Oh, it's worse than that, not just a Yankee, a western Yankee transplanted to North Carolina.
It's hard right now. In one hand I hold tight to the beauty of this world, of what I can see and the emotional beauty that carries my soul, but I also have a mighty angst to get into some good trouble.
At 68 I'm back working full time, grateful I can, and yet angry that I have to because my government is now ruled by fascists put in power by hateful racists and women-haters. So here I stand ready to battle any trump supporters with an axe. It's fight or chew gum and I'm all outta fucking gum.
The above is a video shared by smrchildsadness on Twitter, showing a person participating in a pride parade exchanging a pride flag with a person standing on his (am using his pronoun based on the TikToks/Tweets of what happened) doorway who had a Portuguese flag. There are sounds of cheers and crying and the two people hug each other as they exchange the flags. The man at the doorway then waved kisses to the crowd within the pride parade.
The Tweet says: "NO YOU DONT UNDERSTAND HE WAS WAVING THE PORTUGUESE FLAG BECAUSE HE DIDN'T HAVE A PRIDE FLAG AND THEY TRADED FLAGS AND HE'S SO EMOTIONAL TO GET HIS OWN PRIDE FLAG I'M EMOTIONALLY RUINED"
For context, apparently they were worried that maybe he's a nationalist because he was waving the Portuguese flag and some nationalists opposing the pride march were waving that flag. But upon interacting with him, it turns out he didn't have have a pride flag and he wanted to wave *a* flag in support of the pride march. So they had an exchange and now he has his own pride flag đđ„č.
The image above is a Tweet by kunwara_ladkaa that says "I'm crying so much right now (Image taken by Manuel Fernando AraĂșjo/Lusa)". The image shows the same man from the pride parade crying as he hugs his new pride flag.
The above image is a Tweet by dudz_zZzz that says "ainda nĂŁo parei de pensar nele," which according to Google translate from Portuguese to English is "I still haven't stopped thinking about him." The image is a drawing of the person from the pride parade, crying as he hugs his new pride flag.
Such a loss & at such an age too. She will be remembered fondly.
This quote of hers will never not be relevant:
âIf I have one message to give to the secular American people, itâs that the world is not divided into countries. The world is not divided between East and West. You are American, I am Iranian, we donât know each other, but we talk together and we understand each other perfectly. The difference between you and your government is much bigger than the difference between you and me. And the difference between me and my government is much bigger than the difference between me and you. And our governments are very much the same.â
Satrapi's autobiographical novel was born from her experiences of Iran's Islamic revolution and war with Iraq.
French-Iranian author and film director Marjane Satrapi has died at the age of 56.
Best known for her autobiographical graphic novel Persepolis, which she later directed as a film, Satrapiâs passing was announced on Thursday by French â President Emmanuel Macronâs office.
Her family said in a statement sent to the AFP news agency that Satrapi had died of âsadnessâ a little over a year after the death of her husband, Mattias Ripa.
Macron paid tribute to the author and said âher passing marks the loss of a leading figure in French culture and an artist devoted to freedom, whose work carried a universal message and earned her immense international renownâ.
The dissident writer and illustrator, born in 1969 in Rasht in northern Iran, was from a long line of Iranian aristocrats. In 1983, her parents â politically active Marxists who participated in demonstrations against the shah â sent her to Austria to finish her studies as the 1979 Iranian revolution brought Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini to power, along with growing religious fundamentalism.
She returned home due to homesickness and attended the University of Tehran, obtaining a degree in visual communications, which would lay the foundation for her artistic path, before leaving once more in 1994 for France.
She remained in her adopted country for much of her life, but remained deeply connected to her Iranian roots through her work.
Female agency, Western prejudice
Her black-and-white autobiographical novel, which first came out in 2000, would be born from the experiences of her life, most notably Iranâs Islamic revolution and the fallout of its war with Iraq.
The coming-of-age story weaves together boys, booze and punk rock, while its monochromatic illustrations draw readers into the authorâs world and the strong narrative breathing life into every page.
Some critics praised the balance of geopolitical trauma, gallows humour and personal family history, and the way the book pushes aside stereotypes of Iran by illustrating female agency.
Others accused her of reinforcing Western prejudices about Islam and Iran.
The film delves into her life about growing up a strong-willed young girl of intellectual parents.
âI come from a country where a woman is worth half a man,â she told US entertainment outlet Variety in 2007. âI never thought I had one leg less just because I was a woman.â
Persepolis was later adapted into a film, which gained widespread praise, and was nominated for best animated feature at the 2008 Academy Awards. It won the Cannes Jury Prize in 2007 and the Cesar award for Best First Film.
âWhat we wanted to say is, if these people scare you, look closer: they have parents, they have lovers, they have hope, they have stories,â she told AFP in an interview in 2007 at Cannes.
She went on to work on more films including Chicken with Plums, The Voices, which starred actor Ryan Reynolds, and Radioactive, starring Rosamund Pike as scientist Marie Curie.
In 2024, she was offered Franceâs highest award, the Legion of Honour, but refused to accept it as she felt France hadnât done enough to support the Iranian people fighting for democracy.
âSupporting the womenâs revolution in Iran cannot be reduced to photos or speeches,â she wrote in a January 2025 letter to French authorities. âWhen people are fighting for democracy, we should support them.â
 Opened the parade with Dykes on Bikes, riding through thousands of people flying our own  little fuck you to  the military recruiters at SF pride this year.Â
this 65lb dog is sitting in my lap, and by the way she's no trouble at all. We did not actively seek her, certain entities conspired to bring us together.
I am writing early Tuesday evening before most primary results have been announced. But there are three major stories to be addressed.
First, to no oneâs surprise, the Roberts Court overruled a three-judge panelâs finding of legislative discriminatory intent and gave Alabama the green light to implement a last-minute racially gerrymandered map that eliminated one of two majority Black districts in Alabama. See The Hill, Supreme Court clears way for Alabama Republicans to use congressional map for midterms.
In an unsigned âshadow docketâ order, the reactionary majority said that Alabama wasâlikely to succeed on the meritsâ when the Supreme Court considers the entire recordâa remarkable statement given that a three-judge panel made extensive factual findings that the Alabama legislature was motivated by racial discrimination in violation of the US Constitution and the Voting Rights Act.
The decision plumbed new depths of racist depravity by John Roberts, Samuel Alito, Clarence Thomas, Neil Gorsuch, Amy Coney Barrett, and Brett Kavanaugh. They are racists acting to advance the white supremacist goals of the Confederacy. It is not any more complicated than that. We should not pretend otherwise to avoid hurt feelings or to perpetuate disingenuous notions of propriety that serve only to protect genteel racists.
The decision was especially cynical because this Supreme Court previously ruled three years ago that the Alabama legislature acted with discriminatory intent to deny Black voters representation guaranteed by the Voting Rights Act. Three years later, the reactionary majority ignored its prior finding of discriminatory intent and the subsequent finding of the three-judge panel that the new map was motivated by racial animus.
But it gets worse. The pillar of the reactionary majorityâs ruling was that the three-judge panel refused to grant the legislature a âpresumption of good faithâ in drafting its maps. But the Alabama legislature twice refused to comply with federal court orders to draw a second majority-Black district. Having twice flouted federal court orders to end discrimination, the Supreme Court finds that the Alabama legislature will likely prevail because the three-judge panel did not extend a presumption of good faith to the legislature!
Of course, we should not look for logic or consistency in the reactionary majorityâs opinion. They chose a sideâwhite supremacyâand did what was needed for white supremacy to prevail.
Those are blunt words chosen deliberatelyâbecause they frame the challenge we will face when we win a trifecta in 2028. Will we have the honesty and courage to acknowledge that reforming the Supreme Court is not enough? If we are to reclaim the full citizenship of Black Americans (after Callais) and women (after Dobbs), reforming the Court is not enough.
We must strip the Court to the barest constitutional minimum and rebuild it anew. It must be substantially larger (e.g., the size of the 9th Circuit at 27 judges), the justicesâ terms must be limited by age and length of service; the justices must be subject to mandatory ethics and disqualification rules enforced by someone other than the justices; the Courtâs ability to use an opaque âshadow docketâ with no appellate record must be eliminated; the justices cannot accept gifts, gratuities, book contracts, bribes, subsidies, or vacations masquerading as speaking appearances; and the use of the law clerk program as a breeding ground for political extremists must come to an end.
There are many more good ideas. We must focus on those ideas that can be implemented immediately with a majority vote in Congressâexpansion of the Court, term limits based on age, mandatory ethics and disqualification codes enforced by someone other than the justices.
I understand that many readers will be anxious and outraged by the Supreme Courtâs elimination of yet another Black majority district in the South. If there is any consolation, it is that the efforts of Democrats to push back against Republican mid-census redistricting have limited the damage.
As Stephen Wolf (@stephenwolf.bsky.social) noted, of the 16 seats that Republicans affected by mid-census gerrymandering, the median âshiftâ in the political lean in those districts was from R+3.1 to R+4.9âfor a median shift of 1.8 percentage points.
While that additional advantage is unfair, Democrats can overcome an additional Republican 1.8-percentage-point cushion in a wave election. Indeed, at the moment, the Democratic lead in the âgenericâ congressional ballot is D+7. FiftyPlusOne - Generic Ballot Polls and Average for 2026.
In short, the Supreme Courtâs decision was despicable, but we can overcome the damage by showing up in record numbers. Thatâs the plan. Letâs stick to it.
Trump appoints political hack to most important intelligence position in the administration.
After the terrorist attacks on 9/11, Congress and the â9/11 Commissionâ concluded that lack of coordination among US intelligence agencies missed some of the clues that might have prevented the tragedy. As a result, Congress created the position of Director of National Intelligence, whose primary functions are to serve as the head of the 18-agency Intelligence Community, coordinate and integrate the intelligence gathered, and serve as the Presidentâs principal intelligence advisor.
The clear intent of Congress was to create a position that would rise above inter-agency rivalries within the intelligence community and deliver objective, non-political intelligence assessments to the President. See generally, Congressional Research Service, Intelligence Reform After Five Years: The Role of the Director of National Intelligence (DNI).
Trump broke with the model of the independent Director of National Intelligence (DNI) by appointing Tulsi Gabbard, who was unqualified in terms of experience and temperament. She proved her unfitness by supervising Trumpâs effort to impugn the results of the 2020 election. She famously oversaw the FBIâs raid to seize ballots in Fulton County, Georgia. Far from serving as a neutral advisor to the president, Gabbard became part of Trumpâs revenge tour.
Finding someone less qualified than Tulsi Gabbard was a difficult task, but Trump exceeded everyoneâs low expectations by appointing political hack and hatchet man Bill Pulte.
Pulte has no experience in intelligence. He is a money manager who spent the last sixteen months abusing his position as head of the Federal Housing Finance Agency, where he mined confidential mortgage information to help Trump attack his political enemies. See The Hill, GAO confirms investigation into FHFA Director Bill Pulte. (âPulte has abused his position by scouring databases at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac â two government-sponsored enterprises â for the private mortgage records of several prominent Democrats. He then used those records to concoct fanciful allegations of mortgage fraud.â)
The nomination of Pulte has been met with a sharp, collective intake of breath in both parties. His primary qualification is unquestioning loyalty to Trump. See WSJ, Why the President Tapped âLittle Trumpâ as His Intelligence Chief. (Gift article, accessible to all.)
Per the WSJ,
Pulte has no known national security experience, but he has something Trump values above all else: loyalty. In conversations with the president, Pulte made the case that he would be an unyielding advocate for the presidentâs foreign policy agenda and he signaled support for the war in Iran, according to people familiar with the matter.
Pulte is a danger to all Americans. It would be better to have the DNI role filled by a doorstop than by Pulte. A doorstop would do nothing, but Pulte will use the full force of the intelligence community to attack Trumpâs political enemies and support his delusional war of choice in Iran. Pulte will further undermine the credibility and professionalism of the intelligence communityâvital to US national security.
Worse, Pulte is currently under investigation by the GAO for possible unlawful or criminal conduct involving the misuse of confidential information collected by a federal agency that was then used to target Trumpâs political agencies. Having the nationâs top intelligence officer under investigation for possible criminal conduct is ludicrous. See CNN, Government Accountability Office launches probe into Bill Pulte over mortgage-fraud referrals.
According to the WSJ article above, Republican leaders believe Pulte is unqualified. As an acting DNI, Pulte can serve for 250 days without Senate confirmation. Senate Republicans can force Trump to remove Pulte by simply refusing to vote for any of Trump's legislation or nominees until he removes Pulte and replaces him with a doorstop, or with someone or something with better qualifications.
CBS fires Scott Pelley for exhibiting backbone
Bari Weiss is acting as David Ellisonâs surrogate in reshaping CBS into a network made in Trumpâs image. Over the last several months, Weiss has decimated leadership at CBS 60 Minutes. Last week, Weiss fired the latest round of 60 Minutes leadership and correspondents. She then hired Nick Bilton, a former New York Times tech columnist and Vanity Fair writer with no broadcast TV experience, to serve as Executive Producer of 60 Minutes.
On Monday, Pelley grilled Bilton at his introductory staff meeting about the firings. According to audio of the meeting obtained by Status and confirmed by NBC News, Pelley said Weiss, who was not present, âis murdering 60 Minutes. She does not love this place. She was brought in to kill it, and sheâs been doing exactly that.â
Pelley also said that Weiss has âno qualifications for her jobâ and Bilton has âslender qualificationsâ for his. Staff applauded Pelley on his way out.
Bilton fired Pelley on Tuesday in a letter that spoke mainly to Biltonâs hurt feelings. Pelley issued a blistering response that accused Bari Weiss and others of serious ethical violations.
Pelley wrote, in part,
Last month, 60 Minutes lost its DNA when our entire senior leadership and two of our best on-air correspondents were cruelly fired without cause. Good people were silenced because they stood up for our audience. They stood for fairness against the forces of political bias; they stood for professionalism against chaos.
For my part, new management has instructed me to inject falsehoods and bias into a politically sensitive story. Iâve been told to include assertions that are unverified. To date, in every case, I have managed to ignore these instructions or refuse them. Recently, politicians have been invited to choose correspondents for interviews on the broadcast. Giving politicians control over 60 Minutes interviews is not how this is done. Finally, incompetence and unprofessionalism in the new management have wreaked havoc. In a case involving one of my stories, the entire program came within 19 minutes of not getting on the air at all.
See full statement at Deadline, Scott Pelley Reacts To â60 Minutesâ Firing: âWaste Is Heartbreakingâ.
The jewel in the crown of CBS has been taken over by Trump minions intent on protecting the benefactor. If Pelleyâs charges are true, and we have no reason to doubt them, nothing CBS News reports can be trusted. Sadly, that puts CBS in the company of several other leading media companies that have been taken over by Trump-friendly billionaires.
Hopefully, Scott Pelley will find a new platform that allows him to continue speaking the truth. The era of âWalter-Cronkite-trusted-news-servicesâ is over. We must become active, discerning consumers of the news.
Letâs hope that Bari Weissâs flameout at CBS is spectacular and soon. Perhaps a phoenix can rise from the ashes of a once great news organization if it becomes an unprofitable albatross that no longer amuses the Ellisons or Trump and is sold to the highest bidder.
Concluding Thoughts
Election results are coming in more slowly than expected for Tuesdayâs primaries, so I will write about them tomorrow. There are encouraging signs, and disaster was averted in California. Either Xavier Becerra or Tom Steyer will finish in the top two, thereby qualifying for the general election. California will have a Democratic governor in place for the 2028 presidential election.
The Supreme Court decision was a blow, but also a moment of moral clarity. They have dropped all pretense of complying with the rule of law; they are playing hardball, for keeps. We must do the same as we restore the Constitution and honor the rule of law. But letâs stop pretending that the Court is salvageable or that MAGA cultists will change their minds if only we will listen to their imagined grievances.
Millions of Americans are suffering and have real grievances that must be addressed by a government that is interested in their welfare rather than merely perpetuating the power of the ruling elite.
We are on the cusp of a historic wave election. It will not appear unbidden. We must will it into existence through hard work, fearless determination, and stubborn refusal to surrender to anxieties or exhaustion.
Victory is within the margin of effort. And we can control the amount of effort poured into the 2026 and 2028 elections by tens of millions of dedicated Americans who are already on the front lines. Keep up the good work, and keep the faith! We will win. It is just a matter of time.
this! worth the reading. We, people who have the human capacity to care about humanity and the planet as a whole are more than those who have not these things. Don't give in to despair.
ellievsbear
vaporwave
kianamaiart
germansingergirl
romaincrisis
