@pdorman
I'm a political economist and writer on economics, politics, climate change, statistics, and lots more. I've written four books, stacks of articles and reports, blogs and am working on book #5. Watch out for really bad puns.
The right way is not to restrict recorded music but support lots of people learning and playing it. The world leader is Finland. I have a paragraph on this in my climate book. Fascinating story. One public music school for every 40K Finns.
Nothing I did, including of course pressing Esc, could stop it. I forced WP to close, reopened it, and the deletion continued. The only way to stop it was to reboot the computer. When it came up again, my document was almost empty, with no undo record. I lost hours of work.
Anyone out there a WordPerfect user? A *very* weird thing happened to me yesterday. I was finishing work on an important document, and I suddenly noticed my text was rapidly being deleted, character by character, as if an alien force had taken control of my backspace key.
rump is waging war on Iran with total lack of concern for US public opinion beyond performing violent domination for his hard core supporters. He shows no sign of worrying that this could cost him the next election. That makes it harder to work against the war: what's the lever?
You really have to read their communiqués to see how witless they were. The rest of us, who struggled to build broad support for radical social change, were undermined by their open disdain for 90% of the population. No nostalgia for Weather, please.
Yes to the vacuousness of OBAA, but the Weathermen as a benchmark of seriousness? Really? As a veteran of those years, let me say that Weather combined toxic white guilt with a worship of performative violence that would do Pete Hegseth proud.
www.nytimes.com/2026/03/08/o...
The important point is that the Trump admin displays almost no interest in influencing public opinion, beyond performing for their hardcore base. It's as if they don't think they are at risk from getting crushed in a future election.
www.nytimes.com/2026/03/02/o...
CNN's value is based almost entirely on intangible capital. Its workforce could migrate en masse to a media startup ("NNC") and the entity called CNN would be an empty shell. You'd just have to arrange a new set of media packages.
We went out for a picnic this evening to watch the sunset, but we had to beat an early retreat because my partner was being devoured by mosquitoes. Mosquitoes in February. In Portland.
My experience too. I wonder why. Maybe a strong pool of skilled kitchen workers -- good for consistency. And a critical mass of diners eager to explore and experiment, and who appreciate quality. The Daily O's dining coverage is weak, though. Is it all through word of mouth? (Literally?)
This is a terrible move in general, but one detail stands out: Among the majors that would be ended is the BA in music at Indiana University. This is a premier music program, and faculty/grad opportunities would have to be cut substantially.
www.insidehighered.com/news/governm...
Before you get too enthusiastic about the Supreme Court ruling striking down Trump's tariffs, consider the jurisprudence -- and its political economy.
open.substack.com/pub/peterdor...
It's not too soon to think seriously about saving electoral democracy in the U.S. This post explains why the SAVE Act is a mortal threat and identifies the checkpoints ahead of us this year.
open.substack.com/pub/peterdor...
This is definitely worth a read. The New Deal financial regulatory system is mostly holes at this point. Patching it won't help much.
www.phenomenalworld.org/analysis/fin...
This is an important article, but it doesn't mention the obvious conclusion: police shouldn't have unions. Neither should soldiers. Armed forces of all sorts should have an unambiguous chain of command. Pay them well, but don't let them set policy.
www.nybooks.com/online/2026/...
Don't know about central OR, but we just got back from a snowy hike around Mirror Lake, and it was spectacular. Hardly anyone there either, so Oscar (the dog) could be offleash pretty much the whole time.
Happy New Year -- and welcome to the YEAR OF THE FIRE HOSE.
Epstein I: financial and organizational facilitator of a network of tech scholars and billionaires with a peculiar philosophy of science and politics. Epstein II: mastermind of a gruesome teenage girl sex ring. What's the connection?
open.substack.com/pub/peterdor...
(2) The issue is whether students are urged to think critically about the professor's views and graded accordingly. That's *much* better than students having to guess what the prof thinks and then spouting back what they think they're supposed to say.
This is an important criticism of the "keep it out of the classroom" chorus. (1) Lots of stuff gets said in the classroom, so this becomes the equivalent of anti-loitering laws.
www.insidehighered.com/opinion/colu...
This article doesn't identify the individual(s) who issued the order to cease the Good investigation. Their names should be recorded, and after Trump is gone they should be prosecuted for interference.
www.nytimes.com/2026/02/07/u...
Very sporadic, especially while a book is gestating.
I took up this question too:
peterdorman.substack.com/p/where-will...
It's useful to note that Rogoff got his start (his diss I think, but I might remember it wrong) applying game theory to sovereign debt issues. My diss was applied game theory too! But by my defense I was mostly skeptical.
The thing to bear in mind is that, since the Trump people don't enforce the law and lie about everything they do, no reform matters unless it is tied to external oversight. That goes for everything and not just ICE.
These are all good suggestions, and the underlying point is right. I would add one thing, though. The critical reform (if you want one) is accountability. DOJ and DHS must commit to allowing state and local agencies to investigate and prosecute ICE and BP agents.
jacobin.com/2026/02/demo...
Long ago I used a program called Stella that generated visualizations of systems of differential equations, very intuitive. You could see feedbacks operating on a period-to-period basis. I had a simplified model of income ≠ generating wealth ≠ and vice versa. There must be something like it now.
There is a strong possibility that ICE maintains a database of people who have previously confronted them. They have photo recognition on their phones. Investigators should explore whether Pretti's murder was premeditated.
www.nytimes.com/2026/01/28/u...
This is a bizarre article, which doesn't even try to answer the crucial question in the headline. *What can the Trump people do with those rolls?* The lack of serious thinking on this topic is itself scary. Lay out the scenarios in which access to voter data matters.
www.nytimes.com/2026/01/26/u...
