browserman

Ah, I understand now, I didn't realize I'd been going back and forth with an out-and-out fascist. Don't think there's much more point to this!

You're right, it turns out what the parent meant to suggest was only that they should be tortured.

And other societies developed social norms which sacralized and ritualized the usage of such drugs, or which totally normalized them. Again, the idea that there is a single social expression of what constitutes 'humanity' is a very reactionary mindset that flies in the face of all evidence and history.

Yes - and whenever those people could, from the dawn of history, they were also getting drunk, high, and tripping balls.

How on earth do any of those texts have any ability to inform our idea of 'what it is to be human' compared to the actual weight of evidence of what humans have been doing since the dawn of history? What a bizarre non-sequitur!

I guess we should go back to throwing those guys in prison, for the decorum.

The idea that there is one "thing you are supposed to do" that defines human experience is ironically a pretty modern reactionary mindset. They were smoking cannabis in ancient Scythia - it's "what you were supposed to do".

Yes, I think he likely regrets his previous public positioning and is adjusting. I think, as I said, this is part of a broader shift in the tech-ocracy towards more explicit anti-labor and anti-regulatory positioning, and I think the potential risks of vigorous securities & labor law enforcement to Elon's wealth and personal freedom are likely substantially higher than the slap on the wrist he received from Trump's SEC (which, you'll remember, also imposed some mild restrictions on his ability to Tweet, which clearly irked him far more than the fine). I also don't think a billionaire with a California-based business donating to Democrats is at all fatal to my little theory here, as plenty of right-wing anti-labor, anti-regulation plutocrats donate to Democrats if they think it is in their material interest to do so.

Given that this is your second attempt at quitting the thread with a pre-emptory sign off, I would like to apologize for agitating you so much with my idle speculation here, and I sincerely hope you're able to make this attempt stick.

That he also donates to Democrats does not seem at all fatal to my speculation, as many avowedly right-wing (in the economic sense), anti-labor, anti-regulation businessmen donate freely to both parties. You seem to have some very confused notions about U.S. politics and political economy more generally.

I think 2018 is exactly the kind of thing he is trying to avoid; I think you are underestimating the impact vigorous enforcement of labor and securities laws would have on his business prospects. Elon and his companies of course also spend quite a lot of money on campaign donations, lobbying, and political activity.

I think this is probably only one factor at play here, and who really knows to what degree, but it's certainly more of a factor than marketing pablum about Elon being a futurist deeply concerned with the optimal future of humanity or whatever.

I don't think it's a straight quid pro quo or that he's on a secret Signal chat with Trump or anything. Just part of a broad alignment of the tech oligarchy with the Republican Party on anti-labor and anti-regulation lines.

Tesla's AI engineers can't even solve their own problems, why do you think they could solve Twitter's?

After considering it for a bit, my opinion is that it's mostly a political ploy; if he buys it, he'll bring back Trump et. all, expecting that once the GOP is back in power, they'll make any trouble he may be expecting with the SEC and the National Labor Relations Board go away

I think there are probably other factors at play too. His ego, of course. And also the general desire, also evident among VCs like Andreesen, to discipline the Silicon Valley workforce and remind the uppity code-monkeys who's really in charge.

I'm interested in this assumption that because you do not understand something, no one else must either. Is this a heuristic you apply to all fields of knowledge, or just business law?

This is sort of exactly the thing I mean. Even if you don't agree with me that Elon is a serial liar, I don't think you can dispute a more generous characterization of him as having a long history of optimistically interpreting the facts in his favor. Why on earth would you take this claim at face value?

I agree that he is great at talking.

HN also has fairly strictly enforced guidelines. Do you think dang et. all 'don't believe in free speech'?

I don't have 'anger' towards him, although I certainly have an opinion about whether he is trustworthy or genuinely civic-minded, as I do about many other incredibly powerful political-business operators who collectively set the terms of public life.

Of course, I'm also baffled that people credit him as being a 'builder' rather than an extremely successful marketer and financial engineer, especially at the expense of all the people who, you know, actually do the building...

The most bizarre part of this whole saga has been the legions of online commentators who evidently take Elon at his word when he says he is trying operate in the public interest, or that his actual aims are what he says they are.

It seems patently obvious to me that all of the actions he's taken over the entire time he's been in the public eye have shown him to be an incredibly vindictive egomaniac and serial liar interested only in his own aggrandizement. I find the apparently deep well of credibility he has with the public to be completely baffling.

No euphemism, I meant he was physically turning himself red with online rage

He's red and mad about posts. Spending too much time on Twitter will drive even a disciplined mind insane.

"The Kennedy Center receives an annual federal appropriation in recognition of the Center’s role as the presidential memorial to John F. Kennedy. These funds pay only for the operation and maintenance, and capital repair and restoration of the building and grounds, ensuring that the living memorial to our 35th president remains a vibrant homage to his legacy."

None of the federal money pays for expenses related to the actual programming and operations of the Kennedy Center, it pays for the building and grounds, which has a separate purpose as the federal memorial to JFK and is also used for a variety of public events and educational functions outside of the Center's performance arts programming. The parent comment asked why the government pays for opera (it doesn't, maybe through a modest NEA grant or something), not "Why does the federal government pay for federal monuments and public spaces?"

The Kennedy Center is legally required to sustain itself through private funding and ticket sales. It also offers plenty of free performances.

There have occasionally been (completely wishful) proposals in the U.S. to have a team's IP (the name, logos, record, etc, basically the whole team's 'identity') belong to a city or a public corporation representing the region they draw their fanbase from.