Grant Wu

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‘I don’t want anyone to suffer like I did’: the intersex campaigners fighting to limit surgery on children What should be done about the small proportion of babies born with genitals that are neither typically male nor typically female? Many of those affected believe parents and doctors are often too quick...

These are some quite heartbreaking stories and, as Holly Greenberry-Pullen comments in the piece, really illustrates the perverse absurdity of deeming trans teens to young to even get blockers but being fine with intersex kids getting horrifically drastic full-on bodily surgery as *toddlers*.

Is it about Social Security or people's perceptions of it?

Reverse polarizing me into not giving a shit about the Epstein files, man

Just interacted with a Reddit user who, as far as I can tell, thinks that the dems caving on the shutdown is not a big deal because Adelita Grijalva will have to be sworn in to re-open the government

I think it was B and then A. He didn't plan on voting for it, but then the defectors pressured him until he cracked. He then arranged the votes to prevent the defectors from being vulnerable in a primary.

Either way, it's bad leadership.

Any D running for Senate in 2026 must vow to oust Schumer as leader. Maybe he would quit

This is functionally identical to how Murkowski and Collins were coincidentally allowed to vote against particularly heinous Trump nominees only when there were enough guaranteed ‘yes’ votes for it to not matter. Senate leaders of both parties know how to count to 60.

A bunch of quislings got together and picked 8 people to vote "yes".

They seemed to also be arguing against a straw man

Nobody really thinks this was a coordinated conspiracy of the entire party. The furious condemnations, the sharp criticisms, the public calls for Schumer's leadership to end - clearly a majority of the party didn't support this.

Just argued with someone who believed that there was nothing weird here, Repubs just happened to get the exact number of senators needed, they all just happened to be retiring or not up for election in 2026

I think the middle of this is probably right. At its core this is a group of squishes going rogue against the caucus and a leadership too weak to stop them.

But also that the ranks of the squishes is bigger than apparent on this vote and is trying to do rotating villain to get through it.

I know this sounds mean but if you think that this is a coincidence you're more than a bit of a mark. If Kaine had been up next year, it would have been Warner, if Slotkin was retiring, Peters, etc.

The coordinated nature of this—none are facing voters in 2026—means that either Schumer approved it or failed in his job as Senate Majority Leader to stop it.

Dems voting "no" get zero credit until they demand a change in leadership. Schumer out as Leader, Durbin out as Whip.

Since the Democrats worked extra hard to hide who actually supported this, I think the No Kings/Resistance position should be to primary every Democrat unless they publicly call for Schumer's ouster this week

Either they go into total rebellion mode, which they won't, or the people will

"When it came to fight for affordable healthcare for hard-working Georgians, Jon Ossoff voted to surrender to the party of Trump. Now your insurance premium has doubled. It's time for someone willing to fight." etc.

Yes, I absolutely believe that. I think the results of the 2025 general election show that there was real energy and momentum. Voting "no" might open him up to some attack ads from the right - voting "yes" would kill all enthusiasm from the left.

So is your position that they should all have caved immediately, because you think that not doing so is politically toxic?

Or rather, he wanted to surrender but he didn't want to go on record as voting to surrender

Is the natural conclusion not that Ossoff was protected? He wanted to vote yes but Schumer found someone else to vote no.

I do think that caving immediately would've been much better image-wise than caving now, and would've done less real world harm.

But anyone viewing stove touching as anything more than maybe a silver lining - anyone *hoping* for this outcome - is morally bankrupt

Two ways to read that -

1) the instinct to cave is strongest with the departing generation;

or

2) the retiring members are taking the heat for non-retiring members who agree with them but are scared of being primaried

I don't see why any of that would matter. The (A)PTC paid for premiums, FSAs don't. Unless they're simultaneously changing the rules on those, this will kick a bunch of people off insurance.

Maybe a bug, I can see it.

Yeah how does this work in practice?

Recently went to Costco for a grocery run and ended up with way more stuff than I wanted because of quantities. Wanted a small thing of peanuts and had to get 2 pounds.

there you go

look, this is not how I would have played it, I've posted 'retire bitch' about Schumer repeatedly, but objectively speaking it has worked

"we're offering you an incredible good deal and you repeatedly spit in our faces" is part of why Trump is taking the blame for this

I guess the only reasonable interpretation of "1 year" would be something that expires in 2027

I guess the question is, will voters get notifications about 2027 premiums going up just in time for the 2026 midterms?

Examples exist like @nexusproject.bsky.social

They're just not widely known

I'm seeing this a lot with the shutdown. People are pretending that both sides are just "being lazy" when Republicans are working hard to gut safety nets and Democrats have a mere one (1) ask