We’re going to spare you the hot takes and, as always, dive right into the stories and trends that matter most!
What’s Happening Now
Crypto bros continuing to try to make ‘fetch’ happen. If you’re trying to get a trend going, a good way to do it is to get people with a lot of influence to keep going on about it. We keep seeing this among a certain class of tech bro, this week from Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey who incorrectly proclaimed that “hyperinflation” is happening in the US, and soon would be affecting the whole world. This is, of course, nonsense; we are seeing some mild inflation in certain classes of goods. Economists generally agree that this is due to supply chain disruptions imposed by the global pandemic, and that prices for most things will likely drop once those conditions are eased. Hyperinflation by contrast is a condition where currency is devalued in a runaway vicious cycle of 50% per month over time, and, well, that is not happening.
Dorsey seems to have fallen victim to the same cult of cryptocurrency promoted by the likes of the John Birch Society, and has been convinced that he should be part of a growing chorus to try to take down the US dollar. That, of course, is insane, and the forces mounted against him in that endeavor are bigger than he can possibly imagine.
But that’s not stopping him, or others, from trying, it seems. Couple this with the lingering uncertainty over the pending infrastructure bill and the debt ceiling which must be raised on December 3rd, and it’s clear there are people who would like to try to take down the dollar. And like January 6th, which was not successful, any attempt along these lines could be incredibly damaging and costly, even as it is likely to fail. This all needs to stop. Now.
Facebook changes name to Meta; the world yawns. If there’s one thing that’s becoming clear, it’s that people are increasingly not interested in buying anything that Mark Zuckerberg is selling. People don’t trust him and they don’t trust his company to put societal or individual interests above profits.
This is going to become an increasing strategic bind for the company. As he is the majority shareholder, he controls the board and so thus can’t be “fired,” and if he were to step aside and install non-sociopathic leadership, he would still own a majority of voting shares. A reckoning is coming: he is creating negative value for the company.
In the meantime, we can rest assured they have done no work with ethicists or sociologists to consider how to promote a healthier society with their platform designs, just as he did not consult with ethicists when scheming about how to rate women via web browser from his dorm room. The intention seems to be to divert attention from an increasingly frail business model towards heavy cap-ex and bets on future products no one is sure anyone wants.
Libertarian blockchain-tech types are suggesting that we should want ‘decentralized’ versions of this stuff, which also has not been considered from an ethical or sociological perspective. We don’t really know how to reconcile ‘free speech’ with the tendency for humans to form cults and commit genocide, which is what is likely to happen if we pursue unregulated or self-moderated social media architectures. We know from experiences with structures like Facebook Groups that this is a possible if not likely outcome.
Koch Foundation behind Critical Race Theory assault. We’ve known that the Council for National Policy has coordinated an attack on local school boards. This week The Nation reports that Charles Koch has helped fund that assault. The US Senate hearing this week with Attorney General Merrick Garland was a bit like a horror film; while he was spuriously attacked by senators like Tom Cotton, no one would dare utter a word about the coordinated attack coordinated by CNP and Charles Koch. Why? Who knows. Ignorance? Are they beholden in some way? Hard to say. But reality has yet to poke its nose into the Congressional discourse.
Yale Law School working with disinformation purveyors, Wikileaks, and Russia. A network of people linked to Wikileaks is pushing a distributed blockchain-based social media platform called PanQuake. (The idea is that it can’t be controlled or regulated by governments.) Sean O’Brien, founder of the Yale Law School Privacy Lab, seems to be serving as a chief technical architect. Suzie Dawson, a self-described citizen journalist who had been involved with Occupy Auckland in 2011–2012 and with Wikileaks is leading the effort from Moscow, where she has apparently been in exile since 2017. The group also produces a blog and video series called Talk Liberation, which has promoted noted provocateur Laura Loomer as well as COVID conspiracist anti-vax activist Naomi Wolf. I don’t know why Yale is affiliated with this group, just as I don’t know why the Stanford Internet Observatory and Harvard Kennedy School are taking money from the Koch organization. But it’s worth understanding better what’s going on here. Do Yale Law alumni think this is appropriate? I find it troubling.
Rep. Mo Brooks has a lot of explaining to do—about Space Command and January 6th. Rolling Stone’s Hunter Walker reported this week that several members of Congress were allegedly involved in the planning and coordination of the January 6th assault on the Capitol. Reps. Gosar, Biggs, Brooks, Boebert, Greene, Cawthorn, and Gohmert were named; Brooks apparently wore a bulletproof vest to work that day. Back in January another detail caught my eye, though. The Trump administration made the decision to move the US Space Command from Colorado to Huntsville, Alabama — in Brooks’ district. Given that Arizona and Alabama were (by alphabetical order) important in delaying the vote on January 6th, and Gosar, Biggs, and Brooks have been named as conspirators, the Space Command relocation may be a relevant tit-for-tat to examine.
People in Colorado were shocked by the announcement, and Brooks crowed about it on January 13th. The decision had been kept secret by the Pentagon until announcement that day. The Pentagon’s own Inspector General launched an investigation into how the decision was made in February. Of course, the relocation is also a way to pare down the workforce, which has been an ongoing goal.
Elon Musk is world’s richest man, still wants to send humans to Mars. None of this is shocking if you’ve been following along. Tesla stock has broken $1,100 today. My interest in Musk is focused on the ways in which he presides over a cult of personality. TSLA seems to be disconnected from fundamentals, even as its P/E ratio (357) is starting to fall as Tesla sales continue to rack up. Compare to Apple at a P/E of 29. And TSLA is now a trillion dollar company. I’ll just say this: never underestimate the power of chaos magick, and the many bugs in the Human OS that can be exploited by talented, charismatic leaders.
Pope Francis and Joe Biden get together, bro out. This may seem like a regular part of presidential and papal activity, and yeah, it is, but in the current moment it takes on extra significance. Francis and Biden are both targets of right-leaning Third Rome proponents in the Catholic and Orthodox Churches. Francis, a Jesuit, is considered illegtimate by the Opus Dei faction working with Carlo Maria Viganò, Steve Bannon, and Michael Flynn. They’re also not keen on Biden, as you know. “Biden says Pope Francis called him a good Catholic and said he should keep receiving Communion,” says the Washington Post today. This isn’t really about Biden and Communion; it’s about this broader schism in the Catholic Church Bannon is trying to feed, and around which he is hosting a rally in Baltimore on November 16th. Assuming he’s not in prison or something by then. Which… yeah… how’s that going, anyway?
Truth isn’t the cure for the damage done by disinformation. This week a thread I wrote about how to deal with the damage caused by disinformation in our social landscape went viral. We are failing to understand the social damage being caused by disinformation, and that damage cannot be easily reversed.
We can’t fix society any easier than we can un-stir coffee, or un-burn a fire. Fixing this requires different thinking than that which got us here. Unfortunately, we will likely have to address the “breakdown” with a new, synthetic approach to rebuilding social capital and trust, from scratch. That’s doable, and I have ideas. But it will be like new growth in a forest after a fire. The old forest is, sadly, gone for good. We need to turn our attention to what is being lost: social ties, social trust, social capital — choose your term, but that is the hidden thread that binds us all together and it is what has been burned away these last few years.
I heard from dozens of people who wanted to share that they were touched by this framing. I’m glad we’re finding ways to get closer to the heart of the problem. I’m working on a paper about this specific layer of the problem — the social effects of disinformation. If you’re interested in reading a draft, please email me to request a link.
And to be clear, there is nothing at all wrong with spreading truth far and wide. It just won’t do much to solve the social damage that has been done. Spreading truth is, therefore, a necessary but not sufficient condition for fixing what ails us.
What May Happen Next
We should expect to continue to see Koch-backed efforts at dismantling civil discourse and institutions. The goals for 2022 and 2024 are to tear apart voting rights and render elections ineffective. The “constitutional sheriffs” movement is being nurtured as a way to challenge the federal government. NPR reports the research of Washington Post reporter Robert Costa that the plan for 2024 is to try to assemble slates of “alternate electors” that can challenge those chosen by the electorate. This is a refinement of the half-baked plan they tried to make happen in 2020. Next time, it might work.
The crypto-cult is still focused on attacking the dollar and filling the Bitcoin Bathtub with fresh bro-dollars and juicy criminal syndicate moneylaundering earnings. And we don’t know the extent of that cult. Does it include Moscow Mitch McConnell? Signs point to maybe. His pal, Oleg Deripaska, is a fan. So is Putin. And Snowden. And Assange.
I seriously hope that somewhere there is an intelligence dossier a foot thick on this crypto attack vector and that Congressional committees, the Fed, the SEC, and relevant IC agencies are up to speed on this. I really, really hope that.
We’ll be back next week with everything that matters most!
We’re interested in the major historical trends that shape current events. Tips? Ideas? Drop us a line via email or Twitter DM. Please note: this analysis is historical and political in nature; it is not intended as financial advice and should not be taken as such.
For an even deeper dive, check out my series, The Big History Behind January 6th.
