One of the big things with a free market is that it assumes everyone is out to screw everyone else. Buyers want minimum prices, sellers want maximum. In principle, it all cancels out. Unfortunately, the information and power balance is also assumed to be even. In practice, it’s not. It also requires both parties to be able to walk away. With housing, that’s not an option.
People seem to be missing your point. This isn’t a free market reaction, it’s a reaction to a regulatory change. However, any sane buyer should have seen this coming a mile off.
Housing should definitely not be subject to a full free market, no life critical good/service should be. Housing demand has a lower end that is extremely inelastic. If supply drops enough to hit the limit, prices, in a free market, go haywire (prices rise till demand drops to meet supply, but demand can’t drop, it’s life critical).
This effect is prone to gaming by those with the resources. Therefore regulation is needed to artificially stabilise the market. Removing a massive housing sink is an obvious move to free up the supply.
The life critical resources are:
It’s the government’s job to keep these at a level where none are difficult to obtain, at least at a base level. Generally this requires distorting the market in various manners.
You seem to think it’s an either or question. I’m strongly anti war. At the same time, I know that pacifism is almost as bad.
As I said, look up Nash Equilibriums. The goal should be that the Nash Equilibrium is negotiation. If any one country or sub over arms, then the Nash shifts and war becomes an inevitability. In the Nash based model, disarming is equivalent to increasing the armament of the other countries. A country can over arm without changing its level of military spending etc.
The goal is a stable “steady state”. No-one gains by arming up, but everyone can react effectively to someone doing it, without runaway escalation.
My point is there is nuance to the question. We have a dilemma. We need the very tools of oppression to resist the oppression. However, if we arm ourselves with them, we have the temptation of using them to oppress others, to our benefit.
Ukraine gave up its tools. It gave up its nukes, in exchange for an agreement that Russia wouldn’t attack it, and the rest of the world would back them, if Russia broke that agreement.
What we need is a balance. The world, as a whole must be able to suppress a violent state. At the same time, no one state should have the power to suppress a large proportion of other states. This would allow for policing action, but avoid the use of force for selfish reasons. Right now, America has the biggest stick. And it uses it, and its threat regularly. However, if it just gave up that stick, others would take advantage of the power vacuum. Collectively, we need a big enough stick that no-one can threaten the collective. At the same time, individual members shouldn’t have too much power.
Ironically, this is playing out in Ukraine. While America is sending significant resources, it is not the only one doing so. Abandoning Ukraine would be a dereliction of our agreement to back them. It would also embolden others to act, since Russia got their way.
If you’ve not ran across them, look up Nash Equilibriums. It’s what is in play, and why simple fixes just won’t work
The fundamental truth hasn’t changed. While all measures should be taken to avoid war, those measures ultimately rest on the ability to wage that war.
In martial arts terms. The goal is to avoid fighting. You de-escalate, and disengage where possible. However, when someone is attacked, you need to know how to step in and defend them. Further, you need to know how to counter and neutralise the threat. Those same tools can be misused to do great harm, but many of the methods for avoiding conflict rely on being able to counter the threat, if the opponent drops the veneer of civility.
Within countries, this dilemma was solved by giving a monopoly on force to the government (for good or bad). On the international stage, there is no higher power to appeal to. No police, or father figure to step in. We have to learn to play nice, including when a sibling wants to set fire to the playpen. We must, however be careful not to burn the playpen down ourselves.
Appeasement allowed the 3rd Reich to build the momentum it did. It was a nice idea, but failed when faced with actors who don’t act in good faith. Russian backed trolls online have be desperately pushing the “we should sit down and talk” card, without the accompanying “give back what Russia stole” part.
If America is launching an invasion of Mexico, without the concerted backing of the rest of the world, then it’s the right action to take. If someone breaks their fist on the shield you used to cover someone’s face, that’s on them. A policing action should be multinational, with clear, stated goals. Not 1 country imposing its views on its neighbour by force.
I’m also of the mindset that boots should be on the ground in Israel and Palestine, with orders to help de-escalate both sides. Unfortunately, that’s never going to happen in a useful way. It would have to be a coalition including significant Islamic elements to not immediately explode. The west has been stirring the pot FAR too much over the last 70 years for most Islamic countries to trust us now.
I fully agree, however, that the American military machine needs to be cooled WAY down. It’s become a beast set on devouring its host, along with everything else it can get its claws on. I’ve no idea how that could be achieved though.
That was called appeasement, and was tried. It helped lead to WW2.
There should always be a forum to talk. However, words must be backed by a big enough stick, and the resolve to use it. Otherwise those who respect the use of words will just be flattened by those who are happy to abuse the situation. Finding the balance of this is the biggest challenge we have as a species.
Assuming you are referring to Russia Vs Ukraine right now. Russia was using and abusing words, with no intent to match them with actions. If they truly wanted to come back to the table, they would be welcomed. The catch is, it would have to be backed with actions. Pull back to the original borders, and present the evidence they supposedly have of issues in Ukraine to the international community. Right now they appear to just be bullies, and are being treated as such.
Apparently managed to capture my likeness very well.
They actually don’t. They create a short term boost to certain aspects of cognitive functioning. While, in theory, this improves performance, in practice, it is often bottlenecked elsewhere.
It’s like giving a rally car more engine power. Without the ability to get that power to the wheels, it’s, at best, useless, at worst counterproductive. It might feel like you have more speed, but your lap times will be worse.
On top of this, you have the body’s homeostasis systems. In a normal brain, they will correct for the effects of the stimulant. This pulls the system back to its original state, leading to things like caffeine addiction. In the ADHD brain, their homeostasis systems are tapped out, they can’t get the brain to an optimal state. The stimulant provides an artificial push, that takes a load off of other corrective systems.
It’s akin to glasses. Someone can learn to see through glasses, when they don’t need them. However, someone who does need them will gain a permanent improvement from them.
Unfortunately, BBC news has been corrupted from the inside. It used to be impressively independent of the UK government. It was happy to hold any politician’s feet to the fire. This is why the conservative party worked so hard to put their own stooge at the top. Careers now stop progressing, if you are overly critical of the government, at least in the news department.
Overall the BBC still leans slightly left, and produces a lot of good material. I no longer trust it to report evenly on our government anymore. It’s still a lot better than most news organisations overall however.
That’s a useful health check, but not a useful rule for de-federation. It’s more a sign that we have become lopsided and need to correct in other ways.
Home assistant, ESPhome and Tasmota form a core of this. The self hosting community also has a strong mindset towards security.
The stuff I self host is mostly because I don’t trust the “free” services a lot of techies seem fine relying on. I’ve seen too many providers suddenly go belly up, and screw people over.
I also use defence in depth. The “S” in IoT stands for security.