Tim Cupery

quantitative sociologist, parent, cyclist

[Hunter📈🌈📊 @StatisticUrban]

DSA opposing NATO and calling on the US to withdraw from it is a massive black mark against the org, for me.

[Richard Hanania @RichardHanania]

Douthat, in his goodbye column, says that Trump has behaved in a corrupt and authoritarian manner, but you can rest assured because his second administration "has no great popularity, no legislative capacity, no policy legacy that a Democratic successor can’t easily roll back."

I think this misunderstands how norms fall apart. Compared to Trump, administrations used to face corruption scandals over relatively tiny amounts of money and accusations of a politicized justice system over trivial offenses.

You have Trump now openly selling pardons, doing crypto rug pulls, pulling in billions from all this, and directly telling his subordinates who to prosecute. None of this was thinkable before. Compare Hunter Biden to Don Jr and what Trump himself are doing, we can't even measure these things on the same scale.

Do future administrations go back to the previous levels of corruption? Or has Trump set new norms and redefined what we see as scandalous behavior in politicians?

We better hope Trump is unique in how much he can get away with. He certainly is to some extent, but I would bet it's going to be more difficult to punish all kinds of bad behavior among presidents in the future.

One populist administration threatens norms built up over generations.

This is why populism so often destroys democracy.

[Tim Cupery @cupery]

Have you ever wondered what company is "the official SUV partner of USA soccer"?
Neither have I.

[ApoStructura @ApoStructura]

Average voter: housing here became too expensive, we can’t afford it anymore

Economists: your city needs to build more housing to increase supply

Average voter: I don’t want more housing, I want housing to be more affordable

That’s basically the state of the discourse

[Tim Cupery @cupery]

Living far away from lots of things you do on a regular basis isn't nice. The thing that makes at least frustrating is high-speed transit. Driving a personal car for long periods of time is stressful, unless you live in a truly rural area with empty roads like in car adverts.

[Hayden @the_transit_guy]

It’s fascinating that the current growth pattern of economies like Texas is an attempt to answer: “How far can urban sprawl go until commutes become untenable?”

[James Medlock @jdcmedlock]

Really striking that California building like Austin would reduce child poverty by similar amount as the expanded CTC. If you support one of these things, you should support the other.

[Tim Cupery @cupery]

@cremieuxrecueil It's always convenient when the critics and the boosters give you the same picture of a person or an issue or a book.

[Richard Hanania @RichardHanania]

NYT headline: “Trump Is Said to Be in Talks to Send Afghans Who Aided U.S. Forces to Congo.”

Among them are interpreters for the US military, families of US service members, and more than 400 children.

We’re becoming an evil country.

[Noah Smith 🐇🇺🇸🇺🇦🇹🇼 @Noahpinion]

Progressives think that just not teaching anyone math will make everyone equal.

Instead, poor kids suffer while middle class kids just get their parents to teach them instead.

[Noah Smith 🐇🇺🇸🇺🇦🇹🇼 @Noahpinion]

This is why speeding is stupid, btw

[Ed Whelan @EdWhelanEPPC]

It is impossible for states to “disobey” an executive order. An executive order is a vehicle by which a president directs executive-branch officials how to administer existing law.
Trump cannot “mandate” how states administer their absentee-ballot laws. Insofar as the EO will threaten to withhold federal funds, Trump will need a statutory basis for imposing that condition. (And if he has one, why hasn’t he acted before now?)

[Russell @theramblingfool]

There's a logical fallacy, let's call it the Religulous fallacy, where you find the stupidest people you can that hold a position, and advertise them as the embodiment of that position.

It's highly persuasive to people who already agree with you, but is entirely void of logic.

[adam @resurrecti0ns]

i mean it's mostly a choice between "try to fix the problem" and "pretend the problem doesn't exist" and the main issue is that if you choose the former then university management will drop an anvil on your head the instant a student complains about having to do work

[David Frum @davidfrum]

Maybe we'll have a US ground invasion of Central Asia. Or maybe we'll have a US surrender of control of the Persian Gulf to Iran. Could be anything really, all decided by the Magic 8 Ball whims of one man surrounded by insider traders, assuming he isn't one of them himself.

[Justin Wolfers @JustinWolfers]

In what world is it okay for the Defense Secretary to make multi-million dollar investments in defense companies:
a) Ever;
b) Just before launching a war.

FT has the scoop: https://t.co/ulRcXTH2Vp

In a functional democracy, he would offer his resignation tonight.

[Richard Hanania @RichardHanania]

It's a constant struggle to remind people how Trump has completely redefined the meaning of "scandal."

To think at one point Bill Clinton paid back $4,900 owed to the IRS. Now we're talking blatant crypto scams in the billions. https://t.co/44JGES6oxs

[David French @DavidAFrench]

The sheer scale of the corruption boggles the mind.

[Jeremiah Johnson 🌐 @JeremiahDJohns]

I know it's boring and repetitive to talk about how grossly evil Trump is, but the fact remains: Trump is grossly evil, in a way that's pretty much unprecedented in this country.

[(((Matthew Lewis))) cults & consequences @mateosfo]

I'll go one better:

Apartments are homes. Condos are homes. Families live in them. Children grow up in them. Seniors retire in them.

It's disgustingly classist and condescending for @SenWarren to state otherwise.

[Tim Cupery @cupery]

@theramblingfool This is Dostoyevsky, or is punish*ing* intentional and refers to a different book? (I assume the former)