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RetailSisyphus

@neverwhere11.bsky.social
1K followers 1.3K following 732 posts

The only way to deal with an unfree world is to become so absolutely free that your very existence is an act of rebellion

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Reposted by RetailSisyphus
Faine Greenwood @faineg.com · 27/09/2026
Women trying to succeed in Silicon Valley AI and effective altruist spaces are reporting feeling serious social pressure to attend sex parties - where people have reported being sexually assaulted, like below. Events like Aella’s “Slutcon,” which is happening again this weekend.
Ann Pierce
@itsannpierce
20h
I am disheartened by this as well. I already lost a bunch of followers for agreeing with @tautologer, but it's saddening to see local nerdy women being caricatured as Karen-like outsiders and getting pushed out of the scene. This is exactly why you hear so few concrete, names-attached stories of sexual harrassment and assault. I'm told there is a history of discrediting these because the "slut normalization" thing is top priority and these stories get inconveniently in the way of spreading this ideology.
I got roped into attending last year's Saturday Slutcon party because so many local and out-of-town friends were there (to echo sentiments @tautologer expressed about "slut events becoming central to the larger scenes). Mostly I hung out with people I knew and that was great. But in the course of my 3-ish hours there, there were 2 times my "no" was not accepted by a man I didn't know, and I was physically pushing a huge guy off of me who was rubbing his penis on me, who continued to do it despite my physical force against him, and after I finally wriggled away from him, told him I wanted to dance alone etc., he came back and did it again.
This was scary and bad, but it didn't even cross my mind to report this because one of the other people who didn't accept my "no" earlier in the night was the bartender (an officially sanctioned authority at the event), and I knew the event was organized exclusively by women into CNC (who are vocal about how rapey behavior turns them on), so I figured this sort of thing would just get me laughed at. And anyway, I heard there were a lot of other incidents like it. Later though, someone encouraged me to report this story to the organizers, and despite my embarrassment I did, so *they know* that this and other incidents happened. This is why they cut the Saturday night party this year and created a larger training program for the flirt girls - *because* of things like this last year. Yet the narrative bein…People who haven't been to Slutcon are saying "it's just group therapy," "it's just innocent flirting." But the environment is much like a sex party in that many people are nude, there is making out and sex acts happening out in the open. I think it's pretty unreasonable to expect that every nerdy girl who likes rationalist bloggers or is into EA/AI safety should automatically be comfortable with this! That if she's not, there's something wrong with her, we don't want her in our scenes, etc.
Not to mention, it's explictly an event *for men*, where men are the clients and the "flirt girls" are the product. Last year I overheard an exchange where a man felt "led on" by a flirt girl and was trying to get her punished/kicked out. (A dynamic that seems inevitable in this context!)
Anyway- it does sound like they've upped their consent education a lot this year, are more organized, and that's good! As I've told my friends who are attending: I hope they have fun!
I heard several accounts last year of women who had no problems and really enjoyed the event. That's great!
Just... can we live in reality about this? There are real reasons why male-female sexual dynamics are tricky.
Encouraging autistic men who can't yet read body language to go around asking to see womens' boobs is maybe a bit ill-advised. Maybe not everyone should be/identify as a slut; maybe it's not for everyone.
And yeah, filtering the Bay Area Al safety scene down to only women who are super comfy with this eliminates *most* women - including many of the really smart, nerdy, weird women who've been in the larger scenes for years. What a loss for humanity.
I absolutely understand why people with a minority sexuality would want to create belonging, would want to create spaces for people like themselves. But why do it like this/at this cost?
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Haus of Decline @hausofdecline.bsky.social · 26/09/2026
Instantly cured my depression thinking about Hank Hill pronouncing "Nier: Automata"
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isla @demomolos.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
I have never had a pony, not have I ever asked for a pony. That said, I was able to use the bathroom in every state two years ago.
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Andrew Quemere @andrewqmr.bsky.social · 21/09/2026
A couple went on a Fox News podcast and claimed the state of #Massachusetts took away their teen because they won't help the teen transition. But it's actually because the father was charged with beating and threatening to kill the teen and the mother was charged with witness intimidation.
wbur.org
Mass. parents' story about child's gender transition complicated by court records
Joseph Kutzko was charged with assaulting the child in January 2025, not long before the child was removed from the family’s home. Mother Arlene Kutzko was charged with witness intimidation in connect...
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Katelyn Burns @katelynburns.com · 14/09/2026
One of the more insidious phrasings I've seen with the Dems/trans rights discourse lately is the idea that trans people are being greedy and demanding a "maximalist" approach to trans rights. No, you cannot call the state of rights American trans people had as recently as 2023 "maximalist," sorry.
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John Rogers @johnrogers.bsky.social · 31/08/2026
Whenever I see a poll like this I always like to remind people that approval for interracial marriage in the US did not cross the 50% mark until 1994, when I was already in my twenties.
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Denny Carter @dennycarter.bsky.social · 30/08/2026
amazing stuff
"This government hates us and wants us dead," Kathleen Hanna remarked during Bikini
Kill's set. "They don't give a shit about anybody's healthcare. They don't care if we're dying in parking lots of curable illnesses.
They don't give a shit. They don't care if our rights are taken away. They're ripping people off the streets. I'm not gonna tell you all the bad things! But I am gonna say it makes it hard for me in my body sometimes to have a good time. 'Cause it's hard to turn it off. And I was thinking that on the way here. I was like,
'What a gift.' What a gift we have to be able to play for you. What a gift Olivia has given all of us to do this festival.
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A.R. Moxon @juliusgoat.bsky.social · 27/08/2026
Nor will it end at ethnic cleansing. A machine built to eat people will keep eating people. Those who run it will always find a new category of unwanted humans.
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Peter @notalawyer.bsky.social · 21/08/2026
“having a bizarre obsession with a daddy figure is not uncommon in right-wing households” good point Amy, people on the right are freaks. they’re freaks and they’re worse than us.
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Kevin M. Kruse @kevinmkruse.bsky.social · 18/08/2026
Shocked to learn that the political party led by pedophiles and dedicated to protecting pedophiles has created a police force filled with pedophiles.
A new report by the Ohio Immigrant Alliance, released today, pulls back the curtain on a stunning level of sexual criminal behavior within ICE and CBP. Out of 152 cases of identified immigration officials or contractors accused or convicted of criminal behavior, 131 of them, or 86.2 percent, were charged with sex offenses. Seventy-eight of them—51 percent of the entire cohort—"committed sex offenses against children—the single largest category on the list," the report states. Cases involving a CBP officer, the report finds, "are more likely to involve underage victims" than those of an ICE officer. Yet fully half of ICE officers accused or convicted of sex offenses (12 of 24) had a minor as their victim.
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alec karakatsanis @equalityalec.bsky.social · 12/08/2026
THREAD. Contrary to what you are being told, 40 years of polling have established that shifting money away from police/prisons toward social services is one of the most popular public policies among *all* political demographics. But it's not just that, it goes way deeper.
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RetailSisyphus @neverwhere11.bsky.social · 09/08/2026
What a bad comparison how much funding did the Rwandan government get from the US to fuel their genocide? Has nothing changed about the American public in 30 years?
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Matt Ortega @mattortega.com · 28/07/2026
Stephen Miller said just the other day that all asylum claims are "fake." A couple deported from the U.S. to Guatemala were gagged, bound, and shot dead. Their 14-month old found crying next to their mother's body. People like Miller don't care though because this is the point: ethnic cleansing.
stlpr.org
Overland couple shot dead in Guatemala after local ICE stop led to deportations
The couple’s 14-month-old daughter was found crying beside her mother’s body in a sugarcane field last week, according to Guatemalan authorities and media.
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Better Things Are Possible @internethippo.bsky.social · 26/07/2026
Their plan is to say as little as possible and win by default, which in their mind is the safest path that doesn't alienate anyone. This misses the opportunity to galvanize the public around important issues, and then they throw up their hands about how the voters are ignorant and apathetic
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Aaron Sojourner @aaronsojourner.org · 25/07/2026
Admirable clarity @science.org
The Trump administration hates academic science funding, full stop. They hate where that money goes, and they hate who it goes to. They want to keep all that money for themselves, to hand out to favored cronies who can help them get elected and to steer yet more money and more power back into their hands.

That’s it. That’s the story
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Evan Urquhart @evanurquhart.bsky.social · 19/07/2026
I don't think we should mince words. Transphobia and hatred killed May Pollard. The Idaho legislature killed her as surely as if they'd pointed a gun at her head and pulled the trigger. Anti-trans laws were the gun. www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news...
nbcnews.com
Idaho pushed anti-trans laws for years. Then a teen died.
The life and death of May Pollard, 16, provides a window into the tragic effect that legislation and political rhetoric have had on trans people in America.
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Steve Herman @newsguy.bsky.social · 13/07/2026
Authorities say ICE shot and killed a person this morning in Maine. www.wmtw.com/article/signific...
wmtw.com
Person killed in shooting involving ICE in Biddeford, official says
Police closed part of busy Pool Street in Biddeford on Monday morning and there was a significant police presence.
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Better Things Are Possible @internethippo.bsky.social · 12/07/2026
Mainstream Respectable opinion is that people joking about a bad person's death represents a culture of cruelty, but really it represents a culture of impunity. It's a coping mechanism for watching someone do evil their whole life and never seeing consequences
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Micah @rincewind.run · 11/07/2026
what they learned from minneapolis was not “don’t do this again” but “keep it quiet next time”
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jessica jonestown @newfoundgloryhole.bsky.social · 07/07/2026
THE ACKROOMS
Cathy in the backrooms
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Dave Dildine @dildinedave.bsky.social · 05/07/2026
Direct hit from Dupont Circle.
A cloud-to-ground lightning bolt behind the Independence Day fireworks in DC.
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Oliver Willis @owillis.bsky.social · 03/07/2026
For the people saying critics of Democrats on immigration from the left don’t have an alternative, I always say “go look at the Statue of Liberty, that’s our immigration policy.”
Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,
With conquering limbs astride from land to land;
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.

"Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!" cries she
With silent lips. "Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"
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mtsw @mtsw.bsky.social · 29/06/2026
The Constitutional Crisis started in 2000. You've been living through it your entire adult life. The reason politics feels hopeless is by design — conservatives broke our democratic form of government to guarantee that the people cannot act against them and are continuing to break it.
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Andy Craig @andycraig.bsky.social · 28/06/2026
I know the list is endless but I genuinely think trashing the legitimate congressionally chartered org for celebrating the 250th to instead hijack our national assets and taxpayer funds for his personality cult grifter crap should, in and of itself, be fully sufficient to merit removal from office.
linuscatt · 1d ago
I worked at Smithsonian, specifically raising money for 250th. What I want people to know is we secured millions of private philanthropy to host a month long Folklife Festival on the mall, "The Festival of Festivals". Was going to feature well known festivals, think Burning Man, Farm Aid, Grand Ole Oprey etc. as well as smaller local and regional festivals from across the U.S. and territories. Goal was to feature truly the best and most beautiful creative expression in music, dance, arts and craft traditions, food, community etc. Can't name names but plan was to have headliners every night for free concerts.... Think the types of names who might be affiliated with the aforementioned large festivals. Stars were willing to perform because was under banner of Smithsonian. It had to all be scrapped bc the administration would not release permits to host on the mall. The money went elsewhere, but our nation was robbed of what would have been a once in a generation cultural moment.
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Brandon Friedman @brandonfriedman.bsky.social · 26/06/2026
While it's obvious the next Democratic president should pardon these individuals on day one, the judge who handed down the sentences should also be subjected to a federal investigation to determine if he abused his power and whether it warrants prosecution and potential imprisonment.
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Thembo @thembo.bsky.social · 25/06/2026
It's so cool that a solid chunk of the Dem party, including its leadership, are openly opposed to the concept of Primaries and are visibly angrier at their own voters than they've ever been at Republicans
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Charles Я. Davis @charliearchy.bsky.social · 25/06/2026
There’s been more elite Democrat anger at Democratic primary voters than outrage over the life imprisonment of anti-ICE protesters — including a couple whose only offense was printing zines. Look at what they choose to talk about with the media and what they ignore. It’s revealing!
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maia arson crimew 🏴 @crimew.gay · 24/06/2026
yo! quick question mark, why are you on the "potential future stories" list in my research obsidian, filed under "look into this guy" also can you just quickly read this old tweet of yours out loud?
screenshot of an obisidan document, it says "look into this guy", attached below is a screenshot of a tweet by mark s zaid that says "i've gotten clearances for guys who had child porn issues"
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Marisa Kabas @marisakabas.bsky.social · 19/06/2026
What goes unsaid in these heinous stories about denying essential aid is that a 28-year-old DOGE lackey with zero experience named Jeremy Lewin was named Acting Director of the State Department’s Office of Foreign Assistance in April 2025 and still hasn’t had a confirmation hearing.
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Ashton Pittman @ashtonpittman.bsky.social · 16/06/2026
Kohen Wiley, a 1-year-old child, is dead after a Mississippi police officer shot into a car and killed him. Family members say his mother was holding him in the passenger seat. The officers were responding to a shoplifting call over a box of diapers at the Senatobia Walmart.
mississippifreepress.org
Mississippi Police Officer Shoots and Kills 1-Year-Old Child in Response to Shoplifting Call
A Mississippi police officer shot and killed 1-year-old Kohen Wiley at a Walmart while responding to a shoplifting call.
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Joseph Cox @josephcox.bsky.social · 10/06/2026
Some really crazy cases in here - cop looked up ex-girlfriend and family in Flock 100+ times - cop stalked wife giving "test" as reason - cop searched one plate 395 times in 10 months; was later fired Cops keep getting arrested for using Flock to stalk people www.404media.co/cops-keep-ge...
404media.co
Cops Keep Getting Arrested for Using Flock to Stalk People
There have been more than a dozen cases around the country where police use Flock to obsessively and illegally stalk people.
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Anna Bower @annabower.bsky.social · 04/06/2026
NEWS: A @lawfaremedia.org report finds that *97* Jan. 6ers who received clemency for their role in the attack were arrested, charged, or convicted of subsequent crimes—a number much higher than previously reported. Incredible work by @katherinepomps.bsky.social www.lawfaremedia.org/article/the-...
lawfaremedia.org
The Jan. 6 Pardons: How Many Clemency Recipients Have Faced Other Charges?
The real count is much higher than the public knew.
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Mark Joseph Stern @mjsdc.bsky.social · 03/06/2026
We do not have voting rights in this country anymore. We just don’t. We did for a while because Congress codified them pursuant to a constitutional amendment enacted by the people in a great repudiation of the original sin of slavery. But the Supreme Court has nullified that law and that amendment.
Weeks ago, I warned that vacating the District Court’s
injunction in these cases would “unleash chaos and . . . con-
fuse voters.” Caster, 608 U. S., at ___ (dissenting opinion)
(slip op., at 4). Nevertheless, the Court forged ahead. Now
the Court is squarely faced with a record of the turmoil it
has caused and the harm it has wrought. Yet just as Ala-
bama doubled down on racial discrimination, the Court to-
day doubles down on chaos. Because I choose to defend the
rule of law and the right of all Alabamians to participate
equally in democracy, I respectfully dissent.
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cait (and adonis) @cait.bsky.social · 31/05/2026
all else aside, I think this was the start of a shift for a lot of people- realizing their government was absolutely capable of helping them, but actively choosing not to
There was a brief moment of relief from pandemic stimulus checks
This challenge is longstanding: More than 40% of households were not able to afford what they needed almost every year from 2014 to 2024, according to the report, except for in 2021 and
2022. During those years, Americans' bank accounts were boosted by federal stimulus checks and other forms of government aid meant to help with the COVID-19 pandemic recovery.
Yet the economic health of households relapsed in 2022, when inflation spiked and those federal assistance programs began to expire, shrinking the social safety net at the same time millions of families were moving closer to the edge.
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Marisa Kabas @marisakabas.bsky.social · 30/05/2026
Just a reminder that immigrants inside Delaney Hall are on their ninth day of a hunger and labor strike in protest of inhumane conditions and this was Governor Sherrill’s response last night:
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Jess Calarco @jessicacalarco.com · 29/05/2026
This is bad. Bad for researchers. Bad for science. Bad for universities. Bad for professional associations. For example: 1. Every award would be vetted by political appointees, who could overrule peer reviewers and deny the award if it doesn't advance the president's priorities. 1/🧵
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Jeff Sharlet @jeffsharlet.bsky.social · 29/05/2026
One thing I’m gonna say about this nazi salute is that it does not “resemble” a nazi salute, it is a nazi salute. May we all dispense with this coy “resembles” language in all cases.
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Evan Bernick, a finite mode with a smol hooman and a lorg floof @evanbernick.bsky.social · 29/05/2026
This is an actual Thirteenth Amendment violation, because they have not been convicted of any crime.
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David Dayen @ddayen.bsky.social · 28/05/2026
Immigrant detainees at Delaney Hall ICE prison in Newark, NJ have been forced to cook, clean, & repair the facility for as little as $1/day and sometimes for free. They are on a hunger & labor strike; protesters outside have been tear-gassed. Here's our report, including a quote from a detainee:
prospect.org
Delaney Hall ICE Detainees Take Aim at GEO Group’s Bottom Line - The American Prospect
Immigrants held at GEO Group’s Delaney Hall in Newark are on a labor strike and a hunger strike, refusing to perform the jobs that keep the place running.
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Elizabeth Cronise McLaughlin @ecmclaughlin.bsky.social · 28/05/2026
I cannot say this loudly enough: we need everyone to know what is happening at Delaney Hall. 300 detainees inside are on Day 7 of a hunger and labor strike as of today. ICE is beating, gassing, tasing and assaulting protestors outside every night, and it is getting worse.
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Andrew Lawrence @ndrew.bsky.social · 18/05/2026
the president is raiding the treasury to put your tax dollars into this mans personal checking account as a reward for what hes doing in this picture
A picture of a man inside the Capitol rotunda on January 6 2021. He is wearing full camo tactical gear, masked, carrying zip ties and climbing over a bannister in the gallery
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utopia deferred @utopia-defer.red · 11/05/2026
What do you call camps where people keep disappearing and dying
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Sherrilyn Ifill @sifill.bsky.social · 09/05/2026
Black people are giving it these Confederates raw and uncut. This is how it’s gonna be now. You wonder what we’re thinking? It’s this. I believe this is activist Gary Chambers again in Louisiana.
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Max Kennerly @maxkennerly.bsky.social · 08/05/2026
Agreed. It's not possible to reconcile "rule of law" with "one week the GOP SCOTUS will nullify a 43-year-old statute so they can allow racial gerrymandering, then the next week the GOP VA SC will block voter-approved redistricting and have themselves a laugh by citing the SCOTUS liberals' dissent."
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Chuck Wendig @chuckwendig.bsky.social · 08/05/2026
It’s hard to sell elections as a solution to the problem of courts overturning voter will… in an election. “Vote harder (so they can maybe overturn those votes if they don’t like them)” is a sales pitch whose only response is either apathy or violence.
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Joshua Foust 🪖🎮 @joshuafoust.com · 05/05/2026
The single most defining thing Elon Musk has ever done is killing untold numbers of people by having DOGE illegally raid and disband USAID. Not rickets, not cars, not even the CSAMbot on X. It’s this, and so many media pundits just choose to unsee it.
hsph.harvard.edu
USAID shutdown has led to hundreds of thousands of deaths | Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health
The Trump administration’s decision to shut down the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) has resulted in hundreds of thousands of deaths from infectious diseases and malnutrition, accord...
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Katelyn Burns @katelynburns.com · 27/04/2026
I want cis Americans to sit uncomfortably with the fact that most of these restrictions were ushered in through the liberal act of "just asking questions" about trans people.
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Oliver Willis @owillis.bsky.social · 23/04/2026
every trump nomination, regardless of position, should have been a unified "no" from the democrats that is literally the bare minimum, and the party not only failed at that in the first few months -- THEY ARE STILL FAILING AT THAT NOW
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Jacob T. Levy @jacobtlevy.bsky.social · 22/04/2026
The midterm gerrymandering war and the Iran war alike show Trump's inability to imagine that the people he's picking fights with have any agency, any ability to respond. He loves his "you don't have the cards" metaphor but he's amazingly terrible at actually thinking about whether they do.
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-𝚖𝚘𝚡 @moxiest.art · 22/04/2026
"should we really resort to playing dirty to defeat the nazis i–" yes. kick em in the fucking balls. what kind of question is that. grow the fuck up
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