State of the Discussion

I spend a lot of time in Spotify, average 4 hours a day, many days 12 hours I have a few 50 hour playlists but they aren't really curated, I have 20 or more 1 to 12 hour playlists carefully curated to the mood I wanted.

With that context, my Spotify listening has become a challenge as the algorithm is so trainable that almost any way I let Spotify pick songs it quickly just duplicates playlists I already have created with a different song here and there.

So, it trained me to be more imaginative in my seed requests. Song radio is my favorite way to listen, so I very carefully consider the seed song if I want a certain genre/era of music. It has become really fun to pick more obscure songs by lesser known artists to see how long it takes for that trail to lead back to my choices.

All to say that Spotify can be a fun pastime if you recognize its limitations and try to get around them. If you pick Willie Nelsons On the Road Again or Willis Alan Ramsey's Ballad of Spider John you eventually get to Jerry Jeff Walker but the road there is quite different.

What is not going to come out of all of this is any kind of extension of the ACA subsidies. 

My point was, that extension wasn't going to come out regardless. Those Republicans in Congress (on their own, let alone driven by Trump) simply are not going to extend those until the increased insurance costs generate howls from their own constituents. And they never were. There simply is no plausible scenario where that would happen before spring. Because, even if the Senate Republicans were somehow brought to agree to it, the House simply wouldn't concur.

Whether they allow a vote next month on those subsidies, as agreed, or not, it's fairly certain that an extension will fail to pass. And when it does, it will be defeated stand-alone -- no other spending distractions. (Of course, the Congressional Republicans might surprise us all. But I figure it will be months before they can bring themselves to act.)

GftNC, you have to understand. For some, the options were a) cave in like this (their phrasing, not mine), or b) hang tough a tiny bit longer until the Republicans cave. If those were indeed the choices, their rage over option a) would be well placed.

But those weren't actually the options. Instead we had
a) accept a continuing resolution for the next couple of months, get some relief for a whole lot of Federal workers, and pick up the fight again in January. There is, after all, no chance the GOP will be in any better position then than now. Oh yes, and get a couple of elected Democrats seated finally.
Or
b) hang tough, no matter the collateral damage. While a lot of Federal workers go bankrupt, SNAP money runs out (for real), and a lot of people see their health insurance premiums skyrocket -- except they hear a lot about how the Democrats wouldn't let a bill to fix it even come to a vote.

Be clear, getting ACA funding done wasn't going to happen either way. (At least not for several more months minimum.). But this way, it's starkly obvious that the Republicans have sole ownership of the mess.

Now our strategy going forward to save the Democrats from complete disgrace is to run hard against the Cowardly Cave-in Caucus and get headlines that say "Don't Blame the Whole Party for the Acts of Few" which is a muddled message with nowhere near the power of the bad press the CCC has given us. Still, it's the only way to have any credibility in the midterms. Dems running for Congress will have to run hard against the decision to end the shut down without saving the ACA. 'Making this deal is malpractice.' It's Democrat vs. Democrat as shutdown nears end

"Oh yes, there will be the usual wailing and rending of garments from the left. Because, the very idea of something less than total victory is anathema. But then, strategy and tactics: not a core competency there."

The idea wasn't total victory--only saving people who get ACA insurance. That's all. There was never an effort to save Medicaid, prevent the cuts in Medicare that are coming because of the increased deficit, roll back the tax cuts for the rich...the Republican bill sucks in every aspect but the Dems in Congress chose only one to stand on and they caved on that one.

Now all those people will lose their insurance because they won't be able to afford the rate increase. I lost my insurance temporarily a while ago and had to pay 900 for a one-month COBRA. It's not the kind of experience people forget or forgive.

I agree that strategy and tactics are not core competencies with the DSA left. It should be obvious though that for DECADES strategy and tactics have not been core to Congressional Dems either, not when it comes to national issues.

They completely fail to understand that they are not going to get MAGA votes, that the Republican party never operates in good faith, and that outside of MAGA most voters (especially indies) vote emotionally and have no clue at all about insider baseball tactics or policies and want to be able to vote for perceived strength and commitment.

Acting in a way that leads to headlines that say, "Dems agree to end shutdown" followed by millions suffering rate increases is fucking stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid--on an order of stupid as supporting the war in Iraq.

Pretty clear where this is going. First, it isn't going anywhere unless Johnson is willing to bring the House back into session to vote on the changes from what they previously passed. In which case . . . Epstein Files! And if he won't, no cover about "if only the Democrats would let the Senate vote." They totally own the mess.

Second, assuming it passes, then what. First, a lot of Federal employees who were stuck working without pay, or were furloughed, get their family economies patched up thru the holidays. Also, the new funding bill only runs thru the end of January. Which means that we probably see another shutdown then -- lest voters forget this shutdown by the time voting starts.

Oh yes, there will be the usual wailing and rending of garments from the left. Because, the very idea of something less than total victory is anathema. But then, strategy and tactics: not a core competency there.

My bet is that the Democrats end up with a big boost out of this, come next November. And that's assuming (and frankly, it's a heroic assumption) that, some time next spring, the Republicans in Congress get themselves together without another shutdown at the end of the fiscal year, i.e. next fall, right before the election.

It seems there is always a faction of Democrats who find a way to take two steps back as soon as the party manages one step forward. It's too easy to be the lesser of two evils when the greater evil is evil itself.

if you felt like giving an idea of the discussions, that would be very interesting indeed

so, not really an idea of the discussion, but just some thoughts.

Some of this is, I think, generational. Charlie was born in 1935, and was the youngest of my mom's siblings. The family had come through the Depression, somehow, and were basically, not blue collar exactly, but working class Queens folks. Not desparately poor, but... of limited means.

Folks like that can basically see serious poverty in the rear view mirror. And too far back, either. It's tangible to them in ways that it is not to people like, for instance, me. People who are more solidly and securely middle class.

For my grandparents especially, and for my mom and her siblings, there was serious shame around being "on relief". Around receiving welfare of any kind. It meant that you had failed to maintain your toehold in the respectable world.

There is also a sort of patriotic dimension to it. We had overcome the Depression, we were to go on to prevail in WWII. We would follow that up with the Marshall Plan, and then later with the international aid and "soft power" politics of the Eisenhower and Kennedy years.

All of which covers my uncle's youth and young manhood.

My grandparents and mom's siblings really did think of the US as the greatest country on earth, maybe (probably) in history. Because it arguably was, mostly, for a minute.

So there is that.

And there is a cultural dimension.

My uncle was a NY City fireman, retiring as a lieutanant. In NYC, first responders - cops, firemen - tend to be conservative. Uncle was probably more so than most - not that many FDNY folks are Birch Society chapter heads - but that was likely the common direction - the prevailing winds, if you will - of his social context.

He was also a founder and elder in a relatively conservative church. Which was a chosen social context, of course, but also one that would be likely to reinforce his own conservative instincts.

And I would add, perhaps somewhat oddly, Charlie was a New Yorker. New Yorkers tend to be chauvinistic - tend to think in "we are the best" terms.

That's all I got. Make of it what you will.

I don't know if or what to extent this fits in this thread, but rather than starting yet another one I am linking here a gift article in today's Atlantic by a Reagan appointed judge about the reasons for his resignation: tl;dr Trump's lawlessness:

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/2025/11/federal-judge-resignation-trump/684845/?gift=cx0iluuWx4Cg7JjlT8ugCRF_CkCtm_1560slsmw2zv8&utm_source=copy-link&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=share

At heart, MAGA's problem is one of definition: who counts as Amurikans? Ramaswamy obviously feels that he qualifies. (No clue what his personal definition is. Maybe "anyone Trump supports is in"?) Others, using different definitions, differ. And not just about him.

The thing is, there are lots of definitions. And a movement based on exclusion is in trouble without a single, unified, definition. A charismatic figurehead can, with work, paper over the differences, at least for a while. But MAGAworld looks to be losing their unifying leader, so the fractures over definition are appearing. Put another way, the knives are coming out.

Didn't mean to denigrate Uncle Charlie or the others. Its just that a hallmark of American conservatism in my life has been the ability to build a wall between people they care about and ones they don't. Its how you get compassionate and caring people who see no problem with ICE wearing masks and shooting a priest in the face with pepper balls. I don't believe one negates the other, but one doesn't excuse the other either. Its complicated, like people do.

wj - ...actors can play parts, with authentic appearing emotions, even about experiences they have never personally had — all it takes is having seen someone else experiencing it.

Agreed, but look at what I said: What you do need, however, is some life experience to connect it with. Note that I did not say that they need to have that precise experience, just enough to act as a bridge between their own experience and others'. As russell says, it takes empathy, or as they used to say "fellow feelings." An AI has no experiences, and isn't a person, so can have no personal perspective and cannot reflect. It has to be trained to extrapolate within very narrow ranges and cannot imagine or improvise or project. Even a sociopath has a better perspective for understanding. At least the sociopath is embodied and sensate and conscious. An AI is a database with a good costuming department.

What you do need, however, is some life experience to connect it with.

I’m not so sure about that. Certainly it can help. But actors can play parts, with authentic appearing emotions, even about experiences they have never personally had

What is required is empathy. Which machines do not have.

They can imitate. They cannot empathize. Those are different things.

russell is well on his way with this prompt.

And I don't think that one has to have written a song in order to understand and serve the emotions of the song. What you do need, however, is some life experience to connect it with.

And I'm not talking about a CGI/animated puppet for real performers (a la Gorillaz or Dethklok). That's just human musicians cosplaying something else. What Spotify, Sony, Warner, etc. are after is on-trend content generated by trained expert systems in response to prompts or to the other content listened to by users of their services.

the Monkeys

the Monkees were a made-for-TV group but the songs were written by some of the best pop song writers of the day, and the music was performed by real live A list studio cats.

plus, at least one of the guys (Mike Nesmith) was actually a competent musician and songwriter.

net/net, not at all like AI generated music.

A lot of musical styles, especially commercial pop styles, are highly formulaic, so it wouldn't be that hard to have AI crank it out.

And what you would get would be highly formulaic pop music. Which a lot of people really like, and would be a perfectly fine commodity and lifestyle accessory. It may sound like I'm being dismissive when I say that, but I'm not - that is what a lot of music is made for, and how a lot of music is used.

It's like the art prints at your doctor's office waiting room. They aren't Rembrandt, or even Andy Warhol. But they are pleasant to look at, and don't clash with the color scheme.

Again, not being dismissive. It's nice to have pleasant, undemanding stuff to look at (and even ignore) when you're waiting for an appointment.

What you will not get from AI is a Leonard Cohen, or a Tom Waits, or a David Bowie, or a Paul Simon. To cite some better-known examples. You might get a Beatles of the quality of "I Want To Hold Your Hand", but not an "Eleanor Rigby".

If you fed an AI music generator a diet of any or all of those guys, you might get a simulacrum of their work. But it will be missing the special ingredient that actually makes you sit up and take notice when you hear their stuff - the human insight, the unusual chord change, the frisson that comes from the unexpected use of language in the lyric.

AI is inherently derivative. Derivative work can be useful, and has its place, but it isn't going to tell you anything you don't already know.

What makes the folks I named here artists, rather than simply entertainers, is the way in which they subvert the stylistic formulas they work in to discover meaning beneath the surface of the style.

Maybe someday some kind of AGI gizmo will be capable of that. If so, it probably will not be in a direction that resonates with humans.

But I am skeptical that AGI will ever actually be a thing.

My next thought was that lots (most?) pop stars are performers, and their songs are generally written by someone else.

Linda Ronstadt always maintained that she had no talent as a songwriter. Lots of very good songwriters wrote material with her specifically in mind, though.

wj - you can have AI generate the name of your star and generate genre appropriate "photos" of them. You can then use Claude to generate all the lyrics for your song from a simple, one sentence prompt. You can then feed those lyrics into Suno and have it generate a genre-appropriate song based on the lyrics complete with a vocalist.

It's all just a stew of algorithmically generated near-plagiarism.

You can watch Rick Beato do just that here.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eKxNGFjyRv0

I'm prepping and making changes to my syllabus for the writing class I teach that centers around college music - writing reviews of "college radio" albums from the '80s and '90s, and then taking what they have learned from doing that to comment on the music that is a part of their college lives today.

I had been having them write an essay exploring the question "Does College Music Still Exist?," and digging into the social side of what defines the music of that moment and that community. Sadly, I've never been satisfied with the depth of their engagement with the topic and have been wanting to change it up for a few terms now in the hopes of finding something that gets them thinking more deeply and feeling like they have something that the want to say.

My current idea is to get them thinking more deeply about the ecology of their music media. If the music you listen to is chosen for you by an algorithm, what makes it yours? Should Spotify allow the uploading and monetizing of music produced by AI? Can an AI generated pop star understand your broken heart? Do you really listen to songs you don't buy and music you don't own, or is it just something to consume like fast food?

I keep making stabs at how to turn all that into a philosophical question that can provoke reflection and inspire many different responses - something like "What's Wrong With Listening To Spotify?" or the like, but I haven't found one with the right mojo and moxie. Any ideas?

From here:

https://www.cnn.com/election/2025/exit-polls/new-jersey/general/governor/0

18-44 31% 45 or older 69%
Sherrill 67% 51%
Ciattarelli 32% 48%

The exit polling is broken down in what may be too many different ways at the link. The long and short of it is that being white, older, male, and less educated made someone more likely to have voted for Ciattarelli.

One interesting point is that they asked people if they were concerned about political violence. Not enough people weren't concerned to be statistically meaningful, so the vote breakdown on the "No" side was "N/A."

There's a drop-down where you can get exit polling for the elections in other states.

The thing is, Trump is an asshole and he's making a lot of people's lives more difficult than they need to be. And (R)'s are basically in thrall to the guy.

Last November, enough people were pissed at Biden for any of a variety of reasons, some of them legitimate, and so were willing to give Trump another shot at it.

And now they see Trump without the moderating influences of the people who more or less kept him in the ballpark of legitimate governance.

And they think it sucks.

All of that, plus it's not uncommon for off year and mid-term elections to favor the party not in power, with exceptions for wartime and cases where the party in power is actually nailing it.

That's my analysis, anyway.

On a lighter note, while thinking of examples of rightwingers only showing compassion to suffering encountered in their own circles (remembering that Dick Cheney's support for gay marriage was undoubtedly to do with having a lesbian daughter), I was reading various pieces about DC and smiled to see this:

Former US vice-president Dick Cheney, who has died, had intimidating power. For instance, when Cheney shot a friend while hunting, an apology was made by the friend to Cheney. His fearful aura made it all the more amusing when CNN accidentally published an obituary of Cheney in 2003, but it was unfinished and had been based on a template used for the Queen Mother. Cheney was described as “the UK’s favourite grandmother”.