The top-ranked comment on yesterday's NYT article (https://www.nytimes.com/2026/01/20/us/california-billionaires-wealth-tax.html) on California's proposed "billionaires' tax" complains that billionairs "pay hardly anything in taxes". The idea that the wealthy pay no taxes is directly refuted by the data([https://www.sacbee.com/news/politics-government/capitol-alert/article74271532.html); in California, the top 1% of filers pay nearly 50% of the personal income tax revenue. IME this is characteristic of NYT readers: often mistaken about reality, but never in doubt. (https://www.coffeehouse-talker.net/posts/what-they-know-isnt-true.html)

#kamala-harris #election-2024 #yascha-mounk #democrats I'm not sure how Mounk can wonder about the lack of a serious debate on the left as to why they lost: ten or fifteen years of cancel culture has left them incapable of robust internal debate. When anyone offended by your point can have you fired & banished from polite society by digging up something you said ten years ago that was innocuous at the time, but has since aged out of the ever leftward-hurtling window of… https://www.coffeehouse-talker.net/posts/dems-cant-debate-anymore.html

#california #openai "OpenAI recently hired advisers with close ties to California Gov. Gavin Newsom, including former Sen. Laphonza Butler, to build support for the plan in Sacramento. The startup spent the summer hosting listening sessions with civil-society groups across the state, and pledged to spend $50 million to support nonprofit and community organizations." per the WSJ-- how is this not a shakedown? (https://www.coffeehouse-talker.net/posts/open-ai-is-being-extorted.html)

#biden If Biden stays in, regime media is going to have a real problem on their hands (https://www.coffeehouse-talker.net/posts/regime-media-problem-solved.html)

#california #news Having outsourced their traffic to social media platforms, the California news industry now wants to disincentivize them... sending traffic (https://www.coffeehouse-talker.net/posts/ca-ab-886.html)

#880 #gaza #protests If you're stuck in your car on 880 or the Golden Gate bridge and angry about it, consider electing leaders who will actually, you know, enforce the law (https://www.coffeehouse-talker.net/posts/protests-on-the-golden-gate.html)

#media #layoffs #newyorker There is a much simpler explanation for the media's woes: they simply are not producing a product that anyone wants to buy. https://1ft.io/proxy?q=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.newyorker.com%2Fnews%2Fthe-weekend-essay%2Fis-the-media-prepared-for-an-extinction-level-event (https://www.coffeehouse-talker.net/posts/is-the-media-prepared.html)

#yimby #sanfranscisco #housing #ceqa Interesting to see 48hills casually admit that CEQA is routinely used as a means of extorting developers: https://48hills.org/2024/01/is-this-the-end-of-ceqa-as-a-tool-to-challenge-housing-projects-that-damage-communities/ (https://www.coffeehouse-talker.net/posts/48-hills-says-the-quiet-part-out-loud.html)

The Times needs two months to carefully vet Israeli claims. Hamas claims, on the other hand, are repeated verbatim. (https://www.coffeehouse-talker.net/posts/times-needs-two-months.html)