Mechanical Engineer | Runner | LAC fan
Los Angeles, CA
Joined March 2022
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Anonymous Cactus retweeted
Whenever I post about my Six Penny Plan to balance the budget, inevitably someone replies: “Didn’t this used to be the Penny Plan?”
They are exactly right, and the reason why is sobering.
I introduced my first Penny Plan in 2018. Prior to that, a spending freeze was all it took to balance the budget in five years.
Today, runaway deficits and skyrocketing interest costs mean it will take a six percent reduction annually just to get us back on track.
The math doesn’t lie. Either we take responsibility now, or we condemn our children and grandchildren to economic ruin.
Anonymous Cactus retweeted
The situation unfolding right now is the perfect example of why the majority of the American people have either outright rejected or are at least requestioning the US-Israeli relationship.
Currently, there is an obvious divergence between the US interests and the goals of the Israeli government.
We desperately need a deal to end this disastrous war and save the global economy. Trump obviously wants that at this point and has already said Israel was forbidden from attacking Lebanon. (You may recall every pro Israel account on here claiming this as proof that Trump calls the shots). The ceasefire that the President of the United States of America wants depends on Israel not attacking southern Lebanon.
So, Israel announces they’re doing it. The best Trump can say is no boots on the ground and he won’t even hold on that.
This is a country whose very survival let alone ability to conduct any of these elective wars is completely dependent on US tax payer money, and support. We unconditionally support them even as they undermine our nation.
This is beyond intolerable. You can call all of us every name in the book but it’s just too obvious.
This is getting a lot of hate, but it highlights the benefits of gentle density over radical zoning reform.
Many neighborhoods will not be convinced to mow down SFHs for 100+ unit complexes, but they can be convinced to build basic multifamily. Gradual progress beats stalemate.
In Defense of the NIMBYs
I’ve always been an apartment-loving YIMBY: build, build, build. But over the last few months I’ve been coming to understand the other side.
YIMBYism is a half-moral, half-economic view that says it’s good to build housing: you can allow more people to live in that place, and bring rents down. Those things are good.
But to what end? “Build more” is not really a coherent operating principle because it doesn’t terminate. People want to live in Malibu: so you add 10,000 housing units. But why only 10,000? There are still far more people who want to live there. You want to upzone SF, and you say “just a little bit, it won’t be like Manhattan” yet even Manhattan has relentless demand and YIMBYs want to upzone it further.
The logical end state is that somewhere is The Nicest Place On Earth and eight billion people live there. I don’t know if that really is the outcome people have in mind. You have to draw the line somewhere.
So where do you draw the line? It’s a totally arbitrary call. Is it sixteen stories? Two stories? Abstractly, these are all equally valid.
And then it really does come down to democratic rights — if the people of a given place don’t want to admit a certain change, who am I to tell them otherwise? There’s a gazillion places where I can build my Art Deco skyscrapers — what justification do I have to try to force it on the people of Menlo Park, who don’t want it? That I know better? Doesn’t matter, it’s their private property. That an arbitrarily chosen number of faraway strangers have a God-given right to live there that we must facilitate? Doesn’t make any sense.
And one must begrudgingly admit that some of these NIMBY neighborhoods really do have it pretty nice — they’ve made it nicer than elsewhere, and that is rare — and so their desire to keep it that way is understandable.
Anonymous Cactus retweeted
Sir Kenneth Clark’s opening short clip on civilization’s fragility and the decline of the Roman Empire.
“What happened? Well, it took Gibbon nine volumes to describe the decline and fall of the Roman Empire. And I shall not embark on that. But thinking about this almost incredible episode does tell one something about the nature of civilization.
It shows that however complex and solid it seems, it is actually quite fragile. It can be destroyed.
What are its enemies? First of all, fear — fear of war, fear of invasion, fear of plague — fears that make it simply not worthwhile constructing things, or planting trees, or even planning next year’s crops.
And fear of the supernatural, which means you don’t question anything or change anything. The late antique world was full of meaningless rituals, mystery religions that destroy self-confidence.
And then boredom, the feeling of hopelessness which can overtake people with a high degree of material prosperity. There’s a poem by a modern Greek called Cavafy, a poem in which he imagines the people of some late antique city waiting every day for barbarians to come and sack it. And then finally the barbarians move off somewhere else and the city is saved. But the people are disappointed. It would have been better than nothing.
Of course, civilization requires a modicum of material prosperity, enough to provide a little leisure. But far more it requires confidence — confidence in the society in which one lives, belief in its philosophy, belief in its laws, confidence in one’s own mental powers.
The way that stones at a bridge are laid is not only a triumph of technical skill. It shows vigorous belief in discipline and law. Energy, vitality.
All great civilizations — or civilizing epochs — have had a weight of energy behind them.
People sometimes think that civilization consists in fine sensibilities and good conversation and all that. Well, these can be among the agreeable results of civilization. But they are not what makes a civilization. And a society can have these amenities and yet be dead and rigid.
So if one asks why the civilization of Greece and Rome collapsed, the real answer is: it was exhausted.”
Clark was filmed seated on the rocks beside the Pont du Gard aqueduct in France. The full 11 hour series can be found on YouTube. youtu.be/KNQRqJitqNI
Anonymous Cactus retweeted
As @RepThomasMassie’s Legislative Director, I’m often never more than 10 ft away from him when he’s conducting official business in Congress.
I’m with him in hearings, markups, meetings, walking the halls etc.
Very often, Republicans will approach him in a whisper and say something along the lines of -
“I’m routing for you”
“what they’re doing to you is disgusting”
“I support you on this privately, but you know why I can’t back it publicly”
Or the worst one: “sorry I posted those hits against you. I had to for the endorsement. You understand, right?”
Well these guys: @RepBoebert @RepSpartz and @Rep_Davidson didn’t whisper.
They stand for what they believe in.
Whether you agree with them or not - they are honest and are willing to do the hard thing when they know this risk is high.
THIS is who you want as your elected officials.
Anonymous Cactus retweeted
After months of beating around the bush, one reporter finally writes the true story of my race and when asked, the lobbyists brag about it.
A coalition of Israel’s lobbyists and donors is spending tens of millions of dollars in a blatant attempt to buy a KY congressional seat.
Pro-Israel groups are spending big to sink Thomas Massie in the most expensive House primary in history dlvr.it/TSZsXh
Anonymous Cactus retweeted
Hell, interest rates were at 8% in the 1990’s.
This is the norm not zero.
Don’t underestimate inflation. Especially given the events happening in the Middle East.
Anonymous Cactus retweeted
We cannot let this crisis be used to further normalize CLEAR. It is an insane thing that should not be allowed to exist. We should not have a Disneyland FastPass system for airports.
One thing that gets lost in the car vs transit discourse is how much better a moderately dense car-centric city is compared to low density suburbs.
If the below photo were taken in LA, half the frame would be multiplexes that are walkable to retail. That's a huge improvement.
VCs like Sacks are right to diversify out of CA in response to terrible policy, but the obsession with TX needs to end.
The Austin avg high is over 90F for four months out of the year. I don't care how great TX is for business; you can't pay me enough to deal with that climate.
Remember when you could simply download a meme from Google Images to your phone without needing to dig through the source page and/or get completely screwed by paywalls? We didn't know how good we had it.
Every new CPI or jobs report lately has been shockingly mid. Unemployment up... but not that much. Inflation re-accelerating... but barely. It looks much more like sleepwalking into stagflation than a boom or a crash.
Anonymous Cactus retweeted
The Coast Guard reports that over 3/4 of the boats they stop have drugs. That’s a great job and an admirable record for accurate information.
But it’s not so great if you’re droning them instead of arresting them. If you’re killing people, 1 out of 4 potentially being wrong is too many.
Lawrence Frank undeniably put together a questionable roster this year, but they were never supposed to be THIS bad. Ty Lue has been making absolutely dumbfounding coaching decisions for years, and now the team is screaming for him to go. Ballmer needs get real and listen.
