Rambling Wreck

The cyberpunk memes have become more and more relevant as time marches on, most unfortunately.

Good. It’s horrific how other platforms abused their reach to strangle local, independent, and national outlets alike.

I WANT to see news and actual vetted work and I WANT journalists to get rewarded for it.

Because I want to live in a thinking human world over some AI generated slop dystopia

I pointed this out to @allieevolpe.bsky.social the other day, strangely enough... Some themes are "evergreen," for better or worse.

(Also, I need to stop making "green" jokes about Wicked.😅)

... Oh hey. Well, there it is.😅🤣 bsky.app/profile/geor...

Well, when put it that way…

"Donald, go ahead and try to rewrite history. Use your platform to deflect blame, point fingers, and play the victim. But the evidence speaks louder than your words. History will remember the January 6 Committee as defenders of democracy—and you, as a man who betrayed it."

Adam Kinzinger

‘They turn our farms into rape centres’: Russian mercenaries accused of abuse in Central African Republic A rise in sexual violence means food prices have leapt in CAR as women and girls say they fear working in the fields

"...the growing attacks in the farmlands are having an impact on food production as women stay away from the fields. As a result, some food prices have increased by 50% in the last eight months." - @philipobaji.bsky.social www.theguardian.com/global-devel...

Loving a Shadow - TV Tropes The nature of emotional relationships often overlaps in confusing complications ranging from the simple crush to Freudian oddness. If this causes the writers to accidentally build things like harems, ...

I'm pretty sure there is a trope about this... #DonTheCon tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwik...

The piece has tons of devastating details about Hegseth's many, many disqualifying personal traits, but we shouldn't overlook the parts about how he has repeatedly mismanaged every single organization he's led and been driven out of job after job for utter incompetence.

Once voters had reached that conclusion, many of them simply did not want to hear negative information about Trump that would cause cognitive dissonance about their choice. As Jackie Payne, the founder and executive director of Galvanize Action, which studies the political attitudes of moderate white women, told me shortly before the election, many female voters who believed that Trump would improve their economic situation simply dismissed any rhetoric and proposals from him that they might find troubling. “They were choosing to believe a vision of him that was aligned with what they wanted to get out of him—a strong economy—and they were absolutely discounting anything that felt extreme as disinformation or hyperbole, even if he said he would do it,” she said.

¯\_(ツ)_/¯ www.theatlantic.com/politics/arc...

Coates: Are you ok with the pardon of Hunter Biden?

Clyburn: I am absolutely okay with it. I don't know how many people urged him to do so, but I did.

3 panel My Boyfriend is a Shark Ep#117 “Whaler? What Whaler?” A whaler’s kidnapped baby orca. Mom looks on helpless as Finn stews. The whaler might think he’s won— but Finn comes through in the clinch. Bye bye whaler…

“Whaler? What Whaler?”
My Boyfriend is a Shark Ep#117
Design by Liz Ransdell
Art by Atlas Talos
@thesharkqueen.com
@atlastalos.bsky.social
Check out all your faves from the gang at mbfias.com today!

a close up of a man in a christmas outfit with the words `` you sit on a throne of lies '' . ALT: a close up of a man in a christmas outfit with the words `` you sit on a throne of lies '' .

Oof, yeah, that would be a futile effort. Especially as #DonTheCon uses the "firehose of falsehoods" propaganda tech like it is going out of style.

IMHO "Trump says a lot of things. Sometimes he even believes the things he says, and on extra rare occasions, these things are even objectively true."🙄

Have I mentioned how "'Do you even know how bad things have to be, to make *me* pay attention to politics?' is my life-story now" yet, today?😅 It has been something of a survival mantra for me, this last decade or so.

... Tho considering we got in this mess via a large portion of Americans *completely ignoring* national/DC politics, I'm certain "sticking one's head in the sand" is not the route to go.🙄 (I was like that once. Oh, to be blissfully ignorant of such troubles again...😅) But yes, focus more locally.

Authoritarian regimes being inefficient isn’t new, but I do wonder if the current wave of global reaction, being motivated by things like education polarization and anti-cosmopolitanism, doesn’t actively select against competence in many ways.

When very very smart people are authoritarians, it's usually because they have some sort of emotional issue.

A really smart person doesn't want to be an authoritarian except in very strange circumstances, because the default optimal lifestyle is extremely high prosperity with extremely low responsibility.

Trump offers Pentagon’s No. 2 job to billionaire Stephen Feinberg The search for a capable deputy defense secretary has taken on heightened significance as lawmakers scrutinize Pete Hegseth, Trump’s choice to lead the agency.

Trump offers Pentagon’s No. 2 job to billionaire Stephen Feinberg

www.washingtonpost.com/national-sec...

I understand there as a book about this... (Several, really.) "The Cynic: The Political Education of Mitch McConnell" is the first thing to spring to mind.

WTF Happened? Welp, America has chosen fascism. But the rejection of liberal democracy didn’t start with Donald Trump; it’s been taking shape for decades. Maya and Rebecca sort out how things went so…

Welp, America chose fascism. But the rejection of liberal democracy didn’t start with DJT; it’s been taking shape for decades. @mayagurantz & @gynostar sort out how things went so horribly wrong, in this election cycle and over the last 40 years. Is our political system broken? What do we do now?

I'm begging you, stop hyperfocusing on Washington politics. You can't affect it & it's dealing you persistent psychic damage. Your doomscrolling is not serving you.

Focus on your town. Your city council. Find meetups. Spend your time on your ACTUAL community. If shit goes raw they're your lifeline.

hard to exaggerate how nuts the engagement is on Bluesky compared to 𝕏. a vastly smaller user base (at least officially), but just look at these stats for one of the biggest newspapers on Earth. Musk has absolutely trashed the platform. folks, you are not locked in on 𝕏. not even a little.

There’s a reason people love these stories.

The whole first half of the MCU sees Tony so fucked by his trauma that he creates a murderbot that almost causes an extinction level event! T’Chaka has to deal with the arrogance & isolationism of his ancestors! Natasha was brainwashed! Thor has PTSD! Bruce is a literal rage monster!!!

To be clear, a bad critical reading of a pop culture tentpole is the least of the sins Dr. Brainworm committed with that inanity. But I just had to say something.

perry the platypus from phineas and ferb is standing next to a boy ALT: perry the platypus from phineas and ferb is standing next to a boy

I kid you not. On the bright side, very much a "see, he gets it!" and a "the kids will be alright" moment. 2/2