inflation’s causes are to be found in the government increasing the supply of money and credit to fuel general demand for goods and services—to an extent that exceeds the economy's productive capacities. This is the culprit. This is why it feels like we’re paying more for less. //

All of which underscores the all-important point that neither businesses nor the Russian president nor greedy hedge-fund managers nor greedy tech barons nor greedy CEOs nor mean, politically incorrect people who don’t employ the correct hashtags print money. The federal government does that.

So let’s be clear: politicians, who are not very good at much, are supremely good at deflecting blame. And that’s what this is. This shouldn’t come as a surprise. The same people who underreport inflation’s impact on Americans shouldn’t be expected to acknowledge that it was their decisions that landed us in hot water in the first place. Unfortunately, it is those people—the policymaking failures who run the government—who are now charged with getting us out of it.

As I’ve mentioned before, my gut feeling is that Putin sees himself as the smartest guy he knows and has unshakable faith in his ability to maneuver. You can easily imagine Putin, rather than Barack Obama, saying, “I think that I’m a better speechwriter than my speechwriters. I know more about policies on any particular issue than my policy directors. And I’ll tell you right now that I’m gonna think I’m a better political director than my political director.” That kind of hubris and a realization that one’s political life, or real life, might depend upon a successful military outcome could easily lure a politician into deciding that he’s a better general than his generals.

“When the soul enters the body, when life begins—I don’t have certainty on that,” he said. “And yet, you look around society, people seem to have a lot of certainty about that, and then total confusion as to how to deal with people with psychosis. They’ve got it completely upside down.” It boggled his mind that the other candidates running for governor were 100-percent certain about what they couldn’t know, and weirdly unsure about how to fix things that could be fixed.

“Politics should be a means to an end of a good society,” Shellenberger said. “They’re making it the end.” He was referring to the homeless activists who were his nemesis, but he could have been talking about the environmentalists or the pro-lifers in the desert. “Their real goal is control and moralizing and power. Mine is freedom, care, civilization.”

Click this link to stop your GSuite account from being shut down! We're serious. //

Google finally launched a solution for people with "legacy" GSuite Google accounts. After initially threatening to shut down free GSuite accounts if users didn't start paying for the service, Google has completely backed off. Once users jump through some sign-up hoops, Google will allow their ~16-year-old accounts to continue functioning. You'll even get to keep your email address. //

The deadline to opt out of an account shutdown, which has changed several times now, is June 27, 2022. If you don't complete this opt out by June 27, you will be automatically billed for Workspace. If you don't have a card on file and don't opt out, your account will be suspended on August 1 and shut down.

The automatic enrollment and billing, without explicit user consent, is one of the wilder parts of this story. If you don't closely follow the tech news scene, there's a good chance you won't know this is coming, and you will either suddenly be billed without your consent or find that your Google account has suddenly stopped working.

For a company whose key business pillar is convincing users to store vast amounts of data on its servers, playing games like this is a bizarre decision. At least it came to a reasonable conclusion.

How long after getting COVID can you be reinfected?
This is another complicated question — especially for sufferers of long COVID, who appear to harbor low, even undetectable levels of the virus for weeks and months. For mild to moderate cases, people who test positive for COVID can expect their infection to clear within five to 10 days after their symptoms arose, or since their confirmed test result.

Nascent research suggests that the average immune system can fend off COVID reinfection for three to five months after the previous bout. That’s why, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, people who had a confirmed infection within the previous 90 days are not expected to quarantine after coming in contact with another infected individual.

But all bets are off about six months later, when antibodies are known to start waning — regardless of vaccination

Benny Johnson @bennyjohnson
Elon Musk says he will vote Republican for FIRST time EVER after absolutely SAVAGING Joe Brandon in brutal roast

12:54 PM · May 17, 2022

Musk attacked the “left-wing bias” of Twitter, which Project Veritas confirmed with a damning video they just released. He said that it wasn’t going to be a “right-wing takeover” of Twitter, but a “moderate-wing takeover,” so that all could express themselves in the “digital town square. That’s what the right has been celebrating — just the idea of basic fairness, not being banned for political belief, not having information suppressed because it doesn’t serve the Democratic political narrative. //

But unlike some on the left, Musk even takes people coming back at him and attacking him as a part of the landscape, saying he shouldn’t be able to control everything; he wouldn’t want to be able to stop people from criticizing him. Now, that’s the right attitude to have, and it means he truly gets the concept of free speech that he’s fighting for — that even those who would go after him get to speak. If he can achieve that, then it truly is a “town square.” //

Elon Musk @elonmusk
20% fake/spam accounts, while 4 times what Twitter claims, could be much higher.

My offer was based on Twitter’s SEC filings being accurate.

Yesterday, Twitter’s CEO publicly refused to show proof of <5%.

This deal cannot move forward until he does.
3:32 AM · May 17, 2022