My hottest take: Law enforcement should be more terrified of unnecessarily or accidentally taking someone’s life than of risking their own. That is the table stakes of the job, and what makes it very hard & extremely serious.
Megan Garcia
@thatmegangarcia.bsky.social
Professionally, I work to make our cities better. Sactown ➡️ NYC ➡️ SF I ❤️ cities, pop culture, prestige TV, crap TV, dogs, well-researched podcasts, dumb jokes, smart jokes, & being curious. Will eat the rest of that if you’re not going to finish it.
“The wrong ICE is melting, the wrong Amazon is burning.” (Written on the back of a frozen pizza box)
An utterly wild system, we’re just guinea pigs for however long it takes to realize the bad shit, and then on top of that how long it takes for political leaders to agree the bad shit is bad. And with the last 30 years of tech we still haven’t really caught up.
Something that I didn’t understand as a child but is really wild as an adult, is that so many advances in technology get thrown out into the market essentially unregulated until we see what they f**k up & the damages caused and then laws try to catch up.
Oh my god, PREACH! Yell this at everyone Peter!
Peter@notalawyer.bsky.social · 2y agoDemocrats will often look at something that doesn’t poll well and think “oh no, better move away from that!” but they’re getting their role backwards. parties influence public opinion. if you’re purely reactive, you’re just letting the GOP frame every debate.
Democrats will often look at something that doesn’t poll well and think “oh no, better move away from that!” but they’re getting their role backwards. parties influence public opinion. if you’re purely reactive, you’re just letting the GOP frame every debate.
Peter@notalawyer.bsky.social · 2y agothe lesson of the election isn’t “we should give up on trans rights,” it’s that the GOP took an issue that negatively impacted almost no one and made it a headliner. why would it help to surrender on an issue if they can create a grievance from thin air?
Sharing again my starter pack of amazing, smart, funny female voices, and added a few new one. This list is full of current and soon to be faves. (Confidential to Men: if you’d like to follow more women on social this is a great place to start.) go.bsky.app/7X5PS9R
They wanted Cuomo to win and now they want to make Mamdani a failure
BirdDroneOne@birddroneone.bsky.social · 10mo agoNYT returns to character assassination. Note the framing, which implies Mandani targeted Israel exec orders when in fact, it was all orders after Adam’s was hopelessly compromised by indictment and bending a knee to the Trump admin. www.nytimes.com/2026/01/02/n...
Outstanding piece from @billmckibben.bsky.social today that gives hope that we have the technology and the means to stop fighting over oil. https://billmckibben.substack.com/p/just-possibly-its-the-oil
International law won't constrain Trump's thirst for oil. But every solar panel that goes up makes crude reserves that much less valuable billmckibben.substack.com/p/just-possi...
Just possibly it's the oil?
A solar panel is the new peace sign
billmckibben.substack.com
Amazing, helpful, insightful work here by @chrisgeidner.bsky.social:
Chris Geidner@chrisgeidner.bsky.social · 2y agoOK, I wrote my “who’s going to enforce it?” piece. It’s a lengthy read, trying to respond to a lot of questions I’ve gotten over the past three weeks, but it’s about democracy so I decided it was worth it to lay out in depth, with examples, what I’ve been talking about here and elsewhere.
Yeah yeah he’s cringe but can you imagine being dumb enough to fall for this shit? Like oh sure the worlds richest man with billions in government contracts is saying that disability payments are the real scam, he seems legit lol
Matt Novak@paleofuture.bsky.social · 2y agoThe man currently destroying the U.S. government has changed his name on Twitter to Harry Bolz
BBC tested a bunch of chatbots used as news source: - 51% have issues with answers - 19% fabricate fake statistics / info - 13% fabricate fake quotes or alter them This is exactly what you expect from a random word blender being used as a source of information. www.bbc.co.uk/aboutthebbc/...
To vote in the election to defeat Eric Adams you must register in the Democratic Party in NYC before Valentine’s Day vote.nyc/page/party-a...
Party Affiliation | NYC Board of Elections
Am I Registered? The voter registration form contains a section where you can indicate your choice for party affiliation. The following parties are recognized in New York State:
vote.nyc
southpaw@nycsouthpaw.bsky.social · 2y agoEric Adams sold out this city to get the Trumps to fix his personal problem, simple as that.
I think some people hear “grants” and think that without them, scientists and government workers just have less stuff to play with at work. But grants fund salaries for students, academics, researchers, and people who work in all areas of public service. “Pausing” grants means people don’t eat.
White House pauses all federal grants, sparking confusion
The Trump administration has put a hold on all federal financial grants and loans, affecting tens of billions of dollars in payments.
washingtonpost.com
Ah, I missed Lisa Murkowski’s and Susan Collin’s performative “no” votes only when the Rs have enough votes to pass… and then when they don’t, hem and haw and signal no but then fall in line at the last minute. Feels like a throwback, some things don’t change!
Been listening to the American Hysteria back catalog and am currently circa 2021, which is kind of a trip in current context! But, just finished listening to the lovely interview with @marawilson.bsky.social, and snagged her book on audible. Excited to listen to it.
Being a YIMBY means getting regularly accused of trying to complete the Bay Area’s transformation into a tech bro playground, but tbh a big part of the reason why I want more housing here is to RESIST creeping homogenization. I need rent to get cheaper so I can hang out with more weird artists.
You know who believes in climate change...house insurance companies
My theory is that Trump activated the bigotries even of the marginalized groups he threatened, against other marginalized groups he also threatened. So white women voted their racism, minority men voted their misogyny, older immigrants voted against newer ones, everyone voted their transphobia, etc.
Most succinct fact-check I've read of how LA Fire Dept's budget wasn't recently cut -- in fact, the opposite -- from @politico.com. But that misinformation spread anyway. www.politico.com/news/2025/01...
When we see narratives that blame the most vulnerable people for problems caused by the most powerful, I think it’s important to remember that this viral spread of misinfo is a more pervasive version of what the powerful have always done to defend themselves, with tech they steered in this direction
I’m in Japan right now so I’m obliged to remind the world — we don’t want AI. We want a robust rail system. We want trains. Metros. High speed. Locals. Cute trains. Efficient trains. Trains.
This is not some “new” Zuck. For two years I was one of a small group of civil rights leaders who regularly pressed Zuckerberg to deal w/disinformation, hate speech, voter suppression & Trump incitement on the platform. Myanmar had already happened so we knew the danger of unfettered speech.
The end of the road for me was Kenosha. Facebook had an explicit policy against posting “calls to arms.” A rightwing militia group posted a flyer literally called “a call to arms.” Kyle Rittenhouse took up arms, traveled to Kenosha & killed two men. www.forbes.com/sites/alison...
Zuckerberg Admits Facebook ‘Mistake’ In Leaving Up Kenosha Guard ‘Call To Arms’
The Facebook CEO said the moderation team dedicated to militia groups “didn’t pick this up” when initially reviewing the page.
forbes.com
Nah, it was dumb as balls. Congress relabeled French fries "freedom fries" because they were mad at France for not joining the war. The justification for attacking Iraq was that they had aluminum tubes. The war had a slogan and the slogan was "Let's Roll!"
Starfire’s Deranged Neocon Foreign Policy Podcast@irhottakes.bsky.social · 2y agoThere was a sort of tragic grandeur to the War on Terror that the Trump years lack, I think. There’s only so much you can make out artistically of a country shitting itself in a Walmart to own the libs on a national scale.
I grew up in Nor Cal and literally every time I’m in the Donner or Tahoe area I’m blown away by truly what world class level beauty it all is. Like people travel from all over the world to visit and they absolutely should it is not overrated.
Sheera Frenkel@sheeraf.bsky.social · 2y agoIt snowed all night in Tahoe and this is the view over Donner Lake. I grew up here, but I still can’t get over how pretty California is.
