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Rumor has it a certain council member has been dancing under the pseudonym “Captain Smokeshow.” 🦞

The Rutgers TPUSA chapter — whose characterization of a historian there as a “outspoken, well-known antifa member” led to death threats and moving his family to Europe — think *other* people are being “blatantly defamatory.” Not them, though. They’re doing politics the right way.

Vice Mayor asking CMs not to leave so that they don’t lose quorum. Lots of folks already left. One CM huffing as she left well earlier that “We have done everything but the business of government tonight” to either no one, us council nerds, or the lobbyists still hanging out on the middle.

Shoutout tonight at council for verbs.

Federal programs going away? Sounds like a good time to relieve costs on Nashvillians and provide free transportation using dollars we have locally!! At least just mail out Journey Passes to everybody making under 300% above the poverty line.

Folks, I think this race is gonna be a big deal. 🦞

Yes, arresting a journalist for doing their job is a big flashing red light. But I don't want people to forget the whole reason everyone is out there. This is what I saw inside: Four holding rooms. Two smaller rooms were being used for holding protesters. Two larger rooms held ICE/CBP captives.

One of the stupider parts of this specific corner of social media (here or formerly Twitter) is that you’ll sometimes see posts that seem entirely reasonable. Maybe good, in fact. But if you only knew the context, you’d realize just how absurd it was.

It’s a real disappointment that this didn’t stick before. The article in the next post down provides interesting historical context.

If you’re a national news reporter who printed ICE’s bullshit version of events yesterday, you have a responsibility to also report the truth now that local independent journalists figured it out for you. And if you’re not, you can still donate to @unraveledpress.com

Ben Shapiro tried to deny it's a genocide in Gaza to Charlamagne on The Breakfast Club. So I went on the show today to explain why Shapiro got the definition of genocide wrong, & point out that he uses the G-word for Syria & the Uyghurs, which are nowhere near as genocidal as Gaza. Enjoy:

wow! almost like the right has an intentional habit of blaminf minority groups for actions, the same groups they coincidently think should be “eradicated”

One of the scarier things about our current moment is just how fractured our sources for information are. But also how fractured our understanding of the world around us is.

Just a periodic reminder that a VHS player is called a “VCR,” a name becoming lost to time.

On the topic of “our” duty to persuade abusers, a tale: —— THE FINGER-TAKER’S SON Whenever the king became displeased with one of his subjects, he would send out his soldiers, and before long the offender would find themselves in the basement of the king’s finger-taker.

Glad to see folks working to meet the moment.

So many things happening have me thinking that we’ll need a Reconstruction-level effort when we’re on the other side, but we’ll actually need to complete the job.

this garbage framing really needs to stop. it's not about crime. we know this. asking people how they feel about crime pretends that it is about crime. pretending it's about crime is supporting trump's framing. stop it.

You have to organize. I don't know what else to tell people. And organizing is not sexy and it is difficult and it matters that you be persistent. We need long-distance runners right now.

i find this image so fascinating. it is both a literal example of authoritarianism but also a second-hand reproduction of the aesthetics of other authoritarian states. it's like a simulacra of authoritarianism whose purpose is to attempt to make the simulacra real.

Voting by mail is more accessible for a lot of chronically ill/disabled people, many of whom likely won't qualify to continue doing so if stringent exemption policies are in place, as I wrote last week at @motherjones.com. www.motherjones.com/politics/202...

Might be a good time to know that there is a GI Rights Hotline that can counsel people trying to get out of the military. girightshotline.org

This feels like the last election again. A certain kind of Dem Party partisan keeps the goal posts moving. They’ve crowned Newsom already. No time to dissent before the contest has even begun!

Gavin Newsom is a transphobe "show me the evidence" thread, for all those Vote Blue No Matter Who posters in your replies. this isn't the guy. push back on everyone who is trying to convince you the primary has been decided years in advance with a guy that loses in the general.

Remembering how Terminator 3 updated the threat of AI to the Internet. We need a new entry to incorporate LLMs, but that also moves the franchise into comedy (like how Cameron himself moved Aliens from horror to action).

everyone's reading this tweet completely wrong. the dude just wants to talk about all these ninja turtles

I hope we see the field expand soon. The amount of defenses I’ve seen of Newsom from Dems *before a primary has started* is incredibly disappointing.

I think much of what’s going on right now deserves a thoughtful explanation of the contradictions and complications. (This below does that.) Many times our pithiest thoughts aren’t going to quite fit the bill and we’ll be arguing pancakes and waffles.

No one owes anyone else romantic love. How would we guarantee that? The answers are all unsettling. We owe each other a society that lets everyone thrive. Loneliness is not something only felt by straight men. Our society is alienating everyone from one another. One solution…

Looks like they have the debate up on IG: www.instagram.com/reel/DNUKXsQ...

Feeling even more confident that @aftynbehn.bsky.social can pull a win in the TN 7 special election. An opportunity for some Nashvillians to beat the gerrymander! @eastnashtivists.bsky.social put together a great debate. Hoping it’s up to stream for folks who missed it.

Weirdest defense of taking corporate money I’ve ever heard at the District 7 debate.

If your answer at the Dem debate with starts with “we need a strong border” or something like that, what are you doing here?

Tonight’s dumb napkin cartoon…

imagining "Big Balls Beatdown" in a middle-school social studies textbook

I would support this with one caveat: each of these territories should first be asked if they want independence. Especially if we're talking about Puerto Rico.

The rich must be incentivised; the poor must be disciplined. The political economy of the super-elite in one headline.

If I have to explain to you why it's a bad idea to use a machine that makes shit up 15-80% of the time AND destroys the environment AND contributes to rising fascism and genocide AND puts brilliant skillful creatives out of work by stealing their work, then we're already speaking different languages

kennedy is going to kill a lot of people

Every day the news is like “the US government announces that meat can be sold without saying what animal it is & they are also mandating a return to mercury thermometers,” followed by “RFK Jr. has removed the coloring from Twizzlers in a major win for everyday Americans & their health & pocketbooks”

The Hill working with Onion-level material here.

Nashville 🦞 question: What public creeks do we have? Nice, cool flowing water on a hot day. Even just a place to get your feet in.

when they close it all up, I do believe this will go down as the funniest video on the internet

I feel like a broken record but the president doesn't have legal authority to do this

this reminds me of the period in american politics when pundits would demand that any black politician of note — really, any black person in politics with a national audience — “condemn farrakhan”

I don’t know if this is going to make a lot of sense to anyone else, but the sound of a phone vibrating for a text or app notification (depending on the surface the phone is on) reminds me of the beginning of “Somebody That I Used to Know.”

you rail against how wasteful AI is since it’s an idiotic technology and yet you meet your basic needs using modern conveniences? interesting.

I could be mistaken, but I think I just got an AI fundraising call with fake room tone.

This council meeting needs a white board.