If.

People who aren't civil often demand civility from others. People who think that others are *owed* civility, regardless of their behavior, or that civility is some sort of unconditional virtue, are just asking for it. 2/

I don't think it necessarily needs to be violent—the USSR's breakup, while not completely peaceful, was mostly nonviolent, and Czechoslovakia's was pretty much completely peaceful. Now there are differences between these situations and ours, I know—but an "amicable divorce" shouldn't be ruled out.

I can't think of any way to save the US other than to break it up. The current constitution needs wholesale revision and that's simply not going to happen in the current union following Article V procedures. Dissolving the union opens up entirely new possibilities to create new forms of gov't.

The conventional wisdom, of course, is that (as Gavin Newsom puts it) "divorce is not an option." Really? Nothing lasts forever, including nations. I realize that the dissolution of the U.S. isn't likely to be entirely peaceful. But it is an option.

“Tone-down the rhetoric” is an odd expression, as turning most tone controls down would only make the rhetoric slightly muffled and indistinct due to the Fletcher-Munson curves, thus only reducing perceived, but not not real, loudness. Should be “volume-down“, or, more correctly, “amplitude-down”.

Also, since their firing was wildly illegal & unconstitutional, they should never have been fired in the first place & the people who did it should go to jail for the rest of their lives.

Which makes the reticence among many when it came to criticism of pro-Brexit campaigning in the mid- to late 2010s baffling. The creeping breakdown of politics and policy in the UK is anchored in how Brexit showed how irresponsible populism could be a path to victory

Don't usually disagree with this source, but I'm unsure what government is supposed to do when a large private sector company is cyber-hacked so badly that doesn't further entrench the new corporatism of large companies not allowed to fail.

Nigel Farage comparing paracetamol to thalidomide reminds me of Jeremy Corbyn comparing the evidence Russia was behind the Salisbury poisonings to claims about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. Tapping into different seams of the "Don't Believe what THEY tell you" mindset, but with the same goal.

Encouraging thread. Read in full (provided you havent maxed out your good news quota for the day on Kimmel coverage)

The way Thiel deploys the Antichrist in arguments is deeply bizarre, as it has little to do with Christianity. For the subset of Christians who believe in it, the coming of the Antichrist isn’t strictly a bad thing, as it’s necessary step on the path to Jesus’s return.

Very few people still alive have faced this real and present a threat of fascism, this multi-faceted a set of impossible global challenges. We have to build alliances with people with whom we disagree on almost everything - except saving democracy. We must internalise this before we lose all. 10/10

Every policy choice becomes incredibly simple: Just tell America to fuck off. Just tell Russia to fuck off. Just tell Israel to fuck off. Just tell markets to fuck off. Just tell money to fuck off. Just tell tech to fuck off. Just tell voters to fuck off. JUST SHOUT THE MORAL THING A BIT LOUDER. 6/

🧵 The left in most countries comprises factions arguing that progressive party X must be more left, more centre, or split the difference. The often poor result is then bent into validating the thesis, amplify in-fighting. In fact, data points to in-fighting as the most influential voter turn-off. 1/

On the blatant double standards the media - BBC included - deploys while showcasing Nigel Farage. He is constantly given a free pass not granted to other politicians. bylines.scot/news/the-far...

"History shows this damage-limitation strategy cannot win over authoritarian actors. And each concession chips away at the stigma that once kept far-right ideas at the margins. What was once extreme is increasingly treated as normal".

“I think we're going to test ABC out on this. Let's see how we do. Last time I went after them, they gave me $16 Million Dollars. This one sounds even more lucrative.” I don’t think he’s ever been quite this explicit about his extortion.

it's absolutely fucking crazy that "retroactively legalize Watergate" and "exclude Black people from literally every area of public life" are the two primary a objectives of the chief justice and yet he is never reported on like the vicious gutter racist he is.

We have Tucker hosting Holocaust deniers on his show while cackling at Kirk’s memorial about the “hummus eaters” who killed Jesus, and Candace blaming Israel for Kirk’s death, and now Rogan and his lizard people…whatever happened to MAGA’s ever so authentic concerns about antisemitism?

Whatever else you think of him, I don't think he is insincere about this stuff, and it should be recognized as extraordinary that he, Pritzker, and other governors are talking about the federal government in these terms. It's not normal political rhetoric, it's the language of existential emergency.

Important 🧵 Former leader of the Donbas Russian separatists Pavel Gubarev to Visioner: “…on many sections of the front we are attacking, while the enemy is defending. Because of this, we are suffering incomparably heavy losses."

"The Armed Forces of Ukraine are completely satisfied with the current situation and do not particularly need any peace. Considering their effective work against our oil refineries, with 26% of production destroyed, the situation created is strategically beneficial for them."

"At the same time, state propaganda continues to mislead the public, as if the Ukrainian army is faltering and we will soon win. In reality, the current situation is already tantamount to defeat for us.

“Russia does not have the capability to complete the special military operation with the achievement of set goals and victory under the colonial system of the current government."

Newsom: "I fear that we will not have an election in 2028 -- I really mean that in the core of my soul -- unless we wake up to the code red, what's happening in this country, and we wake up soberly to how serious this moment is."

Retribution should start at the top, but should not stop there. And it should be swift, severe, and not over-focused on observing constitutional niceties that exist now mostly in (some) lawyers' imaginations. /end

> tit for tat Axelrod & Rapaport were right. So was Karl Popper.

I'm sorry. No commissions. Investigations and charges and trials.

We have seen this over and over again before. See the opposition to “Obamacare” versus support for its key policies. The left focuses too much on details and popularity of individual items but loses the fight over the larger political agenda to the far right.

Read the Dekleptocracy substack: "When a phantom foundation with no address, no registration and a founder who might not exist, wires $100 million to the president's crypto company, America has a problem" dekleptocracy.substack.com/p/trumps-she...

Class consciousness and solidarity among elites, in the culture of elite circles, trumps evaluating the moral character of the other elites you associate with. In fact, evaluating their moral character and acting appropriately on that evaluation is viewed as dreadfully uncouth.

Disney should pull their shows from the Sinclair affiliates. Start with Monday Night Football. And college football on Saturdays, followed by the NBA. That's how you fuck Sinclair.

Sunstein also contends in this interview that all nine sitting Supreme Court Justices are committed liberals as he defines the term.

I'm just gonna keep reposting this inane BS from Justice Kavanaugh's concurrence on the roving immigration patrol case from LA.

No, supporting trans rights doesn’t cost elections! “43 percent of voters were more likely to vote for a candidate who stands up for transgender people. Just 21 percent of voters would be less likely to support a candidate who supports trans rights.”

Chilling dispatch from Mario Guevara, the journalist trapped in ICE detention for...doing his job.

Now she tells us. Maybe she should have thought of that a bit sooner. Like before she did it.

I’m almost okay with the pause in a way since it involves MAGA stipulating for the record that they’re the white supremacists. And a show about investigating them is ill timed.

When antifa are outlawed only fa will be legalised.

This is Jade. She just met the biggest dogs she's ever seen. But quickly learned they have the biggest hearts too. 13/10 for all (TT: catimtins.pscal)

“None of that happens without Mike Johnson. Or James Comer. Or Jim Jordan. Or John Thune. Or Susan Collins, or Lisa Murkowski, or the collected sneering crookedness of the Fox media empire.”

“In ordinary times, if the Republican Party was not itself nothing more than a crime syndicate wrapped in a flag, impeachment proceedings would start on Monday and the Senate would remove President Crook and his minions in short enough order.” www.unchartedblue.com/the-trump-ad...

This was the mistake made in 2016 in response to the sincerely held bullshit of the ‘cutting in line’ myth

The next time someone says "we're better than this" I want to them to tell me why they think that. This catastrophe didn't happen twice by accident.

i have to say, as a trans journalist who has covered the "trans debate" for about a decade now, there is no daylight between how the trump administration and conservatives lie about tylenol and autism and how they've lied about youth trans care.

I think Democrat Party Congress members will try to achieve a minor bipartisan compromise all the way to the stage when he’ll put them in jail.

Problem is that the patronage-based culture of Westminster combined with the "service to the party earns you secure employment" mentality of Labour means he's chosen to prioritise the campaign team once in office. McSweeny should've started a podcast and fucked off from the corridors of power.

You're never going to get a splash out of the fact that a family with a combined income of £45-£50,000 still feels poorer than it did five years ago.