Okay one more, outstanding from Jared Yates Sexton @jysexton.bsky.social about the implications that automated technologies have for the execution and prosecution of war crimes.
…second, another excellent piece from Sarah Kendzior @sarahkendzior.bsky.social , in which she touches the third rail that needs to be touched: the Kahanism that runs Israel, and now us.
“Trump is not in control of the Iran War. Netanyahu is, and Kushner is his lackey.”
Two must-reads for the weekend:
First, Rebecca Solnit’s @rebeccasolnit.bsky.social illumination of why those with “the mentality of a rapist” will not win, and…
Politicians are only the errand boys. Dirty energy is yesterday’s garbage. Want to stop this current wave of madness, tech billionaires need to be brought down.
Politicians are only the errand boys. Dirty energy is yesterday’s garbage. Want to stop this current wave of madness, tech billionaires need to be brought down.
Shareholders need to start suing to block the packages. This is obscene.
The Secretary of Defense said we would no longer have “stupid rules of engagement.”
There is no wriggling out of this. There is no excuse for this. There is no absolution for this. There is only justice. Let us only hope it comes at our own hands.
This is a guy who advocated shooting journalists. What do you think his position will be on observers like Renee Good and Alex Pretti
www.nbcnews.com/politics/con...
If you had to pick the one person to replace Kristi Noem who would be worse for the situation or our country, you would pick Markwayne Mullin. That guy is absolute garbage. There will be open warfare in our streets before summer, which is probably the intention.
The way Hegseth and Leavitt whine about the reporting on our war dead is absolutely disgusting.
“For you don’t count the dead
When God’s on your side
And ya never ask questions
When God’s on your side”
— Bob Dylan
The way Hegseth and Leavitt whine about the reporting on our war dead is absolutely disgusting.
“For you don’t count the dead
When God’s on your side
And ya never ask questions
When God’s on your side”
— Bob Dylan
They bring the receipts too
Really interesting report on the 20 largest employers of low-wage US workers. They rely on public programs like Medicaid to subsidize their employees while they pay their CEOs millions.
Want to divert your business from companies for legitimate reasons, start here.
* Dionne Brand
It never occurs to them that they live on the cumulative hurt of others. They want to start the clock of social justice only when they arrived. But one is born into history, one isn’t born into a void.’
Unless, of course, you're an American.
14/end
‘Only the brazen can say, “I was not here. I did not do this and feel that.” One hears that all the time…about what people feel they are and are not responsible for. People use these arguments as reasons for not doing what is right or just. 13/
Anyway I could go on and on but I wanted to land on this passage from Dione Brand's A Map to the Door of No Return which lights up the one singular flaw in the American character from which all the other flaws flow: 12/
We, of course, become the wronged, become the victims, become the righteous avengers of justice and truth and all the American Exceptionalism garbage we're infused with starting in grade school and on and on and on. 11/
...above the interests of their own people.
Now I'm not at all defending the repressive religious movement that followed after their revolution, but bad things happen for a reason, and the reason in the modern world is often something awful initiated by us. 10/
And you can see it echoed and targeted in the official statements from the regime about why we went to war, and in the media reporting, as if our history with Iran started in 1979 and not in 1953 when we overthrew their legitimate government to install a dictator to serve American interests 9/
always ready to lash out at things they can't and don't want to understand, playing white Christian victim like it's all they know how to do, which it is, proud to be the stupidest guys in the classroom and the dumbest drunks at the end of the bar. 8/
The reason I'm bringing this up now is because nothing has changed in this country. We're right back there. Those same MAGAs are still around, now generations of them, in their red hats and militia cosplay and gang colors, still as ignorant of the world and of history as they ever were, 7/
decided not to press charges (I have few regrets in my life, but that's a decision I've always regretted), and went back to my beer (and too many more after that). 6/
Luckily I had become friends with the bartender and he came out to the back parking lot with the baseball bat he kept under the bar. Cops arrived not long after (that probably wouldn't have been a good thing these days), and I picked myself up off the ground (no one helped me up), 5/
These were my hometown MAGAs before they had the hats, and they pulled me off my barstool and dragged me towards the back door while a bunch of other customers just watched and said and did nothing, in the town I grew up in, just down the hill from the elementary school I attended. 4/
That summer I had untamed hair and a full beard and my usual dark tan, and late one night close to closing time some guys down the end of the bar decided I must be Iranian and Iranians needed to be taught a lesson by good Americans and right fucking now. 3/
My mother had a heart attack that summer and I had to move home for a while to take care of her and my father and the house. As usual back in those days you could find me at a local shot-and-beer bar at night. 2/
Getting flashbacks to the Iran Hostage Crisis of 1980, a bit of personal terror that in some ways has never left me, in case people wonder why I am the way I am sometimes. 1/
Well, you know, the world didn’t start until they showed up
Well, you know, the world didn’t start until they showed up
