I think you're right, from a financial perspective, it's fine, but I wonder how it'll affect the site's content and culture.

How it went

Doesn't sound like the reddit IPO is going well, last I heard.

I'm down for invite-only memberships, but idk about taking the whole site private. There's some really good stuff here that should be public-facing.

I dunno, man. My comment was mostly a flippant quip, and yeah, of course I'll concede that most fields runs most of the gamut of incentive structures, but the distribution can vary widely between fields. If that makes sense. My discipline's definitely more of an outlier; very little overlap with industry. Ain't nobody but the taxpayer gonna foot the bill, because there's never going to be a product. It's pure research. Pretty sure I could convince people that the $2 billion dollars for the main experiment I work on was well spent, if I'm granted 30 minutes and a whiteboard. But anyway.

The profit incentives that come with for-profit products seem problematic for a lot of people. Especially when the amount of potential profit is billions of dollars, like for a room temp superconductor. It's not like the guy in this article, Dias, thought he had anything worth two shits, but he still decided to ride the hype train for some short-term recognition. I'd be tempted to say "the system works!" if it didn't damage public trust and perception. Maybe his calculus his that he'll still be able to land a gig for a private company, because he's toast in academia.

I know this is childish, oversimplified, and probably at least a bit of something I tell myself to feel better about having very little income compared to private industry salaries, but I still think there's a nobility in academia. At least in the hard sciences. No, the academic system is not as infallible as I once thought, but it's been really nice to realize that my peers aren't doing what they do for the money. Some of them make a very comfortable amount of money, don't get me wrong, but most of them could earn a lot more in industry, and for less work. Fuck tenured professorship though. I'm not sure where the stereotype of the lazy tenured prof comes from (humanities? note: this is not my perception, I'm trying to guess common opinion), but half of the profs I had in physics seemed miserable. Overworked. Health problems.

I can tell you from years of experience that the attitude in academia is "defend this at all costs" and in industry it's "kill this at all costs".

What is "this"? All of the best researchers that I know in the public sector have very little issue with taking an L and moving on if they were wrong. Again, there's probably a major difference inside academia between fields with a lot of industry overlap vs. not.

I'm cool with not a huge income, but I think having kids would change the game. Already made the choice not to ever do that.

I mean... there's no way to not get caught faking superconductivity. But apparently SpinLaunch and Theranos (and so many others) are allowed to swindle investors for long periods of time. Maybe Dias got inspired.

I should also say that obviously a lot of good can come from private industry and profit motives. And occasionally there's public sector flops, like the faster than light neutrinos, for example. Those guys seemed to know they were wrong and just wanted help figuring out why, though. Honestly, I'm having a hard time thinking of why someone would lie if they intend to stay funded by grants.

Nothing.

Can't find it now, but I saw just the other day that someone had got a paper containing the phrase "As a large language model, I can't..." somewhere in the meat of the paper past peer review.

Apparently this here comment is the first on hubski to introduce the concept of enshittification. It's not only affecting online or social media platforms, obviously.

I think it's some combination of "fascist logic is not logical" and "we may invent some new ways of subjugating people we don't like".

To add on to the former, the theocrats don't even really want you having sex, either, they just want you to magically have children for the Church or the Army or whatever. Ideally, you can just do the virgin birth thing like Jesus's mom, that worked out well. In-vitro is banned in some places here now (there is also some debate as to whether or not the ban was truly on purpose), so ya can't do that. If you absolutely have to have sex, don't have it more than like once per each child. If you have six kids, hopefully you only had sex six times.

As to the latter, we already have the conservatives demonizing cities, where minorities disproportionately live, with lies about "unprecedented" crime and voter fraud. They've also recently repealed affirmative action, and there's always the classic gerrymandering and voter suppression techniques.

Anyway. I wonder if the onset of free porn has something to do with less sex, too.

I kid you not when I tell you that those exact sentiments are part of the reason driving the movement to limit Americans' access to birth control. Abortion was first, but they'll come for the pill, IUDs, even condoms, I suspect. For others in the same white Christian theocracy movement, it's because they know that limiting access to those things will disproportionately impact non-whites poorly. Hard to say which justification is more nefarious. And probably the worst people of all think both.

It's probably the converse, I think, the snark is a coping mechanism for a lack of happiness.

constant diplomacy combined with a wearying Israeli electorate

It's a lot of that, agreed, but are you sure that the pro-Palestine progressive movement here in the 'States can be wholly discounted in influencing U.S. diplomatic efforts?

Through inaction alone, Congress can effectively erase part of the 14th Amendment.

Yep. And, hwowww, what d'ya know, they just happened to drop this ruling during the most ineffective congress in the entirety of American history, coincidentally.

I've seen some really, really bad takes on it as well. Lawrence O'Donnell wanted to pretend like this was some big win, that SCOTUS had confirmed that Trump was an insurrectionist, and it's like, "OK..? Then they also said they're fine with it".

You watch, they'll use the immunity case ruling to fuck up Jack Smith's case as much as they possibly can. Already are. A court that knows it's considered illegitimate is even more dangerous, at least in the short term.

I think the, uh, spiritedness of our rhetoric often gets mistaken for disagreement, when we're usually just quibbling over the specifics.

I will say that you're obviously more optimistic than I, which I respect immensely.

That's probably what OB is hung up on.?

Agree.

It's also really cowardly to simultaneously cloak these deliberations in hypotheticals while rushing to get the ruling out before Super Tuesday. Like "so, this theoretical insurrectionist, whoever it may be". They're supposed to think like that, yeah, but they're not.

Yes and yes. I'm very happy, in general, but not about this stuff. Feeling guilty that none of it directly affects me. But it does fuck over some of my good friends, and plenty of other innocents, so I guess that's more than enough.

Maybe I just come off very poorly in plaintext. I suspect everyone does, though.

I also focus on this kinda stuff here because I don't really get to anywhere else. Like at a baby shower a few weeks ago: "How've you been, am_U?" "I'm good! Very good. It's gonna be a crazy year, though, I'm worried, towards the end of the year" "Why?" "Oh, just the election and everything" "What do you mean?" aaaaaand the shift: "Ah, y'know, election years are always kinda nutzo lately. Anyway, ..", then I change the subject, and that's all she wrote. If someone doesn't wanna talk about something, or feels unequipped or uncomfortable about it, I'm never going to force the subject.

Maybe I need to post more in Pubski to prove to people that I have a life? I don't know. This shit troubles me though, and I'm keen to understand it. I do apologize if it comes across as grating and single-minded.

We're all on the same team, man. We're all worried.

I hope mk's prediction is correct 4 years from now, 'cuz I ain't got no time for the arc of history to do some eventual bending towards justice, I want it nowwwwww.

Sending e-hugs.

I didn't mean to imply that your optimism is tainting the accuracy of your predictions or something, I just meant that you seem to be better than I at internalizing what we're all facing (especially with framing it in historical contexts), and carrying on. Because yeah, when I look at threads from three years ago, we're all saying a lot of the same stuff. We all knew SCOTUS would go theocratic fundamentalist, but I, personally, didn't see them bending over backwards to accommodate an insurrectionist to this degree. It's seems worthy of a small freak out.

I do listen to you. I change my mind frequently. Like obviously JD Vance isn't entertaining enough to lead MAGA, and if I sit down and think about it for two minutes, yeah. And maybe I do get a li'l panicky sometimes, but some of it's because America writ large is almost 100% aloof, and I'm at least subconsciously trying to compensate. Sometimes consciously. But my panic and outrage is never directed towards you. Or anyone else on the 'ski. Except for once when I got pretty mad at b_b over trans rights, peace'd out for a bit, got over it, and came back.

I haven't put any words in your mouth. I appreciate your contributions. But honestly, yes, sometimes I struggle to figure out what it is I've said that you disagree with, or why you're upset with me. If I really upset you so much, and so often? You don't have to talk to me, dude. I enjoy our discussions, but if it's taking some kind of toll on you, then I guess you can mute me or something, but it's not like there are more than 7 people on this website anymore, so that sucks.

The Supreme Court decision today to reinstate Trump on every ballot: Expected. It's not any additional reason for me to level any additional accusations of illegitimacy (edit: nah nvm. I added an edit below). I've already got plenty, besides. But it is telling that the "state's rights" crowd is celebrating.

Trump's response speech to the ruling this morning wasn't much in the news, which is good, because, after thanking SCOTUS (guys I'm starting to worry about his ideas regarding separation of powers) via video message, he literally begs for presidential immunity. "There will be some things that, perhaps, don't work out so well, but, I don't wanna be prosecuted because I decided to do something that is very much for the good of the country and even for the good of the world" (direct quote). There is zero subtlety in his approach. I'm sure that the delay in the immunity ruling has emboldened him.

Sadly, the more I think about it, the more I can see at least 4 SCOTUS members carving out some realm of presidential immunity designed to be a very difficult hurdle for Jack Smith to clear, especially if he rushes the J6 case to trial before the election. That is my official projection. Absolute presidential immunity? No, but some wild-ass version of immunity intentionally made to give Trump the legal W at least through Jan. 20th, 2025. Something like "immune while performing official acts, or even while performing acts POTUS mistakenly thought were official". This has a bit to do with the ruling today, and more to do with explaining SCOTUS wanting to take up presidential immunity this late and so obviously delay his trial. Might explain why they're going to sit on it for a while, too, if it's gotta be finely polished into some tasty bullshit.

edit: After finally reading the 4 dissents (the 4 female justices), who still agreed with the overall ruling but not the justifications, it's pretty clear that this is Donald Trump's SCOTUS. After the GOP members in the early 2021 congress said "Trump's fate will be decided in the courts" to avoid voting for impeachment or conviction, 5 SCOTUS members (including Roberts!) have turned around and said "not only are we going to reinstate Trump on the ballot," (again, expected) "but we're going to wholesale invent a congressional process for insurrectionist disqualification that has no chance of ever being enacted against Trump." Basically for the hell of it. Even if Jack Smith finds him guilty of insurrection before the election, this guarantees no actual mechanism to remove Trump from the ballot. Further, this is even further away from any consistency at all with the "conservative" ideal of state-checked federal authorities than I had thought. Trump and the House GOP will simply try another insurrection, if he doesn't win, and SCOTUS by and large seems fine with it. And yeah, this came out of nowhere. SCOTUS isn't even in session. They released it on their website, because the majority wanted this ruling out there before Super Tuesday. Non-partisan "judging balls and strikes" my ass.

It's been really funny to watch what only the progressives originally called for (a cease-fire, in this instance) get slowly normalized enough that it becomes U.S. foreign policy.

Can't wait to ignore the progressives again.

Sounds like the "undecided" vote in Michigan air dropped 38k meals to Palestine the other day, by the way. It's obviously wayyyy shy of the million+ meals they'll need every day, but it's a message to Netanyahu. Hopefully the message isn't interpreted as "we're so weak we'll only do something symbolic and inconsequential".

Ah. Well, yeah. "Give us back our people and we will resume the killings" is not such a great deal, huh.

it's aims aren't genocidal, they're statecraft

I don't think that's really true, though. Sometimes the framing of things in terms of statecraft is abandoned entirely:

This week alone, a parliamentarian from Netanyahu’s Likud party went on television and said it was clear to most Israelis that “all the Gazans need to be destroyed.” Then, Israel’s ambassador in Britain told local radio that there was no other solution for her country than to level “every school, every mosque, every second house” in Gaza to degrade Hamas’s military infrastructure.

There are many other statements from top government officials in this vein. The hatred runs deeeeeeeeeep. Goes both ways, of course, but this is incredibly asymmetric warfare, if it's warfare at all.

the aim is the elimination of a government, not of a people.

Israel has decided that the only way to eliminate the Palestinian government is to eliminate the people. The exact degree to which this is true is something of a mystery, I agree, but I find it awfully convenient that the timing coincides with when Netanyahu needs to wage "war" for political convenience. And like I've said elsewhere, it would not at all surprise me to learn later that Israeli intel knew of an impending terrorist attack large enough to kill 1,160 Israelis and decided to sit back and let it happen. Supposedly their intel is the best in the world relative to their population size. Makes sense, they have the money for it.

But yes, Hamas has lost some of my sympathy by recently refusing any terms of a ceasefire. But they understand that if they surrender, they'll be facing even less representation in Israeli politics than on October 6th. Which is how this all started anyway. edit: well, it really started with Israel being carved out of Palestine, but if we, erm, can.. forgive... the first Nakba...

I think Israel should exist, but they sure as hell aren't making it easy for me. The left is correct about this one, but anyone pro-Palestine and also pro-Russia can be discarded.

But you can't say "maybe they're more clever than we give them credit for" without some wag bringing up "3d chess" like somehow being smart is worthy of snark in and of itself.

I think impeachment was a foregone fucking conclusion until Lee Atwater led the party to a place of antibellum evil. Now? I mean just fuckin' ask Moscow Mitch.

I'm also kinda puzzling over those paragraphs. It seems like you're saying that Congress impeaching a SCOTUS judge was never going to happen until the GOP went off the deep end starting with Atwater, and McConnell's 2016 shenanigans now make impeachment something that's on the table? But they're not even considering it, even as Clarence Thomas refuses to recuse when we know his wife is batshit fuckin' crazy and was involved in the insurrection herself.

Just posting this for alllllllll to see:

She sent messages that had been making the rounds on pro-Trump sites, where anger over the election echoed her own raw feelings, including this passage: “Biden crime family & ballot fraud co-conspirators (elected officials, bureaucrats, social media censorship mongers, fake stream media reporters, etc) are being arrested & detained for ballot fraud right now & over coming days, & will be living in barges off GITMO to face military tribunals for sedition.”

I mean what in the FUCK?!? A SCOTUS spouse. Who is known to deeply influence the SCOTUS member. Is in fucking Q-Anon. And there is a 0% chance that she's realized the error of her ways. What a goddamn joke that the dems are throwing up their hands.

I think it's true that there were a net number of lives saved from the a-bombs, and if America didn't use 'em, the Soviets would've demonstrated the tech in another few years. Even if WWII was over. It might have tilted the Cold War in favor of the Soviet Union for a long time.

I'm glad I'm not Oppenheimer, though.

I don't really pay much heed to polls and primary statistics, but I can tell you this: It is nothing short of a travesty that there is any debate or room for interpretation about this at all. Not just because of how depressing it that we have Mussolini (or whoever) incarnate still at least kinda holding his own, but because any amount of closeness in the race will help legitimize those who will dispute the election results.

On January 7th, 2021, I was optimistic too. "He shot his shot and it failed", I thought. "He'll be excommunicated from the GOP, and everybody will agree that he's earned himself imprisonment". Not just from the rally, telling the crowd to march to the capitol, and the J6 physical violence on TV, we already knew about the fake electors scheme, pressuring the DoJ, hamstringing the capitol police, the fact that he did fuck-all as everything unfolded, etc., and I thought DoJ would build an investigation immediately and have him on trial by spring of '22.

It's better to just expect the worst. But within reason. Speaking of, it'd be fun to try and predict the verbiage in the inevitable dissent from Alito and Thomas on this ruling, explaining how GOP presidents are immune from prosecution, but dems should be held accountable, actually. I'll think about that.

Roberts' politics are to the right of mine but it's also clear he values his job over his ideology.

No, I agree that Roberts might genuinely think that he's tending to the legitimacy of SCOTUS by doing this normally. But at least four or five of the other justices are pushing for this out of ideology.

Excellent response, and great book recommends. Thanks.

Yes. You're right. IF we had moved on, yes. Or maybe things would be even shittier, like Reconstruction. But we HAVEN'T moved on.

Sorry, I actually read you wrong on this, you said yourself in the text I quoted in my last reply that we hadn't really moved on. Not sure what happened on my end.

JD Vance successfully launching a presidential run

It's not because he doesn't want to, but yes, I agree, he will never be met with success. No one that I named would. Their attempts at carnival barking aren't the refined, chaotic humor that Trump seems to naturally emanate. I can't think of anyone who'd be successful, honestly. Like even if MTG wasn't as stupid/crazy as she is, she just isn't funny or entertaining enough.

What's going to change is their ability to hurt the rest of us.

I hope so, because SCOTUS is further gone than even a lot of cynics thought they might be. Now I'm wondering whether the Koch's stopping support for Haley was only about South Carolina, or if it was because they got early wind of the decision to take up presidential immunity (and likely not rule on it until fucking JUNE), which will almost certainly postpone Trump's J6 trial until after the election. There will probably be no conviction, and certainly no sentencing. Obviously, they will rule that presidents are not free to break the law with impunity, but they've effectively given it to him anyway for the election. And (stole this from Maddow, no shame, she's right) the incentive structure that would set up if he wins guaran-fk'n-tees that he'll never leave office in 2029.

Voting is all we have. And on the one hand, you're right, the party is the weakest it's ever been, popularity-wise, financially, and with respect to ability, but it's very clear that most of their focus is going to be put not into winning elections, but instead, doing everything they can to delegitimize and sabotage elections (like this failed attempt last night by some Turning Point USA idiot, Aubrey). Let's hope our institutions can weather it, and let's pray any firestorms don't involve SCOTUS. They know exactly what they did, yesterday. It's not a legitimate court.

It'd be nice if substantive debates were happening anywhere else. The ICJ and UN are about it.

Oof. OOF.

I worry that because the tankies have made their blanket anti-US stance on Palestine-Israel quite clear, it's played into you crafting a blanket anti-tankie stance on the issue. I hate the tankies, but history will remember this as a genocide. Hamas is absolutely complicit in exacerbating and prolonging it, but Israel's literally carpet bombing the places that they told the citizen population to take refuge in. They're withholding as much humanitarian aid from Palestine as they can. Famine is setting in.

Hamas is irredeemably terrible, but they don't have blank checks from America for all of the weapons money can buy. Oct. 7th was a goddamn tragedy, but now the disparity in death tolls is something like a factor of 50.

Israel did exactly what we did after 9/11. They went to "war" with guerilla terrorists, civilian collateral bedamned. In time, this will be viewed in a very similar light, and, worse, it's just gonna make a shitton more terrorists.

Today he asked the court for permission to post only $100 million rather than the full amount in the New York case

This was hilarious, btw. The Pawn Stars, Art of the Deal treatment of the justice system.

Trump does not have the money he has claimed punctures the image at the heart of his political success: that of a billionaire businessman.

Nah. Sorry, but no. I doubt anybody's mind was changed by this, mostly because they'll never hear about it, and because... this is the thing that'd be a deal breaker for anyone? Nah. Anything court-case-related has done nothing but help him, when the dust settles.

The Hunter Biden informant being a Russian operative? Nothing could be less surprising. We've known that this is the dynamic since Lev Parnas and Giuliani were doing the same fuckin' thing in 2019. We knew in 2017 that a Russian operative met with Don Jr. in Trump Tower during the 2016 campaign to dangle dirt on Hillary (real or no) explicitly as a show of Russia's support for Trump's campaign. It's reason number billion to ignore anyone who says "well the Russia collusion thing did turn out to be a big conspiracy". It did not. We even see the overlap in propaganda content and pro-Russian foreign policies in MAGA, these days. Some may try to make the argument that Trump isn't directly coordinating with Russia, that all of this is being given to him without solicitation. If people can't see the tit-for-tat exchange that's long since been established between Trump and Putin, it's because they don't want to, and I'm not going to waste my time talking to them about it.

Good article. I could use some optimistic takes, but my ideological immune cells start ramping up, sorry. Learned response.

What's sad is that Trump's expectation that they immediately take it up and grant him immunity because he appointed three of them provides cover for them to drag this out by saying "look, we didn't do exactly what Trump wanted", even though the effect of this delay is exactly the same.