What I'm reading: smoky rooms and serious people

Dan Davies, black boxes and smoky rooms:

Some Planning Inspectorate reports read curiously like Agatha Christie novels. Chapter by chapter, you get detail of the objections and analysis, and then a concluding section in which the Inspectorate assumes the role of Hercule Poirot and explains which of them were red herrings and which were killers.

Ned Resnikoff, Serious People:

As one prominent Sacramento YIMBY put it, “This election separated the wheat (people with sincere views on urban policy reform) from the chaff (people who use urban policy reform as a cudgel against their enemies).” Among those who genuinely care about housing affordability, Mamdani attracted support both from the left and (though not without reservations) from the center. The centrists who loathe the left more than they care about YIMBY policy reform denounced Mamdani, while the leftists who hate shitlibs more than they like winning elections did everything they could to make clear that shitlibs were not welcome in the Mamdani coalition.