when you let money into politics — or when you fail to either break or nationalize monopoly — you get government of the sociopaths, by the sociopaths, for the sociopaths.
“at long last, regular folks are realizing again that it is totally feasible for them to work less, yet make the same amount of money or more.” #JonSchwarz https://theintercept.com/2023/09/03/four-day-work-week-labor-day/ ht @DeanBaker13 cc @dpp
i have just invented Artificial Accountability.
if you don’t like it, go tell it to the machine.
truly an icon of American capitalism in the 21st Century. ht @w7voa https://www.politico.com/news/2024/09/02/jacob-wohl-jack-burkman-ai-lobbying-pseudonyms-00176917
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#ScottSumner, formerly of The Money Illusion blog, has moved to Substack.
That makes me a bit sad. I very much prefer independent blogs. But Scott is always worth reading, although I usually disagree with him!
If it says “urgent” in the subject line, it’s not.
If it says “personal” in the sender line, it’s not.
What’s really going to change everything is AA (artificial authenticity).
it’d be cool if you could configure textareas in a browser could behave like emacs, or vi, or whatever your preference in full-featured, keyboard driven editor.
there could be some kind of virtual filesystem you could access; each textarea would be some specially identified *buffer*.
there should be autosave into your own specified filesystem, rather than relying in the site or your browser to preserve your work.
The New York Times’ audience is not its readers, but the next administration, the next cohort of powerful people it will have to simultaneously examine and flatter in order to retain its place in the firmament.
The paper’s editorial choices make more sense, once you grasp that, and that it’s operating under tremendous uncertainty about just who that cohort will be.
i wouldn’t support just arbitrarily banning Twitter. i do think platforms like Twitter, with its centralized and privately managed architecture at its scale and influence, should not be tolerated, should not exist, and we should shape the legal and regulatory environment to be ever less hospitable to such entities. but that’s slow work, requiring consistent application of new laws and regulations. 1/
nevertheless, when i think of Brazil and imagine what it would be like if X were only available via VPN, i’m a bit jealous of the outcome.
again, i don’t support just banning Twitter. considered rule of law matters. but a world in which all the conversation that’s been unable to migrate from there gets a do-over to work towards and help build better forums is something i find that i yearn for. /fin
from “Confiscate Their Money”, by #HamiltonNolan https://www.hamiltonnolan.com/p/confiscate-their-money ht @scott
Text: What does someone who is worth $30 billion lose if you take $29 billion from them? They can still own multiple mansions and a private jet and buy any material thing they want and leave a fortune behind when they die that will take care of their family for generations. As a practical matter of day to day life, they lose nothing. All they really lose is the ability to unduly influence the rest of us. They lose (some of) their ability to act like gods.
the “broken windows fallacy” is indeed a fallacy, but let the windowpane lobby gain a lot of influence and you’ll find policy develop to encourage just this kind of “growth”.
if i were a politician, i’d be the Congressman from Dadjokia. I’d be like, “If you elect me, I can’t promise to work miracles. I’ll work YOU-ricles!”
Do you have a personal relationship with your local government?
That is, do you personally know your representative to local government or policymaking executives (mayor, city manager)?
Do you physically attend and meaningfully participate in local government meetings?
Any of the above would suffice.
32.4%
Yes
(12 votes)
67.6%
No
(25 votes)
“The kleptocrats aren’t just stealing money. They’re stealing democracy” by @anneapplebaum https://www.ft.com/content/0876ef7a-bf88-463e-b8ca-bd9b4a11665c