Diversity vs. cosmopolitanism in Paris, London, New York, & LA; Shame of & for Clarence Thomas; Jay Powell's interest-rate pause; & Evans, Holbo, & Jennings on state coercion & Africa's kingdoms...
Have you seen this NY Fed measure of underlying inflation? Does the Fed want pain in the labor market more than 2% inflation? June's CPI less food, energy, & shelter was 0.0%.
Also, historically, why does inflation tend to fall as fast as it rose in periods of high inflation in the US? And how often does high inflation over-correct to <0% inflation?
Did Brad just say that the US has no autochthonous ethnic group that would support a "blood-and-soil" state? Uh, what about wipipo? Whiteness assimilates what it needs, and castes [sic] the rest aside.
Re: "Britain, also, is a diverse but not a cosmopolitan country, However, Greater London is a cosmopolitan city:"
I would argue that parts of GL are cosmopolitan, but it is not uniform. I spent 2 years in Manchester in the mid-1980s. I didn't get any sense that it was any less cosmopolitan than London where I grew up (although back in the 1980s I don't think I would consider London particularly cosmopolitan, and not a whole lot better one my last visit a decade or so back). GL may lean more left-wing politically, but that isn't a sufficient proxy to call it cosmopolitan.
I have a much more uniformly negative view of Graeber than Henry does -- it feels like he contributed to some of the most counter-productive aspects of the left. For instance, he's a big degrowth fan, tends to valorize pre-modern societies, and his skepticism of state power leading to our housing crisis.
People celebrate Occupy Wall Street, but it's hard not to notice that it had no lasting impact on Wall Street whatsoever.
On France, I happened to reread this in Hannah Arendt's Human Condition yesterday:
"Modern enchantment with "small things," though preached by early twentieth-century poetry in almost all European tongues, has found its classical presentation in the petit bonheur of the French people. Since the decay of their once great and glorious public realm, the French have become masters in the art of being happy among "small things," within the space of their own four walls, between chest and bed, table and chair, dog and cat and flowerpot, extending to these things a care and tenderness which, in a world where rapid industrialization constantly kills off the things of yesterday to produce today's objects, may even appear to be the world's last, purely humane corner. This enlarge- ment of the private, the enchantment, as it were, of a whole people, does not make it public, does not constitute a public realm, but, on the contrary, means only that the public realm has almost com- pletely receded, so that greatness has given way to charm every- where; for while the public realm may be great, it cannot be charming precisely because it is unable to harbor the irrelevant."
But note that AMZN fails on several other points, and we know that AMZN has numerous failings and is doing the reverse of O'Reilly's dictum of increasing value, rather than extracting it. AMZN may well be in it for the long haul, but that doesn't mean that is isn't increasingly extractive.
The drive to increase some metric that pleases investors is a flaw of our [Anglo] capitalist model that places returns [now or in the future] above all other considerations.
Masnick is usually very astute, even given his very obvious libertarian leanings.
Yes, Amazon is one of the standard illustrations of enshittification as business model, the definition having originated to some extent as an attempt to describe that model. A passing acquaintance with the term would suggest not starting one's list of exceptions with a typifying instance.
Have you seen this NY Fed measure of underlying inflation? Does the Fed want pain in the labor market more than 2% inflation? June's CPI less food, energy, & shelter was 0.0%.
Also, historically, why does inflation tend to fall as fast as it rose in periods of high inflation in the US? And how often does high inflation over-correct to <0% inflation?
https://fredblog.stlouisfed.org/2023/06/gauging-underlying-inflation/?utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=FRED%20Data%20News%200723&utm_content=FRED%20Data%20News%200723+CID_c01bdde6694b08b4a697b0eaff84f423&utm_source=Research%20newsletter&utm_term=here
Did Brad just say that the US has no autochthonous ethnic group that would support a "blood-and-soil" state? Uh, what about wipipo? Whiteness assimilates what it needs, and castes [sic] the rest aside.
Re: "Britain, also, is a diverse but not a cosmopolitan country, However, Greater London is a cosmopolitan city:"
I would argue that parts of GL are cosmopolitan, but it is not uniform. I spent 2 years in Manchester in the mid-1980s. I didn't get any sense that it was any less cosmopolitan than London where I grew up (although back in the 1980s I don't think I would consider London particularly cosmopolitan, and not a whole lot better one my last visit a decade or so back). GL may lean more left-wing politically, but that isn't a sufficient proxy to call it cosmopolitan.
I have a much more uniformly negative view of Graeber than Henry does -- it feels like he contributed to some of the most counter-productive aspects of the left. For instance, he's a big degrowth fan, tends to valorize pre-modern societies, and his skepticism of state power leading to our housing crisis.
People celebrate Occupy Wall Street, but it's hard not to notice that it had no lasting impact on Wall Street whatsoever.
On France, I happened to reread this in Hannah Arendt's Human Condition yesterday:
"Modern enchantment with "small things," though preached by early twentieth-century poetry in almost all European tongues, has found its classical presentation in the petit bonheur of the French people. Since the decay of their once great and glorious public realm, the French have become masters in the art of being happy among "small things," within the space of their own four walls, between chest and bed, table and chair, dog and cat and flowerpot, extending to these things a care and tenderness which, in a world where rapid industrialization constantly kills off the things of yesterday to produce today's objects, may even appear to be the world's last, purely humane corner. This enlarge- ment of the private, the enchantment, as it were, of a whole people, does not make it public, does not constitute a public realm, but, on the contrary, means only that the public realm has almost com- pletely receded, so that greatness has given way to charm every- where; for while the public realm may be great, it cannot be charming precisely because it is unable to harbor the irrelevant."
Very much Voltaire's "tend to my own garden" approach. Perfectly consistent with, indeed necessary for, authoritarian rule.
There was a similar path for Pushkin who dropped his social activism for domestic life.
Masnick certainly has missed the point. Enshittification is the plan. He gives Amazon as his first example of a CEO resisting it. Enough said.
But note that AMZN fails on several other points, and we know that AMZN has numerous failings and is doing the reverse of O'Reilly's dictum of increasing value, rather than extracting it. AMZN may well be in it for the long haul, but that doesn't mean that is isn't increasingly extractive.
The drive to increase some metric that pleases investors is a flaw of our [Anglo] capitalist model that places returns [now or in the future] above all other considerations.
Masnick is usually very astute, even given his very obvious libertarian leanings.
Yes, Amazon is one of the standard illustrations of enshittification as business model, the definition having originated to some extent as an attempt to describe that model. A passing acquaintance with the term would suggest not starting one's list of exceptions with a typifying instance.
I bought my copies of the Small Change series in 2013. No DeLong introduction for me!
Bummer! I love Jo Walton.
"But… sometimes it is less valuable to be right than to expand the space of perceived social and political possibilities…"
Maybe. I'm not persuade that Graber's opus is valuable in that way. It depends on the "reception."