@LouisIngenthron I can hear all the arguments. Races are nationalized, we need to pull together, the other side is terrible, whatever.

Revulsion. I am just so tired of feeling like the teet of some cow in cyberspace, constantly provoked enraged pleaded made dependent encouraged not to look so an ever faster drip can be maintained.

Fuck these machines, these systems we've built to do this to ourselves.

About a year ago, I burned out on political contributions, regardless of the virtues of the candidates. The Act Blue ecosystem just came to seem so predatory and toxic I wanted nothing to do with it. I'm getting close to that point with subscription services, the substacks, the streamers, the software. Some of it I still can't do without, but I feel revulsion every time I see these charges and I'm beginning to accept some sacrifice to tell them to fuck off.

"in the Internet economy, there is almost no relationship between contribution and reward… As Rebecca Giblin and Cory Doctorow have pointed out , the crucial thing is to establish a choke-point at which wealth can be extracted. These choke points do more to hinder innovation than to promote it." @johnquiggin https://crookedtimber.org/2023/10/25/retrofuturism/

@failedLyndonLaRouchite as @crookedfootball says, we will reach no consensus as to whether during the 1990s-2000s peace initiatives, the palestinians "never missed an opportunity to miss an opportunity" or whether israel's offers to the palestinians were inadequate, perhaps intentionally designed to be unacceptable by the ever more enfranchised political faction that shot rabin.

"Notice that nothing in my [proposed solutions] requires us to take a stance on history, who started it, who sabotaged this, who committed this atrocity, or any other question of historical injustice. Which is just as well, since while there may be true answers to those questions, I take it that achieving consensus on them is impossible in practice." @crookedfootball https://crookedtimber.org/2023/10/25/israel-and-palestine-simple-choices/

@dpp glad to try to think it through together!

@admitsWrongIfProven no, i’m in the US.

@LesterB99 No. Meir wasn’t defenestrated mid-war either. This unity government is about the war, about overcoming division to address an acute crisis.

Whatever polling there is shows Netanyahu’s standing has absolutely cratered. He’s now gambling for redemption, with cruelty and with all of our lives at stake.

Netanyahu is a great case study in how right-wing policy can yield political success for some time while sewing the seeds of deep catastrophe that emerge from problems right-wing leadership seeks to deny or suppress or oppress rather than address.

A present-day coalition can be bought from the proceeds of dispossessing the less favored and eating what ought to seed corn for a better future.

Until suddenly it can't.

@LouisIngenthron inflation creates winners and losers. there’s no guarantee wages match inflation, but often over time and on averge they do, real wages eventually rise. but that average hides that some workers have bargaining power to gain raises that match or exceed inflation, while those with less bargaining power take tacit pay cuts. inflation launders various kinds of redistributions, for good and for ill. it annoys everyone, as celebrated raises just tread water, which disappoints.

without context.

bibi’s
gamble for redemption
threatens the rest of our
perdition.

"America needs a bigger, better bureaucracy" by @noahpinion https://www.noahpinion.blog/p/america-needs-a-bigger-better-bureaucracy ht @pluralistic

@22 i liked “she she” as thank you!

@cshentrup what are the units of labor?

i’m not saying we don’t have “solutions” to these questions. i’m saying they are historically contingent institutions that result not from some science or credible optimization, but path dependence and law. why should we think we’ve gotten them remotely right?

what is “labor” that is this commodity? i know what a log is, you can weigh it and characterize it. i don’t know what “labor” is prior to some kind of social definition. we have a variety of legal institutions (hourly worker, independent contractor, salaried employee, sole proprietor) that involve remunerating human work. there are other historically common labor institutions we forbid. what exactly is it you think markets can fruitfully price?

@22 my only understanding of this is that visiting Xiamen i knew it was pronounced something like "shaman", but with only that "knowledge" in hand, it's a little bit intended. 😜

@BenRossTransit @Transportist well. your daughter is an exception.

@BenRossTransit @Transportist (i take "by 1968" to be a very generous outer bound.)

@Alon @Transportist @BenRossTransit i don't know about NAP. how about Pacific Atlantic North Dioceanic Alliance, perhaps to tease just a bit?