The New New Deal: The Pu Pu Platter
aka the "Official Policy Platform"
The Republic stands. (For now...)
Amazing.
As Wayne and Garth used to say…”Game on!”
Today I’d like to send along a broad list of possible policies we’ve brainstormed up for the New New Deal over here at HQ. Call it an Official Policy Plan, call it a Pu Pu Platter, the intent is the same: operationalize the concept of a “New New Deal” into a set of concrete proposals to be considered.
Each oriented as a possible solution to an existing and growing problem, and each in the interest of revitalizing the Republic. Take what you like, think about the package as a set of options to deal with these emerging internal and external challenges.
Most of these policies will be controversial. Some (maybe even many) may end up being outright bad ideas or ill-advised. So take it with a grain of sugar.
“Wet clay” as the big man used to say.
While we don't have enough time today to fully go through all of these, we're putting them out there while the Overton window is having its grand opening sale.
Last time we covered this space, I sent out one of the most potentially divisive of these policies, the 100% inheritance tax. The kind of thing that seems insane if we were to implement it tomorrow, but potentially inevitable - depending on how long your timelines are with respect to ai acceleration. Many of these ideas will feel similar.
With that in mind here are 58 potential policies to consider, as the US spends the next two months, figuring out what this software update on the Republic ought look like.
We split these into Internal and Global buckets, but please don't get too hung up on the categories. They're more about direction than destination. Think of it as a new axis on the political compass: not left/right, not auth/lib, but future/past. And we're betting on the future.
Because the next century won't look anything like the last one, and we need new ideas, new pipes, and new societal software to meet this new exciting and potentially disruptive reality.
That’s it. That’s the post.
The Republic stands, a good time to reflect on what could be.
Have a good weekend, get some sun and we can sync on Monday..
As Spock would say to Cap. Kirk, “Fascinating”.
Hey Alex, I hope this spreadsheet of yours turns into a massive Excel model that DOGE pipes into. I'd love to see it EXPAND (leveraging GenAI and/or Rose). You know 5 columns of Impact, Reward sort of metrics. 3 columns of Risk or conviction metrics. Rank order by Reward/Risk in each category. and so on.
The Domestic one for sure!!!
The "Global Position" one is a little ... more challenging. :) Indian Caste system - meh. China and BRICs were all the rage as we very well know (BRICS ETF marked the top, no?) Sinophobia and Russophobia ought to be as shameful as they were not that long ago... I hope you don't think I'm accusing you of that. I am not. I just saw these coming since 2014-2015 (as did Dalio and plenty of astute students of history and between-the-lines-readers). You're on of those very few people who know the dark history of US Corporations ("The Gangs of America") and know the difference between Left Totalitarianism and "China with capitalist characteristics".
(1) Technology enables and leads Ideologies and (2) allows for LEAPFROGING (ie digital payments in China vs US). I challenge us all to leapfrog into a post-nation-state-Identity age! It's too bad the "non-binary" label got jacked by the sexual-Orientalists ( ;) ), when there are err 10x as many ETHNICALLY "non-binary" people, no? Of course, we still have the Royals in the UK, but the US emperors just keep insisting more and more how fully clothed they are. They just keep dressing it up in hot-air narratives around TSLA and NVDA and fueling it with Deep OTM 0-4 day dated call options.
Now, you know, i know, you know that there are NO precedents in any prior financial bubbles of using that LEVEL of OTM-ness and that "duration" of expiration to pump up some white South-African jam!
So indeed, Bernanke was a student of the GD, and we TARPd and TARPd and finally suspended MTM in 3/09 (FASB called it "improvement", not "suspension").
So we did avoid the deflationary depression, but while WE got the bridge, perhaps a whole lot of human collateral damage is manifesting in ZOMBIES on private, public and cultural levels, to put it lightly.
Saying all this negative stuff, just so we take a step back from "Exceptional" and "Global Position" and remember that we did start posturing a tad hard in 2016. ("the medium is the message", we can thank FB/Twitter and Springiness of the platforms' UI-UX paradigm).
Uber and Airbnb didn't ask permission and at least theoretically we've been in a global village for quite some time. So I urge you to PIVOT!!!
Shape public policy. Call it whatever you want. But build for the modern exponential-AI powered future and leverage the AI tools.
We were on the verge of Anarchy (not even the boogie of Communism) in the 1930s... We had to threaten the Supreme courts with stacking to get it done and more than once. So I think that's why it's so key to tap into the same sh1t Bernie, Trump and Brexit tapped into in 2016... but of course the TOOLS and the MEDIUMS have changed for 2025.
I apologize if I sound negative, but I've been around the USSR and Subprime Securitization blocks. Digital nomad for 7+ years, CFA for almost 20. You are brilliant!!! I truly want to encourage you to turn this spreadsheet into living models. One way or another, just seems that transparency and best practices will find their way into Public policy world-wide in 1-2 years - thanks to genAI, blockhains/crypto, and those damn Debt/GDP burdens... although rankly I hate it when we divide BalSht Liabilities by Obsolete Income Statement Metrics. :)
Remember how GDP calc and SEC T-margin mandate were creations of 1930s, too. Fking amazing. 10% OTM calls on TSLA and NVDA for 6 years running. I'll take those Ghost cities for $10T, Alex. :)