hjsas

Fan of funny t-shirts, equality, health, safer courthouses. RTs aren't endorsements.

[Peter Girnus 🦅 @gothburz]

I am a member of the Norwegian Nobel Committee. Or I am not. This has, in recent days, become a matter of international dispute, and I would like to address it from the tram, where I do my addressing.

You may have read a thing I wrote. A great many of you did, more than have read anything I was ever officially permitted to write, which tells you everything about the difference between a press release and a confession. And then something happened so purely, hopelessly funny that I have been smiling into my coffee for three days, which in Oslo is grounds for a welfare check.

They fact-checked me.

The Americans have a website for determining whether things are true, which is the most American sentence I will ever write. It examined my little confession. It ruled.

First it established that I am not real. A relief to my wife. But it is the reason I have had framed. They cleared me of being real by proving that a real one of me would, by law, be silent until the year 2076. The deliberations are sealed for fifty years. My alibi was the confession. My guilt was that I had one.

They did not rule the confession false. They ruled it unauthorized. There is a difference, and the difference is the whole of my country’s foreign policy.

And then the detail I will take to the sealed vault. They faulted the confession for one specific deficiency. They noted, with the sorrow of a schoolteacher, that it “did not include markings” making it obvious the content was satire.

No markings.

I have been fact-checked for honesty and found guilty of style.

In the land of Janteloven, whose first commandment is that you are not to think you are anything special, I have now been formally reprimanded, by Americans, for insufficient self-advertisement. My grandmother is appalled, and, for the first time, proud.

And beneath the thing itself, the readers attached what they call a note. A small grey correction, voted on by strangers, appended to tell the passerby: this is not real. I have thought about that note more than is healthy. In my country we do not need a website for this. A note, here, is not an insult. It is an act of love, performed with a knife. We append it to the newborn and to the dead and to anyone, in between, who forgets the rain. We have had the community note for two hundred years. We call it Janteloven. I did not require the correction. I am the correction. I have spent my whole life as the small grey text beneath other men’s belief in themselves. It is the only committee I have ever truly served on.

The complaint, you understand, was never that the facts were wrong. The complaint was that a civil servant had written them too well. In Norway this is the only crime we take seriously.

But here is the part that should trouble you more than it troubles me, and it troubles me at four o’clock, in the dark. They had to rule at all because people believed it. Not everyone. Enough. Enough strangers read a damp man’s account of cinnamon buns and the rain that judges you and a woman named Kristin ending a meeting with the word “well,” and thought: yes, that is how the moral standing of the species is decided. They found the fictional Norwegian more credible than the real institution. They found the confession more plausible than the citation. And I think it is simply this. People do not disbelieve the official version because they are stupid. They disbelieve it because they can hear, underneath it, the sound of something not being said, and they will follow that sound anywhere. Even onto a tram. Even into the mouth of a man who does not exist.

Now. The one across the ocean. You will want to know how he answered. So, I confess, did I. I checked. I am not proud of the checking.

He said nothing.

This is the great wound of my fictional life. A man who met the actual prize with six hundred words at midnight. Who told a rally we were an indelible stain, that we would not be forgotten, that he was owed eight medals, one for each war. He mourned, in ink, that he had not won the Noble Peace Prize. He spelled it wrong, and in doing so spelled it true. The prize was only ever a dead arms-dealer’s apology to his own obituary. Noble is what he wanted. Nobel is what was for sale.

And about me, the man who sat down and explained, with some tenderness, precisely why he would never win it, he said nothing at all. I was the one thing he did not post about. He answered Norway. He answered the website. He answered the weather of a country he cannot find on a map. He did not answer the one man who had bothered to explain him to himself. He could not. To answer the confession he would have had to read it, and to read it he would have had to sit still, in the dark, for four o’clock’s worth of silence, and that is the one war he has never been able to end.

The website observed, as though it were damning, that the account which produced me “contained other fictitious letters.” Yes. It does. The world is full of rooms I am not allowed into, and I have lately been climbing through the windows. The banker is invented. The arms-philosopher with his doctorate is invented. The Russian who gave up nothing, took everything, and wished a tyrant a happy birthday is invented. The only thing I did not have to invent was the wanting. That part arrived fully formed, from across the ocean, with a deadline it had already missed.

It is dark now. Of course it is. The light here is rationed like everything else, like praise, like the prize. The buns are gone. Kristin said “well” an hour ago, the real one or the invented one, I have lost track, which I suspect was always the point.

They ruled that I originated as satire. I accept the verdict. I would add only this, for the sealed file, for the clerks of 2076 who will unseal all of it and find the note waiting.

I am the only fraud in this affair who told you, in the first line, that he might not exist. Everyone else kept their credentials.

I did not make him want it the way a child wants a thing in a shop window. I only wrote it down. The fact-checkers have confirmed, officially, that I made it up.

Ask them who made it believable.

[PLGC @PL67712441]

In 1948, a photo summarized centuries of injustice. The man in suit and tie, standing before photographers, broke into tears. He was George Gillette, leader of the Mandan, Arikara, and Hidatsa tribes of the Missouri River.

The document in his hands was not a negotiated settlement. It was the forced secession of ancestral lands from his people to the U.S. government. More than 150,000 native ancestral acres, full of homes, schools, churches, and fertile fields. The US government forced him to hand over the land so they could flood it all by building the Garrison dam.

Gillette knew that with his signature he sealed a permanent tragedy. But if he didn’t, the tribes would receive NO compensation, The US government would simply take the land. Through tears he said "Today we sign under protest. Our hands are tied, but our hearts are sad."

The dam flooded entire villages, erased old communities, and buried centuries of indigenous history.

We must not whitewash American history in our schools.

[Jonathan Reiner @JReinerMD]

Here’s the list of countries that perform public executions: Iran, Afghanistan, North Korea, Syria, Yemen, Somalia, Saudi Arabia.

[Daniel Dale @ddale8]

One of the midterms' most visceral GOP ads features a woman attacking Ohio Senate candidate Sherrod Brown over “sex changes for minors — irreversible surgery on kids. Like me.” The woman mentions she got “hormone injections, then surgery — without my parents’ consent. I was a kid.” She uses the words “I was a kid” moments after mentioning the surgery in another ad, too.

But as @MorganTrau of News 5 Cleveland noted last week, the woman had the surgery as a 19-year-old adult, for whom no parental consent would be required.

In other forums, the woman has openly discussed that she was 19 when she had the surgery. But that's never mentioned in the ads; in both, her words create the clear and false impression she was a minor at the time.

Brown has just released a response ad calling the GOP ads "a complete lie," noting the age at which the woman had the surgery and the fact that she had it in Texas, not Ohio. https://t.co/Kdr3OzuB4I

[Alvin Bragg @ManhattanDA]

“I want to remind everyone that the city does not ask you to scan a QR code when parking.” – D.A. Bragg. We are here to help – anyone who believes they have been the victim of this scam should call us at 212-335-8900.

[Sarrah Bellus @sarrah_bellus]

This is an amazing video. We should be learning from our history and each other. Worth a listen!

[Aaron Reichlin-Melnick @ReichlinMelnick]

Incredible. First @SecMullinDHS claimed that @DHSgov identified 15,903 noncitizens on Nevada’s voter roll. Then DHS officials said, no no no, that’s just people we flagged, here’s the names of 185 people we KNOW aren’t citizens.

All 185 were citizens. DHS got 100% wrong.

[hjsas @HJSAS]

@StreetsblogNYC @Sammy_Sussman Ever heard of a Referee? How about a JHO?

[hjsas @HJSAS]

@cheff4u @StreetsblogNYC @Sammy_Sussman That is incorrect. Even judges who are appointed are required to live in NYC. (There are, however, a number of simple explanations for the situation presented that would be totally legal.)

[Karly Kingsley @karlykingsley]

Well said

[James Tate @JamesTate121]

Add to the list: New Deal for the Working class:
New Deal (FDR, 1930s)
Social Security Act (1935): Created old-age pensions, unemployment insurance, and aid to dependent children. Still the core of U.S. retirement and disability https://t.co/Md6J5CVx45
Fair Labor Standards Act (1938): Federal minimum wage, 40-hour week, overtime pay, child-labor limits.
National Labor Relations Act (Wagner Act, 1935): Protected private-sector union organizing and collective bargaining.
FDIC and related banking reforms: Insured bank deposits to stop runs.
Public-works programs (WPA, CCC, PWA, TVA, rural electrification) provided jobs and built infrastructure during the Depression.
Great Society / War on Poverty (LBJ, 1960s)

Medicare and Medicaid (Social Security Amendments of 1965): Hospital/medical insurance for people 65+ and coverage for low-income people. Medicare now covers tens of millions of https://t.co/JIP6c9NC2u

Civil Rights Act (1964) and Voting Rights Act (1965): Banned discrimination in public accommodations, employment, and voting (key votes were bipartisan; Democratic majorities passed them).
Elementary and Secondary Education Act (1965), Head Start, Pell Grants: Federal aid to poor school districts and preschool; later student-aid expansion.

Later 20th century
Americans with Disabilities Act (1990): Accessibility and anti-discrimination rules (passed with Democratic leadership in Congress).
Family and Medical Leave Act (1993, Clinton): Unpaid job-protected leave for family/medical reasons.
CHIP / SCHIP (1997): Health coverage for children in families above Medicaid income limits.

Clinton also signed 1996 welfare reform (TANF), which replaced open-ended AFDC with time limits and work requirements. Caseloads fell sharply; effects on poverty and child well-being remain https://t.co/DasXjdhhSG

Obama years

Affordable Care Act (2010): Insurance marketplaces, preexisting-condition rules, Medicaid expansion (optional for states), subsidies. Uninsured rate fell; CBO and others estimated tens of millions gained coverage options. Costs, premiums, and mandate design remain https://t.co/lVIccz5Old

American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (2009): Large stimulus after the financial crisis.
Dodd-Frank / CFPB (2010): Financial regulation and a consumer-finance regulator.
Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act (2009).

Biden years

American Rescue Plan (2021): COVID relief, stimulus checks, expanded unemployment, temporary Child Tax Credit expansion, aid to states/localities. Supporters credit it with faster recovery and lower child poverty in 2021; many economists (including some Democrats) later argued the size contributed to the 2021–23 inflation https://t.co/baOLdng2nd

Inflation Reduction Act (2022, party-line): First Medicare drug-price negotiation for selected drugs, $2,000 Part D out-of-pocket cap (phased in), $35 insulin cap for Medicare, temporary ACA subsidy extensions, large clean-energy tax https://t.co/NPj8W5UTP2

Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (2021) and CHIPS and Science Act: Roads, broadband, water, semiconductor subsidies. The infrastructure bill had substantial Republican votes.

[Steve Rattner @SteveRattner]

Trump’s net worth hit $7 billion in 2026.

That’s triple where it was in early 2024, according to Forbes data.

[Andrew—#IAmTheResistance @AmoneyResists]

This woman is reciting Donald Trump’s words on his new vaccine recommendations verbatim. This remains the clearest way to illustrate just how far gone he is mentally. This is terrifying.

[Khary Penebaker @kharyp]

Trump stood at the UN today & called the International Criminal Court "an evil group of people." The ICC has never tried one American service member in 24 years. It has issued arrest warrants for Putin & Netanyahu. He is not protecting our troops. He is protecting his friends.

[Mueller, She Wrote @MuellerSheWrote]

Crush the arts (Kennedy Center), destroy the civil service (DOGE), control elections (gestures broadly), dismantle the press (gestures more broadly), decimate science (NIH), and demolish education (DeptEd). The authoritarian playbook.

[ProPublica @propublica]

Sen. Susan Collins helped steer millions in federal defense contracts to Navatek, whose CEO illegally funneled thousands of dollars to her campaign.

The FBI sought to launch a probe and was eyeing Collins and other lawmakers.

Then Trump gutted the unit in charge. THREAD 🧵

[Morgan J. Freeman @mjfree]

Luis Ochoa is 17.
He is a U.S. citizen.

He was driving with another U.S. citizen to enlist in the Marines when he was pulled over and ripped from his car by ICE.

Someone started recording.

This is the horrific video.

While the boys were being beaten, they repeatedly tell the agents they are CITIZENS — and are ignored.

One agent told said, "I don't give a damn. Your parents can't help you now."

Both teenagers were detained for hours before being released.

They were preparing to serve this country - yet their citizenship did not protect them from being beaten, pepper-sprayed, and detained by their own government.

This is what the Nazis did then, and ICE does now.

[Headquarters @HQNewsNow]

Barack Obama at his last press briefing with reporters, 2017:

"I have enjoyed working with all of you. That does not, of course, mean that I've enjoyed every story that you have filed, but that's the point of this relationship. You're not supposed to be sycophants. You're supposed to be skeptics. You're supposed to ask me tough questions. You're not supposed to be complimentary, but you're supposed to cast a critical eye on folks who hold enormous power."

[ProPublica @propublica]

For likely the 1st time in modern history, the Supreme Court decided more cases in fast-tracked, secretive proceedings than in open court.

These “shadow docket” decisions have let the Trump admin. bypass lower courts on ICE stops, abortion access & more: https://t.co/PvHuXbvPYP

[Dittie @DittiePE]

RFKjr just terminated 16 grants worth $38 million that funded: postpartum nurse visits to newborns and new moms in Denver, cancer screenings, first-responder suicide prevention, obesity programs for Native American youth, at-home blood pressure monitoring and produce deliveries for 150 New Yorkers, and infant/maternal mortality reduction for Black families in Arkansas — a state that leads the nation in that exact statistic.

Sixteen programs helping people not die. Gone, as of an August 25 letter.

And the reason? These no longer “advance current agency priorities.” The new priority, per the letter: erectile dysfunction, low testosterone, and low sperm count.

Yes, they are prioritizing limp dicks over sick babies and mothers. Somewhere in HHS, a bureaucrat looked at “babies dying” and “dad’s wet noodle” and picked the wet noodle.

Rep. Diana DeGette called it exactly what it is: prioritizing ED over the health and wellbeing of infants and new mothers.

This is the “Make America Healthy Again” administration, in case you forgot.