guacamolegate. or maybe guacamoleghazi? let’s focus-group it.

by an unelected campaign donor.

i like to think these are targeted.

have you ever met a bunch of more pathetic language police? ht @hurricanexyz.bsky.social

for how long has it been illegal for a Federal dollar to fund research about gun violence? this is an old GOP tactic. you'd like to think all the dead kids would constitute a backfiring of it but, so far, nope.

there was a fire in the kitchen and just when mom put it out i left the shower on in the bathroom i am so awesome i saved our home.

i worry abt more subtle things, the gutting of state capacity from within, corrupting (and skimming from) Federal payments systems etc. i don’t worry at all abt stuff the public will feel unsubtly in prices. i’m grateful for that. when we actually experience the idiocy we’ve elevated, we’ll learn.

i would like it if i were sure people who understand the law surrounding eg access to federal records and systems (not to mention election law) were noting all the possible violations. maybe from all these experts they are firing, we as civil society should fund some investigators-in-exile.

We have Nicholas Gottlieb at US AID, David A. Lebryk at Treasury, who knows how many others, giving up their careers rather than betray their values. Bezos, Zuckerberg, et al, the CEOs of CBS + ABC, placate and bribe the President to preserve and expand their empires. Money makes people pathetic.

Should people who openly bribe the President, even if they are “respected” lawyers or CEOs or whatnot, doing it because “it’s in the best interest of shareholders” be welcome in polite society? Should you serve them in your restaurant? Speak politely with them at conferences?

This is fine. Musk wanted access to the literal spigot of Federal money in a way that made the totally nonpolitical guy who supervises it, a guy Trump and all his Project 2025-ers had been happy to reappoint, feel like he had to resign. ht @marisakabas.bsky.social

We are all so proud of our great corporate champions. 40yrs.blogspot.com/2025/01/ecch...

Good idea or bad? "Ensure every Congressional Democrat in 2028 faces a meaningful primary challenger." (at first blush: upside is accountability for ppl some of whom seem to worry abt more abt risking their jobs than risking the country; downside is primary challenges might cripple in the general.)

Normie white dude: This renaming shit is just stupid. Let Ulysses S. Grant Elementary stay Ulysses S. Grant Elementary. Yes, the Black Hills. It was 150 years ago. I mean, even Robert E. Lee Elementary. Who cares? Let's get real stuff done. Trump: Have I told you about the Gulf of America?

9/11: “They hate us for our freedoms” 1/6: “They free us for our hatreds.”

is there a list of domains where Congress has imposed mandates the Trump Administration would characterize as DEI, so we can monitor the degree to which it is “tak[ing] Care that the laws be faithfully executed”, at least until it can persuade Congress to change the laws, as is its right to try?

“it turns out that most Americans are uninterested in acting like a belligerent asshole on the global stage.” @dandrezner.bsky.social danieldrezner.substack.com/p/the-pretty...

we have to learn to appreciate the small pleasures.

i always used to wonder what it would feel like to live in a golden age.