Notices by Patricia Aas (patricia@social.vivaldi.net)

And make no mistake: anyone participating in this will be called collaborators and traitors, and their descendants will be ashamed for generations.

You think you’re safe because you’re white? He’s talked about leftist, queer folks, journalists, activists. They will grab anyone they want. They will steal from everyone they can get away with. You’ll have neighbors informing on neighbors to snap up their property on the cheap. Y’all are fucking children. Read a fucking book.

1/ The Norwegian election is over, so I guess it’s time to read the book nobody seems to like.

3/ Argument so far in the introduction:

1. They describe a future utopia, where technology is used for the good of mankind. For me it gives a Star Trek Future light.
2. They argue that what got us here is the belief that either the unrestricted free market or the highly regulated free market can get us there.
3. They seem to claim that neither is true. That some things are needed for the good of the many, that not necessarily are things a free market would be incentivized to solve.

I am assuming they mean both regulated or unregulated.

I’m assuming they might make a case for incentives? Or publicly sponsored production? Like universal healthcare or… trains?

They mention «Fully Automated Luxury Communism» by Aaron Bastani as a rare instance of a positive future vision.

Maybe I should read that.
https://www.audible.com/pd/1705255264?source_code=ASSORAP0511160006&share_location=pdp

2/ Example criticism from the left

https://youtu.be/iTC5jKpYYNU

6/ Started on chapter 1 «Grow» and I think it is about «productivity» which I have struggled with before.

I was also reminded of this video I saw a few months ago, which surprisingly explained to me why in American movies and shows everyone lives in apartments on a corridor like in a hotel. And windows are almost always only on one side.

«Why North America Can’t Build Nice Apartments (because of one rule)»

I was reminded of this because he talked about how expensive housing is in cities and how that has forced many people into long commutes.

https://youtu.be/iRdwXQb7CfM

5/ Done with the introduction.

It seems like what they want to achieve is mostly around affordable housing. They are very critical of liberal/Democrat states, because of a logic that goes something like: «if we can’t make it there, we can’t make it anywhere».

They also seem to put this into a perspective of «winning back» voters by showing policy that makes their lives better.

I get a feeling this book will be very US centered in general and California centered in particular. And that’s fine.

I’m sure some of it will transfer. The world has been influenced greatly by the US.

4/ This reminds me of this interview with Professor Lina Khan (former FTC chair) I listened to earlier today. Where she in part argues that allowing monopolies to buy up their competition through mergers and acquisitions (M&As) actually stifles innovation.

Fundamentally because the value of an innovation is not in the good it can do for humanity, but in how profitable it can be.

Sometimes something less effective (lifelong treatment) is more profitable than a solution (a cure).

https://youtu.be/zOCERqbq8js

9/ Ok. When you put it like that it is quite damning.

California has 12% of the US population
30% of the homeless population
50% of the unsheltered homeless population

8/ Ok. We’re into zoning rules.

7/ Huh, they’re forming a strange argument, I don’t have all of it yet. But for now they seem to make the following assertions/assumptions:

1. The best workers live in cities
2. Innovation therefore happens there
3. Maximum performance requires in-office presence (so no remote)
4. It is easier for children who grow up in cities to out-earn their parents.

I’m assuming this is building a foundation for arguing that affordable housing in cities is good for innovation and overcoming class disparities.

12/ I feel they might be attributing to malice things that probably are not, at least not for the vast majority of people. I really don’t think all home owners have pushed for stricter and stricter regulations to suppress the building of new homes to maximize profit on their own «property investment».

Yeah, I’m sure some people are like that. But I think most people have better things to worry about. And I think to the extent they do worry about these things it’s because they want to keep their view or have things be quiet or something.

I guess it comes down to the «use vs exchange value» thing from last summer. If the primary purpose of your «property» is as a home, vs as an investment.

11/ Also, as in programmering, what seems like a bad idea today was often a good idea at the time. But things change.

10/ I can see how liberals/Democrats/leftists are getting very defensive about this book. There is an underlying assumption in any political theory that «my way will give better outcomes».

But I think we’re doing ourselves a disservice by framing everything as a binary. Wanting zoning reform (something I know nothing about) isn’t fascism.

We don’t have to defend every decision ever made by people on our side. We don’t even have to defend our own bad decisions.

That’s what makes it possible for us to become better than we were.

It’s a superpower to change your mind.

14/ Sorry, got distracted by a knitting 🧶 emergency and had to undo stitch by stitch which English speaking knitters call «tink»* (the word «knit» in reverse, because these folks have humor).

As opposed to «frog» when you just rip it until the right place and pick up the stitches again.

I don’t know why they call it «frog». Omg I think it is because «rip it, rip it». 🤦🏻♀️

git revert vs git reset —hard

13/ I also think we might in some cases be too generous and take people at their word. They might say «to protect my property value» and actually the reason might be more «I don’t want black folks in my neighborhood».

16/ How can we create an empathetic society if we keep villainizing our fellow citizens?

This seems massively useful to the powerful: make them fight eachother so they don’t fight us.

15/ The Evil Selfish Homeowner trope has given way to The Hapless Idealistic Politician. I’m sorry, but why is the regular person just trying to get by, being blamed for bad policy, but the political class gets the credit for good policy?

This is annoying.

Summary so far:

The Evil Selfish Homeowner made sure nobody could build anything through a vast conspiracy of various regulations around everything from parking to lot size.

Now entering The Good Politician. Here to save the environment through regulation.

Last year I wondered how one could strengthen the NOK to make imports cheaper. And it turns out that the US running straight into fascism while tanking their economy was the solution all along 😬
https://e24.no/boers-og-finans/i/4Bw036/dollaren-under-10-kroner

Trump is going to Camp David with military leadership. This will end in him using the military against the population. Today or the next couple of days. Starting in California.

You can’t unring this bell.
This is the last moment the US military has to refuse.