disagreeable even.

maybe if we are going to overtly subsidize fixed capital formation under competition—rather than let market power and the promise of difficult-to-limit rents encourage investment—well, we should! but maybe we should pick a an industry to develop that isn’t already obsolete and slowly killing us.

the credo of the contemporary US, articulated pretty directly by its political leader, is that to be smart is to cheat, if and as much as you can get away with it. most of the country’s preeminent tech industry has this as the basis of its business model.

i myself am not so fond of Crown Prince Stephen.

Verifying you are human. This may take a few seconds… With you, it may take a bit longer.

limiting the influence of others may be distinct from increasing our influence. under this theory (it is only that), the motivation for invading Venezuela would have been breaking growing connections with China, Russia, Iran.

doxxing is dickish, even of dicks.

i wonder if the “donroe doctrine” isn’t the actual monroe doctrine (a limitation on influence by European or Asian powers in the Americas), but sold to the President by advisors and, oddly, to the public as crass resource imperialism, even tho that’s kind of fake but the President gets it, likes it.

we should have factional battles over which faction most squanders our energy by drawing us into factional battles.

if AI is so good and the US is the world leader, wouldn’t you expect us to act with more intelligence?

who do you have to kidnap to run Greenland?

i suppose they’ll say the Venezuelans are indians not taxed.

“We have, in Western society, managed to simultaneously botch the dreams of democracy, capitalism, social coherence, and techno-utopianism, all at once. It's embarrassing actually. I am embarrassed. You should be embarrassed.” @apenwarr.ca ht @spavel.bsky.social

put out milk & cookies when you sleep. you never know!

as i grow old, i live in fear of someone confronting me: “Have you no recency, sir, at long last, have you no recency?”

on the one hand it’s good to live a long full life but on the other hand the longer you are around the more the more is taken from you.

i think 3. the choices were autogolpe or defenestration so hey. grandpa was old so he told everybody then she had to put on a show, no i never would consent to be thrown into the briar patch.

the big loser today may be guyana.

a thing about history is you can tell the same story a hundred different ways and all of them are true.