"I do not deride any of this in the least" : U.S. POLITICS OCTOBER 2025

I woke up early so I could finish reading yesterday's district court ruling in the American Association of University Professors' suit, from which the title is drawn:

Triumphalism is the very essence of the Trump brand. Often
this is naught but hollow bragging: “my perfect administration,”
wearing a red baseball cap in the presidential oval office
emblazoned “Trump Was Right About Everything,” or most recently
depicting himself as an officer in the First Cavalry Division.49 Unfortunately, this tends to obscure the very real and sweeping
changes President Trump has wrought in his first year in office. If change is a mark of success, President Trump is the most
successful president in history.

49 I do not deride any of this in the least. Evidently, this
is markedly effective with a broad swath of our people.

Good morning!

I'm not gonna go back through a few days of Rupar vids, but recently he shared a clip of Louisiana's governor basically inviting Trump to send the army into New Orleans & Baton Rouge. Is this the first time in this administration that a Red State gov. has asked Trump to go to town on their Blue Cities? I do know there's also been talk from up top about Memphis, but how on-board is Bill Lee with that?

Oh, super on board. Lee and both Tennessee senators went to the Oval Office for the announcement of the Memphis deployment.

fwiw I talked about this the other week here: https://theprogressivesouth.org/headlights-ep-22-rising-appalachia/

The gist of it is that I think we're likely to see more red-state deployments because our governors and state Republican officials have already been conducting their own wars on the blue cities, so having actual federal troops on their side is just a plus as far as they're concerned.

the odd thing is that, if I'm not mistaken, they have their own state National Guards that they can deploy themselves without having to ask Trump about it

iirc—if they called them up themselves they'd have to pay the bill, if federalized the feds pay

wait, socializing the costs sounds suspiciously left

Also different states have their own laws on when the Guard can be deployed. e.g. Tennessee’s broadly allows it for civil unrest, but it’s unclear whether day-to-day crime fighting would fall under that.

And it can be unpopular obviously, because you are taking guard members away from their normal jobs and lives. Like say a guard member in Knoxville who works for a construction company or something is not going to be thrilled to be sent all the way across the state to hump their gear around Memphis.

Oh, super on board. Lee and both Tennessee senators went to the Oval Office for the announcement of the Memphis deployment.

https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/71IuWndOqHL._AC_SY300_SX300_QL70_FMwebp_.jpg

got to wonder how citizens of Louisiana and Tennessee feel about their governors calling in the National Guard on themselves

Well again, the people in the cities are not thrilled, but white Republicans in the burbs and rural counties are like hell yeah, go get ‘em!

This guy's been doing funny videos about it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JbO5ElUq1MM

finally found something that gets jeffries riled up https://bsky.app/profile/atrupar.com/post/3m22z4gferq2s

most people oppose the national guard being in cities

https://www.npr.org/2025/09/27/nx-s1-5553536/npr-ipsos-law-enforcement-poll-national-guard

The best news I've heard all week is that the government shutdown would cancel SF's Fleet Week and extremely annoying Blue Angels air show that accompanies it.

Speaking of state laws on deploying the Guard, it appears that our shameless hack of an attorney general is rewriting the legal guidance on the fly to accommodate Trump. Color me shocked.

https://www.newsfromthestates.com/article/tennessee-lawmaker-says-ag-omitted-altered-guard-deployment-opinions

but of course they did

Federal employees told Democrats to blame for shutdown in ‘highly inappropriate’ email

Federal employees at multiple agencies received emails Tuesday blaming congressional Democrats for a potential government shutdown “forced” by the party, an unusual use of government communications that typically steer clear of political comments....
The emails go on to say that each agency has a plan in place in the event of “any lapse in appropriations by Congressional Democrats.”

Pretty desperate

!

Awful (not my experience, though)

I have all kinds of feelings about this shutdown that I’ll keep to myself, but you can imagine

Pretty desperate

It doesn't read as desperation to me. This is just sticking to the playbook of never deviating a hair's breadth from the message. What is different this time around compared to most of our lifetimes is that the message is simply and always about defining enemies, not opponents. You can sometimes find ways to come to an agreement with opponents, but not with enemies. They must be crushed.

Telling abused federal employees that garbage is dumb, they’re not fooled.

Fooling them isn't the point. Never admitting a ray of daylight from any other reality to intrude on the message is the point.

they may also remember the history of government shutdowns, pioneered by gleeful republicans.

but also, the mask is off. trump and republicans believe that the federal government, even career positions, is infiltrated with leftist union supporting radicals, and yesterday Trump explicitly said he wants to lay off a bunch of workers, and he wants those that support democrats to leave. previous republican presidents and shutdown pioneers would still go through the show of pretending that they thought career federal workers were honest people who would do their job as best as they could, regardless of political party.

picking up cues from fascists, modern republicans begin to believe their own paranoid projections of what the government is like (full of evil saboteurs driven by politics), and now they're "fighting" that delusion by creating the very thing they were (supposedly) criticizing -- a career federal employee pool that's dominated by their own political party and beholden to the corrupt officials, rather than the law.

I just heard some retired brigadier general on the radio and he pretty much ripped Hegseth a new one... just a point-by-point refutation of all of his bullshit peptalk

He also said that the majority of those leaders would be flying coach from Korea, Japan, Djibouti, wherever they're stationed... they don't have their own private planes

xp And then as more and more things cease working properly, they'll blame sabotage by disgruntled departing employees or something. It was Snowball!

the majority of those leaders would be flying coach from Korea, Japan, Djibouti, wherever they're stationed... they don't have their own private planes

Sullenly resenting, but complying with, ridiculous orders issued from one's superior officer is a normal fact of life for most of the armed forces hierarchy, but I'm sure this particular instance hit all those generals and admirals hard who believed they had risen too high to be dragged back into those feelings again. This was Trump's military parade all over again, but with the top brass.

I was happy they picked Bad Bunny for the Super Bowl, both because I like him and it’s already pissed off the right people in my life, but this shit is so gross:

Donald Trump’s former campaign manager Corey Lewandowski appeared on Benny Johnson’s web interview series “The Benny Show” and warned that ICE agents will be present at the 2026 Super Bowl, where Bad Bunny is set to perform the Halftime Show.

Notably, the Halftime Show, presented by Apple Music, is Bad Bunny’s only U.S. concert appearance that’s set for 2026 at this time, as his highly-anticipated Debí Tirar Más Fotos World Tour, which is scheduled to run from December through July 2026, is not stopping in the states. Bad Bunny told I-D magazine last month that his fear of ICE raids was part of the reason why he skipped touring in the U.S.

When Johnson asked Lewandowski if “ICE will have enforcement at the Super Bowl” where Bad Bunny is performing, the Trump advisor responded: “There is nowhere you can provide safe haven to people who are in this country illegally. Not the Super Bowl and nowhere else. We will find you and apprehend you and put you in a detention facility and deport you. Know that is a very real situation under this administration, which is contrary to how it used to be.”

“It’s so shameful they’ve decided to pick somebody who seems to hate America so much to represent them at the Halftime Show,” Lewandowski said about Bad Bunny. “We should be trying to be inclusive, not exclusive. There are plenty of great bands and entertainment people who could be playing at that show that would be bringing people together and not separating them.”

He concluded, “If there are illegal aliens, I don’t care if it’s a concert for Johnny Smith or Bad Bunny or anybody else. … We’re going to do enforcement everywhere. We are going to make Americans safe. That is a directive from the president. If you’re in this country illegally, go home.”

I'm just disappointed that no TV station used the opening lines of Black Sabbath's War Pigs as the soundtrack for the military meeting.

super bowl is in san jose, no? expect a lot of protestors if ICE is there

I think healthcare was a good thing to hang the shutdown on as it allows democrats to beat the drum on how the subsidies expiring will impact nearly everyone’s premiums. Obviously it is just one issue of a zillion disturbing things, but maybe they can keep the focus here and prevent trump from “flooding the zone with shit.” They need to really drill this point home though and they are bad at messaging.

I don’t care if it’s a concert for Johnny Smith or

you could say a lot of things about Lewandowski, but you must admit he has excellent taste in jazz guitarists

Six Democratic senators on the Senate Judiciary Committee (Durbin, Schiff, Whitehouse, Klobuchar, Coons, and Welch) voted yes on two Trump district court nominees this morning, and my question remains, why do senior members of this party keep voluntarily ceding political capital to Donald Trump

https://ballsandstrikes.substack.com/p/why-is-this-democratic-senator-voting

https://abc7chicago.com/post/ice-chicago-federal-agents-surround-south-shore-apartment-building-dhs-requests-military-deployment-illinois/17908911/

^^^ horrific stuff

NYTimes Trump job approval by age/race/gender

18-29: -36
30-44: -20
45-65: -23
65+: -4

White: +6
Black: -73
Hispanic: -43

Men: +3
Women: -23

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2025/10/02/polls/times-siena-poll-registered-voter-crosstabs.html

I feel like this is a situation that calls for the fabled “double-minus”

white men are such a fucking problem

imagine your approval of trump going UP

Does it not simply mean that 3% more men approve of Trump than disapprove, rather than his approval rating has increased? [I AM NOT A MATHEMATICIAN]

Its still positive, which is crazy.

oh i see

but yes still

anecdotally there were a bunch of trump signs near me that stayed up all through biden and the next election and theyre all gone now

cuts funding to 16 states that didn't vote for him

https://newrepublic.com/post/201223/trump-cuts-energy-funding-16-blue-states-democrats-shutdown

The compact would require colleges to freeze tuition for five years, cap the enrollment of international students and commit to strict definitions of gender. Among other steps, universities would also be required to change their governance structures to prohibit anything that would “punish, belittle and even spark violence against conservative ideas.”

Colleges that sign the agreement would receive “multiple positive benefits,"

Queer Satanic queersatanic.bsky.social‬

> Context: this piece of filth barged into Psych 210 (The Diversity of Human Sexuality) at UW throwing up nazi salutes, yelling Heil Hitler, and calling everyone “[r-slur] degenerates”.
>
> Class didn’t appreciate it.
https://bsky.app/profile/queersatanic.bsky.social/post/3m26l5ykrjs2j

feel like this is where the countrys head is at, meanwhile our political and media elites are cashing checks in a completely different reality

cap the enrollment of international students

this kind of thinking is absolutely killing the UK's once-thriving higher education sector btw

yeah foreign students are basically free money, president deals doing his thing

attn, nazi punks: fuck off

sorry all i see there is a woke mob repressing conservative viewpoints, perhaps illegally

wild how the kid is filming a mob descending on him instead of focusing on running away, desire for clout is stronger than the will to live

yes agreed, when i watched it that part seemed so fake to me, i cannot relate to that and yet this is reality

oh i see

but yes still

I think this is why the administration keeps thinking it is popular, because it is popular (barely) among white exurban men, the only people who matter to them.

the mob is all filming too lol

man bro got arrested too

Anyway that Chicago article is absolutely enraging. Are they trying to provoke violent resistance? This is exactly the kind of thing the founding Fathers thought justified armed resistance!

yeah they are trying to provoke violet resistance

only getting 30% is real bad for the admin thats not even their whole base forget about picking anyone else up

https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:ihpglfqq3dapqjmwl2ntktil/bafkreihhh72lq35jgledeevert3qxakmo5nheiris22xo6v3r7vhe472k4@jpeg

https://archive.ph/VDa4M

https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:ihpglfqq3dapqjmwl2ntktil/bafkreig3xyjvzrnz54w6vxa5nxukq3iqvewevydt3ysqw2cibiq5op67um@jpeg

The South Shore Chicago raid is fucked up, but it may be a more complicated form of fucked up which underscores some pervasive challenges. Some folks hypothesized/pieced together that these may have been some of the migrants that Texas obnoxiously shipped to Chicago several months/years back. At first they were housed in schools in Woodlawn, then eventually moved into apartments in South Shore, where the landlords were reportedly promised 6 months of rent upfront from the city. That money is probably long gone, and the residents stuck in limbo, so there are suspicions that the landlord ratted them out as a pretense, to get them evicted. Ties together several parallel themes of housing/mistreatment/money/misery.

jesus christ this fuckin place

i know there's a lot going on right now but food prices are absolutely insane across the board and the media won't say shit about it, guess that's another thing that's only an issue when a Democrat is office

It's just another in a long line of supposed issues that get discarded as soon as they're no longer useful, like the gang members who took over the apartment building in Colorado or the people eating cats in Ohio. Glad they cleared that up right? Perpetual caravan of nonsense.

Also furries have disappeared across the board. Whither the furries?

The furries were our good, now we’ve run out

-Food-

good food

Since they took the kitty litter out of the schools the furries have migrated into the woods

E furibus unum

Out of Many, FUN!

It's just another in a long line of supposed issues that get discarded as soon as they're no longer useful

should we poll this?

Where do you start, though? Flag burning?

Why depress yourself xpost

good to see: https://www.assignedmedia.org/breaking-news/attorneys-general-defend-trans-americans-ftc-investigation-healthcare

So they're making the "War on Drugs" literal, to justify the boat bombings (gift link): https://www.nytimes.com/2025/10/02/us/politics/trump-drug-cartels-war.html?unlocked_article_code=1.qU8.ma6O.nvcs7A9uy9Ff&smid=url-share

I haven't seen anyone talk about this, but give it a year or so, what do you bet "legal" marijuana operations all over the country get raided?

and yet, a few months back Trump talked about taking marijuana off Schedule 1

There has been a Reefer Madness epidemic lately.

Trump's semi-libertarian instincts always get overridden by Miller's instincts for power. Drug enforcement is already one of the most authoritarian arms of the government, with built-in local/state/federal police cooperation, it's a natural for him to amplify.

Meanwhile, some more details from the Chicago raid: https://chicago.suntimes.com/immigration/2025/10/01/massive-immigration-raid-on-chicago-apartment-building-leaves-residents-reeling-i-feel-defeated

plus drug arrests let them target minorities for non-violent crimes, it's a win-win

if Pete Hegseth ends up destroying the US military, do we gotta hand it to him?
https://www.expressnews.com/business/article/pentagon-commissaries-privatize-grocery-bids-21062931.php

Jessica Ritchey‬
✧@jmritc✧✧✧.b✧✧✧.soc✧✧✧‬
· 2h
Not for nothing but The Art of War is actually a manual for the failsons who got handed armies and had to be told "You have to fucking feed your troops moron, or they bail."

here comes Warmart to your base

I would've thought Hegseth would be gone by now (Signalgate, the lame parade) but he may have redeemed himself his condescending Ted Talk.. Trump loves that kinda shit

I think it's broader: one of the lessons trump seems to have learned from his first admin is that firing people makes him look bad for picking them in the first place and it puts him on the defensive, plus the media will move on quickly no matter what. As long as they're loyal to him, it seems like there's nothing anyone can do to get fired

^^^

As long as they're loyal to him, it seems like there's nothing anyone can do to get fired

and of course, following the law over trump when it involves a sword is completely unacceptable

The head of the Dwight Eisenhower presidential library was reportedly forced to resign after he refused to allow President Trump to gift King Charles a sword that belonged to Eisenhower during the president state visit to the United Kingdom last month. Todd Arrington, a career federal employee, resisted the request for the sword because it belongs to the U.S. government and under federal law and agency regulations, he could not provide it, according to reports.

Stephen Miller is so clearly running the government (after Elon's exit), and is such an objectively objectionable person that it seems like Dems and everyone should be saying his name all the time.

yeah start referring to it as the 'Miller Administration' every chance they get: "we know who's wearing the pants around here..", make Trump look weak & small & old

agree

Trump has kept Miller around longer than almost anyone. Trump probably thinks Miller is too freakish to ever outshine him.

Miller seems to have the perfect temperament for longevity in the Trump orbit, a true believer to the core, so much so that he's evidently willing to withstand all the humiliations that come with the territory, probably even enjoys it to an extent

apparently weirdo Larry Ellison advises Trump all the time, he's been referred to as the 'shadow president'

y'all know about the video of 17-yr old Miller that just surfaced yeah? where he's waxing ecstatic about torture to his high school bus?

Here: https://bsky.app/profile/nullifie.bsky.social/post/3m26nrq5ssk2w

yeah, I saw that.. he got his dream job

Already spraying on his hair in high school.

revenge of the beta cucks

That 17-yr old yesterday: https://bsky.app/profile/normative.bsky.social/post/3m26g2sp43c2i

lol.. I hope the 'gang bangers' see that clip, so they know what they're up against

Why is Miller even there? He basically is President now.

fuck

Josh Gerstein‬
✧@joshgerst✧✧✧.b✧✧✧.soc✧✧✧‬
· 20m
BREAKING: At Trump DOJ request, Judge Michael Simon (Obama) recuses from Oregon's suit over activation of its National Guard for immigration enforcement/ICE security. New Judge Karin Immergut (Trump). DOJ argued comments by Simon's wife @RepBonamici about case merited recusal.

and

Domestic Enemy Hat‬
✧@kenwh✧✧✧.b✧✧✧.soc✧✧✧‬
· 1m
Judge Simon's right - he wasn't required to recuse, though he had the discretion to. The problem arises when principled judges recuse even if there's an appearance of bias but unprincipled judges like Alito and Thomas don't.

I am not adjusting to how deeply demonic these scumbags are:

https://bsky.app/profile/istanbulshiite.bsky.social/post/3m2aghzzmmk2u

(that's a propaganda video of the Chicago apartment building raid; the source is unclear but it's reminiscent of other sick shit DHS has put out)

249 'twas a run

give me Liberty or gimme whatevs

isn't the U.S. the longest running, continuous government around? Like, the UK was a monarchy but now has a PM & parliament... Iceland has a very old assembly but was under Danish rule for a lot of that time

We had a good run

we were like a dynasty out there

Iceland's parliament was formed in the 900s iirc

but not continuous:

After Iceland's union with Norway in 1262, the Althing lost its legislative power, which was not restored until 1904 when Iceland gained home rule from Denmark.

isn't the U.S. the longest running, continuous government around? Like, the UK was a monarchy but now has a PM & parliament... Iceland has a very old assembly but was under Danish rule for a lot of that time

We had a good run

UK had a parliament since the Middle Ages, but yes the franchise wasn’t extended to all adult males until the 19th Century.

When we push these criminals in office out, there are going to have to be Nuremberg style trials for crimes against humanity.

Newsom and Trump are fighting again

Gov. Gavin Newsom is threatening to withhold billions in state funds from any California college that signs onto an agreement crafted by President Donald Trump's administration requiring schools to agree to support the President's education agenda in order to have access to federal dollars.

The 10-page "Compact for Academic Excellence in Higher Education" requires universities to adhere to rules written by the administration in a variety of areas, including admissions, hiring, free speech on campus, teaching and the use of endowments.

"IF ANY CALIFORNIA UNIVERSITY SIGNS THIS RADICAL AGREEMENT, THEY’LL LOSE BILLIONS IN STATE FUNDING — INCLUDING CAL GRANTS — INSTANTLY. CALIFORNIA WILL NOT BANKROLL SCHOOLS THAT SELL OUT THEIR STUDENTS, PROFESSORS, RESEARCHERS, AND SURRENDER ACADEMIC FREEDOM," Gov. Gavin Newsom said in a statement Thursday, intending for the entire statement to be written completely in uppercase letters.

I loathe Peggy Noonan. But;

When you are driven by a sense of urgency you must still try to act like a normal person—normal in your comportment, which means sober, judicious. Not like some pumped-up drama queen who makes everything more jarring and fevered, and who comes across as the living answer to the question, “What would it look like if Captain Queeg took Adderall?

Re Hegseth

lol
Hegseth and “sober”

Anyway forget Captain Queeg all the Nazis were coked to the gills

When we push these criminals in office out, there are going to have to be Nuremberg style trials for crimes against humanity.

But that would be so divisive!

We had a good run

― Andy the Grasshopper, Thursday, October 2, 2025 5:41 PM (one hour ago) bookmarkflaglink

honestly impressive work demolishing the thing

impressive work demolishing the thing

"Any mule can kick down a barn, but it takes a good carpenter to build one."

-- House Speaker Sam Rayburn --

i get the point but a mule cant really kick down a barn

i know a guy

uhhh...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V9pAJz_wXUg

hahaha... wonder how long this will last

Anti-abortion groups furious as FDA approves generic abortion pill

In a move that has left anti-abortion advocates reeling, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) quietly approved a request to manufacture a new abortion pill earlier this week.

UK had a parliament since the Middle Ages, but yes the franchise wasn’t extended to all adult males until the 19th Century.

So that puts the US at 1965?

Sure

I cannot be the only one that is not getting some Baghdad Bob vibes from Mike Johnson when he tries to be interviewed or talked to on camera.

These are some strange times. Robert Anton Wilson is somewhere laughing his ass off.

The dude is pretty much Smithers...

As if posting partisan messages about the shutdown on gov websites wasn't bad enough, it seems the Department of Education took the extra step of involuntarily replacing furloughed workers' out of office messages with similar partisan messages and made it look like the messages were written by said workers.

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/trump-administration/education-department-employees-email-automatically-changed-rcna235211

https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:272owktpki6o3pbdv4egfjl4/bafkreid7vm2s5yabdhrhjbpqw3pkcicw7icutgp4g26n6hvbsbj7ru3yy4@jpeg

Tough break, dead man

turns out he was just a podcaster

but i was told he was jesus II?

Jesus Was A Crossmaker Podcaster

But just wait until Charlie comes back from the dead

(ai)

Oh man, hologram Charlie touring arenas, bring it on!

Jesus Was A Crossmaker Podcaster

― Lithium Just Madison (C. Grisso/McCain), Friday, October 3, 2025 9:27 AM (twenty-four minutes ago)

lol, it would be impossible to explain why but I also just yesterday texted a friend "Jesus Was a Content Maker"

charlie kirk ai that is a marxist

Verily he was the Son of Pod

xp that's what I call dialectic

In 2050 the world was ruled by a trans Charlie Kirk AI hologram

i'm just copying and pasting this from tpm, sorry, but there's a lot to digest in this paragraph:

In a bombastic social media post, Patel this week ended a training and intelligence-sharing partnership with the Anti-Defamation League. In the process, he smeared the ADL and former FBI Director James Comey, claiming “James Comey wrote ‘love letters’ to the ADL and embedded FBI agents with them – a group that ran disgraceful ops spying on Americans,” Patel posted. “That era is OVER. This FBI won’t partner with political fronts masquerading as watchdogs.”

This FBI won’t partner with political fronts masquerading as watchdogs.

just want to highlight this promise from kash patel

while i'm just copy pasting things on tpm that stand out before i have my coffee,

In a podcast interview with The New Republic’s Greg Sargent, Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT) warns that we are fast approaching the point where the space for meaningful political opposition to President Trump is constrained by authoritarian restrictions:

My belief has never been that he’s going to cancel the election in 2026 or 2028—he’s not going to do that. Turkey still has elections, Hungary still has elections, Russia still has elections. The leaders in those countries just constrain that space the opposition can operate in, such that they never have enough room to win a national election. If we are not already there, we are really, really close. Which is why the only way out of that is to make them pay a political price every time they ratchet up pressure on the opposition.

just wanted to say that whenever 2026/28 elections come up and some people express fear that the elections will be shams while others are like "stop expressing fear, i know what happens in the future and it's fine", i often think both sides are totally talking past each other. murphy's response gets at my own fear

In the process, he smeared the ADL and former FBI Director James Comey, claiming “James Comey wrote ‘love letters’ to the ADL and embedded FBI agents with them – a group that ran disgraceful ops spying on Americans,” Patel posted. “That era is OVER. This FBI won’t partner with political fronts masquerading as watchdogs.”

― z_tbd, Friday, October 3, 2025 11:02 AM (eight minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

would be interested in knowing more about this are there documents there perhaps, obvs he could just be making it up but also maybe he knows something re the fbi and adl partnering to spy on americans, wouldnt take the genocide denying josh marshalls snap opinion that this is a smear at face value, and at the end of the day this is obvs a let them fight situation between right wing shitheads

oh for sure! yeah, i 100% believe the fbi worked/works with ADL. i'm laughing at the "that era is OVER" part of patel's message

lol fair (i would still like to know more tho)

https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:gouysuoxatjdb5bjcqe4sfh7/bafkreiejyu2ezrd5cku5ybp3vqy6decxqx6qsslnh77frkmaadmwq4xlim@jpeg

hes got his own logo

Keep Shooting Humans

Not to be outdone by Hegseth changing the name of his department, Patel has announced that the FBI will be formally renamed "Fuckin' Badass Individuals."

Federacion Borrachos Incorregible

They arent that creative it would totally be female body inspector

has Pritzker really sent in the Illinois State Police to arrest ICE protestors in Chicago?

yes

or, to give the benefit of the doubt, he is not actively stopping them from doing so unasked

They arent that creative it would totally be female body inspector

Except they'd change the name of the whole department to BFBI just so they could say Biological Female Body Inspector. Gotta stay ideologically correct at all times, you know. (Unless there's a dollar to be made going 180 degrees against all your previously professed values.)

Well of course they have to inspect the bodies to decided which prison to send them to

DHS has posted a video about 'life after all the illegals are deported' set to Friday I'm In Love, and included a clip from Twin Peaks.

https://bsky.app/profile/kurc.com/post/3m2alej7nx22l

I think they may be meme targeting us based on our web history

LLM prompt: help me own the libs by combining nazi values with leftwing music and tv shows

i assume that robert smith will issue some kind of injunction and get this taken down (as will Mark Frost and Jennifer Lynch) but it's wild to me that they keep doing shit like this

Dems might be winning on the PR front

Almost 8 in 10 Americans say they want Congress to extend enhanced Affordable Care Act premium subsidies, according to a poll published today by KFF, a nonpartisan health policy research group.

About 78% of adults said the subsidies, which lower premiums for people buying coverage on ACA marketplaces, should be extended, compared with 22% who favor letting them lapse.

Support cuts across party lines, with 92% of Democrats, 82% of independents and 59% of Republicans - including 57% of those aligned with Donald Trump’s MAGA movement - backing an extension.

DHS has posted a video about 'life after all the illegals are deported' set to Friday I'm In Love, and included a clip from Twin Peaks.

― I? not I! He! He! HIM! (akm), Friday, October 3, 2025 11:16 AM (one hour ago) bookmarkflaglink

can only imagine the shit they're showing internally if they're willing to make stuff like this public

Support cuts across party lines, with 92% of Democrats, 82% of independents and 59% of Republicans - including 57% of those aligned with Donald Trump’s MAGA movement - backing an extension.

that is heartening, but this is not the same thing as “supporting the shutdown”. in fact, if i had to guess, less than half of the people who support extending ACA premiums don’t understand what that has to do with a shutdown (especially the 57% who are MAGA supporters.

can’t really blame them! the infosphere is fucking incredibly horrible and misleading and, for many people, just straight up propaganda. and also, a bunch of people grew up with schoolhouse rock’s version of how legislation is passed and maybe that’s how they still think of things. that’s not how anything works today! it’s hard to communicate people that, in this case, if you want to extend the ACA premiums, you also have to support the democrats’ effort to refuse to work with republicans until they include it in the federal budget or else the govt will shut down, and unless you followed the last dozen government shutdowns closely, you might not realize it was the republicans who pioneered the shutdown hostage situation and that the democrats doing this now is actually good because it’s not only the sole way remaining to do anything good in the u.s. government, as long as it’s the “good guys” (who also support genocide) who are doing it

scribe ai pleaz make me make good points and fix typso

I just heard Schiff on the radio describing actual premium increases... like a family of four will be paying $1000 more per month for insurance they can barely afford anyway. They just need to keep hammering home that kind of stuff, and also calling it the 'Miller Shutdown' over and over again with AI generated clips of Miller dressed up as Hitler. Fight fire with fire, wft not

the question this leaves us with is if they can reach a compromise on ACA to pass the CR, does that mean Democrats are officially ok with all the other budgetary recissions, tariffs, military presence in blue cities, etc, etc?

Absent credit extensions, mine will go from $177 to over $1000. The other bartender at my workplace has a spouse with several strokes under his belt and a host of other health problems. He's a year away from SS/Medicare, and theirs will go from $111 to over $3000. Per month.

I heard some douchey GOP congressmen a couple days ago, and their new line is "well, if it needs all these subsidies, I guess it's not really 'affordable' anyway, is it?"
Just fucking clueless

I just heard Schiff on the radio describing actual premium increases... like a family of four will be paying $1000 more per month for insurance they can barely afford anyway. They just need to keep hammering home that kind of stuff, and also calling it the 'Miller Shutdown' over and over again with AI generated clips of Miller dressed up as Hitler. Fight fire with fire, wft not

― Andy the Grasshopper, Friday, October 3, 2025 1:11 PM (five minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

This is probably among the best tactics for Dems (all of them) to employ right now

it would have happened anyway because the ACA was always a flawed bit of legislation that was meant to get things started, but the GOP intentionally kneecapped the prices in Trump 1.0 by removing the individual mandate, which decreased the # of people enrolled in insurance significantly

Looks like another boat bombing just happened

Saw something where the fishermen of Trinidad/Tobago were really nervous about going out fishing... Trinidad is only like seven miles from Venezuela

that whole thing is so shady and dark

and wildly illegal

these attacks seem to also be buried in the news cycle

yeah it's possible to see Venezuela from southern Trinidad iirc

‪Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez‬
✧@a✧✧.b✧✧✧.soc✧✧✧‬
· 56m
The government is in full shutdown and the Republicans are refusing to call the House back into session.

Want to know why?

Because we have secured the final vote on releasing the Epstein Files and they don’t want it out.

Call GOP and tell them to swear [her] in

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sAmcuorx-o4

There is SO much ICE activity all over Chicago that I can’t even keep up with it. Arresting protestors, tear-gassing bystanders, throwing flash bangs at cars for yelling at them, multiple helicopters circling areas of the city for hours.

Park district worker posted on Reddit that they’ve been informed ICE will have a heavy presence at the Chicago Marathon.

This is just insane and terrifying. I had no idea it would get this bad this fast.

xp - It's nice to have someone young speaking clearly about that process of dehumanization and its consequences, if only because it will be more likely to get heard and accepted by people in his age cohort than if some old codger like me said the exact same thing. His message is hardly news, but he makes a good messenger for it.

yeah, as someone points out in the comments, it's the lack of hyperbole in that bit that really brings it home

I almost went to the Broadview protest early this morning. Apparently went OK, but then I saw footage from a couple of hours later of people being pushed and arrested. The sheer assholery of it all is so disheartening. These dickheads, they're all just Proud Boys, right? This is their reward. Storm the capital, get pardoned, get free reign and a paycheck to terrorize. They reportedly arrested a couple nannies at a local library and children's museum here today. Imagine taking your kids there and being met by these masked goons with guns.

journalists who cover the situation closely say theyre not proud boys or j6ers fwiw, no one has seen evidence of any of them around and if they were proud boy/j6ers would be loudly talking about it because thats just how they are, and even if there were some of them in the mix there arent nearly enough of them to be able to staff ice etc with anyway

but its not like there arent a million identical shitheads out there

i think he means that the ICE hires are coming from the same demo

i mean why do you need to be a rogue gang when the government is paying you to be hateful in an identical way

theres been a big rumor going around for a while that they are actual j6ers and proud boys

many people stating it as fact in fact

i mean

These dickheads, they're all just Proud Boys, right? This is their reward. Storm the capital, get pardoned, get free reign and a paycheck to terrorize.

― Josh in Chicago, Friday, October 3, 2025 6:54 PM (twenty-one minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

i think he means that the ICE hires are coming from the same demo

― budo jeru, Friday, October 3, 2025 7:13 PM (two minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

not trying to give josh a hard time here hes just asking a reasonable question obvs

as to whether they might as well be proud boys groypers school shooters well yeah

https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:mf5dzzqkp7fnmby6blfeljwj/bafkreihouofpt7jq32lm2ucg7i7fo5iswpnh76q6tuhqb2rhxgamybnt44@jpeg

Yeah, in the end it's a distinction without a difference, but it does beg the question: to quote Paula Cole, where have all the Proud Boys gone? These assholes, they're huge, tattooed, masked and anonymous and rounding up brown people. If they're not actually Proud Boys it's not for lack of intent. Here in Chicago alone a couple of years ago they found all these connections between the actual cops and right wing militia groups like PBs, 3 Percenters and whatever, and nothing ever came of it iirc, so you gotta assume the wide desperate net they've cast for hateful shitheads has caught more than their share of the usual suspects aligned bros.

Speaking of which, in the off chance any of this bullshit ever gets investigated in the future (ha), I assume the identity of all these masked dudes is on the books somewhere. Or, hell, maybe not.

i think with the proud boys at least there were never very many of them they were just good at getting press, and most of them have prob burned out by now some of them were arrested there was a ton of nasty infighting its just not that pleasant of a scene

this indie journalist is super dialed into them j6ers et al shes the one whos been saying theyre not in ice https://bsky.app/profile/noturtlesoup17.bsky.social

ICE has been running TV ads in Houston (and other "Sanctuary Cities") targeted at local law enforcement officers, pitching them better pay & benefits plus the opportunity to do more than 'stand down' when confronting 'dangerous illegal aliens'.

ha wonder how those departments feel about ice poaching their guys

Reassuring there is a limited pool of chuds they are competing for. Not reassuring that they are advertising “excessive force? Hell yeah!”

Anyway, Nuremberg trials needed. (I know they will not happen).

one cannot know the future tho it is worth noting that even the nuremberg trials were kind of a sham

possibly a stupid question -- directed at the aoc tweet above.

if and when the epstein files are released, how do we know the kash patel era fbi didn't destroy incriminating documents in them?

Because that would be illega .... hahahha, just kidding.

Did you see that asshole just directed ice to arrest people for burning flags? That's kind of fast tracking the constitutional crisis on the most basic level isn't it?

they've already snatched people off the street and threw them into holding facilities for writing op-eds about gaza in their school newspaper

possibly a stupid question -- directed at the aoc tweet above.

if and when the epstein files are released, how do we know the kash patel era fbi didn't destroy incriminating documents in them?

― treeship., Friday, October 3, 2025 8:19 PM (one minute ago) bookmarkflaglink

i wouldnt put it past them to try but id be pretty hard to do cause fed document handling tracking backing up etc is so thorough, they could also just release partials and pretend its the whole thing but even that might be hard cause so many people have seen a lot of this stuff already, which idk why dems dont just read some juicy parts into the record

feds ability to generate documents is so powerful you could prob just release fbi emails talking about the epstein files and thered be tons of incriminating stuff in there

i worry it's another red herring like russiagate. that whole period everyone was anticipating some grand revelation that would bring him down, but it never came.

the admins desire to keep it under wraps points to there being serious stuff in there, and in fact epstein was committing serious crimes and trump was a good friend of his, on the other hand it could just be trump not wanting some mildly embarrassing shit to get out

would like to know whats in there tho

regarding the J6 pardons: isn't acceptance of a pardon a tacit acceptance of guilt? Like it doesn't wash away your conviction, it just lets you off the hook

So maybe a lot of those guys (Proud Bees as well) would not be eligible for law enforcement gigs

i am curious too of course. the letter alone was pretty horrific, especially in the context of that birthday book which was like nonstop inside jokes about epstein being a pedophile.

yeah idk what kind of standards theyre applying but not being a known criminal not being in a gang could certainly be some of them xp

i am very confused by trump's meme game right now. like why is he saying that hakeem jeffries is mexican? seems very random beyond, i guess, trump dislikes mexicans and thinks calling people mexican is an insult.

well, he called Democrats satanists today, so IDK

also one thing that is not getting enough attention is noted "pro life" politician jd vance sayin that illegal immigrants shouldn't be treated in the emergency room. they should just die.

https://ca.news.yahoo.com/jd-vances-latest-argument-against-190837226.html

I think the Mexican thing has to do with the unfounded claim that dems want every undocumented person to get free healthcare for life

"The answer is a decision made by the Biden administration.."

ehh no it was like a 1986 LAW that you can't turn anyone away from emergency rooms you daft cunt

yeah, they are claiming that the medicaid cuts and the end of aca subsidies are just going to hurt illegal immigrants. the cynicism is remarkable.

xp

I mean, Trump pardoning Diddy (I'm guessing it'll happen) will probably overshadow Epstein for a while and play into the horrific ridiculousness of their reality show.

we only like good bunny she continued

Kristi Noem’s message to the NFL for selecting Bad Bunny for the halftime show:

“The NFL sucks and we’ll win and God will bless us and we’ll stand and be proud of ourselves at the end of the day and they won’t be able to sleep at night because they don’t know what they believe…

https://bsky.app/profile/patriottakes.bsky.social/post/3m2cxugwvcc2e

_"The answer is a decision made by the Biden administration.."_

ehh no it was like a 1986 LAW that you can't turn anyone away from emergency rooms you daft cunt

Well we know if it’s one thing they respect it’s the law

Trump pardoning Diddy (I'm guessing it'll happen)

maybe. Trump is a racist by training and by instinct. but he also has an instinctive sympathy for really wealthy people. Diddy's best play is to go "full Kanye' and slobber on the ring.

incredible stuff here

‪taber‬
✧@kve✧✧✧.g✧✧‬
· 1h
this is wild: while Stephen Miller's guy was in Minnesota for his uncle's funeral, somebody was able to see his entire phone and take pictures of his Signal group chats talking about military deployments to Portland, and brought them to the Strib

https://www.startribune.com/trump-officials-discussed-sending-elite-army-division-to-portland-text-messages-show/601485729

gift link:
https://www.startribune.com/trump-officials-discussed-sending-elite-army-division-to-portland-text-messages-show/601485729?link_source=ta_bluesky_link&taid=68e064adba21ad00017d76ca&utm_campaign=trueanthem&utm_medium=social&utm_source=bluesky?utm_source=gift

lol they seriously believed there is some like guerrilla war there

as always, the only saving grace of this situation is that these are deeply stupid people with terrible opsec

Thanks for the gift link -- the Strib is so firm with their paywall. The scary thing about "82nd Airborne to Portland" is if they really do see the enemy as those with a lifestyle different than theirs, rather than imaginary looters downtown or ICE-building protesters.

np Eazy, solidarity

Not to be too doom-laden, but when we're seeing people snatched off the streets in Chicago today, it's worth figuring out what to plan for if they start snatching people for broader reasons. Even if we're shocked and appalled, what to do? (Probably not wise to plan it out online lol.)

“ they won’t be able to sleep at night because they don’t know what they believe…”

Don't think of the empty void, Kristi. It’s 3am. God is good. God is good

She's just fronting. It's been done better, but she doesn't feel the need to do any better than that nonsense, because she doesn't think there's any price to pay for tossing out that kind of lazy-ass nonsensical pseudo-Christian pure-arrogance blather.

the admins desire to keep it under wraps points to there being serious stuff in there, and in fact epstein was committing serious crimes and trump was a good friend of his, on the other hand it could just be trump not wanting some mildly embarrassing shit to get out

― lag∞n, Friday, October 3, 2025 7:33 PM (three hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

given everything we know about Trump there is like a 0% chance he is innocent in this and that is based 100% on shit he has said in public, you don't even need to take into consideration his extremely gross actions

The Chicago raid is a real escalation and so far it doesn't seem like there's much blowback about it? It's not anywhere close to the lead story at NYT, WaPo or CNN. It ought to be!

Posted by a photographer friend who has spent many hours on the front lines:

Of all the things that happened yesterday — seeing personal heroes and friends brutalized and arrested, realizing that state and local police are *aiding* ICE, getting shoved and threatened by a Broadview Police officer — this was the most soul crushing. I was walking by myself from the press conference on one side of the Broadview ICE facility to the main protest on the other, and I passed by this SUV that was stopped at the intersection of Lexington and 25th. The SUV was shaking, and I could hear thumping from inside and a man’s voice shouting “¡Ayuda me! ¡Ayuda me por favor!” (“Help me! Help me please!”) Like an idiot, I took a useless photograph instead of a video, and the masked agents in the SUV ordered me to move away from the vehicle and leave the area and stop taking pictures. I tried to protest that I was on a public sidewalk, but right around the corner was an armored police vehicle — the “Bearcat” that operates out of the Broadview Processing Center — and the agent positioned in the top hatch had his weapon trained on me (I think it was an airsoft gun, likely loaded with pepper balls). I walked away and left the poor man inside to whatever fate the United States government intended for him. Intellectually, I know I could not have helped him, even if I had rushed the vehicle or stood in front of it. But I am still wracked with guilt today that I did nothing.

Hey, did you know the US military is pretty much terminally fucked?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hUYK_49SkSY

xp thanks, that was good

The missing link inside the American policy establishment today is a basic discussion about the future and sustainability of the empire in light of America’s industrial weakness and cultural confusion. Powerful ideological and political constraints, however, currently make such discussions not just impossible but also career-ending for any individual who would dare to attempt them. The result of this chronic unwillingness to even acknowledge basic first principles inside Washington is to trap the Navy, Army, and all the other branches of the U.S. military on the far side of the Red Queen’s magic mirror: forcing them to constantly make impossible trade-offs and sacrifices just to postpone necessary discussions a little bit into the future, dooming them to running faster and faster just so that America’s leadership class won’t ever have to move an inch. In this clash between ideology and reality, ideology is almost always the victor. And it is winning at the cost of destroying the U.S. military itself.

There's a lot of interesting stuff in it for sure, even if I think he's not thinking adequately about all of the options that don't require us to have this insanely huge military budget. But I had an issue with this particular framing:

The well-known world of civil society NGOs alluded to earlier can serve as an appropriate starting point for our queries, despite the obvous differences between liberal NGOs dealing with homelessness or drug addiction (who consume resources year after year and never seem to accomplish very much) and the DoD and its surrounding NGO ecosystem.

Conservatives say this a lot, and I think it's just a bad argument. The fact that you're pouring tons of resources into something but not "solving the problem" is mostly an indicator of the scope of the problem, not the inefficacy of the resources.

And it’s not like even if you house all the current homeless, problem
Is solved. People are made homeless everyday for numerous reasons.

Exactly. Homeless services help a lot of people! And then more need help next week.

I think that article misses the point. The nature of war has changed - big stuff like aircraft carriers and submarines seems to be a lot less important than being able to make millions of disposable drones made from part sourced from Alibaba.

the thing thats so good about drones in warfare is theyre cheap, the us military has infinite money tho so being cheap doesnt really matter, which isnt to say theyre not going to buy millions of drones gotta spend that money on something

according to the article above the US military no longer has infinite money, at least not to spend on tech

Trump now sending California Guard troops to Oregon because an Oregon judge blocked his attempt to take over the Oregon Guard. Totally nuts. Another judge already ruled against the federalization of the California Guard but stayed that pending appeal — so now those are the troops being sent to Oregon, which I can’t imagine will go over well with the appeals court. But they’re just completely throwing everything against the wall at this point, looking for any maneuvering room to ramp up military presence in cities.

Eventually I imagine SCOTUS will make clear that the Posse Comitatus Act was intended to let Southern states impose Jim Crow laws, not to protect soy latte cities from martial law, and therefore has no bearing here.

Also, they are embedding videographers in Portland to film the scene as the feds increase their chaotic attacks so that they can show that it really is a (constructed) war zone.

https://bsky.app/profile/alexzee.bsky.social/post/3m2hgsaibys2m

In a separate exchange, Salisbury celebrated FBI Director Kash Patel’s decision to fire several agents who were photographed kneeling during a 2020 protest. He suggested Trump would approve of the action, then insulted Patel.
“This is how Kash survives,” Salisbury wrote. “He will do this stuff for the man but day to day giant douche canoe.”

from the STRIB link above. Felt it should be highlighted.

States rights lol

Small government lol

according to the article above the US military no longer has infinite money, at least not to spend on tech

― treeship., Sunday, October 5, 2025 2:16 PM (seven hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

someone should tell congress

And the Executive.

Judge Immergut has now blocked the effort to send National Guard troops from California and Texas to Oregon, and is determining the

scope of relief based on "conduct of defendants," which she sees in "direct contravention" to first order

https://bsky.app/profile/kateriga.bsky.social/post/3m2inesli3s2q

I think it's safe to say the judge was not pleased with having their initial order immediately violated.

We should now look for the DOJ to seek an EMERGENCY APPEAL to the Ninth Circuit, which, if it upholds the TRO, will rapidly be followed by an appeal to the SCOTUS, who if recent events are any indicator will override via the shadow docket and allow the deployment(s), with absolutely no hint of their reasoning other than deference to the (obviously false) claims of the executive regarding the absolute necessity of immediate action to prevent violence to federal officers and property (for which claims they offer zero evidence).

Now Pritzker says Guard troops from Texas have been ordered to Illinois and Oregon.

Late Sunday, Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker (D) said that the Guard in his state was informed that Trump had ordered 400 members of the Texas National Guard to be sent to Illinois, Oregon and other locations. Trump on Saturday had ordered the activation of 300 National Guard troops to Chicago against the wishes of Pritzker, who has also said he would sue.

“We must now start calling this what it is: Trump’s Invasion. It started with federal agents, it will soon include deploying federalized members of the Illinois National Guard against our wishes, and it will now involve sending in another state’s military troops,” he said in a statement.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2025/10/05/chicago-portland-protests-trump-national-guard/

And yeah, I have the same fear about SCOTUS. If they do that, then all bets are off, Trump federalizes the entire Guard and sends all of them anywhere he wants for any reason at all.

That will probably be what happens, but they are really testing these judges with so many unreasoned decisions. The frustration is palpable.

will there be a point where we all agree we're in the midst of a civil war / totalitarian coup, or are there always going to be people who tell us to go to the doomposting thread, or that we're overreacting. also, where will that point be exactly

Ha, just was reading this essay.

The Point Of No Return
We Are At War, Whether We Want To Be Or Not
https://www.bannedinyourstate.com/p/the-point-of-no-return

Meanwhile, the Democrats have put themselves in the weird position in which any agreement reached to fund the government will be wildly inadequate capitulation.

Yeah how do you approve any federal money at all under the circumstances.

Yeah, anyone who doesn’t appreciate that we’re well past doomscrolling must be pretty good at avoiding the news.

Telling that the Chicago subreddit, which is usually pretty avoidant of politics, has stopped even trying and is 90% posts about ICE sightings, raids and attacks.

Have a feeling next weekend’s Chicago Marathon is going to be an interesting harbinger of what’s to come, one way or the other. Usually it’s a pretty fun, well attended event all along the route, but with ICE already threading to have a major presence there, it’ll be interesting to note the turnout.

Will say finally catching One Battle After Another hit pretty differently after the events of the last few weeks.

Oops. Obviously meant “doomposting” there. Long weekend.

it hadn't occurred to me before, but trump deploying federal troops to "pacify" america is, uh... it's about like america deploying troops to restore order to any other "war-torn" country, isn't it? you send some troops in and they're basically unopposed, because what organized military force is going to oppose the strongest, most advanced military in the world? easiest victory in the world. how hard is it to stamp down an organized anti-government insurrection that doesn't actually exist? and then what? the american military has proved again and again that it is neither willing or able to govern any of the states it's been sent to, like, liberate from tyranny. what are they gonna do, send drones after judge immergut? send drones after tina kotek? i mean look. i'm not an expert military strategist, but his military strategy to me looks more like the Tarkin Doctrine than anything that's ever been attempted in reality.

Interesting that you mention drones and judges, considering a judge in South Carolina who recently issued a TRO just had her house burn down in mysterious circumstances after a week of her receiving death threats.

But surely just a coincidence.

Interesting that you mention drones and judges, considering a judge in South Carolina who recently issued a TRO just had her house burn down in mysterious circumstances after a week of her receiving death threats.

But surely just a coincidence.

― better than ezra collective soul asylum (jon /via/ chi 2.0)

well that's the thing, i mean, the reason tammany hall worked was that it was able to, like. act in the benefit of the people who were part of the machine? this guy is all-stick, no-carrot. i mean deploying political terror effectively kind of depends on convincing the people you're trying to terrorize that there's some, like, benefit to going along with the party implementing the terror. he's less of a "do what i say or i'll burn your house down" guy and more of a "do what i say and i'll burn your house down anyway because i'm miffed that you said "no" the first time i told you to". it's not that i'm _not_ scared by him, but my fear is consistently and conspicuously failing to overcome my complete sense of awestruck wonder at how stupid this man is. C’est magnifique, mais ce n’est pas la guerre: c'est de la folie.

I think what you're describing above is a form of political pointillism. There's no need to arrest everyone at a protest. You can arrest a few of the people, torture them, leak the video to everyone else. Belarus might fit this blueprint, Russia 2012-2022, Egypt post Arab spring?

I'm not sure this fits there or not though, Trump is generally more of a maximalist (except when he isn't)

With individual judges, they seem to be in a uniquely vulnerable position. All must be highly aware of the risks by now, even those that haven't had it made plain to them

Not sure I saw this mentioned but the audience Hegseth was aiming for in his lecture to the generals was the soldiers that he plans to put in these combative situations. He’s basically saying, I’ve got all your bosses in the room with me and I’m telling them to support any war crimes you may commit. We’ve got your back

this guy is all-stick, no-carrot.

yep this is their weakness, and it's a big one

will there be a point where we all agree we're in the midst of a civil war / totalitarian coup, or are there always going to be people who tell us to go to the doomposting thread, or that we're overreacting. also, where will that point be exactly

― budo jeru, Monday, October 6, 2025 12:11 AM (ten hours ago)

Good question imo, which isn't to say the answer is "now." But Abbott publishing (I worry that calling everything "posting" is one of our current problems—if he announced this on the radio or TV it would be feel different, no?) this sounds to me like it's somewhere on the civil war pipeline:

https://bsky.app/profile/bradmossesq.bsky.social/post/3m2jg2g7rpk2w

will there be a point where we all agree we're in the midst of a civil war / totalitarian coup, or are there always going to be people who tell us to go to the doomposting thread, or that we're overreacting. also, where will that point be exactly

― budo jeru, Monday, October 6, 2025

If you're alluding to, well, me, when was the last time I was one of those "people"?

Tim Onion
Pretty clear Stephen Miller, Noem, Hegseth and Trump are trying to provoke a Civil War at this point. What's interesting is they want to do it now, because even though they're unpopular, they seem to believe this is the most popular they'll be ever again. We can't let them win.

^^^^ that's how I feel about it.

President Miller and co. are getting a lot done despite their incompetence, but they are incompetent.

i don't know how you can call it a coup when they are so stupid and unpopular

ha jinx

i think they are doomed because they are already hemhorraging support, which will accelerate when it becomes clear that the tariffs weren't tied to any kind of industrial policy and it was just some stupid bullshit trump wanted to do to force other world leaders to humiliate themselves. (it didn't even do this).

the problem is things can get ugly before their whole thing falls apart.

things are ugly though

The economy is running on fumes and the Epstein files are set to drop as soon as the House comes back into session. A lot of their flailing is a direct result of these circumstances, and it's only going to get worse.

I would be in despair if Trump commanded Reagan's October 1985 approval rating.

the thing is, he could have been completely hands off, never tried tariffs, just enjoyed the benefits of taking over the Biden economy, and he would have been hailed as a hero.

i think there still would be a looming crisis due to the ai bubble, which definitely accelerated under him but was a problem to begin with.

I would be in despair if Trump commanded Reagan's October 1985 approval rating.

omg same

the thing is, he could have been completely hands off, never tried tariffs, just enjoyed the benefits of taking over the Biden economy, and he would have been hailed as a hero.

he could do so many things to be popular! but he doesn't want to be popular.

well, i think they are doing especially fucked up things *because* their backs are against the wall. so this is a scary moment, even if it doesn't look like they are going to create some lasting majority.

totally agree, treesh

I think their approach here is:
1) Via ICE raids and unlawful arrests, sure you are spreading fear but the primary goal is to get people protesting.
2) Sending in the military, the goal is to provoke peaceful protests into violence (or even just something they can frame as violence)
3) Use carefully curated videos as part of a propaganda campaign to shift public opinion about what is really happening
4) Escalate.

things are ugly though

they are going to get worse. I think they will get worse through the midterms and then, if, miraculously, the dems take back control of congress, it might plateau.

I keep deleting responses, but yeah I agree with treeship: I don't take comfort, yet, from bad poll numbers. though obviously you guys are right that him being popular would be much worse

The Confederacy really won the Civil War

https://nymag.com/intelligencer/article/kristi-noem-corey-lewandowski-dhs-fema-trump-enforcers.html

Did people read this at all? Sorry if it was posted on the old thread. Read it with an increasingly familiar mixture of dismay and bemusement.

Father Michael Pfleger to Trump:

"Before you dare speak about any violence in Chicago, look into your mirror, address the violence coming from the White House."

"Literally putting Americans in life and death situations. Some Americans will die because of your Medicaid cuts."

_the thing is, he could have been completely hands off, never tried tariffs, just enjoyed the benefits of taking over the Biden economy, and he would have been hailed as a hero._

he could do so many things to be popular! but he doesn't want to be popular.

Revenge is his only goal, which he promised while campaigning!

It does my head in that polling during the campaign showed people thought of him as more “moderate” than Harris.

We're all Dilbert, says Scott Adams:

"The best form of government would be a authoritarian strongman who had your best interests in heart — which turns out to be Trump."

"We are experiencing the golden age."

"This might be the best presidential situation we’ll ever experience — or anybody will ever experience."

idiot

I've always thought he was Sideshow Bob, not an original idea I know but absolutely appropriate

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fXU2vZTTeMU

“Deep down inside you secretly long for a cold-hearted Republican to lower taxes, brutalize criminals, and rule you like a king”

Are we still posting links to X? It's a complete cesspool. I'm deeply regretting clicking on that just to be reminded what utter garbage people take up a huge portion of this country.

Sorry, linked instead of embedding it in the post.

I just found it interesting to see the swing toward democracy not really being the best way to go about things.

That is what the unitary executive theory is.

We're all Dilbert, says Scott Adams🕸:

_"The best form of government would be a authoritarian strongman who had your best interests in heart — which turns out to be Trump."

"We are experiencing the golden age."

"This might be the best presidential situation we’ll ever experience — or anybody will ever experience."_

Loooooooooooooooooool

President Miller and co. are getting a lot done despite their incompetence, but they are incompetent.

My impression is that a very large slice of the competence is coming from lawyers who work for the well-organized and amply funded ultra-conservative nodes like the Heritage Foundation, Federalist Society, and various outgrowths of the anti-abortion movement. iow all the players who came together for the 2025 Project. They understand exactly what they want to do and have war-gamed their plan extensively. Miller appears to be their direct conduit into Trump's brain. The tricky part is that Trump is so erratic. That's one reason why they keep shoving pre-written EOs in front of him that they know he won't read or think through.

If it all rested on the 'expertise' of people directly hired by Trump, like Hegseth or Bondi, they'd be flailing and failing in spectacular manner. This administration is just a shell wrapped around the unholy alliance of fascist billionaires and theocratic dominionists.

Isn't Scott Adams supposed to be dying?

He’s bad at that too

He died a year ago, the Lazarus effect is still coincidentally producing tweets and grunts resembling speech

dilbert lied
scott adams didn't die

-Turk 182

i was surprised to learn he lives in some bland distant east bay (SF) suburb, but checks out that he probably relishes in living on the fringe of society, safe in his gated tract home environment.

was just reading about Adam's racist downfall, and saw this name: Vivek Ramaswamy

what the hell ever happened to that guy?

assume he's hiding in embarrassed shame

imagine being his neighbor xxp

xxpost He was the co-chair of DOGE for a day or two

https://s3.crackedcdn.com/phpimages/pictofact/8/2/7/754827.jpg

is he still making Dilberts

It's not clear if he's still cartooning, but he has some subscription-based podcast

seems like he has pretty bad cancer

he could just be lying about it though

he got dropped by pretty much every newspaper, and his book publisher.. so what do you do then? Podcast!

think Russell Brand has one as well

was just reading about Adam's racist downfall, and saw this name: Vivek Ramaswamy

what the hell ever happened to that guy?

Thought he was going to run for governor of Ohio?

He’s currently yelling at the drive thru cashier because he didn’t think he was treated with respect

i don't know how you can call it a coup when they are so stupid and unpopular

― a (waterface), Monday, October 6, 2025 9:33 AM (five hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

you don't need to be popular when you control all three branches of govt, and you don't need to be smart to throw your enemies in jail or otherwise silence them w/ an atmosphere of violence/intimidation. also "but they are buffoons" is a common refrain down through the annals of authoritarianism and it's rarely any consolation

additionally, as Aimless points out, you have the morons in the admin but then on the other hand you have a robust apparatus of lawyers and other competent psychos who have been building the voter disenfranchisement/anti-abortion/etc. playbook for decades.

it's not a coup though

If you're alluding to, well, me, when was the last time I was one of those "people"?

― The Luda of Suburbia (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, October 6, 2025 9:30 AM (five hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

i wasn't referring to you, just to a recurring conversation that we seem to be having. it just makes me feel kind of insane that so much is deteriorating but ppl seem convinced that because trump is "unpopular" that this is some kind of stopgap. i mean, he was unpopular before he got elected again too

xp i think if they fuck with the elections enough it will count as a coup but that remains to be seen

and their lawyers are losing, a lot. a lot of lawyers are quitting the DOJ and the clown they got to prosecute Comey has never practiced criminal law. grand juries keep making them look like chumps. i would def. not call it a robust apparatus of lawyers.

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/09/06/us/trump-dc-national-guard-grand-juries-crime.html

xp i think if they fuck with the elections enough it will count as a coup but that remains to be seen

i am way more worried about TX sending the national guard into Illinois, but every person has to find their own set of worries in this mess

the "stupid" charge prompts the question: how did we all get repeatedly outwitted by such stupid people over the course of a decade? perhaps stupidity is either not an impediment in this situation, not an inherent quality like we mostly think of it as, or it might even be helpful in some circumstances.

elected Democrats are less popular than Trump, so I'm not sure if unpopularity is meaningful when the alternative is perceived as even worse (surely part of their unpopularity is in failing to offer an alternative, but w/e)

Ruthlessness. No self doubt. Sociopathy.

worth noting:

‪Christopher Webb‬
✧@cwebbonl✧✧✧.c✧✧‬
· 15m
THE CHICKENS ARE FINALLY COMING HOME TO ROOST

Ryan Walters is out & the investigation floodgates just opened. The Oklahoma AG launched a full audit of Walters’ entire tenure as Superintendent, and it’s about damn time.

Also the education dept website’s being scrubbed of his culture-war nonsense.

how did we all get repeatedly outwitted by such stupid people over the course of a decade?

Eh it's not really a mystery. Racism and nationalism and generalized fear/hatred of the Other and "God is on our side" are incredibly potent political weapons. Their power is exactly why we've had to fight so hard to try to fence them in in various ways, and also why they keep escaping containment. Appeals to communal solidarity across lines of race, religion, etc. are a much harder sell. I'm sure we could drag in all kinds of political science, history and psychology to break down why it's so much easier to unite people against some Other than to unite for the common good, but the track record is pretty clear.

We do also have a track record in this country and elsewhere of being able to beat these things back, so it's not like all is lost. Authoritarian states have short shelf lives, measured in years or decades at most. And the longest-lasting ones have taken root in countries that are much different from the United States — less wealthy, less educated, less civic infrastructure, less diverse, and less accustomed to traditions of civil rights and freedoms.

I just heard some Trump supporter paraphrase the old "He may be a sonofabitch, but he's our sonofabitch" by Truman or whoever... I think so much of the Foxosphere is really hellbent on owning the libs and their woke tears, there's an entertainment element that really doesn't have much of an analog on the left beyond snickering a Jimmy Kimmel bits

The left needs to reappropriate bad vibes, reappropriate cruel humour

tipsy: my point is their stupidity seems to have limited utility in hampering their ability to achieve their goals

Indeed

Every time somebody points to how unpopular Trump is it makes me insane - it doesn't matter any more, he's president and he gets to do what he wants. He already won the election! The polls are meaningless!

The entire mainstream centre-left commentariat seems fixated on proving how much smarter they are than these dolts, how hypocritical they are and it's like..... that has been proven a million times. It doesn't matter. Their hypocrisy is not a negative for them and their stupidity isn't either

It does matter how unpopular he is, though. It means there's a better opportunity for organized resistance and counteroffensives than if he were more popular.

The actual most pressing problem right now is the lack of leadership and organization for that kind of resistance. You can't blame Trump for that, it's on the Democrats and their donor class. Chuck Schumer's #1 supporter is Wall Street, and Wall Street has decided this is all fine and definitely preferable to higher taxes. Which is why Schumer's gotta go, and it'll take an actual grassroots movement to do that. Creating space for new, more aggressive leadership looks like job 1 to me.

my point is their stupidity seems to have limited utility in hampering their ability to achieve their goals

Well their goals are stupid too. They're not trying to do anything complicated. I do think it hampers them, though. Their stupidity is part of what keeps them unpopular. They're too venal, too crude, too naked about it all.

xp yes this, the fascists are weak but the Democrats have been inexcusably weaker

tipsy I get that, I guess I just keep having this image of someone stamping on my face and me trying to splutter, as I lose my teeth, "but you're an idiot... and your poll numbers are also very low"

the fascists are weak but the Democrats have been inexcusably weaker

it pains me to say this but Gavin Newsom is at least.. well, I don't know what he's doing but it beats the current national leadership

and their lawyers are losing, a lot. a lot of lawyers are quitting the DOJ and the clown they got to prosecute Comey has never practiced criminal law. grand juries keep making them look like chumps. i would def. not call it a robust apparatus of lawyers.

the fascist apparatus is not counting on winning in court according to the normal legal constraints of the law. they are counting on creating an escalating atmosphere of national crisis that allows them to operate government on an ever-expanding "national emergency" basis, which the Supreme Court has been overtly blessing repeatedly without bothering to explain its reasoning under either case law or the US constitution. the plan isn't guaranteed to work, but they keep probing, pushing, escalating and looking for ways to grab further power in every action they take. They understand the re-election of Trump as their best chance at a complete takeover and they will not waste it through an excess of caution.

yep. It's true that polls provide a reason for optimism that resistance movements will find allies, but that's about the limit of it for me. they have already achieved the major prize of capturing every branch of government and they are currently waging war on the country unchecked. their popularity could fall further and it would just embolden them. every time we call them stupid they love it.

xxp imho Newsom is trying to have it both ways, look like a "resister" in social media and public statements but at the same time fail to do anything meaningful in terms of concrete actions

giving Pritzker the side-eye now as well, it looks like mayors are taking the lead on this

https://thetriibe.com/2025/10/mayor-brandon-johnson-signs-executive-order-establishing-ice-free-zones/

Isn't Scott Adams supposed to be dying?

has Scott Adams said anything else on twitter lately that we have all seen and can choose to believe

nice. that's the kind of shit that's needed from elected officials.

xpost

Take it easy on Newsom, he just lost a close collaborator whom he prominently platformed to a new audience and whose opinions on trans people he vigorously and publicly endorsed. Guy must be grieving. And imagine how afraid he must be of the same thing happening to him within seconds if he restates his views on trans citizens and constituents at some kind of open air public event.

Hey, did anyone else notice that ICE and the Feds are full of shit and lie?

https://chicago.suntimes.com/news/2025/10/06/marimar-martinez-anthony-ian-santos-ruiz-border-patrol-shooting-brighton-park

The Sun-Times is doing great work, shout out nonprofit media.

Newsom may also veto a bill to ban pfas-coated cookware in CA, he's under the sway of Big Skillet

The confusion around Newsom can be easily explained by his coziness with the tech industry while simultaneously being a regular California “liberal.”

Is there confusion about Newsom? He's a total opportunist and preening egomaniac, which sadly because of circumstances can make him a somewhat useful tool (in all senses of the word) but also a deeply objectionable and untrustworthy person.

(shockingly old to learn: that the Newsom impersonator on Jimmy Kimmel is actually Seth Meyers' brother)

xp he also, at some point, found Kimberly Guilfoyle attractive

Is there confusion about Newsom? He's a total opportunist and preening egomaniac, which sadly because of circumstances can make him a somewhat useful tool (in all senses of the word) but also a deeply objectionable and untrustworthy person.

I wasn’t referring to anyone here

I get it, I just feel like there's an urge any time his name is mentioned for people to be like BUT HE'S TERRIBLE, this happens on Facebook too, and it's like ... doesn't everyone know that? I just take it as a given. I posted his quote about Trump turning the military on American citizens on FB just noting that it's a hell of a thing for the governor of our largest state to be saying and deserves notice, and one of my leftier friends jumped in with "He's just trying to win the nomination in 2028, don't fall for it!" Which maybe he is! But also we have more immediate problems, like the president turning the military on the American people.

yeah, I get it tipsy... he's a knob but even if it's performative, right now it's better than Schumer's pearl clutching and appeals to sweet moderation

I was thinking about all this and, really, who in the Dem party is coming up as a decent shot for Prez? The "best" are people like AOC (too female) and Sanders (sadly too old now). The rest feel like centrists at best or grifters at worst (Newsom, Waltz etc). Maybe I'm not enough across US domestic govt to know. But it feels like once upon a time you guys had fucking *statesmen* as presidents. People with gravitas, smarts, authority without bluster.

Now its all about soundbites, one-upmanship and power grabs. Ugh.

yeah, I don't see a new JFK in the offing

Sorkin dreams

welp

A federal judge will not immediately block national guard troops from being deployed in Illinois after a lawsuit from the state against the president on Monday.

Troops from Texas could be deployed to Chicago on Tuesday or Wednesday, and Trump is also seeking to federalize the Illinois national guard. A similar effort to deploy troops to Portland was blocked by a judge in Oregon.

it doesn't seem like National Guard is really the problem here... everything I've seen is that they stand around looking bored, or picking up litter just to have something to do. I hope that's the case here as well.. it's the ICE/Fed agents who are the fucking assholes

Yeah Trump loves the idea of the Guard because it's as close as he can get right now to sending in the military, but they are much less likely than ICE and the FBI/ATF to be super MAGA. They're mostly people with day jobs who have a range of political views and are not going to love extended bullshit deployments.

And hey while we're talking about leadership and the Democrats, I talked to Corbin Trent (formerly of Justice Democrats and formerly an AOC staffer) this week:

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/ep-24-americas-undoing-and-the-right-wing-message-machine/id1809558592?i=1000730420387

Once the legal precedent that the Guard can be nationalized for any or no reason becomes more firmly established by the SCOTUS, the administration will up the ante and start to claim that any civil protest of its policies is a pretext for forcible suppression and the imprisonment of anyone who leads or organizes such protests, then later on, anyone who participates. It's better done by stages than to try it all at once.

I mean... don't you think he'll get bored with Nat'l Guard deployments, like he gets bored with everything else? Maybe this is some Miller strategy for the optics, but it's pretty clear they were showing him 2020 Portland footage to get him riled up, as much you can still rile him up about anything

Maybe I'm naive but their whole playbook seems to be looking for some new manufactured crisis, and if there's not bloody street battles between Nat'l Guard troops and Portland e-bike commuters and kombucha enthusiasts, he'll probably want some new outrage to get into the headlines

grifters at worst (Newsom, Waltz etc)

assume you mean Walz. he doesn't belong in this context. realize no one left standing is s.o.p. here.

There will be clashes. The footage will be edited to make it look like the protestors are the aggressors. It will be tied to Charlie Kirk and “antifa.” They’ll get what they want from this.

xp yeah, was gonna say

And there is no way Trump is ceding power willingly in 2028. So this all part of his plan to stay in power.

wonder what will be left of him in three years

It will eventually blow up in their face but I’d rather that happened sooner than later.

Re the democrats, while they are lame, i think it is probably hard to stand up to trump and not end up looking stupid. Part of it is the sheer absurdity of what he says and who he is — it is hard to even begin to confront it.

hopefully there's some highly decorated centrist Afghanistan injured veteran out there somewhere, just biding his time and successfully raising his two children, Dakota & Jayce

Dems should be asking 24/7 where the medbeds are and why Trump is hiding the truth.

hopefully there's some highly decorated centrist Afghanistan injured veteran out there somewhere, just biding his time and successfully raising his two children, Dakota & Jayce

We have Mayor Pete already

It will eventually blow up in their face but I’d rather that happened sooner than later.

treeship otm

it is probably hard to stand up to trump and not end up looking stupid

I disagree with this though, just look how excited we all got when Biden mustered the courage to say "will you shut up, man?"

like, all it takes is one journalist to say "what the hell is wrong with you" and the tide turns, I am only slightly exaggerating

Marjorie Taylor Greene is splitting with the Republicans on the issue of Obamacare funding.

https://bsky.app/profile/sahilkapur.bsky.social/post/3m2kumnshnk2f

how did we all get repeatedly outwitted by such stupid people over the course of a decade?

Hard work will always beat talent

Thats a reference to soccer players who make it vs those that don't, not a reference to anyone in particular having talent. But basically these guys have showed up and been busy, and the not-these-guys haven't

The Rock '28

it doesn't seem like National Guard is really the problem here... everything I've seen is that they stand around looking bored, or picking up litter just to have something to do

Leavitt telegraphed a take I had not previously thought of: declaring victory in DC, and taking credit for stats that were already improved.

https://www.reddit.com/r/facepalm/s/ApfmMzqV79

In Trumpworld that is the model deployment: crime down, with little to no Kent State action. And using discussion of it to deflect from the real sinister shit happening elsewhere.

Maybe the NG will be cracking heads eventually, but rn having them be bored shuffling about in camouflage puts a relatively benign face on it - when, as has been noted, the real violence is ICE thugs in scarves pulling you into an unmarked van.

declaring victory in DC, and taking credit for stats that were already improved.

this could as easily be considered as the "retreat and call it a victory" strategy. it's viable, but only because FOX will reinforce the message, the cultists will dutifully believe it, the disengaged will forget the DC deployment ever happened, and the activist left will be too busy resisting the next outrage to have time to respond.

Where she's going is to say of all future Guard action, in any city they choose, is to hold up DC as proof that it's not a sinister takeover, they're just "helping" beleaguered cities reduce crime with cuddly weekend warriors. Cover for the actual thugs in jeans.

On x, all the MAGA echo Stephen Miller and think antifa is burning down the city of Portland , Oregon and rioting every night ( which is also what they said 5 years ago).

lol

https://bsky.app/profile/kylegriffin1.bsky.social/post/3m2m5uicrds23

New on MSNBC: Trump's new acting U.S. Attorney Lindsey Halligan has recruited prosecutors from outside her office to take James Comey to trial, after being unable to find any federal prosecutors in her own office willing to pursue the charges, according to two people familiar with the selections.

Interesting

Country singer Zach Bryan posted a snippet of a new song Friday on Instagram, seemingly taking aim at Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
“And ICE is gonna come, bust down your door /Try to build a house no one builds no more /But I got a telephone /Kids are all scared and all alone,” Bryan sings.

On x, all the MAGA echo Stephen Miller and think antifa is burning down the city of Portland , Oregon and rioting every night ( which is also what they said 5 years ago).

I would like to know the proportion of people who genuinely believe this and those who are cynically taking advantage, and which side of the divide Miller is on (N.B. I don’t think Miller is a Machiavellian genius but may be as internet poisoned as any peepaw and meemaw who get all their news from Facebook).

max tani

Follow
Bari Weiss introduced herself to CBS News staff today on the network's 9AM call, saying she wants to "win," which requires restoring trust to CBS. She also said she was excited for staff to get to know the Free Press, and ended her remarks by saying: "Let's do the fucking news."

It’s kind of funny to think the National Guard will get a nice little vacation, like they are doing here in DC sightseeing the monuments and National Mall (which were and are some of the safest areas of DC)

"Coming up on 60 Minutes: Are transgender Muslims driving the left's maniacal antisemitism? We're just asking questions."

I'm not sure the Guard will see it as a little vacation.. I think they'll see it for what it is: a stupid pageant

they run businesses, they have families, maybe have actual vacations planned

Surely snarling air traffic around the country and now openly saying they don't wanna provide back pay to furloughed workers is going to do wonders for their popularity.

Furloughed federal workers are not entitled to automatic back pay after the government shutdown ends, the Trump administration’s budget office claimed in a new draft memo obtained by The Washington Post, ratcheting up tensions in Washington over the week-long closure.

the 51st State coming through... we're outsourcing our display of naval might

SAN FRANCISCO - The Navy's Blue Angels are not performing their death-defying stunts during San Francisco's Fleet Week – as they are "technically on hold" because of the federal shutdown, organizers said.

And so, the Canadian Snowbirds, the acrobatic demonstration fleet from the Royal Canadian Air Force, are being brought in to save the day.

They arrive on Wednesday at the Oakland airport.

That's the latest from the organizers of Fleet Week 2025, where Navy ships from Canada and Colombia are expected to lead the procession of ships.

Good luck me having to take a flight in a week (not for recreation, something for a family member).

Furloughed federal workers are not entitled to automatic back pay after the government shutdown ends, the Trump administration’s budget office claimed in a new draft memo obtained by The Washington Post, ratcheting up tensions in Washington over the week-long closure.

― Baronet Drowned in Night Frolic (President Keyes), Tuesday, October 7, 2025 1:02 PM bookmarkflaglink

idk that it'll succeed in the end because even with this SCOTUS it's legally on nonexistent ground, but the point of this leak is to make all of the furloughed employees hate the Democrats who supposedly caused the shutdown, and really the only point.

because sure, White House, let's play with people's actual lives to score political points, life isn't real, people don't need a paycheck amirite

Starving to own the libs.

the point of this leak is to make all of the furloughed employees hate the Democrats who supposedly caused the shutdown

[bold-strategy-cotton.gif]

yeah i wonder if they're going to blame the guy who's been given absolute power over everything, who insists on always being the center of attention, or if they're gonna blame the party which has offered no meaningful resistence whatsoever

if they told me I'm not getting backpay, I'd just go home. Let the forest burn

that's the spirit

yeah i wonder if they're going to blame the guy who's been given absolute power over everything, who insists on always being the center of attention

And who has been literally dismantling the government all year.

I can only logically conclude that Governor Internet Hardman is a genuine-not-tactical transphobe
https://www.lgbtqnation.com/2025/10/gavin-newsom-vetoes-gender-education-bill-declines-to-sign-other-trans-protections/

yeah, his 'views are evolving'

barf

it's worth clicking through and reading the full list of bills he didn't sign (not vetoed) -- some had Republican support!

wonder what the Nobel Committee thinks of sending unwanted troops & goons into cities to keep the 'peace'

he has successfully invaded 47 u.s. cities and converted them to patriotic rule, no one is giving him credit for this, it is the most that have ever been converted in such a short time

going through my mandatory workplace harassment training. feels like a portal to another, better world

I had to quit looking at clips of Bondi testifying, what a piece of shit. That's someone who certainly acts like she never expects to face accountability. Although I am doubtful, I'm sincerely hopeful she does one day.

i’d ask her if she has a planned extradition-proof retirement scheme

Lol, she's more at risk for getting a primetime slot on MSNBC than facing any consequences.

going through my mandatory workplace harassment training. feels like a portal to another, better world

Yeah my employer (a local government) is still going strong on all that and DEI.

I had to quit looking at clips of Bondi testifying, what a piece of shit. That's someone who certainly acts like she never expects to face accountability. Although I am doubtful, I'm sincerely hopeful she does one day.

Yeah she was corrupt as fuck as Florida AG. Why should she? She’s failed upwards her whole life.

wait til the Texas National Guard runs into Bad Bad Leroy Brown on the South Side of Chicago

It used to be the sound of helicopters meant there was an accident on the highway or a TV traffic copter on the move, maybe a hospital copter shuttling back and forth. Now I just assume it's a bunch of ICE assholes terrorizing the area. Maybe this whole shit show will finally allow some otherwise privileged people a glimpse of what it's like to live in a place under perpetual targeted harassment from law enforcement. For others, it must be terrifying. It's still mostly all for show, with the actual quantifiable arrests of alleged baddies secondary to the propaganda effort - these ICE teams have camera crews - but it's pretty sad and pointless all the same. Just a waste of time and money for the sake of cruelty. This is what happens when delusion dictates policy. Supporters of this mess have convinced themselves that this is necessary, and I don't know how anyone could convince them otherwise.

On the bright side, it suddenly dropped down to a very fall-like '50s, which for the Texas national guard might as well be Arctic temps. Hope they packed sweaters (no I don't).

Also on the bright side:

JUST IN: The Republican Mayor of Fairbanks, Alaska’s second biggest city, lost re-election last night to a Democrat.

Mayor David Pruhs is a conservative who fought protections for LGBTQ+ residents; he made comments this year drew condemnation this year from Alaska Natives. He lost to Mindy O'Neall.

Don't worry, they're naturally insulated:

https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcTBS2_V77MtIYLITYdZsr8Qlq4W0YUDj0pzs0cavcYIjqVNLoRnWFCDD6I&s=10

https://preview.redd.it/da-fascists-v0-hkiu12vh1vtf1.png?width=1080&crop=smart&auto=webp&s=8d4c4adce54461dd0d871d54071c798ae9421b80

Code Red for Maxwell Street Polish

The video of the ICE pig shooting a tear gas canister at a priest’s head from the safety of a roof is just….

I wish there was a hell.

Trump calling for Pritzker and Johnson’s arrest. Hope it’s just the usual bluster.

sort of feels like a stove or two are being touched

I know we should all be numb to the absolute failure of the press to rise to the moment by now, but my god, could you imagine the media firestorm if Biden had said Abbott should be arrested? It'd lead the news for a month. We'll probably never hear about this one again.

Trump should do it.

He's not going to because he's weak and doing this shit just makes him look weaker.

the video of the priest getting shot definitely feels like something every Catholic Trump supporter ought to be confronted with

yep that is fucking horrific

As far as the press goes, we just have to assume they are working in the service of Trump, so their decisions are not really failures or missteps, but just them doing their job of supporting a criminal fascist regime. We need to stop expecting them to do what they are "supposed to do" and simply speak the truth that they are openly collaborating and not on our side.

xp
I saw a photo of a priest being sprayed in the face, is that the same guy?? fucking hell

Chilling stuff: https://southsideweekly.com/federal-agents-storm-south-shore-building-detaining-families-and-children/

Yeah, that whole story is insane and terrifying. Glad it's finally making some wider traction. Just a horrifying collision of Trump's insane policies, shitty landlords and modern capitalism.

(Note to self, a reminder to take a breath now and then: according to flight trackers those helicopters by me were Cook County Sheriff busting people who are driving on the shoulder to bypass traffic on 290. We should tell ICE to spend their time and our money on *that*.)

not even hiding the motivation: placing them in zip ties and separating them by race into vans for more than two hours early Tuesday morning

know we should all be numb to the absolute failure of the press

which of the papers you subscribe to are not covering this?

i don't think he was saying it won't be covered but that the coverage is soft asf and will be lost in the either by noon tomorrow.

*ether

carne asada otm, I meant it won't be the long-lasting story it deserves to be

This is also happening. Good news:

The Trump administration’s strategy to swiftly roll out mass layoffs of federal workers during the government shutdown has shifted in recent days, administration officials familiar with the talks told CNN, as an increasing number of Republican lawmakers and Trump administration officials acknowledge the potential political perils of the move.

With Democrats having shown no signs of budging in their opposition to a stopgap funding measure that doesn’t address their health care demands and a growing number of Republican lawmakers warning about potential blowback, the White House is now planning to hold off at least a little longer on sending out notices of Reductions in Force (RIFs, as the government firings are typically referred to), despite hoping the threat will still motivate Democrats.

“There’s an increasing acknowledgment within the West Wing that the politics of RIFs, at a moment when we know our message on the shutdown is the better one, would be better later,” one of the officials said. It’s “the idea that if we give it more time, it’ll be because the Democrats truly forced our hand and left us no choice.”

https://www.cnn.com/2025/10/07/politics/white-house-strategy-federal-firings-shutdown

at a moment when we know our message on the shutdown is the better one
keep telling yourselves that

speaking of media coverage, it seems the failing New York Times still thinks Hunter Biden stories are all the rage

https://i.imgur.com/usNh4UA.png

xp - better in the sense that it isn't nearly as bad their re-election chances as punitive mass firings and the consequent fallout. their current message ("we offered them a 'clean CR' and those hypocrites refused") at least is more spinnable.

on a similar note, somewhat interesting article about an ill-fated conservative late night show

https://www.theguardian.com/media/2025/oct/08/conservative-late-night-talkshow

https://i.ibb.co/0pyk4zm4/Screenshot-20251008-142000-Google.jpg

jfc

The thing about the "touching the stove" analogy is that touching a stove is supposed to make you not ever touch it again.

Problem is, I don't see it as much as "touching the stove" as repeatedly grabbing the powerless and shoving their hands on the stove.

Someone who used to work with Katie Porter sent me this clip from a train-wreck interview with her and said, “Now imagine what she’s like when there aren’t cameras around.” pic.twitter.com/OCF73BrUg1

— Yashar Ali 🐘 (@yashar) October 8, 2025

don't seem especially terrible, to be honest

GOP shutdown strategy essentially:

https://www.popmatters.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/img-54216.jpg.webp

And they've got just the person to pull the trigger, too.

they haven't seen literality anyone from this administration take an interview from a Jounalist not on their friends list xxp

I wonder how many more vault finds like that we can expect from the Tiffany Bari Network.

Little did we know that CBS stood for Christ, Bari Sucks all along.

they also gave her $150 million for her stupid substack or whatever it is

https://bsky.app/profile/kelseyreichmann.bsky.social/post/3m2pmhzu4f22o

Let's go girls

The moron has been half-sleeping through a stage-managed "meeting" in which a bunch of no-name right-wing bloggers and influencers have been telling him (and the cameras) horror stories about "antifa." Plenty of hilarious/tear-your-hair-out moments, like when somebody asked him about suspending habeas corpus and he asked, "Suspending who?"

Anyway, Rubio came in to whisper in his ear about some Middle East "deal" and handed him a note reading "Very Close - We need you to approve a Truth Social post soon so you can announce deal first." So that's how the United States is governed in 2025.

https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:z6rujpf4u56jfie7aqic2nfg/bafkreifnuu2shj7hwlarpspphn22abxdlswue2hv7g277x5t7ds66ikp2m@jpeg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dWkjVvoXIS0

Most Roman sources offer overwhelmingly negative assessments of his personality and reign. Most contemporary sources describe him as tyrannical, self-indulgent, and debauched. The historian Tacitus claims the Roman people thought him compulsive and corrupt. Suetonius tells that many Romans believed the Great Fire of Rome was instigated by Nero to clear land for his planned "Golden House". Tacitus claims Nero seized Christians as scapegoats for the fire and had them burned alive, seemingly motivated not by public justice, but personal cruelty.

Fake news, Tacitus was funded by Arianna Huffington

https://www.hindustantimes.com/ht-img/img/2025/10/08/550x309/trump_rubio_note_1759962459430_1759962459583.jpg
https://ignitumtoday.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/Wormtongue-Theoden.jpg

card_bush911.jpg

Nobel shoo-in

Colombia's President Gustavo Petro on Wednesday suggested the latest vessel in the Caribbean bombed by the United States may have been Colombian with Colombian citizens aboard, a statement denied by the White House.

https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/colombias-petro-says-last-vessel-bombed-by-us-was-colombian-2025-10-08/

pam bondi deflected today when sheldon whitehouse asked her if there were "compromising" photos of trump found in the epstein vault --- the photos mentioned by michael wolff.

Anytime a member of this administration "testifies" before Congress, the senator who asks a question should immediately respond to whatever lie comes back with, "OK, so that's a yes, then."

he didn't, which was weird. she deflected in a way that was idiotic, saying that since whitehouse accepted money from reid hoffman, an associate of epstein, he has no leg to stand on when criticizing the president. this apparently was enough to bamboozle whitehouse, even though

1.) his staff looked over his contributions and it turned out it wasn't true (lol)
2.) even if it were that isn't in the same universe as being in photos like the ones wolff described

Also apparently Noem said they arrested “the girlfriend of one of the founders of antifa”.

The entire administration is just so unbelievably stupid, which makes it all the more maddening.

there are no boats anymore

Someone who used to work with Katie Porter sent me this clip from a train-wreck interview with her

all this shows is that CBS is a fucking joke staffed by a bunch of hacks who think what they do is worthy of the name "investigative journalism"

Yeah, that interview began from the standpoint that Trump voters' votes count double, or at the very least their feelings should be taken into account at all times, and before anything else. The correct response to "How will you reach Trump voters?" should be something like "I'll speak very slowly and use one-syllable words whenever possible."

Imagine the press asking a Republican candidate how they’re going to reach Biden voters.

Sharks circle however

https://www.politico.com/news/2025/10/08/katie-porter-tears-into-staffer-new-video-00598942

really important stuff

lol sorry that was catty

People do NOT allow women to be firm and draw lines and demand shit the way men constantly get a pass on.

should a politician: answer questions from reporters in a way that endears the electorate to a candidate, or demand shit?

right. i also just want to mention how thankless and exhausting it must be to do the kind of advocacy that she does. i wouldn't be able to do her job for one day, and if i had to, it would turn me into a miserable misanthropic cranky wretch. if she were amy klobuchar or kyrsten sinema i'd have a different take

1. She comes off bad
2. That was not that hard to gloss out
3. Reporters can also be dumb
4. You can answer dumb shit, tell why it’s dumb, and
5. Still win enough. It needn’t to see the light of day— but it might— and maybe has. Especially if you’re not good enough to crush it.

So yeah, this doesn’t disqualify Porter one bit to me, other than that she’s not good enough at fighting bullshit/stupid “reportorial” idiocy.

keep in mind this is how many people are first hearing about the "frontrunner" candidate.

i guess i misunderstood your post. the way a politician endears herself to me is by demanding shit and not by kissing ass to please some fictional version of "voters"

granted i don't claim to be representative of anything. and it's not my job to elect democrats, somebody else can worry about that

hear hear!

i don’t short that take, either, so pls forgive that of me. it’s a pretty quick uninformed take. i want porter’s voice and steadfastness up front in the battle for sure. there’s not nearly enough of it

Colombian President Gustavo Petro has said that a boat recently bombed by the US was "Colombian with Colombian citizens inside", an allegation the White House called "baseless".

The US has struck at least four vessels in the Caribbean in recent weeks, killing 21 people. The US government has said the strikes in international waters were targeting "narco-traffickers".

But it has not provided evidence or details about who or what is aboard, and the strikes have attracted condemnation in countries in the region amid concerns they breach international law.

The US Senate rejected a measure on Wednesday that would have barred President Donald Trump from using military force against the boats.

Petro replied to a post on X by US Senator Adam Schiff, a Democrat, who said he would vote to block strikes against vessels in the Caribbean as some lawmakers sought to challenge the use of the armed forces in Congress.

The Colombian president said that a "new war scenario has opened up: the Caribbean".

Petro added that "indications show that the last boat bombed was Colombian with Colombian citizens inside it.

"I hope their families come forward and report it. There is no war against smuggling; there is a war for oil and it must be stopped by the world. The aggression is against all of Latin America and the Caribbean."

a few weeks ago, jd vance made a joke about these strikes saying he "wouldn't go fishing in the caribbean right now." so this the level of respect these people have for human rights.

Well, Vance also tweeted "I don't give a shit" when some lawyer pointed out these boat bombings might just be a tad bit illegal, so.

yeah fuck those people's livelihoods and attempts to feed their families

Dude should be in jail.

Bonkers to me that Norway is legitimately concerned about repercussions (rightfully so) for not giving doofus the peace prize.

No Peace Prize, No Peace

this means war

They’re calling it the War Prize now

if he doesn't win, it's likely that Cambodia will attack Armenia again

they should give it to Leo

di Caprio vs. da Pope

peace through pandering, norwegian-style

“Everybody has been talking about: ‘Will he get the Nobel Peace Prize?’” said Brian Mast, a Republican congressman of Florida, on Fox News Thursday morning. “Those … academics and elites sitting in Norway, that board of people that decide it, they need to give President Trump the Nobel peace prize.”

“I’m not certain that the board in Norway that looks at this believes in peace through strength … they believe in peace through pandering,” he said.

Soon, Eylon Levy, a former Israeli government spokesperson, went on camera and said: “You know there is very little that Israelis agree on but there’s one point of consensus this morning: President Donald Trump deserves that Nobel peace prize.”

game recognise game

Kissinger has one

“You know there is very little that Israelis agree on but there’s one point of consensus this morning: President Donald Trump deserves that Nobel peace prize.”

citation needed

Trump is not winning a Nobel Prize.

The chairman of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, Jorgen Watne Frydnes, in December decried “the erosion of freedom of expression even in democratic nations,” calling out Trump by name.

“Trump launched more than 100 verbal attacks on the media during his election campaign,” said Frydnes, 40, who has also served as the head of PEN Norway, a group that promotes freedom of expression.

... “After just over 100 days as president, [Trump] is well underway in dismantling American democracy, and he is doing everything he can to tear down the liberal and rules-based world order,” wrote Kristin Clemet, a former center-right Norwegian education minister and another of the five committee members, in May.

A third member of the committee — and thus potentially the lock on a Trump-skeptic majority — posted several messages critical of the president during his first term. In a photo on Facebook posted the day before the 2020 election, the committee member, Gry Larsen, was wearing a red “Make Human Rights Great Again” baseball hat.

Larsen, a former center-left politician, also wrote in a 2017 Twitter post that “Trump is putting millions of lives at risk,” criticizing a decision to reduce U.S. foreign aid.

The United States must destroy Norway, which is on fire and miserable

bombing civilian boats, bombing Iran, sending troops into U.S. cities, sending the arms to Israel that kept the war going, inviting Putin to Alaska. etc etc etc

Yeah, but look at what JD used to say about him

texas national guard currently mustering to take care of the Oslo antifa problem

the crown prince is in New York today, time for a show of force

they should give the Peace Prize to Michelle Obama

just saw the Stephen Miller on CNN clip, that is some weird shit

where he just goes blank?

a president for all Americans

Trumps says that “we will be making cuts that are permanent and we’re only going to cut Democrat programs, I hate to tell you”.

“We’re only cutting Democrat programs,” he repeats. “We’ll be cutting some very popular Democrat programs that aren’t popular with Republicans, frankly, that’s the way it works.”

The fact that they are putting him in front of cameras so often is not a good indicator of bench depth.

xp

yeah he immediately realized he said something that would probably be used against them in court

Can Trump just claim the Peace prize for himself, the way that colleges used to "claim" national football championships, even though the polling committees recognized another school?

sure, why not?

if he doesn't get it, Norway could lose their FCC license

Death metal bands barred from Kennedy, er, Trump Center.

yeah he immediately realized he said something that would probably be used against them in court

nah he was just having an orgasm from saying the president has plenary authority

bears repeating

“The Nobel Committee is an independent body and the Norwegian government has no involvement in determining the prizes. But I’m not sure Trump knows that. We have to be prepared for anything from him.”

yeah he immediately realized he said something that would probably be used against them in court

not seen this clip, does anyone have a link?

dw just found it

just heard some expert and he says Trump's denial of human-cause climate change almost certainly prevents him from ever getting a peace prize

Death metal bands barred from Kennedy, er, Trump Center.

Pretty sure Varg is going to get a Kennedy Center Honor

Aaron Rupar shared this Trump quote today

Q: What is your view on a two state solution?

TRUMP: I don't have a view. I'm gonna go with what they agree to.

RFKII Sticking It To Big Circumcision:

"There are many other confirmations -- there are two studies that show children who are circumcised early have double the rate of autism. It’s highly likely because they are given Tylenol"

https://bsky.app/profile/acyn.bsky.social/post/3m2rpylcj5c2t

his 'cabinet meetings' are a hoot: 'Sir, under you shining leadership we are safer, healthier and more prosperous than at any time in human history...'

wtf is an “early circumcision”? How long do you have to wait to avoid autism?

otoh creating skepticism about circumcision is a much less harmful thing than skepticism about vaccines.

the other thing about the Nobel Peace Prize is that the committee has no incentive to appease Trump for any reason and plenty of incentive to not appear as though they are.

Letitia James indicted now, as Trump continues his use of the DOJ as attack dogs for his personal grudges. Add it to the pile of impeachable offenses.

his 'cabinet meetings' are a hoot: 'Sir, under you shining leadership we are safer, healthier and more prosperous than at any time in human history...'

So all those cabinet secretaries leave the meeting where they effusively praise their boss. I. My mind they then call a departmental meeting where all their undersecretaries and assistant secretaries-for-whatever must praise the cabinet secretary's vision and prowess.

Then each undersecretary has a meeting with his or her group of middle managers, who must effusively praise the undersecretary. Each manager then holds a staff meeting at which their underlings praise their shining leadership and stunning record.

On down to one lowly person who actually does their job. Who then goes home and gathers together their pets and children, who must praise..

i imagine a tray of blow and molly in the green room

I painted a room green, send it over

his 'cabinet meetings' are a hoot: 'Sir, under you shining leadership we are safer, healthier and more prosperous than at any time in human history...'

This is often a hallmark of this type of rule, that the people at the top don't just want to lie to the people. They wan't to be lied to themselves, and at least incentivise it if not outright mandating it

I can't tell if this is something inherent in personality led rule. Although it seems fundamentally flawed to actively create a truth-free information environment in which the people in charge have no real idea of what's going on either, you could also argue that its more difficult for people in the hierarchy to collude because they're effectively forced to lie to each other at all times too

I guess where this falls down is in war, or where there is sufficient organisation and mobilisation outside the hierarchy/structure

on a similar note, somewhat interesting article about an ill-fated conservative late night show

https://www.theguardian.com/media/2025/oct/08/conservative-late-night-talkshow

― Andy the Grasshopper, Wednesday, 8 October 2025 18:18

So telling that their entire schtick for a generation now continues to be “Why can’t I say the N-word anymore?” with an occasional edgelord daring a foray into that one ‘joke’.

It’s as if our nation was now controlled by a political movement based on phrenology or some other incredibly outdated prejudice. Same with Bari Weiss running CBS — ‘well we could always try racism again, idk’.

María Corina Machado Nobel Peace Prize winner
Venezuela’s most influential opposition leader receives the award.

Hilarious that a Trump aligned person has won this.

She's aligned with Trump?

From The Guardian.

So Trump did not get the Nobel peace prize. But by choosing Machado, the committee has picked a political figure who has praised the US president, which might lessen the fallout.

In public comments, Machado has thanked Trump for his “commitment to freedom and democracy in Venezuela”.

She was also on this year’s TIME Magazine “100 most influential People” list. The justification was delivered by no other than Marco Rubio, US secretary of state, who said she was “the personification of resilience, tenacity, and patriotism”.

She's a pro free market and the major opposition leader to Maduro so she's US aligned at the very least

It’s pretty obviously a rebuke to Maduro for rigging the election, using the military to crush protests and threatening to invade Guyana, rather than any real reflection on Machado’s supposed qualities.

I don't know if I'd go as far as saying Trump is free market though

Yeah, you can obviously read more into it than was intended but it’s not completely implausible that they’re sending a broader message about backsliding from democracy into authoritarianism, sending the military out to police dissent, politically motivated prosecutions and the erasure of judicial independence, environmental destruction, hawkish belligerence towards neighbours and rampant crony corruption.

He's pretty free market when it comes to countries he's not in charge of imo. xpost

Thanks, xyzzz.

It’s pretty obviously a rebuke to Maduro for rigging the election, using the military to crush protests and threatening to invade Guyana, rather than any real reflection on Machado’s supposed qualities.

― ShariVari

That was my first reaction

While you can take this with a pinch of salt, and its a rebuke to Maduro sure, but they would not have given this to Guaido?

Norwegian Nobel committee chair, Jørgen Watne Frydnes, commended Machado as a “brave and committed champion of peace” who “keeps the flame of democracy burning during a growing darkness”.

lol barf

Venezuela was much more plausibly a democracy when Guaido was up to his shenanigans. The last election fundamentally changed a lot.

Agreed, yes.

yup

a “brave and committed champion of peace” who advocated for the US to invade her country and enforce a regime change involving her in a leadership position so she could sell out national industries to Trump and pals while she lines her own pockets. I'm being a Maduro whitewasher here. But she is a pure piece of shit.

lol meant *not* being a Maduro whitewasher

When Obama won the Peace Prize was when it was completely stripped of any meaning. The prize is meaningless

I mean, insofar as it is actually bestowed on people creating conditions for peace. It isn’t meaningless in terms of lending credence to western colonialism and nation-building settler projects, but that’s a given

To be fair to them, making peace w/r/t the Levant is a rather a Lucy football anyways. Giving awards for it incentivizes further war, as war will provide opportunities for another peace deal, another award, and from thence another war that needs to be pacified and so on.

Cut all your planaria in half; now you have twice as many planaria.

http://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_fullsize/plain/did%3Aplc%3At46sqvutibvsmjgwn6r6izve/bafkreidsxet4sgkr2q5nipav6hz62b7i22hbtqzenpxdsz7jzyva4wjooe@jpeg

Not enough.

🇺🇸 The White House has lashed out at the Norwegian Nobel Committee after it awarded the peace prize to Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Corina Machado and overlooked US President Donald Trump.
➡️ https://t.co/qxuxhVhX3C pic.twitter.com/AdWCMxn3VZ

— AFP News Agency (@AFP) October 10, 2025

the triumph of the will

Um, does that post really translate "conquistar la Libertad" as "to conquer Freedom"?

It doesn't quite work, no.

once Kissinger won the Nobel I always just assumed it was like the Golden Boot for footie where it was awarded to the person with the highest body counts for the year

I'd have translated it as "win freedom" or "gain freedom".

Tensions between Venezuela and America soared following the attack, but Machado insisted to The Sunday Times that Trump was right to bomb the boat.

“I totally support his strategy,” Machado said. “And I’ve said on behalf of the Venezuelan people that we are very grateful. I think it is the right thing to do. It’s courageous. It’s visionary.”

He has the heart of a humanitarian. He keeps it in a jar in display in the white house. His own heart is that of an evil motherfucker everyone wishes was dead.

once Kissinger won the Nobel I always just assumed it was like the Golden Boot for footie where it was awarded to the person with the highest body counts for the year

I was browsing previous winners due to reading table's post and being v convinced that there absolutely was no credibility left to strip away by 2009 and was surprised to see how many times it's been a joint award for actual peace accords - so Kissinger won it together with his Vietnamese equivalent Lê Đức Thọ (tho Tho wisely refused it). Sort of a "good job stopping the war that you started" gesture.

To Kissinger, the cause of and solution to all our foreign policy problems

Trump’s special envoy, Richard Grenell​ – who has leading economic negoatiations with Nicolás Maduro’s administration, also voiced dissatisfaction tweeting: “The Nobel Prize died years ago.​”

Well played

god what a pathetic whiny baby, trump and every single person who interacts with him. i'm not sure there's ever been such a potent representation of a completely undeserving loser, the exact opposite of 'doing good', who is so pampered and unable to deal with anything except for blatant asskissing

those grapes... probably sour

It’s still funny not to give it to Trump.

So Trump did not get the Nobel peace prize. But by choosing Machado, the committee has picked a political figure who has praised the US president, which might lessen the fallout.

what "fallout"? whiny tweets? it feels insane that the world is bending itself around the erratic moods of one person.

It absolutely insane, but I know that a couple Norwegian officials expressed concern about additional tariffs on them if he didn't win.

seems like a justified concern

Gift link here to WaPo’s story about Peter Thiel’s kooky lectures about the Antichrist. Basically seems like he’s decided the best way to fight regulations on AI and higher taxes is to try to persuade people they’re demonic.

Silicon Valley leaders have escalated their fight against regulating AI since President Donald Trump’s inauguration. Thiel has close ties to administration officials including Vice President JD Vance, White House science adviser Michael Kratsios and David Sacks, White House AI and crypto czar. As one of the industry’s most influential leaders, his effort to cast resisting oversight of technology development as a religious battle could intensify the industry’s crusade.


Thiel said in his third lecture, on Sept. 29, that only a religious argument could inspire the proper response to the threat of a growing web of global rules, according to the recording.

“There are a lot of rational reasons I can give why the one-world state’s a bad idea: Turn the planet into a prison; I think the tax rates would be very high,” he said, according to the recording. “But I think if you strip it from the biblical context, you will never find it scary enough. You will never really resist.”

https://wapo.st/4h0krZE

“But I think if you strip it from the biblical context, you will never find it scary enough. You will never really resist.”

interesting that thiel's entire worldview is based on fear and scaring others, and now he's integrating that with apocalypse and tech

scooby doo ending: what if PETER THIEL IS THE ANTICHRIST?

"let's see who's underneath that mask"

Is there anyone of his coterie more in need of psychoanalysis than Thiel?

Also he absolute looks like Neidermeyer from Animal House
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BOTZlNDIxNzgtNDZkNi00YzM1LWI1ZTAtZThmMjYyZWE1MmY4XkEyXkFqcGc@._V1_QL75_UX403_.jpg

This is why wealth and power shouldn’t be concentrated in too few hands. Weirdos like thiel and trump impose their personal insanity on the whole world.

Thiel is gay, yeah? I wonder how he reconciles that with his fire & brimstone hell-awaits theology.. or maybe it's not an issue for him

well god loves gay people so

that event in San Francisco was four eight-hour lectures by him... I'd rather chew my arm off

Seems like there are the seeds there for an AI cult wehre the singularity = the Second Coming.

oh totally

Russ Vought

@russvought
·
1h
The RIFs have begun.

The Guardian has a bunch of excerpts of his weird lectures, it all reminds me of Late Great Planet Earth millenialism gobbly-gook. He says that Bill Gates is probably not the Antichrist as he's not popular enough

x-post-

The layoffs run counter to recent internal warnings from senior government officials that such dismissals are legally questionable. In the first days of the shutdown, officials privately counseled agencies against conducting reductions in force, or RIFs, while the government lacks funding, because it would likely violate the law, The Post reported this month.

The officials cautioned that the Antideficiency Act forbids the government from obligating or expending any money not appropriated by Congress, which means the government cannot incur new expenses during a shutdown, when funding has lapsed. The RIF process, which is extensive and involves promising severance payments, would probably be prohibited under the act, the officials concluded.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2025/10/10/trump-federal-workers-layoffs-government-shutdown/

The US Supreme Court and the Republican led Congress will be ok with this though

If the aim of the radical right is to reduce the federal bureaucracy to a broken ruin as rapidly as possible without regard to consequences, then this is the correct choice, regardless of any political qualms the congressional republican leadership might have about badly losing the midterm elections. Even if the democrats gain control of both chambers of Congress, they'd be engaged in dealing with the aftermath of a tidal wave of destruction, with Trump (or Vance) still sitting in office and able to veto their efforts. They sure as hell aren't worried about another impeachment attempt.

they'd be engaged in dealing with the aftermath of a tidal wave of destruction, with Trump (or Vance) still sitting in office and able to veto their efforts.

this just isn't true

it's doomwishing

er, you may have overlooked the fact that after the midterms Trump has two more years in office, or if he dies in office Vance would take his place, or that presidents have veto power.

I'm aware. Neither you or I know if the D.'s will have enough to overcome Trump or Vance's vetoes though

it just sounds like giving up before it even happens

xpost You think the Dems are going to have 67 Senate seats?

anything is possible, but one might be inclined to think some things are more likely than others, and it might be wise to plan around the higher probability results than the wildly optimistic ones

If they keep firing federal workers illegally, trashing the economy, fucking over farmers, etc I think you would be surprised

Actually not everything is possible--even if the Dems flipped every single GOP seat up for election in 2026 they wouldn't reach a veto-proof majority.

in the Senate at least.

Wrote a whole thing about thiel and rene girard and deleted. I think thiel is a dilettante philosophically who is just trying to find a way to dress up his lust for power and wealth.

These “lectures” seem horrendous.

I think he's a very serious and thoughtful person who is looking out for the little guy

Overriding a veto requires a two-thirds vote by both chambers. Thinking that such a huge Democratic majority is within reach during the upcoming midterms is rather unrealistic imo. however, egregiously destructive misrule would probably lead to a more thorough repudiation in 2028. based on the past half year, the radical right seems to be trying to "shoot the moon" and are playing for complete power at the risk of total failure.

https://salmagundi.skidmore.edu/articles/1176-from-philosophy-to-power

If anyone is interested in this stuff this is a good article

i like my thinking better than "well even if the D.'s do win the majority Trump is just gonna sit back and veto everything," which seems like laziness, but to each their own

do you think that is an unrealistic scenario that they should not plan around?

the democrats barely passed any legislation when they held both Congress and the White House because of self-imposed 60 vote thresholds

i have no idea! i don't think Aimless's angle is a particularly useful one to contemplate. i also don't think Trump is going to get any popular, nor are the R.'s in general, and that will affect things drastically. right now, i see no way forward for them to even reopen the government.

so we've went from building our bases in countries around the world to having Qatari air bases built in our country.

You're coming around. "I like my thinking" was an improvement over "this just isn't true", and "i don't think Aimless's angle is a particularly useful one to contemplate" is an advance on both of them.

The Democrats don't have any real chance of winning the Senate next year. The House is obviously up for grabs, but all the redistricting shenanigans combined with the D's own ongoing fecklessness makes that a far from certain prospect. If they do take the House, that would be the end of any real Trump legislation getting through, but Trump barely has a legislative agenda as it is. They could launch a lot of investigations and hearings, of course, which the White House would respond to with massive resistance and hostility.

On the flip side, if the R's manage to retain the House then Trump will claim yet another historic unprecedented greatest victory in the history of the world, the Senate would probably move even more aggressively to limit the filibuster, and who knows what they would push through under those circumstances. Lots of fights to come. Or should I say, one battle after another.

I guess I shouldn't say NO chance of winning the Senate, theoretically they could compete in Maine, North Carolina and ... possibly Iowa? Plus there's the independent candidate running again in Nebraska, so if he won and the other three seats went D, that would give them 51. BUT they also have to defend Osoff's seat in Georgia. And it's possible the R's win all of those races, which would put them at 54 seats.

i'm just glad we got the frog back