He is eating the chess pieces

As a writer I know I have to stop with only posting things about the news, which is political, because it's political when horrifying things happen and you're sad and enraged, because that means you're taking a stance, which you are, which is where we are as a country. Anyway I'll try.

The weather is good again in DC and I'm once again believing that he will die someday. Also baseball is coming back.

I want this to be 100% of social media content from now on

Also this is petty but Truth Social’s precision scale is weird. 2.06k likes is 2060 likes. Same number of characters.

It's about freeing the Iranian people even if it means killing them all www.theguardian.com/world/2026/m... Trump demands Iran’s ‘unconditional surrender’ as bombs pound Tehran and Beirut

I think “back home to their influencer houses” is what makes this gold. But worth reading for the comments too.

Six Americans and 700 Iranian civilians, including school kids. Seeing this messaging everywhere. Why is it so off-message for Dems to recognize foreign casualties when they frame the consequences?

Clears the incredibly low bar for being a decent human being and a professional athlete at the same time, and it will (should!) win him some fans.

A fun AI assignment for students would be to have them write an essay, then write another essay as if it were written by AI, and then identify what's different. I actually think kids would LOVE this, especially if it makes them realize AI's limitations and their own strengths.

Women > Men, part 1000000 www.nytimes.com/athletic/706...

You can help build billionaire-free local news. Repost this -> I give $1 Follow @51st.news -> I give $1 Follow me -> I give $1 Donate -> I match your gift Let's fight misinformation, help good journalists to make a decent living, and stick a big ol' finger in Jeff Bezos' eye.

Someone really needs to create a BS account for that necrotic hand.

This is pretty extraordinary

Guardian’s shade game is top notch.

Vote April 21 to make it happen if you’re in VA

But how will it look futuristic then

One thing that goes undermentioned (maybe?) is Trump’s 19th century essayist capitalization style. Random nouns capitalized for emphasis. This is intentional - you have to work to make this happen with texts and posts. By now it’s a brand but I wonder what really drives it.

“Benjamin Franklin, who turns up during episode two, is particularly nightmarish. He looks as if someone has genetically spliced Hugh Laurie with Anthony Hopkins, and then covered the resulting monstrosity in a thin layer of roving liver spots.” www.theguardian.com/film/2026/fe...

telling my adorable daughter i'm not putting the drawing she made on the fridge because it's toddlerslop

It’s like the live action Schoolhouse Rock characters running the city and it warms my soul

This is an abomination, yes, but it also shows the promise of AI, which is the promise of abominations

I just can’t get over the weird thank you for your attention to this matter thing. It’s deranged.

So a quarter of Republicans are concerned there hasn't been *quite* enough murder and kidnapping. www.nytimes.com/2026/01/23/u...

This is the kind of dorky government-can-work vibe that I can get behind

Weird because it’s ALL optics, the whole operation. He just wants to pick and choose the eyeballs that see it.

ARC and cover drop. Invisibilia, coming from Slant Books in April. Coffee is extra. #booksky #writingcommunity #coverdrop #shortstories

Best TikTok thing going is the two dudes trying food from every country without leaving NYC. If you haven’t seen them yet, it’s incredible. My favorite so far is last week’s. Legit got me emotional.

On only hours notice, hundreds of New Yorkers are gathering in Foley Square to protest the murder of Renee Nicole Good

Agree, it doesn’t matter at all if she was a citizen. It’s bad framing.

This is important - it can't just be about abolishing ICE, there has to be the guarantee of prosecutions, even if that happens down the road. Everyone signing up for ICE now has to know what's waiting for them. It's not a real job and there is no immunity.

Abolish and prosecute ICE. They did a murder in broad daylight today. Imagine what they're doing in the closed facilities we're somehow not even allowed to see.

We don't have to live like this.

Ah so it’s just about priorities

Just a shoutout to the graphic designer who did the Gary Busey icon here. theonion.com/why-are-we-d...

A screaming park where all anyone does is scream into the void alongside others is an idea from a chilling dystopian hellscape but still amazing. I’d do it.

The first thing that made me laugh out loud in four days

I, not a poet, just wrote about Mary Oliver and enjambments on Substack, a site I know nothing about. open.substack.com/pub/dcprose/...

my people

man I hope this isn't the high point of 2026 in retrospect

"What stayed with me wasn’t just pride, though there was plenty of that. It was relief. Relief that, for once, a side selling hope instead of fear had won." On an otherwise ugly day, newswise, this is pretty awesome from Aymann Ismail at @slate.com slate.com/news-and-pol...

This is not hard. Artists are not responsible for ensuring the Kennedy Center remains relevant and successful. The center’s board is responsible for that, in a fiduciary way. All of this energy being directed at artists should be re-directed at the board.

Really is the best city

It’s hard to feel sinister in pajamas. If more people wore pajamas all day there would be less evil in the world. Or at least the evil would be more embarrassing.

This is pretty brilliant and I’d love to see it

Not even the 10th worst thing this week but I've been thinking about the new plaques he installed. Someone engraved those things, matted and framed the autopen etc. I'm fascinating by the people quietly going about their business doing terrible things. www.nbcnews.com/politics/whi...

Something uniquely sad and eerie about coming across an abandoned playground in the woods. But also this is just what all our playgrounds in New Jersey looked like when I was a kid, so it takes me back.

Healing words

fwiw, we can absolutely primary house members a lot sooner & this *should* be career ruining for anyone who voted in favor of this twisted shit they’re creating these bills with immigrant and/or trans minors first to develop a permission structure to violate everyone’s children

Watching ManU and Bournemouth, and every time it's a solid blue v solid red match-up I think of the objectively greatest toy of all time.