James Carradine

Simple empiricist and Bayesian
Politics: self-determination, localize power, maximize consent.
Retweet things I find interesting.

[James Carradine @JamesCarradin1O]

@ThatEricAlper It would take me days to figure this out, so something that popped into mind:

"They flutter behind you, your possible pasts.
Some bright-eyed and crazy, some frightened and lost..."

[Polymarket @Polymarket]

JUST IN: Maryland activist helps block a $5B AI data center planned for the site of an abandoned shopping mall that closed 24 years ago, after gathering over 25,000 signatures.

[Colin Wright @SwipeWright]

I've been telling the right for a while now to stop prematurely celebrating the supposed death of wokeness.

I wasn't trying to be a buzzkill. And it wasn't out of some need to spread fear to maintain my supposed anti-woke grift. It just became clear to me that there was a major disconnect between reliable indicators of its ideological spread and its outward expression.

In 2020, there was a major push to change the ideological makeup of our institutions from the ground up. It was wildly successful. But those changes at the level of graduate students, postdocs, and assistant professors in science, medicine, and law needed years to incubate before they could fully wield their power.

Today, six years later, many have now received or will soon receive tenure, or become doctors and lawyers. The older, non-woke professors are increasingly outnumbered or retiring. Nearly all new hires are still woke, because woke people control the job searches and hiring committees. It's a woke ratchet.

By 2028, those who entered academia during the woke hiring spree of 2020–2022 will have largely moved into tenured positions.

Our institutions have never been more woke. Trump has simply delayed their plans by a few years. What we're seeing now, after the right getting a thorough midterm beatdown, is the woke beginning to test their newfound strength. What can they get away with saying (e.g., Dave Chappelle and Jennifer Welch)? Can they still cancel people over absurd accusations of racism (e.g., the Ole Miss girls making monkey noises)?

They've been training in the off-season, but they haven't yet tested their strength gains in the real world, because flexing prematurely would only invite federal scrutiny. They're emboldened now and will continue testing their strength through 2028. If they win, they'll go all-in and unleash the woke tsunami.

You don't understand how insane it will be. I don't either.

[James Carradine @JamesCarradin1O]

@UziCryptoo $0.02: 'Fair' is people keeping what they earn,

[James Carradine @JamesCarradin1O]

@becka_thompson @grok, who currently face the highest top income tax rates (considering all levels combined), citizens in Minnesota or citizens in Communist China?

[Sun&Steelx @steelx_dr]

@SovereignIM A large section of humanity hate any form of excellence from the most small forms of virtue in someone's character to the most profound achievements.

Why? Because it is an insult to their pathetic egos. Envy and resentment all they way down...

[James Carradine @JamesCarradin1O]

@HistoryBoomer Also, in 1776 around 90% of the population was employed in agriculture and today it's only 1.5%. That's why we're now a nation of unemployed farmers. :-)

[James Carradine @JamesCarradin1O]

@PuzzleWithNova I count 13 shoes, so I gotta go with 6 1/2 people.

[James Carradine @JamesCarradin1O]

CONSENT has been my political bone to pick for a while, which is fairly idiosyncratic in the sphere of X politics.

Am I primarily fighting for the Republicans or the Democrats? Mostly, just government with maximal consent--as our founding document indicates, government derives its "just powers from the CONSENT of the governed."

I agree that CONSENT legitimizes government. CONSENT changes the nature human relations. It's the difference between giving and extortion, love and molestation, doing things because you want to do them and doing things because you're forced to do them. We have huge legal distinctions hinging on whether relationships are consensual or forced.

I also think CONSENT implies exit rights that should be respected. Say what you want about the merits of the Civil War, it was also a serious deviation from principle and a devastating blow to exit rights. Now, if a state no longer consents to being part of the U.S., It will not be allowed to leave.

This leaves us with an gigantic systemic contradiction:

1. Government legitimacy is derived from consent.

but

2. If you don't consent, GFY.

In my opinion, this glaring inconsistency can't be discussed and emphasized enough.

The right to leave is, in my opinion, a very important check on power in a system. It is a check on tyranny and abuse of power in the same way a victim of domestic abuse escaping to a shelter is a check on abuse and power.

When victims aren't allowed to leave, it emboldens the abuser and encourages worse behavior--behavior that ensues when it is impossible to credibly offer the warning: "If you don't stop treating me like this, I am leaving!"

In the current context, do I have any realistic hopes of states or counties being allowed to secede by higher powers. Succinctly, NOPE.

So what's the point of carrying on this line of argument?

Well, for one thing, I really do believe government legitimate to the degree it is consensual, so there's a genuine principle in play here. Also, if enough people start discussing it, maybe the Overton Window can move?

Beyond that, insisting on maximal consent is a rhetorical and negotiational anchor point, especially against the Left who appear hellbent on centralizing power (abolish EC, abolish Senate, abolish states' rights, etc.)

The Left has doubled down on a lot of positions. For example, there's the importance of consent in relationships (e.g, "No always means no.") and, of course, there are endless critiques of power and oppression. In addition, they have doubled down on a great deal of relativism (cultural and otherwise.)

So given their philosophical premises and moral foundations, I think an apt response to the Left is "We do not consent. We say 'No'. We want to leave. Will you really use your power to force us to stay in a relationship we don't want to be in?"

Given everything they've committed to morally and philosophically, this response forces them into positions of hypocrisy and contradiction. My rhetorical and negotiational positions are predicated on their chosen premises.

And their reactions to rejecting consent can be amusing:

"I do not consent!"
"Then leave!"

Um, dude, you're the creators of sanctuary cities and sanctuary states and now you're telling me to leave because I told you I do not consent to your power and abuse? And given I just told you that I reject your authority, so why do you think I would care if you think I should leave?

"There's a social contract!"
"Really? I don't recall signing anything. Do you have a copy on you?"😀

[James Carradine @JamesCarradin1O]

@Costacozy Dammit, dude, take this post down! The aphrodisiacal power of baby blue Crocs sandals is a carefully guarded trade secret, you're blowing it!

[James Carradine @JamesCarradin1O]

@ThoNg676733 @grok, are the actual phonemes of ancient Egyptian known or is this just made up?

[imjustnewatai @imjustnewatai]

I asked fable 5.2 to invent a new musical form.

Fable 5.2 wrote a symphony that’s shaped like a training run.

The orchestra starts as random noise, learns the key, pulse, harmony and the melody, then plays music it was never shown.

[James Carradine @JamesCarradin1O]

@Polymarket

[James Carradine @JamesCarradin1O]

@PhilipGreenspun @nypost Ramen, cereal, bagels and Oreos? That's bad. The only legal defense I can come up with: "I was trying to prepare them for college." :-)

[James Carradine @JamesCarradin1O]

The ’60s and ’70s gave us war, scandal, and Boomers discovering that absolutely everything was grounds for a concept album.

The ’80s were a defiant Pollyanna: "Yes, we may get nuked tomorrow, but damn it, we’re going dancing tonight." Reagan smiled, the synths sparkled, and the Soviet Union eventually conceded defeat.

Then the ’90s arrived to investigate whether all this happiness had been a terrible mistake. We’d vanquished so many dragons that Cobain and Yorke had to make critically acclaimed albums about how awful it was to be winning.

After that, somebody invented Auto-Tune, and the music industry became a factory extruding tuneful dough from a corporate piping bag.

Putting the ’80s last is exactly the sort of joyless behavior the ’80s were invented to cure.😀

[James Carradine @JamesCarradin1O]

@ThatEricAlper How Soon is Now?

[James Carradine @JamesCarradin1O]

@MatthewGagnon Yep. The inexplicably retarded policies of an individual who was a Harvard Law professor for 20 years.

[James Carradine @JamesCarradin1O]

Every ideology has at least one word for infidel or devil. When you realize it's that simple, it starts to make sense.

[James Carradine @JamesCarradin1O]

@801formal_llama @snowandcaffeine @ryandbusse Our elections tend to be like that. Who gets to impose their will on whom by what slim margin? 2024: 49.8% beats 48.3%.