An evil man will burn his own nation to the ground to rule over the ashes - Sun Tzu*
* Several commenters have noted that there appears to be no record of him saying or writing this. That does not invalidate the observation being made. YMMV.
Unfortunately, we’re dealing with Trump and Musk; to them, the ashes are opportunities. They’ll get rich raiding the taxpayer coffers; and when the bill comes due, Trump will be living in Dubai, or Trump Tower and Resorts in Gaza. If not that , then dead; from natural causes, of course….:)
You are wise to wish his bad deeds to rebound upon him times ten. No bad karma on you for it. Wishing the evil pay for their destruction is very good for everyone.
tRump is an enraged agent of chaos. He strikes out at his moment-to-moment foci of grievance. He, like his base, have absolutely no concept of ‘general welfare’ or ‘common good’. We are reaping the crop of psychopathy he has sown.
I agree with what you say, except I think his base is woefully, and to some extent willfully, ignorant. The low information voters feel the malaise of loneliness, lack of community and a sense of hope for the future...as do many people. In that I think the conservative commentators like David French have a lot to say.
I live in MAGA land and for the most part they aren't like Trump and Musk. They are good people, but have consumed a lot of poison.
FOX News and RW "Alternative Facts" media have spent decades successfully brainwashing conservative voters with the pro-GOP narrative that cities (Dem strongholds) are crime infested hellholes. Despite the fact that Red states and rural Red counties have 20-33% higher crime rates.
The GOP and the pro-GOP fossil fuel industry has also been hostile since the 1940's to anything that encourages public transit. Or anything that might lower gasoline consumption.
I think the willful ignorance is off the charts. I've experienced the same: people who are wonderful IRL, kind, thoughtful and friendly in their daily interactions, but choose to believe every ridiculous headline because they want to justify voting for lower taxes or whatever their pet issue is.
Looking at the effects of policy and drawing your own conclusions from various viewpoints is hard. It's much more comforting to pretend everyone you disagree with is a corrupt pedophile who wants to tax you into becoming trans.
Their pet issue is making sure our political, legal, and economic systems continue to oppress people they (meaning most white Americans) don’t like, which used to be primarily black Americans but now has expanded to include other marginalized groups. It used to include gays, but Harvey Milk put a stop to that when he got so many to come out that almost everyone found some of their loved ones in that group and had to drop their hatreds. The polarization started with Brown v Board, exploded with bussing, and has gradually hardened into what we have now. It has nothing to do with taxes (except maybe for the top 1%, whose desire for low taxes has always been a primary motivator for that tiny block of voters), nor the price of eggs (which is just an excuse).
No one has forced anyone to consume poison. Mr French is accurate in describing the 'populist' dynamic, and its ultimate result when grievance is manipulated by the likes of trump. What Mr French didn't say, despite providing a few historic examples, is that humans have proven that this trait of blind, vengeful anger is completely natural to a certain percentage of humans. About 32%, given trump's career polling average. Bernie Sanders has also had consistent support from those who have suffered under the elites, yet few of his supporters have the requisite unfocused animus to revel in revenge.
Not Sun Tzu but still an extremely appropriate statement given how good a description of Trump "evil man" is. Sun Tzu should have said it, and would have were he alive today.
Can you imagine (dream) about a day where you DON'T HAVE TO HEAR HIS NAME AGAIN ......awe....back to LIFE without threats.... awe..... :) And doable too....our choices ! 3.5 million people will choose ......and I'm thinking sooner than later
The ‘happy ending’ of “Atlas Shrugged” is when all the geniuses who’ve embraced selfishness as their core ethos are finally free to leave their hideout in the Rockies and reshape the world - because they’ve crashed civilization and millions of people have died, getting them out of their way.
JFC, John Rogers is right about the warping of young minds reading Ayn Rand.
“There are two novels that can change a bookish fourteen-year old’s life: The Lord of the Rings and Atlas Shrugged. One is a childish fantasy that often engenders a lifelong obsession with its unbelievable heroes, leading to an emotionally stunted, socially crippled adulthood, unable to deal with the real world. The other, of course, involves orcs."
If you read Chuang Tzu (also Zhuang Zsu) ,a Taoist philosopher from the 2nd century bce, his observations of the political opportunists of his time could easily run in editorial pages now. This is a story of the ages, and humans still engage in it.
You admit you're aware that the quote's authorship is unsubstantiated, and instead of taking off the attribution, you make it footnote. This isn't ethical. To be ethical, take off the attribution, and then make a footnote that says "Corrected - Originally quoted as attributed to Sun Tzu, which is entirely unsubstantiated. Still a good quote though."
Ski areas charge more for weekends and holidays. Off-peak pricing is basically a discount to encourage midweek business, but it's the same basic economic principle. Pricing is a time-tested tool for managing demand.
This is what they've done openly since Reagan uttered his lies about government being the problem. When they get into power the work hard to make that true.
Agreed! Republicans since Reagan (probably before) have been saying the government is broken and then proceeded to destroy it bit by bit by cutting funding. The IRS and the Department of Education are two perfect examples.
A great miniseries called The Reagan’s, is on Showtime (although it might be on other streaming platforms by now) and highlights his rise from actor to President. He had deep ties to corporate America along with his (and Nancy’s) racist views.
nope...destroy the government and built to their "hidden" agenda's....what a CLEAN UP IN ISLE 4 after his administration is thrown OUT...The American people, who LOVE their Country....are just not going to give him their Country !!! What a flawed man to even think he could pull this off "for long" in America !!!!! Unhinged
The grand scheme is to restore Feudalism as the social/economic model. This time it is free of physicality like land. It’s all about taking percentages of your income based on what an AI based “wizard” tells the Lord of whatever fiefdom they control. Seriously, I predicted this return after reading an LA Review of Books on the likely return of Neo-Feudalism by Marxist political thinker Jodi Dean. Many hate her open Marxism, but in this instance I believe she was prescient. So far things are moving far more rapidly in the Feudal direction than I ever thought. Fascism and Feudalism work quite nicely together.
Indeed I have and I have loved Varoufakis since he was finance minister of Greece. That said I love the term “techno-feudalism” but to tell you the truth, even though I hold a BS in Bus Admin with a minor in economics, he kinda fails to make clear the means by which these new “Lords” wield power.
Still if we would all go with his “branding” I’d be fine
I would say they wield power by controlling the platforms modern life depends on. For instance, they own the social media companies that people use to communicate and get news, and so, control public discourse. See Musk's Twitter/X takeover and Zuckerberg's cancellation of fact-checking and Facebook's AI slopification for example. They control the flow of information and in an increasingly online world, shape the perception of reality for billions of people.
Amazon has a stranglehold on commerce, even controlling pricing outside of the platform. For instance, businesses on Amazon are discouraged from offering lower prices elsewhere, though that was found to be illegal.* They also control the self-publishing industry through Amazon KDP.
All of these companies, and others such as Google, Apple and OpenAI have used their influence to gain political power. This is seen most prominently in their cozying up to the current Trump administration, but Obama was also tech-friendly.
Simple: He knows the overwhelming amount of NYC residents hate him with the heat of ten million suns. He knows the the people who hate the congestion charge are mostly people in eastern Queens and southern Staten Island. As (mid-island) resident of the latter, I know for a fact that most of those Staten Islanders rarely venture into Manhattan, and those that do for work, take mass transit.
Finally, he's a petty little bully. Let him try and kill the fee (I don't like it, but think it's a good idea overall), he'll be hauled into court by the state...and eventually he'll lose.
Yes, News12 Long Island is chock full of contesting pricing gripes. Over and over. That and copaganda. It’s pretty striking when we are out there to compare NY1 to News12.
the Info wars are in Olympic form now...four years of it now main stream media has bended a knee...wonder if the People will allow Trump to enjoy his Superbowl with hamburger and millionaire buddies today ??? Will there be a whimper of protest or could we pray for a resounding ROAR??? :) We can Pray
I expect he'll try to kill it by putting pressure on the NY legislature and governor. Possibly through the new FBI. The governor seemed to be reluctant to allow it in the first place, and she could probably can it.
Trump will hate it because it works very well indeed in London under our successful and popular Mayor, Saddiq Khan, who Trump chose to pick a fight with during his last attempt to rule the United States
Absolutely. I remember coming into London just after it was introduced - Im a regular visitor. It made a huge difference both to traffic and to pollution, which has been another focus for Sadiq Khan, the mayor. A huge factor in ill health and deaths amongst residents and a major cost to the health system.
But then for a large section of supposedly Christian America (but not all), consideration for their fellow humans has never seemed to matter. The louder they profess their Christianity it seems, the less they put it into practice in their behaviour.
For a segment of allegedly Christian Americans they are born again , and think that their conversion/come to Jesus experience means they have a "get of jail" card to do and think whatever they choose, because, hey, they're " saved".
I've have a sneaking suspicion that a significant segment of those "Christians" support Chump because they secretly believe he's the Anti-Christ and will bring about armageddon for them. And then they will immediately rise to Heaven where there are 70 virgins awaiting, or some such nonsense.
Bitchy,I LOVE your assessment! If there does happen to be a G_D, he is waiting for the end, giving those people a lesson in what they chose to twist, turn, and abuse. There might be hell, especially IF there is a G_D.
👆👆👆🎯Yes the volume of declaration is inversely linked to any understanding, and practice thereof. My father warned me of this, if the espouse christianity in the middle of business, (where it has no place) they are con-men, back away slowly, keeping your hand tightly on your wallet.
I think you are confusing ULEZ (Sadiq Khan) with Congestion Charge? The latter was introduced by Ken Livingstone in 2003. ULEZ was introduced to Zones 1-2 (inside N & S Circular Roads) and then last year extended to everything inside M25 (which was much more controversial and opposed).
I didn’t say that Khan invented it. I said that it works well under him, as it does, with the addition of the ULEZ rules. I’m not sure that Trump is aware of Ken Livingstone, but he has picked a fight with Saddiq Khan. London is a success story for these charges.
https://tfl.gov.uk/modes/driving/ultra-low-emission-zone it was extended outwards to touch the M25 in a number of places. It was extended last year (or 2023?) from original scope of just inside N & S Circular. That was when it hit such strong opposition (the original scope was not particularly controversial)
Congestion Charge was actually Ken Livingston, the mayor before Boris Johnson. The tabloids ran a huge campaign against it and disaster was predicted. Now, London couldn't function without it. Boris retracted an extension west of the C Charge zone (to include Kensington). Sadiq Khan's contribution is the ULEZ, Ultra Low Emission Zone, a restriction on high pollution vehicles which was originally just inside the N & S Circular roads (built in the 1920s) ie roughly Zone 3. The extension to inside the M25 ring motorway was much more controversial and inspired acts of vandalism and civil disobedience. Many more people use their vehicles to drive to work in the outer Zones 4-5. However in actual practice only a small percentage of drivers drove petrol cars from pre 2006 or diesel cars from pre 2016. The ULEZ appears to have reduced central London air pollution along main roads by about 40%.
Insightful as always, Professor Krugman. Congestion tax delivers environmental justice by reducing air pollution in oppressed BIPOC neighborhoods. We are gathering evidence of crimes committed by Musk and his minions to steal our data and treasury funds: https://democracydefender2025.substack.com/p/no-one-elected-elon
The same phenomenon with COVID. For some reason, we have a whole bunch of people here that think that anyone that tells them to do something, is infringing on their "freedom". These people have been so desensitized to why we have community and the social contract: we can accomplish more if we work together. If we were all living in small tribes, anyone acting like this would just be rejected from the tribe.
They will make things exponentially worse for themselves "protecting their freedom" aka "You're not the Boss of Meeee!" It is essentially a defiant 3-year-olds response. When they're in positions of power, this is deadly.
They died by the tens of thousands during covid because they refused to do what they were told was best. Unfortunately that also lead to tens of thousands more dying even if they did follow the rules.
During COVID we started to see the equal and opposite political action in effect. As MAGA saw Trump failing, they went into denial mode. They were lucky that it had a relatively low kill rate, more effective treatments were discovered, vaccines were rolled out in unprecedented speed and it mutated into a less lethal form.
It became a political issue and there was ridiculousness on both sides. I went walking in blue areas where people were masking in the car and out walking on uncrowded streets and nature areas. They even kept it up long after the science said it wasn't necessary.
It's too bad that politics made it impossible to look at the response and assess what worked and what should be changed in the future.
Perhaps they were immunocompromised, and just left their mask on rather than touching it constantly without the ability to wash their hands in the car. It doesn't hurt anyone, unlike unmasked idiots coughing on people in public.
I think it should be factored in that Dumpy hates Manhattan and NYC. In his view, the residents turned on him during his first term, snubbing him and his children. They certainly didn't vote for him. So he moved his official residence to Florida. This second time around is his chance to exact petty revenge on everybody who cold-shouldered him his first time around, like the Kennedy Center and Pres. Biden for pulling his security clearance and intelligence briefings. (Which was the right thing to do.)
I first noticed trump when I arrived in NYC from UK as an immigrant around 1972 - recognized immediately who & what he was from the tabloid's; knew he was just like the tacky 'wide boys' that I had always known to avoid in London from a kid ! And nothing since then has ever changed my mind, so how comes the rest of the US didn't get that message - many did, but too many did not !
Alito and Thomas certainly will, but I don't think the other four will. The big question is whether MAGA will ignore the courts. It sounds like a lot of them are prepared to ignore them.
“Yet Morning Consult found that while residents of New York City approve of the congestion charge, residents of New York State as a whole disapprove by a substantial margin.”
Excellent newsletters professor; yesterday was also incredible. Ironically, it’s the conservatives in red states, who always complain that the east and west coast elites don’t speak for them, and they oppose their views.
Yet, it’s always conservatives that try to force feed their own obtuse way of life, and belief system on the rest of us. They do t like science, so they want all of us, Christian or not, to learn their morality through their religion in school; as though they’ve ever proven to have any.
They believe abortion is a sin, so they force feed their religion on the rest of us, and outlaw abortion. They don’t like premarital sex, so they outlaw contraceptives for anyone not married.
They don’t believe in Global Warming, so now are grand kids will pay the price; although, all of us are starting to feel the effects.
And now we have upstater’s, who never come to the city, telling city folk, it’s my way, or the highway; no pun intended!…:(
There isn't actually a non-infantile stripe of libertarianism, to be honest. The whole of the "philosophy" is essentially "Yer not the boss of MEEEE!!! I can do what I want!" followed promptly by a demand that the State protect THEIR property rights as they steal from someone weaker than them.
99.99% of them would end up slaves for warlords in an actual "libertarian" state. It's a political philosphy for those whose emotional development stopped at 13 years old.
What I would call the non-infantile stripe is remembering the end of the mantra: "...as long as it doesn't hurt anyone else."
Also, there is liberty "from" and liberty "to." If I consent to stay on watch, to stay awake, tonight, while my cave-mate sleeps, I can do the same tomorrow night. If I agree to take my shoes and belt off and walk through a metal detector holding my pants up, I can fly to Europe in just hours.
Re: "the rage some Americans obviously feel at any suggestion that people should change their behavior for the common good". I have long noted that the two US parties are described by identical language. Democrats believe that what's good for America is good for me.
Republicans believe that what's good for me is good for America.
That's paraphrased from Charles Wilson, then CEO of GM, whom Ike strangely elevated to Secretary of Defense in '53. What he infamously said was "What's good for GM is good for America".
Apparently, Republicans have taken that to heart and personalized it. "Not just GM, me, me, me!"
Over the course of the hearings there was a lot of back and forth between Wilson and the Senators, but in the hearing transcript there was an exchange related to the quote in question:
“Senator Hendrickson. Well now, I am interested to know whether if a situation did arise where you had to make a decision which was extremely adverse to the interests of your stock and General Motors Corp. or any of these other companies, or extremely adverse to the company, in the interests of the United States Government, could you make that decision?
Mr. Wilson. Yes, sir; I could. I cannot conceive of one because for years I thought what was good for our country was good for General Motors, and vice versa. The difference did not exist. Our company is too big. It goes with the welfare of the country. Our contribution to the Nation is quite considerable.” (p. 26)
It so perfectly exemplifies CEO arrogance - as we're now seeing play out in real time 70+ years later. The more things change, the more they stay the same.
Australian pediatrician and political activist Helen Caldicott said "The US is a one-party system with two right wings."
This last time, I didn't vote for either the pro-growth, pro-corporate, pro-genocide party with the insane, solipsistic leader, or the the pro-growth, pro-corporate, pro-genocide party with the smiley green face.
I voted for the only anti-genocide party. I voted Green.
Now, my Democrat friends won't talk to me, even though I voted in a Blue state that went 59% for Harris.
If you always do what you've always done, you'll always get what you always got.
Under normal circumstances I might agree with you but this time I think we actually got something different. We have a fully delusional president and a maniacal shadow prime minister. Trump actually believes the 2020 election was rigged by the government, even though he ran the government, and that the Jan 6 insurrection was orchestrated by the FBI, even though he ran the FBI. He thinks that he owns the Gulf of Mexico by renaming it, and he believes that he will soon own Panama, Greenland, Canada, and Gaza. At the same time, Musk plans to privatize the entire government. He and Bezos have already divided up NASA, but the big profits will come from directing all government spending through Twitter, with a basis point per transaction in his pocket, and requiring anyone who needs to communicate with the government to do it through a blue checkmark personal Twitter subscription. And of course eliminate any government program that doesn’t generate a profit. And all this will be magically funded by tariffs that someone else is paying. I don’t care which right wing party we’ve had in the past, this is a completely new universe unconnected from reality.
I, and I am a liberal, feel that rage. Fellow liberals always seem to be promoting altruism and self-sacrifice--for the same of the environment, endangered species, people who are in any way disadvantaged. I care about ME and I expect the government to promote my interests. I don't believe that what's good for America is good for me or that what's good for me is what's good for America. I don't care what's good for America--I just care about what's good for me and that's what I expect my political party to promote.
What’s good for you, if you live in Manhattan, is less traffic, less air pollution, and improved mass transit infrastructure. If you don’t live in Manhattan, all of this is completely irrelevant to you, so move on to something else and leave us alone. Talking to you, DJT.
As usual, it's all petty personal feelings of insult and slight. NYC can't stand him. They made him a convicted felon. The elites laugh at his gaucheness. SNL mocks him constantly. He had to move to Florida full time to find an adoring cult.
Trump holds a permanent grudge against New York because it's the only state that successfully prosecuted him for his decades of crime as a resident of NY City. They wouldn't buy his excuses and overcame the predictable delaying tactics and public histrionics that Trump had used since his days as an apprentice to the odious Roy Cohen to avoid long overdue culpability for his nefarious acts.
He's also resentful of the fact that the vast majority of New Yorkers, those who know him best, recognize him as nothing more than a local con-man, serial failure, and public embarrassment that has metastasized into a menace to democracy, decency, and the rule-of-law worldwide.
The upstate rubes who vote for the likes of Trump and Stefanik are typically aggrieved losers who blame others for their problems and will oppose logical programs run downstate or in any blue-state just out of spite, even if it will never impact them directly. Trump has made riding this wave of aggrieved resentment his ticket to ill-gotten wealth and his seat in government.
It was not his idea and it is popular among those who drive into Manhattan. When.if he goes there he has a police escort - clogging up traffic and making him feel as if he can part the seas. He hates because he loves to hate.
An evil man will burn his own nation to the ground to rule over the ashes - Sun Tzu*
* Several commenters have noted that there appears to be no record of him saying or writing this. That does not invalidate the observation being made. YMMV.
Unfortunately, we’re dealing with Trump and Musk; to them, the ashes are opportunities. They’ll get rich raiding the taxpayer coffers; and when the bill comes due, Trump will be living in Dubai, or Trump Tower and Resorts in Gaza. If not that , then dead; from natural causes, of course….:)
Dead is definitely my preference.
Did you say out load....what everyone (AND all over the WORLD) is thinking ????!!! :) Man...that's ALOT of Karma....
I am thinking only of the greater good. 😉
You go girl…:)
man...I would NOT want to be HIM.... !!!!
You are wise to wish his bad deeds to rebound upon him times ten. No bad karma on you for it. Wishing the evil pay for their destruction is very good for everyone.
tRump is an enraged agent of chaos. He strikes out at his moment-to-moment foci of grievance. He, like his base, have absolutely no concept of ‘general welfare’ or ‘common good’. We are reaping the crop of psychopathy he has sown.
I agree with what you say, except I think his base is woefully, and to some extent willfully, ignorant. The low information voters feel the malaise of loneliness, lack of community and a sense of hope for the future...as do many people. In that I think the conservative commentators like David French have a lot to say.
I live in MAGA land and for the most part they aren't like Trump and Musk. They are good people, but have consumed a lot of poison.
Good people do not vote for the likes of Felon47. People who voted for Felon47 committed an unforgivable crime against humanity.
FOX News and RW "Alternative Facts" media have spent decades successfully brainwashing conservative voters with the pro-GOP narrative that cities (Dem strongholds) are crime infested hellholes. Despite the fact that Red states and rural Red counties have 20-33% higher crime rates.
The GOP and the pro-GOP fossil fuel industry has also been hostile since the 1940's to anything that encourages public transit. Or anything that might lower gasoline consumption.
👆👆🎯
I think the willful ignorance is off the charts. I've experienced the same: people who are wonderful IRL, kind, thoughtful and friendly in their daily interactions, but choose to believe every ridiculous headline because they want to justify voting for lower taxes or whatever their pet issue is.
Looking at the effects of policy and drawing your own conclusions from various viewpoints is hard. It's much more comforting to pretend everyone you disagree with is a corrupt pedophile who wants to tax you into becoming trans.
Their pet issue is making sure our political, legal, and economic systems continue to oppress people they (meaning most white Americans) don’t like, which used to be primarily black Americans but now has expanded to include other marginalized groups. It used to include gays, but Harvey Milk put a stop to that when he got so many to come out that almost everyone found some of their loved ones in that group and had to drop their hatreds. The polarization started with Brown v Board, exploded with bussing, and has gradually hardened into what we have now. It has nothing to do with taxes (except maybe for the top 1%, whose desire for low taxes has always been a primary motivator for that tiny block of voters), nor the price of eggs (which is just an excuse).
No one has forced anyone to consume poison. Mr French is accurate in describing the 'populist' dynamic, and its ultimate result when grievance is manipulated by the likes of trump. What Mr French didn't say, despite providing a few historic examples, is that humans have proven that this trait of blind, vengeful anger is completely natural to a certain percentage of humans. About 32%, given trump's career polling average. Bernie Sanders has also had consistent support from those who have suffered under the elites, yet few of his supporters have the requisite unfocused animus to revel in revenge.
That’s a big part of the problem. They are enculted. How to get them out of that cult is the $64 billion question.
Great quote.
Though apparently misattributed: https://www.truthorfiction.com/sun-tzu-rule-over-ashes-quote/
"Quotes found on the Internet are often untrue." - Abraham Lincoln
Yup. Wise Abe knew that 96.4% of all statistics are made up :)
Doesn't matter who said it - it's all too true, and right on target today.
Quoting Yogi...
Thank you.
😂😂
Not Sun Tzu but still an extremely appropriate statement given how good a description of Trump "evil man" is. Sun Tzu should have said it, and would have were he alive today.
“No man is entirely worthless, he can always serve as a bad example.”
If TFFG is for something, it's probably a good idea to oppose it.
Trump = Exhibit A. QED
Can you imagine (dream) about a day where you DON'T HAVE TO HEAR HIS NAME AGAIN ......awe....back to LIFE without threats.... awe..... :) And doable too....our choices ! 3.5 million people will choose ......and I'm thinking sooner than later
Selfishness made America great, according to the far-right...it's greatest enemy: Internalizing *commonweal* as a societal goal.
The ‘happy ending’ of “Atlas Shrugged” is when all the geniuses who’ve embraced selfishness as their core ethos are finally free to leave their hideout in the Rockies and reshape the world - because they’ve crashed civilization and millions of people have died, getting them out of their way.
JFC, John Rogers is right about the warping of young minds reading Ayn Rand.
“There are two novels that can change a bookish fourteen-year old’s life: The Lord of the Rings and Atlas Shrugged. One is a childish fantasy that often engenders a lifelong obsession with its unbelievable heroes, leading to an emotionally stunted, socially crippled adulthood, unable to deal with the real world. The other, of course, involves orcs."
Paul Ryan is a perfect example of this.
Trump is going to put you in a camp.
If you read Chuang Tzu (also Zhuang Zsu) ,a Taoist philosopher from the 2nd century bce, his observations of the political opportunists of his time could easily run in editorial pages now. This is a story of the ages, and humans still engage in it.
“Chaos is a ladder” -Lord Baelish aka Littlefinger, Game of Thrones, George R.R. Martin.
Even if Sun Tzu didn’t say that about an evil man, the concept is definitely in the zeitgeist.
Jefferson Davis was willing to burn Charleston to the ground.
You admit you're aware that the quote's authorship is unsubstantiated, and instead of taking off the attribution, you make it footnote. This isn't ethical. To be ethical, take off the attribution, and then make a footnote that says "Corrected - Originally quoted as attributed to Sun Tzu, which is entirely unsubstantiated. Still a good quote though."
Emerson.
Sun Tzu never said that
Perhaps not - which means it’s up for grabs if you want to claim it. /s
Awesome comment!
They hate effective policy because it is an existential threat to their core belief that government does not and can not work.
...and more importantly - requires them to pay their fair share in taxes.
Peak load pricing is used at Disneyland- and
for public utilities- undoubtedly others . Does
T-rump want to go after those next ?
Ski areas charge more for weekends and holidays. Off-peak pricing is basically a discount to encourage midweek business, but it's the same basic economic principle. Pricing is a time-tested tool for managing demand.
It's capitalism writ large: how can they be against that? It's positively un-American. (Only slight sarcasm intended here.)
Right
Not to mention senior discounts and
“ kids eat free “ while accompanied by parents .
So Trump fashions himself as the microeconomics guru- uh huh
Many big guys approach him with tears in their eyes tell him that.
So who are we to argue? /s
You must be a Tiedrich fan also! 👍🏻
Probably. Unless DeSantis beats him to it.
And so they seem to be hell-bent on making government not work...
This is what they've done openly since Reagan uttered his lies about government being the problem. When they get into power the work hard to make that true.
"Government doesn't work. Elect me and I'll prove it!" - some guy making fun of Republicans years ago
Agreed! Republicans since Reagan (probably before) have been saying the government is broken and then proceeded to destroy it bit by bit by cutting funding. The IRS and the Department of Education are two perfect examples.
A great miniseries called The Reagan’s, is on Showtime (although it might be on other streaming platforms by now) and highlights his rise from actor to President. He had deep ties to corporate America along with his (and Nancy’s) racist views.
👆🎯
nope...destroy the government and built to their "hidden" agenda's....what a CLEAN UP IN ISLE 4 after his administration is thrown OUT...The American people, who LOVE their Country....are just not going to give him their Country !!! What a flawed man to even think he could pull this off "for long" in America !!!!! Unhinged
That's what they "promised".
The grand scheme is to restore Feudalism as the social/economic model. This time it is free of physicality like land. It’s all about taking percentages of your income based on what an AI based “wizard” tells the Lord of whatever fiefdom they control. Seriously, I predicted this return after reading an LA Review of Books on the likely return of Neo-Feudalism by Marxist political thinker Jodi Dean. Many hate her open Marxism, but in this instance I believe she was prescient. So far things are moving far more rapidly in the Feudal direction than I ever thought. Fascism and Feudalism work quite nicely together.
Have you read Technofeudalism: What Killed Capitalism by Yanis Varoufakis? He discusses just that.
Indeed I have and I have loved Varoufakis since he was finance minister of Greece. That said I love the term “techno-feudalism” but to tell you the truth, even though I hold a BS in Bus Admin with a minor in economics, he kinda fails to make clear the means by which these new “Lords” wield power.
Still if we would all go with his “branding” I’d be fine
I would say they wield power by controlling the platforms modern life depends on. For instance, they own the social media companies that people use to communicate and get news, and so, control public discourse. See Musk's Twitter/X takeover and Zuckerberg's cancellation of fact-checking and Facebook's AI slopification for example. They control the flow of information and in an increasingly online world, shape the perception of reality for billions of people.
Amazon has a stranglehold on commerce, even controlling pricing outside of the platform. For instance, businesses on Amazon are discouraged from offering lower prices elsewhere, though that was found to be illegal.* They also control the self-publishing industry through Amazon KDP.
All of these companies, and others such as Google, Apple and OpenAI have used their influence to gain political power. This is seen most prominently in their cozying up to the current Trump administration, but Obama was also tech-friendly.
*https://doctorow.medium.com/how-amazon-makes-everything-you-buy-more-expensive-no-matter-where-you-buy-it-78f1a9433ea7
What is it about to him?
Simple: He knows the overwhelming amount of NYC residents hate him with the heat of ten million suns. He knows the the people who hate the congestion charge are mostly people in eastern Queens and southern Staten Island. As (mid-island) resident of the latter, I know for a fact that most of those Staten Islanders rarely venture into Manhattan, and those that do for work, take mass transit.
Finally, he's a petty little bully. Let him try and kill the fee (I don't like it, but think it's a good idea overall), he'll be hauled into court by the state...and eventually he'll lose.
Long Islanders too, especially Suffolk County, who are mostly Maga-idiots. Too bad they can’t cut off LI and let it float into the sea.
Yes, News12 Long Island is chock full of contesting pricing gripes. Over and over. That and copaganda. It’s pretty striking when we are out there to compare NY1 to News12.
the Info wars are in Olympic form now...four years of it now main stream media has bended a knee...wonder if the People will allow Trump to enjoy his Superbowl with hamburger and millionaire buddies today ??? Will there be a whimper of protest or could we pray for a resounding ROAR??? :) We can Pray
I'm hoping for a Kendrick Lamar face-off on the 50-yard line!
Meeeee tooooo you read my mind ?? !! wow lol
Then where would all the elites go for their Hamptons summers?!? Maybe hang with the Obamas in Martha’s?
I lived several years in Nassau County as a teenager. It’s the last place I ever want to visit.
Whoa, whoa, whoa. If you did that the currents would probably push it into Connecticut. We don't want any part of that!
Nah, we should just annex it and make it the fifth and sixth boroughs.
I think by now...he needs a SWIFT kick in the arce...lol - or is that just me ???
“Hate with the heat of ten million suns.” I’m gonna steal this from you in referencing the dual Füeher government we have
Spot on
I expect he'll try to kill it by putting pressure on the NY legislature and governor. Possibly through the new FBI. The governor seemed to be reluctant to allow it in the first place, and she could probably can it.
Bingo! It's the Trump 2.0 Revenge Tour.
Trump will hate it because it works very well indeed in London under our successful and popular Mayor, Saddiq Khan, who Trump chose to pick a fight with during his last attempt to rule the United States
Absolutely. I remember coming into London just after it was introduced - Im a regular visitor. It made a huge difference both to traffic and to pollution, which has been another focus for Sadiq Khan, the mayor. A huge factor in ill health and deaths amongst residents and a major cost to the health system.
But then for a large section of supposedly Christian America (but not all), consideration for their fellow humans has never seemed to matter. The louder they profess their Christianity it seems, the less they put it into practice in their behaviour.
For a segment of allegedly Christian Americans they are born again , and think that their conversion/come to Jesus experience means they have a "get of jail" card to do and think whatever they choose, because, hey, they're " saved".
I've have a sneaking suspicion that a significant segment of those "Christians" support Chump because they secretly believe he's the Anti-Christ and will bring about armageddon for them. And then they will immediately rise to Heaven where there are 70 virgins awaiting, or some such nonsense.
Of course the "virgins" are all angry Incel young men...
I'm from the South and dealt with many of these people in my youth. You are exactly correct.
Not only have their past sins been erased— future sins get the same treatment!
Who needs morals?
Bitchy,I LOVE your assessment! If there does happen to be a G_D, he is waiting for the end, giving those people a lesson in what they chose to twist, turn, and abuse. There might be hell, especially IF there is a G_D.
👆👆👆🎯Yes the volume of declaration is inversely linked to any understanding, and practice thereof. My father warned me of this, if the espouse christianity in the middle of business, (where it has no place) they are con-men, back away slowly, keeping your hand tightly on your wallet.
Flee the Fish, lol
Yes he advised backing away, so as not expose one's backside to them.
I think you are confusing ULEZ (Sadiq Khan) with Congestion Charge? The latter was introduced by Ken Livingstone in 2003. ULEZ was introduced to Zones 1-2 (inside N & S Circular Roads) and then last year extended to everything inside M25 (which was much more controversial and opposed).
Yes, I am.
I didn’t say that Khan invented it. I said that it works well under him, as it does, with the addition of the ULEZ rules. I’m not sure that Trump is aware of Ken Livingstone, but he has picked a fight with Saddiq Khan. London is a success story for these charges.
I'm pretty sure that the ULEZ doesn't extend out to the M25, and is still located inside the N. and S. circulars.
https://tfl.gov.uk/modes/driving/ultra-low-emission-zone it was extended outwards to touch the M25 in a number of places. It was extended last year (or 2023?) from original scope of just inside N & S Circular. That was when it hit such strong opposition (the original scope was not particularly controversial)
Congestion Charge was actually Ken Livingston, the mayor before Boris Johnson. The tabloids ran a huge campaign against it and disaster was predicted. Now, London couldn't function without it. Boris retracted an extension west of the C Charge zone (to include Kensington). Sadiq Khan's contribution is the ULEZ, Ultra Low Emission Zone, a restriction on high pollution vehicles which was originally just inside the N & S Circular roads (built in the 1920s) ie roughly Zone 3. The extension to inside the M25 ring motorway was much more controversial and inspired acts of vandalism and civil disobedience. Many more people use their vehicles to drive to work in the outer Zones 4-5. However in actual practice only a small percentage of drivers drove petrol cars from pre 2006 or diesel cars from pre 2016. The ULEZ appears to have reduced central London air pollution along main roads by about 40%.
Insightful as always, Professor Krugman. Congestion tax delivers environmental justice by reducing air pollution in oppressed BIPOC neighborhoods. We are gathering evidence of crimes committed by Musk and his minions to steal our data and treasury funds: https://democracydefender2025.substack.com/p/no-one-elected-elon
The same phenomenon with COVID. For some reason, we have a whole bunch of people here that think that anyone that tells them to do something, is infringing on their "freedom". These people have been so desensitized to why we have community and the social contract: we can accomplish more if we work together. If we were all living in small tribes, anyone acting like this would just be rejected from the tribe.
Make that "free-dumb."
And in this case “free-dumb” rings true!…:)
Perhaps, but it's true.
They will make things exponentially worse for themselves "protecting their freedom" aka "You're not the Boss of Meeee!" It is essentially a defiant 3-year-olds response. When they're in positions of power, this is deadly.
They died by the tens of thousands during covid because they refused to do what they were told was best. Unfortunately that also lead to tens of thousands more dying even if they did follow the rules.
During COVID we started to see the equal and opposite political action in effect. As MAGA saw Trump failing, they went into denial mode. They were lucky that it had a relatively low kill rate, more effective treatments were discovered, vaccines were rolled out in unprecedented speed and it mutated into a less lethal form.
It became a political issue and there was ridiculousness on both sides. I went walking in blue areas where people were masking in the car and out walking on uncrowded streets and nature areas. They even kept it up long after the science said it wasn't necessary.
It's too bad that politics made it impossible to look at the response and assess what worked and what should be changed in the future.
Perhaps they were immunocompromised, and just left their mask on rather than touching it constantly without the ability to wash their hands in the car. It doesn't hurt anyone, unlike unmasked idiots coughing on people in public.
Agree... Particularly as related to the education of our young people. When the next pandemic hits, we shouldn't have to start from scratch again
Alternatively, they were exhibiting symptoms of a respiratory infection and were trying to protect others. I've masked in public for this reason.
I think it should be factored in that Dumpy hates Manhattan and NYC. In his view, the residents turned on him during his first term, snubbing him and his children. They certainly didn't vote for him. So he moved his official residence to Florida. This second time around is his chance to exact petty revenge on everybody who cold-shouldered him his first time around, like the Kennedy Center and Pres. Biden for pulling his security clearance and intelligence briefings. (Which was the right thing to do.)
Oh, the residents of Manhattan and NYC turned on him long, LONG before his first term.
Yes! New Yorkers knew all about him because they've known all about that sleazy family since Fred was running it. For many decades.
I first noticed trump when I arrived in NYC from UK as an immigrant around 1972 - recognized immediately who & what he was from the tabloid's; knew he was just like the tacky 'wide boys' that I had always known to avoid in London from a kid ! And nothing since then has ever changed my mind, so how comes the rest of the US didn't get that message - many did, but too many did not !
Yes, I even heard about him stiffing and ruining small private contractors, when I was growing up in Maine.
A judge just told Musk to take his dirty hands off USAID.
https://kathleenweber.substack.com/p/unlikely-hero-trump-appointee
I triple dog dare the 6 far-right members of the Supreme Court to side with President's Musk and Trump on the USAID issue.
Alito and Thomas certainly will, but I don't think the other four will. The big question is whether MAGA will ignore the courts. It sounds like a lot of them are prepared to ignore them.
Oh, they will, they will. I'll bet they've already received their "instructions".
along with their "vacation invitations" and the mysterious forgiven loans for giant RV's, etc.
Absolutely. Gotta grease the palms to keep the machinery (or should I say machinations) running smoothly.
Collect the whole set!
Yay!
“Yet Morning Consult found that while residents of New York City approve of the congestion charge, residents of New York State as a whole disapprove by a substantial margin.”
Excellent newsletters professor; yesterday was also incredible. Ironically, it’s the conservatives in red states, who always complain that the east and west coast elites don’t speak for them, and they oppose their views.
Yet, it’s always conservatives that try to force feed their own obtuse way of life, and belief system on the rest of us. They do t like science, so they want all of us, Christian or not, to learn their morality through their religion in school; as though they’ve ever proven to have any.
They believe abortion is a sin, so they force feed their religion on the rest of us, and outlaw abortion. They don’t like premarital sex, so they outlaw contraceptives for anyone not married.
They don’t believe in Global Warming, so now are grand kids will pay the price; although, all of us are starting to feel the effects.
And now we have upstater’s, who never come to the city, telling city folk, it’s my way, or the highway; no pun intended!…:(
The hypocrisy is so thick, I can’t breathe!…:)
States Rights, sure. States Lefts, NEVER!!!
Touché..:)
Imma stealing that forthwith!
Carry on, carry on...
Exactly. That's their idea of "freedom of religion" - "we're free to force >our< beliefs on you".
It's the infantile stripe of libertarianism. "I will go wherever I want, whenever I want... .I will carry a firearm whenever and wherever I want..."
There isn't actually a non-infantile stripe of libertarianism, to be honest. The whole of the "philosophy" is essentially "Yer not the boss of MEEEE!!! I can do what I want!" followed promptly by a demand that the State protect THEIR property rights as they steal from someone weaker than them.
99.99% of them would end up slaves for warlords in an actual "libertarian" state. It's a political philosphy for those whose emotional development stopped at 13 years old.
👆🎯👏👏👏Brilliantly summed up.
What I would call the non-infantile stripe is remembering the end of the mantra: "...as long as it doesn't hurt anyone else."
Also, there is liberty "from" and liberty "to." If I consent to stay on watch, to stay awake, tonight, while my cave-mate sleeps, I can do the same tomorrow night. If I agree to take my shoes and belt off and walk through a metal detector holding my pants up, I can fly to Europe in just hours.
Trump has never had to commute, so why is he deciding the rules of the road?
He has (obviously) never missed a meal so why is he freezing USAID aid?
He thinks that every Federal gummint employee is a widget interchangeable with every other widget.
And the Senate and House Republicans are fine with everything he is doing.
He's had to commute - but only by limousine or helicopter.
I'd bet he thinks having a drivers license is just for the little people.
Re: "the rage some Americans obviously feel at any suggestion that people should change their behavior for the common good". I have long noted that the two US parties are described by identical language. Democrats believe that what's good for America is good for me.
Republicans believe that what's good for me is good for America.
That's paraphrased from Charles Wilson, then CEO of GM, whom Ike strangely elevated to Secretary of Defense in '53. What he infamously said was "What's good for GM is good for America".
Apparently, Republicans have taken that to heart and personalized it. "Not just GM, me, me, me!"
Over the course of the hearings there was a lot of back and forth between Wilson and the Senators, but in the hearing transcript there was an exchange related to the quote in question:
“Senator Hendrickson. Well now, I am interested to know whether if a situation did arise where you had to make a decision which was extremely adverse to the interests of your stock and General Motors Corp. or any of these other companies, or extremely adverse to the company, in the interests of the United States Government, could you make that decision?
Mr. Wilson. Yes, sir; I could. I cannot conceive of one because for years I thought what was good for our country was good for General Motors, and vice versa. The difference did not exist. Our company is too big. It goes with the welfare of the country. Our contribution to the Nation is quite considerable.” (p. 26)
https://blogs.loc.gov/inside_adams/2016/04/when-a-quote-is-not-exactly-a-quote-general-motors/
Of course, GM was definitely evil and into "Who killed Roger Rabbit?"
It so perfectly exemplifies CEO arrogance - as we're now seeing play out in real time 70+ years later. The more things change, the more they stay the same.
Australian pediatrician and political activist Helen Caldicott said "The US is a one-party system with two right wings."
This last time, I didn't vote for either the pro-growth, pro-corporate, pro-genocide party with the insane, solipsistic leader, or the the pro-growth, pro-corporate, pro-genocide party with the smiley green face.
I voted for the only anti-genocide party. I voted Green.
Now, my Democrat friends won't talk to me, even though I voted in a Blue state that went 59% for Harris.
If you always do what you've always done, you'll always get what you always got.
Under normal circumstances I might agree with you but this time I think we actually got something different. We have a fully delusional president and a maniacal shadow prime minister. Trump actually believes the 2020 election was rigged by the government, even though he ran the government, and that the Jan 6 insurrection was orchestrated by the FBI, even though he ran the FBI. He thinks that he owns the Gulf of Mexico by renaming it, and he believes that he will soon own Panama, Greenland, Canada, and Gaza. At the same time, Musk plans to privatize the entire government. He and Bezos have already divided up NASA, but the big profits will come from directing all government spending through Twitter, with a basis point per transaction in his pocket, and requiring anyone who needs to communicate with the government to do it through a blue checkmark personal Twitter subscription. And of course eliminate any government program that doesn’t generate a profit. And all this will be magically funded by tariffs that someone else is paying. I don’t care which right wing party we’ve had in the past, this is a completely new universe unconnected from reality.
I, and I am a liberal, feel that rage. Fellow liberals always seem to be promoting altruism and self-sacrifice--for the same of the environment, endangered species, people who are in any way disadvantaged. I care about ME and I expect the government to promote my interests. I don't believe that what's good for America is good for me or that what's good for me is what's good for America. I don't care what's good for America--I just care about what's good for me and that's what I expect my political party to promote.
What’s good for you, if you live in Manhattan, is less traffic, less air pollution, and improved mass transit infrastructure. If you don’t live in Manhattan, all of this is completely irrelevant to you, so move on to something else and leave us alone. Talking to you, DJT.
As usual, it's all petty personal feelings of insult and slight. NYC can't stand him. They made him a convicted felon. The elites laugh at his gaucheness. SNL mocks him constantly. He had to move to Florida full time to find an adoring cult.
Therefore, anything NYC does must be opposed.
Trump holds a permanent grudge against New York because it's the only state that successfully prosecuted him for his decades of crime as a resident of NY City. They wouldn't buy his excuses and overcame the predictable delaying tactics and public histrionics that Trump had used since his days as an apprentice to the odious Roy Cohen to avoid long overdue culpability for his nefarious acts.
He's also resentful of the fact that the vast majority of New Yorkers, those who know him best, recognize him as nothing more than a local con-man, serial failure, and public embarrassment that has metastasized into a menace to democracy, decency, and the rule-of-law worldwide.
The upstate rubes who vote for the likes of Trump and Stefanik are typically aggrieved losers who blame others for their problems and will oppose logical programs run downstate or in any blue-state just out of spite, even if it will never impact them directly. Trump has made riding this wave of aggrieved resentment his ticket to ill-gotten wealth and his seat in government.
Yeah, blue-state red-necks.
Does Trump not have bigger things to destroy than congestion pricing?
He's a petty man. And Trump Tower is in the congestion zone.
He can multitask!
He can't even "task" let alone multitask.
It was not his idea and it is popular among those who drive into Manhattan. When.if he goes there he has a police escort - clogging up traffic and making him feel as if he can part the seas. He hates because he loves to hate.
Without bike lanes I guess I will once again be forced to take the lane, cheerfully pissing off alla drivers who aren’t already enraged.
The regime wants to destroy everything that is good or useful. They want to promote everything that is bad or harmful. It really is that simple.
They seem [strikeout] to be aiming [/strikeout] determined to accelerate extinction.
The sooner it comes, the sooner the rapture will happen.
Yep, that's what they think. I can only imagine the expressions on their faces when it doesn't.
I've seen a dead man. I know what those faces will look like.