Lord, did I not miss Dr. Trump’s Patent Medicine Show. Adding RFK Jr. has just made everything so much worse.

A lot of people (and so also politicians and commentators) can’t internalize that time passes—that today’s electorate simply is not the same one that elected Reagan. I think that’s the reason for the defensive crouch of senior Democrats — to them we’re always on the brink of the 1984 election.

The old man was dreaming about whatever.

I take it this is the sort of appropriate behaviour that we on the left still have to learn? I'm... not sure this is really the team that should be trying to fight antisemitism.

Trump had his accounts suspended on January 7, 8, and 9th 2020. WHEN HE WAS STILL PRESIDENT. It was not Joe Biden because Biden was not President.

👇👇

What movie do you consider “perfect”?

In Disney, we needed a lion. We got… well, a mouse.

Is it too much to ask that our headline writers stop writing headlines that treat executive orders like royal decrees? A lot of Trump’s orders are illegal on their face. Legally the DoD remains the DoD, despite Trump’s fantasies about renaming it. He has no power to restructure visa programs.

If you notice all of your grocery prices going up it’s because it is rotting in the fields. Kudos Trump and MAGA.

Post a female character whom you love.

Why did so many of us Gen Xers, after spending our young adulthoods getting dunked on by boomers, suddenly start acting like we were Baby Boomers (Junior League) when the millennials came along? The millennials were right about more than we were.

Oh dear. Inflation’s all the way up to REDACTED? That can’t be good.

it's not obeying in advance to just go to a protest without RSVPing, you weirdo.

As you cancel streaming services, here is a casual reminder that only 16% of Americans read for pleasure anymore, and your local library has hundreds or thousands of books you haven't read. They would love to see you stop by and renew your library card.

I know the huge owners of dozens of stations have a lot of power over ABC. That said, doesn’t it run both ways? The “Charlie Kirk was A Holy Man Hour” doesn’t seem like adequate content to replace a popular talk show.

I screamed in actual pain when a member asked what statistical confidence means

I must say, our major media conglomerates are making it easier than expected to narrow down the streaming services that I'm subscribed to.

This is a massive, history making abuse of your power. It will define your legacy and one day you will come to regret punishing free speech and trying to destroy democracy.

All of this can happen in Canada and it's already begun. They have disinfo/harassment/threat/crony networks here they've been building for years. Governments are aligning. I fear Canada will wake up one day realizing it's been absorbed into MAGA fascism without anyone needing to announce annexation.

Post a movie you love with a terrible Rotten Tomatoes score. I can’t defend it, except that it’s somehow more ‘80s SoCal than actual ‘80s SoCal.

One downside of having an administration entirely comprised of random podcasters is that when Charlie Kirk was shot, they could not fathom that what a bewildered nation overwhelmingly cried out was “Who the hell is Charlie Kirk?”

Live your life in such a way that when you die people aren't ashamed to quote the shit you said.

Incredible. Trump drags the reputation of a highly regarded economist, first Black woman to be a Fed gov, thru the mud claiming she committed mortgage fraud. But the documents his appointee to run Fannie & Freddie got for him & that he said showed fraud don’t actually say that.

It is pretty amazing to see people go from “the left is the enemy of democracy and must be purged” to “who can really know why good kids do bad things?”

Could the media please rediscover the old stock phrase “it would be irresponsible to speculate at this time?” Because the last few days have been amongst the least responsible in US media history, and I’m including the gilded age there.

It is striking how it seems only now to be registering with a lot of right-wingers that the FBI had an actual job to do, and that firing everyone who knew how to do it might be a terrible idea.

And today my trip to Canada (part the second: OMGWTFBBQ) comes to an end as I fly back to SFO. ... and yes, I also made it home on Wednesday. Oy.

Amazing how the media will actually report on how differently Trump is treating Kirk than Hortman while remaining utterly blind to how differently _they_ treated the two stories.

I know Charlie Kirk valued debate and free speech because he blocked me for fact-checking his lies on Twitter and then put me on his organization's Professor Watchlist for writing a book he didn't like.

We have a rank hypocrisy in the USA that 45,000 people a year are killed with guns, 123 a day, one every 12 minutes. And it is almost completely ignored. But when it is one of their people, it is a massive tragedy, as if it is not happening all the time.

Let’s not forget:

Reminder - Trump didn't lower the flag for Jimmy Carter.

Look, I'm sorry the guy got shot, for two reasons: (1) I'm generally against murders, even of people I despise, and (2) Charlie Kirk was so absurdly over the top that his existence was generally helpful to the left. The man couldn't dogwhistle to save his life — he foghorned. That said /1

Lots of trolls around, naturally. I’m a lot quicker to ban these days when I see bad-faith arguments. Better for everyone.

The basic problem here: 5s before the murder, the murderer was legitimately carrying a weapon. 1s before the murder they were guilty of brandishing. 1s later they were a murderer. We expect cops to always be able to act in that 5s window? HOW????? Our weapons laws are nonsensical.

I will note in passing that the shootings of schoolchildren seem to have become so much background noise—to the point that “3 children were also shot in Colorado” is getting added to the reports of Kirk’s murder the way you’d note that it was 30°C in Orem today.

I post about politics a lot, so I’ll make this clear: I don’t have a “take” on the murder of Charlie Kirk. That isn’t politics, any more than the murders of the Hortmans were politics. This is the _alternative_ to politics. For all that we like to groan about politics, it bears the alternative.

The Trump Administration is once again failing to do its job — and California is cleaning up their mess. We're deploying state resources to protect the 2,000-year old sequoias on FEDERAL LANDS from the wildfires the federal administration are supposed to handle.

SCOTUS: considering race as one factor in a college applicant's file is blatantly unconstitutional ALSO SCOTUS: considering race as one factor in targeting whom to detain and deport is cool cool cool

"Backs off claim?" How is this not "admits he lied?" The Speaker of the House just knowingly lied to the press. There was a time when this would have merited editorials in every media outlet. That time, of course, was when Democrats had the majority. www.washingtonpost.com/politics/202...

A huge thank you to the CBP guard we got at the Peach Arch crossing this time around — he was one of the old-school ones, who just want to hear all about your trip to Canada. I hope he lasts, given the way things are now.

Slightly diminish a book. The Lord of the Rings: The Committee Meeting of the Ring (Elrond, chair).

Alright, so I've been afraid to say this out loud, but I think after today, I can say it: In the first Battle of Los Angeles, the good people of LA County have prevailed. We beat ICE back. 1/

Back to the US today.

Feeling very sorry for the BC Ferries captain making the final announcements for this crossing, which are starting to verge on “Will you idiots get the fuck off of my boat.”

Umm … it’s pretty stupid.

This fab Afrocentric novels and novellas @storybundle.bsky.social ends in less than 2 hours! storybundle.com/scifi