Let me explain why I think Freddy resonates.
Lots of Europeans visit the USA as tourists. They visit New York City, or Washington DC, or Hollywood, or Las Vegas, and if they visit natural beauty too, they go to really crowded places like the Grand Canyon or Yellowstone.
So while they see our cultural and natural icons, they are mostly in blue cities and they therefore also see the decline, the homeless, the drugs, the dirt and the rude, rude Americans.
But Freddy is not doing that. Freddy is driving, and he’s doing it through the heartland, where people are kind and polite, the skies are wide open, and the bounty of Buc-ees and Bass Pro Shops are overwhelming.
Freddy is not seeing fentanyl and decline.
He is seeing the real, hopeful, patriotic, kind America that European tourists rarely traverse.
And he loves it.
That’s why Freddy is a phenomenon.
tech people trying to politely untangle the logic of democrats today, explaining how wealth is really held, produced, and all the good the industry is doing as if people like sanders or mamdani or kanna care — they don’t. they just want your shit. please understand this already.
we live in age of great moral panics about things that don’t matter and zero moral outrage over some of the most egregious societal sins we’ve ever seen
Been trying to tell B2B software companies this for almost a decade.
Everyone wants to sell multiple use cases. Just land the customer. Then focus on *earning* the expansion by delivering ridiculous value.
Problem is… many live with scarcity mindsets and not confident in their value. They try to maximize profit on the front end and oversell. Moderately happy customers who eventually churn because they like don’t love the solution they bought.
I’ve made all these mistakes myself.
If legislators always vote with the President, we have a king.
If legislators always vote with the prevailing wind, we have mob rule.
If legislators always vote with the Constitution, we have a Republic.
Google DeepMind researcher argues that LLMs can never be conscious, not in 10 years or 100 years.
"Expecting an algorithmic description to instantiate the quality it maps is like expecting the mathematical formula of gravity to physically exert weight."
Non-residents who spend millions of dollars on NYC apartments help drive NYC’s economy. Most of the profit in condominium development is in the penthouses. The Ken Griffins of the world make NYC high end development viable, driving high-paying construction, brokerage, legal, marketing, and other jobs in NYC. We should be applauding Ken for spending $238 million in NYC, not attacking him for doing so.
Importantly, non-resident owners of NYC apartments who leave their apartments vacant for much of the year are not a burden to NYC schools, services, or other resources while they drive growth in retail sales, restaurants, theater, and other important drivers of our economy. They also often support NYC non-profits with donations.
Ken’s company is a major employer in NYC of very high paying jobs which drive a considerable amount of our tax base. We wouldn’t want him to move even more employees to Miami.
These non-resident owners also already pay a lot of taxes including mansion taxes, real estate taxes, sales taxes and more.
While @NYCMayor Mamdani likes the tag line ‘Tax the rich.’ Unfortunately, his policies will harm the constituencies he is supposedly trying to help.
I can’t imagine the NYC construction unions are excited about his plan.