@distractal i mean, a séance at least would constitute some cognizable method.
@megmac yeah. people are saying it's like, an expression of love, opening his heart.
the precious dear.
@buermann what did Marc Andreeson say about Musk? https://x.com/pmarca/status/1870915523623670176
Tweet from Marc Andreeson: The thing about Elon’s alleged political power is that it mainly flows from just saying things out loud that are obviously true.
A hand gesture that culminates remarkably like a Nazi salute but begins with a hand on the heart might have been some novelty, something not intended as a Nazi salute. 1/
A longstanding fascination with the number 420 is pretty weak tea as evidence, even if 4/20 is Hitler's birthday. 2/
Support of AfD in Germany doesn't mean you are a Nazi sympathizer, even if that party has neonazi connections. 3/
Circumstantial evidence could always be coincidental. But as circumstantial evidence piles up, the probability of coincidence declines. 4/
Sure it could all be a gag! Trigger the libs! 5/
But that's just a different interpretation of the basic claim, that jokingly or not Musk has some longstanding interest in communicating support of Nazi-ish things. (And the support of AfD doesn't seem too jokey?) /fin
@admitsWrongIfProven they keep trying.
@admitsWrongIfProven yes, it did a bit. he's called himself a socialist in the past, but only in his usual words-have-no-meaning ha-ha way.
AI is has become a cargo-cultish shibboleth among politicians. Was for the Biden Administration, is for the Trump Administration, the UK is going whole hog.
( On the UK, see this excellent piece by @williamcb.bsky.social https://williamcullernebown.substack.com/p/big-tech-in-the-uk )
Are there any efforts in European countries / the EU to supplant US-based communications platforms?
we can't see the future. our base case always has to be muddling thru — turbulence sure, but things mostly remaining as they mostly have been.
but if we crack, if we really do take a turn towards political violence, disappearings, camps, in retrospect it will seem we were astonishingly well warned.
given the success of $TRUMP and $MELANIA, what if somebody tried making a memecoin called $DOGE?
man, we’re going to have the mother of all tourism booms when people learn that those on temporary visas are not subject to the jurisdiction of the United States, so it’s like “The Purge” for them. https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/01/protecting-the-meaning-and-value-of-american-citizenship/ ht @qjurecic
it's weird how bitterly some self-styled centrists have turned against Elizabeth Warren. they don't use the snake emoji, but there's this self-flagellation about having supported her, and so (allegedly) alienated the tech boyz to whom they are now cozying. i guess it's her fault too they went Nazi. 1/
they don't so much blame Bernie, though of course they say his ideas are far too "left" and helped damn the Democrats electorally. but Bernie is popular, even among the supporters of the people to whom they are ingratiating themselves. and he didn't feminize anything. so it's much quieter. /fin
Media orgs think by being "neutral" on obvious matters like did Elon Musk give a Nazi salute they avoid alienating conservatives. They don't get Trump's basic appeal, that he just says it, he's not parsing. They alienate the modern right more by pandering to it than by just saying wtf happened. 1/
Of course there would be blowback if they did just say wtf occurred. But blowback is from movement elites and media. Grassroots might be seduced by their influencers' cynical outrage, but there's at least a shot they take seriously what occurred rather than recoil from the cringe dissimulation. /fin
@GreenSkyOverMe Marx's description of the basic "circuit" of capitalism. A capitalist starts with money M. She spends the money to turn it into C, some commodity, only in order to sell that commodity and end up back with money again, only a bit more money than she started with, M'.
@Phil i'm not sure what history you are referring to? Marbury v Madison, under which the Supreme Court arrogated its contemporary role of supreme arbiter, was decided in 1803, just 14 years after the ratification of the Constitution.
the Constitution is full of explicit language about harmonizing. you may think it fails, but that's it's explicit purpose. common currency, post office, full faith and credit, patents and copyright, all harmonize rules at the national level.
the problem with entirely skipping the C step in the M-C-M' circuit is this: Sure, thanks to financial innovation, M-M' can yield a lot of M'. But if it becomes a trend, you may find that it can't actually buy all that much.
just deleted an instagram account i never really used. still, it felt good.
i’m not sure whether it’s state-owned media or state-owning media, but whichever of those, that’s what X is now.
@Phil that… doesn’t sound like a prescription for the Federal government to fulfill its purpose if harmonizing many aspects of law to bind us into meaningful union.
i’d strongly oppose that suggestion.