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Ted Friedman

@tedfriedman

Recovering academic

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Latest posts by Ted Friedman @tedfriedman

My bet is they don’t actually believe this crap, it’s just something they say for hype purposes because it makes for a clickbaity headline. Still, “maybe we’ve enslaved a conscious mind which is suffering” is a pretty weird flex.

06.03.2026 17:42 👍 187 🔁 18 💬 9 📌 0

So, obviously this isn’t true. But if the CEO actually believes this nonsense, it implies he thinks maybe he’s enslaving a sentient being that has the capacity to feel emotional distress. And he hasn’t immediately halted operations to suss out how to resolve that?

06.03.2026 17:33 👍 611 🔁 123 💬 25 📌 13
Preview
People Are Calling Meta Ray-Bans "Pervert Glasses" On Bluesky, users quickly embraced the term "pervert glasses" to refer to Meta's Ray Ban smart glasses, following a shocking investigation.

Make it stick.

06.03.2026 18:25 👍 7752 🔁 2295 💬 131 📌 274

like, one problem with Platner as a candidate is he encourages his supporters to dismiss marginalized people as wreckers when they express very reasonable worries about a guy with a Nazi tattoo!

06.03.2026 02:22 👍 49 🔁 1 💬 1 📌 0

I continue to be gobsmacked at 1) how common this formulation is 2) how antisemitic and generally bigoted it is 3) and how for all the talk of anti-semitism this is never cited as an example even though it’s quite literally the original incarnation.

05.03.2026 23:26 👍 8820 🔁 2127 💬 360 📌 59

Rian Johnson's The Westing Game

05.03.2026 03:44 👍 75 🔁 9 💬 4 📌 1

Went to sleep there was 10 Jalens in the NBA
Woke up and now there's 80 Jalens in the NBA

04.03.2026 18:37 👍 71 🔁 7 💬 1 📌 1

Assassination market but for the planet

04.03.2026 01:48 👍 69 🔁 15 💬 3 📌 0

This is a very good point. Naziism being normalized in our party is giving the opposition endless ammo and also a free pass to do more Roman salutes. All you people who got this guy where he is today, congrats.

03.03.2026 23:12 👍 1078 🔁 215 💬 21 📌 9

When we talk about Baby Boomers not getting off the stage: In 1997, the US president was born in 1946.

In 2007, the US president was born in 1946.

In 2017, the US president was born in 1946.

And next year in 2027? The US president will have been born in 1946.

03.03.2026 20:10 👍 10705 🔁 3251 💬 198 📌 244
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New YouGov poll finds that for the first time, a majority of Americans disapprove of Trump *strongly.* His overall approval is down to 38%, a new second-term low.

When is the last time a majority has disapproved strongly of a president?

03.03.2026 19:07 👍 4100 🔁 1108 💬 118 📌 92

I honestly hope none of those influencers whose jobs is posting about their supposedly idyllic lives in Dubai get hurt, but, by Golly, JG Ballard couldn’t have constructed a more satisfying comeuppance for a dystopia sold as a Utopia.

03.03.2026 22:33 👍 502 🔁 81 💬 5 📌 7
Image caption: Civil rights activist Jesse Jackson speaks to a guard during a tour of the Krome detention facility in Miami on December 30, 1981, after the quelling of a hunger strike during the Christmas holiday. Jackson's visit brought media attention to conditions at the facility. Mark Foley. Reprinted with permission from AP Photo.

Image caption: Civil rights activist Jesse Jackson speaks to a guard during a tour of the Krome detention facility in Miami on December 30, 1981, after the quelling of a hunger strike during the Christmas holiday. Jackson's visit brought media attention to conditions at the facility. Mark Foley. Reprinted with permission from AP Photo.

Jesse Jackson visiting the Krome Detention Center in 1981. He exposed the racist policy of mandatory detention of Haitians who were deemed "economic" refugees not worthy of asylum. Image from @tinashull.bsky.social's book Detention Empire.

17.02.2026 16:47 👍 312 🔁 116 💬 1 📌 3

For years on my old blog I published the names of servicemembers who died in Iraq & Afghanistan. No other outlets were.

These are the first 4 Americans to die in the Iran War.
Capt. Cody A. Khork, 35
Sgt. 1st Class Noah L. Tietjens, 42
Sgt. 1st Class Nicole M. Amor, 39
Sgt. Declan J. Coady, 20

03.03.2026 23:07 👍 9000 🔁 2996 💬 428 📌 162
Preview
Henrietta Lacks' Family Reaches Settlement in Fight Over Her Stolen Cells Details of the Novartis agreement aren't public, but the family says it is pleased with the outcome.

A long overdue reckoning for Henrietta Lacks — the Black woman whose cancer cells led to breakthroughs but were harvested without her consent. Novartis has settled a lawsuit by Lacks’ estate that alleged the pharmaceutical giant profited off her cells.
https://bit.ly/3NgCeBs

03.03.2026 21:55 👍 417 🔁 216 💬 3 📌 12
Walgreens CEO describes drawback of anti-shoplifting strategy: ‘When you lock things up…you don’t sell as many of them’

Walgreens CEO describes drawback of anti-shoplifting strategy: ‘When you lock things up…you don’t sell as many of them’

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This business genius was paid $1.5M last year just in salary (with another $11M in stock)

03.03.2026 20:47 👍 29 🔁 6 💬 1 📌 0

I’m struck by how every day the admin is like “whoever could have foreseen these consequences?!” when the consequences thus far — evacuations, the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, rise in gas prices, etc. — are all the literal most obvious consequences.

03.03.2026 20:47 👍 2100 🔁 555 💬 86 📌 24

executioners guild shut down in decapitation strike

03.03.2026 20:30 👍 162 🔁 24 💬 2 📌 1
That statue, which was cast back in 1961, was modeled on 1950s Texas Rangers – as in the law enforcement Texas Rangers – Captain Jay Banks. Since it's unveiling 65 years ago it has spent most of its life at Love Field in Dallas. But then in 2020 it was removed and placed in storage. Why? Because Captain Jay Banks was a racist cop who made it his mission to stop schools from integrating.

This is an excerpt from the 2020 book, Cult of Glory: The Bold and Brutal History of the Texas Rangers by Doug Swanson, which describes' Banks' role in efforts to keep schools in Texas racially segregated in defiance of the United States Supreme Court's 1954 decision, Brown v. Board of Education:

Then there is the form and face of the statue itself. This dates to 1956, when the NAACP, backed with a court order, attempted to integrate the high school in Mansfield, about 30 miles southwest of Dallas. White residents erupted in fury, so Gov. Allan Shivers dispatched the Rangers. But unlike state police in other Southern racial hotspots, the Rangers in Mansfield did not escort black students past howling mobs of white supremacists. They had been sent instead to keep the black children out of a white school.

That statue, which was cast back in 1961, was modeled on 1950s Texas Rangers – as in the law enforcement Texas Rangers – Captain Jay Banks. Since it's unveiling 65 years ago it has spent most of its life at Love Field in Dallas. But then in 2020 it was removed and placed in storage. Why? Because Captain Jay Banks was a racist cop who made it his mission to stop schools from integrating. This is an excerpt from the 2020 book, Cult of Glory: The Bold and Brutal History of the Texas Rangers by Doug Swanson, which describes' Banks' role in efforts to keep schools in Texas racially segregated in defiance of the United States Supreme Court's 1954 decision, Brown v. Board of Education: Then there is the form and face of the statue itself. This dates to 1956, when the NAACP, backed with a court order, attempted to integrate the high school in Mansfield, about 30 miles southwest of Dallas. White residents erupted in fury, so Gov. Allan Shivers dispatched the Rangers. But unlike state police in other Southern racial hotspots, the Rangers in Mansfield did not escort black students past howling mobs of white supremacists. They had been sent instead to keep the black children out of a white school.

The commanding Ranger on the scene was Sgt. E.J. “Jay” Banks. A wire service photo showed him casually leaning against a tree outside Mansfield High. To his left, above the school’s entrance, was a dummy in blackface, hanging from a noose. Nearby a white mob had assembled. Some carried signs that threatened death for anyone attempting to integrate the school. Banks saw no need to remove the effigy or disperse the mob. “They were just ‘salt of the earth’ citizens,” he later wrote. “They were concerned because they were convinced that someone was trying to interfere with their way of life.” Blacks were so intimidated that none attempted to enroll at Mansfield.
Several days later, Gov. Shivers ordered Banks and a few other Rangers to Northeast Texas, because African-Americans wished to take classes at all-white Texarkana Junior College, a public institution. Again the Rangers’ job was to stop black students from enrolling.
As at Mansfield, a mob of white men gathered outside the school. An 18-year-old woman and a 17-year-old boy, both black, arrived by cab and began to walk toward the college. The mob blocked their path. Some surrounded the 17-year-old and kicked him, while others threw gravel. The Rangers watched it happen and did nothing except threaten to arrest the two students.    
That wire service photo of Banks in front of the school with the Black person hung in effigy can be seen at the top of today's newsletter.

The commanding Ranger on the scene was Sgt. E.J. “Jay” Banks. A wire service photo showed him casually leaning against a tree outside Mansfield High. To his left, above the school’s entrance, was a dummy in blackface, hanging from a noose. Nearby a white mob had assembled. Some carried signs that threatened death for anyone attempting to integrate the school. Banks saw no need to remove the effigy or disperse the mob. “They were just ‘salt of the earth’ citizens,” he later wrote. “They were concerned because they were convinced that someone was trying to interfere with their way of life.” Blacks were so intimidated that none attempted to enroll at Mansfield. Several days later, Gov. Shivers ordered Banks and a few other Rangers to Northeast Texas, because African-Americans wished to take classes at all-white Texarkana Junior College, a public institution. Again the Rangers’ job was to stop black students from enrolling. As at Mansfield, a mob of white men gathered outside the school. An 18-year-old woman and a 17-year-old boy, both black, arrived by cab and began to walk toward the college. The mob blocked their path. Some surrounded the 17-year-old and kicked him, while others threw gravel. The Rangers watched it happen and did nothing except threaten to arrest the two students. That wire service photo of Banks in front of the school with the Black person hung in effigy can be seen at the top of today's newsletter.

The statue was removed from public view in 2020 in the wake of that book about the Rangers being published. This occurred at the same time that statues of Confederates, Klansmen, racists, and segregationists were removed all over the country following the murder of George Floyd. But now the Texas Rangers Baseball Club, knowing full well the history of the statue, its subject, and its removal, and knowing that multiple municipal institutions decided it was inappropriate for public display, is happy to put that statue up in a public concourse at a major league baseball stadium.

When I learned of this yesterday afternoon I contacted Major League Baseball and asked the following questions:

Is Major League Baseball aware of the history of the "One Riot, One Ranger" statue and its subject, Jay Banks?
Is Major League Baseball aware that Love Field and the City of Dallas removed the statue and put it in storage in 2020 after Banks' involvement in attempting to keep schools segregated in the 1950s came to light?
Does Major League Baseball condone one of its Clubs erecting a previously-removed statue of a staunch segregationist at its ballpark?; and
Does Major League Baseball have any comment regarding the discomfort that will be felt by Black fans when confronted with the statue of a segregationist at Globe Life Field? 
I did not receive a response. I'm going to assume that the league's silence on this means that it wholly condones the Rangers putting up the "One Riot, One Ranger" statue despite its sordid and extraordinarily well-reported history.

The statue was removed from public view in 2020 in the wake of that book about the Rangers being published. This occurred at the same time that statues of Confederates, Klansmen, racists, and segregationists were removed all over the country following the murder of George Floyd. But now the Texas Rangers Baseball Club, knowing full well the history of the statue, its subject, and its removal, and knowing that multiple municipal institutions decided it was inappropriate for public display, is happy to put that statue up in a public concourse at a major league baseball stadium. When I learned of this yesterday afternoon I contacted Major League Baseball and asked the following questions: Is Major League Baseball aware of the history of the "One Riot, One Ranger" statue and its subject, Jay Banks? Is Major League Baseball aware that Love Field and the City of Dallas removed the statue and put it in storage in 2020 after Banks' involvement in attempting to keep schools segregated in the 1950s came to light? Does Major League Baseball condone one of its Clubs erecting a previously-removed statue of a staunch segregationist at its ballpark?; and Does Major League Baseball have any comment regarding the discomfort that will be felt by Black fans when confronted with the statue of a segregationist at Globe Life Field? I did not receive a response. I'm going to assume that the league's silence on this means that it wholly condones the Rangers putting up the "One Riot, One Ranger" statue despite its sordid and extraordinarily well-reported history.

Yesterday the Texas Rangers erected a statue of a segregationist cop at Globe Life Field. A statue that was removed from public property in 2020 because of its racist history. @mlb.com has refused to comment. www.cupofcoffeenews.com/cup-of-coffe...

03.03.2026 14:01 👍 457 🔁 214 💬 19 📌 38
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What this country needs is a politician brave enough to advocate in *favor* of ‘forever wars’ in the Middle East…

03.03.2026 06:10 👍 608 🔁 170 💬 58 📌 14

Even military drone pilots experienced PTSD symptoms. Autonomous weapons solve this and other problems for the military. Moral and legal culpability are dispersed throughout the whole system. Murder becomes a function; murder of the innocent becomes a glitch. No one is to blame.

02.03.2026 16:04 👍 69 🔁 36 💬 3 📌 2

my guess: this ends up as notorious as "alternative facts", it's just so absurd

02.03.2026 22:59 👍 189 🔁 38 💬 12 📌 0

Calling AI "slop" has been one of the most effective instances of the public rebranding a product and it pisses them off.

02.03.2026 20:44 👍 16486 🔁 5115 💬 1 📌 63

As the laid off Middle East News Editor, I concur. Management eliminated the positions of every single staff correspondent and bureau chief in the Middle East.

02.03.2026 20:39 👍 8044 🔁 2215 💬 122 📌 71
Preview
Exclusive | Trump Administration to Drop Defense of Law Firm Sanctions The Justice Dept. plans to abandon its defense of the president’s executive orders that targeted Jenner & Block, WilmerHale, Perkins Coie, and Susman Godfrey.

Okay, so, the firms that rolled over and showed Trump their bellies ended up humiliating themselves for nothing, and the firms that showed even a little bit of fight ended up winning. I think there is a lesson to be learned here!

02.03.2026 22:16 👍 176 🔁 34 💬 3 📌 1

It would be nice if we had a Secretary of Defense who knew what he was doing and not one that just regurgitates quotes from action movies

02.03.2026 15:56 👍 13099 🔁 2675 💬 595 📌 119
Tweet from Ryan Grim: "Understand what Neera is arguing for here: she thinks that no Democratic candidate should appear on any podcast where a host has flirted with conspiracy theories around Charlie Kirk and Israel. I don't think she understands how many podcasts that includes.

And if you make the opposite argument, and say no, actually, tens of millions of people love those shows, Democrats should be on them, she says I'm "defending anti-semitic conspiracy podcasters." The good news is that this stuff doesn't work anymore. Save your breath, nobody cares."

Tweet from Ryan Grim: "Understand what Neera is arguing for here: she thinks that no Democratic candidate should appear on any podcast where a host has flirted with conspiracy theories around Charlie Kirk and Israel. I don't think she understands how many podcasts that includes. And if you make the opposite argument, and say no, actually, tens of millions of people love those shows, Democrats should be on them, she says I'm "defending anti-semitic conspiracy podcasters." The good news is that this stuff doesn't work anymore. Save your breath, nobody cares."

I really don't think "There are so many antisemitic podcasts out there that you just can't help but appear on them" is the defense they think it is.

02.03.2026 14:07 👍 2860 🔁 564 💬 84 📌 101

the plan, such as it is, appears to be “bomb a country of 90 million people that is already facing a water crisis into a failed state, walk away and declare victory”

this is a monstrous nightmare regardless of whether or not it “works”

02.03.2026 04:16 👍 2019 🔁 327 💬 24 📌 11

The kids don't know about the Amanda Bynes poster hastily airbrushed to avoid implying she endorsed peace

02.03.2026 02:45 👍 7176 🔁 1655 💬 2 📌 71

a reminder that Graham Platner is the grandson of the designer of the "Windows on the World" restaurant at the WTC, has considerable family money, and his main business is selling oysters to his mom's two restaurants. These people are fucking marks.

02.03.2026 02:47 👍 2844 🔁 697 💬 90 📌 44