well that's not my favorite way of waking up, especially at 3am! earthquakes really should only occur between 8am - 6pm. it's more civilized that way. #earthquake

#Earthquake M4.8 | 3 km ESE of Berkeley, California | 1m ago | Sep 22, 2025 09:56 am (Universal Time) Did you feel it? Submit a report! #moderate #quake #M2+ #M3+ #M4+ #United_States #California Quake feed for United States: @us.earthquakes.live Quake feed for : @california.earthquakes.live

4.6 quake just now, centered across the bay near Berkeley. hoo boy!

Faced with US indifference, I am struggling to imagine a coming year in which Russia does not goad Europe and NATO into a wider war. I hope beyond hope that I am wrong.

this is profoundly disturbing on multiple levels.

“Another takeaway was how Chinese startups focus on incremental technological advances rather than on major disruptions to the status quo, according to the VCs. Companies start with ‘the stuff that’s easier to market, to digest and to get to scale’.”

"When your country strips you of rights and protections, it tells you that it no longer recognizes you. Other times, you realize that you no longer recognize your country." [email protected] #PostTruth www.nytimes.com/2025/09/21/o...

thinking this morning about how some people think that the cost of academic integrity is delivering up lists of names to the government, when actually the true cost of integrity is doing the exact opposite. And I keep hearing the lines from A Merchant of Venice playing over & over in my head:

Sunday Sermon / QOTD / teshuvah for us all: "The poor can stop being poor if the rich are willing to become even richer at a slower rate."

”و من انا، يا انا، الا انا؟“

watching in horror as the world twists & reality inverts itself & hoping there is some ration of sanity that makes itself heard on the Sunday shows tomorrow because even though I don't watch them I know so many who do & perhaps we can just cling to the recognition of Palestine in the face of it all

There is no world in which it is normal for the president to publicly call upon his attorney general to hurry up and prosecute his political foes. It’s like the Watergate tapes but posted on social media. Let’s get a grip on what’s happening here.

“But Mr. Trump responded to repeated entreaties by saying, “I don’t care,” according to a person with knowledge of the matter.” Never were truer words stated.

“They’re living on the fumes of the real Berkeley values. But they’ve come and gone.” This is true of City government as well. Downtown was handed to developers, and is now just plain abandoned. Homeless are shoved around, not housed.

worth a moment of your time. @timothysnyder.bsky.social's point #9 though, gives me...thoughts - as it should *every single person* involved in academia and education.

the bark of a dog. the gravel voice of a crow. the fog is lifting. #poetry #haiku

“Power is the rock on which truth founders. It will always find willing enforcers: no one ever lost money by telling billionaires what they want to hear. The mainstream media, with a few exceptions, is a single-issue lobby group, whose purpose is to assert the rights of capital.”

"[T]he problem with those devices isn’t their screens—it’s what the tech on the other side of those screens is socializing us to be: siloed narcissists who come to expect every interaction to effortlessly reflect our own preferences." Whatever breaks our techno doom loop, it won't come from SV.

Right now, there's a budget showdown in Washington. Democrats are in the minority. It's most likely that the next Democratic US Senator from Michigan will come into office in the minority. So what do we do? Exactly what we did here in the Michigan state Senate.

We’d be in a much stronger position right now if mainstream Democrats had taken a common sense stand for First Amendment principles instead of piling on undergraduate standing up for Palestine.

I believe it may be time yet again for absolutely everyone to re-read St. Exupéry. The king. The businessman. The vain man. Human nature hasn't changed; we're just too busy being consumed by the flames.

Companies love physical mail. Postcards are great too. The more thr better.

once again, it is that time of year when all good folk rise up and say “Aarrrgh!”

When we get to pleading in my first-year Civil Procedure class, my students often ask me just how over the top a complaint would have to be for a judge to strike it without even being *asked* to do so. Thanks to President Trump, we have an answer: storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...

“we can agree that government censorship is un-American...unions and guilds can take collective action...Americans can call local TV affiliate stations to demand ABC put Kimmel back on; Disney shareholders can reject quisling management; and House and Senate Democratic leaders can do *something*...”

we cautioned you in 2003 & were gently sidelined by the "serious" people in the room. we warned you in 2015 & were told that wouldn't be a problem riding the tiger, because you had it under control. now here we are, our worst fears being realized each day. Where is your rationalization now? hm?

"getting snatched off the street by armed agents of the state, sent to the gulag, and then deported is the same thing as a multi-millionaire having his show cancelled. I am very smart and get paid to share my ideas."

NYT continuing to be the mainstream platform amplifying "maybe fascism is good, actually" takes and honestly the level of abasement needed to even engage is beyond me. I have too much dignity for this shit.

Foghorns filled the night. You were there, in all my dreams: Resolute, like love. #haiku #poetry

one would hope that certain people in a certain c-suite are noticing and shitting some 1st amendment shaped bricks...

When there were still grownups in the room

tl;dr: NO. Trump could declare the easter bunny pope, and it would have about as much weight. Getting so tired of this shit, and there's no offramp to be seen...

This is how we do it.

When a society doesn’t learn from history, it is doomed to repeat it.

A Travel Guide to The Middle Ages, by Anthony Bale

tonight's cocktail: the ‘Me.’ 1 part piss 2 parts vinegar shake well with dry ice. garnish with fire ants. serve cold.

During the early 90s swing revival, this was my go-to stomping ground. many martinis and manhattans happened there while the music bopped & dancers lindy hopped. I will keep my hopes up that its own revival stays a good course. And that they do a decent job on the soundproofing for the neighbors...

I got my double jab this morning - covid vaccine in the left arm, flu vaccine in the right - and while I am feeling quite superior about getting it all out of the way, the ache is starting to settle into my arms and I am wondering about the sensibility of getting both on the same day.

Luckily, Sinclair has a helpful database of all their stations, so you can see if they're operating in your area and respond accordingly. sbgi.net/tv-stations/

HAPPENING NOW: We’re at 26 Fed Plaza, where ICE has been kidnapping immigrant NYers, to demand access to the 10th fl - where people are being inhumanely detained - and to block ICE vans from leaving. We refuse to stand by while ICE abducts our neighbors. Neither should our leaders. #ICEoutofNY

I had forgotten over the years what a complete asshole Hoekstra is. (if you're curious - and too young to recall - en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pete_Ho...)

[thread] Another day where trying to keep up with, let alone catalogue, the abuses of power, the destruction of public well being, the undoing of the rule of law & a century of steady progress toward a more equitable & beneficent society built in the image of this nation's highest ideals instead of

The Dems need to blanket the country with ads where Carr tells Americans they're going to tell us what to think.. You can debate if Americans want to think for themselves but they do not like being TOLD they will be told what to think. That's political death in the US.

the core of MAGA government is giving resentful mediocrities to power to act as tyrants and dominate others

This is the lead story in the New York Times. If you're in the business of communicating, whether through journalism, commentary, or art, this is the five-alarm fire. People are going to remember who spoke up and who stayed conveniently silent or postured about "neutrality."

“These figures reflect a troubling trend that began with the rollback of historic anti-poverty investments that were created to mitigate the harm of the Covid-19 pandemic – underscoring that poverty is a policy choice” We need to do so much better. Maybe start with a wealth tax over $400M...

I do not expect it, because the kind of people who were sanctimonious scolds about how hysterical our Trump warnings were are not the kind of people who ever apologize about anything but I want extensive mea culpas from every last one of them, because I am a petty bitch and we were right

I would start...by taunting every journalist I came into contact with from [every] media organization that is now owned by the White House...“Yes, I will happily answer your question, but first, how can we trust your company, since it is owned by Donald Trump? You have to do whatever he demands.”

I never asked to live through a remake of 1939. Truly.

Speaking of freedom of the press, here is the court-mandated memo LAPD Chief McDonnell sent to all sworn personnel today. In it, the Chief outlines that police can't shoot, detain, or arrest journalists at protests. It also lays out what constitutes a duly authorized journalist. This is a huge win.