This is making me nervous. MAGA acquaintances in PDX are super worked up about things in MN, egged on by livestreamers like Nick Shirley. I've seen other livestreamers at the kebab cart by PSU library this week. I've heard comments on the "high number of Muslims" downtown. Yikes is right.

y'all, I am SO TIRED of people confusing facts with feelings

Seeing a lot of confusion re the J6 pipe bomber. I think the piece people are missing is that to MAGA types this is incontrovertible proof that J6 was a false flag/inside job/staged event to make them look bad. Guilty parties include Democrats, Capitol Police, and "them"

Covering the reception desk at my new job this morning 😬 Last time, last week, I only got two questions and messed both of them up a tiny bit. Let's hope today I get zero questions and mess none of them up at all!

Today I learned that Senile Satan controls hurricanes, and not just with a sharpie. Kristi Noem: “You made it through the hurricane season without a hurricane. You kept the hurricanes away. We appreciate that.”

Me during my child's college orientation when the campus police officer said "don't panic if you don't hear from your kid for a few hours, they're in college now!" LOL funny Me today: I haven't heard from my child since 7:30 am and WE MUST BUST THE DOOR OF HER DORM ROOM DOWN

Bus-commuted today because biking in the dark and rain scares me :-/ Missed the first bus by thirty seconds, boo. Will do better tomorrow, and it'll make me even more eager to get back on the bike in late January or early February.

Me: I am a responsible adult who can work from home Also me: Oh wow, I need to rearrange the suncatchers on this window before I can do anything else (To be fair, I would probably also do this in the office)

"I'm not getting a single good idea out here. let's go back inside, where the gas is"

ʎuɹoH History: Thanksgiving, The Violence They Called Providence 𝘐𝘵’𝘴 𝘳𝘦𝘢𝘭 𝘩𝘪𝘴𝘵𝘰𝘳𝘺, 𝘢𝘴 𝘵𝘰𝘭𝘥 𝘣𝘺 𝘴𝘰𝘮𝘦 𝘥𝘶𝘥𝘦 𝘪𝘯 𝘮𝘺 𝘪𝘯𝘣𝘰𝘹 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘮𝘦. More on this linked in the comments. ♥️ New here? Hi I’m Brooke and I tell the right-wing men in my inbox history until they no longer wish to ‘date’ me. 😉

My prediction is that by the end of the year Trump is out and Vance is in, for any number of reasons (death, illness, crime, embarrassment) since that's what Thiel and other tech billionaires wanted all along. Hope I'm wrong! 🙃

This is vital to understand. I've seen friends and acquaintances slide alarmingly into full antisemitism in the past couple years.

MAGA friend is all in on this, and his friends are too. It's huge in the conspiracy sphere, one of those things that wraps everything together nicely that they love.

For some weird reason I'm using ChatGPT to make an illustrated decision tree from an convo I had earlier. This has taken 90 minutes and still isn't done right. If I'd just done it on my own it would have been done over an hour ago. So I guess I'm proving that I'm still smarter, which feels good.

My cat is this all of the time.

working during the week of Thanksgiving

My kiddo and I watched the livestream of this concert (so good!) and told MAGA friend about it and of course I got an earful about how this was all the fault of the vaccines.

Dragged myself out on my bike this morning and glad I did. Got rained on a bit but also saw the sun for maybe the last time this year 🌦️

MAGA friend watched An Inconvenient Study last night and was telling me how it felt 'validating' for his friends to know there are 40 people in Portland who 'agree on the truth,' just in case you wanted to know how things are going on that front

Today's bike commute required sunglasses (wow!)

This morning's bike commute: no freight trains (yay!), very cold, no animals, few people, brrrr

Things I saw on my bike ride this morning: Two loud seagulls arguing A train at the Gideon overcrossing for the second morning in a row Two Porsches, one Maserati

MAGA friend now telling me the ICE kidnappings are a conspiracy theory to put the Democrats back into power so that 'they' can continue to be in charge. Asking who 'they' are resulted in a nervous breakdown on both our parts.

MAGA friend was telling me last night that this is all fake news and ICE is not actively detaining people in the Portland area 🙄

MAGA acquaintances are all in on this one, yet another thing that will 'blow the deep state wide open"

I car-commuted for the past five years and now can thankfully bus or bike. These are great tips for those who can't.

HAPPY FOUR SEASONS TOTAL LANDSCAPING DAY TO ALL WHO CELEBRATE

I think it is very clear that the Trump regime sees the right-wing influencers on the ground in Portland as an informal arm of their government www.theverge.com/policy/81340...

Last day in my current job. Last reference question of my current job (unless we get a rush!). Having some feels.

MAGA friend mentioned this today, but in the completely-buying-it-and-arguing-with-me-about-how-he-KNOWS-if-something-is-AI context. So these are out there as truth in the MAGAsphere.

“Facts are stubborn things; and whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictates of our passion, they cannot alter the state of facts and evidence.” John Adams, born on this day in 1735

What we’re witnessing in America is what happens when disordered discourse captures a political party, then the state itself. The Republican Party was the first to fall - abandoning truth for conspiracy, ideology for grievance, and policy for performative outrage.

I found 51 cents while cleaning out my office! Follow me for more financial planning advice

Why am I friends with MAGA people? I have lived in red states/towns most of my adult life. I have lots of conservative friends and family. We have always gently disagreed up until a few years ago. Now it's polarized and I want to understand why. Because it's not just my world, but the whole US.

David Brooks is a conservative pundit who has not been a Trump supporter. I don't always agree with him, however, he does look beyond the surface for a majority of his reporting. Equating Donnie with Pol Pot is a bold step...and every bit true.

MAGA friend has called me with a 'startling insight' which is basically just sounding like Guns, Germs and Steel.

Trump's DOJ claimed it's "undisputed that nearly a quarter" of Federal Protective Services had to be diverted to Portland. Now, they tell the Ninth Circ it's more like ~13.1%. They "deeply regret the errors." storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us... Background www.allrisenews.com/p/9th-en-ban...

MAGA friend has been on the carnivore diet (all meat, heavy on beef and pork) for over a year and finally started experiencing some serious health issues this summer. But of course it's the "gluten toxins" leaving his body that are the problem.

MAGA friend, on video deepfakes: I love them, they're going to teach everyone to think more critically about what they see Me: No, it's going to make people believe whatever they think is true and not think critically at all Him: Agree to disagree Me: [Head explodes]

This is the video that Homeland Security posted today.

“Can you put two and two together about what’s going on here??” @saikatforcongress.bsky.social connects the dots for the panel

Moomin has the right idea

I asked MAGA friend about the White House tear-down. At first he denied knowing what I was talking about. "Oh, the renovations?" he finally said. "That's no big deal." I asked how it'd play if Biden had done it. Silence.

Why does everyone keep calling it “The Epstein Ballroom?” Please stop repeating “The Epstein Ballroom” because it is not called “The Epstein Ballroom!” Don’t tell the news that it’s called “The Epstein Ballroom” and please don’t repost this!!!!!

Yet another day where I feel like I'm losing my damn mind when I look at the news. How are any of us functioning?

Exactly this part of the White House is gone.

Astronaut Ronald McNair would have been 75 today. He died in 1986 when the space shuttle Challenger exploded.

this is an absolutely wild use of passive voice, where you have to get through layers of narrative to figure out an ICE agent smashed a car window with his gun like an idiot, which went off and shot two people