…won’t somebody think [DOT 9/9/25]

that'd be a start...

…if only there were some sort of prophylactic preventative that could inoculate you against the news

…or better yet…could inoculate society against the parts of itself that are basically a virulent contagion

i thought this couldn’t fucking possibly be real, and, welp, i was totally wrong, holy fuck

GOLIKEHELLMACHINE (@golikehellmachine.com) 2025-09-09T02:46:48.054Z

every single written account of this in the news has *dramatically* understated the nature of it, it is an archive of depravity

GOLIKEHELLMACHINE (@golikehellmachine.com) 2025-09-09T02:55:49.254Z

…&…avoid the…cognitive dis-junction…induced by the unfeeling juxtaposition of the internet sorting hat

Israeli military orders ‘all residents’ of Gaza City to evacuate immediately [BBC]

…kinda deliberately going with the anodyne BBC link there because I don’t want to literally walk you through the “those poor kids” of it all…but…I doubt anyone’s going to have to struggle too hard to cotton on to what might do the record-scratch thing about those stories & that phrase butting up against one another…still…want to be cautious about ideas getting in too many heads all at once

Did ‘mass hysteria’ trigger Heathrow Terminal 4 evacuation chaos?
Expert says ‘airports can provide the ideal conditions for mass psychogenic spread’
[Independent]

…&…frankly…some images you could do without having in your head

That is…uh, not a drawing of an adult woman. *shudder*

Patton Oswalt (@pattonoswalt.bsky.social) 2025-09-08T22:05:26.570Z

Yeah I guess that’s it! Was just too disgusting to click for a second. But yes. I think I was expecting Jessica Rabbit.

Chris Hayes (@chrislhayes.bsky.social) 2025-09-08T20:13:15.630Z

Yeah, that was my assumption as well, given the way he’s historically talked about female beauty. This is just so much worse

Any handwriting experts out there?Oh wait, we don’t need one because we have eyes…

Christopher Webb (@cwebbonline.com) 2025-09-09T02:46:43.961Z

This Epstein birthday book, which is regrettably online and accessible, would in a normal world compel the resignation and/or arrest of everybody in it. And as of right now, the utter depravity displayed therein is the floor for how bad the details might get.

Literally made me sick to my stomach

Max Berger (@maxberger.bsky.social) 2025-09-08T20:15:08.384Z

The origin story is interesting. The WSJ didn't publish it from their own files; the drawing came from House Dems, who got it from Epstein's lawyers.That's a meaningful accomplishment for a minority party.

Zack Beauchamp (@zackbeauchamp.bsky.social) 2025-09-08T19:08:17.125Z

…right

Yes. The birthday note and the picture of the novelty check from Trump to Epstein for a “fully depreciated woman” are more than enough to compel resignation all on their own, and we’re just going to learn more.

It is fine to keep hammering away at "release the files" but there is a real danger here of underplaying how much this is itself already a smoking gun.

Andy Craig (@andycraig.bsky.social) 2025-09-08T20:47:36.307Z

If you’d done any of like a thousand things we know about Donald Trump you’d have been fired from your job and shunned by friends and family.

Apparently the trick is to do all of them.

Department of Angela (@angelaisms.bsky.social) 2025-09-08T22:42:30.263Z

…yes

…the WSJ…there’s another reason to come back to that…but…let’s see if we get there?

"Why on earth would we abandon institutions that have genuinely made America great? … Why would we put at risk laboratories that are working to cure cancers or perfecting artificial limbs or exploring deep space or testing the limits of artificial intelligence?"

Brendan Nyhan (@brendannyhan.bsky.social) 2025-09-08T19:07:12.718Z

…I know we live in a hyperbolic media landscape…but…I continue to be perplexed by the way the stuff that sounds hyperbolic when we lowball the numbers seems so much easier to shrug off

Because of Trump and DOGE's cuts to USAID, 14 million more people will die by 2030. It would take years to restore these lifesaving programs. America was a great country saving millions of lives. Not anymore. 1/2

(@lonecandle.bsky.social) 2025-09-08T13:13:44.454Z

…than the the parts where once you let out all the hot air there’s pretty much nothing left

**taps the sign**"The US is the world’s largest oil and gas producer. The profoundly destructive ‘shale revolution’ underpinned US economic growth over the past decade and provided a ready source of cheap energy. Any decline in oil and gas usage will undermine the US economy"

Nicholas Beuret (@nicholasbeuret.bsky.social) 2025-09-09T08:21:42.544Z

…these prices?

If your daytime prices spike, install solar.If your early evening prices spike, install batteries. Texas also lends itself to, overnight price spikes being satiated by wind.Now they just gotta keep their nuclear on, build more batteries, and keep the newer faster gas plants in place.

Commercial Solar Guy (@commercialsolarguy.com) 2025-09-06T11:39:27.260Z

…no, silly…not those prices

🇮🇳🛢️ Russian crude is getting even cheaper for India, – BloombergThe price of Urals crude has dipped to a discount of $3 to $4 a barrel to Brent on a delivered basis.Last week, Urals was being offered at a discount of around $2.50 a barrel, wider than $1 in July.

MAKS 25 👀🇺🇦 (@maks23.bsky.social) 2025-09-02T07:01:10.538Z

…getting warmer

Yeah, as somebody also in the industry, the politicians are like “we’re gonna Frack our way to cheap gas powered energy for AI” and the actual fracking, pipeline, utility, etc. guys in the room are like “lol. Lmao, even.”

Sky Marchini (@sky.skymarchini.net) 2025-08-03T23:59:55.591Z

Oh man, tell me about it. My dad owns an oil and natural gas company here in OK. It is hilarious the disconnect between politicians and folks actually in the industry. I think part of the reason my very conservative dad hates Trump is all the stupidity around stuff like “drill baby, drill” etc

Mike 🇺🇸🇺🇦 (@notkissinger.bsky.social) 2025-08-04T00:16:01.749Z

Oh god the oil industry is so annoyed by his demands for lower prices lol. We’re basically at the floor

Sky Marchini (@sky.skymarchini.net) 2025-08-04T00:18:19.972Z

I honestly don't get why people are talking about gas like it's expensive. It's mostly been sub 3 dollars a gallon here in Tulsa for years now. I keep waiting for the shoe to drop so I can be smug about my purchase of a used Chevy bolt last year.

Sensual Kazoo (@sensualkazoo.bsky.social) 2025-08-04T00:29:41.508Z

Memory of when it was lower and not getting that no really, the gas company and station workers are paying the same grocery prices as you OF COURSE THE PRICE WENT UP. If crude was free to the refinery it would probably STILL be over the $1.09 pump price I learned multiplication from in the 90s!

MegaForte84 (@megaforte84.bsky.social) 2025-08-15T14:31:02.596Z

…nearly there

Meanwhile: $WTI Crude is getting kicked in the balls.

Eric Michael Garcia (@ericmgarcia.bsky.social) 2025-08-04T13:55:39.400Z

The only indicator here where Trump is better is the price of gas, which is not down because of anything he has done. It's because OPEC+ increased the supply of crude oil. Oil is down 11.8% and the price of gas is only down 9%.

Machine Pun Kelly (@kellyscaletta.bsky.social) 2025-07-31T16:57:14.205Z

…&…you can get into it

A-95 petrol reached a record high on the St. Petersburg, Russia, commodities exchange at 76.3 kopecks per liter. The price exceeds the previous record set in the summer of 2023.Despite crude oil prices being lower compared to 2023, tight supply & an overheated ruble are driving up the cost.9/10

Malcontent News (@malcontentnews.bsky.social) 2025-07-25T02:59:50.925Z

…but…you risk getting…uhhh…distractred?

SpaceX Starlink experienced a total global outage for approximately 2 hours and 15 minutes, affecting civilian, enterprise, and government users. Drone operations were impacted along the frontlines for both combatants. SpaceX has not explained what caused the outage.8/10

Malcontent News (@malcontentnews.bsky.social) 2025-07-25T02:59:50.924Z

…this you?

Elon Musk's SpaceX has agreed to acquire 50MHz of wireless spectrum and Mobile Satellite Service spectrum licenses from EchoStar for about $17 billion in cash and stock for its Starlink satellite network.

TechCrunch (@techcrunch.com) 2025-09-08T13:33:04.630Z

…pretty sure this is you

Alternative headline: DOGE violated court order and the law by blocking university grants via government payment systems.www.thecrimson.com/article/2025…

Josh Huder (@joshhuder.bsky.social) 2025-09-08T13:53:44.143Z

…this, too

NEW: Ignoring urgently needed reforms in favor of fruitlessly trying to find evidence of fraud, DOGE descended on the Social Security Administration “thinking it should work like a McDonald’s,” the agency’s former acting chief reveals to ProPublica.

ProPublica (@propublica.org) 2025-09-08T11:00:17.631656566Z

…yup…you through & through

DOGE compiled all of our private data to feed it to Trump and now Elon Musk will own the wireless capacity to monitor our communications for the Trump administration. (Also: DAMN THEM for making me sound like a conspiracy crackpot, but this is very real.) www.cnbc.com/2025/09/08/e…

Amee Vanderpool (@girlsreallyrule.bsky.social) 2025-09-08T17:41:54.418Z

…”distracting”

Why isn't DOGE investigating this FRAUD and ABUSE⁉️👇

Let sleeping dogs lie? (@johnhthepoet.bsky.social) 2025-09-08T13:24:40.629Z

…just

If we kill it the money saved would allow us to build our own moon.I knew DOGE was a joke when this wasnt on their list of ways to save money.

Fodder650 (@fodder650.bsky.social) 2025-09-08T16:05:46.904Z

Here is my one concern. If Artemis I, Artemis II, and Artemis III are all $4 billion a launch, $4 billion a launch. At $4 billion a launch, you don’t have a Moon program. It just, I don’t think that exists. We have to bring the price down. And so I have to think about and work with members of Congress. What does Artemis IV, V, and VI look like? But to spend that much money in thinking about what we have to do to have a sustained presence, I think becomes very, very challenging.

And so what? What is the answer? I don’t know, but those are things that I think about, because you look at what the private sector has done for access to space. For the private sector, again, you can, you can have a satellite and get it into space for, you know, a million, little over a million dollars, like that was unheard of 20 years ago. What’s happening to drive the price down of these, of these vehicles. That’s what we have to think about, because the $4 billion figure just is too massive to think we can be sustainable at that number.

[…quote that’s a quote when it appears in the ars thing…from the “administration” that brought you “if we want to win this space race thing maybe don’t let safety concern you overmuch”]

Dude you are in Gen x. You know damn well what happens when this is the mindset when sending people into space.

It's full steam ahead for NASA, according to Sean Duffy, the agency's acting administrator. During an internal employee town hall, Duffy warned of "letting safety be the enemy of progress" when it comes to winning the space race, according to a recording obtained by NBC News.

NBC News (@nbcnews.com) 2025-09-06T00:41:29Z

…all sorts of distracting

🦋
Tesla’s U.S. market share drops to an 8 year low of 38%

CEO Elon Musk has irretrievably damaged the brand despite stepping away from DOGE & once held 80% of the U.S. EV market

EV sales spiking ahead of Trump’s removal of incentives but Musk failed to cash in with ageing models
🦋

#TeslaTakedown

Exclusive: Tesla market share in US drops to lowest since 2017 as competition heats up [Reuters]

…hey…when he isn’t guzzling tax dollars or destroying the fabric of federal agencies or pillaging protected data on citizens or trying to edgelord-post his way into an alternate reality where his shit lives up to his imagination & reliably survives launch &/or re-entry…doesn’t that buddy of yours with the memecoin juice owe you a favor & want to get a lot of satellites up?

I think this essay is meant as a provocation to our thinking so I will respond:the idea of accountability to results is a banality, by which I mean it offers little insight into how to get there. DOGE and it's opponents are as likely to believe they are following this general principle.

Don Moynihan (@donmoyn.bsky.social) 2025-09-08T13:07:06.506Z

…&

Note: Matt literally congratulated Chuck Schumer for going over his parties head and passing the CR which paved the way for DOGE and the OBBB.These people have no soul. No knowledge. No hollywood hills.

Blaise Ulysse Bernard Collins (@wittywebhandle.bsky.social) 2025-09-08T13:49:54.952Z

…look

Yeah this was the most insane part, Luigi Mangione was an IDW guy who would be working at DOGE if he hadn't gone crazy from back pain

Maia (@maiamindel.bsky.social) 2025-09-08T15:57:27.493Z

…the french are thinking of jacking it in on their parliament & seeing what the fruit machine spits out next while their domestic budgetary projections don’t fill their part of the “europe can pay to pick up america’s slack in europe” thing

https://www.france24.com/en/france/20250908-live-france-bayrou-confidence-vote-austerity-budget

…the brits…if they weren’t losing it in an airport…or in london…which doesn’t deal well with the so-handy-they-did-that-so-long-ago tube system calling a strike…& this one is for days…so…I dunno…maybe that has more to do with the heathrow thing than you’d think…are clearly remembering their priorities

How Keir Starmer’s polling became one of the worst in the west – in charts [Guardian]

🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿 🇬🇧 VIDEO: Immigration opposition fuels English national flag frenzyAmid a bitter debate about immigration in the UK spearheaded by Nigel Farage’s far-right Reform party, people hang up British and English flags around their villages and towns.

AFP News Agency (@en.afp.com) 2025-09-09T08:20:04.749Z

…speaking of distracting things I can’t explain

#Banksy has just paid a visit to the Royal Courts of Justice in London. 🎯

Alex Morss 🦇🏴‍☠️♾️ (@alexmorss.bsky.social) 2025-09-08T11:04:28.888Z

[…oh, yeah…so…they also arrested maybe the best part of 1,000 people in london at the weekend

Police make arrests at London Palestine Action ban protest

The Guardian (@theguardian.com) 2025-09-06T12:23:33Z

for protesting because they can’t get out the corner they painted themselves into when they proscribed palastine action]

…the one role rayner held that kier can’t slot in his pick of replacement for is the deputy leader in the party sense…& a number of hopefuls are appealing to the party on a variety of bases including how it ought to be a woman…who’s from the north…but…ange is staying out of it

https://news.sky.com/story/angela-rayner-wont-get-involved-in-race-to-choose-successor-as-deputy-leader

…which strikes me as a pity because she’d be a fantastic candidate to replace herself who already proved she could get those votes…& if write-in campaigns are a thing in internal labour party ballots…which I can’t currently remember is or isn’t a thing…would be…hilarious?

…quite honestly…& I’m not really a “for the lolz” sort…kind of feels like a beggars can’t be choosers opportunity from here

China is on the verge of becoming a world-class submarine power, with new technology and a bigger, better fleet that is spurring a new undersea arms race in the Pacific.

The Wall Street Journal (@wsj.com) 2025-09-09T08:06:52.567583Z

…which reminds me…there was a whole shedload of shite I expected to shovel into this one way or another before the above junked my probably-not-best-laid-frankly-calling-them-plans-is-pretty-bold

“Without the annoying inconvenience of facts justices can create the world that Kavanaugh so flagrantly manufactures. A world in which ICE agents respectfully ‘inquire’ about legal status during ‘brief stops.’”

Sherrilyn Ifill (@sifill.bsky.social) 2025-09-09T02:26:12.539Z

…so

so for those keeping tally, so far today we had:SCOTUS re-firing an agency head a lower court had reinstatedtrump saying domestic violence is nbd trump's pedophilia celebration birthday card to Epstein releasedSCOTUS green lighting racial profiling and "papers, please" policing

Michael (@fleerultra.bsky.social) 2025-09-08T19:42:19.792Z

Indeed, when a 5-4 #SCOTUS majority rejected the ability of federal courts to provide damages remedies for (allegedly unconstitutional) cross-border shootings by Border Patrol agents in its 2020 ruling in Hernández v. Mesa, Justice Kavanaugh was the median vote:www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/pre…

Steve Vladeck (@stevevladeck.bsky.social) 2025-09-08T19:43:20.302Z

Thank God the Supreme Court gave the president's secret police the right to profile and detain anyone based on any immutable characteristic today, knowing the president himself will never reveal himself to be writing Zodiackian poems and pervert kiddie sketches to a world-historic pedophile.

Tim Onion (@bencollins.bsky.social) 2025-09-08T19:51:29.108Z

The police can detain whoever they want. If you didn’t commit any crimes, they have to let you go. What’s the problem?I love how deeply committed to the constitution our textualist judges are.

James (@gravitysra1nbow.bsky.social) 2025-09-08T20:27:29.745Z

MAGA man threatens to kill peaceful anti-Trump protesters—flashes his police badge and gun."When we get in a civil war, I'm coming after each and every one of you!""I'm an officer—what are you gonna do?" he yells."All you hippies are going to get your day, I promise you!"Tulsa, Oklahoma

LongTime🤓FirstTime👨‍💻 (@longtimehistory.bsky.social) 2025-09-08T20:50:41.619Z

I guess it was smart of the Supreme Court to release its most racist decision since Plessy on the same day it was confirmed that Trump used his signature in the place of a vagina in his pedophile love letter/birthday card.I'll admit, I can't top that.

ElieNYC (@elienyc.bsky.social) 2025-09-08T20:30:03.692Z

You know what’s interesting in Mike’s post is that both the heroic defense lawyer and the innocent man in question are also Southerners, but for some reason that doesn’t count in his mind.

Tim Price (@timprice.bsky.social) 2025-09-08T21:49:46.553Z

When I teach the Scottsboro Boys, I make sure to point out that Alabama authorities thought that the fact that there was a trial at all instead of an immediate lynching was a sign of racial progress

Kevin M. Kruse (@kevinmkruse.bsky.social) 2025-09-08T21:45:51.824Z

If you do five minutes of research into the Jim Crow South you’ll see that depicting it as wanting to wrongly convict a Black man in a jury trial is if anything a ludicrously gentle depiction

Love when my political movement requires me to renounce maybe the most beloved novel in American history

Patrick Daugherty (@rotopat.bsky.social) 2025-09-08T19:00:08.630Z

…I’ll fling a quick token in for the why is the WSJ picking up credit on the epstein front if congress got that out of epstein’s lawyers

Trump sued Murdoch over this claiming it was fake. That lawsuit is cooked. www.bbc.com/news/article…

Alejandra Caraballo (@esqueer.net) 2025-09-08T19:04:31.563Z

…uh huh…sure…might take a while to collect

JUST IN: Federal Appeals Court Upholds $5 Million Penalty Verdict E. Jean Carroll Against Trump. Can E. Jean seize the White House when Trump is living there to pay the judgement?! 😀 www.mediaite.com/trump/just-i…

Dean Obeidallah (@deanobeidallah.bsky.social) 2024-12-30T15:26:44.626Z

…but

The 2nd Circuit refused to throw out an $83.3 million jury verdict against President Trump for damaging the reputation of the writer E. Jean Carroll in 2019 when he denied her rape claim reut.rs/4pbZv5J

Reuters Legal (@legal.reuters.com) 2025-09-08T20:15:42.166Z

…that isn’t the reason at least some people were all excited about the timing of things relating to the WSJ going back to that epstein well

The Murdoch family reached a deal that will see Rupert Murdoch's politically conservative son Lachlan Murdoch cement control of a family media empire that includes Fox News and The Wall Street Journal.www.nbcnews.com/business/med…

Khashoggi's Ghost (@urocklive1.bsky.social) 2025-09-09T00:14:44.539Z

…the sibs get, like, a bill or so apiece…you know…the ones some folks were hoping might not simp for the enshitifi-ca-fornicating-cation-ers if they got the news arm of the thing out of his control

Apparently O'Keefe is panicking. Check out his Epstein deflection response on X! 🤣🤣🤣🤣One would think he could do better than this.

Mark Zaid, Esq (@markzaidesq.bsky.social) 2025-09-08T22:27:31.480Z

…why…yes…yes I am in a bit of a mood today…kind of you to notice…oh…you didn’t mean it kindly…fair enough…I was trying to put it kindly…because I don’t think the folks likely to read this are the ones I ought to be mad at…but

Trump supporters are really upset that Trump has to pay E. Jean Carroll 83 million dollars It’s like it’s coming out of their pockets Oh wait It probably is

William Buecker (@wcbuecker.bsky.social) 2025-09-08T21:05:50.891Z

…I could do the other thing…if we’re really sure it’s time for that…probably not great odds on the result being…uh…pretty?

…sigh

…not tunes

…still not tunes…&…that’s so old it isn’t just the dude it’s the dude with less beard than you remember

…oh, c’mon…beards aren’t a constant length…that’s…kind of how come razors exist & shit

…fucking enough, already…just cough up the stuff that soothes the savage breast FFS

…well

[*sigh* ]

[…it’s no good…something something…better out than in…&…at least tucked in here it doesn’t stretch the scrolling if you’re jumping to the comments for sweet relief or whatever…or jumping there to scroll up for the tunes…which I can attest to being handy if you can remember which browser will let those play on a tab in the background while you do something else…so…see…it’s not all bad…right?]

The New Yorker asked me “how bad” today’s Supreme Court ruling was. I boiled it down to one paragraph:link.newyorker.com/view/5bda429…

Cristian Farias (@cristianfarias.com) 2025-09-08T21:52:25.055Z

…I know @loveshaq already did this next part

Mexico’s judicial reform inserts direct elections, but candidates are first vetted by government backed committees.

Supreme Court justices serve 12 years with no reelection, while lower judges serve 9 year terms and can be reelected once.

Mexico becomes the first country in history to do so.👏🏻👇

…but…it’s by way of providing a wossname

Gorsuch and Barrett sit in stolen seats. Kavanaugh is a drunken credibly accused rapist whose debts were mysteriously laid off. Thomas and Alito take bribes from billionaires. And Robert ignores the law to appease Trump.The current Supreme Court is illegitimate. All these rulings must be reversed.

David Slack (@slack2thefuture.bsky.social) 2025-09-08T22:08:59.791Z

…&…ok…some inflated egos beg to have their big boy balloons burst the way some faces are comprehensibly described as “punchable”

what a humiliating way for don jr. to find out his dad sends birthday cards.

Molly Knight (@mollyknight.bsky.social) 2025-09-08T21:21:53.112Z

…but in the other lane we spend a good deal of time doing donuts in to impress the other kids in the drugstore parking lot with nothing better to do

🧵This is worrisome. Currently, Murdoch's children are split 3 to 1 regarding the direction of Fox. 3 want to return it to a news source providing accurate news. 1 wants it to chase profit at any cost, even if that means advancing false claims. www.nytimes.com/2025/09/08/…1/3

E. Rosalie (@erosalie.infoepi.com) 2025-09-08T21:43:36.656088Z

…will the real slim shady kendall roy please stand up?

Murdoch should countersue and expose Trump to discovery.

Molly Ploofkins (@mollyploofkins.bsky.social) 2025-09-08T21:14:28.784Z

Whatever happened to Trump trying to force an expedited testimony from Murdoch because he might die? Did it ever happen?

Trump lawsuit against Murdoch and ‘Wall Street Journal’ turns personal

Trump says he personally told his “very good friend Rupert Murdoch” that he had not sent a racy birthday greeting two decades ago to Jeffrey Epstein.

The reached a deal where Murdoch doesn't have to be deposed until after the court resolves his motion to dismiss trump's case.

Mueller, She Wrote (@muellershewrote.com) 2025-09-08T20:17:52.610Z

That’s the Murdoch succession battle settled – James, Prudence and Elisabeth Murdoch walk away with a cool billion dollars each, and Lachlan gets the media empire.Hopes of a #resistance takeover of Fox News were always thin, but now they’re gone…

James Ball (@jamesrball.com) 2025-09-08T20:20:06.939Z

Lachlan Murdoch will take control of a new family trust in a deal for the Murdoch empire worth $3.3 billion, ensuring his father’s media empire will retain its conservative slant.

Under the terms of the deal, Lachlan’s 3 older siblings receive $1.1 billion each. 🎁 https://www.nytimes.com/2025/09/08/business/media/murdoch-family-trust-succession-deal.html

…ok

[…so…trying not to build up a second wind to blow me down some different possibly primrose paths…but…it’s…harder than it probably seems like it should be…so…I dunno…if I’d ever ask you to believe anything I say on the mere basis that it was about me & I said it…maybe take my word for that before we get to the next bit?]

I'm genuinely baffled as to why Trump's team is going full denial on this. The MAGA base knows he assaulted E. Jean Carroll and bragged about assaulting many others. They know he bullied Stormy Daniels into sex. They know he's a predator! So why not just shrug it off?x.com/PressSec/sta…

Amanda Marcotte (@amandamarcotte.bsky.social) 2025-09-08T20:46:35.536Z

…these people like a roman analogy…let’s try horatio on for size & see if I can at least avoid seeming like I’m butchering natalie haynes’ act…how’s that sound?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lays_of_Ancient_Rome

…quit sniggering in the back…this isn’t that version of spartacus…that said…as examples of places you can find the story online go…tough to out irony there being a listing on artofmanliness.com…at least if you ask me…& their editor’s note reads thusly:

Editors’ note: While serving the English government in India during the 1830s, politician, poet, and historian Thomas Babington Macaulay spun semi-mythical ancient Roman tales into memorable ballads or “lays.” His most famous lay was “Horatius,” a ballad that recounted the legendary courage of an ancient Roman army officer, Publius Horatius Cocles. In the fifth century B.C., Rome rebelled against Etruscan rule and ousted their last king, Lucius Tarquinius Superbus, to form a republic. But the king refused to go quietly into the night; he enlisted the help of Lars Porsena of Clusium in an attempt overthrow the new Roman government and re-establish his reign.

In a battle against the approaching Etruscans, the Roman army faced defeat and began to retreat across the bridge which traversed the Tiber River; this is where we’ll let the poem pick up the heroic tale.

As we mentioned this week in a post about Winston Churchill’s moral code, this was one of the statesman’s favorite poems. He memorized all 70 stanzas as a boy to inspire himself to develop courage, and would recite the poem throughout his life. Because the “lay” is so long, we’ve offered a condensed version below. For the full ballad, see here.

https://www.artofmanliness.com/character/manly-lessons/manvotional-horatius-at-the-bridge

…TL;DR…one dude can hold a bottleneck at a bridge if it’s narrow enough…which…on the one hand

…but…if you can also destroy the bridge…& then…in full armor…swim across to survive…without giving any of the other armored people back on the other bank any ideas about any precedents getting set in the process…well…lotta ifs…but…if…then…& what is more my son…you’ll be “a man®©[pat. pend.]

…wield a knife…like…maybe a surgeon…who’s also a general…but not that sort…sorta?

www.reuters.com/business/hea…World Health Organization called for the "protection of public health excellence" at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.He pointed to how the CDC's reputation as a "center of excellence" has inspired other countries to adopt its best practices.

Deborah Lynn (@mrsdeborahlynn.bsky.social) 2025-09-07T19:26:28.533Z

…living embodiment of your sink or swim deal

Florida Man-in-Chief Dr. Lapado admits he didn't study the impact of ending routine vaccination requirements.Ya know who did? Real scientists.Including Dr. Yvonne Maldonado, who Sec. Kennedy recently FIRED from the CDC's vaccine advisory committee.Answer: This is dangerous.

Jeremy Faust, MD (@jeremyfaust.bsky.social) 2025-09-07T18:56:13.461Z

…the kind of “medical opinion” that’s only “qualified” in the sense that following its advice could kill ya?

Today on Fox News, RFK Jr. said that Dr. Daskalakis is a “Satanist”. This is another desperate piece of propaganda from the far right. He is not a Satanist. He is a man of integrity who quit the CDC because he refused to perpetuate disinformation against the people of the United States.

Elizabeth Jacobs, PhD (@elizabethjacobs.bsky.social) 2025-09-07T17:54:00.289Z

…I’m getting more histrionics than heroics here…which isn’t very brave horatius of them, tbh?

This is a great quote and I’m glad to see it being covered and also fuck this doc who won’t allow their 68 year old patient, let alone one with this history, to get a fucking Covid shot without “CDC guidance.” Read the news, doc!

“Robert F. Kennedy Jr. told senators last week that anyone can get a new coronavirus vaccine. But many Americans are finding the opposite.”Via @davidovalle.bsky.social and Paige Cunningham.

Dan Diamond (@ddiamond.bsky.social) 2025-09-07T17:15:06.291Z

Kennedy has insisted covid shots are still easy to obtain, claiming that @hassan.senate.gov was “making things up to scare people.”But The Post talked to people who are struggling to get the vaccine. Elaine Cox, a 68-year-old with lung disease, said she wept after being denied a prescription.

Dan Diamond (@ddiamond.bsky.social) 2025-09-07T17:19:53.090Z

It is seriously time for shaming and peer pressure for docs refusing to recommend Covid vaccines to their patients. Please, good docs, helps us out with this. They are not going to listen to folks without medical degrees.

This includes vaccine hesitant docs who say things like (I am quoting here, this happened), “You’ve had enough Covid shots for now.” And, “I’m not against the Covid vax but I’ve seen more reactions to the vax than I have to Covid itself.” (Yes that one made my head 🤯.)

…& by them I mean the sham of a department that has darth helmet running it where there used to be some stuff on the books about health & human services…just in case that wasn’t clear?

…you try to change the station but the same old record keeps playing

…yeah…uhh…shrug.emoji, indeed…what more eloquent manner might even exist by which to convey how beyond words awful you find that, when all is…ah…said & done?

If you can flood three continents with a single H-bomb in the Atlantic, that bomb is rather more powerful than all the nuclear weapons we, as a species, ever manufactured, multiplied by some factor with two many zeroes appended.

And we already live on protein derived from CO2—via photosynthesis.

Nice work if you can get it! From The Observer review of Ian McEwan’s new book.

Matthew Cobb (@matthewcobb.bsky.social) 2025-09-07T07:21:58.030Z

Tbf this is the reviewer/subeditor’s mistake. The book uses CO2 and soil bacteria.

Matthew Cobb (@matthewcobb.bsky.social) 2025-09-07T17:02:42.303Z

Sounds to me like McEwan badly needed to hire a competent SF writer as a ghost-world-builder, at least.

(Saw this same sort of bullshit decades ago from Paul Theroux with the execrable “O-Zone”. Literary writers who paddle in the genre waters all unaware of the shark infestation.)

Should people stick to their lanes? I think that's very much up to them, right?

Richard Bown (@bownie.bsky.social) 2025-09-07T08:22:35.915Z

I write SF/F. Every time I’ve tried dabbling in some other genre, I rapidly discovered (a) it’s harder than it looks from outside, and (b) there’s an enormous body of prior art to understand and ideally master before you can start.

A common problem with litfitc authors is they don’t notice this.

…once the analogies get their hooks in you

What this would morally allow Epstein victims to do is left as an exercise to the reader.

Samus is Here (@samusishere.bsky.social) 2025-09-07T18:42:47.749Z

…&…while bearing in mind who might be towing a gift horse in your direction

🧵Jack O'Donnell was Trump's casino boss from 1987 to 1992Erin Burnett interviewed him in JulyHe said in the 4 years he oversaw the casino, Trump was with Epstein constantlyNotice the dates. This goes back to the late 1980sHe said Epstein was Trump's "best friend" and with him all the time.

Denise Wheeler (@denisedwheeler.bsky.social) 2025-09-07T19:01:37.355Z

…while a spontaneous 2nd line breaks out in procession

No outreach’ to Epstein victims despite Trump’s vow to investigate.Nine attorneys tell Guardian they have not been contacted by justice department in more than 6 months, a state of affairs they call ‘atrocious’.It sheds doubt on the sincerity of this Administration.share.google/ldT1hXxFssVU…

Dovewoman 💙 🇺🇦 💙 (@dovewoman.bsky.social) 2025-09-07T19:27:22.807Z

…well…out in the lukewarm waters of the arctic thaw

The total loss of NOAA’s office of Oceanic and Atmospheric Research —a nerve center of global climate science, data collection and modeling — represents a setback for climate preparedness that experts warn the nation may never recover from.(Published April)

ProPublica (@propublica.org) 2025-09-07T03:00:06.2768227Z

Opposition to US commercial ties with China went from a left-coded thing (e.g. protesting the crackdown on Tibet during the 2008 Beijing Olympics, Bernie opposing Chinese ascension to the WTO, Pelosi protesting Bill Clinton's dinner with Jiang Zemin) to right coded.

Bill McKay (@mckay4senate.bsky.social) 2025-09-07T02:54:58.507Z

Government not by fact but by ideology. Always a disaster because officials try to make reality fit their vision. Lysenkoism in the USSR, which tried to change the laws of nature, created famines that killed tens of millions of people in the USSR and China.

Heather Cox Richardson (TDPR) (@hcrichardson.bsky.social) 2025-09-07T16:03:10.608Z

last december i wrote that democrats needed to behave like an actual opposition www.nytimes.com/2024/12/18/o…

jamelle (@jamellebouie.net) 2025-09-07T18:55:57.270Z

🛢️ Eight key members of the OPEC+ alliance say they have agreed to boost oil production, in a strategy analysts saw as a bid to gain a bigger market share of crude sales. ➡️ u.afp.com/SdhN

AFP News Agency (@en.afp.com) 2025-09-07T16:00:06.786Z

Former IDF 🇮🇱 soldier: “As time passed, another harsh truth emerged: Our own state had lost its way. If we went to war on Oct. 7 to save what was dearest to us, it soon became clear to me we were fighting because our leaders were never planning to stop.” www.nytimes.com/2025/08/30/o…

The Tennessee Holler (@thetnholler.bsky.social) 2025-09-07T20:43:34.474Z

My neighbor in Orlando mentioned this EXACT concern to me last night!

Jon Cooper (@joncooper-us.bsky.social) 2025-09-07T17:01:18.389Z

“$800 Million per month”As we send them billions in aid + weapons. www.haaretz.com/israel-news/…

The Tennessee Holler (@thetnholler.bsky.social) 2025-09-07T21:48:39.031Z

LOL #RibbonCuttingSeason 🎀 makes the NYT.🤡 @nytimes.com www.nytimes.com/2025/09/07/u…

Carl Quintanilla (@carlquintanilla.bsky.social) 2025-09-07T18:46:43.494Z

Can confirm. Also the deluge of submissions, many of which are entirely inappropriate for our journal. Dealing with these uses up time that could be spent on the ones that are relevant to our field and that we’d like to publish #twitterstorians 🗃️

Dr. Heather Dichter (@hdichter.bsky.social) 2025-09-07T07:43:51.730Z

Like clockwork. 🤡 www.wsj.com/economy/trad…

Carl Quintanilla (@carlquintanilla.bsky.social) 2025-09-07T19:01:25.409Z

“.. The backup plans have been part of internal discussions for many months because some White House officials anticipated the possibility that courts would intervene to stop Trump's tariffs ..”@nbcnews.com www.nbcnews.com/politics/tru…

Carl Quintanilla (@carlquintanilla.bsky.social) 2025-09-07T16:18:19.892Z

The Arctic is becoming increasingly contested thanks to Trump's Greenland ambitions, putting Norway on high alert for Russian threats. Read more: https://bloom.bg/3JSmcf5📷: Lorna MacKay

Bloomberg News (@bloomberg.com) 2025-09-08T10:31:01Z

I saw an ICE recruitment ad on Linkedin and this is just a taste of the comments. Linkedin!!

This was the ad

…or whatever you’d make of that

D.C. Police sent an arrest warrant for the Republican congressman to the U.S. attorney’s office, where the interim U.S. Attorney refused to sign it. The case remained under MPD “investigation” until Trump took over.Then it was promptly, conveniently closed. trib.al/cPwSpqu

Jon Cooper (@joncooper-us.bsky.social) 2025-09-07T19:14:13.962Z

…as it were

Doing smug millennial posting voice to justify extra judicial killings

Annie Kelly (@annieknk.bsky.social) 2025-09-07T08:39:52.903Z

Ezra's little post not only doesn't START from the Q, how do you combat fascism, but he gets a lot of details wrong. Start w/how you defeat fascism:1) Peel off 8 House or 4 Senators2) Get 3.5% of US people in the streets3) Rescue GOP from collapse4) Win a free and fair election in 2026

emptywheel (@emptywheel.bsky.social) 2025-09-07T19:17:51.265Z

imagine having lived during the 20th century, having access to books about other centuries of Japanese history, and saying this

Olúfẹ́mi O. Táíwò (@olufemiotaiwo.bsky.social) 2025-09-07T23:07:03.390Z

Wonder what it’s like to be Elon when you’re just constantly chasing these mental fantasies produced by your own nightmares

Nearly 6 billion people live in the 101 countries that a recent study has identified as confronting a net decline in water supply — signaling enormous challenges for food production and a heightening risk of conflict and instability.By @abrahm.bsky.social, w/ graphics by @lucaswaldron.bsky.social

ProPublica (@propublica.org) 2025-09-07T23:08:01.389371065Z

The ‘invisible kingpin of data centres’ riding the Gulf’s AI boom on.ft.com/4gfS0qr

Financial Times (@financialtimes.com) 2025-09-07T08:25:09.289975Z

…that’s gotta be a comedy name for a rickety-racket-y-rink-y-dink-parasite who *of course* calls dubai home to all his pots of lucre

You know, I have a somewhat limited tolerance for being told that my (literally expert!) honest opinion on the state of the constitutional order in 2025 constitutes "dooming"

Robert Black (@hurricanexyz.bsky.social) 2025-09-08T05:14:12.195Z

…but

responding to fascist threats with strength and power rooted in community WORKS. in order for fascist rhetoric to work, the target of their ire has to be painted as weak and ineffectual. standing on business like Pritzker has done here is unironically the ONLY thing that works.

speakwithanimals (@beanzone.me) 2025-09-08T02:29:14.963Z

…does kinda track

Imagine going back in time to like 2010 and telling people that the HHS Secretary would be promoting burgers and fries on TV while expediting review for nicotine pouches. And he'd be testifying to Congress with a pouch in his mouth. All while calling his agenda Make America Healthy Again.

Matt Novak (@paleofuture.bsky.social) 2025-09-08T04:15:13.420Z

…if you

Jeremy Pizzi, legal adviser at Global Rights Compliance, told Newsweek Russia "has even more horrendous behavior to hide from the world."

Newsweek (@newsweek.com) 2025-09-08T21:28:08.933Z

…catch my drift

People are so fascinating

Ahhhhh (@nerdjpg.com) 2025-09-07T15:36:38.392Z

…sigh

ICE is in retreat. The Chicago Police Department is standing firm with their city. Chicago belongs to its people.

Carter P. Hayes (@allchronology.com) 2025-09-08T19:53:26.357Z

…if you’re sure we’re ready to face all that music

APOLLO: “.. Census data is starting to show a slowdown in AI adoption for large companies.“.. The US Census Bureau conducts a biweekly survey of 1.2 million firms, and one question is whether a business has used AI tools .. to help produce goods or services in the past two weeks.”

Carl Quintanilla (@carlquintanilla.bsky.social) 2025-09-07T11:43:17.963Z

A handful of narrow growth engines are propping up America's otherwise broadly slowing economy:on.ft.com/4n2v9B2

Financial Times (@financialtimes.com) 2025-09-07T13:29:03.658938Z

Walmart spent $35.3B on stock buybacks from 2019 to 2024, enough to give each of its 2.2M employees annual bonuses of $2,719.Last year, Walmart CEO Doug McMillon pocketed $27.4M — 930x the company's median employee pay of just $29,469.Textbook corporate greed.

Robert Reich (@rbreich.bsky.social) 2025-09-07T23:30:07.986412Z

JB Pritzker: “The president knows so little about the government and he cares so little about delivering anything that talking to him is a useless endeavor. I’m about delivering for the people of my state, he’s about delivering for himself.“

Marco Foster (@marcofoster.bsky.social) 2025-09-05T17:20:18.409Z

We can set an example for the whole nation in this election.

Zohran Kwame Mamdani (@zohrankmamdani.bsky.social) 2025-09-07T22:44:04.549Z

Good morning. Senate Republicans said they wouldn't change the rules of the Senate and as soon as Trump told them to change the rules they are changing the rules.And not a small change! Obliterates advice and consent. Confirming Trump nominees 100 at a time! With one vote!

Chris Murphy (@chrismurphyct.bsky.social) 2025-09-09T13:43:45.739Z

…sorry…thought someone mentioned some sort of review?

ICE is hiding in custody deaths. open.substack.com/pub/detentio…

Jenn Budd (@jennbudd.bsky.social) 2025-09-08T22:09:24.710Z

ICE has launched "Operation Midway Blitz" with immigration raids in Chicago. blockclubchi.co/4m74AcS

Block Club Chicago (@blockclubchi.bsky.social) 2025-09-08T19:56:55.163Z

Constitutional Law Exam, Fall 2025: What is law?

Anthony Michael Kreis (@anthonymkreis.bsky.social) 2025-09-08T20:16:41.418Z

*was

First Elon; now Pulte? Both please punch my face jerks, for sure, but what a toppy daddy Bessent is www.politico.com/news/magazin…

Kara Swisher (@karaswisher.bsky.social) 2025-09-08T10:49:01.480Z

Meanwhile on Twitter, Cousin Nate is at it again…

Nick Turse (@nickturse.bsky.social) 2025-09-08T04:12:09.205Z

Is this part of Trump’s Nobel Peace Prize application?

Nick Turse (@nickturse.bsky.social) 2025-09-08T10:52:26.597Z

"Deporting vagrants to uninhabitable shacks in the hinterland, but From The Left."

Leonid Baezhnev (@rev-avocado.bsky.social) 2025-09-08T02:04:03.383Z

There are 16 million vacant homes in the US & less than 1 million people without homes.

Pundits keep saying we need to build more housing when what we need to do is confiscate homes & apartments kept vacant by landlords & mega-corporations for short-stay rentals & artificial price manipulation.

When I was in journalism school, I was the only person in my cohort to be an immigrant, a person of color, and a resident anywhere south of the Mason-Dixon Line. Nobody, not even the professor who wrote a book about Dr. Antony Fauci, believed my warning in early 2024 about how bad things could get

Alex Ip 葉清霖 (@alexip718.com) 2025-09-08T01:43:00.894Z

When I was an immigration and border reporter, people didn’t just accuse me of straight up making shit up – they outright gaslit me and threatened to have me put away for my “paranoid delusions”

Common theme of people I've interviewed recently. At universities, in research centers, in diplomacy, in the legal system, dealing with refugees or immigrants:The reality inside is much worse than you would think from the outside.

James Fallows (@jfallows.bsky.social) 2025-09-06T22:40:56.687Z

…I’ll

The U.S. labor market would be barely growing without job gains in health services. Eight charts look at employment and the American workforce.

The Wall Street Journal (@wsj.com) 2025-09-08T11:13:39.183769Z

This is a good indication of the sectors that are hot among investors, from biotech and defense tech to AI, AI, and AI.

TechCrunch (@techcrunch.com) 2025-09-08T10:57:05.085Z

Seems like JPMorgan kept Epstein in the child rape business when it was all falling apart in 2011.

LOLGOP ❌👑🤡 (@thefarce.org) 2025-09-08T10:26:04.141Z

Epstein had an army of professionals working for his trafficking enterprise, from hairdressers to psychiatrists to immigration lawyers and dentists…And “Even doctors who prescribed his victims birth control and screened them for sexually transmitted diseases.”www.miamiherald.com/news/state/f…

nullifie (@nullifie.bsky.social) 2025-09-07T19:29:20.595Z

Here is the DOJ's itemized list of Epstein evidence.From the Epstein files that Bondi had on her desk, then didn't have, and now a hoax.Includes photos, cameras, computers, hard drives, cell phones and more, including one CD labeled "girl pics nude book 4"www.justice.gov/ag/media/139…

Denise Wheeler (@denisedwheeler.bsky.social) 2025-09-07T18:21:14.138Z

🧵Jack O'Donnell was Trump's casino boss from 1987 to 1992Erin Burnett interviewed him in JulyHe said in the 4 years he oversaw the casino, Trump was with Epstein constantlyNotice the dates. This goes back to the late 1980sHe said Epstein was Trump's "best friend" and with him all the time.

Denise Wheeler (@denisedwheeler.bsky.social) 2025-09-07T19:01:37.355Z

…toxicmasculine

What this would morally allow Epstein victims to do is left as an exercise to the reader.

Samus is Here (@samusishere.bsky.social) 2025-09-07T18:42:47.749Z

…just…uhh…sayin’

"Mamdani’s opponents understand that defund is toxic, which is why they want to tie the mayoral frontrunner to his previous stance," writes @mychaldenzelsmith.bsky.social.

The Intercept (@theintercept.com) 2025-09-08T21:31:01.334Z

In the United States, passengers are not entitled to any compensation if their flight is delayed or canceled. That was supposed to change. Last week, however, the Trump administration quietly canceled plans to compensate U.S. passengers for delays and cancellations.

Popular Information (@popular.info) 2025-09-08T21:29:52.990Z

The decision to reverse the proposed consumer protections, which are very popular, came after an aggressive lobbying campaign by Airlines for America and individual airlines. The industry used its influence, cash, and flattery to get their way.

Popular Information (@popular.info) 2025-09-08T21:30:20.779Z

At an alarming pace, the Trump administration has fired climate scientists, rolled back regulations, interfered in data collection, and cut planning and emergency response funds. That puts all Americans at risk.Read The Big Take ⬇️

Bloomberg News (@bloomberg.com) 2025-09-08T21:30:07.904Z

Misinformation is spreading as fast as factual reporting, making it harder than ever to tell fact from fiction. This guide equips journalists with 7 advanced techniques to spot AI-generated content under deadline pressure.

Global Investigative Journalism Network (@gijn.org) 2025-09-08T21:30:01.000Z

…& it sure is anything but firm footing out there where the lies are fleet & the truth is bootless

Brian has been way ahead in articulating this argument and it's good to see more elite opinionmakers joining him…

Greg Sargent (@gregsargent.bsky.social) 2025-09-07T18:57:39.889Z

…so…since this…despite what you might have come to see by way of the inherent bias of the source in the tertiary-through-at-best-secondary senses…is about as TL;DR a mercifully brief sketch of the approximate timeline of relationship collapse between two rotten peas in a privileged pod that thought it was classier than la grande bouffe

….while also representing about as far down that particular rabbit hole as I’m prepared to leave the daylight behind for while thinking I can drag my way back above ground before we run out of that for the day…which…are getting shorter, I’m noticing

🧵It's been said for quite a while that when Trump and Epstein had their falling out, Trump dropped a dime on Epstein with the FBI in a fit of pique. Even Epstein said it.That doesn't qualify as 'informant'Just connect all the dots and this is what you really get….

Denise Wheeler (@denisedwheeler.bsky.social) 2025-09-07T20:22:48.825Z

[…anyway…I know it kind of makes a mockery of the see what I can manage part when I managed that part before I managed to drive a wall-o-text into a gap there wasn’t between the awful sounding stuff & the stuff I don’t personally file under “sounds awful”…YMMV…Ts & Cs apply…you won’t have read the small print because we hide that in something with the word quantum in it because microdots are just so relic of the past nowadays…but…believe it or not…this actually is approximately what we all signed up for…or got signed up for…delete as appropriate…but…never mind connecting the dots…even one of these suckers is the last thing that needs added connections that way…but…the olive branch-y sort…might be a different matter altogether…so…uhhh]

…see what I can manage[?]

…if it counts for anything…I slung that in a short stack just this morning…but…on the basis the rest of the post goes down flatter than the proverbial pancake & you deserve better…I’ll scrounge up another handful of the previous lineups you can pick your favorite suspects out of?

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31 Comments

    • …wanna argue…really can’t…can not stress enough how much I’m feeling you on that

      …like…I am aware that there are still amazing people doing things that actually do buck the ambient odds by making the world better & providing potential for the future to have some baseline appeal to heading in a non-despair-inducing direction

      …but…even with as much of the frothing nonsense being…you know…froth…& nonsense…or mysteriously flouting with seeming impunity strictures we appear to have fondly imagined could be broadly vestigial on the grounds we’d never actually put anyone gauche enough to require their deployment in any of the positions those would relate to

      …that…pretty explicitly…seem to have given up grinding the gears & tried to full on sugar-in-the-gas-tank seize the whole transmission on a slick surface with an unforgiving gradient headed for the edge of a cliff where there used to be a famous bridge

      …but…the markets haven’t panic-panicked…so…it’ll probably buff out, right?

      …fuck…sorry…i’m doing it again…lemme go immerse myself in tunes until maybe I can give it a rest

    • The SCOTUS decision about grabbing people based on their appearance is fucking insane. It’ no wonder they used the shadow docket, because even Roberts couldn’t gin up a convoluted explanation for it.

      • When John Major was UK PM I worked around the corner from the British Consulate. Every night there were IRA (peaceful, luckily) protests. When I left work I used to get mistaken for John Major, even though I was wearing J. Crew normcore and Major is 20 years older than I am. That is how WASPy I look. But even I am incredibly paranoid about these ICE knock-on-the-door-unexpectedly arrests so I have my driver’s license, passport, and original Social Security card at hand at all times. I don’t think I’d last long in an El Salvadoran prison.

  1. This smug dumb motherfucker (despite being an aeronautical engineer, wasn’t a maritime  or submersible engineer!)

    At least he was a (really stupid) engineer unlike reality TV quiver full dipshit Duffy.

    When you forget safety in a rush to beat another nation into space, this is what happened…

    Gus Grissom, Ed White and Roger Chaffee got burned alive because everyone ignored safety.

    The Murricans weren’t the only ones… the N1 rocket explosion in the 1970s was caused by Kremlin panic.

    EVERY FUCKING SPACE DISASTER the US had was because of political dicks interfering with design, engineering and safety considerations.

    History repeats itself because GOPer MAGAts don’t fucking read books let alone history (although in the to be “fair” Chris Lizzard bothsiderism… Kennedy’s gang at NASA made the first mistakes, but Raygun, Bush and now Trump are repeating them.)

  2. Now we got WSJ fear mongering China’s new submarine fleet.

    The same fleet that covered up sinking their latest SSBN lost with all hands?

    The same fleet that has no actual blue water operational or combat experience? Not to say the US Navy isn’t prone to fuckups either, but experience matters (unless you went to MBA skule and believe it doesn’t.)

    That trained with experts from the Russian Navy who historically hasn’t done well on the surface or under the sea? Russian subs sank one ship for every sub it lost, the worst loss ratio of all sub fleets in WW2.

    Same bullshit as it ever was. Trying to fear monger us into another fucking bullshit Cold War. I’m not saying that China isn’t a threat, but how much of one if it doesn’t know what the fuck it’s doing?

  3. Cheer up!

    Mamdani Holds Huge Lead in Mayor’s Race, Times/Siena Poll Finds

    The Times must be furious about this. Well, maybe not the youngest hires, but there are a lot of dinosaurs gathered around the Times Square Tar Pit. I’m sure they would love to see a Mayor Cuomo because he is one of them: center-right, indifferent to the plight of the city, probably lots of low-caliber but highly influential mutual acquaintances who infest the same restaurants and watering holes (see you at The Polo Bar!) and wash up at Hamptons fundraisers.

    I almost feel sorry for our clown shoe Mayor, Patch Adams, except that PoliticoNY publishes the public schedule of Governor Hokum and Patch. Hokum’s schedule is as you’d expect, things like addressing some incredibly niche voting bloc, where Patch’s is always “No public schedule released by 10 PM.” There was a rumor floating around that the Trumpenführer would offer him a cushy no-show HUD job to clear the field for Handsy to go mano a mano with Zohran, but now the latest hot goss is that he would be offered the ambassadorship to Saudi Arabia. Patch was just down at Mar a Lago and it’s just the place for him: showy, very nouveau riche, was probably asked to take a drink order more than once.

    But representing us in “Saudi,” while typical of the foolishness of this benighted administration, would be a grave mistake. SA is an important ally in the region, or more like a frenemy, so he’d have to tread very carefully. Also, the House of Saud is notoriously successful in buying whatever it wants, and that includes foreign intelligence. Since I believe that Patch would sing “It’s Raining Men” at my wedding if I coughed up a couple of 20s, I’m sure he’d be in their clutches before his plane touched down in Riyadh.

    My two cents. Let’s return to reveling in what I hope is truthful and enduring polling results. “Let us/Receive/Our King!”

  4. …uh…in further mixed news…I figured at least one of you would appreciate this & actually on that basis down here was a better place for it

    SoCal businesses and public institutions can get $7 per square foot to ditch their lawns

    Los Angeles Times (@latimes.com) 2025-09-08T21:18:04.642Z

    …the downside is while I was putting a finger on it I waded through some of the stuff I managed to leave out that I thought I wouldn’t see my way to displacing so…if you have a magic 8-ball you probably have a better a shot at predicting the outcome of that than I do my trajectory through the rest of the day…much less the post or these comments?

    • …well, that’s one of the things from one of the things I was expecting would shake out near enough the top to get pasted in before I felt obliged to lay off…quality of mercy…not strained…droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven & all that sort of thing…so…if the post balloons some indeterminate time-lapse into currently-the-future-stop-doing-spaceballs-it’s-not-funny

      …at least that’ll be one embed I can skip

      …damn it

      …blew the lead on the spaceballs clip…I know…I know…I’m my own worst enemy…or I would be if there weren’t so many vastly better financed people who seem to think the enemy is anyone not-them…which…kinda includes me by default…which…sucks for at least one of us, I guess?

      …again…apologies all round…&…uh…if you feel like skipping the one about getting the electric chair for all my future crimes by the one guy who made his given name an unpronounceable glyph for a bit…I…ah…sort of futzed with that first playlist enough that I dunno that it makes sense to still call that a short stack?

      …so…uh…maybe extra apologies to @farscythe?

      […the “headphones” track is not an attempt to laugh at any recent events…any resemblance to actual people or headphones is purely coincidental…& no animals…muppet/spirit or otherwise…were harmed in the making of this post…by me, anyway…I don’t speak for wordpress or your ISP…but they probably didn’t either…ok…so…uhh…actually…if dinosaurs count…hmm…doesn’t count…they’d been dead so long they’re literally an entirely different thing…never mind…as you were…ignore me…I’ll probably go away on my own at some point?]

      • no need to worry about me mate….between the epstein book and the possible new defense strategy getting thrown about…i decided to stop paying attention and play video games for today instead

        • …that first playlist down at the end of the post might not go down too bad if you stretch to that part…once I found my way to the Tuesday Paper Club number I thought I might have found a seam I could mine a little for farscy-snacks…maybe?

          • definitely interesting stuff in that list…will have to give it a listen proper tomorow tho as im already the last person awake down here….and still havent found the arse to pick up a new set of cans

  5. …ummm

    …so…err…it didn’t go the way I’m pretty sure my mother would have told me I could get away with calling the constructive one

    …which is to say the post might seem somehow to be cursed…on account of it suddenly doubled in size when I refreshed the page

    …clearly it’s as clear that that had nothing whatever to do with anything I might or might not allegedly have…against a wealth of advice…done…as it is that everything is fine because the US still has a man of his word where the buck(s) stop

    …so…look forward to my complete & total exoneration in that civil suit about the RSI

    …really…everything’s coming up roses…so…I don’t even mind the smell on account of how everything they’re growing out of seems to have a layer of shit on top?

    • …funny story…wordpress still wants to assure me you could slide right through all that in less time than I can make a coffee last…you don’t even need the gascon bonus to your quart d’heur according to that estimate

      …whereas it’s…what…30-odd of the regular sort since this was supposed to be a done, dusted & posted post

      …miracle of efficiency today is what I am?

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