Centrally Unplanned

Socio-Economics and Media Otaku. I write insufferable effort-posts about economic history & politics; tv, film, and anime analysis; and also whatever. Hyper-focused area expertise & excessive introspection are my jam. Rationalist-adjacent, if that's still a thing. Check the #essay tag for long-form works that I care about

[selfmaderibcageman]

how do you have a job where you make slides like this and not run around in circles screaming

[eightyonekilograms]

America’s National Security Wonderland - American Affairs Journal

While America is battling exhaustion and political polarization at home, it is now facing something it’s never faced abroad: it is locked in

There was some reasonable nitpicking from @centrally-unplanned and a few others when I posted this American Affairs article about the Navy, but I still think its basic premise stands:

The Navy is fully aware that winning a kinetic war with China is fundamentally impossible (doubly-so now that we’re going out of our way to alienate everyone who might be a potential friendshoring ally with trade barriers and general shithouse diplomatic behavior, which wasn’t yet obvious at the time the article was published), and so with that ostensible goal out of the question, they’ve pivoted to a much more achievable goal of “looking good in front of our geriatric Congress which still thinks it’s 1945.”

[centrally-unplanned]

I don't remember my nitpicks! But yeah, while I do think the above overstates things (you cannot in fact just "convert" commercial ship dockyards to military production facilities on the cheap, for example) I agree with the core premise - the US military is built for quick wars based on overwhelming kinetic power delivered by its standing army, and is clearly dwarfed by China when it comes to any capacity to replenish those stocks in a longer conflict.

This theory of war is not intellectually bankrupt? If you do win overwhelmingly, you can "simply" bomb the enemy's industrial capacity away once you obtain military superiority, and modern bombardment capacities to do that are pretty high. But A: even our basic capacity for ordinance/ammunition production is struggling, B: that is an incredibly rosy prediction for the course of any conflict, and C: really isn't how modern conflicts go? If the US is in a conflict with China over Taiwan and we find ourselves carpet-bombing Chongqing, that is not a conflict over Taiwan; that is World War 3. Most conflicts today seem to occur in boxes of restraint to ensure they don't tip into nuclear MAD or destroy the world economy, and those boxes are absolutely going to leave some shipyards untouched and permit a "round 2". We don't really have a plan that?

Ofc if you were a serious military planner in the US with power and agency, you would be pushing hard to alleviate this problem via A: friendshoring military-related production to allies to build a robust, economically cost-effective production network, and B: going all-in on immigration to boost US total productive capacity and maybe even allow for the economics of more truly domestic industrial investments to pencil out without needing to force rich Americans into lower-paying jobs. But that kind of serious military planning is also a capacity we no longer have, so. Yeah.

(Joking aside the US is doing *some* of the friendshoring at least, we aren't completely lost here, but it isn't a great picture overall)

[collapsedsquid]

So many Americans anti-Sun Yat-sen, shameful.

[eightyonekilograms]

#two-thirds haven’t heard of mao???#christ

I’m undermining my own tag here but I guess in fairness the gray bar says “haven’t heard enough to say”. I’m not sure if I have a favorable or unfavorable opinion of Chiang Kai-shek, and I read a whole biography of him.

[eightyonekilograms]

You know what, let’s toss it to the polling ground:

What’s your opinion of Chiang Kai-shek?

Favorable

Unfavorable

Haven’t heard enough to say

Just show results

Remaining time: 5 days 20 hours

[collapsedsquid]

Mr Trump sir the market thinks you are a coward who will never charge a toll

[collapsedsquid]

Sigh

[centrally-unplanned]

A deep irony of this era is that the Gulf States have lead the charge on just fully bribing the Trump admin from top to bottom; there is no other country more capable of getting a friendly ear to shift a policy for them.

And they must be looking around at the absolute shitshow they have found themselves in and going "all that money and this is what it bought us??" Couldn't have happened to a nicer crew of guys etc.

[collapsedsquid]

Needs to really stick it to them, Mr Trump you need to demand a 20% cut of Saudi Aramco & friends, none of this "investment" shit.

[centrally-unplanned]

If its a good enough deal for Venezuela, why not Saudi Arabia? I thought y'all were pro neo-imperialism, what gives!

[k-simplex]

Started reading Worth the Candle (thank you @vren-diagram !) and my initial impression, from the plain prose and annoying references (calling the second instance of something electric boogaloo...) is that this book is basically if Ready Player One were somehow good

[k-simplex]

This book launches a depleted redditonium shell directly at my skull every few pages

[collapsedsquid]

Mr Trump sir the market thinks you are a coward who will never charge a toll

[collapsedsquid]

Sigh

[centrally-unplanned]

A deep irony of this era is that the Gulf States have lead the charge on just fully bribing the Trump admin from top to bottom; there is no other country more capable of getting a friendly ear to shift a policy for them.

And they must be looking around at the absolute shitshow they have found themselves in and going "all that money and this is what it bought us??" Couldn't have happened to a nicer crew of guys etc.

[phaeton-flier]

I do not enjoy having to sound like I'm defending every aspect of the ~Neoliberal World Order~ whenever I say things like "the data shows real wages are higher than in the past", but also I find it quite irritating that the people who think they're in a bad spot in the current system are those in the United States. Fuck off

[phaeton-flier]

You wanna know who had their quality of life go down over the last few decades, maybe look at some of those places that had actual warfare outside their doorstep and not just Bigger Number Than When I was 5

[centrally-unplanned]

Reminds me of how we now have so-called Left candidates calling for things like property tax freezes on the elderly in the name of the ~affordability crisis~; a demographic the has benefited the most from asset appreciation! When people promote fake ideas about the economy they will, inexorably, propose fake "solutions" that makes things worse based on those fake ideas.

The US, almost certainly, needs to raise taxes on large swathes of the population (just to close the deficit for a most basic priority). Really hard to do when you think the majority of Americans live "paycheck to paycheck"!

(And to be clear there are very real economic problems in the US, it is just more specific than all this)

[cartoon-fanaticism]

GLaDOS voice: "Would you like to see some artwork I generated? I've heard from other test subjects that AI-generated artwork produces an uncanny valley response in human viewers because they can't perceive it as fully real. They've told me that it looks absolutely hideous to them, that they can't imagine anything more disgusting than AI art. But, well I've been practicing and wanted your honest opinion. Feel free to let me know how ugly you find this by ranking it on a scale from 'vomit-inducing' to 'eye-bleeding'." A robotic arm lowers from the ceiling holding a hand mirror up to Chell's face

[wassuppeas]

[official-kircheis]

datacentres are becoming the new vaccines for leftists

[official-kircheis]

[centrally-unplanned]

Wait until the people learn They are using the data centers to research new vaccines! #deepstate

[afloweroutofstone]

Running for office on the promise to raise property taxes on old people

[themasterofallusion]

sadly this is illegal in most states. not for age discrimination reasons. uniformity clauses are in most state constitutions with only like 2 or 3 exceptions

if I'm elected unlike my IDIOT opponent I'll tax retirement funds and social security income

[centrally-unplanned]

Actually not a barrier for most of the US population! The elderly across the US recieve property tax *breaks*, base rates don't come into it. Some of them are directly targeted at seniors, allowing them do things like list their property value at a lower rate for tax purposes (New York). Other states, like California's infamous Prop 13, don't target seniors specifically but directly privilege people who have owned property the longest, and math does the rest. The US government bends over backwards to give its richest residents lower taxes - you could double the property taxes of old people overnight in many states purely through repealing deductions like these.

[afloweroutofstone]

Running for office on the promise to raise property taxes on old people

[phaeton-flier]

so the Black Rose Duelists are twice over the reflection of the Student Council Duelists: Firstly, because the Student Council was made of people who wanted the power to bring world revolution. They were people wanted something to change, wanted the world revolution. and the Black Rose Duelists are all reactionary, so to speak, they all want things to go hack to the way they (supposedly) there before: Want to stay as friends, want to have her brother back to chasing her, wanted go back to being a child.

And secondly, because all of the Student Council Duelists wanted to win the Rose Bride, aka Love. All of their motivations are some form of "If I have love, then..." and all of the Black Rose Duelists want to kill her, aka destroy love, and their motivations are to get rid of some love that supposedly has ruined some part of their lives: Miki's love for Anthy meaning he no longer chases Kozue, Love as a requirement for Adulthood, Juri's love making her former friend awkward, etc.

[phaeton-flier]

thru these lenses, its clear why Tatsuya went unchosen: Him declaring that he wouldn't give up, that he really thought Wakaba would come back to him because of his Love, was both him accepting the progression of time rather than seeking to return to the past, and him declaring that he wouldn't try and destroy her love for the other man.

[centrally-unplanned]

Also because the "Onion Prince" is a useless talentless uggo and would never be hot enough to grace the Castle of Eternity with his mid presence. But your reasons are good too!

[argumate]

I think Tyler Cowen has chose comfort, contrarianism, and class allegiance over truth and while he’s good at what he does it makes it impossible for him to be a truly great intellectual.

[argumate]

the urge not to be grouped with people making silly critiques of Trump (or Bush) should not encourage you to make silly defenses of Trump (or Bush), you can just make a better critique and still feel superior!

[rustingbridges]

I do wonder what the lower bound on literacy is

[rustingbridges]

I mean, if computers get good at talking, and audio/video production becomes cheap enough, how little reading is needed to take it easy? I assume most people will still learn and use some reading, because there are some things which seem much easier as visual media (e.g. lists, menus, signs), but I think it highly unlikely most people will need to be able to, say, read a book smoothly. but how low can we go? do most people need to be able to read a short article? maybe not

[centrally-unplanned]

I think only "AI replaces cognitive workers" futures get you to this point - written text is just better, massively so, than audio text or w/e at a whole class of activities. People will not use audio to plan trip itineraries, or write technical manuals, or email back and forth about sales projections. They will use audio+ to supplement those! We already do ofc. But text just has too many use cases to get rid of. And once you can email, you can read a short article; the skills are complimentary.

(A lot of the discourse around literacy I think gets tripped up by the fact that books are how a lot of literacy is taught in schools, but it was never the primary use case for the skill.)

[globalincident]

Okay then, what's the lower bound on handwriting specifically?

[centrally-unplanned]

Oh that is essentially zero, and could vanish from kids as standard learning in our lifetimes. I think we are attached to it aesthetically, and it *is* a good way to practice letter recognition and such, so it will stick around as a skill is my bet. But it is already fully optional, and that is going to continue.

[rustingbridges]

I do wonder what the lower bound on literacy is

[rustingbridges]

I mean, if computers get good at talking, and audio/video production becomes cheap enough, how little reading is needed to take it easy? I assume most people will still learn and use some reading, because there are some things which seem much easier as visual media (e.g. lists, menus, signs), but I think it highly unlikely most people will need to be able to, say, read a book smoothly. but how low can we go? do most people need to be able to read a short article? maybe not

[centrally-unplanned]

I think only "AI replaces cognitive workers" futures get you to this point - written text is just better, massively so, than audio text or w/e at a whole class of activities. People will not use audio to plan trip itineraries, or write technical manuals, or email back and forth about sales projections. They will use audio+ to supplement those! We already do ofc. But text just has too many use cases to get rid of. And once you can email, you can read a short article; the skills are complimentary.

(A lot of the discourse around literacy I think gets tripped up by the fact that books are how a lot of literacy is taught in schools, but it was never the primary use case for the skill.)

[aorish]

i've also noticed that there are seemingly a lot of art house movies about making movies, maybe we want to try exploring something else about the human experience? like masturbation, perhaps

[phaeton-flier]

Write what you know! That said only the massive agglomeration of movie studios and destruction of the mid-budget film have kept it from Isekai-apocalypse levels of self-referentiality

[centrally-unplanned]

Also, write what the audience wants, right? Who do you think watches abstract, highly-demanding arthouse films with no commercial appeal? Other fucking artists and their adjacenies, of course - people like meta things about themselves!

(Hopefully someday we do get a true avant garde masterpiece about being isekai'd, though - the people yearn for the modern otaku's End of Evangelion)

[centrally-unplanned]

Well, certainly is a lot riding on Platner being a selfless, upstanding person and dropping out of the Maine senate race, because the US lacks political parties and can't actually force him out! And he could probably stay in and still have some chance at winning, because enough voters just truly do not care about any personal morality from their politicians (as evidenced by using your eyes and observing current reality). Which gives him a pretty decent incentive to stay in, right? If he drops out, his political career is forever cooked, and since he is a desultory failson he has nothing else going on. If he stays in and wins, he is one of the most powerful politicians in the country. Isn't that worth a ~20% gamble?

For him personally of course. For the country it is a disastrous gamble to take when the stakes couldn't be higher. What a great system!

(I'm not making a prediction, to be clear - I am hopeful he actually is going to do the right thing because moral failings are not a bundled good; and the parties are asymmetrical, Dems do not have the morality blank check Republicans do, so Platner's odds will go down in a real way that he will see. But this should not even be a debate.)

[trainbrain27]

Ok, today he's been accused of sexual assault in 2021. The Nazi thing apparently doesn't matter, he's immune to punching. The previous abuse and unsettling behavior wasn't disqualifying.

As much as I don't want to hand it to him, his campaign is factually correct in saying "It is not a coincidence that this story comes a week before the ballot deadline, just as the previous false allegations came a week before the primary."

I don't presume to judge allegations like this, but the timing is intentional.

[centrally-unplanned]

"The timing is intentional" is in the end cope though, right? "Hey when running for political office, people are going to play politics" - yeah! Not something one should be surprised about!

While ofc Politico was working on this story for weeks and did not like sit on this until today or anything, interested parties smelled blood in the water on Platner's obvious weaknesses and put resources into that. That is why this info was discovered. The way you counter that is by being like 99% of the hundreds of other candidates running for office right now across every ideological spectrum who don't have sexual assault and nazi tattoo scandals plaguing their campaign: you run the genius tactic of not having a nazi tattoo or committing sexual asssault! This is actually a super easy bar to clear.

Politics is about winning, and you should run candidates who are optimized to win. Platner very clearly was an extremely poor roster pick; something he knew about himself, and then ran anyway. He should have known better, and primary voters/activists/etc should have known better. But here we are.

[theresponseblog]

According to Lyndsey Fifield, she and several other women were interviewed months ago by the New York Times and told them all these things, and the NYT did sit on it.

[centrally-unplanned]

Yes, ~months is how long an article of import can take to fact check and edit, this is a very normal timeline. You need more than this, you need actual evidence. Show me someone from inside the NYT saying "we went against protocol a bit on this one", implying they were sitting. Something real!

(Lyndsey Fifield also isn't even the victim in the primary story, she wouldn't actually have the needed insight to know the timeline)

Far from it, I think they probably rushed it a little bit. It is the Times, they are only human and are very liberal. They wanted the story out before the ballot deadline to replace Platner, when it would make the most difference. They would have published it regardless, don't get me wrong, but I am sure the editors were thinking of that date as they burned the midnight oil to get this one out the door.

[centrally-unplanned]

Just wondering what the correct model of Iran is here - Marginal REVOLUTION

Prior to the war, I linked to a tweet from Matt Yglesias which explained why Matt opposed the war, and I expressed my agreement with his sta

Okay I am prior committing to this being the last of my "how far Tyler Cowen has fallen" posts because at this point it is just punching down; the above is embarrassing levels of him trying to play his Just Asking Questions™ shtick to own the libs without confessing to it. He is implying-without-saying that maybe some kind of war was necessary, in response to Iran launching more strikes in the strait:

But given their reckless behavior in what is supposedly a wonderful war outcome for them, what is the correct way to model what they would have done had Trump and Netanyahu not attacked?

The correct model is they would not be bombing the strait. The thing they did not do for forty years, very reliably, they would have continued not to do.

The terrible things that are happening now, do they not reflect an underlying equilibrium that would have emerged anyway within a few years’ time, or do we hold some hypothesis here of extreme path-dependence, suggesting the Iranian government would have been less bellicose on more or less a permanent basis?

Yes, we do hold that hypothesis! If we didn't try to overthrow their government and murder their leaders, Iran would have done what it had always done for the past 40 years!! Why do I even need say to this??

I certainly agree that the massive militarily escalations before the current war committed by the US and Israel may have changed the balance, sure, but...that isn't proving anything at all. Like. Yeah? That is what countries do sometimes when you bomb them, which we had already done to Iran multiple times!

Also, he has a whole thread on here about how "if the peace deal was so good, why is Iran striking again?" and buddy, we didn't sign it. We haven't signed a treaty! It isn't real! The war isn't over! The US bombed Iran last week!

Iran is not a stable actor by any means, total shitheel government, but there is just no way around the fact that the US is just as unstable. We are a government run by feckless liars, obsessed with fake grievances and weird reputational hang-ups, captive to mercurial domestic politics that could swing at any time. I have no idea how trustworthy the new leadership of Iran - the one we put in power after murdering the old crop of leaders in a surprise attack in the middle of us hosting negotiations with them if you recall - is going to be. Because trust is a two-sided relationship, and it currently has no space to be tested.

They might be unstable, I fully believe that is possible. But that proves none of what Cowen is trying to say here, as he is conflating the current government of Iran with the pre-war one with a level of blase indifference I can only describe as dishonest. And with no argument beyond "hmm maybe?" for his case - a strategy as universally applicable to any point as it is useless in proving them.

It is painfully obvious to me that his demand for "hot takes" about how Maybe Trump Has A Point have outstripped the supply; lacking authentic arguments, he has been forced to invent them. "Markets in Everything" I guess?