@Alon i guess they know it about as well as they know no civilians were killed at Shifa. there’s always someone saying anything. nevertheless Israeli’s perception of the war and the perception of followers of media in any other country, even their closest allies, seem very starkly at odds. (this is a sympathetic take. if this were not true, it would be hard to understand or forgive how Israel as a political community tolerates its country’s actions.)
Can anyone point to a comprehensible explanation of why this is? Is it some kind of relativity effect, like time is very different if you are traveling near light speed?
“Because there’s less gravity on the moon, time there moves a tad more quickly – 58.7 microseconds every day – compared to on Earth.” https://www.theguardian.com/science/2024/apr/02/moon-nasa-coordinated-lunar-time
ht @danjac@masto.ai
@Alon mentions The death toll and quoting Biden are quite different than seeing the kind of imagery and interviews the rest of the world is seeing.
Naftali Bennett can say “*No civilian was killed*. Not one.” at Al Shifa. Israelis, but no one else, can consider that remotely plausible.
Israelis vaguely know the world is getting a bad impression, which they consider unfair. They have no idea, viscerally, how horrible even the depictions in cautious, sympathetic US media have become.
“the horrific violence and incipient famine in Gaza receive little coverage in mainstream Israeli media” #JoshuaLeifer https://www.nytimes.com/2024/04/02/opinion/netanyahu-protests-legacy-war.html
"Though it seemed completely automated, [Amazon's] Just Walk Out relied on more than 1,000 people in India watching and labeling videos to ensure accurate checkouts. The cashiers were simply moved off-site, and they watched you as you shopped." #MaxwellZeff https://gizmodo.com/amazon-reportedly-ditches-just-walk-out-grocery-stores-1851381116 ht @vonkarama
The inimitable @DeanBaker13 on my sister #AdelleWaldman's new book, "Help Wanted". https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/6371119899
I think I’ve found the compromise that will end America’s culture wars. You can thank me later.
We should all just agree that 2nd Amendment rights under the Constitution begin at the moment of conception.
@dpp and once you’re gone you can never come back, when you’re out of the blue and into the black.
@rst i hope so. if the US is simultaneously involved in a major middle east war while also deterring russia in europe, a third front would be rather difficult to sustain.
i would take announcements about readiness with boulders of salt. i certainly don’t claim to know anything about China’s current capacity, but if you were ready today and your intention is to act, not to deter, dissembling your unpreparedness helps you achieve an element of surprise.
rust never leaks.
@djc (i think in wealth rather than income stats, it’s mostly due to the roughly third of the bottom 50% of households that owns a home enjoying a bit of the asset price boom. but note a real estate price boom is largely at the expense of the roughly 2/3 of bottom 50% households that do not own a home, and so are short a perpetual stream of future shelter.)
@djc again, there’s a lot of mischief in the denominators here. what is the wealth of the bottom 50%? roughly 3% of total wealth. you can argue that if trends in that chart continue indefinitely — continue indefinitely as a multiplicative process, in percentage rather than dollar terms — eventually we’d meaningfully equalize. that’s quite a conjecture. 1/
@djc but in fact what this chart shows is a 52% increase on roughly 3% against (top 1%) 8% on 31%. Work that out and you get like 60% more dollars flowing to the top 1% than to the bottom 50%.
( i’m taking my rough figures from here. https://www.visualcapitalist.com/wealth-distribution-in-america/ ) /fin
@djc no, i don’t think wealth levels have evened out at all. on the contrary. the effect of booming asset values to make the rich richer dramatically outstrips relatively high percentage gains in wages against tiny bases of low wage earners. wealth is a cumulation of income (including unrealized gains/losses) net of consumption. when asset values boom, given the initial distribution of marketable assets, so too does wealth inequality.
you can’t meaningfully address inequality without addressing inequality of nonlabor income.
if israel provokes a broader war i wonder what happens to taiwan.
@petrillic you are not alone, but i promise i’ll leave you in peace and not insist on chatting from the middle seat.
@skye do electrons dream android skies?
there are things i’d like to say, but
april 1st may be not the very best day.
@22 (i thought it was a great piece!)
should we screencap great posts here over to other hellsites?
i feel like there's a counterproductive asymmetry: we tend to see really clever their-stuff (which, besides the really clever, is a reminder we are segregated away from interesting action), while they tend not to (and so can presume they live in the metropole and are missing nothing that matters).
(ceci n'est pas un post du 1er avril.)