the last interesting and useful thing the libertarians did in this country was running william weld as their vice presidential candidate and the national libertarian party has made it very clear that they’ll never do that again

if you wanted to ask this question and get an interesting discussion out of it, what you would ask is “what are the libertarians willing to compromise on, as the considerably smaller minority in this hypothetical coalition”

i don’t really think this is an interesting question, the answer is no. insofar as libertarianism is a meaningful strain of thought in the US, it’s a fringe movement that fractures between temporarily embarrassed liberals and insane anarchists. the AFT represents almost 2M members.

*how* did he find himself in that situation, you fucking cowards?

anyway, this one’s the last record for tonight and specifically for my friend, the biggest who fan i have ever and probably now will ever know

moving on, i own records that i have no memory of ever having purchased and have no idea what they sound like, we are going to check one of those out now

oh, wow, this fucking rules.

a lot of english-language punk has been kind of disappointing in this very stupid era we live in, but, man, spanish-language punk has been fucking cooking. this record’s a few years old now but rules, and, also, consider this a statement of support for spain on sunday

lol, i bought this record for the next POST BRUNCH dj gig i am doing in august

(i am aware that the music probably exists and i am just too old and uncool to know about it but they put combat baby on the radio!)

when i say "where is the sexy countercultural malaise anti-trump music" i am thinking of this album 90% of the time

anyway speaking of records, my record-buying budget has gotten a lot smaller this year, but i found a reasonably priced copy of this i couldn’t pass up, my favorite of theirs, hands down, and i don’t mean that in a snob way

nonsense, i love moving 700 pounds of record boxes and finding somewhere to put them every time i move to another 1BR apartment

on the other hand, people paying literally anything for music at all is an improvement over the current state

man, i get why, but they should be buying vinyl and tracks they can download

i can’t wait to watch THE ODYSSEY as all christopher nolan movies should be seen — on an aging ipad i have mounted on a swingarm over my laptop at my desk

i suppose both teams already lost so they don’t have to worry about cursing it

in general this is something i tend to try to be good about, very occasionally someone will say something so completely offensive or out of line that they deserve what they get, i do not accept smol beanism as a defense for legitimately wildly out of line behavior

this neighborhood tonight is whiter than it has been in at least five decades

i immediately regret wearing my YOU CAN GO TO HELL I AM GOING TO THE TULSA STATE FAIR shirt

this solves the mystery but does not lessen the utter weirdness

my neighborhood is filled with people dressed in western wear like they’re going to like dance, and, reader, this is very confusing. this would be like living in a suburb and suddenly seeing large, roving bands of black metal fans walking around everywhere.

i get that he’s stupid, that he’s corrupt and that he’s an asshole, but what i mean is that i cannot remember a time he has ever been on the right side of literally *any* issue, and that’s genuinely really unusual.

i straight up don’t understand this guy’s deal at all

worth remembering when you read this garbage that tucker carlson begged hunter biden for a recommendation for his son

this is a good question and there are a few reasons: 1) it's not a serious reform bill, there's no funding for it, 2) it's a poison pill for reconciliation, and attaching it to anything means the filibuster kills it, 3) rural voters are the most likely to be negatively impacted by it

Liberalism has failed to thrive in the attention economy because we have accepted ignorance and consumerism as the norm.

lmao, this is an incredible fold

now we'll get to see if tillis wants to betray even more abuse survivors to confirm a grossly unqualified nominee. spoiler: he probably will.

Me, to a historian: "Hey, fun fact from the future for you: we're going to have our second non-consecutive presidential term" Them: "Oh really? Who is it?" Me: "You should probably sit down"

good faith disagreement here, but i think it's the opposite; trump was able to seize the republican party was because they were running on fumes when it came to leadership and he was seen as an iconoclast not beholden to party dogma, they've done nothing to fix that problem since he took over

also, like, imagine going back to the year 2000 and telling yourself about the future. "in 2020, joe biden will be president" okay, sure, makes sense "he will have been preceded by donald trump" what the fuck "he will be followed by donald trump" WHAT IN THE FUCK

The chorus is growing louder! 🐺🎶Our three-month-old critically endangered American Red Wolf pups are practicing their howls at our offsite facility. Howling helps wolves communicate with their pack, strengthen social bonds, and announce their presence across long distances.

Ezra knew one thing - pre-ACA health policy - better than almost anybody else, and he has successfully turned that into a career where he has never needed to learn anything else.

a thing i think about often is how, 99.99% of the time, a guy like donald trump becomes an entry-level mob goon and gets murked or goes to prison because he can't stop running his mouth long before he ever advances, and the fluke of his family's wealth is why we're dealing with [waves arms wildly]

The Ragin Cajun era is over, now is the dawn of the Klein Whine era

i personally think ezra klein is too attached to his personal brand rather than the future of liberalism

i don't even think these are terrible ideas on their face, but you can't accomplish 1) or 3) without serious court reform and 2) is an incredibly niche and low priority idea

if blanche gets confirmed i think it's entirely possible we'll see the first attorney general to get disbarred during his term

so, this is obviously deeply corrupt and wildly illegal and everyone involved in it on any side should die in prison, *but* this totally misunderstands how social media works, buying this access is setting money on fire

i *do* think it'd be helpful if indivisible got moving on mobilizing protests in october as a show of force and defiance, because i think it would settle a lot of jittery nerves to see millions on the streets before election day and show just how impossible the task of pacification actually is

sort of a tangential point, but trump's apex of political and cultural strength was two years ago and he's spent the intervening time pissing it all away by kicking every hornet's nest he can find and making damned near everyone miserable and angry

Me in 2017: I dig the premise and the gameplay is fun but man, this villain is truly just an irredeemable shitbag in a way that I think is a *little* cartoony Me in 2026: Guerrilla Studios is built over a fissure that grants them the gift of prophecy. Amsterdam is the new Delphi

the idea that supreme court reform would lead to the dissolution of the republic is a very stark demand that republicans be enabled to rule for eternity, and whatever else david french says about the republican party, this is what he actually believes

i blame someone like french more than most for the moral rot of the republican party, because french was, at one time, in a position to take moral stands that would matter, and actively sought to avoid that whenever possible until he no longer mattered

this is related to my theory that in Silicon Valley we have the first-in-human-history generation of superrich people who live in the suburbs and drive everywhere

the wealthiest people in human history fucking off to space during the apocalypse only to spend the next few centuries locked into ever-tightening circles of competitive contempt and loathing for one another would probably have been too on the nose thirty years ago but is pretty apt now

i guess it stands to reason that you could read this as me saying the gilded age barons were "better", but that wasn't the point i was trying to make. i *do* think i'm on solid ground in noting that they were *different*.

lol, like an hour ago, i was sure she wasn't going to run, lmao, good fucking luck, south carolina republicans

the last ditch reconciliation hail mary they’re trying to get in before the midterms needs 50 votes + vance, with mcconnell on the sidelines, that leaves thune with two hall passes to spread amongst collins, murkowski and paul, and tillis, cornyn and cassidy can all do whatever the hell they want