hawkish fed did nothing to gold though.
@admitsWrongIfProven Drehen Sie die Unendlichkeit und sie wird Null.
(blame Google Translate if that makes no sense. or just blame me!)
@Phil are independent courts repugnant to democracy? can the people never choose a decision-making procedures other than the whim of the people as expressed through the whim a quasi elected quasi king?
under our constitution btw the electoral college is not elected. its weird quasi electedness is an ad hoc ex post state level innovation.
under our constitution democratically elected Congress is supreme. and it is, even with respect to independent agencies.
@arthegall ha!
but then we’ll have to wait 91 years instead of just 11 for the next fun year!
2-squared / 4-squared / 5-squared
@Phil democracy in our constitution is invested in Congress. the President is not elected by the public, and the notion of one man representing the fractious public is absurd. “independence” is conferred by Congress against the influence of that one man, democratically and often appropriately. that this Supreme Court might strip that basic institutional and democratic prerogative from our system is on them. no agency is ever independent of Congress, the heart of our democracy.
Congress has created offices and agencies within the legislative branch, right? The Library of Congress, Congressional Research Service, the erstwhile Office of Technology Assessment, etc.
If the Supreme Court overturns Humphrey's Executor, could independent agencies migrate to the legislative branch?
“You cannot restrict unfreedom to a particular class of people. It will metastasize to consume the entire society.” @jbouie https://www.nytimes.com/2025/04/16/opinion/trump-court-order-constitution.html?smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare ht @jeffjarvis
just called my Florida Congressional delegation to express my CECOT outrage. one human picked up (on behalf of Rep Luna), two voicemails (Sens Scott and Moody).
the right time to throw the ring of power into the volcano is when it is you who holds it.
we forgot that, tried to wield it, now look who we’ve become.
@otfrom @BCAppelbaum generally speaking the plan from this administration is unlikely to be the one you want.
“nobody can be trusted with absolute power, least of all the demagogues who seek it. The one good thing Trump’s trade policies are achieving is to demonstrate this yet again. They are harbingers of chaos. The world’s challenge is to survive the folly. The US’s is to end it.” #MartinWolf https://www.ft.com/content/a3e6174c-25e9-4428-9109-16e37319e9e2
some people think it was a kind of ennui that left us open to fascism, citing perhaps Fukyama’s “last man” and a predicted rebellion against that status by those with “megalothymia”. 1/
i think it was not ennui but annoyance that left us vulnerable. people were just annoyed by pronouns and what one might call the microincriminations of “wokeness”. These seemed real, even pressing, while words like “fascism” or “tyranny” or “extermination camps” seemed hypothetical, overwrought. 2/
oops. /fin
“It’s a great idea, if…done right. Federal lands are a national resource, and the nation needs more housing… What cities like St. George need most—and what they mostly refuse to allow—are modest homes and apartments for…workers and families.” @BCAppelbaum https://www.nytimes.com/2025/04/15/opinion/housing-crisis-federal-land.html?smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare
(may i suggest microcities? www.interfluidity.com/v2/8772.html or just the sort of districts #MikeEliason would design and propose?)
if they had any sense they’d call the whole thing off and declare the weaker dollar a great victory.
every time i swipe the credit card, whatever bullshit i am blowing the money on, i am increasing my capital account surplus.
it’s been a long time, but i guess i’ll have to watch some 60 Minutes segments.
the same forces that pushed Obama to say “if you like your health insurance you can keep it” pushes an effective housing politics to concede “if you like your neighborhood, you can keep it”
in neither case is the constraint necessarily virtuous. perhaps it can be overcome. but it’s the same problem.
although the laundering itself remains illegal, providing extremely difficult to penetrate *money laundering services* has been effectively legalized, as long as the infrastructure is “digital assets”.
see @jp_koning https://www.moneyness.ca/2025/04/if-its-crypto-its-not-money-laundering.html