#multi-billionaires

[tomorrowusa]

^^^ Another way of thinking about what a trillion represents.

The very filthy rich and their enablers are overwhelmingly losers.

[ir-tg-curvy-mature-feetworship]

The tech bros' First Amendment

[tomorrowusa]

To paraphrase what they say in the pest control business: There's never just ONE multi-billionaire.

We may not be able to get rid of them, but we can certainly vote their MAGA pawns out of office.

Midterm Election Day is 148 days from today. To do nothing to defeat Capitol Hill Republicans is the same as entrenching the status quo.

[tomorrowusa]

California voters had their first chance to be heard on data centers. They didn’t hold back.

The Monterey Park ballot measure is part of a wave of opposition rising across the country.

Monterey Park, California became the second municipality in the US to use a popular referendum to ban AI data centers. And it wasn't even close. The anti-data center measure received 86.38% of the vote, and mail-in votes are still being counted.

California’s first-ever anti-data center ballot measure is shaping up to be an absolute shellacking for the tech industry — part of a wave of opposition rising across the country, as communities and lawmakers grapple with the frenzied push to build AI infrastructure. Monterey Park, a city of 60,000 people about 10 miles east of downtown Los Angeles, placed a measure on Tuesday’s ballot asking voters if they wanted to prohibit data centers in their city. The response, so far, has been an unequivocal “yes,” with 86 percent of votes counted as of Wednesday afternoon in favor of the proposal. Local officials and environmental organizers said they hope the drubbing will spur other cities to enact similar bans. “A lot of the other cities that are facing data center proposals are going to follow suit,” Elizabeth Yang, the city’s mayor, said on Tuesday. “There’s [a] bad reputation across the board, across the country, from other data centers that have been built in neighborhoods.”

Congrats to Mayor Yang and the people of Monterey Park. 🍻🎉

In general, Americans want data centers about as much as they want Ebola virus.

Tech companies want to shove AI down our gullets while making us pay higher electric rates for the dubious privilege.

With some exceptions, things are not going well for tech at the ballot box these days.

In a separate article, POLITICO reports...

Less than half an hour after polls closed in the Golden State, San Jose Mayor Matt Mahan conceded the governor’s race, becoming the most prominent casualty for tech on primary night. The former startup executive rallied Silicon Valley donors to pour tens of millions of dollars into his failed bid, only to land in the low single digits. Tech challengers are also stumbling in congressional races in the tech-heavy Bay Area. Entrepreneur Ethan Agarwal conceded early Wednesday after coming nowhere close to advancing against Silicon Valley Rep. Ro Khanna, a progressive who’s championed a proposed tax on California billionaires. And wealthy venture capitalist Eric Jones could get boxed out of his challenge to Democratic Rep. Mike Thompson in his Napa County district, as Jones is pulling in at a close third. “This is a preview of what’s coming in 2026, and it’s a preview of what’s coming in 2028,” Rob Flaherty, a Democratic strategist who was deputy campaign manager for Kamala Harris’ presidential campaign, told POLITICO. “Association with tech money is increasingly going to become a problem.” The anti-tech mood is rising across the U.S., with the California results just the latest demonstration of populist opposition. Voters are angry about water and energy-hungry data centers in their communities, and parents are concerned that chatbots are harming their children. Tech is poised to suffer more electoral defeats this summer in New York, Florida and elsewhere, where detractors challenging the industry are frontrunners in their upcoming primaries. “People are looking for these avenues to push back on tech,” said Irene Kao, director of Courage California, a progressive advocacy group. “Voters at the end of the day really want to see candidates who reflect who they are. They want candidates who feel less out of touch.”

And what could be more "out of touch" than tech multi-billionaires who are feverishly developing new technologies to put us out of work?

The primary season is less than half over and there are more potentially bad results for billionaire tech lords.

In NYC, a progressive named Alex Bores is running for US House from NY-12. He worked in tech himself for a while but is now running a strongly anti-oligarch campaign. NY-12 covers the midsection of Manhattan and is a very high profile race. In polls, Alex has been running first or second and big tech has been contributing to Alex's opponents.

Because the area is heavily Democratic, winning the Dem primary makes the winner the overwhelming favorite to win in November. So if you have friends who live in NY-12, urge them to vote for Ales Bores. Election Day is June 23rd and early voting starts on Saturday June 13th.

Alex Bores for Congress

^^^ There's a map of the distract at his site, just scroll down.

[tomorrowusa]

J.D. Vance would prefer to have people think of him as a barefoot hillbilly from some Appalachian hollow. In fact, he's a venture capitalist with a Yale law school degree who grew up in a Cincinnati suburb and likes couches a lot.

Far right tech oligarchs like Peter Thiel groomed J.D. and have lavished him with campaign loot.

In a recent column, Nobel economics laureate Paul Krugman writes...

Vance’s ascent has, to a significant degree, been powered by a small group of technology billionaires, with Peter Thiel, who poured millions into Vance’s 2022 Senate race, at the center. There’s clearly overlap between this coterie and the tech types who a year ago briefly swooned over Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Their enthusiasm for Kennedy seems to have waned as they’ve realized the obvious — that he’s a crank who could still play the role of spoiler, but not a serious presidential contender in his own right. On the other hand, the elevation of Vance — who seems to be a worse politician than even his detractors realized, looks harder to reverse. While it’s technically still possible to replace Vance on the G.O.P. ticket, Trump is probably stuck with him. In any case, you really want to think of Vance as an avatar, not of hillbillies — as the title of his memoir would have you believe — but of tech bros. [ ... ] Some right-wing techies have also descended into conspiracism. Leading the pack, Elon Musk has taken to promoting false claims that Democrats refuse to deport illegal immigrants because they expect to receive their votes. In general, as I’ve noted in the past, paranoid politics comes surprisingly naturally to the ultrawealthy, and not just in the tech sector. Partly that’s because it’s hard for some billionaires to avoid surrounding themselves with people unwilling to tell them when they’re talking nonsense. Partly it’s because some seem to feel a peculiar sense of grievance over the things money can’t buy: If I’m so rich, why can’t I shape the world to my liking? [ ... ] Anyway, the backing of tech billionaires is a key reason we ended up with Vance as a vice-presidential contender. He pitches himself as a champion of working-class America. But behind his cynical culture-warring — behind his professed allegiance to Everyman totems like Mountain Dew — he’s closely tied to a tech-sector ethos that’s anything but populist.

J.D. is part of the "elite" he claims to be fighting against. He's a willing errand boy for far right tech oligarchs who think that their enormous wealth gives them the right to impose their will on society.

[tomorrowusa]

White House: 400 wealthiest families paid average tax rate of 8.2 percent

The White House released an analysis on Thursday estimating that the 400 wealthiest American families paid an average federal income tax rate of only 8.2 percent on $1.8 trillion of income from 2010 to 2018.

It’s not surprising that the filthy rich aren’t paying their fair share of taxes. It’s a bit ironic that they do spend a ton of money on tax lawyers, lobbyists, and campaign contributions to make sure they don’t have to pay up.

The White House released an analysis on Thursday estimating that the 400 wealthiest American families paid an average federal income tax rate of only 8.2 percent on $1.8 trillion of income from 2010 to 2018.

"Two factors that contribute to this low estimated tax rate include low tax rates on the capital gains and dividends that are taxed, and wealthy families’ ability to permanently avoid paying tax on investment gains that are excluded from taxable income," the report said.

The filthy rich will usually find ways to hide money and avoid paying taxes on income. So what would be helpful is a tax on consumption.

There’s no fun in being filthy rich if you can’t be ostentatious in your display of wealth. So it’s much harder for these folks to hide what they consume and show off to the world. If a tech oligarch from Silicon Valley wishes to to buy an island, then tax that transaction. Any luxury goods like yachts or diamonds brought into the US by private individuals from other countries should be taxed as well.