Central Air

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.centralairpodcast.comThis week: the case for AI regulation and what it would look like, with Dean Ball, who helped to shape AI policy in the Trump White House and is soon to join OpenAI. Is bank regulation a good model for AI regulation, where companies follow rules about making their own rules? We discuss that, and whether we have other choices. Then: for paying subscribers, this week’s episode ends with the very first (but not the last) Central Air cocktail hour, where Ben, Megan and I pour ourselves some drinks, unpack what we’ve heard from our guest, and try to get comfortable with what the future holds for us. To hear the whole episode, upgrade at www.centralairpodcast.com.

On this week's show: everyone loves to talk about affordability these days, or more specifically, they love to complain about unaffordability. But what are they actually complaining about? At least four things, we think: inflation, interest rates, real incomes, and income distribution — or, basically, the whole economy. We invited Natasha Sarin, a professor at Yale Law School who co-directs The Budget Lab there, and who previously served as an economic official at the Treasury Department under President Biden, to join us for this conversation. Plus: interest rates, and what might happen to them if President Trump gets his way on monetary policy, grading Fed Chair nominee Kevin Warsh on a curve, and “white people tacos."Sign up for updates from Central Air at www.centralairpodcast.com. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.centralairpodcast.com/subscribe

On this week's show: we’re joined by Jerusalem Demsas, Editor-in-Chief of avowedly liberal publication The Argument. Jerusalem makes the case for immigration advocates to ride the thermostatic shift toward support for immigration without avoiding the political traps that befell Democrats under Joe Biden.Plus: we talk about what sort of bargain Democrats should try to drive about funding the Department of Homeland Security in the wake of the abuses they’ve perpetrated in Minneapolis, and we look at one aspect of The Argument’s project: getting liberals to stop acting like they’re “temporarily-embarrassed communists” and take pride in their own coherent worldview. We consider Moderna’s announcement that the US policy environment has turned too anti-vaccine to support expensive research into certain mRNA applications for fighting infectious disease. And Ben makes a case for one of the ugliest vegetables around. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.centralairpodcast.com/subscribe

This week: the bombshell at the Federal Reserve — the bank was served with subpoenas related to a criminal investigation into Jerome Powell’s congressional testimony about renovation cost overruns, and Powell's direct-to-camera video pledging to resist this use of a pretextual criminal investigation to pressure him and the bank to lower interest rates. We also discuss the Minnesota ICE shooting.Plus: Steve Morris of The Long Run joins us to discuss the groveling apology that gay liberal comedians Bowen Yang and Matt Rogers had to offer for showing insufficient respect to our lord and savior Jasmine Crockett, and we discuss at the problems facing straight people — who these days seem to talk a lot about how awful the opposite sex is while having very little sex with the opposite sex. This is sad!Leave a comment on this episode at centralairpodcast.com This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.centralairpodcast.com/subscribe