Mark Funkhouser

It's not quite where it was in 1975 but I just came back from having to wait a while to top of my tank. First ripples of the coming wave?

In the latter days of his life Mark Twain was a fire breathing radical in the best sense of the word, turning his consummate skill with words to just causes. Here is his short story, The War Prayer.
americanliterature.com/author/mark-...

😡😡😡😡

A madman’s war | Men Yell at Me by Lyz Lenz Get more from Men Yell at Me by Lyz Lenz on Patreon

"If we’ve learned one thing from the Epstein files, it’s this: The problem is never just one man, one moment, or one action. It’s the hundreds or thousands of other people who willingly enable him so they can profit."

www.patreon.com/posts/madman...

I don't know him but his writing is solid. And apparently he cooks well.

Incredible. Who is on the board of the White House Correspondents Association?

Monopoly Round-Up: The Epstein Class Launches a War Arab princes, Western bankers, Silicon Valley AI guys, and Israeli hawks are all part of one blob. And they just started a war. Plus, the Ticketmaster trial starts...

"In other words, this attack on Iran isn’t a civilizational conflict, it’s anger from the Epstein class of elites towards a separate group of elites in Iran."
open.substack.com/pub/mattstol...

To be clear, the GOP majority abdicating its congressional responsibilities and ceding its power to the executive is a choice.

Republicans could call votes and end this today if they wanted to. They choose not to.

The GOP's cruel plans for another Big Ugly Bill The Republican Study Committee's framework for a second reconciliation bill aims to make life even more miserable for immigrants, including legal residents.

"..ever and always, the cruelty is the point." open.substack.com/pub/washingt...

every single psycho thing Donald Trump does he does only because almost every single federally elected Republican has chosen unilaterally, independently, and with complete freedom to go along with it unconditionally

“The continuity is in no small part due to the influence of Rob Dubow, who has been the city’s finance director since 2009 and has encouraged mayors to prioritize improving the health of the pension fund.”

And successive mayors who listened and stuck to the program.

A decade ago, Philly’s pension fund looked like it could sink the city. Now it’s on pace to be fully funded by 2032. A decade ago, the pension fund was only 45% funded. But a series of reforms under successive mayors have fostered a remarkable turnaround.

Here's a link to a gift article that I think should work.

share.inquirer.com/nIg0Tw

Every single R in Congress needs to be held accountable for this. The voters do not want these wars.

A decade ago, Philly’s pension fund looked like it could sink the city. Now it’s on pace to be fully funded by 2032. A decade ago, the pension fund was only 45% funded. But a series of reforms under successive mayors have fostered a remarkable turnaround.

A rare good fiscal news story at a time when cities across the country are struggling financially.
share.inquirer.com/nIg0Tw?utm_s...

Netflix Backs Out of Bid for Warner Bros., Paving Way for an Ellison Takeover

The richest man owns X.

The second and third richest men control Google.

The fourth richest man owns Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp.

The fifth richest man owns The Washington Post.

And now the sixth richest could soon take over both Paramount and Warner Bros.

See the problem here?

Canaries in the Coal Mine Working people understand the state of the union in ways the wealthy cannot see.

Regular folks know they're being screwed and they've been trying to figure out who to blame. Pretty soon some politician is going to tell them the truth and they're going to believe it.

Vital reporting by Gwen Frisbie-Fulton open.substack.com/pub/workingc...

Mayor Zohran Mamdani is again flooding the airwaves and social media with snappy videos of himself in a custom Carhartt jacket, warning New Yorkers to stay safe. He is again holding news conferences at the city’s emergency operations headquarters, surrounded by top aides in outerwear bearing agency emblems. And he is again at the helm of a government operation that, by virtue of its complexity and general unwieldiness, can lend itself to people falling through the cracks.

The tone of contempt here, in a news update, is disgraceful. "How dare Mamdani and his team...uh...wear those clothes and use social media to try to prevent bad things from happening when...um...bad things could still happen in a situation like this!" GTFO.

There are a lot of things we shouldn't allow private equity to own.

They want a responsive government that works to enable them to meet their needs.

The slogan on the shirt is correct. Everything is indeed political.

Signal of the Week: 8.6% Late payments are a leading indicator of recession...let's see the numbers.

That this is happening while the stock market is booming explains a lot of the rage we are seeing among ordinary Americans. open.substack.com/pub/rebeccar...

Table 1. Percentage of workers exposed to any contacts of a different race, by type of contact and race of respondent | Brookings

Table 1. Percentage of workers exposed to any contacts of a different race, by type of contact and race of respondent www.brookings.edu/interactive/...

It is impossible to make a man understand something when his salary depends upon his not understanding it. Upton Sinclair

The American president is more insulated from accountability than a British royal.

Our political system provides the elite with immunity. It has to change.

Opinion | One Man Stole $660 Million. He’ll Never Pay It Back.

The level of corruption @brendanballou.bsky.social describes in this article is simply stunning. It's also exactly what you'd expect when the Supreme Court gives the nation's top elected official blanket immunity.
www.nytimes.com/2026/02/18/o...

notorious radical left communist rag says tax the rich

Insanity. They are laughing at us.

No! Don't tell her! This is a lot better for those of us on the side of freedom and democracy.

This is an excellent insight.

Armies Don’t Fight for Abstractions? History Would Like a Word. America was born from an abstraction, and Ronald Reagan understood what some leaders now forget: country and principle are accomplices, not rivals.

"It was the deep knowledge — and pray God we have not lost it — that there is a profound, moral difference between the use of force for liberation and the use of force for conquest."

From a time when a Republican President understood and believed in America.

open.substack.com/pub/mattklew...