Using my First Amendment rights to see you in the streets and to say....
Folks on the left, did not give birth to or raise Tyler Robinson. We read his grandmother's quote and saw the pictures. Those explain a lot.
JD doesn't understand there's no need to LIE about what Kirk said---we can just play the footage. Vance's call for the new Stasi is working. People are being fired; students protesting for their teacher were on last night's local news. The snitches need to remember the rhyme.
Kirk was an unapologetic racist, misogynist, and Christo-fascist. We should not apologize for saying so. Many speaking up are retired, but unfortunately Miller got our bank info from Musk's DOGE thefts. They probably got our medical records, and that doesn't bode well for the trans community.
As for the memorializing, here is a good quote: "How you die does not redeem how you lived!"-Reverend Howard John Wesley. Amen. Love. Peace. Better Days.
Kirk was also something that Trump and his cult are..Bullies.
Ours is a bully culture, bullies are celebrated, and when killed mourned and martyred. The bullies victims are ignored, ridiculed or demonized.
The first case of bullying that reached the national conscious was Columbine, the the trench coat mafia were simply a couple of teenagers that had been bullied and ostracized until they couldn't take it anymore, and more have followed, but the shooting shifted the conversation to guns and gun control, not the bullying.
Some minds are fragile, you can only push them so far, until they snap. This includes work place shootings, maybe even Luigi Mangione (can't say I have sat down with him).
"Comedians" that punch down, instead of punching up are bullies, like Bill Maher,
Dave Chappelle: His Netflix special The Closer drew major criticism for jokes targeting the transgender community, prompting protests from Netflix employees and other advocacy groups.
Ricky Gervais: Known for his cutting-edge and controversial humor, Gervais has been accused of punching down with jokes about marginalized groups and even punching up by mocking a problematic celebrity.
Louis C.K.: In addition to facing multiple accusations of sexual misconduct, he has also been cited for "contrarian" and dark humor that has been described as punching down.
Andrew Dice Clay: In the 1980s and 1990s, his aggressive and often misogynistic and homophobic material became the subject of intense controversy and backlash.
Daniel Tosh: The host of Tosh 2.0 has been criticized for jokes that are intentionally racist, sexist, and homophobic.
Jeff Ross: The self-proclaimed "Roastmaster General" has built a career around insulting people, a style that some consider punching down.
Don Rickles: Known for his signature insult comedy, Rickles targeted a wide range of groups and individuals, a style that that would be scrutinized differently in the modern era.
Comedians that punch up get cancelled, Stephen Colbert and Jimmy Kimmel
Shoot one, warn a thousand.
We are way past the tipping point into an authoritarian regime. Does anyone think that our elections will be any different than Hungary's or Russia's.
Stephen Colbert and Jimmy Kimmel were about two of the only shows that I recorded and watched on DVR. Now just Colbert. I remember that showing Daniel.
From DIRECT ACTION ALERT: We’re calling for protests at all Fox affiliates throughout the country today, Saturday, September 20, 2025 at 1PM.
We will be present at the Fox affiliate in Denver (Fox 31, 100 Speer Blvd. Denver, CO 80203).
Please join a Fox Takedown event or create your own protest. We’re asking everyone to join us in protesting for freedom of speech and against the network that called for the mass murder of unhoused Americans.
Here's my remaining 2¢ - thanks to Trump's eCONomy: I will never celebrate Kirk's killing, just as I will never celebrate his life. I think that's a reasonable way to feel.
And I feel the same way about Tyler. His life is essentially all shot to hell, to be a bit sarcastic. At 22, the judgement part of his brain is not fully formed---people put guns in his hands at an early age. Think that's reasonable also.
"people put guns in his hands at an early age" - Some parents like to believe that familiarizing their children with instruments of mass death is a reasonable practice. They believe wrong. What's being accomplished is the normalizing of home/ family militarization - a disturbing trend here in America over the past 25 years.
We are quickly becoming one of those "shithole" countries these "gun families" condemn - and we're sliding that way because of "gun families". There's just so much irony.
“We hit some new lows over the weekend with the MAGA gang desperately trying to characterize this kid who murdered Charlie Kirk as anything other than one of them and doing everything they can to score political points from it.” Jimmy K.
This line was MISinterpreted by many [e.g., Bill Maher and Mr. Hartmann] as suggesting the suspect was aligned with the MAGA movement.
"... trying to characterize ... as anything other than one of them ..."
It's just a statement of fact, in my opinion.
This is about the "MAGA gang" and their finger-pointing, their knee-jerk blaming.
It is Not about what the murderer's affiliation actually was.
The irony is that MAGATs like Ted Cruz agree with you!
Cruz Likens F.C.C. Chair’s ‘Threat’ to That of a Mafia Boss
The Republican senator warned that retaliating against media outlets over coverage that conservatives view as negative would set a “dangerous” precedent.
That’s kind of crazy to go after the trans in the wake of the Charlie Kirk assassination! I mean it wasn’t a trans person who went crazy and killed Kirk- the trans partner was even cooperative in the report I heard. It was a trans boyfriend- a white cis gendered man!
My observations are that Charlie Kirk’s killer was apolitical and neither recruited, nor radicalized. The Discord app for group text, video, screen sharing, and discussions is used by gamers, not for politics. In Discord over 6 years, Tyler Robinson, an avid gamer, used the word Trump once in 2019, and the word Biden once in 2020. That is it, people. I call that apolitical. His friends said he never talked politics. Only games.
For political reasons, the Administration and the Republican Utah governor are trying very hard to paint Tyler Robinson into the left camp. The right needs that Reichstag Fire pivotal event, the root of their biases (plural).
Tyler Robinson had a grudge against homophobic Charlie Kirk. Tyler could not resolve that. Evidently Tyler Robinson’s mother said he had moved left recently. I think first, slightly to the left of Nick Fuentes, then that his mother and the Utah governor conflate bisexuality with the left.
Therein lies a problem. Many on the right are confused by God-given sexual orientations. Confused, they indiscriminately throw out chum. Bloody chum in the water brings sharks. Frenzied sharks will bite anything. That is not violence. What they bite brings to them emotionally soothing food.
There is a need for health social services to address those emotionally challenged individuals that strike out with gunshots. Instead of reaching out to help, some crazed individuals with megaphones torture them repeatedly with heteronormativity. Alex Jones. Charlie Kirk, et al.
That is not politics, that is abuse. Yes. This is systemic abuse and societal failure. Those are both fixable. Some do not want to fix. They want to exploit it to make money. I am disgusted by those making a living by bellowing insults in this type of torture chamber.
Thom, if a draft were to come back it simply must be for men AND women equally. As for "high school graduates" I can see what would happen...a lot of people would get one credit or so short of finishing, then drop out and wait a few years to complete it with a GED. Or colleges would take them as "almost" done. There may be good reasons to require some sort of public service (though last I heard the military doesn't want unwilling conscripts and a year would barely train them anyway), but we have to look a little deeper into how this would be structured, if it is even possible.
Incidentally in typical German fashion the Nazis had a detailed and complex system of badges for "undesirable" people to wear, one that went far beyond the well-known yellow star for Jews. (See https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/classification-system-in-nazi-concentration-camps). The king of Denmark said he would wear the star in solidarity with his people so perhaps if things continue those of us who oppose the current regime should start wearing symbols too. What are they going to do if millions of people show up wearing the red triangle of political opposition? In unity there is strength.
Men and women equally but with an exemption for one parent of small children. Let each family decide who that might be. Revive the conservation corps or add elder care as options. make it High school graduates or turn 18 if not actively attending full time high school. The very rich will still find a way to wiggle out of it if only by sending their children to school abroad and bringing them home at thirty five or something. But the point is we'll catch a much broader net of mixing up classes than we currently manage.
Volunteer Regular Army here. Pretty much agree. Would not appreciate conscripts---rather be on front line with someone who thought they could do the job and wanted it. The biggest incentive and leverage the services have is: you asked for it, so put up or shut up.
The pay has went up and so has the prestige because of our system. Now if we could get rid of the psychos currently running it.
"[W]hen Jimmy Kimmel said Charlie Kirk’s assassin was “MAGA” (apparently in error)." WRONG! Jimmy Kimmel did not say the assassin was or was not MAGA. He said "the MAGA gang" was doing everything it could to depict the murderer as anything other than MAGA. Read again or listen to what Kimmel said.
Trump is stupid, but he is nonetheless a ruthless megalomaniac who uses fear and loathing to generate anger against political opposition to acquire power. Gender dysphoria is due to what laymen call "birth defects." "Birth anomalies" is a less pejorative term. We do not criminalize people with Down syndrome, or autism, or who are born with an underdeveloped limb, defective heart, blind, etc. In fact, we nurture them and help them to adapt. But if you are born with ambiguous external and/or internal gender organs, our fascist president wants you to be treated as a criminal terrorist???
As a psychologist, I was trained in the late 60s that transgender people were mentally ill. Then, in the 90s, I ran across some articles by my now-friend Veronica Dranz, a biologist whose work focused on gender-related anomalies. Dr. Dranz woke me up to the fact that gender dysphoria nearly always has a biological basis. Physicians who treat these unfortunate people surgically are often removing organs to help resolve the causes of their gender dysphoria (confusion).
Less than one percent of the population is transgender. Some were born with the external genitals, and often internal organs, of both genders - hermaphrodites. Others were born with covert vestigial genitals, like being born female on the outside, but having gonads inside their labia or a penis-sized clitoris. I have a report in my library of a surgeon discovering a partially formed womb in a male patient while doing corrective abdominal surgery on another organ. The patient was clueless that "he" had a female organ until after the surgery.
The majority of transgender people with no external genital ambiguity suffer from hormone generation common to the opposite gender and/or neurotransmitters that confuse the brain. But it has taken 50 years of biological science, especially the human genome mapping project, for healthcare practitioners to discover these facts.
Sadly, modern medicine has done a lousy job of educating the public, so the vast majority of Americans still think that people suffering from gender confusion are psychotic sex perverts - unless one of their offspring was born trans. Then they are likely to woke themselves.
Thanks to the 1st Amendment, we can rewrite history fearlessly...
Here is a slightly subtle transposition of a speech of one of the greatest liars of all time...
Indeed, the idea that Trump would threaten the networks because he wants them to start criticizing him was floated by Trump himself last month: “Despite a very low popularity and, according to many, among the worst 8 months in Presidential History, ABC & NBC great NEWS, two of the best and least biased networks in history, give me 2% BAD STORIES. IF THAT IS THE CASE, THEY ARE SIMPLY AN ARM OF THE FASCIST REPUBLICAN PARTY AND SHOULD, ACCORDING TO MANY, HAVE THEIR LICENSES Re-APPROVED BY THE FCC.”
And now the news. 1. Senate rejects competing bills to fund government, increasing risk of shutdown on Oct. 1.
2. Trump suggests US troops could return to base in Afghanistan, citing its proximity to rival China
3. Zelenskiy says Ukrainian forces inflict heavy losses on Russia in counteroffensive
4. U.S. Government Is Expected to Get Multibillion-Dollar Fee in TikTok Deal
Fee would be latest example of government getting paid for involvement in private-sector deals
5. Trump adds $100,000 fee for skilled worker visa applicants
6. Sacramento man arrested in shooting at ABC10 news station, police say
7. My favorite news item is that my former boss Alex Acosta testified in secret yesterday.
“It is clear that Alex Acosta holds no remorse and does not feel, even in hindsight, that Jeffrey Epstein received a sweetheart deal,” Rep. Yassamin Ansari (D-Ariz.), told reporters on Capitol Hill.
Ansari and other panel Democrats have, alongside Republicans, been meeting behind closed doors Friday with Acosta as part of House Oversight’s Epstein investigation.
Acosta, who later served as labor secretary during President Donald Trump’s first administration, agrees to speak with lawmakers on his own volition — a departure from other witnesses who have for the past month and a half been giving depositions in compliance with Congressional subpoenas.
During a break in the Friday proceedings, Rep. Melanie Stansbury (D-N.M.) said that while Acosta said he “took responsibility” for the decision not to prosecute Epstein during the George W. Bush administration.
“But,” she added, “when asked if he had directly reviewed the evidence itself in this case, he said that he had not actually read the statements of the victims.”
“Mr. Acosta, at least to us in this deposition, essentially said he didn’t have faith in the victims, their stories and their ability to tell their own story and their own testimony,” Florida Democratic Rep. Maxwell Frost said. “It seems like Mr. Acosta really had no idea about what was going on in his own office during this investigation.”
Democrats also said Acosta on Friday evaded questioning about whether the plea deal with Epstein ever came up when he was being vetted to join the first Trump administration.
8. 'No evidence' found yet of ties between Charlie Kirk's shooting and left-wing groups, officials say by Allan Smith
Sat, September 20, 2025
9. Man Claiming to Be Charlie Kirk's 'Martyr' Allegedly Threatened to Shoot Up Gay Bar in Slain Activist's Name
Treven Michael Gokey was arrested in Arizona on a terroristic threat charge
Released from jail
10. Charlie Kirk’s memorial is scheduled for Sunday at State Farm Stadium in Glendale, Arizona. The event will include speeches from Trump, Vice President JD Vance, Erika Kirk and other administration officials. Among them:
Susie Wiles, White House chief of staff
Marco Rubio, secretary of state
Robert F. Kennedy Jr., health secretary
Pete Hegseth, defense secretary
Stephen Miller, White House deputy chief of staff
Tulsi Gabbard, director of national intelligence
Sergio Gor, director of the White House personnel office
Trump's son Donald Trump Jr. and Tucker Carlson, the conservative commentator and former Fox News host, are also among the scheduled speakers.
I note that Nick Fuentes and Laura Loomer are not included.
Joshua Runkles, 42, has been booked on charges of carrying a weapon into a prohibited place and impersonating a police officer, according to the Arizona Department of Public Safety.
Re "— Geeky Science! Do fatty foods scramble your mind? It appears so. Granted, the study was done on fruit flies, but the parts of their brains that were affected by a high-fat diet that caused memory loss are pretty identical to those in humans. The study out of Japan was published in a peer-reviewed journal and suggests that eating too much fat can lead to long-term memory loss. So much for the Atkins diet!"
There are myriad studies that "suggest" things and we jump a long line of causes and effects to come to a conclusion ... that isn't really connected. I am a retired scientist and I read "Good Calories, Bad Calories" and I was appalled at how shoddy and biased diet research has been ... and I believe still is. Our public health agencies are doing us no favors by not compiling all of the pertinent information and what it might meant, and I really mean might.
Grandma lived to be 99, stayed sharp. You don't want to think about what she ate---she didn't either, after losing everything in the depression. Human brains---60% fat and running on glucose.
The best thing I've ever read was "Overdiagnosed: Making People Sick in the Pursuit of Health" by three doctors, Welch, Schwartz, and Woloshin. They talk about research too.
"And even more amazing, NOT A SINGLE MAJOR MEDIA OUTLET has bothered to pick the story up from the Miami Post and other Florida sources. Having masked secret police disappear people — permanently, apparently — has now become “normal,” just like in Germany in the late 1930s. Welcome to Amerika."
Emphasis added - by me - because this media blackout is blatant censorship. I doubt the corporate media will ever regain trust with the American people, and I think the media know it. If I'm correct, this is extremely dangerous because it signals they are "all in" on forever being the lucrative mouthpiece of Trump, Netanyahu, Putin and other intersecting transnational crime syndicates.
If public service is to be an option, why should the requirement for a year serving the country for all high school graduates be limited to men? (For the purpose of this conversation I will stipulate that there are two genders.) I felt lucky but guilty in the 1960's when my high school classmates, male, were drafted and sent to Vietnam. One became a helicopter pilot and was shot down and killed; another was a jet pilot who was MIA. (Just sayin.) One could say that pregnant persons would be able to opt for public service in many instances.
I won a National Health Service Corps scholarship for grad school which required, after I finished my masters degree in community health nursing, that I serve in Appalachia for 2 years, at a time when few jobs in my field were available. We arrived in West Virginia with our 6 month old baby, who, it turns out, gave me credibility with my pregnant clients when I explained the benefits of breast feeding. We were able to make a significant positive impact! The experience was eye opening and powerful, and for this woman, it was truly an honor to serve.
While I agree about the draft I think it should be not men but rather everyone. And I would provide an exemption for one parent per family with small children, if that happens to be the case. Let each family decide which parent would stay with the kids. Many countries have this year of service and provide multiple options including elder care in addition to military service.
Trump's censorship bans were on those whom he thought were against him or his followers. He's been about shutting up the satirists because they get to the truth about him best.
Thom thank you for telling us about physicist Tom Campbell who wrote the book my big TOE. It has really helping me get through this craziness. And there is some free podcast of some of his interviews on Apple Podcast.
Using my First Amendment rights to see you in the streets and to say....
Folks on the left, did not give birth to or raise Tyler Robinson. We read his grandmother's quote and saw the pictures. Those explain a lot.
JD doesn't understand there's no need to LIE about what Kirk said---we can just play the footage. Vance's call for the new Stasi is working. People are being fired; students protesting for their teacher were on last night's local news. The snitches need to remember the rhyme.
Kirk was an unapologetic racist, misogynist, and Christo-fascist. We should not apologize for saying so. Many speaking up are retired, but unfortunately Miller got our bank info from Musk's DOGE thefts. They probably got our medical records, and that doesn't bode well for the trans community.
As for the memorializing, here is a good quote: "How you die does not redeem how you lived!"-Reverend Howard John Wesley. Amen. Love. Peace. Better Days.
Kirk was also something that Trump and his cult are..Bullies.
Ours is a bully culture, bullies are celebrated, and when killed mourned and martyred. The bullies victims are ignored, ridiculed or demonized.
The first case of bullying that reached the national conscious was Columbine, the the trench coat mafia were simply a couple of teenagers that had been bullied and ostracized until they couldn't take it anymore, and more have followed, but the shooting shifted the conversation to guns and gun control, not the bullying.
Some minds are fragile, you can only push them so far, until they snap. This includes work place shootings, maybe even Luigi Mangione (can't say I have sat down with him).
"Comedians" that punch down, instead of punching up are bullies, like Bill Maher,
Dave Chappelle: His Netflix special The Closer drew major criticism for jokes targeting the transgender community, prompting protests from Netflix employees and other advocacy groups.
Ricky Gervais: Known for his cutting-edge and controversial humor, Gervais has been accused of punching down with jokes about marginalized groups and even punching up by mocking a problematic celebrity.
Louis C.K.: In addition to facing multiple accusations of sexual misconduct, he has also been cited for "contrarian" and dark humor that has been described as punching down.
Andrew Dice Clay: In the 1980s and 1990s, his aggressive and often misogynistic and homophobic material became the subject of intense controversy and backlash.
Daniel Tosh: The host of Tosh 2.0 has been criticized for jokes that are intentionally racist, sexist, and homophobic.
Jeff Ross: The self-proclaimed "Roastmaster General" has built a career around insulting people, a style that some consider punching down.
Don Rickles: Known for his signature insult comedy, Rickles targeted a wide range of groups and individuals, a style that that would be scrutinized differently in the modern era.
Comedians that punch up get cancelled, Stephen Colbert and Jimmy Kimmel
Shoot one, warn a thousand.
We are way past the tipping point into an authoritarian regime. Does anyone think that our elections will be any different than Hungary's or Russia's.
A funny thing happened on the way to the White House?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3gXLdl-aj_w
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v5-xpoL280E
Stephen Colbert and Jimmy Kimmel were about two of the only shows that I recorded and watched on DVR. Now just Colbert. I remember that showing Daniel.
From DIRECT ACTION ALERT: We’re calling for protests at all Fox affiliates throughout the country today, Saturday, September 20, 2025 at 1PM.
We will be present at the Fox affiliate in Denver (Fox 31, 100 Speer Blvd. Denver, CO 80203).
Please join a Fox Takedown event or create your own protest. We’re asking everyone to join us in protesting for freedom of speech and against the network that called for the mass murder of unhoused Americans.
In solidarity, The American Opposition Team
https://www.americanopposition.org/?ss_source=sscampaigns&ss_campaign_id=68cdbee852111b28766a92e8&ss_email_id=68cdc18021ccdc171d2d417b&ss_campaign_name=Direct+Action+Alert%3A+Fox+News+Protests+on+9%2F20&ss_campaign_sent_date=2025-09-19T20%3A48%3A09Z
Here's my remaining 2¢ - thanks to Trump's eCONomy: I will never celebrate Kirk's killing, just as I will never celebrate his life. I think that's a reasonable way to feel.
And I feel the same way about Tyler. His life is essentially all shot to hell, to be a bit sarcastic. At 22, the judgement part of his brain is not fully formed---people put guns in his hands at an early age. Think that's reasonable also.
Well, that's two of us.
"people put guns in his hands at an early age" - Some parents like to believe that familiarizing their children with instruments of mass death is a reasonable practice. They believe wrong. What's being accomplished is the normalizing of home/ family militarization - a disturbing trend here in America over the past 25 years.
We are quickly becoming one of those "shithole" countries these "gun families" condemn - and we're sliding that way because of "gun families". There's just so much irony.
“We hit some new lows over the weekend with the MAGA gang desperately trying to characterize this kid who murdered Charlie Kirk as anything other than one of them and doing everything they can to score political points from it.” Jimmy K.
This line was MISinterpreted by many [e.g., Bill Maher and Mr. Hartmann] as suggesting the suspect was aligned with the MAGA movement.
"... trying to characterize ... as anything other than one of them ..."
It's just a statement of fact, in my opinion.
This is about the "MAGA gang" and their finger-pointing, their knee-jerk blaming.
It is Not about what the murderer's affiliation actually was.
Only the shooter knows, and he's not cooperating.
The irony is that MAGATs like Ted Cruz agree with you!
Cruz Likens F.C.C. Chair’s ‘Threat’ to That of a Mafia Boss
The Republican senator warned that retaliating against media outlets over coverage that conservatives view as negative would set a “dangerous” precedent.
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/09/19/us/politics/ted-cruz-fcc-abc-jimmy-kimmel.html
Cruz is a kind of broken clock. But, instead of being right twice a day, he's right once a 6-year term
That’s kind of crazy to go after the trans in the wake of the Charlie Kirk assassination! I mean it wasn’t a trans person who went crazy and killed Kirk- the trans partner was even cooperative in the report I heard. It was a trans boyfriend- a white cis gendered man!
My observations are that Charlie Kirk’s killer was apolitical and neither recruited, nor radicalized. The Discord app for group text, video, screen sharing, and discussions is used by gamers, not for politics. In Discord over 6 years, Tyler Robinson, an avid gamer, used the word Trump once in 2019, and the word Biden once in 2020. That is it, people. I call that apolitical. His friends said he never talked politics. Only games.
For political reasons, the Administration and the Republican Utah governor are trying very hard to paint Tyler Robinson into the left camp. The right needs that Reichstag Fire pivotal event, the root of their biases (plural).
Tyler Robinson had a grudge against homophobic Charlie Kirk. Tyler could not resolve that. Evidently Tyler Robinson’s mother said he had moved left recently. I think first, slightly to the left of Nick Fuentes, then that his mother and the Utah governor conflate bisexuality with the left.
Therein lies a problem. Many on the right are confused by God-given sexual orientations. Confused, they indiscriminately throw out chum. Bloody chum in the water brings sharks. Frenzied sharks will bite anything. That is not violence. What they bite brings to them emotionally soothing food.
There is a need for health social services to address those emotionally challenged individuals that strike out with gunshots. Instead of reaching out to help, some crazed individuals with megaphones torture them repeatedly with heteronormativity. Alex Jones. Charlie Kirk, et al.
That is not politics, that is abuse. Yes. This is systemic abuse and societal failure. Those are both fixable. Some do not want to fix. They want to exploit it to make money. I am disgusted by those making a living by bellowing insults in this type of torture chamber.
https://hotbuttons.substack.com/p/bloody-chum?r=3m1bs
I think we should stop saying this is Trump, and start saying this is Republicans.
This is the representation they want. It's either what they they stand for or what they are afraid to stand against.
It is the Republicans who have saddled us with this, after trying to to overthrow the government and put him in power by force, four years ago.
I like you're bearing
Your*
Thom, if a draft were to come back it simply must be for men AND women equally. As for "high school graduates" I can see what would happen...a lot of people would get one credit or so short of finishing, then drop out and wait a few years to complete it with a GED. Or colleges would take them as "almost" done. There may be good reasons to require some sort of public service (though last I heard the military doesn't want unwilling conscripts and a year would barely train them anyway), but we have to look a little deeper into how this would be structured, if it is even possible.
Incidentally in typical German fashion the Nazis had a detailed and complex system of badges for "undesirable" people to wear, one that went far beyond the well-known yellow star for Jews. (See https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/classification-system-in-nazi-concentration-camps). The king of Denmark said he would wear the star in solidarity with his people so perhaps if things continue those of us who oppose the current regime should start wearing symbols too. What are they going to do if millions of people show up wearing the red triangle of political opposition? In unity there is strength.
Men and women equally but with an exemption for one parent of small children. Let each family decide who that might be. Revive the conservation corps or add elder care as options. make it High school graduates or turn 18 if not actively attending full time high school. The very rich will still find a way to wiggle out of it if only by sending their children to school abroad and bringing them home at thirty five or something. But the point is we'll catch a much broader net of mixing up classes than we currently manage.
Volunteer Regular Army here. Pretty much agree. Would not appreciate conscripts---rather be on front line with someone who thought they could do the job and wanted it. The biggest incentive and leverage the services have is: you asked for it, so put up or shut up.
The pay has went up and so has the prestige because of our system. Now if we could get rid of the psychos currently running it.
"[W]hen Jimmy Kimmel said Charlie Kirk’s assassin was “MAGA” (apparently in error)." WRONG! Jimmy Kimmel did not say the assassin was or was not MAGA. He said "the MAGA gang" was doing everything it could to depict the murderer as anything other than MAGA. Read again or listen to what Kimmel said.
Trump is stupid, but he is nonetheless a ruthless megalomaniac who uses fear and loathing to generate anger against political opposition to acquire power. Gender dysphoria is due to what laymen call "birth defects." "Birth anomalies" is a less pejorative term. We do not criminalize people with Down syndrome, or autism, or who are born with an underdeveloped limb, defective heart, blind, etc. In fact, we nurture them and help them to adapt. But if you are born with ambiguous external and/or internal gender organs, our fascist president wants you to be treated as a criminal terrorist???
As a psychologist, I was trained in the late 60s that transgender people were mentally ill. Then, in the 90s, I ran across some articles by my now-friend Veronica Dranz, a biologist whose work focused on gender-related anomalies. Dr. Dranz woke me up to the fact that gender dysphoria nearly always has a biological basis. Physicians who treat these unfortunate people surgically are often removing organs to help resolve the causes of their gender dysphoria (confusion).
Less than one percent of the population is transgender. Some were born with the external genitals, and often internal organs, of both genders - hermaphrodites. Others were born with covert vestigial genitals, like being born female on the outside, but having gonads inside their labia or a penis-sized clitoris. I have a report in my library of a surgeon discovering a partially formed womb in a male patient while doing corrective abdominal surgery on another organ. The patient was clueless that "he" had a female organ until after the surgery.
The majority of transgender people with no external genital ambiguity suffer from hormone generation common to the opposite gender and/or neurotransmitters that confuse the brain. But it has taken 50 years of biological science, especially the human genome mapping project, for healthcare practitioners to discover these facts.
Sadly, modern medicine has done a lousy job of educating the public, so the vast majority of Americans still think that people suffering from gender confusion are psychotic sex perverts - unless one of their offspring was born trans. Then they are likely to woke themselves.
Thanks to the 1st Amendment, we can rewrite history fearlessly...
Here is a slightly subtle transposition of a speech of one of the greatest liars of all time...
Indeed, the idea that Trump would threaten the networks because he wants them to start criticizing him was floated by Trump himself last month: “Despite a very low popularity and, according to many, among the worst 8 months in Presidential History, ABC & NBC great NEWS, two of the best and least biased networks in history, give me 2% BAD STORIES. IF THAT IS THE CASE, THEY ARE SIMPLY AN ARM OF THE FASCIST REPUBLICAN PARTY AND SHOULD, ACCORDING TO MANY, HAVE THEIR LICENSES Re-APPROVED BY THE FCC.”
And now the news. 1. Senate rejects competing bills to fund government, increasing risk of shutdown on Oct. 1.
2. Trump suggests US troops could return to base in Afghanistan, citing its proximity to rival China
3. Zelenskiy says Ukrainian forces inflict heavy losses on Russia in counteroffensive
4. U.S. Government Is Expected to Get Multibillion-Dollar Fee in TikTok Deal
Fee would be latest example of government getting paid for involvement in private-sector deals
5. Trump adds $100,000 fee for skilled worker visa applicants
6. Sacramento man arrested in shooting at ABC10 news station, police say
7. My favorite news item is that my former boss Alex Acosta testified in secret yesterday.
“It is clear that Alex Acosta holds no remorse and does not feel, even in hindsight, that Jeffrey Epstein received a sweetheart deal,” Rep. Yassamin Ansari (D-Ariz.), told reporters on Capitol Hill.
Ansari and other panel Democrats have, alongside Republicans, been meeting behind closed doors Friday with Acosta as part of House Oversight’s Epstein investigation.
Acosta, who later served as labor secretary during President Donald Trump’s first administration, agrees to speak with lawmakers on his own volition — a departure from other witnesses who have for the past month and a half been giving depositions in compliance with Congressional subpoenas.
During a break in the Friday proceedings, Rep. Melanie Stansbury (D-N.M.) said that while Acosta said he “took responsibility” for the decision not to prosecute Epstein during the George W. Bush administration.
“But,” she added, “when asked if he had directly reviewed the evidence itself in this case, he said that he had not actually read the statements of the victims.”
“Mr. Acosta, at least to us in this deposition, essentially said he didn’t have faith in the victims, their stories and their ability to tell their own story and their own testimony,” Florida Democratic Rep. Maxwell Frost said. “It seems like Mr. Acosta really had no idea about what was going on in his own office during this investigation.”
Democrats also said Acosta on Friday evaded questioning about whether the plea deal with Epstein ever came up when he was being vetted to join the first Trump administration.
https://www.politico.com/live-updates/2025/09/19/congress/acostas-epstein-interview-00573415
8. 'No evidence' found yet of ties between Charlie Kirk's shooting and left-wing groups, officials say by Allan Smith
Sat, September 20, 2025
9. Man Claiming to Be Charlie Kirk's 'Martyr' Allegedly Threatened to Shoot Up Gay Bar in Slain Activist's Name
Treven Michael Gokey was arrested in Arizona on a terroristic threat charge
Released from jail
10. Charlie Kirk’s memorial is scheduled for Sunday at State Farm Stadium in Glendale, Arizona. The event will include speeches from Trump, Vice President JD Vance, Erika Kirk and other administration officials. Among them:
Susie Wiles, White House chief of staff
Marco Rubio, secretary of state
Robert F. Kennedy Jr., health secretary
Pete Hegseth, defense secretary
Stephen Miller, White House deputy chief of staff
Tulsi Gabbard, director of national intelligence
Sergio Gor, director of the White House personnel office
Trump's son Donald Trump Jr. and Tucker Carlson, the conservative commentator and former Fox News host, are also among the scheduled speakers.
I note that Nick Fuentes and Laura Loomer are not included.
Joshua Runkles, 42, has been booked on charges of carrying a weapon into a prohibited place and impersonating a police officer, according to the Arizona Department of Public Safety.
Re "— Geeky Science! Do fatty foods scramble your mind? It appears so. Granted, the study was done on fruit flies, but the parts of their brains that were affected by a high-fat diet that caused memory loss are pretty identical to those in humans. The study out of Japan was published in a peer-reviewed journal and suggests that eating too much fat can lead to long-term memory loss. So much for the Atkins diet!"
There are myriad studies that "suggest" things and we jump a long line of causes and effects to come to a conclusion ... that isn't really connected. I am a retired scientist and I read "Good Calories, Bad Calories" and I was appalled at how shoddy and biased diet research has been ... and I believe still is. Our public health agencies are doing us no favors by not compiling all of the pertinent information and what it might meant, and I really mean might.
Thanks Steve.
Grandma lived to be 99, stayed sharp. You don't want to think about what she ate---she didn't either, after losing everything in the depression. Human brains---60% fat and running on glucose.
The best thing I've ever read was "Overdiagnosed: Making People Sick in the Pursuit of Health" by three doctors, Welch, Schwartz, and Woloshin. They talk about research too.
Chronic colitis precludes a fatty diet.
"And even more amazing, NOT A SINGLE MAJOR MEDIA OUTLET has bothered to pick the story up from the Miami Post and other Florida sources. Having masked secret police disappear people — permanently, apparently — has now become “normal,” just like in Germany in the late 1930s. Welcome to Amerika."
Emphasis added - by me - because this media blackout is blatant censorship. I doubt the corporate media will ever regain trust with the American people, and I think the media know it. If I'm correct, this is extremely dangerous because it signals they are "all in" on forever being the lucrative mouthpiece of Trump, Netanyahu, Putin and other intersecting transnational crime syndicates.
Bingo! They are forming the biggest syndicate in history to shake down everyone not on the inside. Give me an: F-A-S-C-I-S-T-S
If public service is to be an option, why should the requirement for a year serving the country for all high school graduates be limited to men? (For the purpose of this conversation I will stipulate that there are two genders.) I felt lucky but guilty in the 1960's when my high school classmates, male, were drafted and sent to Vietnam. One became a helicopter pilot and was shot down and killed; another was a jet pilot who was MIA. (Just sayin.) One could say that pregnant persons would be able to opt for public service in many instances.
I won a National Health Service Corps scholarship for grad school which required, after I finished my masters degree in community health nursing, that I serve in Appalachia for 2 years, at a time when few jobs in my field were available. We arrived in West Virginia with our 6 month old baby, who, it turns out, gave me credibility with my pregnant clients when I explained the benefits of breast feeding. We were able to make a significant positive impact! The experience was eye opening and powerful, and for this woman, it was truly an honor to serve.
You are the nurse we all hope to get when we need one, MaryPat!
Fuck trump. Fuck fascism. No pasaran
While I agree about the draft I think it should be not men but rather everyone. And I would provide an exemption for one parent per family with small children, if that happens to be the case. Let each family decide which parent would stay with the kids. Many countries have this year of service and provide multiple options including elder care in addition to military service.
Trump's censorship bans were on those whom he thought were against him or his followers. He's been about shutting up the satirists because they get to the truth about him best.
Thom thank you for telling us about physicist Tom Campbell who wrote the book my big TOE. It has really helping me get through this craziness. And there is some free podcast of some of his interviews on Apple Podcast.