Shocked by the awful death of Rob Reiner. I spoke with him for over an hour last night. We talked about his work and his plans for the future. I always enjoyed his company. We met at his Dad's in 1975. Last thing he said to me was "See you next year.." Such a terrible end. Such a sweet man.

thesis: sheppard's "Bombs Away" is cultural appropriation

it's beginning to look a lot like #ficsmas

All I know is that if I’m still practicing I’m raising that issue in every PFR. The problem, of course, would be proving it has an impact in any specific case.

BREAKING: Federal judge rejects DOJ's effort to subpoena the names and medical records of children who have received gender-affirming medical care from the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia. storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...

Tbh this whole list of podcasts are either shows I've already enjoyed listening to or things I immediately want to add to my podcast app so this is lovely company to be in!

Happy Trans Day of Remembrance. I'm glad you're here.

Yeah, from experience I can tell you that hormones do a lot of things including changing your mood and how you handle emotions, but they don’t make you think clearly. They will help reduce stress related to dysphoria and passing, which can help, but they don’t inherently “fix” anything.

Sedition is something very different, it’s trying to sabotage American democracy. For example:  - Lean on foreign governments to meddle in our elections - Pressure election officials to “find” 11,780 votes - Manipulate business records to tilt an election

Elected officials who inform their constituents about federal and constitutional law are doing their jobs. That includes when they remind service members that they could be prosecuted for following unlawful orders because it's a violation of the Constitution. That is the law.

the Harvard Crimson called Epstein a “child sex offender” while the Chronicle of Higher Ed called him a “disgraced financier” and that pretty much sums up where we are with higher ed journalism

Anyone who thinks our beef with Venezuela is about drugs is in for a crude awakening

welcome to bluesky. you can follow me, or my posts can follow you

Jesus, I wrote a lot of orders during my clerkship, including at least one that led to Bar investigations into unethical lawyering, and I never even got close to using the phrase, “outright lied” in one. No surprise that Bovino is a scumbag, but that he’s such a bad liar is interesting.

When I was clerking, we had one case where the judge reminded the parties in a summary judgment ruling that lies may be able get you past summary judgment, but that doesn't mean a jury will buy them. That was as close as we got. (They settled.)

I used to work IT for the county gov including the court, and all the clerks were buzzing when the (chief) judge issued an order on a case ruling on all pending motions w/o hearings, forced parties to go to a hardass mediator, and attached a copy of the oath and code of ethics for them to review 🫥

Right up there with the leftists I used to know who lost their minds when a woman was put in charge of any department they didn't like. Could they even name the man who had been in the same position? Nope, but the second a woman was doing the job she was below reproach and a traitor etc.

I hate this sort of meme. “The only difference between the parties is whether the power to destroy human civilization rests in the hands of leaders who think gays, women, and black people should have their rights acknowledged.” Even if true, how is Rainbow B-52 not infinitely preferable?

Earlier today, I was notified that someone was at my door. This is who it was:

It was finally time to accept that a large percentage of the population does not read words

CNN: What if there are more names connected to the Democratic Party that come out in the files? CHRIS MURPHY: So what?

Ukraine is rejecting Trump’s plan right now at the UN Security Council. ⬇️

So much about this is ridiculous but I can't get over the 'US gets 50% of the profits' from rebuilding the country. What in the actual fuck is that. Fuck 'em with a cactus.

Dang - how bad was the Border Patrol invasion in North Carolina? None other than Thom Tillis himself is blasting DHS for gross overreach, and demanding lists of those detained, property damage caused by CBP agents, and their plan for restitution. www.charlotteobserver.com/news/politic...

DHS claimed that on September 26, a DHS officer claimed that they were forced to deploy riot munitions because protestors were "becoming increasingly hostile." In fact, "the [Body Worn Camera] video shows that the protesters were simply standing there when agents first deployed any force."

"AI girls never say no." They're not just saying the "quiet part" out loud anymore. They're screaming it. It's both pathetic and horrorifying.

If you listen to Silicon Valley types talk about AI platforms, they’re obsessed with discussing whether it’s “uncensored” or not; what they’re talking about is whether they can make nonconsensual porn, not all of which is from images of people who are adults. Musk is moving Grok that way rapidly.

Happy Thursday! We're almost through the week! The star of today was 18 minutes before sunrise when the sky had this very nice combination of design and color, which dissipated shortly afterwards. Tap for full size. I hope you have a great day!

it feels inappropriate to say ‘happy’ trans day of remembrance but i hope it has been a meaningful day and i hope my cis friends are doing right by the trans people in their lives

Thank you for being my Senator

Schrödinger’s indictment has both two and three counts (but also neither two nor three counts).

!! I'll have to try refind it later but I read an interesting article on that point once, talking about how much selecting the cases to hear in the first place is a part of the Court pushing the law rightwards

I have long said people don't be hatin Chief Justice John Roberts as much as they should be hatin Chief Justice John Roberts

Dear UPS: I want to track my packages. I don't want to chat with your AI help agent. And I certainly don't want your AI help agent to complain when I close it. My package isn't on my porch yet? Cool. That's all I needed. I'll check again in half an hour. Bye. That's it. That's the interaction.

Github may be broken but at least Bluesky has firmly supplanted Twitter as the place to complain about it

lmao nearly every major tabletop platform or website hosts on Cloudflare, which is currently shitting the metaphorical bed. Kickstarter, Backerkit, and Gamefound. But also itch, Roll20, DTRPG. Effectively the whole online RPG market is offline.

cloudflare's on-duty IT staff bangs on the doors which I have padlocked from the inside as I calmly break open lava lamp after lava lamp and drink the contents

Can't find out if Cloudflare is down because Cloudflare being down has taken out DownDetector, along with half the internet.

yes but he only exercises power without congressional approval when doing so is illegal

Why am I so against generative AI in games? Because I simply do not want my initial reaction to art to be one of suspicion and scrutiny, AI slop is fundamentally damaging my relationship to art and artistry, and I am deeply resentful that it is forcing me to be guarded when I should be wowed.

just because the clown car goes very fast does not mean it isn't full of clowns

Marjorie Taylor Greene blasts Trump for 'vicious' attacks after saying her company received a pipe bomb threat SURPRISE! Those MAGA folks are violent extremists. A shame no one could recognize this from Jan 6th insurgency.

Remember when conservatives went batshit crazy that government officials occasionally alerted social media companies to posts that might violate their TOS?

years ago an emmy-winning comedy writer posted this in a DM group and I’ve thought about it literally every day since (anonymized and shared with permission)

domestic abuse, sexual violence, etc is virtually unprosecuted because it isn't *in practice,* a crime at all--it's the exercise of legitimate force by the person who holds the right to govern, over and against the person who must BE governed.

it's so funny how trump keeps keeps threatening to go after bill clinton if this epstein stuff doesn't go away but no one cares

A lot of people really, desperately want to believe that Bill Clinton's a pedophile because they think it would absolve them for being happy that Trump won in 2016.