inflation (falling real wages) by taking actions which (by their own admission!) by slowing wage growth or worse perhaps aren't too concerned about falling real wages!!!
3) A big chunk of of "inflation" now is due to vertical supply curves! Pick your reasons: shipping bottlenecks, market power abuse, general struggles with turning the economy off (and firing a bunch of skilled workers) and turning it on again (hey where did all the skilled workers go). The big profits are the clue!!
4) Cutting off the leg might cure the pain, but also might cause gangrene!
FALL FUNDRAISING DAY 5
Give me all your money or I become a TikTok star instead!
Joke, of course, but obviously "the internet" has changed quite a lot. I think the fall from the golden age of the blogosphere largely predated the rise of what we think of as "social media," and was due to other reasons, but the new stuff occupies that space now.
I don't fail to "get" TikTok because I'm old (though maybe that too), I've just never liked watching little internet videos like that. I suppose I "get" podcasts, in that I understand why people listen to them, but I never do. The only time I'd listen to that kind of thing is when I'm driving, and I rarely drive!
Consider giving to me instead of that shitty podcaster!!!
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Joke, of course, but obviously "the internet" has changed quite a lot. I think the fall from the golden age of the blogosphere largely predated the rise of what we think of as "social media," and was due to other reasons, but the new stuff occupies that space now.
I don't fail to "get" TikTok because I'm old (though maybe that too), I've just never liked watching little internet videos like that. I suppose I "get" podcasts, in that I understand why people listen to them, but I never do. The only time I'd listen to that kind of thing is when I'm driving, and I rarely drive!
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Nobody Can Move
Economists have dumb models in their heads about largely frictionless economies. Things like "moving costs" don't factor in to their mental models of how things work (no economist on teevee pontificating has a model in a supercomputer, it's all vibes).
"People can just move where the jobs are" is one. A bad assumption in normal times, but certainly a bad assumption when mortgage rates are high. Home prices are also high because no one wants to sell when mortgage rates are so high because, among other reasons, they'd be trading their 3% mortgage in for a 7% one in the new location. Things are not yet going to hell, but...
"People can just move where the jobs are" is one. A bad assumption in normal times, but certainly a bad assumption when mortgage rates are high. Home prices are also high because no one wants to sell when mortgage rates are so high because, among other reasons, they'd be trading their 3% mortgage in for a 7% one in the new location. Things are not yet going to hell, but...
Incentives
I bet these now convicted felons will still be treated like amusing rogues, the way the press always treats Republican dirty tricksters. Turd Blossom, with whom David Broder dined on quail. Roger Stone for *decades*.
Related, conservatives have been terrorizing women going to Planned Parenthood for decades and decades. That's just how it has to be. 20 people show up to Alito's house and THIS MUST NOT STAND and every elected Dem has to answer for it. Punching down is always ok, especially when you're punching the libs. A minor incovenience to important people? THIS IS CANCEL CULTURE.
A pair of right-wing provocateurs pleaded guilty Monday to telecommunications fraud stemming from robocalls made shortly before the 2020 election.The incentives being, "there are rarely any consequences, and even when there are they probably just give you even more attention." Not expecting any serious sentencing here.
Jacob Wohl, 24, and Jack Burkman, 56, each pleaded guilty to one felony count, a spokesperson from the Cuyahoga County Prosecutor’s Office confirmed.
Related, conservatives have been terrorizing women going to Planned Parenthood for decades and decades. That's just how it has to be. 20 people show up to Alito's house and THIS MUST NOT STAND and every elected Dem has to answer for it. Punching down is always ok, especially when you're punching the libs. A minor incovenience to important people? THIS IS CANCEL CULTURE.
Monday, October 24, 2022
Green Tea
For various reasons I was reminded by the moment during the Kerry Campaign when he tried to order Green Tea and Candy Crowley flipped her shit. Even Jeb! risked putting off the rube - the ones who eat nothing but mayonnaise jello and pork fried twinkies - by losing a few pounds, according to all the Dalton grads at the New York Times.
Anyway, the problem with all the "diner safaris" wasn't that our elite publications were trying to explain Trump voters to "us."* It was that they were the people on the planet least able to do that competently. *Half a million Trump voters in New York City - more than several states - something rarely acknowledged.
Anyway, the problem with all the "diner safaris" wasn't that our elite publications were trying to explain Trump voters to "us."* It was that they were the people on the planet least able to do that competently. *Half a million Trump voters in New York City - more than several states - something rarely acknowledged.
Inflation
The DC ghouls are going to invoke it for any nice thing they don't like.
About the only way shifting people off Medicare reduces inflation is if it reduces the number of people. Which I guess it would.This would be good for the budget and economy. And depending on timing, could help reduce inflationary pressure or allow interest rates to come down more quickly.
— Marc Goldwein (@MarcGoldwein) October 24, 2022
They can also be designed to protect and enhance support for lower income workers. https://t.co/WtUjuUqHuE
Opportunities
Whenever you hear something like, "now is not the time to politicize this," or, "surely we all agree," know that there are powerful rich people at the table - the table you have been told not to even try to flick a few notes towards - taking the opportunity of any tragedy to download as much money as they can into their pockets.
The report is clearly motivated by real concern for Ukraine’s situation. But I fear that its proposals threaten to undermine what it seeks to defend. When democracy is under attack we need to tread carefully on political economy. The CEPR authors do the opposite. Contrary to what you might expect, namely that war would lead to a search for solidaristic social and economic measures to shore up the Ukrainian home front, the CEPR team demand radical deregulation. In this respect they outdo the imagination of even a radical observer such as Slavoj Žižek who in a recent piece in project syndicate fondly imagined that the war had led to a temporary retreat of neoliberal designs on Ukraine. History, it seems, is more radical than that. Licensed by formulaic assumptions about endemic corruption and inefficiency on the part of the Ukrainian state, the CEPR authors propose to sever any association between war-making and the state as anything more than a residual safety net. The 21st century has thus given birth to a new strange new vision of warfare without the state. This is all the more striking for the fact that it emerges unbidden out of a far more familiar set of questions.
...
As far as possible the report argues the basic functions of Ukrainian government should be outsourced.Doctors Without Borders can provide basic medical services, while the UN and Red Cross can provide (and pay for) medical supplies. Spending on cultural programmes (such as protecting museums and galleries) can be covered by international organisations and NGOs.
Queer as Folk
She had Fax her column in from Cancelled Island for not wanting to use queer!!!
It's historically ridiculous (and ridiculous anyway) and more importantly it's a page pulled right from the "Gender Critical" TERFs who obviously populate her group chats and email lists.
The point, basically, is gay people are fine because of course we are accepting of gay people, at least the nice normal ones, but don't force me to tolerate those other fucking gross weirdos. If you do, I might stop tolerating the "normal" ones, too!!!!
Endless examples to make a point that shouldn't need to be made, but Mike's book - partly about reclaiming 'Queer' - came out almost 20 years ago.
Whether It Matters If Journalists Are Imprisoned And Repeatedly Raped Depends On Who You Talk To
Not my job as an objective journalist to have an opinion, really.
I'm sure the New York Defense Force will argue he's just expressing their views, but which views get simply stated without rebuttal and which ones don't involves a set of choices.
I stopped even arguing this stuff, because political journalists aren't dumb, they're aware of all of this, they have heard these arguments, and they prefer to pretend their critics are saying unreasonable things because they are, mostly, bad faith actors.
It sucks that political journalists are tarnishing the brand of journalism, but I can't fight that fight for you, good journalists.
Of course, just what is threatening democracy depends on who you talk to. Many Republicans are just as frustrated, convinced that the threat stems from liberal teachers, professors or media personalities who they fear are indoctrinating their children; undocumented immigrants given a path to citizenship; or Democrats widening access to voting so much that they are inviting fraud.Objectitudinal journalist Jonathan Weisman.
I'm sure the New York Defense Force will argue he's just expressing their views, but which views get simply stated without rebuttal and which ones don't involves a set of choices.
I stopped even arguing this stuff, because political journalists aren't dumb, they're aware of all of this, they have heard these arguments, and they prefer to pretend their critics are saying unreasonable things because they are, mostly, bad faith actors.
It sucks that political journalists are tarnishing the brand of journalism, but I can't fight that fight for you, good journalists.
Sunday, October 23, 2022
Bye Boris Johnson
Spent his last day lying to the press that he had the required 100 MPs supporting him. He didn't so he dropped out.
FALL FUNDRAISING DAY 3!!!
I'd say there are worthier causes than me, but that would be false modesty. There are no worthier casuses!
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Gonna Have To Raise Rates More
Another thing which will cause prices to rise but which isn't "inflation" in the Milton Friedman sense ("Inflation is always and everywhere a monetary phenomenon, in the sense that it is and can be produced only by a more rapid increase in the quantity of money than in output.") But it's Friedman's universe, so the response will be to keep raising interest rates and reducing money for investment which could help with all such causes of cost increases.
From Iowa to Ohio, nearly a third of the region is in drought, up from a quarter a week earlier, according to Thursday’s update from the US Drought Monitor. Parched conditions have also jumped in states bordering the Mississippi, like Arkansas, Tennessee, Mississippi and Louisiana.
It all points to little relief for the transportation snafus seen in recent weeks. The dwindling water levels have led to barge groundings, forcing blockages and days-long delays on the Mississippi and Ohio rivers, which are among the most important routes for US heavy industry and agricultural shipments.
The Marketplace Of Ideas
It's changed a bit, but for a long time the WaPo opinion section's primary purpose was for elites in different camps to send public memos to each other. Mostly the center right having a little debate with the right about who to bomb next. No I don't quite understand why this was a necessary function, but that was basically what it was for.
Along those lines, questioning the integritude of the institutions populated by friends of the Washington Post Editorial Board is not the kind of public memo that is acceptable. Debate me, you cowards! Wait, where's my microphone...
Along those lines, questioning the integritude of the institutions populated by friends of the Washington Post Editorial Board is not the kind of public memo that is acceptable. Debate me, you cowards! Wait, where's my microphone...
Saturday, October 22, 2022
Sounds Bad
Probably is!
Some of the classified documents recovered by the FBI from Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home and private club included highly sensitive intelligence regarding Iran and China, according to people familiar with the matter. If shared with others, the people said, such information could expose intelligence-gathering methods that the United States wants to keep hidden from the world.
FUNDRAISING FUN DAY 2
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Props or People
I've said this before, but I do think a big change over the past 20 years, even if one which happened gradually, is that news gets entirely filtered through "political news." This is true of cable news (especially), of the major papers, of all of it. A big chunk of the day at CNN used to be just fairly straightforward rip and read style news coverage, now it's always 8 floating heads discussing What It All Means For Ron DeSantis.
An expanding consequence of this is that, filtered through the Both Sides coverage, things that were generally agreed upon as "bad" can no longer be portrayed as such as long as one political party says it's "Good, Akshually."
These people have had their life upended by DeSantis, and quite often the coverage just treats them as NPCs in the Politics Game. Ron DeSantis ruins 19 lives, how will this play in Tallahassee? What does this mean for 2024?
If Ron DeSantis straps on an automatic weapon and starts personally gunning down homeless people while flanked by state troopers, would the politics lens be put aside? Would The Two Sides Differ On The Legality dominate, "holy shit, Ron DeSantis just murdered a bunch of people."
I don't think this is an absurd example. It isn't actually in a different category from what he did with these people, just a bit more extreme.
An expanding consequence of this is that, filtered through the Both Sides coverage, things that were generally agreed upon as "bad" can no longer be portrayed as such as long as one political party says it's "Good, Akshually."
These people have had their life upended by DeSantis, and quite often the coverage just treats them as NPCs in the Politics Game. Ron DeSantis ruins 19 lives, how will this play in Tallahassee? What does this mean for 2024?
If Ron DeSantis straps on an automatic weapon and starts personally gunning down homeless people while flanked by state troopers, would the politics lens be put aside? Would The Two Sides Differ On The Legality dominate, "holy shit, Ron DeSantis just murdered a bunch of people."
I don't think this is an absurd example. It isn't actually in a different category from what he did with these people, just a bit more extreme.
Friday, October 21, 2022
FALL FUNDRAISING DAY 1
For those getting off work.
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The Ancestors
Got sucked into a free trial of ancestry.com. Never been hugely interested in all of that, but there are bits of half remembered family lore I was told about when I was young that I was mildly interested in confirm/reaffirming.
Didn't spent a lot of time on it, and no major effort to confirm most of what was being suggested to me, but the father's side family lore was basically correct: Romanian Jews fled to England in the 1860s or so, with some local non-Jewish lasses in the mix.
I had thought Black was a simple immigrant name, just chosen to be easy to spell in the new country. It is that, in a way, but also just a direct translation from the Romanian name: Negru.
Maternal grandmother's background a bit of a mystery (to me) still, but I was surprised that the grandfather's side goes all the way back to the 17th century in the US, originating in Wales.
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Didn't spent a lot of time on it, and no major effort to confirm most of what was being suggested to me, but the father's side family lore was basically correct: Romanian Jews fled to England in the 1860s or so, with some local non-Jewish lasses in the mix.
I had thought Black was a simple immigrant name, just chosen to be easy to spell in the new country. It is that, in a way, but also just a direct translation from the Romanian name: Negru.
Maternal grandmother's background a bit of a mystery (to me) still, but I was surprised that the grandfather's side goes all the way back to the 17th century in the US, originating in Wales.
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How Could They Have Done This
UK political journalists and pundits have spent the last several weeks blaming the Tory party membership for choosing Liz Truss. They're all quite convinced that the problem is that the members (people who pay 25 pounds per year, basically) have a say (they began this with Corbyn), and that We Wouldn't Be Having All Of These Problems if not for the interference of the masses.
They think the Tory MPs should have the only say.
Of course the Tory MPs chose Boris in 2019 (technically the members had the final say, but he was the majority choice of the MPs - the members just blessed their decision). The last selection process involved the MPs whittling it down to the top 2, and they were Sunak and Truss. The members then chose Truss, largely because the Daily Mail spent several weeks advocating for her, including pushing some pretty suspicious (likely bullshit) polls.
My point is that "the members" aren't to blame. It's their pals the Tory MPs and their pals who work for the Mail (I don't mean the Mail has mind control powers of the membership, but if they'd gone the other way Sunak would have won).
A new selection process limits the likelihood of the membership having much say even more, and there's still a decent chance Boris Johnson will return!
They'll still blame "the members," because they can't blame the people who were at the same college at Oxford as they were.
They think the Tory MPs should have the only say.
Of course the Tory MPs chose Boris in 2019 (technically the members had the final say, but he was the majority choice of the MPs - the members just blessed their decision). The last selection process involved the MPs whittling it down to the top 2, and they were Sunak and Truss. The members then chose Truss, largely because the Daily Mail spent several weeks advocating for her, including pushing some pretty suspicious (likely bullshit) polls.
My point is that "the members" aren't to blame. It's their pals the Tory MPs and their pals who work for the Mail (I don't mean the Mail has mind control powers of the membership, but if they'd gone the other way Sunak would have won).
A new selection process limits the likelihood of the membership having much say even more, and there's still a decent chance Boris Johnson will return!
They'll still blame "the members," because they can't blame the people who were at the same college at Oxford as they were.
Lock Him Up!
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And of course the judge is letting him stay free pending appeal.BREAKING: Steve Bannon sentenced to four months, fined $6,500.
— Ryan J. Reilly (@ryanjreilly) October 21, 2022
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FALL FUNDRAISING FUN
A strange thing is that blogging is it is a lot harder than it used to be. One reason is there aren't any other blogs! Not many, anyway. Not updated-regularly-and-not-behind-a-paywall blogs. Paywalls generally are frustrating, as is every journalist who complains 'people only read the headlines [tweets]' because, my guys, no one has subscriptions to 20 publications, unless they have institutional access. I can't just link to things without considering the paywall.
The cross-blog conversation has largely been lost. I think that was some of what made the whole blog "culture" fun, if a bit silly, back in the day. Ah, well, no point in dwelling on the past!
Thanks to all who help keep my blogs mighty and strong. It's not hard to blog for a few days, but it's hard to do this "all the time" which is what I do, really, even if that isn't obvious. Not sure blogging is going to SAVE THE WORLD as we once hoped, but hopefully I provide some value to people, still, in providing a space for community at the very least. Internet communities are another thing that have been lost (not completely).
Consider giving some of your money to me instead of the Starbucks asshole!
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The cross-blog conversation has largely been lost. I think that was some of what made the whole blog "culture" fun, if a bit silly, back in the day. Ah, well, no point in dwelling on the past!
Thanks to all who help keep my blogs mighty and strong. It's not hard to blog for a few days, but it's hard to do this "all the time" which is what I do, really, even if that isn't obvious. Not sure blogging is going to SAVE THE WORLD as we once hoped, but hopefully I provide some value to people, still, in providing a space for community at the very least. Internet communities are another thing that have been lost (not completely).
Consider giving some of your money to me instead of the Starbucks asshole!
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Begging bowl out for a week as is the custom.
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Trussed
UK political journalism is even dumber than American political journalism, and I, of all people, know what an extreme statement that is.
Many parts of this, but a big one is that they *all* (journalists, politicians) grew up together, went to school together, married each other, etc. The BBC has a weekly public affairs show, with audience questions, and last night they put on Boris Johnson's sister, who was a regular guest throughout his time in office.
It makes it difficult for any of them to blame anyone with actual power, because that's probably tomorrow night's dinner guest. So they all stubbornly refuse to see where actual power is.
A bit of this in the US, too. There is a club. But not *everbody* is in the club, unlike the UK.
Many parts of this, but a big one is that they *all* (journalists, politicians) grew up together, went to school together, married each other, etc. The BBC has a weekly public affairs show, with audience questions, and last night they put on Boris Johnson's sister, who was a regular guest throughout his time in office.
It makes it difficult for any of them to blame anyone with actual power, because that's probably tomorrow night's dinner guest. So they all stubbornly refuse to see where actual power is.
A bit of this in the US, too. There is a club. But not *everbody* is in the club, unlike the UK.
Thursday, October 20, 2022
Conservative Morality
Somewhat tangential to this, but back in Ye Olden Days conservative "morality" at least had some sort of consistency to it, even if it was totally full of shit. All the young conservatives pretended to be virgins until they were married, and the DC press played along with this. Every conservative made being a professional prude part of their act.
I don't know how to follow the current "young men don't get laid enough and it's all the fault of the wokes" line.
I don't know how to follow the current "young men don't get laid enough and it's all the fault of the wokes" line.
The Sorting Hat And Fascism
A minor problem with the upper ranks of liberalism (as many things) being dominated by people who went to fancy schools, many of whom are very invested in the sorting hat aspect of fancy schools, is that a deep belief in this version of meritocracy isn't too far from a basic conservative/fascist view of The Natural Order Of Things.
No I'm not saying that "liberals are the real fascists," just that peaking when you're 20, combined with ageing out of relevance and the associated midlife crisis, explains the small but real liberal-to-fash-curious pipeline.
I deserve my success, and people should know their place.
Some people buy a fancy sports car, some people buy caliper sets and start screaming about The Kids Today for disrespecting them.
No I'm not saying that "liberals are the real fascists," just that peaking when you're 20, combined with ageing out of relevance and the associated midlife crisis, explains the small but real liberal-to-fash-curious pipeline.
I deserve my success, and people should know their place.
Some people buy a fancy sports car, some people buy caliper sets and start screaming about The Kids Today for disrespecting them.
Gambling Our Way To Prosperity
I suppose I thought we'd get beyond politicians who think "New York City is an unpopular shithole, what it really needs is a casino to revitalize it!" by the year of our Gritty, 2022, but our political class really do have their brains stuck in like 1987.
Now one of the city’s biggest commercial developers is pitching something that Times Square does not have: a glittering Caesars Palace casino at its core.And some catnip for the cop Mayor, who I was reliably informed is the future of the Democratic party.
In a copy of a letter soliciting support for the casino, which was obtained by The New York Times, the companies promised to use a portion of the casino’s gambling revenues to fund safety and sanitation improvements in Times Square, including by deploying surveillance drones.Maybe give Trump the casino license. Not a bad idea if it'll make him go away, otherwise. Just promise to bail him out every couple of years. Fairly standard for urban casinos, as the business of "just taking money from people" is hard, for some reason.
Lock Him Up!
I get that if you're indicting a former president it's reasonable to make sure the 'i's are dotted and the 't's are crossed, but powerful people needed to be held to higher, not lower, standards. Weird powerful people don't see it that way!
U.S. District Court Judge David O. Carter found that several documents between Trump’s allies must be made public, as they showed that the group participated in a “knowing misrepresentation of voter fraud numbers in Georgia when seeking to overturn the election results in federal court.”
“The emails show that President Trump knew that the specific numbers of voter fraud were wrong but continued to tout those numbers, both in court and to the public,” Carter wrote. “The Court finds that these emails are sufficiently related to and in furtherance of a conspiracy to defraud the United States.”
Fried
Whole somewhat opaque subculture of Professional Democrats centered around this scammer, and, well, lol lmao?
Billionaire FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried said he’d spend lavishly to elect Democrats in the coming years. But with midterms looming, his wallet is suddenly shut.
Think the problem is too many people did, mate.
Failures
"No one is getting their new covid booster" is not actually a mysterious problem. "Covid is over," the prominent media platform mocking of people who are concerned enough to throw a mask on still, and an incredibly poor (didn't bother) marketing campaign and rollout are the explanations.
Maybe it won't matter, much, but the obvious and predicted consequences should not be confusing to the people who ensured this outcome!
Maybe it won't matter, much, but the obvious and predicted consequences should not be confusing to the people who ensured this outcome!
Tragic Gardening Accident
UK has lost another PM.
...Awesome.
EXCLUSIVE:
— Steven Swinford (@Steven_Swinford) October 20, 2022
I'm told that Boris Johnson is expected to stand in the Tory leadership contest
He's taking soundings but is said to believe it is a matter of national interesthttps://t.co/SuApE3RmIr
Wednesday, October 19, 2022
Only Going To Hear About A Tiny Fraction Of These
A really tiny fraction.
In August, a pregnant Missouri woman named Mylissa Farmer suddenly needed an abortion, just over a month after her state enacted its near-total abortion ban. Her water had broken 17 weeks into her pregnancy, and her medical records indicated a number of health factors placing her at greater risk of pregnancy-related complications, including increased risk of sepsis, loss of her uterus, and even death. Farmer is also 41-years-old. Doctors treating her recommended an abortion, but, of course, couldn’t provide her one under state law, reported the Springfield News-Leader.
My Knees Will Be Fine
As an on again off again runner (lots of off, old guy respectable at the moment, haven't been impressive since I was about 25), I've long worried about my knees. "Everybody knows" runners destroy their knees eventually. I think I only briefly had some sort of knee pain. I put on a knee strap for a bit and it went away. That was a long time ago, and now I'd probably just take a break if I felt something similar.
Anyway, I'm not surprised that it's possible running doesn't hurt your knees (more studies necessary, always), and might even be beneficial.
Anyway, I'm not surprised that it's possible running doesn't hurt your knees (more studies necessary, always), and might even be beneficial.
But accumulating research, including studies from Esculier and others, generally shows the reverse. In these studies, distance running does not wreck most runners’ knees and, instead, fortifies them, leaving joints sturdier and less damaged than if someone had never taken up the sport.Certainly you can always hurt yourself with exercise, and putting too much weight on your knees before your relevant muscles had a chance to strengthen will still do that, but that's different than "every step destroys a bit of cartilage" which had been the popular message.
Wait What
Sounds bad.
WASHINGTON — The trial of a former U.S. Capitol Police officer charged in the Jan. 6 riot began Tuesday with jurors set to decide whether his Facebook message warning a rioter to remove information from a public post amount to obstruction of a federal grand jury.
...
Macchiaroli made clear he would be pitting the Justice Department’s theory against Riley’s 26 years of service, including his role on Jan. 6. Jurors heard Tuesday that Riley was the first officer to respond to the scene when pipe bombs were discovered at the RNC and DNC headquarters near the Capitol.
Go Local Sports Teams!
For much of my life I wasn't much of a sports fan. Probably anti-sports, really. I'm still not a megafan - there are times when I watch a reasonable amount of baseball, and times I don't - but I at least understand sports fandom in a way that I didn't once upon a time.
Still even without getting it, Philly fans are a bit wild in a mostly entertaining way. City was shaking just for... the Phillies getting past the wildcard round.
Still even without getting it, Philly fans are a bit wild in a mostly entertaining way. City was shaking just for... the Phillies getting past the wildcard round.
Can He Shut Up
Interesting, at least!
Former President Donald Trump is set to answer questions under oath Wednesday as part of the defamation lawsuit brought by former magazine columnist E. Jean Carroll.
...
In civil cases if someone declines to answer questions the jury is allowed to apply an adverse inference against the person when deciding their potential liability.
Price Spiral
I suppose it takes big brained economists to see prices going up, wages falling in real terms, then declaring it a "wage/price spiral" and demand the Fed tank the economy.
There's a bit more pushback on this stuff from economists under the age of 60 (somewhat a generational thing if not entirely) now, but in a few years it will be fully acknowledged that destroying investment in the face of rising prices caused by supply constraints and market power was actually insane.
The hippies will be right, once again, but not given credit. As always.
House prices and rents going up? Hike borrowing costs to prevent new home construction. Labor supply tight in certain markets? Hike borrowing costs to prevent investment in new capital and let businesses know this will happen every time so they should never bother investing!
True genius stuff.
There's a bit more pushback on this stuff from economists under the age of 60 (somewhat a generational thing if not entirely) now, but in a few years it will be fully acknowledged that destroying investment in the face of rising prices caused by supply constraints and market power was actually insane.
The hippies will be right, once again, but not given credit. As always.
House prices and rents going up? Hike borrowing costs to prevent new home construction. Labor supply tight in certain markets? Hike borrowing costs to prevent investment in new capital and let businesses know this will happen every time so they should never bother investing!
True genius stuff.
Tuesday, October 18, 2022
Freedom
Probably the smartphones are making us all crazy, but for a weirdo like me, the ability to be in basically any city and get public transit directions (often with real time arrival information) is a true life improvement.
Way Below The Keyes Constant
It's almost impossible to imagine a US president having this low of an approval rating.
There isn't one explanation for the difference between the countries, though the many partial explanations are interesting!
And it isn't as if the UK has (metaphorically) blown up yet. Worrying things, but nothing that catastrophic has actually happened.
According to a Redfield & Wilton Strategies poll released Monday, Britain's new prime minister has a net approval rating of negative 61 percent, down 13 percentage points from a similar poll last Thursday. Only 9 percent of respondents approve of her overall performance, while 70 percent disapprove.Definitely not a Republican president. I think Bush hit 24% once in a slight outlier poll, but basically "27% is the hard minimum, certainly for Republican presidents" is likely true.
There isn't one explanation for the difference between the countries, though the many partial explanations are interesting!
And it isn't as if the UK has (metaphorically) blown up yet. Worrying things, but nothing that catastrophic has actually happened.
General Betrayus
The line between "general" and "former general" isn't very thick. It's all one big happy blob. And when this behavior is perfectly normal, you're a sucker for not being a part of it, and a traitor if you complain. The unthinkable becomes your just reward for your promotions, the promotions themselves just the step ladder to all of this.
More than 500 retired U.S. military personnel — including scores of generals and admirals — have taken lucrative jobs since 2015 working for foreign governments, mostly in countries known for human rights abuses and political repression, according to a Washington Post investigation.
In Saudi Arabia, for example, 15 retired U.S. generals and admirals have worked as paid consultants for the Defense Ministry since 2016. The ministry is led by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the kingdom’s de facto ruler, who U.S. intelligence agencies say approved the 2018 killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, a Washington Post contributing columnist, as part of a brutal crackdown on dissent.
I Didn't Do It
Makes it that much easier to kill people without any accountability, not that there's much now.
IN A SERIES of little noted Zoom meetings this fall, the city of Oakland, California, grappled with a question whose consequences could shape the future of American policing: Should cops be able to kill people with shotgun-armed robots?
The back-and-forth between the Oakland Police Department and a civilian oversight body concluded with the police relinquishing their push for official language that would have allowed them to kill humans with robots under certain circumstances. It was a concession to the civilian committee, which pushed to bar arming robots with firearms — but a concession only for the time being.
"Quiet Quitting"
Powerful old people love running with, "The problems of the society we created are the fault of the young." Rather obvious why, but it's worth observing.
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Larry spent years pushing the "young men won't work" view, and since reality has overtaken that, he's pushing the "young people are working, but they're fucking lazy" view.Given dismal productivity growth, likely caused by quiet quitting, wage inflation will have to come down significantly if sustained months near 2 percent inflation is to be attained. I do not understand the basis for believing this is likely without a meaningful recession. 10/10
— Lawrence H. Summers (@LHSummers) October 17, 2022
Because he is a big brained economist this is what his advanced economic models run through a supercomputer tell him. Haha, no, he's just reading nonsense trend pieces and mainlining gibberish from CNBC just like every other cranky loser old person.
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The Excluded View
Worth noting for no particular reason (ok publishing Christopher Caldwell) that the New York Times publishes way more extreme right wing figures than "extreme" left wing ones, and by extreme left I mean, "to the left of Nancy Pelosi."
Debate me, you cowards, in the marketplace ideas. That marketplace might have expanded slightly in 20 years, but still hasn't expanded much beyond how I used to describe it, as admitting the whole range of views from The (old) New Republic to the Free Republic.
I'd somehow missed that Caldwell wasn't just someone they published regularly, but actually a "contributing opinion writer" who seems to have a 10 pieces (or so) per year gig.
Among other things, he's affiliated with Coup Central, the Claremont Institute.
Debate me, you cowards, in the marketplace ideas. That marketplace might have expanded slightly in 20 years, but still hasn't expanded much beyond how I used to describe it, as admitting the whole range of views from The (old) New Republic to the Free Republic.
I'd somehow missed that Caldwell wasn't just someone they published regularly, but actually a "contributing opinion writer" who seems to have a 10 pieces (or so) per year gig.
Among other things, he's affiliated with Coup Central, the Claremont Institute.
Monday, October 17, 2022
Being a Reporter
When the Reporter Defense Squad assembles, they are happy to confirm your most cynical view of how they perceive their jobs.
Always fun when a political figure demands that a reporter apologize for being a reporter https://t.co/df01SdCtiP
— Ben Jacobs (@Bencjacobs) October 17, 2022
Lock Him Up!
Doesn't sound like enough to me!
The Justice Department said on Monday that Stephen K. Bannon, a former top aide to Donald J. Trump, should spend six months in jail and pay a fine of $200,000 after a jury found him guilty this summer of willfully disobeying a subpoena from the House committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack.
Spicy Post
Not really, but I did write a post about a somewhat sensitive subject that I failed to express well enough, so I deleted it.
THIS IS CANCEL CULTURE AND I AM TOO SCARED TO SAY WHAT I REALLY THINK BECAUSE THE WOKES WILL CANCEL ME!!!
Not really, just some subjects require some care and I didn't think I succeeded! So post deleted.
THIS IS CANCEL CULTURE AND I AM TOO SCARED TO SAY WHAT I REALLY THINK BECAUSE THE WOKES WILL CANCEL ME!!!
Not really, just some subjects require some care and I didn't think I succeeded! So post deleted.
Hippie Shit
The biggest hippie shit in recent years was probably The Green New Deal, in various manifestations. Obviously it's fair to quibble with any particular item, but the concept was a serious atttempt to deal with the fact that moving away from oil and reducing emissions generally would be costly.
You know the basic dialogue:
Hippies: We need to save the planet from climate change!
VSPs: whoa that's going to be costly, and therefore politically unpopular, and hit the people (poor) you hippies claim to care about the most [for limited purposes, the VSP now claims to care about poor people, also, too]
Hippies: Ok, good point, we need to put together a political package that ensures the costs and benefits are allocated fairly so that it will have broad political support!
[5 MINUTES LATER]
VSPs: What the hell is all this shit in this package that has nothing to do with climate change!!! The Left is Unserious yet again!!!
You know the basic dialogue:
Hippies: We need to save the planet from climate change!
VSPs: whoa that's going to be costly, and therefore politically unpopular, and hit the people (poor) you hippies claim to care about the most [for limited purposes, the VSP now claims to care about poor people, also, too]
Hippies: Ok, good point, we need to put together a political package that ensures the costs and benefits are allocated fairly so that it will have broad political support!
[5 MINUTES LATER]
VSPs: What the hell is all this shit in this package that has nothing to do with climate change!!! The Left is Unserious yet again!!!
Sunday, October 16, 2022
Speaking Of Facile Holocaust Comparisons
Y'all.
One of the enraging things of the Trump era was everyone being surprised that the New York Times, which partnered with Bannon and the gang over this fucking book, behaved like the New York Times always does.
(worse than facile, of course).@amychozick got her hands on that "Clinton Cash" book, y'all http://t.co/pgc20pgKgP
— Maggie Haberman (@maggieNYT) April 20, 2015
One of the enraging things of the Trump era was everyone being surprised that the New York Times, which partnered with Bannon and the gang over this fucking book, behaved like the New York Times always does.
Hippie Shit
One thing about being on The Left is that a standard rhetorical cudgel is painting all your ideas as childish, naïve, utopian. And then ideas like, "we will blow the shit out of Iraq, send some 24-year-old Heritage flunkies in to run the place, and the flowers of Democracy will bloom," get treated as hard-headed Very Serious Realism.
For years, people have been begging the United States to reevaluate its relationship with Saudi Arabia. So often, the West has seemed to willfully overlook the abuse of the Saudi government — in the bombing of Yemen (one of the poorest countries in the world), the jailing of activists, mass executions, and the surveillance and kidnapping of critics abroad, including Jamal. Those of us concerned about Saudi Arabia’s disregard for human rights were told by the foreign policy “adults in the room” in Washington that we needed to be realistic — that realpolitik and national security interests had to take precedence over human rights.Don't know how many times the Very Serious People have to fuck everything up before this changes. Infinity times, probably!
Saturday, October 15, 2022
He Didn't Shit Himself On Stage - He Won
That crack NYT objective political analysis we love
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Partisans will pick their own candidates in #GASEN debate as the winner, but @HerschelWalker in clearing the low bar he set for himself and in aggressively going after @ReverendWarnock for voting "96%" with Biden did what he set out to do.
— Trip Gabriel (@tripgabriel) October 15, 2022
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LOL LMAO
Missed that Tesla had a bad day at the dog track yesterday (and this year, generally).
$TSLAQ could still be happen!
Nazis
For reasons perhaps hard to explain now - sometimes things are just of the moment and defy later explanation - there was a period in the aughts when making facile Nazi comparisons was considered to be an unexcusable form of anti-Semitism. I think that was wrong in degree, in that I think one can make facile Nazi comparisons without being guilty of being an anti-Semite, but I think the general point of "it's more than just rude to make facile Nazi comparisons, so avoid doing that," was correct.
Anyway, things change, not necessarily for the better. Everyone conservatives don't like is a Nazi, but the liberal Nazis, not the conservative ones, who they support.
Anyway, things change, not necessarily for the better. Everyone conservatives don't like is a Nazi, but the liberal Nazis, not the conservative ones, who they support.
Friday, October 14, 2022
Weirdest Plot Arc
Deserved or not, back in the day, Lara Logan had a rep among the war skeptic crowd of doing war reporting that had a bit less cheerleading than that provided by other on camera personalities. Her "evolution" has been weird!
Streaming Ads
"We" all used to complain about commercials, but I'd say the big problem with, or at least limitation of, network television wasn't the commercials themselves, but instead was that every show had to be written with the commercial breaks in mind. So precise 7 minute (or whatever they were) segments written with a dramatic moment or minor cliffhanger at every ad break, and a precise 42 minute show. This limited (or provided structure to, depending on how you look at it) the writing and gave every show the same basic rhythm.
Streaming shows don't have to be of a fixed length and they don't have to write each episode according to that basic format. Episodes can be longer or shorter, dramatic moments don't have to come at that precise pace.
But, if the shows did have commercials, that was the way to do it. Adding (presumably by algorithm, not with human editing) ads to shows that were not written with the ad breaks in mind is going to be really really annoying! Ad breaks in movies shown on broadcast TV were like this, but they were at least edited in by humans. I have watched some streaming shows where the ads get dropped in by algorithm and, folks, it's some serious malarkey!
Streaming shows don't have to be of a fixed length and they don't have to write each episode according to that basic format. Episodes can be longer or shorter, dramatic moments don't have to come at that precise pace.
But, if the shows did have commercials, that was the way to do it. Adding (presumably by algorithm, not with human editing) ads to shows that were not written with the ad breaks in mind is going to be really really annoying! Ad breaks in movies shown on broadcast TV were like this, but they were at least edited in by humans. I have watched some streaming shows where the ads get dropped in by algorithm and, folks, it's some serious malarkey!
Well What Are You Going To Do About It
I always come back to this anecdote told by I don't remember who (someone on Obama's staff), about the way reporters treated McConnell refusing to give Garland a hearing for SCOTUS. Essentially, instead of treating it as a kind of unprecedented power play by Mitch, their questions were all basically of the sort in the title.
And, ok, there's always a point to be made about the asymmetric ways reporters treat Republicans (just a force of nature, impressed by their power, no judgment about their actions) and Democrats (whoa, whoa, must behave, responsible for even the things they aren't responsible for, must solve the problems the Republicans caused even as we mock them for trying).
And, ok, there's always a point to be made about the asymmetric ways reporters treat Republicans (just a force of nature, impressed by their power, no judgment about their actions) and Democrats (whoa, whoa, must behave, responsible for even the things they aren't responsible for, must solve the problems the Republicans caused even as we mock them for trying).
But, also, it isn't the reporter's job to make the case for you. What are you going to do about it?
Nasty People
I continue to ponder just how nasty the people involved with this are. Sure the obviously racist stuff is bad enough, but on top of that, or complementary to that, they are just horribly cruel people more broadly.
We do have a bit of a problem in a system where "stepping on other people" is often rewarded. I'm not being utopian here, "oh wouldn't it be great if really nice people were in charge?!?!?!?!", I just mean it's a problem that the biggest fucking assholes in the country run almost everything.
We do have a bit of a problem in a system where "stepping on other people" is often rewarded. I'm not being utopian here, "oh wouldn't it be great if really nice people were in charge?!?!?!?!", I just mean it's a problem that the biggest fucking assholes in the country run almost everything.
Ukrainians Are A Bunch Of Pedos
Ok maybe Musk can't do charity forever, sounds reasonable.
TWENTY PARAGRAPHS LATER
Don't have to be a genius forensic accountant to know this accounting is absurd.
So far roughly 20,000 Starlink satellite units have been donated to Ukraine, with Musk tweeting on Friday the “operation has cost SpaceX $80 million and will exceed $100 million by the end of the year.”
But those charitable contributions could be coming to an end, as SpaceX has warned the Pentagon that it may stop funding the service in Ukraine unless the US military kicks in tens of millions of dollars per month.
Though Musk has received widespread acclaim and thanks for responding to requests for Starlink service to Ukraine right as the war was starting, in reality, the vast majority of the 20,000 terminals have received full or partial funding from outside sources, including the US government, the UK and Poland, according to the SpaceX letter to the Pentagon.Consider the editing process that led to the Pentagon's take being pushed all the way to the fucking bottom of a story.
SpaceX’s request that the US military foot the bill has rankled top brass at the Pentagon, with one senior defense official telling CNN that SpaceX has “the gall to look like heroes” while having others pay so much and now presenting them with a bill for tens of millions per month.
Don't have to be a genius forensic accountant to know this accounting is absurd.
According to the SpaceX figures shared with the Pentagon, about 85% of the 20,000 terminals in Ukraine were paid – or partially paid – for by countries like the US and Poland or other entities. Those entities also paid for about 30% of the internet connectivity, which SpaceX says costs $4,500 each month per unit for the most advanced service. (Over the weekend, Musk tweeted there are around 25,000 terminals in Ukraine.)"The Beskar armor we use for the Ukraine terminals is very expensive," Musk said. Like Trump, he can't shut the fuck up.
Thursday, October 13, 2022
The Badgering Style
Sometimes Americans see BBC news interviews and think, "why aren't our journalists like that???" But after you watch enough of them (and, in my case, did a radio interview once and was on the receiving end!) you realize that in their own way the BBC style often as useless as the American one.
The BBC style is to adopt a haughty condescending tone, and a hectoring interrupt-every-30-seconds approach, which they use for everyone from the Chancellor to the Exchequer to the person who runs the local food bank. It sounds aggressive, and occasionally does dislodge an important person from their talking points, but it is a kind of "both sidesing" in it's own way.
The US style is to throw out mostly softballs with the occasional hard question, and when the subject fails to answer the hard question or lies, just say, "moving on."
The main difference is the UK style makes everyone - equally - seem like a defensive liar, while the US style makes everyone - equally - seem like a well-meaning person deserving of respect.
Of course both make exceptions. Sometimes US politicians get a grilling (not always appropriately!), and sometimes the BBC style is applied with more subtlety, but generally...
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The BBC style is to adopt a haughty condescending tone, and a hectoring interrupt-every-30-seconds approach, which they use for everyone from the Chancellor to the Exchequer to the person who runs the local food bank. It sounds aggressive, and occasionally does dislodge an important person from their talking points, but it is a kind of "both sidesing" in it's own way.
The US style is to throw out mostly softballs with the occasional hard question, and when the subject fails to answer the hard question or lies, just say, "moving on."
The main difference is the UK style makes everyone - equally - seem like a defensive liar, while the US style makes everyone - equally - seem like a well-meaning person deserving of respect.
Of course both make exceptions. Sometimes US politicians get a grilling (not always appropriately!), and sometimes the BBC style is applied with more subtlety, but generally...
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Not Quite As Corrupt As Feared
Or at least less loyal to Trump.NEW: #SCOTUS refuses to hear Trump appeal over Mar-a-Lago documents. No noted dissents. pic.twitter.com/aqFuFYMLPM
— Kimberly Robinson (@KimberlyRobinsn) October 13, 2022
Did I Miss The Big Media Debate
Over whether spending tens of billions of dollars on nausea-inducing AR glasses for the military was, um, inflationary, or whatever excuse we're using this week to not spend money on nice things?
Soldiers testing the headsets have complained about their “mission-affecting physical impairments,” and say that wearing the goggles can cause headaches, nausea, and eyestrain. Acceptance of the tech “remains low,” says a summary prepared for Army and Defense Department officials and seen by Bloomberg, with soldiers complaining that the headsets don’t “contribute to their ability to complete their mission.”
...
Microsoft won a series of contracts potentially worth tens of billions of dollars to supply the US Army with its AR glasses. The contracts have been seen as validation not only of Microsoft’s augmented reality strategy, but of the feasibility of the AR tech in general. The goggles are intended to provide soldiers with live information on navigation and commands via a head-up display, as well as offer thermal and night-vision views.
Our Bastards
I certainly don't like that our "foreign policy" and associated rhetoric (not just in government, but echoed by the press) distinguishes a bit too obviously between good dictators (our bastards) and bad governments (often not even dictators, just ones that won't sell their lithium supply for a nickel, or whatever). However, if that's how it has to be, it's reasonable to expect that our bastards are, in fact, ours, at the very least.
Above my pay grade a bit, but I don't think there's any basis to justify our long relationship with Saudi Arabia. Even less now, of course.
Above my pay grade a bit, but I don't think there's any basis to justify our long relationship with Saudi Arabia. Even less now, of course.