The looksmaxers are apparently self limiting and ephemeral, everyone. No need to bother learning more about them

so he ended up arguing that we should hate the sin of torture but we shouldnt blame the sinners - in some ways, perhaps, we should actually pity them as our scapegoat/sin-eaters - because they were just doing what "we" all wanted them to do. so really in some ways we're ALL torturers, right, man?

The Greek epics feel a lot like a mix of the Monty Python Holy Hand Grenade parody of biblical texts crossed with Dragon Ball Z.

It is really funny that Virgil decided that the founder of Rome was a demi-god who got his ass hand to him so completely by a mortal (Diomedes) that his mother (Aphrodite/Venus) had to rescue him. Later he also had his ass beat by a stronger demi-god(Achilles) and Poseidon had to save him.

Great work by @rooseveltinstitute.org @elizabethwwilkins.bsky.social rooseveltinstitute.org/publications...

That's Sulyok standing next to him in attached photo. Brutal.

Let's just do it and be Christmas legends

I am annoyed that I constantly find myself considering sortition seriously

Russ Vought specifically calls out USAID as something he's proud of (illegally) dismantling. The cut foreign aid has likely already killed hundreds of thousands of people and will eventually kill millions.

"This guy didn't even offer him a nice place to sit on a lamb skin?" "A bath with no oils?" Zeus is going to fuck him up. "Woah wait...if you go without me offering you a place t sleep tonight I am going to get gored by divine bulls. Would you at least sit by the fire for a bit?"

Last night: "And then Nestor the Horse Lord spoke again and..." ::kids groan::

I'm reading the Odyssey to the kids and I want to relate me favorite part so far: Telemachus, the son of Odysseus has called a town meeting to public accuse his mother's suitors of being ignoble and the great sin (in ancient Greece) of being a bad guest. The suitors protest his description so...

As the present Fascist International teeters and wobbles and starts breaking apart I'm very curious to find out how many more core components of the American conservative project are plain-old foreign-influence operations

The ethos of NYC as succinctly put by Glove and Boots (RIP) is, "move fast or get out of the way."

I love that spring in New York is just a handful of non-consecutive days that occur over a roughly two month period that also includes snowstorms and heat waves

Ok I guess the AC guess on today. On April 15th.

Taxes are good, actually.

Are there literally any signs that the regime is going to collapse?

about competitive authoritarianism that autocrats call elections they think they have successfully rigged, as a legitimation tool, and are sometimes forced out by a too-big-to-rig verdict. Read a political science sometimes, guys. 2/

I mixed up peremptory and perfunctory. today. Embarrassing.

I see dead people (and so do you)

american exceptionalism is nothing when compared to southern exceptionalism

Tax anyone who upholds the most evil government in our nation's history into bankruptcy. Burn every confederate flag, wreck every monument, and uphold the glorious history of redemption during Reconstruction while cursing elites that stole that brighter future for the South from us.

We still have to finish the Reconstruction. The wound is still festering.

DOGE turbocharged the deficit. budgetlab.yale.edu/research/wea...

Lesser known nerd rock Tuesday www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZIpO...

Even if she went to the room with the intention of having sex people are allowed to change their mind. Maybe she thought he was a creep or the vibe changed and she wanted to leave? People shouldn't defend rapists.

It’s infuriating when a woman comes forward about a man raping her in his hotel room after drinking and the response is “Why would she go to his room?” “Why would she drink with him?” This is Mike Pence logic. Women should be allowed to hang out with men without expecting they will be raped.

Very pleased and sort of stunned to be part of the new class of Guggenheim fellows.

you are not unc if you're in your 30s. you're unc if you are a black man that dresses like this.

used to work with a writer who kept pitching "explainers" for "gamer terms" like "thick" (yes, seriously) and would not accept that these words originate from AAVE and then get disseminated through the FGC into the broader gaming community.

You have to be a consciously malicious liar to say this, considering Christian charities were begging them not to defund the agency and they did anyway. And now hundreds of thousands are dying from it. What an absolutely depraved man.

i bet this goes crazy if you’re a dumbass

If I were a man of faith I might wonder if God was trying to tell me something.

One of my proudest pieces, "Isometric Exercise"

Oh no, someone is putting sociology in economics again! is the economy truly part of society and full of humans?

you know, at some point, we are going to have to clarify what “if it drags on” actually means

Just played a game of Civ 7 as Ashoka the World Renouncer where I was on a large island with just 4 settlements and just built wonders and did science and utterly dominated in science and culture in the ancient era. Every other homeland civilization surprise war'ed me and slowly sent 1-2 troops...

Reaganism still rules the GOP (and they are hellbent on making these statements self-fulfilling prophecy)

The community is rallying around him quietly, I think they're realizing that the administration wants to get rid of that guy at your table at men's group, the contractor who did some work for you, the usher who greets you Sunday morning at church. Good people you know are being hurt, especially kids

If I were a man of faith I might wonder if God was trying to tell me something.

In honor of this day I will (re)post my favorite (and extremely surreal) youtube adaptation. www.youtube.com/watch?v=yVmw...

Peter Magyar’s election is an earthquake for MAGA. He says Orban’s regime paid for CPAC events in Hungary, that is a “crime,” and he’s ending the practice. CPAC conferences in the U.S. & Hungary are key ideological events for the far-right. Now they’ll have to pay for it on their own in Hungary.

I'm fairly gobsmacked by the number of people who profess surprise that Orbán was funding CPAC. Did you know of his ties to Heritage and Project 2025? One of the most telling, tho, was he funded Rufo and the racist Trump tried to install at State, Jeremy Carl. www.splcenter.org/resources/ha...

GONZALES OUT AS WELL. Good.

No tax on tips!

schism! schism!

all of the debates about popularism etc were just such a waste of time. not entirely. messaging matters. it’s better to have good messaging than bad messaging. but what moves voters - especially in this polarized and calcified era - is events. but it’s hard to write that every day on substack tbf.

This is the worst analysis I have ever read.

How many Americans are one illness or injury away from being a Door Dash Grandma? #precarity