My browser history, minus the porn — 8/31

expunged once weekly,
usually on Sundays

The inversion of American values

Excerpt: What Trump is doing follows a clear pattern that any serious student of authoritarianism would recognize: declare emergencies that don’t exist, militarize responses to civilian problems, target political opponents, normalize federal military presence in domestic settings, and use military deployment to intimidate broader opposition.

Crime rates are at historic lows in most American cities, but Trump claims unprecedented lawlessness requiring military intervention. Notice that the cities being targeted—Chicago, Los Angeles, New York—are all led by Democratic officials who oppose Trump’s policies. This isn’t about crime; it’s about punishing political opposition.

Inside the USAID fire sale

Excerpt: One of the more surreal knock-on effects of the gutting of USAID is that the U.S. government is now holding a massive fire sale for mosquito nets, water towers, printers, iPads, chairs, generators, defibrillators, textbooks, agricultural equipment, motorbikes, mobile health clinics, and more. Until recently, these items supported the 5,000-plus foreign-aid projects that the Trump administration has now canceled.

With Intel, Trump continues his race to violate every clause in the Constitution by now arriving at the Takings Clause

Excerpt: The Fifth Amendment of the Constitution closes with the prohibition, “nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.” And yet, if Trump were to succeed with this arrangement vis a vis Intel, that foreclosed scenario is exactly what would be happening.

One of the last times I saw Craig
by Ace Backwords

Excerpt: It was really sad to see. Because Craig was basically a really good guy. But that’s life on the streets. Some people hit the streets with some kind of deep wound in their souls. And then the streets just tear them apart.

A personal note, from Robert Reich

Excerpt: My first book was published in 1982. It didn’t make anywhere near the bestseller list.

One day I was at a friend’s house and noticed it on a bookshelf in his living room. I told him how flattered I was that he had bought it. He looked a bit sheepish and suggested I pull the book out and look inside.

When I opened the cover, I found that the entire inside had been hollowed out. It had been sold to him for safe-keeping. It was where he stored valuable jewelry from his grandmother. He assumed no one would ever find it because no one would ever pull out my book.

I won’t say The Adventures of Priscilla changed my life, but it certainly helped

The death of the review? Cultural criticism is at risk of erasure

Is it illegal to not buy ads on X? Experts explain the FTC’s bizarre ad fight.

Last week’s browser history

8/31/2025

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4 responses to “My browser history, minus the porn — 8/31”

  1. granville Avatar
    granville

    One of the true signs of how badly the Democratic party has rotted is the attacks on Trump by Newsom and people like the author of that TechDirt article *from the right.* One is literally calling him a communist, and this article is claiming it’s unconstitutional to get something in return for giving corporations bags of money. If that’s true, then fuck the constitution.

    Bernie Sanders has been standing in Congress and banging the lectern for the last 20 years demanding that, in his formulation, every company that receives a government subsidy should surrender an equivalent of equity to the US Treasury. That’s not illegal. It’s fucking leftism 101.

    Sanders at least is consistent. He backs this too (with some obvious reservations, namely that Trump doesn’t entirely understand what the fuck he’s doing when he’s doing it): https://www.reuters.com/world/us/us-senator-sanders-favors-trump-plan-take-stake-intel-other-chipmakers-2025-08-20/

    The point that needs to be made is that this shit will never work without a comprehensive industrial policy which, though I’m no fan, Biden had, and Trump doesn’t. If he wants to see factories relocated back to Ohio, it isn’t enough to slap tariffs on, we have a whole generation that has no clue how to do that type of work and will need basic training to do those jobs. Naturally Republicans are pissants, and they’re not funding that. So rather than production capacity relocating to the US, they’ll stay abroad and simply wait out the tariffs and we’ll just all get poor-er still. Yay.

    In France they defined the term “dirigism” for this type of thing — basically, government “guidance” of industry that is appalling to the free market ghouls but still falls significantly short of whole-on wearing red stars and shooting landlords. Every government does it to some extent. It’s not out of the question that Trump doing this will make it easier for the non-jagoff Democrats to do it too. Because they should! The alternative is literally *giving corporations money for nothing!*

    Reply
    1. Doug Holland Avatar
      Doug Holland

      As frequently happens, you’ve given this more thought than I have. Can’t muster any disagreement with what you’ve said. It’s what I’d write, if I cared enough to be better informed.

      I would be happy to see companies surrender equity in exchange for all the corporate handouts and welfare they receive, and *orgasmically* happy to see the end of corporate handouts and welfare.

      My response is a knee jerk: if Trump & the Republicans are doing it — whatever it is — it’s wrong. Their track record and ongoing lies remove all presumption of innocence. Save time by assuming nefarious intent. They’ve forfeited any benefit of any doubt, so when Trump demands X% of a giant corporation, and the giant corporation quickly writes a check, I know for certain that something all fucked up has just occurred.

      There is a wise way for the government to get something in return from corporations, and there’s a criminal and/or stupid way. If Trump & the Republicans are doing it, it’s either criminal or stupid. Most likely both.

      Reply
      1. granville Avatar
        granville

        No doubt, good reason to be skeptical of anything that increases the power of government when this jagoff is at the top of it. Moreover, since there’s not a trace of ideology behind his motives, there’s reason to believe the government is never going to follow through on this in a meaningful way (yet to hear Trump demand equity for subsidies from all his agro and gas buddies) and/or will sell this off at the worst possible time. Liz Warren seems to have the correct take in that Reuters article: welcome to the party, Donnie, but do you really know what you’re doing here?

        But Trump’s crypto shit and knocking down every single regulatory obstacle to your bank investing your social into 44 million tokens called “FuckBoiCoin” are going to turn the economy into a white-hot ball of fire that is going to devour the next 10 years and make the 2008 crash look like nothing, and these people are attacking him from the RIGHT, for not being enough of a free marketeer. Just insane.

        Reply
        1. Doug Holland Avatar
          Doug Holland

          > not a trace of ideology behind his motives

          Truth — and you’re the first I’ve seen say it so plainly. Republican ideology is always “reduce taxes on the wealthy,” but that’s been their mantra since the Paleozoic. Beyond that, the current crop of Republicans have no discernible ideology except to worship Trump and keep America fearful by spreading manure on all public discourse.

          As for the next ten years, my prediction is that things will crumble quicker than that, likely *much* quicker. It’s a dice-roll which of Trump’s stupidities will blow up first. It might be the economy. Might be martial law. Could be a severe climate catastrophe. Could be COVID this winter, with vaccines harder and harder to obtain. Don’t count out war; Trump would love that and might trigger one for fun, or for no reason at all.

          There is no stupidity that’s too stupid for him, no cruelty too cruel. There’s a greater than zero chance he’ll drop nukes on Peru.

          I tend to think crypto won’t be a major factor in the collapse, but that’s probably because of my ignorance: all things crypto are piffle to me. I have no working grasp of what crypto is, and not enough interest to read a Wikipedia page and find out. It’s an autumn breeze stirred with nothingness.

          Reply

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