Yesterday: FAA rolls out national AI air traffic control tool. Today: FAA issues nationwide ground stop after massive communication failures.

It’s not only that AI is generally stupid for general use, but now it’s interfering with critical infrastructure. If anybody in power had any sense of serving the public good, the entirety of Silicon Valley would be shut down until massive state regulations were implemented.

This is a huge con job where the people in charge are not only self-obsessed with god complexes but follow far-right, anti-state psychopaths like Curits Yarvin. These people are far more dangerous than MAGA dipshits clawing to the notion of immigrants being dangerous—especially since neither political party cares about tech oligarchs running rampant with the idea of the future.

Not only is this senseless, but it’s still actionable to contain, and nobody in power is going to remotely attempt such a thing. We’re going to deal with the consequences of this lacking en masse.

Eleven House Democrats—all awash in money from AIPAC—missed a vote to begin impeachment proceedings against Pete Hegseth, effectively ending the effort.

It’s just one of those things where the electorate will be enraged, the elected will offer some excuse about bureaucracy or procedure or timing, and the fascist machine will continue because liberals would rather see capitalism remain uninterrupted than fascism inconvenienced.

I knew better than to expect anything of anyone in national government, and it seems the years of disappointment to come have officially begun.

I was in a ride share on the way to the Hollywood Bowl when the driver asked me why I moved to Los Angeles. My initial response was for the culture. Most places just don’t have the diverse art scene. This weekend was a pretty good example of what I meant.

Jimmy Eat World

Carissa’s Wierd

The show at the Bowl was for Jimmy Eat World and their Bleed American tour—the venue being the biggest the band had ever headlined. The night before was a noise show featuring Leila Bordreuil and Twig Harper at the single-room art space Human Resources. Last night was Carissa’s Wierd at the general music venue Echoplex. (This one was particularly strange because I’ve been listening to that band for 20 years, most of which they’ve been broken up for, but apparently has had a resurgence in popularity among the TikTok kids, and I was easily one of the oldest people in the crowd—by decades.)

So in three consecutive nights I saw three wildly different concerts at venues of all sizes, and that’s just the norm here. And this was just music. I didn’t go to any movies or galleries. And most places in the United States—much to their detriment—simply don’t offer that kind of consistent experience. I often think that opportunity for exposure to the arts is one of the most broken parts of American society (albeit admittedly less important than like, the housing crisis or decaying infrastructure).

The powerful and their news outlets consistently seek to divide people, and the arts are a way to fight back against that. It’s probably one of the reasons as to why they’re so under-funded here. Sometimes weekends like this make me kick myself for not moving to LA sooner in life, but for now I’m just glad I did at all.

Along Third by La Brea

LA Mayoral race early-morning update via LAist

Though the race officially can’t be called, voting in Los Angeles tends to break progressive later on—the same way it did during the mayoral primary earlier this year when Nithya came from behind to beat Spencer Pratt—meaning that Raman will likely run away with this thing. This is wonderful news for the future of Los Angeles.

Though there are many nationwide electoral celebrations going on, this is the one that I was really looking forward to. Yes, because it directly affects the city I live in, but also because Karen Bass is a centrist democrat. While many of the election results across America are about Democrats beating out Republicans, this was a progressive usurping a traditional liberal in a major city.

I can’t really get excited about the ‘Blue Wave’ until politicians actually start doing things; prosecute the Trump administration, abolish ICE, divest from Israel, tax the ultra-wealthy, increase the minimum wage, end the war in Iran, release the Epstein Files. I mean start with any of those.

To me, this feels very much like 2008, when this era of ‘hope and change’ turned into broken promises, a continued war on ‘terror,’ a bank bailout, and excuses as to why universal healthcare wasn’t an option—and that was when the Democrats controlled all of Congress and the White House. If this new batch can actually follow through on some serious changes in how American governance has been going, I’ll happily change my tune. But for now, I’ll keep my attention on what happens locally and not hold my breath on sweeping national change.