I can’t believe they somehow created a scenario where a straightforward invasion would have been the smarter play!

What I can’t get over is the fact that nobody in the media or our government seems to be able to process the fact that we don’t actually occupy Venezuela. Like, do they literally think governments are the equivalent to the people at the top? They didn’t kidnap a government. They kidnapped a man.

you can't bribe Trump by pulling him aside and saying "hey word around the office is that a few boxes of T-bills are gonna fall off da Brinks truck at 33rd and JFK boulevard tonight" you have to hand him a sack of money with dollar signs on it while loudly yelling "HERE IS THIS BRIBE YOU DEMANDED"

This whole debacle of invading Venezuela feels exactly like late nineteenth-century Russian imperialism to me. I wouldn’t be surprised if it has the same endgame.

That is not dead which can eternal lie, and in strange aeons Tiny Tim did NOT die.

Doomed, Trump! You’re doomed for all time! Your future is a horror story written by your crime! Your chains are forged by what you say and do, So have your fun, for when you’re done, A nightmare waits for you!

I… I honestly think things might be turning. 1. His FBI spends untold amounts of money and time “redacting” vast troves of documents. 2. He gleefully signs a law forcing those documents’ release, thinking he’s covered his butt. 3. Through incompetence or malice, the redactions weren’t…

I cannot wait for the big reveal in Fallout Season 2 that answers the question on every lore nerd’s mind: Why is Anthony House not wearing his special hat?

Hey, look at the history of this stuff. When Nixon released his tapes with massive redactions everybody calmed down and he suffered no political consequences. Clearly this is the smart play.

This is joy.

Here’s my take on D&D: I an running our group using the 2024 rules update for the first time. I’m running them through AD&D’s Night Below, which was published 30 years ago this year. Almost no updates needed, beyond ignoring printed monster stats and setting a few DC’s. The game’s got legs.

Anecdotal, I know, but my entire family is sick and it feels like the same is true for basically everyone. Do… do we even have a CDC anymore?

is it possible that the reason so many of the hoi polloi hated Obama wasn’t because of the color of his skin, but the content of his character?

Feeling really sorry for Monica Lewinsky these days.

America’s current state has scam artists scamming scam artists to such an extent that I honestly wonder what percentage of the gross of each scam comes from the individual perpetuating it. Money flowing between pockets devoid of all value.

I have been thinking about Stephen Miller. Not a lot, for he doesn’t deserve much attention, but it occurs to me that his entire existence can be explained thus: There is a time coming when one will be able to walk up to any high school senior in the country and ask, “Who was Stephen Miller?” 1/

So, is ICE not getting paid right now, or are they illegally getting paid right now?

So what are the odds that he’s dead before we get our government back?

So… what happens when he DOES croak? We have president Vance, a nightmare, if an uncharismatic one. But what else? What policies remain, what gets scrapped, what bold new evil actions are taken, what gets pushed back? Is it an immediate coup (against Congress) and purge? Do they have options?

To honor Charlie Kirk’s philosophy, I will extend him no empathy for his passing. I can not help but feel for those he left behind, however.

If we break him from his base, he loses his immunity. That’s why the Epstein files have been the one allegation he’s actually fought: pedophiles are icky, and ick is a huge motivator for his base. He loses his base and he knows he loses Congress immediately, before he can rig the 2026 elections.

Cosby’s evidence was less damning.

For literal years, I’ve pondered making a YouTube video about the dangers of dispensationalism as a theology in this country, particularly in regards to Israel, but nobody would watch it. And then Lindsay Ellis put a version in her latest video. It’s like a weight is suddenly lifted off my back.

He’s never going to look better than he does right now. And right now he looks like a literally empty shell.

They’re really doing it, aren’t they? They’re Bernie-ing a stroke victim.

Wait, that bizarre 3-hour butt-kiss meeting… was that a narcissist’s last meal? DID THEY SECURE PARDONS WITH THAT SHIT????

I realized today that Trump’s death would be the worst possible political event for Gavin Newsom. So a 2-for-1!

AI of the “love, blood, and rhetoric” school. You can have the blood and love without the rhetoric, or the blood and rhetoric without the love, or you can have all three together, consecutively or concurrently. But you can’t have the love and rhetoric without the blood! The blood is compulsory.

I want to make a post about the Emperor’s New Clothes being an unrealistic fairy tale, but nothing I can come up with will make it better than Terry Pratchett’s take, just more specific to current circumstances. So something something fuck ICE.

The thing that makes Democracy great isn’t that it brings power to the masses. It doesn’t, never has. The thing that makes it great is that it forces compromise and coalition-building. If you think you’re above that because you know what’s right for the nation, you are anti-democracy.

Everyone treating Gavin Newsom as a next-level genius: I’m not saying what he’s doing isn’t savvy and effective, but it’s also literally textbook satire. And that textbook is “A Modest Proposal,” published in 1729. So while it is certainly impressive, it sure as heck ain’t new.

Just to be clear: When we say “crime rates,” we mean rates of reported violations of the law. When they say “crime rates,” they mean colored people living openly comfortable lives. And when HE says “crime rates,” he’s specifically referring to African Americans.

The trick to getting a PhD is to be the first person ever to find fascination in a deeply, insanely boring thing.

Here’s the thing about scams like the South Seas Trading Company: the counterforces grow linearly, but the effectiveness of actions against them grow only logarithmically. This fools a lot of people into assuming a stable equilibrium, since at the beginning both appear roughly the same.

The thing that gets me about Epstein isn’t that this is the straw that broke the camel’s back. It’s that none of this is news. It’s that the lower-downs are locked in a bubble that just now got barely penetrated, while the higher-ups thought they could get away with it forever. Both defy reality.

The one advantage I can see, maybe, to the MAGA movement coopting the mainline church into their toxic politics is that MAYBE in my lifetime, after it all implodes, people will stop seeing it as easy to claim my prince of peace’s blessing on their hateful, destructive policies and works. Maybe.

“Always remember that the crowd that applauds your coronation is the same crowd that will applaud your beheading. People like a show.” -Terry Pratchett

Oh! What a tangled web we weave, When first we practice to deceive, And we are an idiot.

Y’all do realize he’s illegally allocating the funds of his illegal tariffs to illegally grow ICE into his personal Gestapo, right? It’s how he’s planning to hold power through any election or term limit. The whole separation of powers thing needs to be maintained or it all breaks down.

“Flood,” by They Might Be Giants, is the most perfect album of all time, and easily the most influential piece of media from the 1990’s, right at the start. I would die on this hill, but nobody’s gonna fight me on this.

does anyone have an economic analysis that doesn’t start with “fallen, fallen is Babylon the great?”

Does… does he think he can bully his way into a state where the U.S. can impose taxes on imports but gets to export to other countries duty-free? How many wars does he plan to start over this?

All these right wing posts are like “We insist that we get the imaginary guy in our head that we voted for, not the actual asshole we got!” “Why did you vote for him, then?” “He was the only answer to the imaginary problems in our head!”

Here’s the thing about a global economy. It can’t just stop and restart like an elevator or a state save in a video game. People go under when things aren’t moving and it causes a chain reaction. Ultimately, it even blows up banks. Things get BAD, yo, long after the error is corrected.

“So, now that people are broke and desperate, it’s finally possible to get good help again.” “But my retirement is cratered and groceries cost my entire income!” replied the pundit. “I can’t afford to hire anyone now!” “Oh, I see the confusion,” his guest replied smiling. “No, you’re the help.”

Trump’s aspiration is to be Daddy Warbucks. That requires a Depression.

Huh. Is Vivek Ramaswamy the Exactor of Tribute from Daniel 11:20, and Musk the contemptible person from Daniel 11:21? I mean, the descriptions definitely fit.

For people who believe Trump is literally the Antichrist, please remember that the antichrist explicitly gets three and a half terms (Daniel 7:25 and Revelation 12:14). Just something to be aware of. (Also, would explain why it’s phrased that way: the first times are the “legitimate” ones.)

I was wondering why the orange clown would even want Greenland, a land famously named as a marketing tactic to trick people into settling there. Then someone brought up the Mercator projection, and it all fell into place.

As far as I know, no human-to-human transmission of this strain of bird flu yet. But Trump will have learned the lesson of Covid and will be doing his best to blind people to bird flu’s impacts. Remember that he doesn’t care about the human cost, only popularity. Wash your hands and mask up!