Charles Sumner

And, for the record, the ancient world is a lot bigger than it was when I was in college!
Let's study *all* the classics, not just some of them.

Studying the classics - seeing how Grecco-Roman societies collapsed after they failed to protect their citizens equally under equal laws - gave me the fire under my ass I needed to fight for equal laws for my entire political career. Not having the option to study these things is bad and dumb.

I watched it just after taking a class on Anabaptism and it reminded me of nothing more than an Anabaptist martyrology.

Yay! Agreement!

I'm not being tounge-in-cheek at all! I think it's true that a significant temptation to doom for some people (who have lost the ability to believe that things will ever get better) is that at least the people who made things suck will suffer.

Abandoning doomerism means abandoning belief in a just, self-regulating universe.

Doomerism is a belief in *justice*. That bad things will happen to people who deserve them (us).

Eurofascism is about relitigating the Treaty of Trianon so the Baron of Shitfucksberg can reclaim his rightful clay. American fascism is about defending used car dealers' sacred right to sell cars that explode thirty miles down the road.

Donald Trump is mortal and JD Vance is a Eurofash who lacks Donald's intuitive understanding that the American authoritarian model is about giving the Worst Guys You Know free reign to tyrannize their petty fiefdoms rather than esoteric woo-woo pseudointellectual tradcath philosopher king LARPing.

Ok, one last one:

The bald eagle, near extinction back in the 1960s, is booming and is a nice protection and restoration story.

There is *a lot* bad going on. And we need to keep track of that.

But it is healthy to take time to notice the good, too.

People voted for Trump because Harris's affordability campaign was boring nerd shit and Trump's deranged conspiracy theorism was Funny Good Economy Man telling they wouldn't have to talk to tech support workers with a foreign accent anymore

Three cheers for the mighty Quabbin Reservoir and the many members of the MWRA priesthood.

Yes. I think it's her realizing she needs to make headlines doing performative stuff because her constituents told her they want her to do more of that kind of thing.

Does listening = policy changes?

Americans do not need to start shooting cops

Americans do need to start telling them “no” and closing ranks when they are ordered to disperse and charged by cops

Like Schmitt had genuine substantive ideas of society and the state that hold up to examination and can’t be dismissed out of hand. Yarvin’s idiot fanfiction of resentment is a truer reflection of the ideologies essence.

fascism the first time around taking place after a cataclysmic war and economic collapse inadvertently gave it a kind of intellectual weight it didn’t really deserve. Carl Schmitt is as a thinker *way* more serious than Yarvin, but Yarvin is probablt more of authentic fascist ‘intellectual’

It's rhetorical posturing. It's craven. Isn't it also "Figuring out what rhetoric your constituents want you to use and then deploying it in public?"/aka listening to them?

Yes, this is craven, yes, it's probably not truly representative of her "real" beliefs, whatever those are but: this counts as listening?

Guns N' Pansies

World War II pro-American propaganda.

The Devil, dressed in the manner described in the main post, hides behind a chimney in a scene from "Santa Claus Vs. The Devil (1959).

By way of illustration:

WHY DO ALL THESE PEOPLE LOOK LIKE CARTOON VILLAINS. THIS MAN SHOULD BE WEARING AN ALL-RED LEOTARD WITH LITTLE HORNS ON HIS HEAD AND CARRYING A PLASTIC TRIDENT AROUND.

A huge part of fascism is inculcating despair and creating a society that won’t push back, right? That hopelessness is an intentional part of their project, which only makes fighting back against it more urgent and necessary.

I understand that this goes against every feeble, meek, conciliatory political bone in their bodies. They can barely bring themselves to call out Trump himself half the time! But unless something arrests our slide, complete surrender to Trump will quickly become the social expectation.

Democrats need to directly attack and pressure institutions for caving to Trump. As in, they need to give speeches and call out - by name - companies, universities, and law firms that have acceded to his illegal demands. If they don't, the path of least resistance will always be acquiescence.

completely forgot to post the issue this morning but: would you like a brief but cathartic recap of the unmitigated disaster for the center/center-right that was the Seattle first round? updates on big mayoral races? one of the worst House Dems catching a real primary? read for that and more:

The latter group here--those that are just addicted to avoiding online criticism--have also likely been impacted by Twitter being taken over by fascists. Suddenly, they're more likely to be dogpiled for supporting the LGBT+ community instead of opposing it, and they take that trend at face value.

I think it's cool that the American right has independently invented their version of a Leninist politburo