Citing anonymous sources, the New York Times reported on May 4, US president Donald Trump is considering an executive order that would require pre-release  “national security vetting” of all new Artificial Intelligence models.

The following day, the US Department of Commerce revealed that three three large AI firms — Microsoft, Google, and xAI —  have already agreed to submit their models for “pre-deployment evaluations and targeted research.”

For obvious reasons, those developments trigger my strong aversion to regulation of anything, at any time, and at any level of government. I can indulge a little — very little — bit of sympathy for the position Trump’s in though:

Individual state governments have been rolling out AI regulation proposals for some time, and that’s just not According to Hoyle.

AI, at least if connected to the Internet, is clearly an interstate and/or international commercial activity, and the US Constitution clearly and unambiguously assigns the power to regulate such activity to the federal government. Specifically to Congress, but in the absence of congressional action, I can see why Trump would want to preempt the illegal state-level schemes with something of his own.

I just wish that something of his own was “none, period.” Here’s why:

“Whatever can happen,” Augustes De Morgan wrote in 1866, “will happen if we make trials enough.”

To which I must add, if “we” don’t make trials enough, someone else will.

AI will inevitably be pushed to whatever, if any, limit it has.

If American researchers can’t legally do it, Chinese researchers will do it.

If Chinese researchers can’t legally do it, Swiss researchers will do it.

If every government on the planet imposes pesky regulations on doing it, people who don’t care about pesky government regulations will do it.

It can happen. Therefore it will happen.

I don’t wear rose-colored glasses … or at least, in poor metaphor mix, I consider those glasses half-full. We can plausibly expect both good and bad things out of AI developed to its limits.

Those  of us who are allowed to avail ourselves of the most advanced AI possible will disproportionately reap whatever rewards it produces.

Those of us for whom maximal AI is forbidden fruit will be more vulnerable to AI’s dark sides.

Since I like rewards and loathe punishments, I prefer to belong to the former group. So should you.

King Canute understood that he could not effectually command the tide. Our rulers should heed the lesson.

Thomas L. Knapp (X: @thomaslknapp | Bluesky: @knappster.bsky.social | Mastodon: @knappster) is director and senior news analyst at the William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism (thegarrisoncenter.org). He lives and works in north central Florida.

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On May 2, Spirit Airlines ceased operations after it failed to get the US government to bail it out of the latest in a series of untenable situations — at least two of which the US government put it in to begin with.

As of 2023, Spirit was the seventh largest air passenger carrier in North America, and largest in the “ultra-low cost” category.

Like many businesses, Spirit had taken some hard knocks during the COVID-19 panic, and like many businesses it had availed itself of government grants and loans to stay afloat. By way of recovery, the company explored possible mergers, first with Frontier and then with JetBlue.

The former deal didn’t work out. The latter, which would have made the combined companies the fifth largest US airline, worked out just fine … until the US Department of Justice sued, predicting “higher fares, fewer seats, and harm [to] millions of consumers.” A judge agreed.

Spirit’s stock price tanked. The company filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection twice in two years, reducing the size of its fleet and the number of people it employed in a desperate race to achieve solvency and remain in business. All because the US government decided it, rather than the market, knew what the market needed.

Then, on February 28, the US regime attacked Iran — and, by way of an attendant massive increase in fuel prices, attacked Spirit Airlines yet a second time. That attack proved fatal.

Maybe Spirit would have failed even absent the massive jet fuel price increases.

Perhaps the proposed merger with JetBlue would have dragged that airline down, too, instead of profitably folding Spirit’s assets into a more efficient operating environment.

And maybe all of Ted Bundy’s victims were mere moments away from choosing suicide when he strangled them to death instead.

We’ll never know, will we?

What we do know is that the US government’s murder of Spirit Airlines will almost certainly result in (checks notes) “higher fares, fewer seats, and harm [to] millions of consumers.”

Airlines come and airlines go. Some of the brands I grew up with — Pan Am, TWA, Northwest — have gone under or merged with others in the 21st century alone.

It’s not always as obvious that government was behind those disappearances as it is responsible for the death of Spirit, but you can always count on government to reduce your choices and increase your costs — while claiming to do the opposite.

Thomas L. Knapp (X: @thomaslknapp | Bluesky: @knappster.bsky.social | Mastodon: @knappster) is director and senior news analyst at the William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism (thegarrisoncenter.org). He lives and works in north central Florida.

PUBLICATION/CITATION HISTORY

“Today’s decision by this illegitimate Supreme Court majority strikes a blow against the Voting Rights Act,” US House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) thundered. It is “designed to undermine the ability of communities of color all over this country to elect their candidate of choice.”

File under “every accusation is a confession.”

SCOTUS’s ruling in Louisiana v. Callais quashed the argument that Louisiana is not just permitted, but required, to gerrymander congressional districts for the purpose of ensuring that candidates from — and claiming to collectively represent because REASONS — particular racial groups are nearly guaranteed to win election. Good for the court.

Jeffries is big mad. Why?

His criticism assumes, absent any rational basis, that all members of any “community of color” can, will, and must choose to support and vote for ONLY candidates from that “community.” And it assumes, again absent any rational basis, that voters who are not members of that “community” can, will, and must choose to support and vote ONLY for candidates who aren’t part of said “community.”

That view is no different its essence than claims that black people — ALL black people — prefer fried chicken and watermelon for lunch between the crack binges they go on right after picking up their welfare checks. And that white people —  ALL white people — keep robes, hoods, and nooses hanging in their closets to haul out for entertainment purposes between meals of white bread and cheap domestic beer with methamphetamine chasers.

Jeffries is, in other words, openly and virulently racist.

The Fifteenth Amendment to the US Constitution provides that “the right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.”

The right to vote does not imply any guarantee of Pantone Matching System [TM] closeness in skin tone between the candidates elected and the voting majorities in districts. Nor should it.

If you’re voting on the basis of skin color, You. Are. A. Racist.

If you choose to vote, there are many other things to base your vote on than the candidates’ races, and almost all of those things are better criteria.

What are the candidates’ positions on the policy issues you care about?

Are the candidates of good moral fiber?

Are the candidates upstanding and contributing members of the whole district “community” rather than just beholden to one racial subgroup of that community?

“Representative government” is difficult if not impossible even with no racism involved. Assuming that all people of a particular sex, occupation, ZIP code, etc. have similar interests or needs is just as irrational as basing such assumptions on race.

I suspect there are still quite a few racists among us, although thankfully fewer than there used to be.

But if we’re going to engage in the charade of “representative government” (I consider that a myth and a fantasy), we shouldn’t cater to them by drawing districts to  enshrine their views in that system.

Thomas L. Knapp (X: @thomaslknapp | Bluesky: @knappster.bsky.social | Mastodon: @knappster) is director and senior news analyst at the William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism (thegarrisoncenter.org). He lives and works in north central Florida.

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