#vote Eric Adams out

[news4dzhozhar]

[cyarsk52-20]

#EricAdams and #KathyHochul aren’t changing tunes cuz THEY saw a video of a young black homeless man being held in a chokehold for 15 mins and dying…nope!!Their changing tunes cuz WE saw a video of a young black homeless being held in a chokehold for 15 mins and dying!!

There was people who warned ny voters during the mayoral and governor elections not to vote for these two candidates

The idea that you protect people by excusing killing the mentally ill and homeless is an argument for fascism and eugenics. You protect people with housing, healthcare, compassion. The bloodlust of conservatives is the real sign of what they want, not their empty words.

When i say conservatives I'm including people like Eric Adams and Kathy Hochul. This country is so far right that some Democrats would would rather defend this killing than house and care for people. And they are also the problem

I recall seventeen months ago, I was ridiculed for not being in “full support” of everyone’s favorite candidate running for a particular position. Or, sympathizing with a bigot-lite from Long Island. And seventeen months later… I was right about both of them.

As of this week reading that they’re a bunch of inhumane dinos (democrats in name only) they’re all like “I told you so “

I know cause I’m one of them

FQ Eric Adams and Kathy Hochul a nigpine and a hew! I’ll be feeling like this again after they get voted out of office mark my words

[renthony]

Just curious. How bad has Biden been at controlling COVID-19 in your view?

First: I already responded to a similar question you left on this post.

Second: Biden has been atrocious for COVID-19 safety and management. COVID-19 is still killing people, and our president has done a horribly insufficient job in mitigating that. "Better than the Republicans" is not the same thing as "good" or "effective." Biden's abysmal reaction to COVID-19 is part of why I'm so thrilled that the Uncommitted campaign for the Democratic primary has achieved some success. That particular campaign is focused on ceasefire in Palestine, but the People's CDC explained in a statement how Palestine is also very much a public health issue. We need to scare the bastard and actually do some of that "pushing him left" that people claimed they'd do after getting him elected. Though it seems to me like a lot of people just settled for, "okay, we got rid of Trump, we don't have to worry anymore."

Third: While I'm at it, people have to do more than vote. You have got to get involved. You have got to do more than participate in the presidential election once every four years. Join a union (may I recommend the IWW?), follow the guidance of The People's CDC, volunteer for your local Food Not Bombs, get involved in a tenants union like the Autonomous Tenants Union Network, read Riot Medicine, get trained in first aid and get involved in a street medic group, read up on your local politics and get involved on the small-scale, do something in addition to voting in the presidential election. Even if you're limited in how much you can personally participate, find the people who are talking about these issues and signal boost them, and share the information with others who may be more able to participate more. If you can tell people to go vote in the presidential election, you can also tell them to go do other things, too.

Now, with all of that out of the way, here are some links related to Biden's abysmal COVID-19 response:

During his 2020 campaign, Biden promised immediate $2K stimulus checks. Instead, he delivered $1,400. Sources: [x] [x] [x] [x] [x]

Velena Jones for NBC Bay Area: "‘Too expensive': Bay Area residents shocked over new COVID vaccine prices"

Reuters: "COVID vaccine manufacturers set list price between $120-$130 per dose"

Joseph Choi for The Hill: "Free COVID-19 test program to be suspended for now"

Disability activist Alice Wong writing for TeenVogue: "Covid Isn't Going Anywhere. Masking Up Could Save My Life," and the follow-up article, "COVID and the 2024 Election: What Biden and Democrats Owe High-Risk People."

Laura Weiss writing for The New Republic: "Democrats Can't Keep Ignoring Covid in 2024."

David Cohen and Adam Cancryn for Politico: "Biden on '60 Minutes': 'The Pandemic is Over.'"

Alex Skopic for Current Affairs: "COVID-19 is Still a Threat. So is Biden’s CDC."

Adam Cancryn for Politico: "Biden Appears to be Over Covid Protocols."

Paul Thornton for the Los Angeles Times: "Covid Still Rages, and the Biden Administration Isn't Helping."

Eric J. Topol for the Los Angeles Times: "The U.S. is facing the biggest COVID wave since Omicron. Why are we still playing make-believe?"

We should have free, universal testing. We should have free, universal vaccination. We should have free, universal treatment. We should have financial assistance for those of us who can't work outside the home. We should have mandated work-from-home for any job that can be done remotely. We should be emptying prisons and paying attention to the way disease and abuse proliferate inside their walls. We should have COVID-19 safety PSAs and government support for universal masking. We should have free distribution of N95s. We should have mandated masking in medical settings and public spaces. We should have a higher minimum wage. We should have healthcare reforms. We should have strong worker protections. We should have improved infrastructure. We should have a president who gives a single flying fuck about how many of us are dying.

And we have none of it.

But we sure seem to have money to keep dropping bombs, arming cops, terrorizing the vulnerable, and imprisoning innocent people to use for slave labor.

[companion-showdown]

Who is most important to the history of Doctor Who?

TOURNAMENT MASTERPOST

propaganda under the cut

Douglas Adams – script editor for the late Tom Baker era

the obvious: wrote and helped write some of classic who's best episodes. infuriated everyone with romana's regeneration scene in destiny of the daleks. has had a massive impact both on doctor who specifically and on doctor who through his general impact on scifi, no one is doing it like him. and he's hilarious! (anonymous)

Rona Munro – only writer for both Classic and NuWho

Only person to write an episode for both classic (survival) and new who (eaters of light). responsible for: making the master a catboy and giving ace a cheetah girlfriend. 'death by Scotland' (anonymous)

Russell T Davies – revived Doctor Who

Russell T Davies wasn't just "some guy" they got to run the revival series; He lobbied the BBC to bring the show back and was in discussion talks in 1998 before the show was back on air. Davies brought the show back in a ginormous way and allowed a new generation to fall in love with the series, which translates into people going back and watching Classic Who as well. Under him, the show was immensely popular, regularly being one of the most watched things each week. Doctor Who would not exist today without him and I'm not even sure the classic show would have the same love it currently does without Davies introducing the series to a brand new audience. Also if we're including extended media not just the main show, Sarah Jane Adventures SLAPS. (anonymous)

Steven Moffat – showrunner for the eleventh and twelfth Doctors

This might be a hard sell on the website that, for some reason, can't seem to progress past 2011 when it comes to evaluating Moffat and his work, but I'm going to try anyway. Curse of the Fatal Death, advocate for female doctor since 1998. First onscreen biracial and bigender regeneration. Wrote some of the most iconic episodes of the series, including the 50th, Blink and Heaven Sent. Things like Weeping Angels, the Empty Child, the Silence, all instantly became part of the show's iconography because his concepts were THAT GOOD. Wrote Missy. The 50th special, again, was basically a love letter to the entire show. Brought Doctor Who to an even bigger audience than ever! It was airing in cinemas worldwide! Stuck around for s10 because there was no clear successor for showrunner position, because he loved the show that much. Took criticism to heart and always tried to better himself as a person and his writing, which - well, Doctor Who's longevity is in its willingness to change. Cast Peter Capaldi. Wrote Heaven Sent. Has written the most stories out of anyone in the show's history. Most of all, I think he understood the true heart of the series when he ends his first story with "Everybody lives Rose! Just this once, everybody lives!". He gets it. Also Capaldi run again I cannot stress this enough. (anonymous)

Chris Chibnall – showrunner for the thirteenth Doctor

invented gay people and sapphics <3 (anonymous )

[centrally-unplanned]

If it makes you feel any better, “I wrote in Bloomberg” lives in NYC, so his vote is largely irrelevant.

and yeah, also seems like the most likely place for the kind of guy who likes Mike Bloomberg to be

Oh I know, my reaction was a comedic exaggeration to be clear. Though seriously seeing a 20-something in NYC nostalgic for Bloomberg is itself very funny. Eric Adams has really knocked it out of the park, huh?

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

SEP 22, 2023

The Senate has confirmed three top defense leaders. Last night it confirmed Air Force General Charles Q. Brown Jr. to replace Army General Mark A. Milley as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff when he retires at the end of the month. Today, it confirmed General Randy A. George as Army chief of staff and General Eric M. Smith as Marine Corps commandant.

The Senate filled the positions at the top of our military by working around the hold extremist senator Tommy Tuberville (R-AL) has put on more than 300 military promotions, allegedly because he objects to the government’s policy of providing leave and travel allowance for service members who have to travel to obtain abortions. 

Jennifer Rubin of the Washington Post focused on the House Republicans today, though, when she wrote: “The GOP completely gone off its rocker—incapable of passing House spending, ranting and raving at AG, cooking up ludicrous and baseless impeachment, unable to greet Zelensky with joint session. This is not normal. This is egregious. You'd think the reporting would reflect it.”

Indeed, the House Republicans remain unable even to agree to talk about funding the government, let alone actually passing the appropriations bills Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) agreed to four months ago. Today, right-wing extremists in the House blocked a procedural vote over a Pentagon funding bill, keeping what is normally an easily passed bipartisan bill from even reaching the floor for debate. McCarthy acknowledged to reporters that he is frustrated. “This is a whole new concept of individuals who just want to burn the whole place down. It doesn’t work.”

The extremists do indeed appear unconcerned about the effects of their refusal to fund the government, and since they have the five or six votes they need to sink the measures McCarthy wants to pass with only Republican votes, this handful of representatives are the ones deciding whether the government will shut down. 

McCarthy could pass clean funding bills through the House whenever he wishes, but he refuses. To do so would mean working with Democrats, and that would spark a vote to throw him out of the speakership. And so, rather than keep the members in Washington, D.C., to work on the appropriations bills over the weekend, McCarthy recognized he did not have the votes he needs and sent them home.

The extremists are bolstered by former president Donald Trump, who posted on his social media platform today that the Republicans in Congress “can and must defund all aspects of Crooked Joe Biden’s weaponized Government…. This is also the last chance to defund these political prosecutions against me and other Patriots. They failed on the debt limit, but they must not fail now. Use the power of the purse and defend the Country!” 

Experts say shutting down the government would not, in fact, end the former president’s legal troubles, but he is actually doing more than that here: he is trying to assert dominance over the country. As Representative Adam Schiff (D-CA) said: “Let’s be clear about what the former president is saying here. House Republicans should shut down the government unless the prosecutions against him are shut down. He would deny paychecks to millions of working families & devastate the US economy, all in the service of himself.”

Extremist leader Representative Matt Gaetz (R-FL) responded to Trump’s statement with his own: “Trump Opposes the Continuing Resolution” to fund the government,” he wrote. “Hold the line.” Ron Filipkowski of MeidasTouch noted: “House Republicans refuse to fund the government to protect Donald Trump.” 

Trump’s accusation that President Biden is weaponizing the Justice Department against him and others who tried to overturn the results of the 2020 election is the opposite of what has really happened. Not only has Biden stayed scrupulously out of the Justice Department’s business—leaving in place the Trump-appointed leader of the investigation into Biden’s son Hunter, for example—but also we received more proof yesterday that it was Trump, not Biden, who weaponized the Justice Department against his enemies. 

Nora Dennehy, who abruptly resigned from former special counsel John Durham’s investigation into the origins of the FBI’s investigation into Russia’s interference in the 2016 election, explained in her confirmation hearing to Connecticut’s state supreme court yesterday that she quit because Trump’s Department of Justice was tainted by politics. Before joining the probe, she said, “I had been taught and spent my entire career at [the] Department of Justice conducting any investigation in an objective and apolitical manner.” 

But Trump and his loyalists expected Durham’s investigation to prove that there was a “deep state” conspiracy against him, and then–attorney general William Barr seemed to be working to support that fantasy, even though there was no evidence of it (as shown by the fact the investigation ultimately fizzled). Barr was, she thought, violating DOJ guidelines in his public comments about the investigation and in his consideration of releasing an interim report before the 2020 election.

“I simply couldn’t be part of it,” Dannehy said. “So I resigned.”

The resistance of the extremists to McCarthy’s leadership is spilling over into foreign affairs as well. Today, Ukraine president Volodymyr Zelensky was in Washington, D.C., where he met with President Biden at the White House and with leaders at the Pentagon, and spoke to a closed-door session for the Senate. But he did not speak to the House of Representatives. While McCarthy met with him privately, the speaker maintained that “we just didn’t have time” for him to address the House. 

As part of their demands, House extremists want to cut funding for Ukraine’s defense. This would, of course, work to strengthen Russian president Vladimir Putin’s hand in his war against Ukraine. Earlier this month, former Central Intelligence Agency director John Brennan told MSNBC that it is “absolutely essential” to Putin that Trump win back the White House in 2024. “I think it is Putin's main lifeline in order to find some way to salvage what has been a debacle in Ukraine for him," Brennan said. "If Trump is able to return to the White House...Putin could have a like-minded individual that he can work with, detrimental to U.S. interests certainly and detrimental to Western interests overall.” The intelligence community assesses that Putin worked to help Trump in the 2016 and 2020 elections, and is pushing pro-Russia and anti-Ukraine propaganda now.

Defense Secretary Lloyd J. Austin III assured Zelensky that the U.S. will continue to support Ukraine and work with allies and partners to make sure it has the weapons it needs. Lara Seligman of Politico reported today that the Pentagon will continue to fund Ukraine operations even if there is a government shutdown. Military activities deemed crucial to national security can be exempted from being shuttered during a government shutdown.

And finally, 92-year-old Rupert Murdoch announced today that he will be stepping down as chair of his media empire, including both Fox Corporation, which includes the Fox News Channel (FNC), and News Corporation, which owns the Wall Street Journal and the New York Post, among other newspapers. In 1996 the Australian-born mogul launched the Fox News Channel with media specialist Roger Ailes, who had packaged Republican presidential nominee Richard Nixon in 1968 by presenting him to audiences in highly scripted television appearances. 

The Fox News Channel initially presented news from a conservative viewpoint, but over time its opinion shows, delivered as if they were news, came to dominate the channel. Those shows presented a simple narrative in which Americans—overwhelmingly white and rural—wanted the government to leave them alone but “socialists” who wanted social welfare programs demanded their tax dollars. Isolated in the fantasy world of FNC, its viewers became such fanatic adherents to right-wing politics that FNC wholeheartedly trumpeted Trump’s Big Lie after he lost the 2020 presidential election because viewers turned away from FNC when some of its personalities acknowledged that Biden had won..

Angelo Carusone, president of Media Matters for America, said today that “Murdoch created a uniquely destructive force in American democracy and public life, one that ushered in an era of division where racist and post-truth politics thrive.”  Margaret Sullivan, formerly the Washington Post’s media critic, wrote in The Guardian that FNC was “a shameless propaganda outfit, reaping massive profits even as it attacked core democratic values such as tolerance, truth and fair elections.” Murdoch, she wrote, wreaked “untold havoc on American democracy.”

Murdoch sees it differently. In his resignation letter, he attacked “bureaucracies” who wanted to “silence those who would question their provenance and purpose” and “elites” who “have open contempt for those who are not members of their rarefied class.” “Most of the media is in cahoots with those elites, peddling political narratives rather than pursuing the truth,” he wrote. 

Forbes estimates that their media empire has enabled Murdoch and his family to amass a fortune of more than $17 billion.

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

[windandwater]

I didn't vote for eric fuckface adams in the primary election but when I voted for him in the general it was only for his party affiliation. Cuomo had been forced to resign over allegations surrounding him and I knew that if he were a republican he would have held on until the bitter end and perhaps run again in the future.

not so with democrats. democrats will kick a bitch out when they fuck around.

and now. a federal indictment? for a deeply unpopular democratic mayor?

I hope and believe he's as good as gone. even if he doesn't get convicted or escapes a sentence. they're already calling for his head.

our two party system is trash but they are not the same party. they work differently.

vote with your principals in the primary, and with your party in the general. and vote for the party with the most integrity. you will get results.

[wrestler-smash-or-pass]

Weekly Wrapup 3/10/24

This Week's Rankings:

Utami Hayashishita - 88.9% smash

Jon Moxley (Dean Ambrose variant) - 84.6%

Eddie Guerrero - 80.5%

Edge and Beth Phoenix - 75.1%

KENTA - 75.1%

Unholy Union (Alba Fyre and Isla Dawn) - 74.3%

Carmelo Hayes - 71.6%

Bear Boulder - 69.1%

Pretty Deadly (Elton Prince and Kit Wilson) - 59.9%

Minoru Suzuki (Current Day) - 51.8%

Randy Orton with a mustache - 50.9%

Sami Callihan (CZW Era) - 26.4%

Gangrel - 24.1%

Gorgeous George - 21.4%

Average smash rating this week: 61.0%

More stats under the cut, along with my observations, commentary, and some of my favorite tags...

Most total votes this week (most enthusiasm)

Jon Moxley (Dean Ambrose) - 364 votes

Minoru Suzuki - 361

Utami Hayashishita - 343

Edge and Beth Phoenix - 338

Eddie Guerrero - 303

And least total votes this week (least enthusiasm)

Sami Callihan - 178 votes

Gorgeous George - 187

Unholy Union - 206

Bear Boulder - 217

Carmelo Hayes - 222

The closest poll was Randy Orton with a mustache, who won 115-111

Top Ten Overall

Kris Statlander - 91% smash

Athena - 90.2% smash

Hikaru Shida - 89.7% smash

Utami Hayashishita - 88.9% smash

Minoru Suzuki (Young Variant) - 88.7% smash

Swerve Strickland - 88.3% smash

Toni Storm - 88.1% smash

Hiroshi Tanahashi - 87.7% smash

Hangman Adam Page - 86.4% smash

Bianca Belair - 86.4% smash

Bottom Ten Overall

Vince McMahon - 3.9% smash

Ric Flair - 4.6% smash

Kane (Corporate variant) - 10.1% smash

Miracle Violence Connection - 11.8% smash

Gene Munny - 12.4% smash

Spike Trivet - 12.% smash

Kevin Sullivan - 13.1% smash

Triple H (Terra Ryzing variant) - 18.6% smash

Eric Bischoff (NWO) - 20.0% smash

Gorgeous George - 21.4% smash

Top Women Overall

Kris Statlander - 91% smash

Athena - 90.2% smash

Hikaru Shida - 89.7% smash

Utami Hayashishita - 88.9% smash

Toni Storm - 88.1% smash

Bottom Women Overall

Eve Torres - 47.1% smash

Carmella - 47.8% smash

Nikkita Lyons - 48.2% smash

Julia Hart (Cheerleader Variant) - 49.8% smash

Kelly Kelly - 50.3% smash

Top Men Overall

Minoru Suzuki (Young Variant) - 88.7% smash

Swerve Strickland - 88.3% smash

Hiroshi Tanahashi - 87.7% smash

Hangman Adam Page - 86.4% smash

Hikuleo - 86.0% smash

Top Tag Teams

The Golden Lovers - 80.4% smash

Unholy Union - 74.3% smash

Best Friends - 66.7% smash

Motor City Machine Guns - 65.5% smash

Roppongi Vice - 62.7% smash

There were some new additions to the overall lists this week. Utami Hayashishita earned a spot on both the top overall list and the top women's list, and Gorgeous George just barely kicked Charlie Dempsey off the bottom overall list.

We've now had three polls on Jon Moxley, and the ranking is:

Current AEW Mox - 84.8% smash

Dean Ambrose - 84.6%

CZW Mox - 82.3%

Also, people prefer non-mullet Eddie Guerrero (80.5% smash) to Eddie Guerrero with a mullet (77.0% smash), and people prefer Randy Orton sans mustache (62.3% smash) to Randy Orton with mustache (50.9% smash).

Also like...88.7% of you would have done Minoru Suzuki when he was young, but only 51.8% of you would do old Suzuki? To echo the sentiments of a few reblogs, is this not the "sexualize that old man" website?

In actual blog news, the 250th poll was posted today, and we hit 500 followers a couple weeks ago but I forgot until now. Thank you so much to everyone who's followed, submitted poll requests, reblogged, liked, and otherwise interacted with this blog!

And now for some of my favorite tags and comment

@lghockey on Gorgeous George: #what in the revolutionary war is that haircut

@booboo-eyedbambi on Bear Boulder: #i need him to squish me like he's trying to get the last of his toothpaste out of me

@midcarder on Minoru Suzuki: #the only reason to not fuck suzuki is because you're afraid

@regalityandcoffee on Carmelo Hayes: #on one hand hes hot#in the other hand i once had a dream he tried to kill me so- I once had a dream that William Regal put drugs in my suitcase as I was going on vacation with Mox. Wrestlers are rude af in dreams.

[dreamsweet]

im gonna get accused of being a russian bot for this but it’s insane to me how people are like “at least vote in local and state elections and maybe you’ll get some good people in!” as if the biggest thing politicians do on a regular basis isn’t lie out of their asses. the nc house got a republican supermajority that can overrule the democrat governor’s veto because a representative who ran and was voted in as a democrat switched parties and there’s no precedent for any kind of recall process so she’s just in there until the next election. look at eric adams slashing the nypl budget so the nypd has hundreds of millions extra to terrorize new yorkers. not to mention sinema and fetterman on the national level. like come the fuck on

[queer-book-character-tournament]

Okay!!! So I’ll give everyone a few hours to recover from all of that and wait until tomorrow (April 1st, sorry guys no prank here just a queer battle) to post the final round Gideon Nav vs Ianthe Tridentarius vs Eric Bittle

This will last one week so everyone has plenty of time to get their votes in for the final winner and then we’ll start the bonus polls which so far consist of: The Great Gideon Face Off (a battle for the ultimate Gideon since we had like three submitted to the tournament), The Simon Showdown (same thing but for Simons), Blonde Short King Queer Jock Battle (Andrew vs Bitty, no one asked for this I just think it would be fun so I’m doing it), The Ultimate Round Four Divorcee Loser (Ronan vs Harrow), and since it doesn’t seem they will do battle in the main tournament The Ultimate Round Four Divorcee Winner (Adam vs Gideon), Crow Divorce Challenge (Jesper vs Wylan), Fox Divorce Fight (Andrew vs Neil), Bone Girl Battle (Nina vs Harrow vs Nona), Carry On My Wayward Son (Kade vs Jack vs Nancy), International Incident (Henry vs Alex), Time Traveled To Legal Marriage and Divorce (Jane vs August), Into The McQuistonverse (all submitted Casey McQuiston characters throwing down), War of Hearts (Magnus vs Alec), Ari/Arati Third Try: Divorce Addition (Ari/Arati vs Anna), Divorce Is Buy One Get One (Kieran vs Mark vs Cristina), Shadow Hunter Show Down (Helen vs Aline), Magnet Clicking OUT Of Place (Kit vs Ty), Wake Me Up Inside (Jordan vs Hennessy)

I’m open to more ideas for bonus rounds but that’s what’s slotted in the meantime!

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

By: William Deresiewicz

Published: Nov 21, 2024

The politics of the academy have been defeated. Its ideas, its assumptions, its opinions and positions — as expressed in official statements, embodied in policies and practices, established in centers and offices, and espoused and taught by large and leading portions of the professoriate — have been rejected. This was already evident before November 5. It can now no longer be denied.

Some data points: A post-election survey from Blueprint, a Democratic polling firm, discovered that, among reasons not to vote for the Democratic presidential nominee, “Kamala Harris is focused more on cultural issues like transgender issues than helping the middle class” ranked third, after only inflation and illegal immigration. Among swing voters, it ranked first. California approved a ballot measure to stiffen penalties for theft and drug crimes by a margin of 69-31. Los Angeles elected a former Republican as district attorney over the progressive incumbent by 61-38. Alameda County, which covers most of the East Bay including Berkeley, recalled its progressive DA by 63-37. Portland, Ore., elected a former businessman as mayor over the leading progressive candidate by 18 points.

We’ve seen comparable results in recent years. In 2020, California rejected affirmative action by 57-43. In 2021, Seattle elected a Republican city attorney over a police abolitionist, New York City elected Mayor Eric Adams — despite his manifest deficiencies — on a law-and-order platform, and Buffalo, N.Y., reelected its mayor as a write-in candidate by 19 points over the socialist to whom he had lost in the Democratic primary. In 2022, San Francisco recalled three progressive members of its Board of Education by lopsided margins, then recalled its progressive DA.

Survey findings tell the same broad story. A Marist poll this year revealed that 57 percent of Latinos surveyed are in favor of deporting all illegal immigrants. A Pew poll showed that 75 percent of Black respondents and 85 percent of Latinos are in favor of voter ID laws. After the Supreme Court banned affirmative action in college admissions, Gallup found that 52 percent of Black and 68 percent of Latino adults supported the decision. Another Pew poll, consistent with earlier findings, showed that only 4 percent of Latinos use “Latinx,” and that of those who have heard of the term, the vast majority reject it. And then there are perhaps the most important data points of all. Donald Trump increased his support among Black, Latino, and Asian voters from 2016 to 2020, then increased it again from 2020 to 2024 (he also got a majority of the Native American vote). The light was blinking. Now it’s solid red.

Over the last 10 years or so, a cultural revolution has been imposed on this country from the top down. Its ideas originated in the academy, and it’s been carried out of the academy by elite-educated activists and journalists and academics. (As has been said, we’re all on campus now.) Its agenda includes decriminalization or nonprosecution of property and drug crimes and, ultimately, the abolition of police and prisons; open borders, effectively if not explicitly; the suppression of speech that is judged to be harmful to disadvantaged groups; “affirmative” care for gender-dysphoric youth (puberty blockers followed by cross-sex hormones followed, in some cases, by mastectomies) and the inclusion of natal males in girls’ and women’s sports; and the replacement of equality by equity — of equal opportunity for individuals by equal outcomes for designated demographic groups — as the goal of social policy.

It insists that the state is evil, that the nuclear family is evil, that something called “whiteness” is evil, that the sex binary, which is core to human biology, is a social construct. It is responsible for the DEI regimes, the training and minders and guidelines, that have blighted American workplaces, including academic ones. It has promulgated an ever-shifting array of rebarbative neologisms whose purpose often seems to be no more than its own enforcement: POC (now BIPOC), AAPI (now AANHPI), LGBTQ (now LGBTQIA2S+), “pregnant people,” “menstruators,” “front hole,” “chest feeding,” and, yes, “Latinx.” It is joyless, vengeful, and tyrannical. It is purist and totalistic. It demands affirmative, continuous, and enthusiastic consent.

People are fed up, and I don’t just mean people who voted for Trump. A few days after the election, I was listening to The Brian Lehrer Show on New York Public Radio, which was broadcasting one of those endless postmortems that the media has been conducting, when another listener called in. She identified herself as Black, a Berkeley grad, “super liberal,” and a resident of Brownsville, a largely Black neighborhood. Referring to the burden that the influx of asylum-seekers has placed on the city’s resources and therefore on people’s lives (“I’m talking about Black people here, at the lower end of the economic spectrum”), and how you weren’t supposed to talk about it, how if you did talk about it you were accused of being racist, how you weren’t even supposed to notice it, how people were being asked “to engage in a cognitive dissonance that is literally not possible,” she finally said, with beautiful succinctness, “When did liberalism mean no common sense?” It’s clear that many Democrats have been wondering the same thing.

How did things get to this pass? And how did the academy, the school and citadel and engine of this revolution, become so desperately out of touch with reality, including the reality of people’s lives outside the liberal elite, their needs and beliefs and experiences? One answer is that academics tend to live inside a bubble. They socialize with other academics; far more than used to be the case, they marry other academics; and, of course, they work with other academics. When groups whose members are broadly similar in outlook are isolated from external influences, two things happen: Their opinions become more homogeneous, and their opinions become more extreme. Which is exactly what’s been taking place in the academy in recent decades. The ratio of liberals to conservatives has soared, and more of those who identify as left identify as far left. And both of those trends are more pronounced in the fields and institutions that are leading the revolution: the humanities, the social sciences exclusive of economics, the “studies” programs and departments, the schools of education and social work, the elite universities, and the liberal-arts colleges.

The reason that these disciplines can drift so far from reality is that they are not answerable to reality.

Those fields have another thing in common: They are intellectually corrupt. You know what I’m talking about. Any fool idea passes muster, no matter how preposterous, as long as it conforms to prevailing theoretical trends and preferred ideological positions. Nobody wants to make waves: to speak up at a conference, to undermine a colleague or colleague’s student, to invite examination of their own research. Data is massaged; texts are squeezed or bound and gagged. Jargon helps to paper over cracks in logic; countervailing evidence is tucked under the cushions. Standards are ignored to the point where no one can even recall what they are anymore. It’s no wonder that the social sciences are suffering a replication crisis. In the humanities, there is no crisis, because there is no replication to begin with, no factual claims to reproduce, only “readings,” “interventions,” “Theory.”

The reason that these disciplines can drift so far from reality is that they are not answerable to reality. If an engineer miscalculates an equation, the building falls down. But what would accountability to reality even mean in the humanities, given that their findings are never applied? It’s not like there are going to be consequences for saying something stupid about Shakespeare. In the social sciences, and, less often, in the hybrid “studies” fields, findings are applied, but it isn’t clear that there’s much of a feedback loop there either. How many hypotheses in psychology have been abandoned because they led to bad educational policy? How many gender-studies scholars have rethought their suppositions in the face of the calamity of gender youth medicine? The more a field becomes beholden to theory, or Theory, the further it floats away from empirical observation and therefore correction. The enterprise becomes entirely self-referential, words built on words, a kind of intellectual Ponzi scheme.

So how are academics going to respond to their political repudiation? One alternative — the likeliest one — will be to stay the course. The people have spoken, but the people are wrong. They’ve been misinformed and disinformed. They are victims of false consciousness, too benighted to understand their own interests. They are racist, sexist, xenophobic, yearning for a strongman. The attitude reminds me of the few American Communists who were still around when I was young — scientifically certain of everything as they headed ineluctably toward political extinction.

But academics have another option. They can entertain the possibility that they’ve been wrong, about a lot of things and for a long time. They can consider that the notion that Harris lost because of racism and sexism is belied by the fact that we have already elected a Black president; that Harris received a larger share of the white vote than Joe Biden; that a female presidential candidate has already won the popular vote; that the nation, far from distrusting women with executive office, has elected 44 female governors in 31 states; that 16 of those governors have been Republicans, which means that most Republicans supported them; that those states include not only blue or purple ones but Alabama, Arkansas, Nebraska, Oklahoma, South Carolina, and South Dakota; that Kansas and Texas have actually elected Democratic women governors; and that while there are surely people in this country who wouldn’t vote for a woman or nonwhite presidential candidate, they also surely wouldn’t vote for any Democrat. That Harris lost for other reasons altogether.

Trump is appalling, evil, criminal. But the worse he is, the worse the liberal elite must be, if so many prefer him to them.

They might further consider that the majority of Black, Latino, and Asian Americans do not share their politics or ideology; that the people who speak for those communities in elite liberal spaces — not only colleges and universities but the media, the arts, the nonprofits — share the politics and points of view not of those communities but of other liberal elites and therefore do not, in the simplest and most important sense, represent them; that progressives have been promulgating policies in the names of those communities that they reject — for Blacks, police defunding and abolition; for Latinos, lax immigration and border enforcement — and that they reject them for good reasons. That identity is not a very useful way of understanding people’s motivations.

Finally, they might consider that to say that certain people “vote against their interests” is not only condescending but wrong. People know what their interests are. They know it much better than you do. Their interests are the same as everybody else’s: public safety, economic security and opportunity, and on top of that a little dignity, a little respect. And while Trump is hardly likely to advance those goals, the 80 percent of the country that lies below the upper middle class is perfectly justified in doubting whether the Democratic Party, and the elites that run and influence it, will do so either, because for decades they have not. Yes, Trump is appalling, evil, criminal. But the worse he is, the worse the liberal elite must be, if so many prefer him to them.

Ten years ago, I published a book, Excellent Sheep, that argued that the meritocratic elite, which includes the professoriate as well as the academy’s administrative class, had become self-serving, self-perpetuating, and, as leaders of our most important institutions, incompetent. It had lost its authority. It had lost its legitimacy. The time had come for it to step aside in favor of a new, more democratic dispensation. Nine months after the book came out, the rough beast glided down his gilded escalator. A few months after that, a wild-haired septuagenarian socialist almost single-handedly destroyed the Clinton-Obama establishment. One would think the message would’ve been received by now. The message is you failed. Sit down, be humble, and listen and learn.

[demani-dusk]

This is a post a friend made on a different platform, asking people to copy+paste. I'm keeping the censored words censored, frankly because I'm lazy, even though I know tumblr works differently. Anyway, I think it's important:

Hi friends (in the USA)! Please call your representatives, especially the ones listed in this post, and ask them to vote NO on HR 9495. As you know, I usually shy away from legislative and electoral politics. This one is really important, though, and has a huge impact on ALL kinds of organizing.

Q: What is HR 9495?

A: HR 9495 would grant the executive branch of the United States the power to universally revoke the tax-exempt status of organizations (such as nonprofits, universities, and news outlets) by designating them as supporting t-rrorists. For many tax-exempt organizations, this would lead to shutdown. It would also give the Executive Branch more leverage over universities.

Q: But isn't t-rrorism bad?

A: The bill allows the revoking of tax-exempt status without due process. In other words, any organization that the executive branch decides it doesn't like could be designated as t-rrorist.

Q: Why does my Democratic representative support this?

A: Many Democrats support this because they've been on the receiving end of protest campaigns around their position on Palestine, or because they are sympathetic to the suppression of pro-Palestine protesters. If passed, this bill would give more leverage to suppress student speech at universities. For example, a university that has an official student group calling for ceasefire could be threatened with having its tax-exempt status revoked unless it shuts the student group down.

Q: I'm an anarchist/communist/socialist. Why should I call my representative? Isn't this some Eduard Bernstein shit? What's next, are you gonna tell me to join the DSA?

A: State repression sucks, and this bill is aimed specifically at reducing the ability to organize outside of electoral politics. In Atlanta, we've seen targeted attacks on nonprofits that support protesters, including the state of Georgia passing legislation banning bail funds! In other words, nonprofits can no longer bail out protesters whose bond is set at $650,000 in retaliation for protesting! This stuff is really bad and sometimes "by any means necessary" includes *shudder* calling your congressional representative.

Democrat Reps who voted ‘Yes’ on HR 9495 during 2/3 vote and who need to be urged to vote NO:

Colin Allred (D-TX), Nikki Budzinski (D-IL), Yadira Caraveo (D-CO), Ed Case (D-HI), Kathy Castor (D-FL), Jim Costa (D-CA), Angie Craig (D-MN), Henry Cuellar (D-TX), Sharice Davids (D-KS), Valerie Foushee Davis (D-NC), Debbie Dingell (D-MI), Lois Frankel (D-FL), Jared Golden (D-ME), Vicente Gonzalez (D-TX), Josh Gottheimer (D-NJ), Josh Harder (D-CA), Jahana Hayes (D-CT), Steny Hoyer (D-MD), Marcy Kaptur (D-OH), Greg Landsman (D-OH), Susie Lee (D-NV), Mike Levin (D-CA), Kathy Manning (D-NC), Lucy McBath (D-GA), Grace Meng (D-NY), Gwen Moore (D-WI), Jared Moskowitz (D-FL), Frank Mrvan (D-IN), Donald Norcross (D-NJ), Frank Pallone (D-NJ), Jimmy Panetta (D-CA), Chris Pappas (D-NH), Marie Gluesenkamp Perez (D-WA), Pat Ryan (D-NY), Adam Schiff (D-CA), Brad Schneider (D-IL), Hillary Scholten (D-MI), Kim Schrier (D-WA), Brad Sherman (D-CA), Elissa Slotkin (D-MI), Eric Sorensen (D-IL), Greg Stanton (D-AZ), Haley Stevens (D-MI), Marilyn Strickland (D-WA), Tom Suozzi (D-NY), Emilia Sykes (D-OH), Shri Thanedar (D-MI), Norma Torres (D-CA), Ritchie Torres (D-NY), Juan Vargas (D-CA), Gabe Vasquez (D-NM), and Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-FL).

[qqueenofhades]

You know what’s fun on election night? Living in a city where the elected mayor is ALREADY A FELON where the primary was thrown out in court because of video evidence of ballot stuffing so you had to vote for someone who may not actually win the election and now your primary is happening AFTER the actual election. Who is gonna be my mayor? Who the fuck knows!

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/04/nyregion/bridgeport-connecticut-mayor-election.html

Look, I know this is technically not New York, but also: New York, what the hell are you doing? Eric Adams is literally insane, you elected George Santos, you blew a number of winnable races that probably gave the Republicans the House, and now these shenanigans? Y'all need to just sit down and think really hard about your life choices. Mmmkay.

[beardedmrbean]

Newly released body camera footage contradicts claims made by New York City Councilman Yusef Salaam, one of the infamous Central Park Five, regarding a recent traffic stop.

The incident, which occurred Friday night, prompted Salaam to accuse the police of racial bias and lack of transparency.

Salaam, who was on his way to dinner with his wife and four children, was pulled over for having overly tinted windows. The brief encounter, captured on the officer’s body cam, lasted less than a minute and concluded with Salaam being released after identifying himself as a councilman.

Despite the video evidence indicating a routine traffic stop, Salaam criticized the officer for not explicitly stating the reason for the stop.

“This experience only amplified the importance of transparency for all police investigative stops, because the lack of transparency allows racial profiling and unconstitutional stops of all types to occur and often go underreported,” Salaam, a Democrat, said in a statement.

NYC Mayor Eric Adams commended the officers involved, emphasizing the professionalism, courtesy and effective communication displayed during the incident. The New York Police Department later confirmed that Salaam was also in violation of state law for driving a vehicle with out-of-state plates and excessively tinted windows.

The police stop in New York City on Friday casts a renewed light on a police transparency bill, called the How Many Stops Act, a proposal Salaam supports that City Council members are set to vote on Tuesday to override Mayor Eric Adams’ veto.

It would require officers to publicly report on all investigative stops, including relatively low-level encounters with civilians. Despite being invited for a ride-along by Adams to showcase the bill’s potential negative impact, Salaam declined, citing the recent traffic stop as a reason.

Officers are not required to give a reason for a stop, but Salaam said the police should have done so voluntarily.

City Council Member Sandy Nurse said she was on a video call with Salaam and other people when he was pulled over. Nurse said she heard Salaam ask the officer for the reason for the stop, and none was given.

Marc Claxton, a former NYPD detective and director of the Black Law Enforcement Alliance, echoed the mayor’s sentiments, praising the professionalism exhibited by both the officer and Salaam during the encounter. Claxton emphasized that in the absence of the ongoing legislative context, the incident would likely have gone unnoticed, resembling routine stops that occur regularly in the city.

The New York City Benevolent Association president, Patrick Hender, called for an apology from Salaam and other elected officials who had criticized the police officers involved. Claxton, however, expressed doubt that an apology would be forthcoming, stating that the incident was a routine and professional interaction with no grounds for personal grievances.

In an interview, Salaam denied using his title to evade a ticket. He explained that he was in the process of transferring the registration of his vehicle from Georgia to New York. Despite moving back to New York in December 2022, Salaam still maintains ownership of a home in Georgia and has family residing there.

He expressed unawareness that his tinted windows, permissible in Georgia, violated regulations in New York City. Salaam asserted that had he received a ticket or warning, he would have promptly addressed the issue and had the tinted windows replaced.

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

Democrats stand united as McCarthy is ousted.

October 4, 2023

ROBERT B. HUBBELL

Kevin McCarthy was removed as Speaker of the House on a motion to vacate the chair—a first in our nation’s history. The unprecedented nature of the vote speaks to McCarthy’s unique unfitness, lack of moral character, and ever-present mendacity, as well as to the collapse of the Republican Party. The small margin by which McCarthy lost—eight votes—conceals the deeper division revealed by the defection of 90 Republicans on Saturday’s continuing resolution to fund the government.

          McCarthy proved his unique unfitness to serve as Speaker when he made a pilgrimage to Mar-a-Lago to kiss Trump's ring on January 28, 2021—three weeks after Trump incited the assault on the Capitol.

          McCarthy proved his lack of moral character when he voted to oust Liz Cheney from his Republican leadership team for standing up to Trump's treason.

          McCarthy proved his venality when he promised to remove Adam Schiff and Eric Swalwell from the House Intelligence Committee to gain votes for the Speakership.

          McCarthy proved his untrustworthiness when he empowered a GOP representative to negotiate terms for a joint commission to investigate the events of January 6. When the GOP representative got everything Republicans wanted, McCarthy walked away from the agreement, forcing Democrats to form a special committee without Republicans (except for Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger).

          McCarthy proved his lack of integrity when he granted Tucker Carlson exclusive access to surveillance tapes from inside the Capitol on January 6.  

McCarthy proved his duplicity when he said that a vote was necessary to open an impeachment inquiry and then opened an impeachment inquiry of President Biden without an authorizing vote.

          McCarthy proved his mendacity when he lied to the American people and President Biden about his commitment to funding levels in the 2023-24 budget when making a deal to raise the debt ceiling in May.

          Ultimately, McCarthy lost the Speakership because he had lied to everyone—friend and foe alike. No one trusted him. He will forever be a “double asterisk” in the history books—a speaker who was elected after fifteen contentious rounds of voting and the first speaker in our nation’s history to be removed on a motion to vacate. McCarthy deserves the humiliation and opprobrium attached to the inglorious end of his ignominious political career.

          But the House Republican caucus also lost on Tuesday. It does not have a governable majority. (It never did.) Despite ridding itself of McCarthy, the House GOP remains hostage to the extremist elements in the caucus, a fact that bodes ill for any effort to pass a budget or keep the government open— let alone pass legislation to advance the interests of the American people.

          The “Party of No” has entered a permanent Twilight Zone in which its sole reason for existence is opposition, its only unifying principle is grievance, and its lone tactic is chaos.

          It does not matter who Republicans elect as Speaker; the next Speaker will be controlled by eight Republicans who managed to oust McCarthy. Until Republicans acknowledge they do not have a functional majority and must reach out to Democrats to create a governing coalition, every Republican Speaker will be a temporary occupant of the office.

          Republicans will go through the motions of electing a speaker capable of governing their caucus. They will fail. In the meantime, Democrats maintained unity and discipline throughout the chaotic tenure of Kevin McCarthy. That is a hopeful sign for future Democratic control of Congress. The most important lesson of McCarthy’s loss on Tuesday is that the only path forward is through the Democratic Party. Tell a friend!

Coda.

          When the motion to vacate passed, GOP Rep. Patrick McHenry was appointed as acting Speaker under protocols relating to “continuation of government” in the event of a disaster.

          Rep. McHenry will likely occupy the “acting” role for ten days (or less) and has little authority other than ensuring the election of the next speaker. But Rep. McHenry’s first act was to order Speaker Emerita Nancy Pelosi to vacate her private “hideaway” office in the Capitol by Wednesday (a day when Pelosi will be at memorial services for the late Senator Dianne Feinstein. See Politico, McHenry ordered Pelosi to leave her Capitol hideaway office by Wednesday.

          Although the reason for Rep. McHenry’s communication is unclear, it appears that he wants to claim Nancy Pelosi’s office for himself. Per Politico, the email to Nancy Pelosi said:

“Please vacate the space tomorrow, the room will be re-keyed,” wrote a top aide on the Republican-controlled House Administration Committee. The room was being reassigned by the acting speaker “for speaker office use,” the email said.

          Rep. McHenry’s insulting first act is an inauspicious start to the post-McCarthy interregnum. Let’s hope that someone tells Rep. McHenry that evicting Nancy Pelosi from her private office while she is attending a funeral is a bad look.