Julian Western

[Maine @TheMaineWonk]

Radical Leftist Ronald Reagan on tariffs in 1987:

We are there.

[MeidasTouch @MeidasTouch]

😬

[Ed Krassenstein @EdKrassen]

Hitler demonized Jewish people by repeatedly calling them "criminals".

He then convinced his party of cult-like supporters that Jewish people were bad enough to be sent to torture prisons without due process.

His followers went along with it.

He continued to demonize them.

He then killed them.

Trump demonized immigrants by repeatedly calling them "violent criminals".

He then convinced his party of cult-like supporters that Undocumented Immigrants were bad enough to be sent to torture prisons without due process.

His followers went along with it.

He continued to demonize them.

DON'T LET HISTORY REPEAT ITSELF!

[Jon Cooper 🇺🇸 @joncoopertweets]

Trump wants to protect & enrich billionaire perverts because he's one of them. First, he passed massive tax giveaways to billionaires. Now, he's covering up child sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein.

We're not stupid and we know when we're being lied to. Release the Epstein Files!

[Robert Reich @RBReich]

History shows how fascists can come to power in a democracy:

1. Threats of violence
2. Consolidation of power
3. Forming a police state
4. Jailing opposition
5. Attacking the free press

Sound familiar?

[Robert Reich @RBReich]

This week Trump has warned of a "bloodbath" if he's not elected, promised again to release violent Jan 6 criminals, claimed immigrants aren't people, and called for the prosecution of Liz Cheney.

These are warning signs of fascism. If we ignore them, here's what happens next.

[CALL TO ACTIVISM @CalltoActivism]

A British writer penned the best description of Donald Trump I’ve ever read:

“Why do some British people not like Donald Trump?”

A few things spring to mind. Trump lacks certain qualities which the British traditionally esteem. For instance, he has no class, no charm, no coolness, no credibility, no compassion, no wit, no warmth, no wisdom, no subtlety, no sensitivity, no self-awareness, no humility, no honour and no grace – all qualities, funnily enough, with which his predecessor Mr. Obama was generously blessed. So for us, the stark contrast does rather throw Trump’s limitations into embarrassingly sharp relief.

Plus, we like a laugh. And while Trump may be laughable, he has never once said anything wry, witty or even faintly amusing – not once, ever. I don’t say that rhetorically, I mean it quite literally: not once, not ever. And that fact is particularly disturbing to the British sensibility – for us, to lack humour is almost inhuman. But with Trump, it’s a fact. He doesn’t even seem to understand what a joke is – his idea of a joke is a crass comment, an illiterate insult, a casual act of cruelty.

Trump is a troll. And like all trolls, he is never funny and he never laughs; he only crows or jeers. And scarily, he doesn’t just talk in crude, witless insults – he actually thinks in them. His mind is a simple bot-like algorithm of petty prejudices and knee-jerk nastiness.

There is never any under-layer of irony, complexity, nuance or depth. It’s all surface. Some Americans might see this as refreshingly upfront. Well, we don’t. We see it as having no inner world, no soul. And in Britain we traditionally side with David, not Goliath. All our heroes are plucky underdogs: Robin Hood, Dick Whittington, Oliver Twist. Trump is neither plucky, nor an underdog. He is the exact opposite of that. He’s not even a spoiled rich-boy, or a greedy fat-cat. He’s more a fat white slug. A Jabba the Hutt of privilege.

And worse, he is that most unforgivable of all things to the British: a bully. That is, except when he is among bullies; then he suddenly transforms into a snivelling sidekick instead. There are unspoken rules to this stuff – the Queensberry rules of basic decency – and he breaks them all. He punches downwards – which a gentleman should, would, could never do – and every blow he aims is below the belt. He particularly likes to kick the vulnerable or voiceless – and he kicks them when they are down.

So the fact that a significant minority – perhaps a third – of Americans look at what he does, listen to what he says, and then think ‘Yeah, he seems like my kind of guy’ is a matter of some confusion and no little distress to British people, given that:

• Americans are supposed to be nicer than us, and mostly are.

• You don’t need a particularly keen eye for detail to spot a few flaws in the man.

This last point is what especially confuses and dismays British people, and many other people too; his faults seem pretty bloody hard to miss. After all, it’s impossible to read a single tweet, or hear him speak a sentence or two, without staring deep into the abyss. He turns being artless into an art form; he is a Picasso of pettiness; a Shakespeare of shit. His faults are fractal: even his flaws have flaws, and so on ad infinitum. God knows there have always been stupid people in the world, and plenty of nasty people too. But rarely has stupidity been so nasty, or nastiness so stupid. He makes Nixon look trustworthy and George W look smart. In fact, if Frankenstein decided to make a monster assembled entirely from human flaws – he would make a Trump.

And a remorseful Doctor Frankenstein would clutch out big clumpfuls of hair and scream in anguish: ‘My God… what… have… I… created?' If being a twat was a TV show, Trump would be the boxed set.”

-Nate White

[CALL TO ACTIVISM @CalltoActivism]

This made me laugh out loud. 😂

“Shortly after having returned to Mar-a-Lago in after sitting at his NY civil trial, Trump is walking along the beach, feeling pretty dejected about everything.

He decides to go for a swim, but ends up going a little too far from the shore, and since he was winded from the walk, he begins to drown.

Suddenly, three teenaged boys spot him from the beach, rush into the water, and rescue him.

Back on the beach, Trump, after regaining his breath, thanks the three for saving his life. “Anything I can do for you guys, name it!” he says. “Bigly! I alone can fix everything!”

The first boy says, “Well, I want to go to West Point, but my grades are lousy.”

“Say no more,” Trump responds. “All those teachers work for the Deep State anyway. I’ll write you a recommendation and pull some strings to get you a spot at West Point.”

The second boy says, “Well, I can’t find a girlfriend.”

Trump says, “Just grab them by—well, I used to own Miss Universe, I’ll hook you up!”

The third boy says, “I want to be buried in Arlington National Cemetery.”

Trump, a bit puzzled, says, “You’re only eighteen! You’ve got your whole life ahead of you! Why are you thinking about your funeral?”

The boy replies, “Because once I go home and tell my mother that I just saved you from drowning, she’s going to kill me!”

[Ossi Fritsche🇮🇪🇩🇪🇪🇺 @OssiFritsche]

@joncoopertweets Maybe👇👇

[Jon Cooper 🇺🇸 @joncoopertweets]

🚨🚨BREAKING: Elon Musk has come under furious fire from Ukraine after it emerged he thwarted a major attack on the Russian navy. According to reports, Musk secretly ordered his engineers to turn off his Starlink satellite network over Russian-occupied Crimea last year in order to prevent what would have been a devastating Ukrainian drone attack on Russia’s naval fleet.

Mykhailo Podolyak, an adviser to Ukrainian President Zelenskyy, blasted the tech billionaire on Twitter, writing “Sometimes a mistake is much more than just a mistake. By not allowing Ukrainian drones to destroy part of the Russian military (!) fleet via #Starlink interference, @elonmusk allowed this fleet to fire Kalibr missiles at Ukrainian cities.”

Russia is known to have used its naval ships in the Black Sea to strike deep into Ukrainian territory and impose an effective blockade of the Ukrainian Black Sea coast, which is crucial to global grain shipments.

“As a result, civilians, children are being killed,” Podolyak said. “This is the price of a cocktail of ignorance and big ego. However, the question still remains: why do some people so desperately want to defend war criminals and their desire to commit murder? And do they now realize that they are committing evil and encouraging evil?”

[Brian Tyler Cohen @briantylercohen]

Not even a month apart.

[Out of Context Iga Świątek @SwiatekOOC]

My new life motto

[Julian Western @WesternJulian]

@eliebouraad @secupp @Mediaite You're exactly right.

[Julian Western @WesternJulian]

@emmahayes1 Wishing you a speedy recovery 💙 Get well soon

[Catherine Russell @unicefchief]

Leading by example.

Thank you @GretaThunberg for your donation in support of @UNICEF's work to protect children from severe malnutrition amidst climate change, conflict and the COVID-19 pandemic. #UNGA

[No Lie with Brian Tyler Cohen @NoLieWithBTC]

Every single word of this from @AnaKasparian.

[Greta Thunberg @GretaThunberg]

"Environmental destruction in parts of the Amazon is so complete that swathes of the rainforest have reached tipping point and might never be able to recover, a major study carried out by scientists and Indigenous organisations has found."
https://t.co/26MF56pEI6

[Greta Thunberg @GretaThunberg]

"Europe’s directly elected representatives now have to choose: they can either save the EU’s “climate targets” with their legislative loopholes or they can begin saving our climate, because right now, that is not what EU targets are working towards."
https://t.co/AnGBxmC4TA

[No Lie with Brian Tyler Cohen @NoLieWithBTC]

NEW: A woman in Dallas is arguing that she can’t be ticketed for driving alone in the HOV lane because she’s 34 weeks pregnant and the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade—and Texas law now says a fetus is a person. She says they can’t have it both ways. https://t.co/LJecTAmw0i

[George Takei @GeorgeTakei]

If foreign terrorists were shooting up our schools, churches, groceries and parades, the GOP would demand we bomb them back to the Stone Age.

That it’s home grown terrorists with AR-15s means we get thoughts and prayers and more crap about mental illness and good guys with guns.