Fascism is distinctively modern because it presupposes that traditionalist society is unavailable. It begins from a diagnosis of society as already fragmented by the forces of modernity & posits a post-traditionalist basis of organic unity in new fictions of the state, leader, race.

the stock market is a balancing act between the war in Iran and Claude code. just like they teach you in Corporate Finance.

yes. Most modern bureaucracy should be under congress not executive authority. This category of thing didn't really exist in 1789 and people have misclassified it in the 20th century.

maybe we should abolish article 2. repeal and replace with something much less personalist.

“when people opt to devote their energy to tracking the latest TikTok star or scrolling content instead of nurturing interpersonal relationships, they are effectively amusing themselves to death.” @zephoria.bsky.social

if spacex is dumb beyond what the remarkably resilient dumb of the stock market proves able to sustain, it'll be politically useful to have musk's fingerprints so indelibly (if somewhat surreally) planted on the holes in people's investment accounts.

your own. personal. beezus.

from @apenwarr.ca apenwarr.ca/log/20211229

I've been told that one of the reasons the japanese economy works is that you can live more cheaply -- smaller house, worse food -- before social stigma kicks in. Same material deprivation, less psychic cost. [2nd hand info from people running on anecdotals: I trust it, but you maybe shouldn't]

i’ll answer for myself. @besttrousers.bsky.social doesn’t think there’s meaningful information in the fact that the median household can’t afford necessary expenditures at average rates. i think that’s a pithy summation of the affordability problem, and it is a very real problem. 1/

cc @hlstephens.bsky.social is this a fair critique of your work?

Like whose side are you on? This isn't hard or complicated: "As governor, I am asking the federal government to withdraw its immigration enforcement officers from our community in the name of safety so that events don't escalate further." Treat *them* as the problem, not your own residents.

blurring the boundaries between news and fiction is what these times really require.

“Our findings confirm a challenging economic reality, in which millions of people across the country are struggling to cover the cost of necessities on their current income, or what we refer to as ‘making ends meet.’” @hlstephens.bsky.social et al www.brookings.edu/articles/sta... ht @npr.org

Delaney Hall action call in NYC subway

keynesian wizarding contest.

Labor and capital about to become interchangeable

What a great intro. www.wsj.com/business/bil...

you know you haven’t been brainwashed as long as you have a dirty mind.

That some Republicans can just call anyone they dislike or fear Trans whenever they feel like it goes alongside their escalating feud with the Pope. They don’t believe in Trans Substantiation.

Dhaka. They are building one of the world’s largest megacities in such a way that vast swaths of it are and will forever be immune to cars.

I’m struck by how many far left policies from a decade ago are supported by a majority today. What capacities and foundations can you build today that will change the world in 10-15 years?

Eula sounds like a very old-fashioned name for a girl.

the unthinkable has become very ordinary. there’s a lesson in that.

“The ‘Third Way’ in liberal politics involves saying things that working people love, but doing things that sociopathic plutocrats love.” @doctorow.pluralistic.net pluralistic.net/2026/05/30/r...

“the ‘unitary executive’ is, quite simply, incompatible with a theory of checks and balances.” @asharangappa.bsky.social // she proposes a fourth branch under which the “independent agencies” would sit. lots of details to think about, but a useful idea. ht @hcrichardson.bsky.social

i have an answer to this. drafts.interfluidity.com/2024/09/04/i...

@steveroth.bsky.social's work on wealth accumulation and concentration is amazing and you should all check it out. wealtheconomics.substack.com/p/the-magnum...

so, this is deeply, deeply horrifying thedreydossier.substack.com/p/i-found-a-...

“within the supplemental poverty metric, the poorest people each year are overwhelmingly people who got hit with a catastrophic medical bill… …Creating independent welfare bureaucracies within each corporation is redundant and inefficient and pulls business managers away from actual production.”

[some-subscribed-rss] New Post: Eight Measures of the US Price Level, by Menzie Chinn https://econbrowser.com/archives/2026/05/eight-measures-of-the-us-price-level

impartial scientific research is the enemy of despotism and so naturally vought wants to destroy it

The verdict is in. American industrial policy under the Inflation Reduction Act was really working! It was raising wages while strengthening the economy. The benefits were taking off before it was murdered by the OBB. If we get the chance to bring it back we should do it and even make it better.

external “powerbank” batteries should have old-school headphone jacks and drive them via bluetooth. bluetooth headphones can’t replace the old-school kind because bluetooth headphones need to be charged. but you already keep an external battery charged at levels that’d power headphones like forever.

you should always trust what they say. no one is smarter, or more candid and impartial when speaking to the public, than a CEO.

and Elon will complain about the deficit, whose growing contribution to aggregate profit is necessary to prevent a collapse in the share prices of profitable businesses, let alone combustible-gas filled zeppelins like SpaceX which would surely ignite during any broad crash.

yes!! prospect.org/2026/05/20/e...

Something that can happen to people engaged in politics is they can come to believe that something they care about deeply being done—some vital change—is effectively impossible; some corruption or problem is baked irrevocably into politics. If you come to believe that, you may become 'black pilled.'

“What Democrats should be seeking to do is better fund state legislatures and Congress. Just as we are the side defending the vision of a competent and well-staffed civil service, we need to be the side defending the role of legislatures.” @adamgurri.liberalcurrents.com

“for my friends, everything. for my enemies, the law.”

“for my friends, everything. for my enemies, the law.”

if u were living in the US during the Jim Crow 1950s, it would simultaneously have been true that u were living in a technologically and socially miraculous society, a pinnacle, and that u were participating in or enduring a social and moral catastrophe beyond redemption. today is not so different.

I think the first blind spot is that so many people move from "my culture is only good one" to "my culture is the only bad one" without considering any intermediate steps...

we need to recover Popeye masculinity.

@gabrielu.bsky.social offers fascinating, surprising history of Peronism, coups, and complexities of actual organization and activism in Argentina that didn’t fall neatly along ideological or social-class lines.

right now I could be the next president of New College

promote aspirational versions of efficient lifestyles.

“That is the logic of virtuous violence. Violence comes to feel not merely expedient but righteous because it is cast as protecting one’s own side, restoring order, and ending chaos. In doing so, however, it denies the humanity of those being attacked.”