The Ledger
Every statement that passed quotation and attribution checks. Mix any filter with any other: certainty 1/5, debate potential 5/5, or both at once.
why aren't all 1,273 resolved? a statement only gets an assessment when the public record can support or contradict it. opinions and what-ifs never can, and 18 checkable ones are still open, waiting for their date. predictions held up or didn't; assertions are supported or contradicted. on every card: ▮▮▮▮▮ certainty · ▮▮▮▮▮ debate potential. speakers are clickable
Perry: Most Surprise Medical Bills Stem From Provider Submission Errors
“In most of those cases, the provider submitted the claim wrong.”
Gallagher: CCP operated an undeclared police station in Manhattan
“The CCP via an innocuous sounding nonprofit that was basically a United Front Work Department entity set up on a police station in the heart of Manhattan that was being used to surveil, harass, and in some cases physically assault people on American soil.”
Gallagher: Americans can easily buy dangerous pathogens like HIV online
“You right now, Joe, could go online and buy, you could buy, you could definitely buy AIDS, you could buy MERS, Middle East Respiratory Syndrome. There's no tripwires in place for the purchase of this stuff,”
Lonsdale: Most 8VC portfolio companies caught Chinese spies attempting theft
“Most of our companies have at some point in the past decade, caught people from China trying to steal things.”
Gallagher: BlackRock and MSCI funnel US capital to blacklisted Chinese entities
“We've done an investigation of BlackRock MSCI, and we've only scratched the surface. We've investigated some other some venture capital organizations, and we are, we're, Capital continues to flow even to companies that are on various federal government blackli…”
Lonsdale: Decoupling from China would push iPhone costs to thousands for years
“Like an iPhone would cost right now a few thousand dollars probably for the next three, four or five years, you know, each, if we didn't have China for now, and then eventually we could get cost down a lot more, but there's going to be like a huge disruption i…”
Slat: The Ocean Cleanup has faced bribe requests from local officials
“Oh, well, without mentioning names, of course, but we've definitely been in situations where you're being asked for you know, for bribes and things like that.”
Gerstner: 44% of Americans Aged 18–29 Prefer Socialism Over Capitalism
“Joe, among the age group, 18 to 29, 44% of that group believe socialism is a superior form of organizing government than capitalism.”
Gerstner: Ukraine Aid Could Fund Invest America for 20 Years
“What we've spent in Ukraine to date would pay for this program for 20 years and seventy five million children touching almost every American household.”
McGrew: OpenAI models are improving, contrary to user reports of degradation
“Ah, we think it's actually getting better over time that, you know, some of the reports are sort of confounding various different things.”
Andreessen: Europe fell from ~15 of top 50 tech firms to just Spotify
“25 years ago, if you did a list of the 50 biggest tech companies in the world, like a pretty significant number of them were European. It's like, I don't know, probably 15 of the top 50 or something. You know, today you're basically down to Spotify which is gr…”
Karp: Palantir AI identifies adversary positions across large land masses
“The most powerful use of our product currently, and again, of one of our products is Being able to identify an adversary over a large lying mass using AI, and that obviously it's been reported has led to a different level of ability to acquire the adversary's …”
Gee: Pharma hired three lobbyists per legislator during her Louisiana tenure
“In Louisiana, when I, my first year as secretary, when I started to take on this issue, There were three lobbyists hired for every legislator in my state. Pharma.”
Lonsdale: India is now producing more annual unicorn startups than China
“There's now more unicorns per year recently in India than China, as China falls, and India seems to be rising there.”
Lonsdale: Red states enact extreme social policies to deter blue migrants
“Like a lot of red states, and I don't necessarily agree with this, but a lot of red states are being more extreme than even the average person there on social issues in order to try to sort in order to say we don't want blue people coming. Like, if like, oh, w…”
Balaji: China is flexing new diplomatic muscle via Saudi-Iran deal
“What they have flexed over the last couple of months is the new diplomatic muscle. Right. They've managed to get France and Brazil and a bunch of neutral countries, formerly neutral countries. They have peace between Saudi and Iran.”
Mintz: California spent $20B on homelessness as homeless population rose 20%
“The state has spent twenty billion dollars on homeless services in the last five years. Twenty billion dollars. The number of homeless people in the state's gone up 20% in that time.”
Attia: Centenarians on average exercise less, smoke more, and eat worse
“If you look at, you know, Tom Pearls and Nir Barzilai, who probably run the two largest cohorts of studying centenarians and their offspring. I mean, on average, centenarians exercise less, smoke more, eat worse.”
Attia: A balanced exercise portfolio can add a decade to lifespan
“It means if you're paying attention, To a portfolio approach of strength, stability, aerobic training, anaerobic training, all those things, you know, it can add up to a decade to the length of your life.”
Israel's Unit 8200 encourages departing soldiers to commercialize non-classified military tech
“If you're at 8200, of course, which is the most famous of the Israeli military units in tech and in cyber, although there are many when you leave the military, believe it or not, you're actually encouraged to take that technology with you. Now, I don't mean if…”
Pompeo: Congress repeatedly rejected State Department budget cuts from $70B to $45B
“We proposed a budget, Joe, about two-thirds of the State Department budget think Forty five billion instead of seventy billion. And each year, both Republican and Democrats alike on Capitol Hill said, nope, we're going to give you a seventy billion.”
Pompeo: Kim Jong-un walked away from agreed terms in Hanoi
“Chairman Kim kind of walked away from what we understood he had agreed to, what he had told me himself.”
Pompeo: Internal opposition and late timing prevented Trump's TikTok ban
“Oh, a little bit of bureaucracy, and then frankly you had senior leaders in the administration who didn't want to close the deal out. There were a couple of us advocating for it, and we ran into a buzzsaw, and then there was, we were a little late, Joe, to be …”
Hedge funds borrowed Morgan Stanley's own repo money to short its stock
“A number of the hedge funds would come in and borrow money from us through, through a repo account. And then they would take that money and use it to short our stock. And it wasn't just us. They did it to Lehman. They did it to us.”
Dr. Johnston: Over 50% of Doctor Time Is Spent Generating Bills
“So if you look at a doctor's time, so again, doctors are only a small part of how health is determined, but they're important. You know, more than 50% of that is spent documenting in order to improve a bill and the outcome of a bill. I mean, the predominant re…”
Lonsdale: Over 40% of Coke is bought through welfare benefits
“Right now our government actually gives like money for people to buy like soda, soda drinks, like over 40% of Coke is bought apparently through welfare benefits and stuff.”
Caliri: Chinese State-Owned Enterprises Ship Fentanyl Precursors to Mexico
“There are state-owned enterprises in China that are shipping fentanyl and fentanyl precursors to Mexico.”
Berdichevsky: Graphite-metal oxide battery chemistry has completely flatlined
“This graphite metal oxide chemistry went through an S curve and flatlined, totally flatlined. And that's sort of when I started to see it flatlining at Tesla as part of the, was part of the impetus for starting Sela.”
DeWitte: Nuclear regulations are ~100 pages versus millions of guidance pages
“So the big thing we saw was we've built this massive inertia of millions of pages Of effectively regulatory guidance is what it's called. Basically recommendations on how to meet the regulations, which minds you are maybe a hundred pages or so. But you've buil…”
DeWitte: Oklo micro-reactors cost between $30M and $40M to build
“Oh, I mean you know, if you put the reactor inside of it, kind of depends a little bit on the exact sighting and how much work needs to go into it, but somewhere between 30 and forty million dollars.”
DeWitte: No Plant Applying Directly to the NRC Has Ever Come Online
“Since the NRC was formed no plant that has submitted its initial original application to the NRC has ever come online. All the plants that are operating today submitted their applications, their initially, their initial application, sorry, to the Atomic Energy…”
Glock: CA Supreme Court blocked UC Berkeley student enrollment increases under CEQA
“The Berkeley ruling of the California Supreme court where they said you couldn't increase even the number of students at the university of Berkeley. Because of this California lawsuit system where you're allowed to sue just about anything.”
Glock: California Cities Are Exceptionally Dense Yet Suffer Far Higher Housing Prices
“California has
Actually, exceptionally dense cities.
They have cities about 7008 thousand people per square mile, which is very high relative to the rest of the U.S., which is more like three to 4000 people per square mile.
and yet it has housing prices that …”
Glock: 40% of Land in Nine-County Bay Area Is Reserved for Cattle
“The 40% of that land in that nine county Bay Area is reserved for cattle.”
Glock: Skid Row camping enforcement cut crime and violence by 40%
“A study done right afterwards showed that crime and violence in the area, mainly against the homeless themselves, went down 40%, and it didn't seem to spill over to these other neighborhoods.”
Glock: LA and SF audits show subsidized housing costs reach $800K per unit
“They recently did an audit in LA and in San Francisco that found these things cost about 700 dollars per square foot and around 800,000 dollars maxed out per apartment.”
Glock: Roughly 40% of subsidized housing spending goes to soft costs
“About 40% of this money went to what's called soft costs in the construction industry. This is the paperwork, the financing, all these other little things in it.”
Lonsdale: Former Colombian President Duque caught protesters using Russian tech
“And the president of Colombia told us he's caught those same Chilean protesters with Russian technology, trying to do these things in Colombia as well.”
Craft: China sanctioned former UN Ambassador Kelly Craft for speaking out
“You know, I'm sanctioned by China because of literally speaking out, and making certain that the world knows.”
Craft: Biden's EV tax incentives directly violate the USMCA agreement
“When President Biden came in and he has now decided that we are going to be, you know, electric vehicles by twenty-twenty-five, and there's been these tax incentives to be able to purchase. Well, that is in direct violation of USMCA.”
Sprowls: Florida state colleges must offer money-back job guarantees on three programs
“So now if you go to a state college in Florida, they have to offer at least three certifications or technical degrees where they say, if you come and you get this certificate, And you are not working in that field in six months. We'll give you your money back.…”
Sprowls: Only 14% of Florida State Prison Inmates Are There for Drugs
“Only 14% of the people in state prison in Florida are there for drugs.”
Khanna: Facebook Knows Instagram Causes Teen Depression and Anxiety
“Facebook has information that Instagram is causing depression and anxiety about teenagers.”
Khanna: Nine of the top ten sites on Facebook are conservative
“I mean, I looked the top nine out of the top 10 sites on Facebook are conservative sites with Donald Trump and Hannity and Ben Shapiro and others.”
Lonsdale: US spent nuclear fuel could power the country for 100 years
“There's enough of that spent fuel to power the whole US for a hundred years.”
Lonsdale: Education Department officials covered their eyes to avoid Palantir data
“I remember when I was at Palantir, 15 years ago, and we were exploring different ways to help the federal government, and we went into the Department of Education, and we were going to show them something they could do to use data to do a better job, We put so…”