Katie Skeen, PhD
@skeen.bsky.social
Cold-eyed warm-hearted editor researcher mother radical optimist. 🩷NYChicagoDublinPhiladelphia🩷 I was on Jeopardy! the week that Alex Trebek shaved off his mustache.
We don’t talk enough about Ray Bradbury beyond Fahrenheit 451 so consider this a Ray Bradbury Appreciation Day post
Adam Rawnsley@arawnsley.bsky.social · 2d agoToday, August 4, 2026, is the setting of Ray Bradbury’s short story “There Will Come Soft Rains” about a fully automated house continuing on after the family who lived there and the world around it died in a nuclear blast.
I can’t believe we’re doing another cycle of pretending to have a deal with Iran. This is so stupid.
Shouldn’t be shocked at any lie RFK Jr tells, but he whined to Dana Bash that businesses were shut down during the pandemic “with no just compensation.” There was an almost trillion dollar PPP loan program, and his organization got millions from it, none of it paid back, to make payroll.
This is a story about the President and several of his hand-picked appointees all committing crimes and blatantly lying to the public while stealing public funds and abusing the criminal justice system, but the NYTimes describes the situation like they're recapping a soap opera.
Larry Glickman@larryglickman.bsky.social · 4d agoAnother example of the problem with the fixation with Trump’s putative emotions: here a story about the Trump administration’s corruption, incompetence, and venality is framed as one about Trump’s “wrath.” www.nytimes.com/2026/08/01/u...
He dumped water we needed in LA to fight the Palisades wildfires into the Central Valley just to fuck us over and it wasted water they needed for the grow season. No one remembers this either. It's insane.
Stephen Judkins@stephenjudkins.bsky.social · 4d agoIt's pretty infuriating that Trump is denying disaster aid to Oregon for political reasons and I have barely heard anything about it, while Biden was falsely accused of doing the exact same thing to North Carolina and millions of people believed that
I was glad to see a handful of Quakers protesting on a corner today with pro-immigrant signs, but . . . a handful of Quakers feels like not enough to meet the current moment. 🔔 #WHATAREWEDOING
Studio version now available to stream but I still like the original:
Katie Skeen, PhD@skeen.bsky.social · 9mo ago"Are you really living when you've got a penchant for human sacrifice?" 👏👏 for Ron Gallo singing "Peter Thiel" at today's WXPN Free at Noon concert 👏👏
A.I. thinges fall apart The data center kan not holde Olde fashioned love Ys loosed upon the worlde
What is your favorite Fats Waller song? Today, it's "Keepin' Out of Mischief Now."
Thread about an absolute real one. Please read all the alt text because it elaborates greatly on the already excellent posts.
Shooti@bambooshooti.bsky.social · 6d ago#ResistanceRoots Major General Smedley Butler was born on this day in 1881 in West Chester, Pa. One of the most decorated figures in U.S. Marine Corps history, he transformed into an anti-war activist and whistleblower. He exposed a plot by wealthy men to overthrow FDR and install a dictator. /1
Mount Holly Springs is a tiny Pa. borough - 4 cops covering 1.4 square miles, pop. 2,300 It's turned a staggering 32 immigrants over to ICE in just 4 months since teaming with the feds The cruelty of mass deportation has come to small-town America. My new column www.inquirer.com/opinion/moun...
This quaint Pa. borough is a ‘speed trap’ nabbing immigrants for ICE | Will Bunch
Police in Mount Holly Springs, a tiny borough in Central Pennsylvania, have turned over 32 immigrants to ICE since March.
inquirer.com
This is what "both sides" journalism has wrought. A complete inability for journalists to simply state clear and obvious facts that are supported by reams of research. This is not a debate. There are not two sides. Bike infrastructure and traffic calming make streets safer.
The War on Cars@thewaroncars.bsky.social · 6d agoIt's not just advocates who say this. Researchers, studies, and data say it. That's why advocates say it. Reporters can just say it, too!
See the phrase I’ve highlighted here. The New York Times gratuitously inserts it to suggest Trump is operating in the public interest when he’s obviously not. Take that phrase out and the rest of it is right.
Research that used a federal grant to pay for asthma patients to have their gas stoves replaced showed a dramatic fall in asthma attacks. The program was cut short after President Trump took office.
The EPA halted a study on gas stoves and asthma. But even partial results were striking.
Research that used a federal grant to pay for asthma patients to have their gas stoves replaced showed a dramatic fall in asthma attacks. The program was cut short after President Donald Trump took of...
washingtonpost.com
Why are we losing anti-fascists like Glen Hansard and Sinéad O'Connor instead of the fascists #makeart
If you can build a business on “How Hollywood Gets My Particular Thing Wrong”, you will never go hungry.
Glen Hansard died exactly one year after I saw him this magical night in Philadelphia with Marketa Irglova and @snacktimeofficial.bsky.social July 29, 2025
What's some good stuff to do with a 3 year old in Philadelphia on a weekday? I will not ask an LLM. Thank you
The arguments against language reclamation haven't changed much in the nearly 20 years I've been working in this field: "It costs too much." "People are choosing to abandon their languages, so let them." "They have no practical use." "It's just sentimental nostalgia." Fuck All That, a thread:
Sometimes It’s O.K. to Let a Language Die
When cultural preservation comes at the expense of speakers’ decisions, sometimes it's O.K. to let a language die.
newyorker.com
Ceasefire is one word, without a hyphen as a noun or adjective. The verb form is cease fire. Do not refer to ceasefires as peace deals or peace agreements, as that would imply a lasting resolution to the conflicts.
it is abundantly, painfully, despairingly clear that humanity has still not taken the true measure of the fast-unfolding catastrophe that is climate change the world burns, ecosystems collapse, water tables empty, oceans die, and we look elsewhere, too busy fiddling with the AC
Rudy Pirquet@rudypirquet.eurosky.social · 2w ago🔥 Notre époque en une image… Plage de Moutchic, Lacanau, sud-ouest de la France. Vacanciers à la plage entourés par les incendies, 24 juillet 2026… 📷 Maximilien Lamy #NotrePlanèteBrûle #incendies #DérèglementClimatique #climat #environnement #photography
Time for a #painting "Howth Lighthouse and Dublin Bay" was one of the dozens of paintings I did the first time I did a 24-hour livestreamed video painting marathon thing. It's an evening view of the Baily Lighthouse and across the bay as seen from high up on the Howth Cliff Walk #SpéirGhorm #ArtYear
New GAO report examines how driver blind spots endanger pedestrians and cyclists—and asks why USDOT has done nothing about it. www.gao.gov/products/gao...
