Status: brain-dump of Giridharadas The Persuaders, Ch. 5. This chapter is an extended interview with Anat Shenker-Osorio (ASO, my acronym), who has a public presence and published books in her own right. This is more theory; I don't have a direct AI application, but if you're wading into politics more, this is recommended background reading.
Common political conceptions
A lot of fury at Democrats, from their own side, comes to this argument:
Too many Democratic politicians play to the center, competing for moderate or swing votes who simply do not exist. Even worse, they come across as spineless and immoral by making compromises that don't make any sense. If they tack left, they can rally the base much better and win more, and they should definitely stand up to Republicans in Congress more.
I agree with 75% of this at object-level. Democrats really should move left, but it's because animating the base is more important to winning the center than they estimate, not because they should ignore the center.
A better model for base voters, swing voters, stances and messages
Swing voters are very much a thing
We don't need to distinguish swing, moderate, independent, Obama-Trump, or other labels that overlap a lot all that much.
The best way to think of a swing voter is they're the "good point!" people.
One pair of polls shows this:
"Do you agree black men hold themselves back?"[1] 70% of swing voters agree
"Do you agree that racism is why black men can't advance?" 80% of swing voters agree
Those are completely contradictory... showing that for such a voter, agreeability matters more than principle. Swing voters, basically, want politics to go away, and for the world to make a bit more sense.
Therefore, the way you win swing voters is by saying something simple, loudly, consistently, frequently. You get the megaphone to do that from the base.
Persuade swing voters by animating the base
ASO distinguishes "activists" from "the base."
Activists always turn out and do a lot of work for you. They tend to be very negative and neurotic, and since other people are not those things, it's really bad when they do all your messaging. In the AIS context, this means the most motivated people messaging on "you're all gonna die" is probably a mistake.
The base is definitely on your side, but might not turn out at all. Giving them 4-day old deli turkey (Joe Biden in 2024) is not going to do it.
When you do animate the base, they work 24/7 persuading swing voters. The base is big, loud on social media, enmeshed in swing-voter dense social networks. You want them doing much more for you than just turning out.
So this breaks the usual left v. center mental model: base+swing a synergy, not a tradeoff, and the synergy is a motivated base lifts swing voters, it doesn't turn them off.
The best message is one your opponent won't shut up about
ASO gets this from Republican pollster Frank Luntz. Republicans are very good at it. You want a message that:
Your base loves
Swing voters are amenable to, once they hear it more
Your opponents hate
Then your opponents do all your messaging work for you.
R: we're building a border wall D: terrible wall, see, look how easily Mexicans just cut right through it Swing: ohmygosh they really are trying to break in to our country
Democrats often find firm footing by making Republicans talk about The Economy as a deity you have to sacrifice children for.
D: Universal Pre-K, we're gonna pay for it by taxing the rich R: You fool! the rich will just evade your tax by moving out of New York. Swing: tax evasion is a crime tho?
Democrats have an opportunity on Israel's War. Today it goes like:
R: we're pro Israel Some D: it's a genocide Other D: look, I'm really sorry about the anti-semitism in our party. We also stand with Israel Swing: hmm D are racist, R are not
It could go like this:
D: Israel has killed 20,000 Palestinian children, it's a genocide R: OK firstly the 20,000 children number is unverified, secondly killing 20,000 children doesn't count as a genocide Swing: I have a 6 year old...
Sell cake, not cake batter
Don't stay in the thick of intermediate, legal, procedural language. Try to avoid saying "health insurance" even, the goal is "see a doctor." Everyone can see a doctor.
Bad: We need to be mindful of balancing the need businesses have for immigrants with respect for the law, and far too many immigrants do not respect the law. Good: build a wall. deport them. close the border. etc.
Bad: We’ll expand the Child Tax Credit and increase refundable benefits Good: Everyone can afford groceries, gas, seeing a doctor
Bad: We’ll reform zoning and streamline permitting Good: You shouldn't have to drive half hour just to get your kids to school
Really the only message Democrats need is we can have nice things. I don't think this is 100% true issue-by-issue, but it is mandatory as part of a general messaging spread, and I notice progressives seem to have embraced the two-pronged approach of "standing up to the rich" while "promising affordability."
What if AI safety gets polarized?
I'm a lot more worried about failing to socialize one side or the other at all to the issue. I'm also worried about misdiagnosing that as polarization: if the right gets its shit together on AI safety and the left does not, I'm not going to point fingers at the right for "polarizing" it.
I'm under the impression right now that:
Everyone hates data centers, left or right, especially farmers.
The right-leaning or MAGA side is pretty freaked out about job apocalypse.
The left is still playing dumb like this is all a marketing hoax, but they also really really hate data centers.
To me, negative sentiment toward AI across the board is probably good, but the industry has a lot of opportunity to direct it to something useless, like banning a few data centers and doing not much else.
I also notice that HuggingFaceGate has lasted in the news way longer than OpenAI probably wanted. That seems important.
Lastly I'll point out Ronnie Cheung's phrase "your job is to destroy AI" stood out to me. It's more "cake" than "cake batter" and sounds nicer than stopping halfway, like the industry's preferred term "pace AI."
Also Ro Khanna coined the term the Epstein class. That's the level of contempt many Americans have to the CEO overlord class right now. Tech overlords is too weak.
Status: brain-dump of Giridharadas The Persuaders, Ch. 5. This chapter is an extended interview with Anat Shenker-Osorio (ASO, my acronym), who has a public presence and published books in her own right. This is more theory; I don't have a direct AI application, but if you're wading into politics more, this is recommended background reading.
Common political conceptions
A lot of fury at Democrats, from their own side, comes to this argument:
Too many Democratic politicians play to the center, competing for moderate or swing votes who simply do not exist. Even worse, they come across as spineless and immoral by making compromises that don't make any sense. If they tack left, they can rally the base much better and win more, and they should definitely stand up to Republicans in Congress more.
I agree with 75% of this at object-level. Democrats really should move left, but it's because animating the base is more important to winning the center than they estimate, not because they should ignore the center.
A better model for base voters, swing voters, stances and messages
Swing voters are very much a thing
We don't need to distinguish swing, moderate, independent, Obama-Trump, or other labels that overlap a lot all that much.
The best way to think of a swing voter is they're the "good point!" people.
One pair of polls shows this:
Those are completely contradictory... showing that for such a voter, agreeability matters more than principle. Swing voters, basically, want politics to go away, and for the world to make a bit more sense.
Therefore, the way you win swing voters is by saying something simple, loudly, consistently, frequently. You get the megaphone to do that from the base.
Persuade swing voters by animating the base
ASO distinguishes "activists" from "the base."
When you do animate the base, they work 24/7 persuading swing voters. The base is big, loud on social media, enmeshed in swing-voter dense social networks. You want them doing much more for you than just turning out.
So this breaks the usual left v. center mental model: base+swing a synergy, not a tradeoff, and the synergy is a motivated base lifts swing voters, it doesn't turn them off.
The best message is one your opponent won't shut up about
ASO gets this from Republican pollster Frank Luntz. Republicans are very good at it. You want a message that:
Then your opponents do all your messaging work for you.
R: we're building a border wall
D: terrible wall, see, look how easily Mexicans just cut right through it
Swing: ohmygosh they really are trying to break in to our country
Democrats often find firm footing by making Republicans talk about The Economy as a deity you have to sacrifice children for.
D: Universal Pre-K, we're gonna pay for it by taxing the rich
R: You fool! the rich will just evade your tax by moving out of New York.
Swing: tax evasion is a crime tho?
Democrats have an opportunity on Israel's War. Today it goes like:
R: we're pro Israel
Some D: it's a genocide
Other D: look, I'm really sorry about the anti-semitism in our party. We also stand with Israel
Swing: hmm D are racist, R are not
It could go like this:
D: Israel has killed 20,000 Palestinian children, it's a genocide
R: OK firstly the 20,000 children number is unverified, secondly killing 20,000 children doesn't count as a genocide
Swing: I have a 6 year old...
Sell cake, not cake batter
Don't stay in the thick of intermediate, legal, procedural language. Try to avoid saying "health insurance" even, the goal is "see a doctor." Everyone can see a doctor.
Bad: We need to be mindful of balancing the need businesses have for immigrants with respect for the law, and far too many immigrants do not respect the law.
Good: build a wall. deport them. close the border. etc.
Bad: We’ll expand the Child Tax Credit and increase refundable benefits
Good: Everyone can afford groceries, gas, seeing a doctor
Bad: We’ll reform zoning and streamline permitting
Good: You shouldn't have to drive half hour just to get your kids to school
Really the only message Democrats need is we can have nice things. I don't think this is 100% true issue-by-issue, but it is mandatory as part of a general messaging spread, and I notice progressives seem to have embraced the two-pronged approach of "standing up to the rich" while "promising affordability."
What if AI safety gets polarized?
I'm a lot more worried about failing to socialize one side or the other at all to the issue. I'm also worried about misdiagnosing that as polarization: if the right gets its shit together on AI safety and the left does not, I'm not going to point fingers at the right for "polarizing" it.
I'm under the impression right now that:
To me, negative sentiment toward AI across the board is probably good, but the industry has a lot of opportunity to direct it to something useless, like banning a few data centers and doing not much else.
I also notice that HuggingFaceGate has lasted in the news way longer than OpenAI probably wanted. That seems important.
Lastly I'll point out Ronnie Cheung's phrase "your job is to destroy AI" stood out to me. It's more "cake" than "cake batter" and sounds nicer than stopping halfway, like the industry's preferred term "pace AI."
Also Ro Khanna coined the term the Epstein class. That's the level of contempt many Americans have to the CEO overlord class right now. Tech overlords is too weak.
seriously I'm just reproducing this from memory, I might have the #s flipped or polls worded wrong.