Mediaboss Marketing

Democrats and public education advocates are urging Gov. Doug Ducey and his fellow Republicans in the state Legislature to keep their promise to lift the states annual school spending cap.

Republicans and Democrats in the state legislature together passed a budget in June that dedicated more than $600 million to new, permanent funding for K-12 education. However, if two-thirds of the legislature doesnt vote to lift the states Aggregate Expenditure Limit, or AEL, districts across the state wont be able to spend around $1.3 billion already allocated to them.

GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX

SUBSCRIBE

Many Democrats in the Legislature say they only voted in favor of the budget because Ducey and the Republican legislators promised they would later call a special session to lift the limit.

If Democrats can prove they have the votes to override the AEL, Ducey will call a special session, said C.J. Karamargin, communications director for the governors office.

What is the point of giving our public schools money but not allowing them to spend it? asked Sen. Christine Marsh during a press conference Thursday. Its a betrayal of our students and our schools. Its also a betrayal of the legislators who voted for a less-than-ideal budget under the promise that there would be a special session to address the AEL.

Voters added the AEL to the Arizona Constitution in 1980. It implemented a shared monetary limit based on the spending and enrollment at all public school districts in the state, according to the Arizona Education Association. Once districts reach their shared limit, they can do no more spending in that fiscal year.

Advocates pointed out on Thursday that the AEL predates laws requiring sometimes costly accommodations for special education students as well as expensive technology that is now used in many classrooms.

A small group of legislators and education advocates gathered for the press conference on the state Capitol grounds in Phoenix on Thursday morning to call out Ducey and legislative Republicans for their failure to schedule a special session.

If the AEL isnt lifted for 2023, school funding will drop off April 1 and districts will be unable to spend more than $1 billion in money they were given.

According to Marsh, who is a teacher at Scottsdale Unified School District, her district stands to lose around $28.4 million if the limit isnt lifted. Chandler Unified School District stands to lose $62.4 million, Phoenix Union High School District would lose $52.6 million and Tucson Unified School District would lose $66.1 million

This comes down to kids, and they deserve to know that their state cares about their education, Marsh said. And right now, they dont know this.

Failure to lift the limit will result in teacher layoffs, larger classroom sizes and poor learning outcomes, Superintendent of Public Instruction Kathy Hoffman said during the press conference.

Sierra Vista Unified School District, located southeast of Tucson, would have to reduce its average teacher salary from $50,000 to $35,200 if the limit stays in place, Hoffman said.

How are schools supposed to obtain highly qualified teachers for only $35,000 a year? Hoffman said.

The spending cap might also mean fewer paraprofessionals to assist special education students, and fewer counselors, behavioral coaches and school nurses, she said.

Democrats said they agreed to approve the state budget in June without addressing the AEL as a concession to Republicans who wanted to wait for a judgment in a court case challenging Proposition 208, also known as the Invest in Education Act. The voter-approved measure would have provided millions in funding for schools through a 3.5% surcharge on all income greater than $250,000 for individuals or $500,000 for joint filers.

But the judgment calling the act unconstitutional and the following appeal period are now long passed, and Democrats say its time for Ducey to call the promised special session.

Democrats are confident that, if Ducey does call for a special session, they have the votes to lift the spending limit. The state education budget passed in June with 48 votes in the House and 21 in the Senate, more than the votes needed to lift the limit, said House Democratic Leader Reginald Bolding.

But Karamargin countered that Democrats havent supplied the governor with a list of Legislators who are on board.

Well consider it as we said we would, he said.

Those who supported that budget should support lifting the limit so that money can be spent, Bolding said on Thursday. He believes that anyone who changes their vote was playing political games or being dishonest.

Karamargin believes Bolding was making assumptions when he said that those who voted for the budget should support lifting the AEL.

The Legislature voted in February to lift the AEL for the 2022 fiscal year, which ended June 30. The proposed vote would be to lift it for 2023.

***This story has been updated to include comments from the governors office.

Read this article:
Democrats urge Republicans to keep promise, lift cap that will stop schools from spending $1 billion - Arizona Mirror

This week has been difficult for those of us who want to see a fully democratised, 21st-century polity that doesnt have a hereditary billionaire as its head of state. Everything from the gratuitous wall-to-wall media coverage to the arrest of anti-monarchy protestors and the state-sanctioned cancel culture of those who dissent has laid bare the fact that this transition is as much about coercion as consent.

But, strangely, these acts have not been the most difficult thing to reconcile in this tumultuous week. Instead, it has been watching the livestream of tens of thousands of fellow citizens from all walks of life, quietly queueing for up to nine hours to file past a coffin while bowing and curtsying. My initial response was one of bemusement followed by a touch of despair. Why, I asked, would so many people, often with so little, show such deference to an institution that is the very embodiment of the inequalities of wealth and power that permeate our country? Because until republicans can fully understand this sentiment, we will struggle to win the argument for transition from constitutional monarchy to constitutional democracy.

To gain that insight you need only listen to the same people interviewed, almost continuously, on television and the radio about why theyve attended. People are clearly moved, with some in the queue talking about their parents deaths or, more commonly, about wanting to be a part of history. Thus, many are not there to honour the institution of monarchy or a royal individual; what is prevalent is the expressed need to feel part of something more than themselves.

So how can democratic politics fulfil that function instead? If we think about our current political class replacing monarchy, that is clearly not the answer. How many prime ministers in the past 50 years would you queue up to pay final respects to? Probably not that many. But therein lies a fundamental truth about the institution of monarchy it is a distraction. It is a spectacle exalted for exemplifying virtues that should be typical in public life and public behaviour. Casting such behaviour as exceptional allows the likes of Boris Johnson, Liz Truss and the economic elites they represent to break and exploit the rules for their own benefit and that of their very narrow class interest of which the monarchy is an integral part.

For half of Queen Elizabeth IIs reign, our common life was destroyed by the privatisation of water, energy, public transport and council housing, by the desecration of our land through fracking and sewage in rivers, and by the despoliation of our common wealth in the selling off of childrens and elderly care homes to private equity groups. This all took place without so much as a royal murmur of disapproval.

Yet, at the same time, the royal family managed to exempt itself from more than 160 different pieces of legislation for its own economic advantage, such as the waiving of the 40% inheritance tax on the crown estates estimated 15.2bn of royal assets.

So while republicans should respect the language of duty and sacrifice monarchists have so forcefully claimed that the royal family makes on our behalf, we should not pretend that the reality is anything other than a lie. That is not what monarchy is. It may provide a symbolic way for us to recognise other peoples sacrifice and commitment to society but the monarchy itself risks nothing and does not suffer, save for having the lives of the royal family become the stuff of celebrity gossip. Through it all, it remains the backbone of a power structure that traces its roots back to feudalism.

The idea of divine and indivisible sovereignty embodied in the monarch has been passed on to parliament. There it continues to legitimise the power of a close-knit elite community resistant to the fact that in a complex modern society all of us have a stake, and all should have a voice.

If you doubt this cultural trickle-down and its replication in the fabric of our social, political and economic life then simply look at the schools our King, his sons and the leaders of industry and finance attended. Eton, Harrow, Westminster the training camps for the next generation of generals, captains of industry and prime ministers. Perhaps in a genuine democracy, our legislature could offer real checks and balances against such hereditary power. Yet more than half our legislature remains not just unelected, but increasingly distinguished only by having helped to fund the party of hereditary privilege the Conservative party. Another 92 directly inherited their exalted positions.

If we as a country are to move away from the constant democratic gaslighting of this political class, we must make constitutional, democratic reform a political priority. It isnt a sideshow to be relegated behind the NHS, the energy crisis or climate issues. Discussion of the monarchy, our politics, our constitution, is something to be vigorously aired, not shut down or even temporarily suppressed.

In a UK that needs such deliberation, my own party would be wise to give expression to such democratic sentiment.

But as weve seen this week, republicans must also offer something that goes beyond the material technicalities of politics and governance. Sacrifice, timelessness and ritual need not be bound up in ermine and gold. We glimpsed that most recently during the pandemic. The sense of belonging, of something shared, the clapping for those who risked their lives who sacrificed for all of us. This is good politics; politics that demands of people that they sometimes act and feel in a way that goes beyond themselves and which is connected with the past and future of our society and community.

Perhaps a republican head of state could be regularly chosen from those who display these qualities. People who put their lives on the line such as the military and firefighters, but also people who commit in other ways like nurses and teachers, who give up their time to kids whose successes they may never live to see.

The British people have never, through democratic means, been given the chance to try something different and approve or reject constitutional monarchy. Instead, those who have exercised their so-called democratic rights have been shut down, intimidated or arrested.

Observing this I was reminded of a Chinese media student who shadowed me while I was a BBC reporter. During one conversation, I mentioned the massacre of Tiananmen Square. She hadnt heard of it, so I showed her John Simpsons now famous report on the tragedy. She watched it. Then she said: Yes, this is probably true. But then Im fully aware of the nature of the regime I live under. But you? You delude yourself you live in a democracy. So whos the bigger fool? She was right. It really is time for us to wake up and understand the flawed reality of the very limited democracy we inhabit.

Clive Lewis is the Labour MP for Norwich South

Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a letter of up to 300 words to be considered for publication, email it to us at guardian.letters@theguardian.com

Go here to see the original:
Amid the mourning, we republicans should look and learn but we must not be silenced - The Guardian

A Quinnipiac University poll conducted in late August found that 67 percent of U.S. adults think the nations democracy is in danger of collapse. That is what President Biden said in Philadelphia, many of you would respond, when he called out MAGA Republicans for an extremism that threatens the very foundations of our republic.

But in the Quinnipiac poll, Republicans were as likely as Democrats to say that democracy is in trouble (69 percent of each party, and 66 percent of independents). In fact, large majorities of every demographic groupno matter the age, gender, race or education levelagreed with this dire assessment. Does this mean we have achieved a consensus without realizing it?

Unfortunately, no. The more convincing explanation is that Americans are so divided in how they define democracy that they can reach the same conclusion for radically different reasons. So after Mr. Biden said that supporters of Donald Trump promote authoritarian leaders and fan the flames of political violence, many Republicans countered that it was Mr. Bidens speech that was a threat to freedom (as if Mussolini and Hitler got together, as Donald Trump Jr. put it).

[Related: Why Bidens speech on MAGA Republicans failed.]

Based on how different candidates in this years midterm elections talk about our political system, I can see four distinct definitions of American democracy. All of them will still have adherents after November, but the election results may give one or more of them momentum toward the next presidential election.

1. Democratic Party democracy. The Democrats are now pretty much united on what makes a functioning democracy, which was not always the case for the political party that was once strongest in the Deep South. Todays Democrats want to make voting as easy as possible, and they support the one person, one vote principle that says each vote in an election should be of equal worth, and each citizen should have equal representation in government. They generally want government to be quicker in responding to the demands of voters and responding to crises like gun violence and climate change.

And, as of now, they also support the principle of majority rule. This principle became more popular among Democrats after they lost two presidential elections despite winning the most votes, but there has been ambivalence about it. Many civil rights leaders opposed run-off primaries when they had the effect of knocking out Black candidates who could only win pluralities, and many supporters of Bernie Sanders were fine with the idea that he could get the Democratic nomination in 2020 by getting only a plurality of primary votes in a crowded field.

2. Traditional Republican Party democracy. Think of people like Liz Cheney, Mitt Romney and Bill Kristol here. Republicans have traditionally favored democracy with guardrails; that is, they dont want government acting too hastily in response to public opinion, and they worry about mob rule and a tyranny of the majority eroding individual rights. They dont always support the strict application of one person, one vote, and they defend the rules of the U.S. Senate, including the filibuster, as preventing more urban and populous states from dominating national government (though there is no equal mechanism to prevent a rural majority from dominating national government).

In normal times, Republicans would oppose Democratic Party attempts to maximize the power of the majority through such reforms as abolishing the Electoral College, expanding mail-in voting, and giving statehood to the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico. But this year many never-Trump Republicans are allied with the Democratic Party because, as Mr. Kristol puts it,

If we dont have two reasonably healthy parties, the unhealthy party has to be defeated.

The results of Republican Party primaries over the past six years, including the defeat of Ms. Cheney in her congressional primary in August, make it clear that traditional Republican champions of democracy are on the defensive within their own party.

[Related: Liz Cheneys ouster from Republican leadership is bigger than politics. Its a fundamental attack on truth.]

3. Stop the steal democracy. Most Trump Republicans do not agree that the Democrats are defenders of democracy. Mr. Trump himself, along with hundreds of Republicans running for statewide office this fall, claim without proof that President Bidens victory in 2020 was stolen or rigged. On the surface, they support the small-d democratic process in the United States, but their insistence that certain election results cannot be trusted inevitably erodes confidence in the legitimacy of all elections. (Some Democrats say that certain election laws, such as purging people from voter rolls when they miss elections, have led to unfair election outcomes, but very few have questioned the counting of ballots or the validity of official election results.)

The stop the steal movement does have various remedies for what it sees as a corrupt system. One is to give state governments the power to accept or reject election results (the thinking behind the attempt on Jan. 6, 2021, to nullify Mr. Bidens victory); similarly, there is an effort to get the Supreme Court to rule that state legislatures should have the sole authority to set election rules. Another strategy is to more tightly control voter participation by imposing ID requirements and registration deadlines, limiting the times and places where one can vote, and challenging the validity of individual votes as they are cast. Along with the prosecution of rare voter fraud cases even when fraud does not seem intended, these efforts could have a chilling effect on voter participation, but maximum voter turnout is not a goal of stop the steal partisans. Tellingly, 67 percent of Republicans in a Pew Research Center poll from 2021 said that voting is a privilege that comes with responsibilities and can be limited; only 21 percent of Democrats agreed, with most saying instead that voting is a fundamental right for every citizen and should not be restricted.

4. A republic, not a democracy (with an emphasis on the second part of the phrase). A smaller number of Republican and independent candidates say outright that democracy is not always a good thing, at least at the national level. (They may think it is OK at the local levelas in neighborhoods deciding what kind of housing is permitted, or parents deciding on a school districts curriculum. Call it subsidiarity without solidarity.)

Some think the problem is that voters ask too much from the government, and thus give the government too much power to tax citizens and regulate behavior. Democracy is a soft form of communism that basically assures bad and dangerous people will be in power, said Jeremy Kauffman, a Libertarian candidate for the U.S. Senate from New Hampshire, in an email interview with the Boston Globe.

But some voters in both parties seem to be disenchanted with democracy because it results in a government that is too weak. In an Axios/Ipsos Poll conducted in early September, 33 percent of U.S. adults (including 42 percent of Republicans and 31 percent of Democrats) agreed that strong, unelected leaders are better than weak elected ones. For years, Mr. Trump has echoed this sentiment by praising and even seeming to envy anti-democratic leaders like Chinese President Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin, and this year he seemed to get carried away in a conference-call rally with the Republican nominee for governor of Massachusetts. Geoff Diehl will rule your state with an iron fist, Mr. Trump told residents of the state that brought us the Boston Tea Party and the Battle of Bunker Hill, and hell do what has to be done.

Attacking democracy is a dicey strategy for winning elections, so most Trump allies running for office this year maintain that, yes, democracy is a good thing (even if they think it is easily corrupted). But there are occasional statements to the contrary.

Senator Mike Lee, a Republican from Utah, controversially tweeted that were not a democracy in 2020, adding We want the human condition to flourish. Rank democracy can thwart that. A spokesperson for Mr. Lee said that the senator was merely advocating republican checks on democratic passion, but the tech mogul Peter Thiel, a major donor to Republican candidates, has been more blunt, once writing for the libertarian Cato Institute that I no longer believe that freedom and democracy are compatible.

There is a big difference between grousing about democracy and actively trying to replace it with another form of government. Its also uncertain that there can be a lasting alliance between those who think democratic government is too strong and those who find it too weak. But the lack of consensus on what democracy is, and on what it should be, could end up doing away with democracy altogether.

[Read next: Abortion, student loans and the Republican weakness for nostalgia.]

See original here:
Republicans and Democrats agree that democracy is in trouble. They just don't agree on its definition. - America Magazine

In 2013, Rigetti Computing began its push to make quantum computers. That effort could bear serious fruit starting in 2023, the company said Friday.

That's because next year, the Berkeley, California-based company plans to deliver both its fourth-generation machine, called Ankaa, and an expanded model called Lyra. The company hopes those machines will usher in "quantum advantage," when the radically different machines mature into devices that actually deliver results out of the reach of conventional computers, said Rigetti founder and Chief Executive Chad Rigetti.

Quantum computers rely on the weird physics of ultrasmall elements like atoms and photons to perform calculations that are impractical on the conventional computer processors that power smartphones, laptops and data centers. Advocates hope quantum computers will lead to more powerful vehicle batteries, new drugs, more efficient package delivery, more effective artificial intelligence and other breakthroughs.

So far, quantum computers are very expensive research projects. Rigetti is among a large group scrambling to be the first to quantum advantage, though. That includes tech giants like IBM, Google, Baidu and Intel and specialists like Quantinuum, IonQ, PsiQuantum, Pasqal and Silicon Quantum Computing.

"This is the new space race," Rigetti said in an exclusive interview ahead of the company's first investor day.

For the event, the company is revealing more details about its full technology array, including manufacturing, hardware, the applications its computers will run and the cloud services to reach customers. "We're building the full rocket," Rigetti said.

Although Rigetti isn't a household name, it holds weight in this world. In February, Rigetti raised $262 million and became one of a small number of publicly traded quantum computing companies. Although the company has been clear its quantum computing business is a long-term plan, investors have become more skeptical. Its stock price has dropped by about three quarters since going public, hurt most recently when Rigetti announced the delay of a $4 million US government contract that would have accounted for much of the company's annual revenue of about $12 million to $13 million.

The company argues it's got the right approach for the long run, though. It starts in early 2023 with Ankaa, a processor that includes 84 qubits, the fundamental data processing element in a quantum computer. Four of those ganged together are the foundation for Lyra, a 336-qubit machine. The names are astronomical: Ankaa is a star, and Lyra is a constellation.

Rigetti doesn't promise quantum advantage from the 336 qubit machine, but it's the company's hope. "We believe it's absolutely within the realm of possibility," Rigetti said.

Having more qubits is crucial to more sophisticated algorithms needed for quantum advantage. Rigetti hopes customers in the finance, automotive and government sectors will be eager to pay for that quantum computing horsepower. Auto companies could research new battery technologies and optimize their complex manufacturing operations, and financial services companies are always looking for better ways to spot trends and make trading decisions, Rigetti said.

Rigetti plans to link its Ankaa modules into larger machines: a 1,000-qubit computer in 2025 and a 4,000-qubit model in 2027.

Rigetti isn't the only company trying to build a rocket, though. IBM has a 127-qubit quantum computer today, with plans for a 433-qubit model in 2023 and more than 4,000 qubits in 2025. Although qubit count is only one measure of a quantum computer's utility, it's an important factor.

"What Rigetti is doing in terms of qubits pales in comparison to IBM," said Moor Insights & Strategy analsyt Paul Smith-Goodson.

Along with those machines, Rigetti expects developments in manufacturing, including a 5,000-square-foot expansion of the company's Fremont, California, chip fabrication facility now underway, improvements in the error correction technology necessary to perform more than the most fleeting quantum computing calculations, and better software and services so customers can actually use its machines.

Rigetti Computing's plans for improvements to its broad suite of quantum computing technology.

To reach its goals, Rigetti also announced four new deals at its investor event:

Qubits are easily perturbed, so coping with errors is critical to quantum computing progress. So is a better foundation less prone to errors. Quantum computer makers track that with a measurement called gate fidelity. Rigetti is at 95% to 97% fidelity today, but prototypes for its fourth-generation Ankaa-based systems have shown 99%, Rigetti said.

In the eyes of analyst Smith-Goodson, quantum computing will become useful eventually, but there's plenty of uncertainty about how and when we'll get there.

"Everybody is working toward a million qubit machine," he said. "We're not sure which technology is really going to be the one that is going to actually make it."

See the original post:
Quantum Computing's Impact Could Come Sooner Than You Think - CNET

From the White House to the boathouse, infrastructure has traditionally been narrowly defined as the roads, bridges, waterways, and other projects that allowed a post-industrial America to flourish.

Not anymore.

In the latest sign that the technology revolution is moving in new directions, a six-line law with no name is helping to redefine the traditional notions of infrastructure to include artificial intelligence, quantum computing, and semiconductors.

The legislation, quietly signed by President Biden last month, amended a 2015 law widely known as a highway bill, as befitted its name: the Fixing Americas Surface Transportation (FAST) Act.

A provision of the law provides for expedited Federal environmental and permitting review for covered infrastructure construction projects. Currently, those projects include some of the largest, most complex, and novel infrastructure projects in the U.S., such as massive pipelines and multibillion-dollar renewable energy projects, according to a Federal steering council overseeing them.

Now, with the recent change in the law, the projects potentially qualifying for speeded-up review also encompass semiconductors, artificial intelligence and machine learning, high-performance computing and advanced computer hardware and software, quantum information science and technology, data storage and data management, (and) cybersecurity.

The amended law, titled only An Act, added those computer-related projects.

The legislations sponsor, Sen. Bill Hagerty, R-Tenn., says his intention is to boost national security, especially by fast-tracking permitting reviews of semiconductor plants expected to be built because of the Chips and Science Act. That law, also signed by Biden last month, provided funding incentives to establish such plants.

I came to Washington to create jobs for the American people and bolster our national security to beattheChinese Communist Partyin the competition that will define the century, Hagerty said after Biden signed the FAST Act law on Aug. 16. His office called the FAST Act legislation a watershed bill that enacts regulatory reform that benefits private-sector companies building products that are essential to American national and economic security.

A technology industry expert familiar with the legislation downplayed its effects, saying that Hagertys bill does not represent a collective movement to recast what critical infrastructure looks like. I think that smartly, what youre starting to see is more the ability to leverage technology as components of broader infrastructure projects. It doesnt make the components themselves infrastructure.

But the official summary of the bill by the respected Congressional Research Service calls AI, semiconductors and the other new technology projects now covered by the FAST Act infrastructure projects.

And infrastructure experts say that redefinition has the potential to fast-track a variety of tech projects beyond the scope of what has long been considered critical infrastructure.

Anthony Lamanna, a professor at the Del E. Webb School of Construction at Arizona State University, says infrastructure has traditionally been viewed as the built environment for civilization your water, your sewage, your electric.

When he first read the FAST Act revision, Lamanna says, I have a background in concrete and construction, so my gut was that the tech stuff doesnt really fit.

On further reflection, he says, Maybe we start looking at this as the chip manufacturers are part of this future cyber infrastructure I think somebody coming up with this stuff seems to be thinking far into the future. By fast-tracking these projects, were saying this is important to civilization in the future.

Adie Tomer, a senior fellow and infrastructure expert at the Brookings Institution, likened the language in Hagertys bill to last years high-profile Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, which he says makes it explicit that the way infrastructure is construed is that broadband and digital technology is considered infrastructure.

Clearly, we are modernizing our definition of physical infrastructure to include digital tech, says Tomer, who supports the change but says it also bears further scrutiny because data storage facilities and other projects potentially covered by Hagertys bill are privately owned.

What should be the Federal relationship with the private owners of those kinds of facilities? Tomer asked. I dont think its necessarily clear yet Its a critical area to watch.

On the day Biden signed the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act last year, a White House blog post hailing the legislation focused almost exclusively on projects such as roads, bridges, and rail, along with broadband.

But a MeriTalk review of the legislation shows that the word digital appears 144 times, including a Federal requirement to adopt digital management systems on construction sites using state-of-the-art automated and connected machinery and optimized routing software.

The bill also requires the administration to report to Congress on using digital tools and platforms as climate solutions, including AI and blockchain technologies.

The move towards redefining infrastructure for the tech age echoes recent developments in Europe, where the European Union adopted tougher cybersecurity rules for network and information systems. The European Commission, which proposed the measures, defined them as critical infrastructure protection that would make Europe fit for the digital age.

In Washington, the FAST Act legislation was introduced in the Senate by Hagerty and several co-sponsors on Jan. 10 and passed the same day by unanimous consent. After a brief floor debate, it cleared the House in July by a vote of 303-89.

During the debate, Rep. Jim Costa, D-Calif., called the legislation a commonsense bill that will build on the progress we are already making today with the CHIPS and Science Act.

The bill here simply adds key national security-related technologies, like semiconductors, to the types of projects that are eligible for an existing Federal program that improves the coordination between Federal departments on permitting, Costa added.

That environmental review and permitting process, Hagerty has said, should be much speedier for the tech projects now covered by his bill, dramatically (reducing) the time required to stand up new manufacturing capacity in strategically critical sectors, such as semiconductor fabrication.

The Federal Permitting Improvement Steering Council oversees that expedited permitting process. When it added another industry to the eligible projects last year, it chose one decidedly more traditional than high tech: mining.

Mining is an important infrastructure sector, the body wrote.

Continued here:
Are AI and Quantum Computing Infrastructure? The Feds Say Yes - MeriTalk