Charlie Clarke

It’s just not possible for Dems to accommodate the Abundance folks, who seek deregulatory policies for their developer/investor clients. I’m all for a big tent, but up until the point that accommodation starts to undermine progressive messaging. And that message is that we need a muscular government to curb the excesses of unfettered markets, concentrated wealth, and the attendant political corruption (aka oligarchy). Besides, there’s already a political party that stands for small government, low taxation on wealth/income, and deregulation. Why can’t the Abundance folks just align naturally over there?

🚨 University professors have been saying AI is completely destroying learning and that we'll soon have an AI-powered, semi-illiterate workforce. Here's a glimpse into the educational apocalypse: "Sarah, a freshman at Wilfrid Laurier University in Ontario, said she first used ChatGPT to cheat during the spring semester of her final year of high school. (...) After getting acquainted with the chatbot, Sarah used it for all her classes: Indigenous studies, law, English, and a “hippie farming class” called Green Industries. “My grades were amazing,” she said. “It changed my life.” Sarah continued to use AI when she started college this past fall. Why wouldn’t she? Rarely did she sit in class and not see other students’ laptops open to ChatGPT. Toward the end of the semester, she began to think she might be dependent on the website. She already considered herself addicted to TikTok, Instagram, Snapchat, and Reddit, where she writes under the username maybeimnotsmart. “I spend so much time on TikTok,” she said. “Hours and hours, until my eyes start hurting, which makes it hard to plan and do my schoolwork. With ChatGPT, I can write an essay in two hours that normally takes 12.” - "By November, Williams estimated that at least half of his students were using AI to write their papers. Attempts at accountability were pointless. Williams had no faith in AI detectors, and the professor teaching the class instructed him not to fail individual papers, even the clearly AI-smoothed ones. “Every time I brought it up with the professor, I got the sense he was underestimating the power of ChatGPT, and the departmental stance was, ‘Well, it’s a slippery slope, and we can’t really prove they’re using AI,’” Williams said. “I was told to grade based on what the essay would’ve gotten if it were a ‘true attempt at a paper.’ So I was grading people on their ability to use ChatGPT.” - AI in education is a serious topic, and many schools and universities are blindly jumping into the "AI-first" wave without considering short and long-term consequences. It would be great to hear more from teachers and educators to understand potential solutions. This might be a great opportunity for rethinking the education system and how students are assessed. - 👉 Link to the full article below. 👉 To learn more about AI's legal and ethical challenges, join my newsletter's 94,700+ subscribers (link below).

This Cato ‘immigrants pay more taxes’ flex + Indian chart is peak cherry-picking. Impressive numbers… until you actually look under the hood. 🧐” 1. It’s median household income, not individual or per-capita — and Indian households are structured differently • The chart (and the “twice as much” claim) uses households, not people. Indian-American households are larger on average (~3.0–3.8 people vs. U.S. average ~2.5) and far more likely to have multiple full-time high earners (dual STEM/medical professionals is common). en.wikipedia. • Indian Americans still have high personal earnings (median ~$85k for ages 16+, ~$106k for full-time workers per 2023 Pew), but the “almost twice” headline evaporates when you adjust for household size and number of workers. This is a classic statistical sleight-of-hand when comparing groups with different living arrangements. 2. Extreme positive selection bias … this is the cream of India’s elite, not “immigrants” in general • Indian Americans aren’t a random sample of India’s 1.4 billion people. The vast majority arrived via H-1B, EB-2/3, or student visas …hyper-selective for advanced degrees and high-skill jobs. You’re comparing the top ~0.1–1% of India’s talent/IQ/education distribution to the broad U.S. average (which includes everyone from McDonald’s workers to retirees). • India’s own per-capita income and education levels are far lower. This doesn’t prove broad immigration is economically magical; it proves cherry-picked high-skill immigration works for the selectees. Second-generation outcomes are strong but show some regression toward the mean, and chain migration/family sponsorship often dilutes the skill level over time. 3. Cato’s overall “immigrants pay more taxes” claim has well-documented methodological holes • Cato (a libertarian think tank that favors more immigration) attributes welfare benefits received by U.S.-born children of immigrants to “natives,” not the immigrant parents. This understates immigrant fiscal costs. The Center for Immigration Studies (CIS) and others note this flips the picture: when you count the full household burden (including kids), immigrant-headed households use welfare at higher rates than native-headed ones. • Cato aggregates all immigrants (high-skill Indians + low-skill groups + illegals). The net positive they find is heavily driven by the high earners. Other studies (National Academies of Sciences, Heritage, etc.) have found first-generation immigrants often impose net costs, especially low-skilled/illegal cohorts. • Their data ends before the post-2021 border surge effects fully hit long-term budgets. 4. H-1B-specific issues (the main pipeline for Indian success) • Many Indian immigrants in tech come via H-1B, which has documented problems: outsourcing/body shops (e.g., Infosys, TCS), wage suppression (foreign workers often paid less for similar roles), and ethnic nepotism once Indians reach management (preferring co-ethnics for hiring/promotions). This displaces U.S. workers and depresses wages in STEM. • Fraud allegations are common (fake credentials, benching workers, etc.). Critics argue this isn’t “adding value” so much as arbitraging cheaper labor and networks. 5. Other drains and context • Remittances: Indian Americans send massive sums back to India (India receives over $100B+ in remittances annually, a huge chunk from the U.S.). That’s money leaving the U.S. economy. • Cost of living: Indians are heavily concentrated in high-cost metros (SF Bay, NYC, etc.), where nominal incomes are inflated anyway. Adjust for purchasing power and the gap shrinks. • The post uses Indian success to defend a general “immigrants = net positive” narrative from Cato. But Indians are ~1.4% of the U.S. population and an outlier. Broad policy implications (more low-skill immigration, open borders, etc.) don’t follow from one high-performing subgroup.

Immigrants generate more income and taxes than the average person, per CATO Institute.

Trump does a lot of things I hate. But you know what he doesn't do? Promote political violence against his enemies. The same can't be said about the worst wackadoodles on the Far extremes right now.

The scissor kick is a natural movement for a lot of hitters! ✂️

If you’re looking for a polite take, this isn’t it. I’ve said it repeatedly on the Conflicted podcast: Pakistan was never a neutral mediator between Washington and Tehran. Not for a second. What we’re watching now is not diplomacy, it’s pure manipulation dressed up as statecraft. Let’s call things by their proper names. Under field marshal Asim Munir, Pakistan isn’t some balanced civilian democracy playing honest broker. It’s a military system with a democratic façade, pursuing its own interests with a level of cynicism that should surprise no one who has followed its behavior over the past two decades. What did they sell to Donald Trump? A fantasy. A pipe dream. That the Islamic Republic can be reasoned with. That it is pragmatic, not ideological. That it is capable of compromise if only you flatter it enough and give it incentives. In short: that you can extract “the deal of the century” from a regime whose entire strategic doctrine is built on resisting precisely that outcome. And Trump - obsessed with the optics of a deal - bought it. Meanwhile, senior voices inside Pakistan weren’t even pretending neutrality. A defence minister pushing conspiratorial narratives, blaming the “Zionists,” portraying Iran as a victim, while 6,000 missiles and drones were raining down on GCC states that host millions of Pakistani workers. That alone should have been disqualifying. If a country is willing to throw its own economic lifeline (the Gulf) under the bus for ideological or tactical alignment with Tehran, what exactly makes anyone think it would safeguard American interests? And here’s the uncomfortable part: this isn’t new. We’ve seen this movie before. The United States spent years, treasure, and blood in Afghanistan, only to discover that Osama bin Laden, and his network, were living comfortably in Pakistan all along - while Pakistan was simultaneously cashing in on US counterterrorism billions in funding. They didn’t fail to find the target. They bloody managed it. Why end the hunt when the hunt itself pays and pays pretty well? Fast forward to today, and the pattern repeats, only this time the battlefield is Iran. At the very moment the regime was under maximum pressure (militarily strained, economically cornered, strategically exposed) Pakistan steps in, not to mediate, but to buy Tehran time. Time to regroup, breathe, and ultimately survive. That’s not mediation. That’s intervention - on one side. From a cold, historical lens, this may well be remembered as the pivot point. The moment when pressure was lifted prematurely. When momentum was lost. When a winnable strategic position was traded for the illusion of a negotiated breakthrough that was never going to materialise, ever! Five years from now, looking back, this could read like a familiar chapter: First Afghanistan - undermined from within. Now Iran - diluted from without. In both cases, Pakistan didn’t just mislead Washington. It shaped the battlefield to its advantage, all while claiming partnership with a clueless US administration. And Washington, once again, chose to believe what it wanted to hear.

To end the deadlock in the negotiations and build trust, the US should lift the blockade of the Strait of Hormuz and release the captured Iranian ship so that Pakistan can bring Iran to the negotiating table as a mediator. The aggressors are the US and Israel, not Iran. Instead of defeating Iran, they have lost the war of self-narratives. Iran is not Venezuela, Libya or Iraq. The US cannot win a war waged on the behest of the Zionists at the negotiating table. It can only save face. If Iran is destroyed, every country in the region will be badly affected and the US will have to bear the burden.