Favorites November 7th 2023
There was some interesting discussion in the comments, but one thing I had not realized is that the lead time for utility scale solar is way shorter than for a coal plant. (3 years vs 6). I suppose it's not that surprising once you think about it, but it could mean that someone building a natural gas power plant has to look pretty far in the future to estimate competativeness with solar. While we're at it, residential batteries are starting to take off, SunRun is reporting a 33% attach rate for batteries.
I think I've linked to that list of reform ideas before, but it's from this article, and it's a much better option than continuing to raise interest rates until we get a recession.
Darrell Owens is more straightforward, simply stating that we should be accepting refugees from Sudan as fast as we did the ones from Ukraine.
Longer Reads
• Great one minute video about Yuppie fishbowls in Long Beach. There's also a longer write up. TL;DR: tons of people move into the luxury apartments that get built, reducing upward pressure on rents in nearby existing buildings. (src)
• Thread describing the phenomenon of Dayooth shaming on TikTok and other social media. (src)
Flotsam and Jetsam
– AppleTV remote now can be used like an iPod-style scroll wheel (src)
– Cruise has driven a tenth as many miles with safety drivers as Waymo did, although of course they'd argue that their miles had way more examples of unusual events. (src)
– Los Angeles might not be very dense, but it's a lot denser than most of the US. (src)
– Dalle will put Richard Nixon in renaissance art, on a movie poster, or in stained glass. But it won't put him shirtless on the cover of a romance novel. (src)
– Article by Yglesias about how there are two different problems both called 'homelessness' (src)
– Vancouver is getting an electric fire truck! Good news: it has a very tight turning radius (src)
– People who used to say 'free tibet' now want the PRC to take Taiwan, and celebrate Russia as anti-imperialist while their mercenaries help prop-up brutal african dictatorships. Tankies are suddenly everywhere, supporting anything that is sold to them as "America Bad" (src)
– Yikes, polling indicates people support Trump over Biden on Israel/Gaza, and it's not because Biden is too pro-Israel (src)
– Another super clear example of construction leading to reduced rents, this time in Boise (src)
– Increase in crime under Trump was good for Republicans, it's gone down under Biden, why would Republicans want to keep it going down? (src)
– More stupid requirements for complicated to build buildings, this time in Washington state. (src)
– Nate Silver and Matthew Yglesias discuss whether democratic wins yesterday make it more or less likely that Biden drops out. (src)
– New book from James S. A. Corey (src)