Remember when compilers would detect that someone was using it to build another compiler and silently inject bugs?

this metaphor in Musk v. Altman closing statements is SENDING me

BREAKING: The California Coastal Commission told a Dana Point couple they could rebuild their aging home — but only if they agreed to demolish it whenever the government says so. We filed suit to stop this unconstitutional shakedown.

The largest supermarket in Britain, that operates on razor-thin margins, is about to be crushed for the crime of paying different jobs different salaries, while our legislature shrugs. How dare they suggest that “so-called market rates” can exist in Soviet Britain.

In a previous tweet, I pointed out that China will have a harder time catching up with the United States. China’s GDP was about 78% of the U.S. level in 2021, but by 2024 that share had fallen to roughly 64%. Some argued this was simply an exchange-rate effect, while others questioned the metric itself and suggested that purchasing-power parity, or PPP, tells a different story. It is true that the renminbi has weakened from around 6.3 to roughly 7.2 per dollar, a depreciation of about 13%. That does reduce China’s GDP in dollar terms. But the divergence between China and the United States is visible in underlying growth. In nominal terms, the U.S. economy has expanded more rapidly. American GDP rose from about 23 trillion dollars in 2021 to roughly 28 to 29 trillion in 2024, an increase of around 25%. China’s grew from approximately 114 trillion yuan to around 130 trillion yuan, closer to 15%. Even allowing for differences in measurement, the gap is widening, not narrowing. The same pattern appears in capital markets. U.S. equities, represented by the S&P 500, increased from roughly $45 trillion in 2021 to around $55–60 trillion more recently. Chinese markets have moved in the opposite direction. Indices such as the CSI 300 and the Hang Seng have seen their combined market value fall from around $13 trillion at their peak to closer to $10 trillion. If this were primarily a currency story, it would be difficult to explain why U.S. markets have surged while China’s have contracted in absolute terms. This points to a deeper structural shift. China’s growth model, long driven by investment, construction and credit expansion, is running into constraints, including diminishing returns and rising debt burdens. The United States, by contrast, continues to benefit from stronger consumption and more resilient capital markets. There is also a historical lesson. During the Cold War, Nobel economist Paul Samuelson projected that the Soviet economy would eventually catch up with or even surpass that of the United States in late 20 century . Those forecasts extrapolated from USSR’s strong growth trends but underestimated geopolitical realities. As for PPP, it serves a specific purpose but has clear limitations. It is useful for comparing domestic purchasing power, yet far less informative when assessing global economic weight, financial influence or technological leadership. For instance, India’s economy already appears significantly larger than Japan’s. Few would argue that India offers a higher level of development. Finally, headline GDP figures themselves have limits. Investment can boost output and employment in the short term while generating little long-term return, especially when financed by rising debt. This concern has long been raised in discussions of China’s infrastructure and construction-led model. Questions around data transparency add another layer of uncertainty. For policymakers, the implication is straightforward. Treating this as a currency-driven fluctuation, or relying on PPP-based comparisons, risks misreading China’s trajectory. The evidence points to a more durable divergence, shaped by structural factors rather than short-term financial movements. This is not simply a cyclical slowdown. It marks a shift in relative economic momentum.

This is quite something. The new Hungarian PM goes on state TV to announce the end of state TV.

You get to $222b based on the price the last guy paid for one share. Dump billions, buying pressure evaporates, share price craters. Taxing people based on what other people might pay for your possessions when you are not selling them is a moral and logical hazard.

Hayek expressed this better in Road to Serfdom. To the gentle socialists who want big gov b/c they hate the sociopaths running big corporations, just wait until you centralize the power into a single source. You'll be shocked to discover who gravitates there and ends up on top.

Monty Python levels of almost too-cartoonish-to-conceive corruption coming out of the Delaware Chancery Court in the lawfare ops against Elon. This is the judge

Unfortunately this is the most important political cartoon for understanding the mind of the median voter.

to socialists, wealth is always conceptualized as money in a checking account. if you sell richy rich's mansion to fund this scheme, you would not get anything close to what the market previously told you it was worth; there would be no one willing to buy it at the estimated capitalist market price in a socialist economy.

More importantly, it skewed the demand for wildfire risk properties. If insurance market was properly functioning, there would be much less demand and thus less homes built in these areas bc the insurance cost would make them prohibitively unaffordable. Instead, CA taxpayers effectively subsidize this behavior, when demand pressure could otherwise have developed (or redeveloped) more appropriate high value housing elsewhere in LA.

Fun fact: this bureaucracy is designed to make politically-animated decisions. The Coastal Comm is made up of appointed "volunteers". They are paid nothing, except a tiny stipend of $12/hr for some prep they might do for the monthly hearings addressing the 1000s of pages of material prepped by a well-paid enforcement staff. Imagine what kind of "justice" people in such position dole out. Not only is the crop made up of a certain politically-motivated crowd (who else would do such a thankless side job?), but this structure ensures that they can never be adequately prepared and never motivated to make unpopular-but-correct decisions (ie, justice). Court review is extremely limited; grand deference is given to their decisions, no matter how many ludicrous things the commissions might say to shed light on their motivations. Exactly what the government wants.

Here is the full length video report into the mysterious 'Global Disinformation Index' and how it censors political speech across Europe and the US. Please share widely, more people need to know.

I have a lot of Qs about Kennedy too, but these cartoonish characterizations of his motives are silly. He’s a KENNEDY. If he said the things everyone wanted him to say he would have been anointed emperor years ago.

Presented without comment.