iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Reposted by Alex Galbraith

Salon.com @salon.com · 23/09/2026

Nikole Hannah-Jones' New York Times Magazine essay about her daughter's schooling has generated lots of discussion. The big question: Are progressive parents hypocrites for wanting the best for their kids? @alexwgalbraith.bsky.social argues the debate misses the point.

salon.com

Wanting the best school for your kid doesn't make you a hypocrite

Nikole Hannah-Jones' controversial essay asks if you can fight for a better world while accepting the one you have

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Reposted by Alex Galbraith

Douglas Moran @dougom.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

@alexwgalbraith.bsky.social Private equity is a cancer on our economic system. It needs to be stopped. Any time I read about a well-known company going downhill , I always check to see if they were bought by private equity, & the majority of times they have been. www.salon.com/2026/09/25/t...

salon.com

The private equity backlash could start at the drive-thru

The places Americans once loved for being cheap are a lesson in what buyouts do

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Alex Galbraith @alexwgalbraith.bsky.social · 17/09/2026

Also, he didn't die and this isn't a biography. This piece is about the news right now. You do not need to provide an overview of everything a person has ever done when you report a new story on them. Who would want to read that?

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Alex Galbraith @alexwgalbraith.bsky.social · 17/09/2026

Even if everything you say is true, what would Macklemore personally being an anti-semite have to do with his current actions? Bad people can make correct points. Israel is carrying out a genocide in Gaza. Palestinians should be free to live their lives. The messenger doesn't change that.

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Alex Galbraith @alexwgalbraith.bsky.social · 17/09/2026

I believe Macklemore when he said the costume pieces were chosen at random, to disguise him as part of a secret show, particularly when nothing else about his performance suggested he was doing an anti-semitic caricature

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Alex Galbraith @alexwgalbraith.bsky.social · 16/09/2026

It's not easy to write a song that's extremely close-to-home while also being relatable. Just look at "Ordinary" by Alex Warren. It hides feelings behind massive Imagine Dragons-style festival drums. It can't bear to be vulnerable. It sucks. If you want to write an all-timer, you can't be timid!

youtube.com

Alex Warren - Ordinary (Official Video)

YouTube video by Alex Warren

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Alex Galbraith @alexwgalbraith.bsky.social · 16/09/2026

It's one of my core issues with the modern country charts. None of the men are willing to be saps. They're screw-ups, sure. They've been wronged, maybe. But they're never vulnerable.

salon.com

Bro-country has curdled

Morgan Wallen and his imitators are here for a long time, not a good time.

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Alex Galbraith @alexwgalbraith.bsky.social · 16/09/2026

Ed Sheeran deserves all the hate he's getting right now. I'll add more to it when my story goes live later today. But I won't stand for saying he's a bad artist. You all just have no respect for schmaltz. He's great at exceedingly tender and overwhelmingly corny music. It's not easy to make!

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Reposted by Alex Galbraith

Tressie McMillan Cottom @tressiemcphd.bsky.social · 08/09/2026

I CANNOT AGREE STRONGLY ENOUGH IT DRIVES ME ABSOLUTELY OUT OF MY MIND THAT PEOPLE LEFT-OF-CENTER CITE THIS MOVIE SO CASUALLY BUT IT IS A TIME-SAVER TO HAVE SHORTHAND FOR “OH I SEE I AGREE WITH YOU BUT HATE YOUR GUTS”.

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Reposted by Alex Galbraith

Amanda Marcotte @amandamarcotte.bsky.social · 08/09/2026

My colleague @alexwgalbraith.bsky.social is getting grief for this piece, but he's right. I hate to say, but Mike Judge may have got right wing-curious around this time. He was buddies with Alex Jones. I think he's come back around, but the movie is reactionary. www.salon.com/2026/09/06/i...

salon.com

"Idiocracy" is still a worthless artifact 20 years later

The film's smirking, know-it-all pose was tired when it released. It’s useless now

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Alex Galbraith @alexwgalbraith.bsky.social · 08/09/2026

It's especially disheartening because Judge is one of our best creators working in the realm of dullards. His dimwits usually have more humanity than the one-note dummies that populate "Idiocracy" though:

Up to this point, Judge’s filmography was exceedingly kind, willing to dig deeper and find humanity in an entire universe of schmucks and mediocrities. “Idiocracy,” on the other hand, was as cheap as the mid-aughts culture it was setting out to satirize.

Poisoned by the overwhelmingly toxic culture of time, the film’s downward-punching humor is as radioactive as its future’s fallow fields. There are a few fun visual gags about the degraded far-future — a hospital named St. God’s, the city’s digital clock tower being stuck on a blinking 12:00 — but its punchlines tend toward nasty. One of the few running bits in “Idiocracy” concerns Joe’s articulate speech, which citizens of the future invariably characterize as “f**gy” and “r**arded.” Courtroom sketches of Joe show him holding out a limp wrist.

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Alex Galbraith @alexwgalbraith.bsky.social · 08/09/2026

"Idiocracy" turned 20 this month, and like a lot of mean-spirited mid-'00s culture, it's not worth remembering. A rewatch does Mike Judge's nastiest film no favors.

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Alex Galbraith @alexwgalbraith.bsky.social · 08/09/2026

It's exactly this attitude that I don't like about "Idiocracy." If you think you're better, then be better. And If it helps, I don't write the daily newsletter anymore.

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Alex Galbraith @alexwgalbraith.bsky.social · 31/08/2026

Seeing George Santos' name back in the news, I can't help but feel like my commentary from this weekend holds. Nobody fades away in an era where sustaining attention has never been easier. For @salon.com:

salon.com

Why don't celebrities go away anymore?

From Donald Trump to Taylor Swift, the same names still run culture and politics

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Alex Galbraith @alexwgalbraith.bsky.social · 27/08/2026

Dolly Parton was one-of-one in music history. You've read about that by now, if you didn't know it already. But Parton's apolitical politics also can't be replicated www.salon.com/2026/08/27/d...

salon.com

Dolly Parton blazed a path that modern country stars can’t follow

Parton's outwardly apolitical, quietly radical balancing act can't be repeated in the social media age

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Alex Galbraith @alexwgalbraith.bsky.social · 24/08/2026

After the X-odus, Facebook's turn to AI boomer paranoia and Reddit's hollowing out via Discord, even the social media sites that supposedly replaced these spots are empty. Where do people go to have fun, make conversation and pass time on the internet? I mulled it over for @salon.com

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Alex Galbraith @alexwgalbraith.bsky.social · 24/08/2026

BrooklynVegan hadn't had its rowdy comments section for a decade, but its demise got me thinking about websites where people used to gather. We're losing the last of the spots that people swung by everyday to take the temperature of their fellow online enthusiasts.

salon.com

The internet is losing its third places

Does anyone know where to hang out online anymore?

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Alex Galbraith @alexwgalbraith.bsky.social · 11/08/2026

The trans panic in professional sports is so imaginary that conservatives had to create their own threats to the integrity of women's competition. Despite what Sophie Cunningham might think, the biggest threat to her league is people like Enes Kanter Freedom.

salon.com

Conservatives find their fighter in Sophie Cunningham

The anti-trans movement in sports needed a face. It found one in the WNBA player

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Alex Galbraith @alexwgalbraith.bsky.social · 03/08/2026

Gillian Welch's "Time (The Revelator)" just turned 25. The standout track "Everything Is Free" worried about a world in which people expect to be entertained for nothing. We've lived in that world for decades. It's worse than she thought.

salon.com

Gillian Welch's “Everything Is Free” warned us all along

Her 2001 song on piracy predicted who'd get rich — and who'd be left behind

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Alex Galbraith @alexwgalbraith.bsky.social · 13/07/2026

If any of that sounds interesting to you, sign up for my newsletter. It's free and hits your inbox five days a week. On top of my slightly skewed take on the news, it also includes great work from Salon's inimitable stable of columnists!

salon.com

Salon.com

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Alex Galbraith @alexwgalbraith.bsky.social · 13/07/2026

Because I'm me, I looked at McConnell's disappearance through the lens of R.E.M. They opted neither to burn out nor fade away, calling it quits while they were all still friends.

R.E.M. were a band of ancient Southern spirits, released from their dimension and onto our radios when a beltway road was carved through the forest around Atlanta. For more than 30 years, barring a few monstrous digressions into glam rock, they crafted jangly soundtracks for Flannery O’ Connor stories that didn’t exist. Michael Stipe had the drive to be a pop star, but his take on the genre was an enigma wrapped in a mystery wrapped in kudzu.
When news of their 2011 breakup broke, it came as a shock twice-over. Not only was one of the pillars of alternative rock calling it quits, but they were speaking about it in frank, unitalicized language. These band members were not just mortal, they were the type of guys who said they were ready to “call it a day.”

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Alex Galbraith @alexwgalbraith.bsky.social · 13/07/2026

If the last few days have proved anything, it's that politicians need to hang it up much sooner. Lindsey Graham's death may have been sudden, but it can hardly be called a surprise when a septuagenarian dies. For Crash Course from @salon.com, I wrote about our congressional age crisis.

salon-crashcourse.beehiiv.com

McConnell health truthers are missing the point

It’s not the cover-up, it’s the crime.

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Alex Galbraith @alexwgalbraith.bsky.social · 07/07/2026

Balogun's presence didn't end up mattering, but the hand-wringing from liberals was still instructive. If progressives types want to get and hold power, they have to get comfortable bending the rules to their benefit. My latest for @salon.com:

salon-crashcourse.beehiiv.com

Learn from the Trump-FIFA controversy

It’s cool when your guys do it.

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Alex Galbraith @alexwgalbraith.bsky.social · 06/07/2026

If you like any of this, why not sign up for Crash Course? It's a free, daily newsletter placing all of Salon's top political coverage directly in your inbox. Check it out here:

salon.com

Salon.com

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Alex Galbraith @alexwgalbraith.bsky.social · 06/07/2026

Another essay got a little bit TNT Sunday movie, but hovered around the same general idea. Donald Trump is quick to toss off people who don't serve him anymore.

salon-crashcourse.beehiiv.com

Trump has no more use for these guys

The president turns on his biggest boosters the second they stop providing for him.

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Alex Galbraith @alexwgalbraith.bsky.social · 06/07/2026

In one essay, I had to admit that Matt Walsh got one thing (kind of) right. The right is much more willing to 86 people who no longer serve their goals. Democrats, not so much ...

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Alex Galbraith @alexwgalbraith.bsky.social · 06/07/2026

Maybe it was the looming promise of fireworks and day drinking, but Crash Course for @salon.com was uncharacteristically cheerful last week. Inadvertently, my daily essays kept circling the praiseworthy bits of MAGA media and Trumpworld.

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Alex Galbraith @alexwgalbraith.bsky.social · 06/07/2026

I need all progressives fretting over Donald Trump intervening on behalf of the USMNT to consider "it's cool when my guys do it" thought. It's been the Republican worldview for at least a decade. Free yourself.

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Alex Galbraith @alexwgalbraith.bsky.social · 24/06/2026

If you’re sick of he-said, she said bulls**t — or just want to talk about the best performances at Woodstock ‘99 — why not sign up for Crash Course from @salon.com? First one’s free, second one’s gratis and the rest come at no cost to you. salon-crashcourse.beehiiv.com/p/jd-vance-s...

salon-crashcourse.beehiiv.com

JD Vance's he-said, he-said BS

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Alex Galbraith @alexwgalbraith.bsky.social · 24/06/2026

I was the first person in my family (on either side) to graduate college, but no amount of book learning can fully bleach the North Florida from my bones. That’s my excuse, in any case, for dedicating part of my politics newsletter to the joys of Limp Bizkit’s “Break Stuff.”

Borland switches to a squealing, ratcheting riff that gets tighter and tighter as Durst threatens to peel the skin off your body with power tools. The band ends this breakdown by coming to a dead stop as Fred threatens to “break your f**king face tonight.” The next 25 seconds are groovy, freewheeling chaos. Durst demands the listener hand over something he can snap in half over a bed of screeching turntables and pinballing guitars. It’s stupid, it’s violent, it’s awesome.

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Alex Galbraith @alexwgalbraith.bsky.social · 22/06/2026

In Crash Course for @salon.com last week, I pointed out that Trump's massive blunder left the U.S. side of the table with few ways to save face. The world has seen Iran take the U.S. military's best shot, without so much as flinching. That's a terrible starting position.

That’s not to say that there’s any possibility Steve Witkoff and Michael Anton could have crafted a “good” deal for the U.S., given how things have gone. Trump attacked Iran, thinking the regime in Tehran would collapse. When the Iranians showed that they could withstand those attacks, even after many of the nation’s leading figures were killed, Trump’s negotiators were left in the lurch. When you lose a war, you have to take a bum deal, and that’s unquestionably what happened here.
That’s a situation Americans should get used to. The unipolar model of world affairs, and its associated negotiating position, has been in decline for at least two decades. The global financial crisis hollowed out the idea that smaller economies should go along to get along. Trump’s unpredictable nature made it seem that agreements with the U.S. were worthless. Now that Iran has shown how to withstand bomb-based opening bids, future administrations should expect more strong-arm responses from formerly pliable nations.

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Alex Galbraith @alexwgalbraith.bsky.social · 22/06/2026

It's fun to watch a D-tier talent like JD Vance get clowned on the world stage, but even a skilled negotiator would have trouble getting a win out of the Iran negotiations. salon-crashcourse.beehiiv.com/p/this-is-wh...

salon-crashcourse.beehiiv.com

This is what losing looks like

The United States should probably get used to bad deals.

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Reposted by Alex Galbraith

Erin Keane @erinkeane.bsky.social · 17/06/2026

"We’d count ourselves lucky if most of Trump’s screwups could be remedied with a bit of bleach," writes @alexwgalbraith.bsky.social in Crash Course, @salon.com's free morning newsletter (not a Substack!) that you can and should sign up for here: salon-crashcourse.beehiiv.com/p/trump-s-pe...

salon-crashcourse.beehiiv.com

Trump’s peroxide presidency

The president has spent much of his second term cleaning up his own messes.

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Reposted by Alex Galbraith

Erin Keane @erinkeane.bsky.social · 16/06/2026

In which I open Crash Course to read about the Iran ceasefire and learn @alexwgalbraith.bsky.social is a crafter. "I took trash and turned it into something I could use." salon-crashcourse.beehiiv.com/p/iran-cease...

salon-crashcourse.beehiiv.com

Iran ceasefire is worth doing poorly

Trump’s deal will likely be worse than what was in place before. That doesn’t matter.

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Alex Galbraith @alexwgalbraith.bsky.social · 03/06/2026

You have to understand, .jpgs are a young medium. Bored Ape Yacht Club is the future.

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Alex Galbraith @alexwgalbraith.bsky.social · 03/06/2026

This idea that AI is here forever and we have to come to grips with it drives me insane. Generative AI needs an incomprehensible amount of resources to work and produces nothing but garbage. Cut the money off and watch it die!

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Alex Galbraith @alexwgalbraith.bsky.social · 01/06/2026

My hometown once boasted the best schools in FL. Now it's home to the highest portion of six-figure earners in the state, a truly wild amount of remote workers sitting on drained wetlands, and almost all of them want to put a bullet in the school system so they can save a few hundred bucks.

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