John McMillan

IT Tech Guy. Yes, I love comic books.

[Dave Troy @davetroy]

For background, the suspension was allegedly due to "impersonation," which makes zero sense. Likely it was gang-reported and then algorithmically suspended, and of course there is no recourse. Gil's account remains suspended.

[Robert Graham @robertgraham]

My flippant response got too many views. I stand behind it, but it needs context/explanation.

There's a group of people around Peter Thiel (co-founder of Palantir) who believe in "post-liberalism" philosophies. This refers to "classic liberalism", the way scholars use the term, not "left-wing Democrats", as every conversations now use the term.

This refers to how western democracies run, from Europe to the US to Japan/Korea. We are all part of the "US led post WWII liberal democratic world order", though Trump has now abdicated that leadership.

While agreeing in principle that such liberalism is good in the world, they disagree with some bits of practice. Namely, our "soft power" is falling behind Russia and China. What we need is "hard power", a more powerful military, meaning a more technological military, meaning advances in software/AI. We need a national purpose to accomplish this, like the Manhattan Project, like the Moonshot, like the creation of the Internet. Silicon Valley shouldn't feel embarrassed for working toward these goals, helping with mass surveillance and intelligent weapons, such as how Anthropic pulled back from the miliary. They should instead feel embarrassed for working on trivial consumer crap, like the next big iPhone app like Angry Birds.

Peter Thiel has a bachelor's in philosophy, and Alex Karp a PhD. These aren't the ignorant musings on such subjects like you see from Elon Musk's tweets (pbuh), but people who have thought a lot about it, have studied a lot about it, and have been hanging around with fellow travelers on this subject for the past decade.

Now Trump has completely rejected liberalism as he attacks its principles and institutions, but that's just because he's a dictator-wannabe. He doesn't really understand it, it's not his ideological core, and he'll be gone after 2028, where his cult-of-personality movement will go with him.

The Republicans will then have to rebuild their party. The leading character is JD Vance. It was Peter Thiel that funded Vance's first campaigns, who put him on the political stage. Vance says he believes in this post-liberalism vision.

Palantir is at the center of AI for surveillance and military use. Thiel also helped fund Anduril, which has quickly grown to selling billions of intelligent drone weapons to the military. They are new military-industrial-software complex displacing the old complex.

That is the background here that you would use to understand these 22 items.

[American Economic Liberties Project @econliberties]

This cynical report—which @elonmusk used to call for @linakhanFTC's firing today—is part of a campaign to remove an effective and popular public servant for actually serving the public, rather than billionaires.

Let's take a spin through its "findings."👇🧵

[Dave Troy @davetroy]

Putin seeks to dismantle U.S. foreign policy apparatus, if elected.

[John McMillan @_Johnny_Mac]

@kentuckycosmos Those are really cool clouds 😎

[For All The Marvels @ForAllTheMarvel]

🚨 AMAZING GIVEAWAY 🚨 ‼️
Graded Amazing-Spider-Man issue 180

To WIN FOLLOW LIKE OR RETWEET good luck 🤞

#SpiderMan #MarvelComics #Marvel #Giveaway #GiveawayAlert #Win #comic

[John McMillan @_Johnny_Mac]

@mrmarkmillar https://t.co/20YI5FkB6v Mike's Amazing World of comics site has this feature. Didn't know about the time machine site.

[Caroline Orr Bueno, Ph.D @RVAwonk]

Elon Musk is now explicitly encouraging his 120 million followers to start following QAnon.

Put differently, Elon Musk is encouraging his 120 million followers to join a domestic terrorism movement.

[Laurie Garrett @Laurie_Garrett]

11/ Finally, @elonmusk -- thank God you were born in South Africa and therefore can't follow in #DonaldTrump footsteps, sweeping you, and your mammoth ego, into the Oval Office.

Just shut up and get back to building cars, batteries, spaceships and giant holes in the ground.

[Morten Øverbye  @morten]

Elon Musk tweeted he would vote for a Republican Congress, he wants Trump back on Twitter, and supports DeSantis. He derides liberals and journalists, cuddles alt-right trolls and conspiracy theories. Where he stands politically remains unclear to The New York Times.

[John McMillan @_Johnny_Mac]

@Angry_Staffer Is it lazy or deliberate? Honest question. I find it hard to believe that the "Dems in disarray" narrative is not being utilized as a weapon to disenfranchise voters and weaken Democrats political will by constantly having to defend themselves.

[John McMillan @_Johnny_Mac]

I just subscribed to Civil Discourse with Joyce Vance https://t.co/j1VoSwvEJ9

[Teri Kanefield @Teri_Kanefield]

Maybe they actually prefer fascism. Maybe they prefer Trump's vision of America to an expanding liberal democracy that embraces diversity.

The theory that they are scared or blackmailed gives them a lot of credit.

[Elizabeth de la Vega 🇺🇸🦅 @Delavegalaw]

You don't have to be brilliant to do what Judge Cannon is doing. Nothing she is doing is brilliant; quite the opposite. She is playing for her team. Why? Because Trump et al are her team. The tribalism she is displaying is the most insidious form of corruption there is.

[Glenn Kirschner @glennkirschner2]

The GOP is on the road to doing to the American people what Putin is doing to the Russian people, what the Iranian “Morality Police” are doing to Iranian women, what Kim Jong-un is doing to the N. Korean people. But WE still have the ability to vote them out to protect ourselves

[Shayan Sardarizadeh @Shayan86]

A plea to Western news outlets and journalists: Please DO NOT publish videos of protests in Iran without blurring or pixelating the faces of protesters. The authorities use them to identify and detain protesters. You're putting their safety at risk.
#MahsaAmini
#مهسا_امینی

[Greg Olear @gregolear]

"In real life, no one wants to be the bad guy. So the grotesquely wealthy have devised a method of operation in which the individuals who help them increase their vast wealth know so little about the big picture that they don’t see themselves as villains."
https://t.co/aCYGrJs60Q

[Robert Reich @RBReich]

Ginni Thomas, the wife of a Supreme Court justice, was directly involved in efforts to overturn the 2020 election.

How on Earth has Clarence Thomas not been required to recuse himself from all cases involving Trump's attempted coup? At the very least. I mean c'mon.

[Ron Filipkowski @RonFilipkowski]

The problem now is that many of these liars, hucksters, scammers, fraudsters and criminal conspiracy theorists have been busy getting jobs as poll workers. Not poll watchers, election workers. All part of Bannon and Flynn’s plan. https://t.co/Eq13uDTtav

[Joe Walsh @WalshFreedom]

Has anyone asked why the Governor of Florida is flying migrants from Texas to Massachusetts?