My most "against type" opinion as a Bluesky liberal is that I think Ross Douthat is a pretty good opinion writer.
Why is everybody talking about Jimmy Carter this morning?
Optimistic in the short term, pessimistic in the medium term, optimistic in the long term, pessimistic in the very long term.
Has anyone considered that Trump's drive to conquer Persia is actually a desire to emulate Alexander the Great?
God, we're doing Sparta discourse again. Maybe just let them rest in peace rather than dragging them out for the culture wars.
Has anyone blamed Mamdani for Marvel Comics leaving New York?
Have any fundies called out Trump on this daylight savings time thing? Isn't the Antichrist supposed to change the times and seasons?
Today I discovered that Havarti and a slice of fresh pineapple makes a decent sandwich.
I don't have much good to say about the late Senator from South Carolina, but I will say he always struck me as a guy it would be fun to have a conversation with after a few drinks.
PG Wodehouse Roger Zelazny Ruth Rendell JGA Pocock Donald Westlake
uosdɯᴉS ɐuɐꓷ 🦄@danacorn.bsky.social · 4w ago5 authors who died while you were alive who you've read five books by each Ursula LeGuin Chaim Potok Kurt Vonnegut Tony Hillerman Douglas Adams
C J Cherryh Lawrence Block Margaret Jacob Alan Moore Jane Smiley
Noah Berlatsky@nberlat.bsky.social · 4w agofive living writers that you've read five books by each Rita Dove Tasha Suri Courtney Milan Grant Morrison Tom Perrotta
Was this the face that launched a thousand posts, and burnt the topless towers of X (formerly Twitter)?
Pwnallthethings@pwnallthethings.bsky.social · 4w agoThat Lupita Nyong’o’s looks have made some of the most powerful men go completely insane and fight over her inclusion in this movie only goes to prove that Nolan casting her was absolutely correct bsky.app/profile/dail...
@manchesterup.bsky.social is having a half off sale, so if anyone wants to pick up my book with them now's the time: manchesteruniversitypress.co.uk/9780719081279/
Manchester University Press - An age of wonders
An age of wonders - Browse and buy the Paperback edition of An age of wonders by William Burns
manchesteruniversitypress.co.uk
Wishing a very happy Fourth of July to the people of France, Spain, Holland and Mysore.
The ultimate resistance to Trump 2 is not the Democrats, or the liberals or the immigrants, but physical reality. The warming world, bird flu, the stuff you can't bullshit your way around or intimidate.
I am really beginning to despise the standard open access journal model. The contempt for scholarship in making people pay to get published isn't progressive. It's just another step in exalting the customer at the expense of the worker.
It's interesting how the kids's "ask the old people where they were during 9/11" has replaced my generation's "ask the old people where they were when they heard about the Kennedy assassination."
Pendulum has swung a little far in this direction, I think. The rejection of Copernicanism by the Church was a major reason why scientific leadership migrated to France and Protestant Europe in the late seventeenth century.
Adam Rutherford@adamrutherford.bsky.social · last mo.Very little. The Holy See is (adjusted for inflation) the single biggest funder of astronomical research in history. As for Galileo, he was found guilty of suspicion of heresy, spent one day in gaol, and the rest of his life living in a palace, and continued to publish heliocentrism around Europe.
Happy Juneteenth holiday to my American followers. It looks to be the most enduring legacy of the Biden Administration.
Given the fiasco of the Iran war, I'm hearing a lot less "on to Ankara!" stuff these days, an unalloyed good.
#RIPCarloGinzburg I've assigned Night Battles many times in Ren/Ref or early modern surveys.
Five favorite books that didn't make the Guardian 100 in no particular order: The Way we Live Now (Trollope) Mr. Sponge's Sporting Tour (Surtees) Joy in the Morning (Wodehouse) Neuromancer (Gibson) Rasselas (Johnson)
Mariadele Boccardi@mariadele.bsky.social · 2mo agoFive favourite books that didn't make the Guardian 100 in no particular order: The Ambassadors (Henry James) Cold Comfort Farm (Stella Gibbon) The Shooting Party (Isabel Colgate) Voss (Patrick White) Les Mémoirs d'Hadrien (Marguerite Yourcenar)
Nowadays the voice tells you that Guys are Not Supposed to Read
Micah@rincewind.run · 2mo agowhen I was a teenager I would devour every romance subplot I could find, and "the genre that's literally just the romance subplot" seems like an obvious fit! but there was still a voice in my head telling me that Guys Were Not Supposed To Read Romance you gotta tell that voice to shut up
Ted Cruz looking forward to being only the second creepiest US Senator from Texas.
I think websites have just generally gotten worse. It's getting impossible to pay some of my bills online because I just get trapped in circles that don't take me where I need to go.
The key advantage of Chicago is that it's so big the rest of the state can't screw with it as much.
Ken@tcbullfrog.bsky.social · 2mo agoChicago needs to be evaluated before just declaring a winner Most of Illinois hates Chicago heavily because Chicago actually is big enough to big time the rest of the state