In my last update, Ankush Khadori had argued that Elon Musk’s legal strategy in a lawsuit over his attempt to withdraw from his agreement to purchase Twitter would necessarily rely on obfuscation and delay.[1] and I wondered how much of Musk’s nonsense the judge hearing the case would be willing to put up with.[2] It doesn’t sound like this particular judge will have much time for such nonsense at all.[3] If Musk gets out of this with a favorable verdict, I think a whole bunch of people, certainly including myself, are going to be really, really surprised.
Dave Michaels, “Judge in Twitter, Elon Musk Case Known for Quick Work,” Wall Street Journal, August 6, 2022, https://www.wsj.com/articles/judge-in-twitter-elon-musk-case-known-for-quick-work-11659791075
Gilead
Gun nuttery
Matt Ford, “The Ecstasy of Watching Alex Jones Get Trounced in Court,” New Republic, August 5, 2022, https://newrepublic.com/article/167321/alex-jones-sandy-hook-trial-ecstasy-watching-trounced-court
Donald Trump
Coup attempt
Particularly feeling a dissonance about now between on the one hand, white Christian nationalist "thin blue line" support for white supremacist gangsters (police), and on the other hand, their support for the #January6 coup attempt and their objection to the @FBI #MarALagoRaid.
— David Benfell, Ph.D. (Public) (@BenfellPhD) August 9, 2022
Eric Tucker and Michael Balsamo, “Trump says FBI conducting search of Mar-a-Lago estate,” Associated Press, August 8, 2022, https://apnews.com/article/donald-trump-mar-a-lago-government-and-politics-9e8d683afe87389407950af7ccfdbdd6
Ideology as ‘science:’ economics
There are a lot of folks who play economists on television. They even put on sufficiently convincing acts (meaning they regurgitate elite-pleasing neoliberal talking points) that politicians listen to them and universities hire them. But Robert Kuttner is a rare example of the real deal. Read his shit: He supplies arguments and evidence, quite in contrast to those other talking heads, including, by the way, Paul Krugman.
Robert Kuttner, “Our Bewildering Economy,” American Prospect, August 8, 2022, https://prospect.org/economy/our-bewildering-economy/
- [1]Ankush Khardori, “I Used to Work on Cases Like Twitter v. Musk. Here’s What Will Happen Next,” New York, July 30, 2022, https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2022/07/what-will-happen-next-with-the-twitter-v-musk-lawsuit.html↩
- [2]David Benfell, “Elon Musk’s Achilles’ heel,” Not Housebroken, August 1, 2022, https://disunitedstates.org/2022/07/10/elon-musks-achilles-heel/↩
- [3]Dave Michaels, “Judge in Twitter, Elon Musk Case Known for Quick Work,” Wall Street Journal, August 6, 2022, https://www.wsj.com/articles/judge-in-twitter-elon-musk-case-known-for-quick-work-11659791075↩