good news everyone

This kind of thing used to be a much bigger part of social media in general. Much of it has given away—everywhere—with re-posting popular takes. Much less first-hand.

Well it finally happened, dogs are now wearing more winter gear than teenagers. creativebyrovelo.com/therovelorecord

The ideal childhood, increasingly.

See, it’s not hard to denounce this and toe it into the larger pattern of criminality.

prefer to listen to experts that inform and warn about implications of allowing illegality to become embedded vs approach that games out the strategy for readers.

Had to have Grok convo with tween. Essentially most of my advice to him now is avoid the internet as much as possible even while the tech itself permeates every facet of his existence. Fun parenting challenge

Grumpy this am. Woke up on wrong side of history again.

Trying to cut commenters some slack today, because it seems like a lot of folks might not have anywhere to process all this except on here.

New statement from PM Carney.

Reading Chotiner interviews with people who actually know what they're talking about is interesting because you realize his main skill is not "gotchas" but just like, facilitating effective communication. when that runs into someone who's used to dissimulating they get humiliated.

The most disturbing presidential press conference I have ever seen. fallows.substack.com/p/blind-into... (First 3/4ths before paywall.)

Sprinkles Cupcake Doctrine

PSA: You can go outside.

Tough to get Saturday back on track when you wake up to regime change

I asked Chevron if anyone at the company had any communication with the White House prior to the U.S. military strike on Venezuela.

We had a good run

He's doing foreign policy like a private equity firm.

Trump just announces the US will be running Venezuela now, until the can do a "safe, proper, and judicious" transfer of power. Announcing an occupation before you've occupied a country is a new one.

“Sometimes you don’t survive whole. You only survive in part. But the *grandeur* of life is that attempt. It’s not about the solution. It’s about being as fearless as one can and behaving as beautifully as one can under completely impossible circumstances.”

Abysmal statement from Canada on the illegal US action in Venezuela. It doesn’t matter how much you dislike Maduro, that doesn’t justify a violation of international law and the UN Charter. You can’t call on “all parties” to respect international law and not call out US lawlessness.

Agree with every word.

wild to see every news outlet use the term "capture" to describe what happened. we're not at war with venezuela! this is *objectively* an illegal kidnapping of a sovereign country's leader

"Mexico strongly condemns and rejects the military actions carried out unilaterally ... by armed forces of the United States of America against targets in the territory of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, in clear violation of Article 2 of the [UN] Charter" www.gob.mx/sre/prensa/m...

Marco Rubio is reportedly saying Maduro will stand trial in US courts. Which means it’s now the US administration’s position that US courts can hold foreign presidents, but not the US president, accountable for crimes.

Snap reaction: This is the most stunningly illegal action by an American president in my lifetime; certainly the worst, most destabilizing thing Trump has done.

More than 4,500 New York residents were hospitalized with the flu last week — marking the highest number ever recorded in a single week, health officials said: gothamist.visitlink.me/BU4t_3

There’s an epidemic of people using Grok to do sexual violence to women on Twitter. Yet Canadian politicians, media etc have failed to adopt another platform en masse, making it near-impossible to fully disengage and be tapped in to vital conversations and information. What are we doing.

recession indicator

Not surprised Europe is first. Hoping Canada will follow: French authorities will investigate the proliferation of sexually explicit deepfakes generated by artificial intelligence platform Grok on X, the Paris prosecutor's office told Politico. www.politico.eu/article/fran...

I don't recall off hand who made the point about AI being, more than anything else, a machine for displacing responsibility. That increasingly looks like its most reliable feature

I've been tracking the spread of nonconsensual deepfakes on X for more than two years. Here's a timeline of how Musk's leadership allowed the practice to flourish from a once-underground market to a viral trend, with little recourse for victims or legal enforcement. spitfirenews.com/p/grok-csam-...

What Grok/X has done is unprecedented. There are no other instances of a major company affirmatively facilitating the production of child pornography. Treating this as the inevitable result of generative AI and social media is a harrowing mistake.

The media needs to recognize that there is a marked difference between the endemic problem of CSAM being posted to social media platforms and a platform giving users a tool to actively create CSAM.

Spider Sitting On Shower Wall Can’t Wait To See Look On Man’s Face https://theonion.com/spider-sitting-on-shower-wall-can-t-wait-to-see-look-on-1819579557/

Stone is a senior fellow at the Institute for Family Studies and director of its "Pronatalism Initiative," and he regularly gets quoted as an authoritative source by commentators across the political spectrum despite this kind of gutter racism and other undisguised bigotries. I find that baffling.

So someone was unsuccessful in trying to steal $300 worth of food from a business owned by the Sobey family (net worth $5.5 billion), and the cops thought it warranted a news release

words for 2026: Defenceless under the night Our world in stupor lies; Yet, dotted everywhere, Ironic points of light Flash out wherever the Just Exchange their messages: May I, composed like them Of Eros and of dust, Beleaguered by the same Negation and despair, Show an affirming flame. —WH Auden

The most unbelievable thing about Stranger Things is the all female jazz string trio in Hawkins, Indiana

Kevin Drum was the first journalist to really get into the ties between lead and crime rates (not just serial killers) and I think it is one of the most important articles we’ve ever done www.motherjones.com/environment/...

Got a bad case of Mayor envy.

Requesting do-over

Mandy Patinkin singing Somewhere Over The Rainbow with PS 22 chorus at @zohrankmamdani.bsky.social inauguration

Wild to see my article become BMJ’s biggest piece of the year. I want to be clear about something going forward: My work is about getting important ideas in front of people who need to see them, and who might be able to do something about them. 1/2 🔗 www.bmj.com/content/390/...

A List of Predictions Made in 1926 About 2026 🧵

Tracy Beth Høeg has no apparent experience with creating or regulating drugs, but she did make a name for herself casting doubt on some vaccines. Her appointment as the acting FDA drugs chief signifies a greater focus from Trump's FDA on (ending) vaccines. From me www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...

Found my kid’s love of stranger things so adorable and enhanced the experience of watching for me in a thousand ways.

Happy New Year! Don’t give up on good things.