Election Update 9/25/26

 So, I almost forgot about this. I just spent yet another week in atlantic city, came back today, and I'm tired as fudge. I almost forgot about this update, but I do wanna get it out tonight, so let's do this.

Senate

 

A lot has happened this week, a lot of polls came in, but all in all, not a lot has changed. New Hampshire has recovered a bit. Minnesota is closer than it should be IMO. Talarico keeps gaining steam in texas. El Sayed is doing okay. Susan Collins is kinda holding on in Maine. Troy Jackson is ahead, but by a relatively unhealthy 1 point margin. Iowa is now tilting democratic. Nebraska has been updated to also be tilt D. 

So...what can I deduce from this? Well, between this and the governor races, where republicans seem to be doing a bit better in the same states, here's my honest interpretation. This blue wave is more a negative reaction to Trump, rather than a rejection of the GOP at large. Federal races seem to have a strong democratic bias, but governor races have less so. It seems like there are split ticket voters who still lean republican, but are sending a strong message against Trump and his horrible management of the country. It's why Susan collins is still viable. It explains the apparent ticket splitting between state wide and federal races. Federally, the public is sending a strong rejection to Trump, but they're not really against conservatism at large. This is an important distinction, and something we on the left need to read correctly. 

The races where republicans are doing worst are in races with very strong trumpy candidates on the federal level. But at the same time I aint seeing a huge appetite for progressivism. El Sayed isnt doing as good as I hoped. Flannagan in Minnesota is underperforming. So is Troy Jackson. We saw in primary data that in most races, progressives generally underperformed moderates by 1-2 points. Not a huge difference, but enough to be noticed. And I think this explains some of the trends we're seeing. 

As an ex republican, I kinda get the vibe. When I left conservatism, I realized it wasnt just the current crop of conservatives that were bad, it was the entire ideology. But a lot of people can very well say that "well, it's not that all conservatism that's bad, it's just Trumpism." So they'll reject current guy, and then touch the hot stove again and again. It would be nice if people could wake up and realize that the entire ideology is bad, because it is, but sadly, a lot of Americans are brainwashed by "the cave" and are just like "well i dont like this puppet show, but I like puppet shows and you're bad if you don't." You try to tell them the whole puppet show thing is bad and they get angry and reject you. 

It's frustrating. It's like watching these guys touch a hot stove over and over again. You just wanna shake them and say THE PROBLEM IS TOUCHING THE STOVE. And they'll be like "no, it's just that particular burner" and keep getting burned again and again. But that's where people are at. For whatever reason, they dont like liberalism. Is it in part a messaging problem? Yes, despite the more positive polling of the moderate wing, I dont think moderates really offer a convincing message to voters. Most conservatives would rather vote for conservatives, and most liberals would rather vote for someone further left. A pragmatic moderate might look good on paper, but due to the worldview issue, they just dont appeal to anyone.

At the same time, that worldview issue is what makes americans so conservative. Underneath politics are deeper philosophical differences stemming from religion. The more hardcore Christian people are, the more conservative they are. Meanwhile atheists and agnostics are the most liberal. My worldview trends toward the latter. But your median American citizen is some flavor of Christian. A "moderate" Christian, like a casual catholic or mainline protestant, but a Christian nevertheless. And that serves to keep them in the cave and keep them moderate. And even as conservative screws them again and again, they'll keep going back to it because "well it's just that iteration of it, sure, neoconservatism tea partyism trumpism is bad but this time it will be different. It never actually is, because it's that ideology and that worldview that's the problem. But these voters never make the connection, they remain conservative as it fails them again and again. This is why I kinda think Americans are secret socialists, but also not really. Like the argument for "secret socialism" is that they clearly realize something is broken and are clamoring for change...but any time the change slaps them in the face, they're like "no not like that" and go on about how the solutions offered go against "their values." Well...did you ever consider your values suck? But I digress. I just wanted to explain where I see this election going. 

House

 

Sticking with the normal house model. When I take that other one I floated at face value, I get extreme volatility with just a few points difference. That's why it has such a low probability of dems winning. While the GCV currently aligns with this model roughly, a few points difference could drive the race to either be republican favored, or for democrats to win like 270 house seats. I dont see either of these outcomes as realistic. Looking at other models, they seem to align more with this specific model than the other. Fifty plus one kinda viewed the 270 dem house seats prediction as possible, but about as likely as republicans winning the house. I'm more convinced that we're likely going to see something between say, 220 to 250 seats for democrats, with 235 being a good middle ground. I could even say 220-240 with 230 being a middle ground. I dont see there being a ton of volatility here. 

 

 Governors

 

 While democrats dominate the senate, they're often having problems making the same inroads in the house. Especially down south. This gives us a more Obama era esque map, where the rust belt governors are seemingly outperforming the senate candidates in places like Minnesota and Michigan, but down south, Texas is still red, and Georgia is tilting red at the moment. We also see stuff like red New Hampshire. Again, I think conservatism is still alive in America, the problem is Trumpism. People aren't necessarily looking for a progressive to fix things here, they're more reacting to Trump right now. Doesnt matter that conservatism is a crap ideology with little to no redeeming features, a lot of people will trending toward it for ideological reasons, only to get burned on the hot stove again and again. 

Conclusion

 

 I guess that's where I'll leave it. Again, kinda half asleep while writing this, maybe a bit ranty, but yeah. It's where I've been thinking about it. In some ways, this map is VERY VERY good for democrats. But...it also seems to come with some nuance and lessons within. Maybe people arent looking for progressives and democratic socialists to fix everything atm (even though they probably should), they seem to reacting more to Trump in particular. It's how I best make sense of this data, since some democrats clearly seem to be doing better than others, even bucking state trends. Maine, Michigan, and Minnesota arent as blue as they should be. And then there's the governorships. Maybe I'm oversimplifying. I dont think progressives are not viable, and I'll remain stubborn that if we wanna fix America's problems, we NEED progressives to do that with bold agendas. Band aid fixes won't do it. And conservatism causes the problems in the first place. But that doesn't mean that most Americans are on the same page as us, even in this relatively populist era. They got too many ideological brainworms where they'd rather touch the hot stove again. And let's face it, often progressives make stupid and unproductive ventures into idpol and weird foreign policy spats when they should be focusing on economics. So even progressives often get lost as they focus on the wrong issues. That's frustrating too. But I digress.

And yeah, for the rest of this election cycle, you should expect weekly updates at minimum. Fridays/weekends at the very least, and maybe more often closer to the date itself.  

Discussing the White House Press scandal

 So, in typical Trumpian fashion, Trump basically banned the White House Press Corp and ended the practice of having the press cover events. This was a clear attempt to punish people for being critical of him, since we know, Trump is a super special snowflake who can't handle any criticism. 

Surprisingly, the courts are ruling against him. I say surprisingly because I was under the impression the president doesnt have to give access to media outlets. And let's face it, access to important figures is an important part of Noam Chomsky's propaganda model. Access normally comes with quid pro quo. Media outlets critical of political figures dont have to give them interviews and the like. I thought press access worked like that, with Trump being able to just say "no access" if he felt like it, but apparently the courts (and media outlets) are treating this as a violation of free speech. It seems to be because it's discriminary. it's a lot like labor violations. If you fire someone for trying to unionize, thats illegal. If you fire someone for any other reason, that's legal. So if you wanna fire someone for trying to unionize, you come up with some other excuse to make it happen. Trump's biggest sin might be the fact that he made the understanding that always existed too blunt. He's such a snowflake everyone knows he did it due to criticism, and its falling through.

Anyway, I feel mixed on this. On the one hand, i do believe all views should have access to the president, but they obviously dont. Credentialed journalists are credentialed in ways that have biases. No one adds Jacobin to the white house press pool, its always establishment media that has a corporate bias. And, if anything, this is why Ive kinda not cared about this. Like oh boo hoo, you lost access. If youre outside of the "acceptable" spectrum of debate, you never had access. Doesnt matter how valid your views are or aren't. You arent allowed. Youre discriminated against. That's ALWAYS been a thing. ANd if the president wants to make the existing understanding more blunt, so be it. 

On the other hand, I dont think that politicians should HAVE TO give media their time. I believe that free speech should guarantee everyone has the freedom to express their views, but no one is owed a politician's time. If a politician wants to dodge an interview with an unfavorable outlet, or ignore questions from them, they should be able to. Let how that looks come off as it is. I dont think presidents should HAVE TO answer questions from hostile media outlets. Even if trump is immature AF about it, I think the implication of the opposing view puts an unrealistic obligation. Should someone with my views have to answer questions from a fundamentalist christian or anarcho capitalist outlet? Should trump have to answer questions from, say, Jacobin? Id say no either way. Let the people decide how that comes off. I got news for you, only the president's die hard supporters sympathize with him, and most people on the left know trump is a snowflake. So who cares? 

Just...my view. I see where the argument is being made though, you dont WANT quid pro quo in arrangements like this. Im just pointing out the reality of how the relationships between media and politicians has always worked. And how its always been screwy. ANd yeah Im just like "oh gee, you LOST access? Imagine that!" (I never had it). But hey if the courts wanna rule this way, maybe some anti establishment outlet should sue to gain access or something. Ya know, kinda like how satanists take advantage of rulings in favor of Christians. If they do it why not everyone else? If those are the rules, what are the unintended consequences? And I know, the media will come up with some argument in favor of credentialism, but credentiialism is itself a de facto filter that shapes the views of those who have acess. Pro establishment views get represented, anti establishment ones aren't. And it's BS. 

The fact is, this is why i dont care too much about this one. Im glad to see trump get pushed back against, but yeah, i dont really believe american media access to politicians lives up to the legal standards being put forward here. 

Current hardware prices are a bubble

 So...I keep seeing weird doomer rhetoric about the AI bubble, with people going on about how OMG YOU SHOULD BUY NOW IT'S ONLY GONNA GET WORSE, THE PRICES WILL NEVER COME BACK DOWN AND THEY'RE KILLING HARDWARE OWNERSHIP AND BLAH BLAH BLAH!

While I dont deny rich people be rich people and will continually find new ways to screw people, these people dooming like this need to chill. This is another weird hardware bubble, similar to the COVID and crypto booms. Prices are expensive because rich people are in their own little bubble about how great AI is, and how we need to buy up the entire productive capacity of PC hardware years in advance for AI datacenters no one wants, for AI that no one wants, and at some point, the bills are gonna come due. These companies are gonna have to turn a profit somehow, and they're selling a product that most people dont want. Dont get me wrong, there ARE customers, but it's a B2B thing, it's businesses selling to each other. But NORMAL people? They're not on board with AI. And to be fair i dont blame them. it's always been this artificial thing. I am normally pro tech and even I kinda hate AI. it's just a bunch of tech bros telling us that this is "it", and we gotta get "with it" or we're gonna be "left behind", and most people are like F off. 

So...what happens when the bill for all of this current hardware for data centers no one wants for AI no one wants comes due? Well, if these companies cant turn a profit, they're screwed. They're gonna go out of business, the industry is gonna consolidate. I dont think that AI will go away entirely, but I think it will be a painful lesson for many wealthy people heavily investing in it, and suddenly there will be tons of hardware no one wants and more and prices are gonna POP. 

Look at COVID. Look at the RX 6000 series I venerate so hard in recent years. 6650 XT. $400 MSRP. $800+ during COVID. Bought for $230 in 2022. Yeah. That's what's gonna happen here eventually. RX 9000 and RTX 5000 cards will go for 2x+ MSRP, and then....prices will crash and things will return to normal. When? 2028 or later. Not sure. 2026 and 2027 are gonna be bad. We're in that 2021 phase with high demand and prices that are ridiculous. But eventually, it'll crash. Might take a few years, but yeah. The industry is gonna have to crash eventually. What is happening now isnt sustainable. I dont think that this is a new normal or permanent. Ive seen variations of this happen in recent years. Crypto booms in 2017 and 2018, COVID in 2020-2022. And now this. 2025-2027ish? Again, idk when exactly it'll pop, but I'm guessing some time between 2028-2030. 

I just wanted to push back against the doomers since some of them are getting overly dramatic. If this were truly a new normal that's one thing, but again what's driving this is rich people buying up the entire world's supply of computer parts years in advance for a product no one actually wants. This isn't sustainable and if I had to guess, it'll crash eventually. Maybe I'm wrong, but I see the writing on the wall. This is a bubble IMO. 

And yes, I fully recognize that this bubble popping could lead to a massive market correction that will likely throw us into a new great recession style recession. And it will be painful to many. Again, think the housing bubble, again. But yeah, that's really the only thing keeping the US economy going right now. It's like 10 billionaires siphoning trillions in funds to each others companies in a giant circle until the whole thing collapses. It really is that ridiculous in my view. Again, how is this even remotely sustainable? It isn't. 

Again, just pushing back on the doomers. 

Discussing another House forecast I built

 Okay, so, I basically saw a thread on how cook PVI works, and I'm going to try to bring back something I experimented with a while ago. Basically, I'm going to take the cook PVIs directly and compare them to the generic congressional vote. I'm not going to go by individual districts leading to a more compact model. Rather I go by the amount of districts with a certain score and group them in a way where I should be able to get a rough idea of where the house sits. 

The Cook PVI is weird. Basically whatever the score is, the actual margin is double, that's why this model failed previously. i didn't account for that properly. Anyway, this should have resolved it, and without further ado, here's another house model based on this methodology:

 Okay, so let's go over how this differs. First of all, the number of house seats I get is almost exactly what I get in my other model at the moment. I updated the other too today and after adding a few more republican seats, I get 235-200 with that one. So right now, we're projected to get around 234-235 seats depending on what model you use. Pretty close. Definitely better than the first one I used. This is, btw, an improved version of my 2024 one. 

At the same time, let's discuss the differences. The big one is the certainty of the win. Here's the thing. My other model is based on 2024 voting data. However, we've had a lot of gerrymandering since 2024, leading to the median district being R+3 vs R+1, this means we'd literally need a GCV of D+6 rather than D+2 to take the house. Currently, we're at D+8.6, which is good, but still, this level of gerrymandering is gonna hurt us into 2028 and beyond, since this level of gerrymandering means we need a strong margin to actually take the house. The republicans F-ed us on that one, and democrats havent really done enough to gerrymander their own states. 

Anyway, this leads to a more Lean D rather than safe D rating for the house. The house probability only slightly exceeds senate probability under these conditions. 

Another flaw with this design is how....not granular the results are. Im grouping districts by their rating here. If one of a certain rating goes, they all go. So if the GCV dropped below 8, we would suddenly be down to 225 house seats, whereas in my other model, it would literally require a 7 point drop to get down to 225 under current conditions. So....yeah, something is off between the two models here. Which is probably more trustworthy? Well, I trust cook more than I trust converting 2024 voting margins given how many districts have shifted due to gerrymandering. A lot of the results my other model spits out probably will be wrong in the real world. Like, I know I currently have my other model flipping AK-AL, but then when I see polling data for it, it's R+14. So that other model...isn't necessarily great. 

Anyway, this just goes to show that if the democrats want to remain relevant into the future, they HAVE TO use their power in 2028 assuming they get a trifecta and RUN WITH IT. They HAVE to pass reform that attempts to rein in gerrymandering, guarantee voting rights, etc. We can win NOW, but this is a ludacriously liberal voting environment. I mean, texas and alaska are flipping blue in my senate forecast FFS. Even states like Kansas and South Carolina are SWING STATES. So yeah. Democrats better actually use their power to DO SOMETHING to ensure their future political relevance or they're gonna lose it because in a more neutral political environment, the house is gonna go 210-225R. They literally need to overperform somewhere in the ballpark of 4-6 points in the GCV JUST to take the house. It's nuts. Basically, they'd only hold the house in a 2006, 2018, or 2026 style environment here. Gerrymandering is the bane on democracy's existence, but at this point, we either need to get a blue wave big enough to end the practice, or we fight fire with fire. I say we uncap the house and expand it to around 1300 members, reducing each district size to 1/3 of its current residents. That will get rid of the ridiculous built in advantages the GOP seems to have. Either that or do like, proportional representation based on the percentage of how people vote for various candidates. Point is, they cant just keep the house like this. The GOP is attempting to rig it and erode democracy under the principle that they choose their voters before the voters choose them. It's a BS system that has to change. 

Anyway, we'll see how these models pan out. I mean, I'm good with senate and presidential forecasts, but the house has always been something I find iffy. When I forecast the house at all, I generally add a forecast last minute because without adequate polling data, it's just so hard to get the methodology down. I'm literally trying to use metrics other than polling and the best I got is cook PVI ratings and previous voter data. Typically, prior voter data might be adequate, but when you DO got so much gerrymandering going on, yeah that other model is gonna be straight up wrong on stuff. 

Election Update 9/18/26

 Okay, so I decided to start doing these weekly as I'm able. Not sure about next week, might be a bit late, but we're getting to that point in the election season where we're getting CONSTANT data coming in, and the forecasts are changing rapidly. I don't have much to say beyond that, but I do wanna post the stats at least.

Senate 

I don't have a ton to say here other than republicans are screwed. While we still have october, we're getting pretty close to this cycle's end game and it seems to be going even harder blue. We'll see if dems keep the momentum up. if one recalls in 2024, I thought Harris would win at this point in the cycle, but her numbers fell apart going into October. And let's be honest, the senate isn't really like, locked down for democrats. If republicans overperform by say, 3 points, they'll still win the senate. So we don't have a ton ton of certainty here, as blue as this map appears. It's basically a 2/3 chance democrats win the chamber, but there's still about a 1/3 chance republicans overperform enough to hold onto it. Here's an example of what this kind of scenario could look like.

 So yeah, let's not get OVERconfident here. Republicans can still overperform and win, let's not count our chickens before they hatch here.

House

 

On the flip side, I WILL get confident about the house. For me, it's not a matter of whether the democrats win the chamber, it's how much they win it by. And while I am running a rather experimental model this election season that seems to contradict the polling data I occasionally see on individual districts, given how the GOP barely won the chamber when the results were about 11 points redder, the democrats probably WILL sweep, it's really a matter of how much. My model might be a bit overconfident on that fact, I admit that, but yeah. Democratic control? Pretty confident of it. It really is a matter of the margins. Conservatively maybe it'll only be 225 rather than 232 or whatever, but hey, it's still control of the chamber. 

Governors

Map is what it is, I don't think this one changed a whole lot in practice. I know Texas is getting a bit pinker, but still, eh. The dems seem to mostly do good up in the rust belt here, and struggle a bit more down south. Kinda typical for dems in a normal cycle I'd say, and shows a bit of a split between federal and state level politics. People seem to want to send a strong message to trump, but they seem fine with republicans on a local level, where the extremeness of the results is a bit muted. Could indicate that the current blue wave we see in the senate is driven by an undercurrent of being anti trump specifically, rather than anti GOP. 

Conclusion

So yeah, a lot has changed, but a lot has also remained the same. This map got very blue, but we could see it get a bit redder going into October if the trends we saw in 2024 happen again. We'll see. I fully expect the energy to be on the democrats' side, but the current results are SO optimistic for dems I can't help but temper expectations. Maybe polls are overshooting them a bit. Keep in mind it won't take much for the GOP to maintain control of the senate. Just a 2-3% difference could flip the entire chamber the other way in the current environment. The house is stronger for democrats but keep in mind I'm running off of a highly fundamentals based model that's experimental in nature given my severe lack of polling there. I'm just interpolating 2024 results with uniform shifts based on GCV there. Actual results may vary. Governors, well, yeah, look at the map.

Anyway, that's this week's result. Next week might be a little late maybe, I'm not sure. I expect to get it out next friday but if not it'll come out over the weekend some time. That's why I do them on Friday in the first place. Most polls come out during the week, with far fewer polls releasing on weekends. I can post a post and expect it to not be obsolete within a couple hours or a day or two. Best way to do it in the current environment. Anyway, that's this week's, see you next week.  

 

 

Atlantic City needs some freaking Georgism

 So....Georgism, I kinda have a love hate relationship with the ideology. I consider it simplistic, boiling down all problems with capitalism to land ownership, and proposing the LVT as an end all be all to those problems. BUT...I can also be nuanced, recognizing LVT can be useful when implemented on a smaller scale, replacing local property taxes, or being targetted specifically at land speculators. And that's where this comes in handy.

Looking at Atlantic City, the math isn't mathing. I see vacant lots next to the beach that no one does anything with, which is just insane to me. I know NJ is up north and it's not a year round tourist destination, thats one of the reasons it struggles, but seriously after looking at other towns Ive been on vacation at, I've never seen empty land next to a beach. Because that's prime real estate location. It's in demand. Everyone wants it. The price is high, because the earning potential is high. 

But Atlantic City doesnt seem to have that earning potential. Paying more attention to the area, everything with its politics seems to be X is struggling to be profitable, Y is struggling to be profitable. Everything is struggling, and yet, then the price of the land is insane. I know that there's still an empty lot where Trump's Plaza casino used to be (it was demolished like 10 years ago), and I know Ive seen video footage of the areas on the northern part of the island just being...empty. Like wtf. Why is it empty?! And then....when discussion of this stuff goes on the market, it's like...oh yeah, this lot sold for like millions and billions of dollars. And it's like...wait I thought this was a struggling beach town, why tf is this land so valuable. Like you would think between lots being empty for years, and high prices of land, that something isn't adding up here. That the fact that nothing is being done with the land would mean it isn't as valuable as people are saying it is. Like, the land is insanely valuable, but it's so insanely valuable that it cant seem to find a buyer, much less one who can actually pull in a profit. This is why it seems to remain a casino town, the casinos are the only businesses big enough to eat the cost and be able to make any profit at all. Everything else seems to just go out of business. It's weird. 

So...I basically googled the issue, and because google searches are answered by an AI now, I had a discussion with the AI about it. Apparently, there's rampant land speculation there where real estate developers and the like buy up land and just...hoard it. They do it to drive up the price so they can sell it for a profit. Simply by denying it to the market, they can make it artificially scarce, which drives up the price. But this price IS out of sync with the market. And as such, the land doesnt get buyers, no one does anything productive with it, anyone who attempts to is killed economically because the place is of relatively low demand for a beach town, but to the land barons, it doesn't matter. They will sit on it for LITERAL DECADES driving the price up waiting for the right buyer at the right price. They can wait forever, especially because, in NJ, they only do property taxes. 

So....let's discuss property taxes. Land value taxes tax you on the value of the land. it discourages hoarding and incentivizes productive use of land. It would basically solve this problem. but property taxes? Well, that taxes the buildings on the land. So if you build a building on the land, like the former trump plaza site or some random lot on the north side of town near the beach, well, you get taxed out of existence. Only the casinos can afford to really remain profitable because they're big enough to eat the tax burden and remain profitable. Of course, the casinos are incentivized to appeal to relatively affluent people. Theyre the ones who bring in the big bucks. But yeah. We're starting to see why this place has so many contradictions. Why everyone in the real world is struggling, whereas everything seems so insanely overpriced. With property taxes, a land speculator can buy a lot, sit on it forever, barely pay any taxes, and yeah they'll just wait out the market forever. With LVT, they'd be forced to do something with the land, or to sell it. The land tax would make this hoarding behavior unprofitable because you lose money for sitting on the land and doing nothing with it, youre incentivized to DO SOMETHING with it, something profitable. If Atlantic City implemented an LVT, it would probably bring in some much needed market corrections. Maybe it would be harsh to some, but the current environment is stifling to most. You got poor people unable to afford a place to live, homeless people running around the place, you got casinos struggling to be profitable. You got tourists complaining about the homelessness problem. It's a solid solution. So why doesn't AC implement it?

Apparently they cant. According to google AI, unlike PA where you CAN do split rate taxation, taxing land value and property, NJ has these stupid rules where every municipality has to conform to uniform rules where they tell the localities how they can tax. And in order to fix that, youd need to change state level laws. Of course, these same speculators will lobby the crap out of the legislature, ensuring that such a thing never passes, ensuring that people continue to suffer.

Ya know, the older,  and the more I understand, I get the more frustrated I get. There are tons of solutions to our problems, not just this, but also, other ideas. Ya know, like UBI. And it seems like, whenever we want to do something that fixes the economy and makes it work for the people, there's some wealthy special interest that insists society has to suffer because they make money off of it. They hide behind legalese and broken systems that benefit them, and use their massive wealth to ensure that the system doesn't change.

Of course, that's why we're in a populist era of politics. People understand politics as usual has to go. They want to "drain the swamp" so to speak. Sadly, they voted for Trump, the demagogue, the guy who was supposedly the deal maker, the guy who owned casinos right in AC, one of which is now a vacant lot. And he was always a demagogue. So people want change, and the more the system resists changes, the more radical I think people are gonna get. There is a real desire from many to "burn it all down", because they understand the laws are all written by the elites who profit for them, and theyre part of the problem. We just dont understand who the real problem is, and what needs to be done. That's where we on the left come in. We gotta be the ones actually analyzing these problems, correctly identifying them, and offering solutions. Trump and his right wing populism isnt gonna do it. He and his buddies ARE the swamp. And he's not there to destroy them. He's there to enrich them. He's a false messiah. As I keep saying, if you want real change, you want it from the left. Progressives and the like.

Now, I will say this, populism is like fire. A little bit is energizing. We need it in order to push a narrative that yeah, the status quo is the problem and we need relatively radical change not normally accepted to fix it. Locally in AC, it's LVT. Nationally, we need a UBI. But too much populism is a bad thing. Just like too much fire is a bad thing. You dont wanna burn down the place. But as long as elites continue resisting solutions that actually benefit the people, I fear the population will get increasingly extreme until society tears itself apart. We saw this with the evolution of Trump's coalition. 2016, yeah okay they're pissed off at the status quo, i can understand that, now it's like..."hello fascism". 

Same with the left. UBI, social democracy, very well needed. Literal communism a la the more extreme elements in the DSA, NO, HELL NO. 

So...we need more change than we're getting, but not enough to enable the worst possible people in society to attain power and make things worse. 

BUt yeah, in atlantic city, this populism should perhaps take on georgist characteristics. Again, nationally, not HUGE HUGE on the idea. I dont think LVT is the end all be all to the problems of capitalism, I think it's a crappy way to fund a UBI. But insofar as fixing AC's rampant land speculation problem, yeah, it would help the city significantly. I just wanted to mention it since I'm on one of my autistic obsessions with a new vacation destination, and I'm analyzing the problems as I see them. And it is frustrating, understanding how much better society could be, if not for selfish rich people ruining everything. Really, like we dont like to talk about it, but that's why everything is broken. Rich people have corrupted the systems and stop us from implementing the changes we need. Doesnt mean we should stop advocating for solutions, but it is frustrating. Especially since most people dont even have the wherewithal to get this far in identifying problems properly or offering real solutions. They end up just simping for the rich people and/or identifying the wrong causes to the problems while then screaming about everything being broken. It's another weird paradox of our society. 

Some people REALLY need to get a grip (AC rant)

 So, I'm still in vacation mode and trying to plan my NEXT trip to AC. And the more I research, the more I seem to come across a certain class of people with...shall we say, "refined tastes" who seem to crap on literally everything. The philosophy difference is astounding. It's like, with hardware, you got, on the one end, the people who are like, anything less than a RTX 5090 and 9800X3D is garbage, and would consider my current gaming rig as unusable. Then you have me, the budget buyer, who is trying to find the cheapest, most efficient way of doing things. Oh, you can gave on a 5050? Just get that. it's not that I settle for crap, quite the opposite. I don't support people buying, say a 1030 for modern gaming. Likewise, for hotels, I wouldn't recommend people stay in a seedy motel 6 with a 2.3 star rating and the hotel having conditions so bad it should probably be closed down for health reasons. I simply support finding the cheapest ways of doing things properly, since I don't have a ton of money. Maybe splurge a little when a little more money gets you a lot more quality, but certainly don't overspend to the point where you get diminishing returns. 

However, both with gaming and with vacations, I seem to run into a lot of online comments from people who approach things from that polar opposite end of the spectrum who can't be satisfied with anything. For example, I'd like to see more middle class options in AC in terms of food. For the most part, the food thing has been my biggest obstacle with making the budget affordable, and while I'm finding my way around thanks to cheap food court options and a few local eateries renowned for good food at an affordable, price, there seem to be people who think there aren't ENOUGH fine dining options in AC. These are the guys who will spends $600 at the borgata on a weekend because it's the borgata and everyone says the borgata is the best thing ever, but will complain there arent enough places to eat late at night and that they resent having to eat in a food court. Meanwhile I look at the food courts in casinos like resorts and hard rock and I'm like "BASED!" To be fair, I would like more than mere food courts. I miss some of the middle of the road dining options I normally get going to other locations. Like on vacations down south, if I wanted steak, I'd just go to outback or texas roadhouse since it's reasonably priced. I know the real steak connoseurs would say that that steak is hot garbage and we should be willing to pay 2x the price or more for some BS fine dining steak out of some upscale steakhouse, but again, I literally dont have the money for that kind of crap. It's nice to have REASONABLY PRICED options, really it is. But it seems like for these guys, it's a sleight against their very existence. They NEED the best, they won't settle for nothing less than the best, they crap on people who want less than them, and they complain about everything.

The complaining is what REALLY gets to me here. Like, okay, you have your tastes, you're entitled to them, but it seems like this class of people really gets pissy over, well, everything. They think AC is a crime ridden dump, but go there any way, they crap on anything but top tier accommodations. One of them even said something like "A Philly 9 is a New York 2", and my attitude is "well if New York is so much greater than Philly then just go stay there, you rich frick". Really....like, that's where a lot of the perspective comes from. It's rich New Yorkers with insanely high standards who complain about anything else. And often times what they're complaining about isn't bad, it's just not what they're used to. They need LUXURY, they have REFINED TASTES. They NEED the best and crap on everything that isnt the best. They are so up their own you know whats that they literally lost perspective. It seems to happen a lot with like...really rich people. They're so rich, and so out of touch, and so used to luxury, that they're just...bored with it. They dont appreciate what they have and complain when everything isn't perfect. And it's like nothing satisfies them. 

And...again, it wouldnt be a problem if this were just a taste thing. But it's not. It rolls downstream. These guys make a big stink until the whole world revolves around them, and then they complain that it doesnt enough. Like, again, I see a lot of travel destinations in the Northeast closer to home as, quite frankly, unreasonably priced. But because these guys will pay enormous sums of money for experiences that they then complain about, we all gotta suffer. If anything, these guys have so much economic pull, that the entire economy stops catering to the rest of us. The same is going on with hardware and gaming. The tastes of the ultra wealthy minority drive up the costs for everyone else, to the point that the rest of us get crowded out because the industry is too busy appealing exclusively to these guys. So while we struggle to cobble together computers through RAMpocalypse, these guys brag about their 5090 builds and act baffled when others cant afford the same privileges they can. The same is true with vacation destinations. One of the reasons I chose AC was it is reasonably affordable by northeastern standards. Normally the south is more affordable, but getting down there is a bit more difficult for me these days. And one of the reasons I chose the casino to stay at that I did is because it has reasonably priced accommodations and food. Again, I'm not looking for glitz and glam. If anything, the experience at resorts is higher class than what I'm used to in a lot of ways. And even food court food is pretty good, on par with eating in like a diner or casual pizzaria down south. If anything, I'll give new yorkers this, the quality of a pizza tends to be inversely proportional with its distance from NYC. Food court AC pizza is still better than most southern pizzas I've eaten. The furthest south you really get decent pizza is like virginia, once you get into the carolinas, it starts tasting like crap. But yeah. Outside of like, steak, which is associated with fine dining, I'm mostly fine with my budget options. And for that stuff, I just wish we had more mid range options that didn't involve driving 10-20 miles out of town. Ya know? It would be nice to have a middle ground between a $65-100 steak and like, a $10-20 hamburger, ya know? But again, I digress.

I just felt a need to complain about the super high class people, because it is a socioeconomic topic very related to this blog. I feel like income inequality in america is a huge problem, and that the problem isn't just like that 0.1% that everyone talks about, it's often the top 10-20%. As I said, America feels like a playground for this relatively small upper class consumer class that partakes in the majority of ALL consumer spending. And it is starting to feel like the true middle class doesnt really exist any more, and that the rest of us are just hired help. I kinda resent the fact that the people of AC are forced by the threat of poverty to get jobs just to serve these rich ###holes who complain about everything, and I resent how this increased economic inequality is diminishing the purchasing power of everyone else, as the businesses go where the money is and try to appeal more and more to the wealthy and their refined tastes, to the exclusion of everyone else. Really, I kinda think we should be taxing the everloving fudge out of these guys and redistributing the money to everyone else and making their lives easier. End poverty and wage slavery, and redistribute the money in such a way that businesses have to appeal to more people for the economy to work.

Again, Fordism, ie, the idea that we should pay workers so they can actually consume products is a large factor in what made the 20th century economy work for people. Businesses needed to appeal to a diverse clientele all over the socioeconomic spectrum to maximize profits. But as the economy has shifted where most money seems to pool among the top 10-20% of Americans, it seems like everyone else's lives are getting crappier while these guys just come off as out of touch entitled jerks who don't even seem to appreciate what they have. It's kind of insane. And yeah, that's me political/economic rant for the day. Tax the wealthy. And not just the ultra wealthy, but the normal wealthy people too. And use the money to give everyone a UBI.