Primarily here because people I know are here. I write SFF books, wrangle my kids and cats and swear a lot.
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FTR, I'm incensed with every milquetoast, spineless shitbag who thinks just having a D after their name is enough. But the constant insistence by Bernie (and his fans) that we could get votes for progressive economic policy by catering to broke white dudes is absolutely responsible for this mess.
Jeebis fuck. The number of people in the comments blaming Democrats when Bernie isn't a fucking Democrat and never has been. And his anti-Democrat bullshit is a huge part of why we're in this shit to begin with.
Stephen Manning, this guy’s lawyer, is one of the best in the country. It’s very good news that he’s taken this case.
Shrub, but yes. I adored her. She was the reason I went into journalism.
My favorite evergreen Molly Ivins quote: "I prefer someone who burns the flag and then wraps themselves up in the Constitution over someone who burns the Constitution and then wraps themselves up in the flag."
Unbelievably bad. “The CDC you knew is over. Unless someone takes radical action, there is nothing there that can be salvaged.” www.advocate.com/politics/dem...
Florida is literally what happens when the HOA takes over state government.
Now this is the attitude ALL district attorneys need to take when it comes to dealing with Trump.
We are getting the Epstein birthday book that Donald Trump says doesn’t exist.
Well if nothing else this will ABSOLUTELY finally get them sued to hell You don't piss off the other rich people!! ESPECIALLY Taylor Swift and her army
Blue state. They want to use natural disasters to punish us for being insufficiently loyal to the regime.
The US is (almost) uniquely built on a flavor of religion that is heavily into sin/punishment and the Just World fallacy. Millions of Americans sincerely believe that anyone who is sick and/or poor must have brought it on themselves, or angered God, and therefore doesn't deserve help.
A federal grand jury has declined to indict another person arrested as part of President Trump's D.C. crime surge. This was the only case we know of in which the National Guard participated in an arrest. After the grand jury declined to return an indictment, DOJ moved to dismiss the case.
I kinda feel like a lot of the fuckery we're in is because ignorant dipshits like this feel inadequate next to actual experts, and therefore want to kill expertise itself. I mean, some of it is also religion freaking out that their fairy tales don't stand up to empiricism, but yeah.
Heads up! I was just able to schedule updated (Pfizer) COVID boosters for myself and my 12 year old at CVS. Online questionnaire just asked if we had underlying conditions. No other verification requested (though not sure if they'll ask in person.) First available appointments were next Friday.
You don't even need to understand complex science: -Virus bad for body -Vaccine tells body about virus -Body recognizes virus now, so body fights virus better!
After all this time, the fact that millions of theoretically literate people still don't even understand the basics of how vaccines work is enraging.
Dr. Demetre Daskalakis, who resigned from the CDC, revealed that RFK Jr. has NEVER been briefed by CDC experts on measles, flu, or Covid: “No one from my center has ever briefed him on any of those topics…He’s getting his information from somewhere”
Lawyers make hypothetical/conditional arguments ALL THE TIME. A hypothetical/conditional argument IS NOT THE SAME THING AS A FACTUAL ADMISSION. LEARN TO READ, FOLKS.
There is no route out of fascism that involves sacrificing the vulnerable. All that does is tell the fascists that we're willing to turn on each other for the illusion of safety.
Happy birthday to Jack Kirby.
I know it's illegal on here to notice that our leaders are actually fighting back in the job we actually elected them to do, but here's the Wall Street Journal bitching about Schumer's "historic" delaying tactics that have left almost 90% of Trump appointee slots empty. archive.ph/2025.08.27-0...
However evil you think this is, it’s worse: “The A.I. companies selected to oversee the program would have a strong financial incentive to deny claims. Medicare plans to pay them a share of the savings generated from rejections.”
New acting director of CDC Jim O'Neill expressed being pro paid organ donation. "There are plenty of healthy spare kidneys walking around, unused."
Purge mentality. They think the way to make the country strong is to take out people they consider useless. That includes everyone with a disability or chronic illness. They won't dirty their hands directly killing us. They'll just take away everything we need to live.
It's in a blue state. They want to use our natural disasters to control and punish us.
Not just arresting 2 firefighters. They held two complete fire crews at gunpoint for three hours while checking each person's ID. Leading to many hours delay in controlling the 9000 acre blaze.
What part don't you understand? Nothing else is going to work because they've already taken away all of our power. I'm a big advocate for a general strike, but if that fails, then what? How do we stop a madman who will fuck over the entire world?
And when that war finally, inevitably, comes, there won't be enough of us with combat skills and weapons to fight against the world's most sophisticated military. Which means yes, we are going to need help from other countries to unseat our dictator.
But you're missing my point, anyway: This doesn't end without mass action that has tangible consequences for ignoring it. Getting that mass action going is going to be impossible so long as cishet white people aren't feeling any pain, and by the time they do, it'll be too late for anything but war.
We've had way more than one, going all the way back to 2017. But media hasn't covered most of them. Even so, they still wouldn't work even if there were 5 million people in the streets daily, because he'll just start shooting. Yelling isn't power. Owning the military is power.
We've HAD mass protests already. They don't work. They never have. We do however still have unions, and if we can get the heads of all the big ones to agree to a general strike, then that's an option. The problem, as usual, is cishet white people thinking they're immune to danger.
This is why I really encourage any Trans folks, or parents of Trans kids, to GTFO of the country while it's still possible. If there's any chance at all of going somewhere else, take it. And I desperately hope Canada starts recognizing the danger we're in and grants refugee status.
A general strike is the only non-combat option we have left, and getting one organized is going to take getting people to understand that that IS our only option. So long as people keep lying about what court cases can actually do, we're not motivated to do more.
Protesting has no teeth on its own. Unless it comes with genuine power--in the form of voting, strikes or physical resistance--the people in charge can ignore it. And they already have. Mass protests in Hungary and Israel have changed nothing. They will change nothing here, too.
I love (dill) pickles, but yes. The sudden pickle fervor is very wtf.
He is wrong on the facts. 1. The data is clear, VBM benefits Democrats electorally and it remains true. Rejected mail ballots skew Democratic as well. 2. Strict photo ID laws also disadvantage Democrats, particularly young voters and those in urban areas. Again, this is data not opinion.
We already formed the Western States Compact in 2020. Making it more formal would be pretty easy. Only problem is that King Clown isn't remotely beyond just dropping bombs on our cities if we actually tried to secede.
Yep. Though that piece doesn't include Washington, which is very much part of this coalition. Helps a bunch that our new gov is also the former state AG, and trounced Trump's ass in court several times in his first term.
1. We no longer have clean elections. 2. Legal actions are doomed to fail because everything eventually will end up at the compromised SCOTUS. 3. He has the entire federal government, military included, under his control.
We no longer have civil means of removing this regime from power. Fascists have control of every single part of the federal government, including the military. This doesn't end without civil war, and we're going to need help on our side to fight back.
Because what affects us affects the world. You can't have full-on collapse of a nuclear superpower and major component of the world economy without the rest of the world going to shit. And that doesn't even account for the climate-crisis acceleration.
When they eventually erect their Ashli Babbitt statue in the Capitol, it's going to be awkward that my book The Undertow inclues the first and to-date fullest biography of their hero. (In the book, a J6 lawyer predicts the statue, & calls for a holiday.) www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...
The shooter literally had the minimalist “Loss” meme on their rifle. You cannot take anything this person said or did at face value. It’s all so deep soaked in irony and toxic fandom culture that if you aren’t actually researching this stuff for a living you really shouldn’t be engaging with it.
🚨 The CDC as we know it is being severely altered tonight. In addition to the CDC director being ousted, the Post is reporting that several senior leaders are leaving as well. Here are from two of the resignations:
They’re in an airport, dude. You’re looking at kids who are bored in an airport.
Right wingers only care about the identity of the shooter when it’s something they can use as a weapon. The FSU shooter was a literal neo-Nazi and that went away very quickly. Most school shooters are white men between the ages of 16-24, but nobody ever talks about that
This article is from 2023.
The plan for "gangbangers in Baltimore" offered by someone who influences the thinking of the VPOTUS. Relatedly, what his ex-girlfriend told The New Yorker: "When I asked her if she’d ever changed Yarvin’s mind about anything, she said she’d gotten him to stop using the N-word, at least around her"
This is insane and pretty sure it’s part of the deal with Putin. It’s not that subtle.
JUSTICE FOR SANDWICHES
Random: Trans folks alone outnumber active-duty military in the US. Add in the rest of the queer community, and we also outnumber military + LEOs. Unless Trump starts just plain shooting all of us (not putting that past him), it's not going to be easy to either deport or jail everyone he hates.
The fact that this administration is hell bent on punishing Kilmar Abrego Garcia while rewarding Ghislane Maxwell tells you all you need to know about their violent racism and misogyny.
They’re all acting as if they’re certain they’ll never have to face justice for their crimes.
Surprising no one, Musk's man within GSA still works for Tesla at the same time as he works for the government. @autost.bsky.social did you think no one would find out?
Cost of Trump's D.C. Occupation: $1.1M per day. Cost to operate public housing for D.C.'s entire homeless population: $169,226 per day. It's not about what this country can or can’t afford. It’s about priorities.
Putin must be beside himself with glee that his army of propaganda trolls has been so successful. He can just sit back and watch the US succumb to plague, famine and violence.
Antivaxxers are going all in to outright deny germ theory, falling in line with Kennedy. This post suggests that hand, foot, & mouth disease is actually "vaccine injury" rather than a viral infection.
The daughters of Hermann Göring's aide - who refused for years to talk with art-theft investigators - put their home in Argentina up for sale, and GUESS WHAT.
Wut
GOOD NEWS! For the FIRST time ever, and after MORE THAN 30 YEARS of HIV vaccine clinical trials, researchers have developed a vaccine that has SUCCESSFULLY generated TIER 2 broadly neutralizing antibodies (bnAbs) against HIV and BLOCKS viral infection in vaccinated PEOPLE.
“They’re going to kill me here,” Neri Alvarado thought. Alvarado was allegedly targeted by the Trump administration because of his tattoo of an autism awareness ribbon. Now, free from El Salvador's notorious CECOT prison, Alvarado wants the world to know what they lived through.
Many people picture a democracy becoming authoritarian as a single dramatic event, like the Bolsheviks capturing the Winter Palace in 1917. But often, especially in the 21st century, there never is one. It's more gradual, a process in fits and starts. Good explanation of that here:
I keep saying that this doesn't end without actual war. People need to either get out now if they can, or prepare to have to fight or hide out away from the fighting.
This is the kind of language inversion fascists use before they make opposing them a crime and render their political opposition a domestic enemy that is treated as a terrorist threat You don’t vote yourself out of this. They are setting the stage for a single party state where opposition is treason
Yeah, we're not going to violate the Geneva convention, thanks.
The top story of the moment is the one story that our most influential newsrooms won’t touch: That the United State has become an authoritarian state. presswatchers.org/2025/08/we-h...
Pritzker: To the members of the press who are assembled here today and listening across the country, I am asking for your courage to tell it like it is. This is not a time to pretend here that there are two sides to this story.
Illinois Gov. Pritzker vows to pursue Trump officials who participate in an illegal National Guard deployment to Chicago: "If you hurt my people, nothing will stop me - not time or political circumstance - from making sure that you face justice under our constitutional rule of law."
Trump and Stephen Miller basically kidnapped the wrong guy and are now moving heaven and earth to torture him and pretend they had a reason other than bigotry.
Nope. Not least because the white/Christian supremacist wing of the party won't be able to stomach him having a practicing-Hindu wife.
Ill Douche.
Just keeping with tradition.
You get the drift.
I'm old enough to remember how we used to laugh at authoritarian leaders like Saddam Hussain for doing just this...
It's already hit a couple of them. But since MAGA doesn't even care about their own kids, nothing's going to move that needle.
For the love of God, no! It is not a political horse race, it is an authoritarian attack on our democracy.
Still waiting for someone of prominence to admit it was not about eggs.
Eliminating fraud, waste, and abuse by constantly, unnecessarily painting and repainting over a memorial and policing a single crosswalk 24/7.
So they're literally policing speech. Hmm.
You don’t really think of AI as being bad for the environment After all, it’s only computers. How could that possibly be so bad But the truth is, it’s VERY harmful
That’s not even to mention mass internment under the Alien Enemies Act (last invoked during WWII), a super-charged “Operation Wetback,” and a metastasizing case of McCarthyism and the Lavender scare aimed at the media, military, and higher ed. All the greatest hits of US History all at once!
Trump's Presidencies have so far involved numerous Saturday Night Massacres, dozens of Watergates, and a never ending parade of Tea Pot Dome scandals. I worry that we're about to enter the "dozens of Kent State's" portion of the story.
Every non-citizen (and naturalized; they'll get to those, too) who has any history of anything as small as paperwork glitches or a traffic ticket needs to assume they're going to get picked up eventually. Prep your families now, and get out if you can.
It's the common throughline on all of these wtf cases. IIRC, there was one guy who got taken just because he'd been *accused* of a minor crime even though the charges were dropped. Any contact with law enforcement: you get kicked out.
I'm surprised so many people don't get what's going on: They're running database searches on all LPRs and visa holders to find ones that have ever had any flags. Minor weed possession, paperwork errors, etc. Then they're canceling their status with zero warning and using that premise to take them.
The majority now sees violent punishment--hitting kids, the death penalty or war--as abhorrent. But a minority, mostly white guys, now see it as the only way to retain the dominance they believe they're entitled to. And they're using the framework of the childhood programming beaten into them.
The Millennials who were the victims of this surge in violence ended up going two different directions as adults: Completely rejecting it, and the religion behind it, or getting brainwashed by it and repeating the same patterns, especially as the larger culture continued to shift.
White Christian men who saw their paychecks waning, their wives leaving the home and their kids playing with the Brown kids next door lost their dang minds. Dobson's message of violent control was very appealing.
But the grifters who were in charge of commercialized Christianity in the '70s and '80s knew they had no chance of keeping that gravy train going with all the massive social change happening. To keep control of their flocks in the face of those alternatives, they had to force obedience.
The religion itself, of course, is heavily entrenched in the idea of violence as punishment: Their entire concept of sin and Hell is all about that, and this goes back to the very roots of Christianity itself (and undoubtedly before, and cross culturally.)
Physical abuse was, of course, an accepted norm among almost all American families up through the 1980s. But when research started showing the damage it was doing, educated, science-respecting people started using other tactics. The people who didn't? Conservative Christians.
I think James Dobson is probably one of the clearest root causes of why we're in this shit: He's one of the most prominent voices who drove the idea that violence is good punishment, and that anyone crying out for help--even a baby--is just trying to be manipulative.
Mob boss. Always has been.
I think the throughline for both things is personalization: The consistent sin of America is the inability to give a shit about other people unless you know them or their pain affects you, too. Put a sympathetic face to the DC occupation, and opinion will likely shift there, too.
Last week someone made this point, a lot of money people (including tech) made a very clear, very calculated decision that authoritarianism, even a corrupt kleptocracy, was better for them financially than risking Dems doing a wealth tax/tax fairness etc. It was an eyes-wide-open choice.