this just in

donald trump has ordered that all solid state guitar amps are to be converted to tube amps by the manufacturer, and all amps made in the future will be tube amps. he's explained that tubes are better.

whatever i may have thought or not thought about israel-palestine previously, which was always an attempt to be empirical in acknowledging that israel was in fact absolutely carrying out a "genocide in slow motion" but not particularly critical of that observation, it changed after the barbaric terrorist attack. 

back in the early to mid 00s, i would frequently find myself arguing you should stop calling it apartheid because it's not. apartheid is a type of slavery. israel actually repeatedly rejected apartheid when john kerry tried to present it as a compromise by setting up factories in the west bank for the israeli market. israel said "no, those are jobs and they should go to jews". israel just wants the palestinians gone and removed, it doesn't want to enslave them. i would frequently argue that what's happening is a genocide in slow motion, and cite chomsky, who was saying it even earlier.

i today actually would argue that palestinian statehood should be semi-permanently removed from the table as punishment for the atrocity. maybe we can talk about this again in 2050, if the muslim culture has improved and corrected itself, and there's still anything left. that can't be the outcome of this behaviour.

it should not be on the table today.

it isn't. it's magical thinking.

i don't really have much critical to say about what netanyahu has done recently. i'm more critical about what netanyahu did before 2023 than after. further, i actually support allowing jews to worship at their holy sites and consider that to be a liberal position, and restrictions on jews praying in jerusalem to be a right-wing position, that i don't support. it is factually correct that the west bank is historical israel, while gaza is not (it was the philistine pentateuch 5 city confederation, which we know today was a greek colony founded in the bronze age collapse) and most of lebanon was inhabited by the west-semitic speaking and very near to hebrew phoenecians, who were a sort of greco-jews (jews colonized by greeks).

i don't support the decision to suspend israeli elections and i do think netanyahu has to face his corruption charges in israel. my criticism is related to his conduct in the system, rather than his actual decisions.

it will be up to israeli voters to decide what direction israel moves in after this. i suspect it may be further to the israeli right. but they need to be able to vote.

i would encourage the israeli right to move to a system of just compensation and eminent domain in the west bank. if i agree that the west bank is historical israel and they should get annexation over with and move on, it would be with a rule of law inserted by an enlightened political process, which has not existed to this point.

i would like to see 100% export taxes on oil, electricity, potash, aluminum, steel, lumber, hormone-free milk and the critical minerals the us is asking about.

that money should be invested into social services to help retrain workers who lose their jobs for 21st century employment in electric vehicle production, renewable energy, climate change mitigation and local food production.

https://nationalpost.com/news/if-trump-imposes-50-per-cent-tariffs-should-canada-hit-back-trade-analysts-disagree

i want to be clear that what the data in michigan suggests is that the democratic party is undergoing white flight - that white people are abandoning the democrats, which is structurally shifting the state to the republicans, without shifting it to the right.

that would suggest that michigan is following a similar path as ohio, and it's on the path to becoming a safe republican state, and will likely start electing more republicans to the senate, house and governorship.

the result is that the democrats may get taken over by these fringe identity groups, but they will be increasingly uncompetitive in state races. this should be disappointing, as the democrats had found a formula that worked in michigan: liberal white women. this is being attacked by a small minority and, as we've seen happen often in michigan, the white majority is getting up and leaving instead of digging in and fighting.

the democrats will need to address the issue of white flight in the party, or prepare to accept minority status in the state. that's the choice ahead of it.

these things need to be regulated, clearly.

you should require a license to operate them and need to be above 18.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/health/e-scooters-pediatrician-survey-9.7305210

it's worth pointing out that while the results in wisconsin and michigan seem to be flipped, they were essentially the same. however, turnout was much higher in wisconsin, so the fringe candidate wasn't able to squeak in. 

this suggests the democrats are doing better in wisconsin, and becoming irrelevant in michigan.

the polling fail was also essentially the same, because the "polls" being referenced weren't really polls, they were advertising by the same central committee. floating fake polls that show your opponent so far behind they have no chance is an understood voter suppression tactic by candidates that are actually running behind to get their opponents to stay home. people missed the obvious tactic due to naivete abour the candidates being "progressive", despite running on the far right. this suppression tactic worked in michigan but not in wisconsin. but, i mean, the difference could have just been how many people are on holidays.

i want to insert a cold dose of reality into midterm predictions. there's a narrative in the media about the democrats winning control of the senate because voters are angry about iran.

i don't see the data to support that.

likely changes, from what i can see:

michigan---->republican

georgia---->republican

new hampshire---->republican: toss-up

virginia------>republican: toss-up

the senate appears to be somewhere between r+1 and r+4, with i think a 2 seat pick for the republicans being most likely. the republicans don't have a single seriously in danger seat at all.

further, trump is going to have some of the republicans that voted against him replaced with loyalists.

trump is going to pick up something close to 5 seats in the senate.

nothing has really changed in the house. each party has about 210 solid seats and there are about 15 tossups. given that the republicans have won two close elections, and nothing has changed, i don't see any reason to forecast a democratic flip. can you show me the seats the democrats will flip? 

to be clear: the democrats are not out of it in the house. i think they have no chance at all of flipping the senate, and are actually going to lose senate seats. they might win the house. but it looks like you'd have to give them something like 40-60 odds, given they failed to do exactly the same thing twice. what's the definition of insanity?

it's still too early to make clear predictions. i might change my mind in november.

for now, i'd say,

odds that republicans increase seat count in senate: 95%.

odds that republicans keep house: 60%. ish.

the us version of the yeast is still fortified.

the best thing to do is probably to bike over to detroit, buy it and bring it back.