Our Kind of Traitor (novel) - Wikipedia

I've thought for years that this piece of fiction tells us a lot about how the post-Soviet world works.

Our Kind of Traitor (novel) - Wikipedia share.google/2n7DySrtzfYo...

How?

I still remember reading for the first time about "f*ck you money" in Nassim Nicholas Taleb's book "The Black Swan."

For him it came by making a killing in the stock market; for all of us it would be the implementation of #UBI.

When I read about AI 2027 pushing their predictions 18 months into the future I thought of the Millerites in 1844.

Will there be a subsequent "Great Disappointment" in 2029?

Yes.
#TheAIGrift

To all those promoting AI (i.e., LLMs), crypto currencies, and the value of social media, I reply, Matthew 7:15-20.
#TheAIGrift
#CryptoFraud
#SocialNarcissism

p.s., I get the irony of posting that last one on BlueSky. 😁

@sarahkendzior.bsky.social, love this line in "They Knew":

"The only reliable compass in twenty-first-century America is a moral one."

However, I fear that neither American religious institutions nor the utilitarian calculus of our technocrats can provide us with that moral compass. 😔

Maybe this?

Take away the racism and misogyny from the Republican Party and all you'd be left with is the religious bigotry.

Wait! That too would wither without the former.
#ItHasHappenedHere

Trump fears the revelation of

#RussianMoneyLaundering

more than he fears the revelation of a sex scandal.

💰 is the key to understanding everything about Trump and why the Russians assisted his 2016 campaign.
#ItHasHappenedHere

I was playing poker the other night and this half-drunk guy could not figure out why I had gone all-in (I had a flush but he was blind to the three clubs on the board), so he sat there for five minutes as the dealer kept checking his watch trying to jawbone a reaction from me. Failing, he folded. 😁

It now seems a given that if you let anyone on the right talk for more than ten minutes they will eventually slide into the moral gutter of racism, misogyny, and/or religious bigotry.
#ItHasHappenedHere
#BadFaith

From your thumbs to God's eyes. 🫩

It's no coincidence that Sinclair Lewis placed a Protestant bishop at the center of an authoritarian government's rise in "It Can't Happen Here."

Lewis understood how the American strain of the Christian religion would be central to the destruction of liberalism and democracy.
#ItHasHappenedHere

Zorg speaks.

"Your ass is grass and I'm a lawnmower."

Third Book of Maccabees 1:6

The Wild Bunch Let's go. YouTube video by Pedro Calvo

"Let's go."

"Why not."

--The Gospel According to Sam Peckinpah

youtu.be/FLwRmsMXnE8?...

I think race has always played a role, post-Brown v. BoE and SCOTUS ruling to integrate schools.

Read Rich Benjamin's chapter when he visits Aryan Nation congregation near Coeur d'Alene.

It's always less about religion than race, except this,

bsky.app/profile/theg...

I only recently read this 1953 book by Robert Heilbroner.

If I'd read this my first year in business school I would have switched sooner to being a history major.

Marx's solution may not be workable but his analysis is far more interesting.

I also don't think conservatives ever read Adam Smith.

The rightwing attack on publicly funded higher education seems an extension of the attack on publicly funded K-12, which was--and by inertia still is--a reaction to racial integration.

We must honestly address the desire of tens of millions of Americans to have white only public and private spaces.

YouTube Share your videos with friends, family, and the world

"Morally filthy" to describe the U.S.?

Yep. That basically sums it up.
#ItHasHappenedHere

I've always thought Reverend Wright was morally correct as well.

youtu.be/Ix-AMYos0Js?...

a group of men in suits and ties are standing next to each other on a bbc news channel . ALT: a group of men in suits and ties are standing next to each other on a bbc news channel .

Who knew Trump's moment to jump the shark would result from a war of choice and blasphemy? 🤔
#ItHasHappenedHere

Supports my thesis that
#RussianMoneyLaundering is at the core of the Epstein/Trump story.

bsky.app/profile/theg...

I'm so cynical that these stories make me think about the Jessie Smollett hoax of 2019.

I'm just saying, if we learn later that Altman paid to have his house firebombed and shot at, I won't be shocked.

That said, please, people, stop doing stupid shit to shut down AI.
#TheAIGrift
#TheAICon

What if LLMs are not really hallucinating, they're just misunderstood? 🤔

🤣🤣🤣🤣

#TheAIGrift
#TheAICon

Fossil fuel subsidies - Wikipedia

Wonder how this person feels about fossil fuel subsidies?

Fossil fuel subsidies - Wikipedia share.google/KeIXgQEfpm3Q...

Surprised he missed the opportunity to say drug trafficking reduced 1000% during first year of his second term. 🤣

#VenousInsufficiency do thy work! ⚰️

a man is making a funny face in the dark and saying `` uh ... yeah '' . ALT: a man is making a funny face in the dark and saying `` uh ... yeah '' .

Is it possible those on the right have not read Plato extensively enough? 🤔

My memory is that Plato argued for an education that taught one to appreciate ideal moral values and aesthetics. In addition to these "conservative" goals was the aim of figuring out where your individual talents lay so you could take your right place within the perfect caste society.

It's been thirty years since I last read Plato's "Republic" but I seem to remember him (i.e., Socrates) arguing for an educational system that supported existing institutions, not upending them.

You'd think this totalitarian template, resting on institutional perfection, would appeal to the right.

MAGA is creating the Brightburn version of Jesus.

Interesting. I'll add it to my reading list.

Thanks!