Wanderer. I do the artings and the writings.
541 followers 462 following 535 posts
view profile on Bluesky 
Also in this episode: *Trump's lawless bombings of so-called "drug boats" are only getting more emboldened *Trump's biggest backers are encouraging him to expand the bombings (see JD Vance "joking" about killing fishermen) *GOPers doing nothing to join Dems in imposing constraints/transparency
I criticize the govt when it does bad things, not only because bad things merit criticism, but also to assert the crucial right to criticize the govt. Even if the govt were doing nothing wrong, nothing that merits criticism at all, you’re still fully entitled to say negative things about leaders.
New: 404 Media is suing ICE. We have filed a lawsuit demanding ICE release its $2 million contract with Paragon, a company that makes powerful spyware to break into phones and read encrypted messages. This is expensive for a small outlet but this info is important www.404media.co/were-suing-i...
Gendered administrative burdens academic.oup.com/jpart/articl...
"history is also going to remember the cowards who definitely knew better but still let things happen—whether it was for money, convenience, or just comfort. Use ... the only phrase that can genuinely make a weak bully go away: F**k you. Make me.”" www.pajiba.com/news/john-ol...
👇
Look at what these people are doing | www.nytimes.com/2025/09/22/r...
4th deadly US strike on a boat in the Caribbean. As with the others: -in area US military operates freely -arrest low risk -no legal rationale -violates international law -no evidence of who US hit If really traffickers—very much an if—the move is interdiction. Would get evidence and intelligence.
Student visas dropped to a four year low. Trump also cuts spending on research by hundreds of billions on college campuses. This is how you end American exceptionalism. I gifted this article so you can read it www.bloomberg.com/news/article...
CNN: “4 US citizens, a father and his 3 children, were among 5 people killed Sunday by an Israeli air strike on southern Lebanon…” www.cnn.com/2025/09/21/m...
All headlines just from today 🇺🇸
yes! congressional control of the purse applies to the white house as well. you can defund stephen miller.
MAGA, because it's a cult, doesn't realize the majority in America and around the world think today's spectacle was truly weird, sad, and unhinged. In no way did it honor Charlie Kirk. It abused his murder as a political rally in honor of their King, Donald Trump. Hella weird.
This is as rambling a Trump speech as I've ever heard: old Biden, crime-ridden Washington DC, the MAHA discovery of a cure for autism, interspersed with occasional anecdotes about Charlie Kirk. On Fox News, I just saw a shot of people sneaking out early from the seated areas to avoid the rush.
Looks like I won't be tuning in for a few days to @msnbc.com BAD choice to air the "Charlie Kirk" Memorial. It doesn't have a Goddamned thing to do with Charlie Kirk. It's a MAGA Rally. Stick it in your ass.
What’s up, Oklahoma? Mandatory Charlie Kirk memorial plazas and statues at every public college, while higher-ed budgets get slashed.
In a less insane time, if it was discovered that the President of the United States said this privately to their AG, it would’ve triggered an all-encompassing, impeachable corruption scandal. Here, Trump is saying it publicly and it’s just another Saturday.
Man alive. I have studied Right Wing authoritarianism for years and have watched some truly fucked up shit and today’s memorial service is maybe the most concentrated example of how messed up and disturbing that sector truly is.
🤬🤬🤬
No more turning away…
Always.
Witness.
Josh Shapiro: "I was on a Spanish language radio program in the Allentown area and the host said something really chilling to me -- that he now has to think about what topics he's going to discuss because he's fearful he might offend federal regulators of the president."
It’s truly disgusting.
Historians have wondered how a nation such as Germany with a rich cultural history and strong democratic traditions could descend so rapidly into authoritarianism and barbarism. America seems to be trying to find the answer by doing an experiment in living history.
Normalize all the authoritarian moves, am I right dawg?
The lesson of history is that tyrants cannot be appeased. Appeasement only feeds their insatiable hunger for power. Tyrants prey on people who feel unsafe and vulnerable. But without mass submission, a tyrant is powerless.
This is quite the post. 1. He unambiguously directs his AG to go after those who investigated him for his crimes 2. He admits being influenced by online chatter He is mob bossing out in the open, because he knows he has corrupted every federal law enforcement agency into submission.
EXCLUSIVE: In an undercover operation last year, the FBI recorded Tom Homan, now the White House border czar, accepting $50,000 in cash after indicating he could help the agents, who were posing as business executives, win government contracts in a second Trump administration.
I experienced this last week & refused, saying I had never before been asked to provide the names of any analysts I was planning to quote to get a comment. Spox replied that maybe they were D donors. (In that case, it was 3 retired top military JAG officers.) I guess that was not a weird oneoff.
The use of athwart makes my purple prose loving self giddy.
When we get to pleading in my first-year Civil Procedure class, my students often ask me just how over the top a complaint would have to be for a judge to strike it without even being *asked* to do so. Thanks to President Trump, we have an answer: storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...
NEW: Trump administration asks SCOTUS to intervene in the Lisa Cook case
I cannot overstate how remarkable it is that under GOP rule, US federal health regulations have been captured by fringe crackpots who espouse views that the vast majority of the US public—and nearly 100% of health professionals—reject. Gift link:
At $100,000 per H1B visa, Amazon alone will end up paying $1 Billion. Or, more likely, laying off most of their international staff. www.cbsnews.com/news/trump-h...
"Because someone died, we have to take away your rights" -- the same pretextual rationale that authoritarians always use
From the almost legendary former CEO of Disney
I think this abbreviated version conveys the practical implications of the longer one: Draft Bill Would Authorize Trump to Kill People www.nytimes.com/2025/09/19/u...
This is a profoundly important suit. I would like to know how to support.
Alex Acosta remains defiant defending his decision not to prosecute Epstein. He “essentially said he didn’t have faith in the victims, their stories and their ability to tell their own story and their own testimony, which is deeply disturbing to all of us sitting in there,” said Rep. Maxwell Frost.
🔥🧑🌾 MISSOURI FARMER to @RepMarkAlford: “Trump is not helping the farmer. When are you gonna stand up for us instead of kissing his ass?” cc: @GovBillLee @RepChrisTodd @rustygrills @CSexton25 @RepFaison @WilliamLamberth @SenBrentTaylor @MarshaBlackburn @AndyOgles @RepTimBurchett
This is the playbook, folks. If you're not paying attention now and doing something about it, then you're going to have to sit down the rest of your life because democracy is being taken away. Do not be quiet in this moment.
Extraordinarily corrupt. I watched FCC chair Brendan Carr's full interview on Hannity. Carr basically said straight out that coverage of Trump he deems overly hostile can be decreed contrary to the "public interest," and thus grounds for yanking licenses: newrepublic.com/article/2006...
The president of the United States believes he has the right and the authority to use the firepower of the federal government to crush people who say things about him that he does not like. It's as simple as that.
While we're all distracted by the domestic sideshow, Trump is sending the military out to kill people he says are "terrorists", in violation of US and international law. No wonder people at the Pentagon are checking in with their lawyers. www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archiv...
I would call this “consciousness of guilt” in an eventual domestic trial or international war crimes tribunal.
Rookies? 🤬🤬🤬 hmmmm…maybe you shouldn’t be there then, eh? Maybe you don’t have the requisite credentials to make these decisions, eh? Maybe you’re there because this administration is a shitty, pustulant sore that put you there to spread its blight and contagion far and wide?!
Straight-up Kremlin propaganda.
“But what makes the Kimmel affair different, and much more chilling, than the dismissal of Colbert is the directness and obviousness of the federal government’s interference.” Yeppy yep.
Further update: SCOTUS has instructed Lisa Cook's lawyers to respond to Trump's application by Tuesday, September 25th at 4pm. Notably, no administrative stay in the meantime—effectively/implicitly granting Cook's request not to impose one.
Trying to cover that 1st amendment violating ass up with a gossamer veil.
“Having spent the prior day sending celebratory gifs to reporters asking [Carr] about the entire episode/he grew notably skittish. Yesterday, he showed up/to argue he had actually played no active role in Kimmel’s suspension at all.” Curiouser and curiouser. Sarcasm at 11.
It was not a “surprise twist.” It was the entirely expected outcome of RFK Jr replacing scientists with quacks.
moments ago, ice agents again came out of the broadview detention/“professing” facility to escort a silver suv out of the lot. one of the agents picked up and threw congressional candidate kat abughazaleh to the ground.
🚨NEW: "The Late Show with Stephen Colbert" just dropped its first response to ABC, FCC chair, and Disney firing Jimmy Kimmel. Trump ain't sleeping tonight. 🤣 This is a must-watch. 🔥
1. He can fire all the prosecutors he wants but still a long way from getting a conviction without evidence. We'll see. 2. He's getting crazier by the hour now, isn't he? This is on top of talking about re-invading Afghanistan and no one is allowed to criticize him on TV...and that's just today.
firmly believe it wasn't what kimmel said about kirk's killer that made dollhands so mad. it was showing this clip and adding: "He's at the 4th stage of grief, construction ... This is not how an adult grieves the murder of someone he called a friend. This is how a 4-year-old mourns a goldfish."
I know it's frustrating when lawyers point out when something the administration is doing is not legal. But responding with "the law doesn't matter anymore" is really unhelpful and defeatist. Clarifying the law is important because it reminds us not to comply in advance and to resist and take action
Luckily, Sinclair has a helpful database of all their stations, so you can see if they're operating in your area and respond accordingly. sbgi.net/tv-stations/
Part of our constitutional crisis is that Republicans are stopping Congress from playing its fundamental oversight role.
They’re going to fire a US attorney because they couldn’t find evidence for a crime that was manufactured by the administration? Banana republic shit
Holy fkn shit.
“What we’re seeing is an unprecedented attempt to silence disfavored speech by the government,” said Brendan Nyhan, a political scientist at Dartmouth College. “Donald Trump is trying to dictate what Americans can say.” https://to.pbs.org/46AYg7U
There's so much to unpack -- his childish understanding of the world, his raw nerve of grievances, his sociopathy -- but I can't get past what a whiny, pathetic loser you'd have to be as president to stamp your little feet and cry that the media isn't "allowed" to be mean to you. Mom said so guys!
I will not go gentle into that good night. I will rage. Rage against the dying of the light. (All due respect to Dylan Thomas for the borrowing of his lines for my contextual purposes.) #art #donotobeyinadvance #dosomething #saysomething #istandwithcolbert #istandwithkimmel #freespeech
;&/8;’s🤬fr83827,’ 🤬dh da dusnd 🤬3$7:&:8;&;8hsidyznsu 🤬🤬!!’
Precisely.
Can Jimmy Kimmel sue Brendan Carr, or other federal actors, for violating his First Amendment rights by coercing ABC to suspend his show, and maybe eventually to fire him? To teal deer it, yes, but without an effective remedy. /1
Good.
Don't be chickenshit.
This was after Colbert was canceled. Which was two months ago.
Folks, I don’t know what end is up right now.
We’re being punked, right?!
"My Committee will be a leading force in the righteous endeavor to protect the legitimate free exchange of ideas and opinions, which requires the vigilant maintenance of appropriate behaviors within our publicly accessed social media forums." People overuse "Orwellian," but ... c'mon.
I think it was less about his comments wrt Kirk as they were pretty benign and more about his jokes aimed at Trump. #istandwithjimmy #jimmykimmel
Don't want to say I called it, but... you know... sometimes I know what I'm talking about. www.techdirt.com/2024/11/27/b...
TERRORISM EXPERT HERE: He cannot designate an idea as a terrorist group. There is no org called ANTIFA. There is no leadership or funding path or no membership. Also there is no terrorism law in America. Ask Luigi. He wants to call anyone a terrorist. That’s Fascism. #ReleaseTheEpsteinFiles
Unfuckingreal.
Exactly this
Listening to the hearing today makes you feel sick as you realize the statements Kennedy has made. Dr. Monarez stated: “He said that CDC employees were killing children and they don’t care. He said that CDC employees were bought by the pharmaceutical industry. He said CDC
WGA Statement on ABC’s Decision to Pull Jimmy Kimmel Live!
The Kimmel video: "The MAGA gang desperately trying to characterize this kid who murdered Charlie Kirk as anything other than one of them, and doing everything they can to score political points from it."
We are now straight into full-blown McCarthyism, with black lists and everything.
"Some military lawyers and other Defense Department officials are raising concerns ... around the justification for the strikes." "Other defense officials are looking to provide legal protection for the individual military personnel involved in the strikes, who might be 'personally liable.'"
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.
Pritzker: What's at stake here is free speech. It's our constitution and our way of life. Do we really want the president intimidating people, organizations to get others fired? People ought to be standing up and speaking out.
It was taken down in February (from what read when Mehdi posted about it), but it’s web archived (for now). web.archive.org/web/20250911...
The FCC Chair saying “You can deal with Kimmel the easy way or the hard way” is the very definition of a chilling effect on speech, and a good indicator the First Amendment is a dead letter in the Trump regime. Free speech is dying in America and none of our free speech warriors seem to care
Ha! No, no they do not. And they will willfully point to “consequences.” Guarantee.
so many dead canaries and we just keep on mining
I wrote about Ted Cruz's dismissal of right-wing violence, including an extended excerpt from my book looking at the construction of non-existent cabals. www.pbump.net/o/the-vast-l...
Dr. Susan Monarez: “I could have stayed silent, agreed to the demands, and no one would have known. What the public would have seen were scientists dismissed without cause and vaccine protections quietly eroded…I would have lost the one thing that cannot be replaced: My integrity.”
Just mind boggling.
Sen. Bill Cassidy: HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. expected you to change the childhood vaccine schedule, despite a lack of science or data to support that move? Former CDC Director Susan Monarez: "Correct."
NEW: FBI Director Kash Patel says recent court orders — related to a few dozen pages of grand jury material — are preventing him from releasing the FBI's massive trove of Epstein files. That's not what the courts actually said. www.politico.com/live-updates...
Dear. Fucking. God.
Far as I can tell, Robert Redford was: * successful at everything he tried * genuinely intelligent & insightful * desired by women * envied by men * an absolute mensch to everyone he dealt with * a tireless, lifelong philanthropist ... and he died peacefully in his sleep. 10/10 life. No notes.
This is quickly mushrooming into a real international incident www.washingtonpost.com/world/2025/0...
former CDC official Dr. Houry: "I first learned that the secretary had changed our CDC covid vaccine guidance on an X social media post. CDC scientists have still not seen the scientific data or justification for this change. That is not gold standard science."