One big problem with the world is how few people in power I can imagine sitting down and reading a book
One big problem with the world is how few people in power I can imagine sitting down and reading a book
It's looking increasingly like these guys thought that if they could wreak more death and destruction than the other side then they would be respected as strong powerful men and they would "win" and that would make them big important heroes. Very possibly they had no rationale deeper than that.
Did you know that Nepal had a high-stakes election last week? That the backstory involved Discord, a youth movement, and a rapper-turned-politician? I didn't - at least until a student of mine told me. She wrote it up for others to learn too: www.techpolicy.press/nepals-gen-z...
โOf course,โ Astrid says with great professionalism. โThere are many wonderful women-loving-women stories to choose from. Do you have any other parameters for me to narrow the search for you? Do you like stories set on the high sea? In the Old West? Or maybe with a speculative element, you know, likeโโ โLike in Barbarella?โ Gus Andersonโs eyes light up. Astrid has only the vaguest impression of a young Jane Fonda in a skimpy outfit on the Barbarella movie poster, an image that serves the male gaze as its raison dโรชtre. โComparable titles in the sense that these stories are also set in the future, or in space, or sometimes both,โ she says firmly. โWould you like some recommendations?โ โAbsolutely.โ The old man sounds giddy. โBring them on.โ Astrid writes down This Is How You End the Time War and Gideon the Ninth for him, and then personally takes him to the stacks to retrieve The Stars Are Legion, by Kameron Hurley. โThere isnโt a single man in this book. Everybody on this planet is a woman.โ โOh, my!โ Gus Anderson, his head probably brimming with images of thousands of chicks making out with one another for his delectation, checks out the book and leaves happily.
A fan messaged me about this passage from Sherry Thomas's book, "The Librarians," in which a librarian has an annoying older male patron ask her for some woman-on-woman sf๐
Alysa Liu telling 60 Minutes โI love struggling, it makes me feel aliveโ is a legit revolutionary statement from a Bay Area native in a time when copious amounts of time and resources are being put toward convincing us to opt out of experiencing struggle, friction and self-actualization
If Jeff Bezos could afford to spend $75 million on the Melania movie & $500 million for a yacht to sail off to his $55 million wedding to give his wife a $5 million ring, please don't tell me he needed to fire one-third of the Washington Post staff.
Democracy dies in oligarchy.
Since July, I've tracked at least 2,300 cases in which federal judges have ruled ICE has illegally detained people without bond or due process.
This is one that stands out:
storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...
One of the best things Iโve read in a while:
Our analysis at @bellingcat.com on the killing of Alex Pretti breaks down the video evidence.
He never reached for his gun.
Agents sprayed/tackled him while his hands were up.
He was disarmed before he was shot.
The first shot came from an agent firing at him.
www.bellingcat.com/news/2026/01...
A dark blue mug with an American flag reads โAMERICA 1776 โ 2026โ
Fairly sure itโs unintentional, but the end date on this mug being sold by the Smithsonian does make it sound a little like theyโre saying America dies in 2026โฆ
San Francisco is going to give families making under $230k free child care for kids under 5. It is nice to see that good things can still happen.
www.sf.gov/news-mayor-l...
A much-liked post by Germanyโs satirical newspaper @der-postillon.com with the titles โVienna Academy of the Arts offers Trump admission as a studentโ and the caption โThey donโt want to get blamed againโ
A joke for the history buffs:
Germanyโs satirical newspaper @der-postillon.com titles: โVienna Academy of the Arts offers Trump admission as a student โ They donโt want to get blamed againโ
Trying to protect everything from everyone all the time is a good way to drive yourself crazy. This is why we threat model. Here is EFF's Surveillance Self Defense guide to putting together your security plan, also known as threat modeling: ssd.eff.org/module/your-...
Letโs talk about abolishing ICE.
Very few people who say โabolish ICEโ mean โabandon all immigration enforcement.โ Rather, they mean โthe structure of immigration enforcement is irretrievably broken and needs to be reorganized, just like we did 23 years ago when we created ICE.โ
/1
If the old robber barons like Rockefeller and J.P. Morgan had a stock ticker showing them nonstop insults from the hoi polloi they too would send the Pinkertons into random Midwestern cities to get into fights with locals.
For those keeping score, Bellingcat, The New York Times Visual Investigation Team, & Washington Post's Visual Forensic team have all published analysis showing the ICE shooter wasn't in the path of Renee Nicole Goodโs vehicle when he shot her, contradicting statements by the President & his cronies
everyone thinks theyโre a foreign policy expert now huh
If you are a resident of California, the state now has a portal where you can demand deletion of your personal data from 500+ registered data brokers with a single request form, for free.
consumer.drop.privacy.ca.gov
I think a good flex would be to buy a "I Bought This Before We Knew Elon Was Crazy" bumper sticker and put it on a Nissan Leaf
Were there moments that you missed? Anything that happened thatโs on the cutting room floor? I donโt think thereโs anything I missed that I wish Iโd gotten. Iโll give you a little anecdote: Stephen Miller was perhaps the most concerned about the portrait session. He asked me, โShould I smile or not smile?โ and I said, โHow would you want to be portrayed?โ We agreed that we would do a bit of both. And then when we were finished, he comes up to me to shake my hand and say goodbye. And he says to me, โYou know, you have a lot of power in the discretion you use to be kind to people.โ And I looked at him and I said, โYou know, you do, too.โ
The Vanity Fair photographer from the Susie Wiles story.
Holy. Shit.
www.washingtonpost.com/style/power/...
The real question is not "Why is Bluesky so left-coded," the real question is "Why can't the right exist in a social media environment without algorithmic assistance, where people can ignore them"
This post-mortem and the accompanying full technical report from Anthropic is a fascinating glimpse into how rapidly hackers are using commercial AI services (here, Claude) to do recon & launch successful attacks on victim orgs.
www.anthropic.com/news/disrupt...
Itโs pretty funny that end-to-end encryption is safer from the US government than itโs ever been, and the reason is criminal corruption.
In a better society, all the men in those Epstein emails were taken out to the middle of the ocean and given a fair opportunity to swim home
Trump Still Polling Well With Working-Class American Pedophiles
Trump Still Polling Well With Working-Class American Pedophiles https://theonion.com/trump-still-polling-well-with-working-class-american-pedophiles/
Itโs not that we didnโt want the shutdown to end, itโs the fact that millions of people suffered throughout this shutdown and it was for nothing. Thatโs the most upsetting part.
Democrats seem to think the pivoting to the center makes them most electable but all it does it piss *everyone* off.
Having beliefs/a backbone and being authentic is the best way to win elections. People are fucking sick of croneyism and corporate suck ups and that is why Zohran cruised to victory
Chuck Schumer Helps Pull Democrats Back From Brink Of Courage
Chuck Schumer Helps Pull Democrats Back From Brink Of Courage