@cstross and I have no doubt the tariff chaos and its impact on the US and our allies was by intent. its sabotage. its essentially a playbook someone is following to try to induce a second Great Depression

@cstross That's the whole point.

Economic success is functionally defined as making the number of people you're dependent on larger. (Much nuance, many details, but fundamentally.)

I don't think it's emotionally obvious to most people just how intensely the folks with lots and lots of money hate needing anybody.

That hate becomes a desire to forcibly simplify the economy into something that does what they want. (Everyone has to do what they say; they never have to do what they're told.)

@cstross "Economic uncertainty" was the entire Republican policy message when campaigning against Obama in 2012. They banged that drum for months.

(The *social* campaign message was “Gay marriage is stealing your babies.”)

I would like to say that the shoe is on the other foot now, but they’ve cut off their feet and are bragging about how awesome the stumps look.

@cstross the immense sums involved in that tech bubble seem to be destroying the utility of a lot of the measures normally used to judge the health of the economy. When it bursts and is no longer papering over weakness in everything else the sudden change in those measures is going to be shocking.