Current work · Writing
The writing, as a practice
The writing archive holds the finished essays and commentary. This page is the process behind them: what's in progress and how a topic gets chosen.
The Omniscient Planner
Grant a planner every fact in the world and a machine that never errs. He still cannot choose between steel and aluminium, because the number that choice needs is made by a contest he has abolished.
In the pipeline
There are usually a couple of things going at once: a longer essay arguing a position all the way through, and shorter commentary on something current, a policy decision or a debate I think is being handled badly. The essays take a while. The commentary goes out when it's ready rather than on a schedule.
How topics get chosen
The trigger is almost always having a view I want to defend. If I think the common take on something is wrong, or too easy, and I can make the other case, that's a piece. This is the opinion side of the work: the research is where I run the numbers, and the writing is where I argue what they mean. I skip anything I don't have a real position on.
Published pieces
Everything finished lives in the archive, the longer essays and the shorter commentary together.