am i the only person for whom the names “vance” and “walz” code as oddly similar? i sometimes hear a claim about one and misinterpret it as referring to the other until i double-check myself.
@chrisp historically the corporate income tax was progressive, but it’s so low now any progressivity that remains (i don’t know) would be over a pretty narrow range,
freedom includes the right to be left alone, but that doesn’t mean being left alone should be the default.
@railmeat That’d be great. But most of them were not born at that time. For almost 60 years they’ve been in territories under Israeli control, so they should have Israeli citizenship.
“And so every American who had a home became the enemy of every American who didn't – including one another's children. Every home built threatened your own property values.” @pluralistic https://pluralistic.net/2024/10/01/housing-is-a-human-right/#rentier-tech
“humans make AI slop; it does not spontaneously generate itself. Its production is driven by ordinary economic incentives and not some manifest destiny of machines by which they will inevitably grasp the totality and index all possible realities within their vast numeric matrices. If the internet is dead, it’s because capital is a vampire, not because machines have taken over.” @robhorning https://robhorning.substack.com/p/the-envisioners
The heart of the American Constitutional system is an active, assertive Congress. Unfortunately, Congress is now a fearful, incapable, pathetic. I think we'll need electoral reform to change it's character, but @ddayen offers important ideas to chew on. https://prospect.org/politics/2024-09-30-how-congress-gets-its-groove-back/
going to start a social media site called “ruth.social”.
posts will be referred to as “random acts of kindness”.
In April, both sides wanted to save face but avoid a larger conflict.
Do both sides want to avoid a larger conflict now?
i suspect the Saudi leadership is really enjoying its popcorn.
@railmeat they are stateless because they remained within the borders of the country that formed around the place where they lived. i agree they should be given citizenship in the state of Israel. there would be much greater hope for peaceful coexistence if they were fully enfranchised citizens.
while missiles are flying and ground troops invading, no one will GAF what happens to stateless people in Gaza and the West Bank.
@kentwillard Xi has been terrible on foreign policy, and domestically is unrepentantly authoritarian. he has dashed hopes for a freer, more socially liberal China.
but he has also managed to tame China’s plutocrats, has made good industrial policy choices, and has insisted on the primacy of a politically determined social sphere over “market outcomes” that seem (to him) destructive. (i agree with some, disagree with some, of his choices, wish they were more democratically made.)
a mixed bag!
“The project of trusting markets and technology and positive thinking keeps being tried, and keeps failing, and then keeps being re-proposed, as thought it were somehow new and deserves a fresh shot.” @davekarpf https://davekarpf.substack.com/p/the-climate-movement-really-does
@kentwillard i think there’s some possibility of his doing the right thing after exhausting every other alternative. China’s leadership has a foolish aversion to “welfarism”, but the solution to China’s current downturn is just a few checks away, in the form of endowing greater demand by the general public.
“if China’s central government has fiscal space—and it uses that space in way that gives households the confidence to spend more—China might be able to recover from its property downturn on its own, without relying even more on exports.” #BradSetser https://www.cfr.org/blog/beijing-still-has-fiscal-space
Leaves most of the country well above sea level. https://xkcd.com/2992/
@kentwillard right. i think you just want to give the local newspeople an excuse, that local hook, and then give them a real interview. it'll be the biggest moment of their career. absent overtly political pushback from Sinclair or something, it will get aired.
@kentwillard It’s the interviews, though, that get most of the reach from people not already so much your base, no? Would local media refuse the interviews, even if they weren’t attached to local rallies? Just visit the local hot dog shop as their hook? You could fit a lot more shop visits and short interviews than a rally that occupies at least half a day, with all the logistics.
MEMORANDUM
To: Trump/Vance Campaign HQ, Walz Oppo
Re: Closeted Furry?