This is nuts.

They're building the SS with federal money.

“Each act, each occasion, is worse than the last, but only a little worse. You wait for the next and the next. You wait for one great shocking occasion, thinking that others, when such a shock comes, will join with you in resisting somehow..."

Today’s poem: Theodore Roethke, “I Knew a Woman” #lunchpoems

Random thought but, whatever opinions you might have about reddit and the various gay subreddits, r/askgaybrosover30 smashed a lot of lies I had been holding onto as a closeted conservative christian, and people there helped me find a path out of the closet, and I will be forever grateful for that.

This book is “the tits” as @thejacko.bsky.social would say. (I’m going to just keep plugging it.)

This is revisionist bullshit. Jefferson de-supernaturalized the New Testament. In 1797 congress ratified and Adams signed the treaty of Tripoli, the english text of which says that “the Government of the United States of America is not in any sense founded on the Christian religion”.

He conceives of himself as the absolute dictator of the world, bound by nothing but his own sense of what’s right.

There’s a thing that happens in social groups when a charismatic malignant narcissist gains influence. People excuse his cruelty, play down the abuse, then shift toward victim-blaming. The longer it goes on, the more the narcissist transforms the personalities and behavior of the people who remain.

the entirety of the free world has been Neville Chamberlaining for the past year and it is such a disgrace.

unhinged, angry psychopaths.

saturday morning cartoons

genuinely kind of fascinating that Ventura of all people is making an extremely lucid comparison of Trump to Marcos

In case anyone finds it useful, some quick Iran background, based on being married into an Iranian family for nearly 30 years now. It’s pretty much what you might expect. . .

Two movies that come to mind tonight that are worth watching: Gandhi (1981) Battle of Algiers (1966) Both timely.

I agree with this, but also want to say: this is not a reason to stifle your own voice, or not show up to protest. We are many. The more of us they hurt, the stronger we will become.

NYC folks: i’m headed to foley square. maybe i’ll see you there.

this is one of the worst features of modern political journalism. skip reporting on facts, policies, practical impact, etc. we just run polls and report on statistics, in a gigantic narrative-generation circle jerk.

worth noting: christian nationalists want to overthrow the constitution in order to restore their fantasy christian society… because their belief system is so bad at winning converts they cannot persuade people by the means their own religion specifies.

Just picked up @lkatfield.bsky.social Furious Minds at Munro’s in Victoria BC. Already loving it. A great supplement to recent books on Post-liberalism books such as Kelly and Sleat @politybooks.bsky.social This is a fine genealogy of the US right but has implications for us over the pond Atlantic

There are (among others) two basic ways of seeing America. You can see it as this amazing bastion of freedom that was achieved in 1776 because the founders made a government out of Lockean liberal ideas. Their project hit some snags along the way, but the founding was good and pure and right.

This is the way.

Today’s poem: Denise Levertov, “A Cloak” #lunchpoems

Cardinal Müller (former doctrine chief for the Vatican) is in First Things today with a vacuous bit of handwringing about double truth theory. So here’s my take on the question, which was in part inspired by the hypocrisy I saw during my years as a conservative catholic.

jamelle just keeps getting better and better ❤️

If you are anxious and sad about the state of the world, that's fine, and there are plenty of strategies for dealing with that. But I think you already know that drive-by online dooming isn't a strategy. It's selfish and adolescent. It's a contagion that only spreads the worst of you, not the best.

There is a grave moral consequence to letting this go on. Shut down the government, have a general strike, grind the country to a halt, hit the streets. But not treating a demented administration lying about its thugs committing cold-blooded murder as an emergency? That is an emergency in itself.

thats not what makes it hot. its the yearning.

if you need something to make you smile, here's Aaron Copland conducting "Rodeo".

finally, the times is willing to interpret the evidence instead of playing agnostic

The Tarkin Doctrine: 1. Impose control through terror 2. Get blown up 3. ????? 4. Profit!

impeach him NOW

lol if you show up in my mentions being a doomer and your profile advertises that you’re a “sociopathic asshole”, that’s a block.

biceps / triceps ✅

Wipe out the democratic establishment. I want an army of AOCs, Jasmine Crocketts, Zohrans and Landers. This accommodationist bullshit is just palliative care as they usher our democracy into a quiet death.

Listening to Satyagraha at the gym.

AOC: This has now become what we feared most about ICE for a long time—that it would be used as an anti-civilian force with no accountability. At the end of the day, what we saw today was a murder, and murders in cold blood need to be prosecuted.

AOC: ICE has less accountability than virtually any law enforcement agency in the U.S., yet they are some of the most well-funded, operating with impunity—and we just saw them murder an American citizen in cold blood in the street.

HuffPost has obtained a video of a physician trying to give medical care to the woman shot and killed by ICE goons today, and not being allowed to go near her. The ICE agents claim there are medics on site, but witnesses scream that there are no medics present

The woman murdered by ICE: 37-year-old Renee Good.

I’m sitting on the toilet watching a video of myself reading “Still I Rise” by Maya Angelou, and weeping.

The “prosecute the former regime at every level” candidate has my vote in 2028.

important message to all bluesky users

"I just don't see how the cold blooded murder of a mother in Minneapolis is going to bring back the 5 for 5 deal at Arby's"

Thinking about this essay I wrote a few years back about collective myth-making and its role in both the MAGA world and certain forms of Christianity.

Serious question: did the expression “hot wife” originate as a joke about Jerry Falwell Jr.’s cucking fetish?

Here's a cherished memory. My freshman year of college I was in an intensive year-long Great Books program. The program had three courses per semester: Philosophy, Literature, and History/Politics. At the end of spring semester I ended up in a study group prepping for finals.

Since we're doing 10 year photo comparisons: 2006 vs. 2016 vs. 2026.