One Big Bad Bill

In this episode, we break down Trump's "One Big Beautiful Bill" and its dystopian AI provisions: automated fraud detection systems, centralized citizen databases, military AI integration, and a 10-year moratorium blocking all state AI regulation. We explore the historical parallels with authoritarian data consolidation and why this represents a fundamental shift away from limited government principles once held by US conservatives.

• (00:00) - Intro
• (01:13) - Bill, general overview
• (05:14) - Bill, AI overview
• (07:54) - Medicaid fraud detection systems
• (11:20) - Bias in AI Systems and Ethical Concerns
• (17:58) - Centralization of data
• (30:04) - Military integration of AI
• (37:05) - Tax incentives for development
• (40:57) - Regulatory moratorium
• (47:58) - One big bad authoritarian regime

Links

• Congress page on the One Big Beautiful Bill Act
• NYMag article - Republicans Admit They Didn’t Even Read Their Big Beautiful Bill
• Everything is Horrible Blogpost - They Did Vote For This (GOP House Edition)

Authoritarianism

• Historical context
  • Holocaust Encyclopedia article - Gleichschaltung: Coordinating the Nazi State
  • Wikipedia article - 1943 Amsterdam civil registry office bombing
  • Wikipedia article - Four Ds
• Conservative leaning, pro-privacy, anti-government
  • Data Governance Hub blogpost - Review and Literature Guide of Trump’s “One Big Beautiful Dataset”
  • Cato Institute blogpost - If You Value Privacy, Resist Any Form of National ID Cards
  • American Enterprise Intitute blogpost - The Dangerous Road to a “Master File”—Why Linking Government Databases Is a Terrible Idea
  • EFF blogpost - The Dangers of Consolidating All Government Information
• ACLU against national ID cards
  • ACLU main page on national ID cards
  • ACLU blogpost - National Identification Cards: Why Does the ACLU Oppose a National I.D. System?
  • ACLU blogpost - 5 Problems with National ID Cards
• Inherent unfairness of ML
  • Lighthouse Reports investigation - The Limits of Ethical AI
  • Lighthouse Reports investigation - Suspicion Machines
  • Amazon Science publication - Bias preservation in machine learning: The legality of fairness metrics under EU non-discrimination law
  • Michigan Technology Law Review article - The Unfairness of Fair Machine Learning: Levelling down and strict egalitarianism by default
  • Wired article - Health Care Bias Is Dangerous. But So Are ‘Fairness’ Algorithms

Military

• WallStreet Journal article - The Army’s Newest Recruits: Tech Execs From Meta, OpenAI and More
• Trump ex