The Beatles released their greatest album 60 years ago today
Stop Calling Me Frank
@stopcallingmefrank.bsky.social
Working up a fever in a one-horse town. Somerville garage-punk-pub-rock band on Rum Bar Records. The music stuff is the band’s; the politics, crap takes, & lit crit mumbo-jumbo are mine. https://stopcallingmefrank.bandcamp.com/track/olly-oxen-free
The Trump admin has weakened the fed system for detecting & countering foreign election threats, leaving states largely on their own for the first time since 2016. Now Patel is cozying up to countries that def don’t share American interests, months before the 2026 midterms. That’s not a coincidence.
I’m one of those people who also believe that most things — with a number of Significant Exceptions we all know — have gotten a lot better in the last three decades. Here’s another one: TV. Even mid TV shows today have the visual/production/performance quality of Major Motion Pictures in the 80s.
John Pfaff@johnpfaff.bsky.social · 4h agoForty years ago, in 1986, NYC suffered over 1,600 homicides. Homicides would peak at over 2,200 a few years later. There were 305 in 2025.
Iran Is Lying Secretly And Is Willing To Surrender Unilaterally And Let America Destroy It And Impose Pax Israelica Onto The Region Vs No It Is Not.
Iran demands what it demanded four months ago, more news at ten
FinTwitter@fintwitter.bsky.social · 24h agoIRAN HAS SIGNALED IT IS WILLING TO REOPEN THE STRAIT OF HORMUZ BUT IS DEMANDING THE RIGHT TO COLLECT TRANSIT FEES, SECURITY GUARANTEES AGAINST FUTURE ATTACKS, AN END TO THE U.S. NAVAL BLOCKADE AND RELIEF FROM U.S. OIL SANCTIONS. - WSJ
How baffling that they refuse to pretend to have lost a war that they have actually won. www.nytimes.com/2026/08/04/u...
An Angry Trump Struggles to Understand Iran’s Defiant Leaders
Iran’s leaders have perplexed several American presidents, perhaps none more than President Trump.
nytimes.com
Oh for the love of all that is holy...
Aaron Rupar@atrupar.com · yesterdayCornyn: "There's nothing we could do to rein in the president"
Republicans love pushing vocational-only education instead of comprehensive-education because they want a healthy supply of low-cost servants and less competition for the professional and boss jobs they want their own kids to have.
Seth Cotlar@sethcotlar.bsky.social · yesterdayIn a college sociology class in the late 1980s I was assigned a Marxist analysis of education that argued that the US education system is designed primarily to produce efficient workers for the labor market. And now Trump’s Department of Education is just tweeting it out.
Folks look at you like you're crazy when you say we're in the midst of the worst, most unprecedented Article I constitutional crisis in American history, & then it's Tuesday.
Aaron Rupar@atrupar.com · yesterdayCornyn: "There's nothing we could do to rein in the president"
👇🎯
Jack Nicholson: Forget It, Jake. Chinatown.
ALT: Jack Nicholson: Forget It, Jake. Chinatown.
static.klipy.com
Stop Calling Me Frank@stopcallingmefrank.bsky.social · yesterdayI always wonder about the Bluesky bubble assumption, which is never explained: What new ideas circulate on X that I haven’t considered? What good-faith arguments or claims on X do I need to address? What unfamiliar but relevant topics are discussed on X that aren’t discussed here?
As his confirmation to lead the Justice Department hung by a thread last week, acting Attorney General Todd Blanche told faith leaders on a private call that he was preparing to take action to roll back abortion access nationwide. www.politico.com/news/2026/08...
Blanche assures anti-abortion supporters that Dobbs will be ‘permanent in every single state’
The acting attorney general made the remarks during a private call with faith leaders.
politico.com
NEW: The Trump administration's recent banning of a data privacy protection technique that the Census Bureau used for decades has delayed the release of one-year estimates from the American Community Survey, which many local community leaders and researchers rely on www.census.gov/newsroom/pre...
Someone needs to answer this. 🤷♀️
Thranduil's Patient Wait in The Hobbit
Alt: Thranduil's Patient Wait in The Hobbit
static.klipy.com
Stop Calling Me Frank@stopcallingmefrank.bsky.social · yesterdayI always wonder about the Bluesky bubble assumption, which is never explained: What new ideas circulate on X that I haven’t considered? What good-faith arguments or claims on X do I need to address? What unfamiliar but relevant topics are discussed on X that aren’t discussed here?
RFK, Jr. urges us to hashtag “live real life” while posting pictures of himself skippering his sailboat off the Kennedy compound.
Benny Johnson wanted to rename the Strait of Hormuz after America in March. By July he says Iran controlling it does not bother him one bit. Same energy from Higbie and Knowles, all quietly walking back the forever war they cheered for months. MAGA media discovers consequences.
The growing MAGA media despondency over the Iran war quagmire
mediamatters.org
Iran has now gobbled up nearly all U.S. ATACMS and PrSM ballistic missiles, plus half of Tomahawk cruise missiles and a very considerable share of the THAAD and Patriot interceptors, sources tell @reuters.com’s Erin Banco, Jonathan Landay, and Michael Stone. www.reuters.com/world/us-has...
EXCLUSIVE: US has used 'virtually all' of its long-range precision missiles during Iran war, sources say
The U.S. Army has used up much of its stockpile of highly accurate long-range missiles during its five-month war with Iran, according to three people familiar with the data, raising concerns about the...
reuters.com
It was this one, and, yes, I do believe that was an All In first.
Everywhere should be a hostile place for Republicans. They should not be able to find a friend anywhere. They should lose all their professional and familial relationships. They should be blocked from signing up to social media platforms, clubs, and yard sales. They should be ejected from fairs.
Just remembered I’ve this on my calendar for the better part of a decade. Happy Dying Smart House day to all who celebrate.
Aaron Meyers@aaronmeyers.bsky.social · yesterday"Today is August 4, 2026" There Will Come Soft Rains By: Ray Bradbury
Gonna make my 2027 goal to get my ass kicked by Jonah Hill
Dan of the Year@downwithdan.bsky.social · 2d agoHe will never understand that being "the fat guy from Superbad" is infinitely better than being "the martial arts chud nobody likes"
Bluesky oldheads will remember that brief period of time when the conservative trolls tried to storm the place and were flummoxed by the idea they would have to organically grow an audience and that someone who didn't want to talk to them could nuke every interaction they ever had from orbit
www.dailykos.com/stories/2026...
‘Platner on steroids’: GOP scrambles to contain domestic abuse scandal
On Sunday, Ohio Republican Rep. Max Miller went live on camera to deny the horrifying domestic abuse allegations levied by his ex-wife, saying that her accusations are false because she returned to…
dailykos.com
Hot new verb of attribution just dropped
The dirty trees sounds like a real, not at all made up problem from a man whose mind totally works.
Aaron Rupar@atrupar.com · 2d agoTrump: "Look at the blue cities. What do they have in common? They're all dirty. They're filthy dirty. Their streets are dirty. Their streets smell. Their storefronts are broken. Their trees are all gross. Everything about the place is dirty. It's really all of them."
At least one Wall Street bro is hopeful about the future. 🙏🏻
Denny Carter@dennycarter.bsky.social · 2d agoheard an interview recently with an anonmyous wall street bro who said his employer would not subscribe to the president's truth social insider trading scheme because they did not want to go to prison when the rule of law returns