Arbitrary and Capricious
Watermelone U., Chunkin' Hall
Joined June 2015
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Hapless Toad retweeted
So you have this woman in charge of the American Psychological Association, Rouse over at the American Anthropological Association, etc. It’s just not tenable to claim this stuff is minor or a right wing fever dream when these people keep getting put in charge of major orgs.
Hapless Toad retweeted
Interesting article from Alice Evans about the drastic differences in gender roles between Victorian England and India. If I’d known about this example I might have included it in my Modern Folk Beliefs V: “Your ancestors had kids in their teens”, as it supports the point quite well.
Hapless Toad retweeted
Leaked Republican memo expresses extreme worry about being thrown into that briar patch
Leaked memo shows Republicans privately see Francesca Hong as "uniquely dangerous" in the general election & that “more moderate and establishment Democratic alternatives would likely produce lower base motivation and depressed turnout":
kenklippenstein.com/p/will-f…
Hapless Toad retweeted
It causes a lot of hubbub whenever things go south, but in practice the reason states subcontract implementation is precisely to gain plausible deniability and achieve things that ass-covering institutions and legal reviews would never permit. It's a state capacity crutch
Hapless Toad retweeted
The woke option to support is clearly England
They have to face:
- fascist colony that tried to steal their land decades ago
- global colonial power that sent the largest fleet in history to crush their faith
- nation that imposed their rulers and culture on them for a millenia
Hapless Toad retweeted
It’s not just that Slobodian suffered no harm for misrepresenting the evidence in such an egregious way, that would be bad enough, it’s that he actually benefited from it, because there is a whole industry of activist scholars and journalists who believe that everything bad in the world is somehow the result of the influence of a few intellectuals who died a long time ago.
Hapless Toad retweeted
RT 🔒 This is exactly what brings back the magic of The Weeds.
Liberal Millennial Woman: You know, we should just, like, help people
Matt Yglesias, shifting in his leather jacket and putting out his cigarette: sometimes you gotta be tough, it's a dangerous world out there
Hapless Toad retweeted
Third, effects of population decline are unevenly distributed, rural areas + regional cities hardest hit as young ppl cluster in places with other young ppl, which for older ppl in those regions contributes to a sense of national decline even when their own bank account is ok.
Hapless Toad retweeted
Often disagree with Mr Baker but not here.
Europe committed to spend more on defense. Europe lowered its tariffs on American goods while we raised ours on theirs. We led on Ukraine then tossed it entirely to Europe on condition they buy our weapons rather than build their own defense industry.
Now, our war means almost overnight different Europeans face 40-400 percent energy inflation.
Hapless Toad retweeted
Dang - almost like we subsidized demand (industrial policy, electrification) while constraining supply (renewable mandates, Clean Power Plans, etc.)
Electricity rates are rising across the country: In nominal terms, electricity rates have risen 33% nationwide over the past five years, adding about $35/month to household bills.
Hapless Toad retweeted
Corollary of the below: if you find yourself looking at a modern building and wondering what the architects involved were thinking, try reverse-engineering the architectural drawings in your mind's eye
Very brief explanation of this and related architectural issues:
Humans evolved in natural environments with "fractal" geometry - that is to say, with organic detail at every length scale from km down to mm. So the de facto ban on ornament ("form follows function") in standard architectural modernism results in urban environments that seem blank and despressing.
(Not that you need every surface to be covered with carved statues etc, e.g. Georgian buildings are very pleasant even with only basic decorative elements like moulded cornices, windows divided in to smaller panes by glazing bars etc.)
This also explains most of the situations where modernism is at its most likeable:
1) Skyscraper skylines: because the skyscrapers are *far away*, blankness at short length scales (<1m) ceases to matter, structure is provided by the ensemble. Esp powerful at night
2) Drawings or photographs: similar to the above - short length scales are not so visible because pictures are *small*. Black and white photos are particularly flattering because stains, moss etc that would otherwise "jump out" are obscured
3) Small-medium buildings in rich natural surroundings. E.g. glass pavilions on big garden plots. The blankness only occupies a small fraction of your visual field, can even be a pleasant foil to abundant foliage. This also works for buildings in historic streets
4) Ornament by the back door. E.g. Art Deco (really a pre modernist style), Postmodernism (where ornament is ironic) or Hi-Tech, where "functional" structural or service elements are exposed on the facade at vast expense to create interest
Hapless Toad retweeted
this is why i think the turn to post-liberal economics among both republicans and democrats will not lead to enduring consensus or popularity, people really do like cheap stuff
Greenspan "explained what was behind [the last decade's] extraordinary slowdown in US inflation. One indicator in particular was key, he said...I couldn’t help interjecting. 'The import price of Chinese goods!'... Greenspan ... asked whether I cared to deliver the rest of the presentation." Chris Antsey @ @BW on the key difference between Internet's contribution to low inflation in the 90s, and AI's today. bloomberg.com/news/articles/…
Hapless Toad retweeted
The demise of material politics post education polarization is overstated because at the end of the day, every election since 2016 has been about inflation, immigration, and abortion, and people change their votes when they believe their material circumstances are imperiled.
Hapless Toad retweeted
"That's not how TV depicted real men in my youth!" is a beautiful illustration of the generational divide here
All manosphere influencers seem to think they have worked out masculinity from first principles, free of social norms. But if you transplanted them to the last century, people would have assumed they were bizarrely vain. You didn't see DI Burnside on The Bill going to a gym unless it was to arrest the proprietor.
Hapless Toad retweeted
i actually quite like modern architecture — the chicago skyline, the U.N., things of that nature — but it may be something that really only works when done quite well. but obviously, like, haussmannian blocks are nicer than design code compliant buildings today
Hapless Toad retweeted
Paul Ehrlich is dead. His legacy is misunderstood.
He was, in fact, correct about a lot of things-- he was rendered wrong because innovative and industrious people chose to make him wrong.
The lesson for today is simple: people have to choose to make low-fertility-fears wrong.
Hapless Toad retweeted
The outsourcing of city services to contractors amd NGOs is 80% downstream of public sector unionization. No service a city in-sources with on-the-books public employees can ever be right-sized or modified, and creates insane pension liabilities
Hapless Toad retweeted
Read this ⤵️ and you'll understand why many vaunted YIMBY bills have accomplished little *thus far.*
It's not that the reforms were misguided. It's O-ring problem.
There are many constraints on development, and removing one achieves little while others remain in place.
1/4
Responding to some of the comments in this thread:
To create housing there are several doors that need to be unlocked. Unlocking each individual door is necessary, but not sufficient until every door is unlocked.
SB79 (and the host of other state pro-housing bills) is an example. Land use is one of the doors that's now been unlocked. As a developer it provides site opportunities on which i can build a housing project. SB79 etc are fantastic achievements, and were necessary.
But in the City of LA for example, other doors remain locked. The financial burden of Measure ULA and inclusionary requirements result in projects not penciling in spite of the fact that SB79 etc gives me the necessary land use outcome.
ULA and similar transfer taxes like Santa Monica and Culver City have imposed need to be reformed/repealed and inclusionary requirements need to be eliminated before the site opportunities turn into real housing projects.
LA County and City anti-landlord ordinances are another example. No one can afford be in the rental housing business if the fundamental ability to collect rent is impaired.
Also LA's reality is that their utility company LADWP is no longer capable of connecting new buildings to power. I have an LA project that's been completed and waiting for power for 22 mos and counting. Yes, 22 months. Anybody think I should be starting another project in LA?
Every one of these issues needs to be solved before the land use benefits of SB79 will manifest in built housing.
SB79 is one indispensable and necessary piece of the puzzle. We now need to get the other puzzle pieces in place to achieve sufficiency.
Hapless Toad retweeted
The long public decline of Elizabeth Warren is representative of the general abandonment of substantive policy analysis on the progressive left. All their former wonk outfits have been captured too.
