Bruce Friend

[Governor Jared Polis @GovofCO]

Colorado is world famous for our treasure trove of fossils.

On Wednesday, paleontologists relocated a triceratops footprint from the Fossil Trace Golf Course in Golden. It will now go to the Golden History Museum.

https://t.co/w2tlZJJX6q

[Mario Díaz-Balart @MarioDB]

I am requesting that the House immediately come back for a second vote on the Speaker @PatrickMcHenry

[Bruce Friend @bfriend407]

@RepKenBuck @KyleClark @GOPMajorityWhip Hi Ken 👋 How about a vote for McHenry to be speaker for the rest of the year?

[Liz Cheney @Liz_Cheney]

Members of the House and Senate who are voting to deny Ukraine assistance on the 85th anniversary of Neville Chamberlain’s 1938 “peace in our time” speech should read some history: Appeasement didn’t work then. It won’t work now.

[American Veteran @amvetsupport]

I am asking those who follow to please retweet this call to action. We cannot, repeat cannot, have a Commander in Chief who calls for the execution of a Chairman of the Joint Chiefs. A man too cowardly to serve. A Man who tried to overthrow our government. We cannot allow this

[Frank Luntz @FrankLuntz]

65% of Americans want presidential elections to be decided by nationwide popular vote.

33% want to keep the Electoral College.

https://t.co/UImrTkBq1Z

[Acyn @Acyn]

Neguse: Americans might wonder how did we get here and what legislative strategy has the House Republican Caucus devised to avoid a government shutdown. Apparently, that strategy is waste an entire summer debating bills on protecting gas stoves….

[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

[Robert Reich @RBReich]

FYI: Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito — both of whom accepted luxury vacations from billionaires — could rule on an upcoming Supreme Court case that would ban a federal wealth tax.

If they don’t recuse themselves, why would we expect Americans to ever trust SCOTUS again?

[Mehdi Hasan @mehdirhasan]

One of the most important myth-busting deep-dives I've ever done.

What was the real impact of Covid school closures?
Were they avoidable?
Did they cause 'learning loss' & mental health decline?
What's the impact of Covid on kids' health?

Please do watch:
https://t.co/qHgwYA5b0I

[Erik Loomis @ErikLoomis]

You get a job in academia based around a series of lucky breaks completely beyond your control.

Many faculty think they got their job because they "earned" it when in reality, someone was in a good mood on given job talk day because they had sex that morning or whatever.

[Erik Loomis @ErikLoomis]

But think of Gordon Gee's retirement package!

[Veena Dubal @veenadubal]

I’m adding to my first lecture for first year law students that one in four grad students experience anxiety and depression. And that this is a structural problem, not an individual one. It is making me tear up. What a world we have created.

[Bruce Friend @bfriend407]

@JDVance1 The vast majority of the thousands of Black Lives Matter protests have been peaceful, with more than 93% involving no serious harm to people or damage to property.

[Josh Marshall @joshtpm]

Let’s admit that every reporter in DC knows but most won’t say for fear of falling out of favor with the bothsides rules of official DC: there is a two-tiered Justice System. One for Democrats, in which the most exacting focus on conflicts of interest are followed, often going …

[Bruce Friend @bfriend407]

@joncoopertweets NO. Election day should be moved to Sunday.

[Mueller, She Wrote @MuellerSheWrote]

Finally, if there are any crimes that were committed, and he has evidence beyond a reasonable doubt to obtain and maintain a conviction on appeal, Hunter should be prosecuted. I think every dem would agree with that. 4/

[Rob Richie @Rob_Richie]

Key result in national poll: "One of the biggest takeaways was the consistent majority support for Ranked Choice Voting in all of its different potential applications. After deliberating, majorities of our sample consistently supported the use of RCV for all kinds of elections"

[Bruce Friend @bfriend407]

@JDVance1 Keep power in the Ohio Legislature where it belongs. Vote Yes!

[Josh Marshall @joshtpm]

“the USA is going Hell!!!” Lol someone’s having a nice day