Javen Swanson 🏳️‍🌈

I'm going to try following Governor Cox’s advice to log off, touch grass, hug the people I love, and focus on doing good in my community.

So for now, if you want to connect, reach me via phone, text, or email. I'll be spending more time offline. Hit me up in real life to grab coffee or a beer!

I disagree with most everything Utah Governor Spencer Cox says, but on one thing we do agree: social media companies are conflict entrepreneurs that have hacked our brains, addicted us to outrage, and turned us against each other, all to generate profit.

Worst of all, it's breaking our brains and corroding our humanity. For me, the benefits of social media no longer justify the cost.

What's online isn't real life. The algorithms amplify the loudest, most extreme voices because outrage drives engagement (and profit). There's so much fake discourse, with anonymous accounts and bots spinning up disinformation and trying to create alternative realities.

I've decided to take a break from social media. I'll leave my accounts active for now, but I'm deleting the apps and choosing to stay away for awhile.

Just utterly despicable.

Related data point: Bernie Sanders is the most popular politician in the United States.

There are more guns in the United States than anywhere else and more mass murders, too, so maybe, “How could this happen?” isn’t the right question 🤷‍♂️

I graduated with a degree in mathematics, so I'm pretty good at this stuff.

$100 drug.

50% off = $50.
75% off = $25.
90% off = $10.
100% off = $0.

The president keeps saying he's going to reduce drug prices by 1500%. Can someone do that math for me?

How the Democrats Became the Party That Brings Pencils to a Knife Fight

For too long, Democrats have defended the rules while Republicans smashed them. It’s time to start fighting fire with fire. This is a great article.

Not the biggest Newsom fan here but this is right on.

291_fightingback YouTube video by Netroots Nation

"Are we thermostats or are we thermometers?!" asks
@keithellison.bsky.social. Instead of bending to transphobia "it is not a good idea to sell out your base. If you want to redeem yourself come up with a story that is inclusive and doesn't feed into rightwing scapegoating." #NN25

ranked choice voting question from aurin chowdhury, asks each candidate say what they admire in each other and why the other 2 should be on our ballots too, starting with dewayne davis on jazz hampton and omar fateh @dewayneforminneapolis.com

Trump's agenda is getting destroyed among independents

This is a must-watch. It’s Mamdani explaining how Democrats can win back voters they’ve lost—and how he pulled it off last week. Tl;dr: Listen to voters, fight for them, and give them something to be FOR, not just talking about what they should be AGAINST.

This is true, if you don't think poor people count as human beings.

I genuinely cannot believe how many Democrats are spending their energy on destroying Mamdani when the GOP is trying to turn ICE into a full on secret police by drastically raising their budget

Viktor Orban tried to ban the Budapest Pride parade. He got the biggest one yet. Steve Hendrix reports from the Hungarian capital

www.washingtonpost.com/world/2025/0...

Minnesota. Go see Cabaret at the Guthrie before the Administration cancels theater. It’s absolutely chilling.

Gross indeed. The Democrats now smearing Mamdani are the same Democrats who did nothing to stop Trump's return to power and are doing nothing now to oppose his rampant corruption and authoritarian power grab.

137,000 people in Minnesota would lose health coverage and become uninsured under the Republican health agenda.

16 million people would lose health coverage and become uninsured under the Republican health agenda, including 137,000 people in Minnesota.

Policymakers should protect people’s health care, not cut it.

Mr. Mamdani’s relentless focus on economic affordability resonated widely and could be a playbook for the party’s success as well. “There is no doubt that Trump and Republicans will try and seize on him as a kind of exemplar of what the Democratic Party stands for,” Mr. Axelrod said.

We should be so lucky! (Screenshot from www.nytimes.com/2025/06/25/n...)

it turns out that embracing a multi-racial, multi-faith democracy is the best path towards peace in this chaotic world.

Imagine if the Democratic Party actually helped Zohran instead of trying to kneecap him at every step. A better party is immediately possible if they stop shoving money into the anti-trans combination Racism Dial/Money Toilet and instead get behind candidates people actually want.

It’s true we don’t have a “vaccine” for HIV, but we *do* have an injectable long-lasting HIV prevention drug that was supported by NIH research dollars and approved by the FDA literally days ago. So stupid to back off on vaccine research when we’ve made so many promising breakthroughs recently.

Democrats are racking their brains trying to find the "Joe Rogan of the left" while doing everything they can to defeat people like Zohran Mamdani and AOC, who actually possess the skills they're so desperately looking for.

“We’re not members of the factinista. We go straight from the gut.”

This is how you speak about God when speaking of God authentically is completely foreign to you.

Edwin and Ricardo Torres DeSantiago, 32 and 33, both of Minnetonka, were among the attendees wearing black buttons with the letters "LFG" in white with the initials "MH" in a red heart. When the DFL won a trifecta in 2022 to control the Minnesota government, Melissa Hortman exclaimed, "Let's [expletive] go!" explained Edwin Torres DeSantiago, who works in DFL campaigns.

Even got a shout-out in the Strib.