Joel

I don’t know what changed, but this is what it feels like to use this website now

It tells you something fairly profound about the nouveau riche of the Texas suburbs. These people are slaves to a cause that unquestionably is against their own material interests, but they've been fed so much bullshit by their church, the "news," and their friends that they're noseblind to it. -OS

The answer to "when they go low" *is not* "we go high."

It is "we kick them square in the teeth."

i am not going to vote for a primary candidate who does not have an answer to "what will you do when Trump's thugs try to kill or arrest you," because that will happen

One striking thing about the NYer for me is that, while preserving a tone of status-quo decorum (and luxury ads), it has published some of the most radical and impactful journalism in this country's history, "Hiroshima," "Silent Spring," 1/3

TRUMP
I hate the law. I’m going to break the law relentlessly and install venal corrupt asshats who will let me break the law because they are only loyal to me.

EVERY NEWS PUBLICATION IN THE COUNTRY
{plays clips of this}

VOTERS
What he said was he’s going to create jobs.

(17) Pale Fire by Nabokov. I finished this book on a trip to NYC in college and am still obsessed. The delusion of reference is hilarious, and the original poem works almost on its own.

(16) The Dream Songs. Here, John Berryman’s sad, messy world is beautiful and sometimes surprisingly lucid.

(15) The Bell Jar. I only read this a few years ago; one of my partner’s favorite books, and one that I’ve enjoyed revisiting in a few different contexts.

(14) The Glass Bead Game. Hesse at his most elaborate and insane, imagining monks in the future with something a little like highly abstract AI.

Feel like its a bad sign about the health of the republic that Pritzker has to talk about TX Dems like they’re the Polish government-in-exile in London

Oh I agree! I saw somebody saying that they’d have ICE “monitors” intimidating people at every polling place and brother, they’re having trouble staffing regular levels, let alone the beefed up staffing they want, let alone the omnipresent doom scenario.

how is pritzker the only one who seems to remember that he's the governor of a sovereign entity too

(13): The Divine Comedy. I read this in translation but spent a lot of time looking at facing Italian, which added to my delight. I was less interested in Dante’s enemies list than in his artistry. The way he describes the whole universe is very, very strange.

(12): The Natural (Bernard Malamud, 1952). Who doesn’t love an Arthurian baseball yarn? I read this in a college course on baseball.

Meet "Sailor Socialism," the Infowars Interview Subject Who Went Viral "Poor people shouldn't get sick and die because they can't afford to see a doctor, obviously."

it's kind of funny that dasha is now pro-Trump reactionary doorknob and the infowars lady who interviewed her came out as a gay liberal

www.teenvogue.com/story/sailor...

I'm going to level with you: I don't give a shit if he stole a table. I had a girl illegally bring a firearm into my dorm freshman year while high off her ass and pull it out for show and tell. Call me when he did something like that

Related phenomenon is the urban work-from-home NIMBY (concerned about street parking around the clock, construction noise makes their job harder to do from home).

(11): Huck Finn is a book I’ve read at least three times (in 10th grade, junior year of college, and before reading James last year). It’s still not a book I viscerally love, but I appreciate it. I also get how hard it is to teach in 2025.

"drunk idiots steal college property" is, like, a stock joke in american culture

(10): Demon Copperhead. Not actually my favorite Kingsolver, but I might be in the minority here. It’s a lot easier to follow than Dickens’ original, and it does a lot of justice to the people of Appalachia.

(9): Comet in Moominland (Tove Jansson). Very mellow kid lit, even with the threat of destruction. These books were not well known when we mom spotted these at Border’s.

Yeah, I think half true in the sense that Christianity did a radical theological rework compared to Judaism or Islam, but it’s a fool’s errand to try to litigate this, and it’s wild to watch progressive Christians try to honor an impossible aim to “decolonize the Tanakh” or whatever.

Relatedly, there is this idea that Christianity’s polemic against “the Pharisees” is inherently offensive … but the Hebrew Bible makes far more violent polemical attacks than that against Canaanite religion. It’s not the most coherent standard.

Christianity aside, you’ve also got your Karaites and your Samaritans!

I understand this idea of Christianity appropriating the Hebrew Bible, which feels at least half true. But the I see well-meaning people suggesting everyone defer to Rabbinic Judaism on the meaning of the Hebrew Bible, which is historically misguided.

The media should write another piece about Mamdani

"Trump is losing support among Zoomers" and "not all Zoomers voted for Trump" are in no way contradictory statements.

The Remains of the Day (Kazuo Ishiguro, 1989). I didn’t read this book until last year. A darkly resonant thing to read in the last year of the Biden term. Excellent.

The Witches (Roald Dahl, 1983). Probably some combination of misogynistic and antisemitic but also structured magisterially in creating a small comfortable world for our protagonist, then threatening it. The book ending really hits you when you’re a kid.