James Standish

[NOBUNAGA🇯🇵🏯_夏樹蒼依 @japan_nobunaga]

I went to In-N-Out and ordered a cheeseburger. The cashier, a calm young woman named Destiny, asked me a question I did not expect.

"You want that Animal Style?"

I paused.

I did not know what this meant. But a samurai does not admit he does not know. So I answered with weight.

"...Animal Style."

"Cool. So that's mustard-grilled, extra spread, grilled onions, pickles. Yeah?"

I understood now. This was a sacred permission. For one meal, I was being told to put down my manners at the door. To eat the way a beast eats, without shame. I had waited my whole life for someone to give me this order.

"Yes," I said. "I will become the animal."

Destiny did not blink. "...Okay. You want your fries Animal Style too?"

I stopped. Even the potatoes?

"The potatoes also become animals?"

"I mean, they get cheese and sauce and grilled onions, so..."

"Then yes. Let the potatoes abandon their restraint as well."

"...Got it." She was the calmest woman I have ever met. "3x3, 4x4, or just the one?"

I did not know these numbers, but I knew a challenge when I heard one. "How many must I face?"

"It's, like, how many patties you want."

"How many is the most honorable?"

"...Four is a lot."

"Then four. A warrior does not ask for fewer."

She wrote it down without argument. A 4x4, Animal Style, with animal fries. She warned me once, kindly. "That's gonna be huge." I told her I was counting on it.

It arrived. It was a tower. Cheese and sauce ran down my hands the moment I lifted it. There was no clean way to eat it. There was no dignified way. That was the entire point.

I ate it like a beast. Both hands, no honor, grilled onion on my chin, and I have to be honest with you, it was the best thing I have ever put in my mouth.

For thirty years I have kept my manners at every table in the world.

They handed me a burger and told me to be an animal, and I have never felt so free.

So tell me, America.

The whole country knows the secret menu. What else are you hiding in plain sight?

And "Animal Style." Was I eating the animal, or finally becoming one?

[Yasmina @yasminalombaert]

Brilliant!

“Trump, the peacemaker.” - Jonathan Pie

“Back to you, Sophie.
Thank you. It's interesting, isn't it, that Trump signed this deal in Versailles, you know, the location of another famous humiliating, total capitulation. But you know, of course, Trump will spin this as a massive success because he's got form in declaring he's won when clearly he hasn't.

But this war was a success in the same way that paying $14 million to have large chunks of blue paint floating in an algae-infested reflecting pool was money well spent.

The truth is, the United States has rarely looked weaker, and Iran has rarely looked stronger, having now worked out that if anyone doesn't do exactly what they want them to, they'll just close the Strait of Hormuz, and they've got the whole world by the bullbags.

We went from week one: "I will win. Victory will be easier than that time I kidnapped the president of Venezuela."

To week two: "I won."

To week three: "Why aren't you helping me win?"

To week four: "I don't need your help to win, but if you don't help me win, I'm going to destroy NATO."

Week five: "If you don't let me win, I'll annihilate an entire civilization."
It's quite a feat to give the Iranian regime the moral high ground, but luckily, Donald Trump shattered the illusion of American morality a long time ago.

Week six: "We're winning, and to prove it, here's an AI picture of me dressed as Jesus.”

Week seven: "The Pope is a soy-filled, woke, Guardian reader."

Week eight: "I'm getting bored now."

Weeks nine through to 14: "Really bored now, and I've got ballrooms to build and cage fights on the White House lawn to organise."

And four months later, victory!

Thank you very much, where's my peace prize?

And if the rest of the G7 can just clear up the mess and pay the bill, that would be great.

The outcome was always inevitable, but you know, it's been fun to watch.

Most of Trump's posts on Truth Social around the conflict have sounded less like the leader of the free world and more like a 14-year-old boy who's the only one left in the class not to have fingered anyone.

One particular highlight being on Easter Sunday, when Trump went on to Truth Social to write, "Open the fucking strait, you crazy bastards."
Which are the words of a true diplomat with supreme control of the situation.

He then spent some time at the White House Easter Egg Roll, where he gave a speech to a bunch of bemused primary school children about how he's thinking of starting World War III in Iran and Joe Biden's auto-pen.

But this conflict hasn't all been plain sailing. Trump got really angry with the UK, and Spain, and Canada, Australia, Italy—in fact, anyone who raised any objections to this gross example of imperial overreach was branded a coward.

It was as if he felt like we should all be grateful that his latest piece of American expansionism didn't involve making Canada the 51st state or carpet bombing the sleepy village of Greenland.

Perhaps if you want your allies to be good allies, then maybe start treating us like allies. Don't bully your allies, or slam illegal tariffs on your allies, or interfere with their elections by overtly promoting far-right parties across Europe whilst hurling insults at our leaders and threatening to invade Allied sovereign territory, and then demand we come to your aid just because you started a war because one, Benjamin Netanyahu told you to, and two, to distract from the fact that you appear in the Epstein files more times than Jesus is mentioned in the Bible.

But at least someone did all right out of this whole thing. Well, for me, the highlight of the whole shit show was the $2.1 billion in bets placed minutes before presidential announcements about the war in Iran.

1/2

[Zlatan Ibrahimović @Ibra_official]

The studio will never forget

[James Standish @imperialpint]

Actual liberalism, actual equality & justice are being replaced with equity & social justice. https://t.co/MY6m0TrODF

[James Standish @imperialpint]

The Operating System of my mind hasn't had an upgrade for 50,000 years!
https://t.co/5o4NErCMI1

[James Standish @imperialpint]

@ByronYork @Shawn_Regan @nypost The solution is to repeal HLA et al. Get the lawyers out of street maintenance. No more unfunded mandates passed by the 1% of commuters that bike to work

[James Standish @imperialpint]

@FilmThePoliceLA @ByronYork @varifrank @Shawn_Regan @nypost In 2013 the avg LAPD officer made 5.6 stops/month earning $94k. By 2025: 1.8 stops/month earning $161k. Officer pay up 70% over 13 years. Stops per officer down 68%. LA rewards less work with more money — every single year

[Forecasting Research Institute @Research_FRI]

We completed the most comprehensive study of how economists and AI experts think AI will affect the U.S. economy.

They predict major AI progress—but no dramatic break from economic trends: GDP growth rates similar to today's and a moderate decline in labor force participation.

However, when asked to consider what would happen in a world with extremely rapid progress in AI capabilities by 2030, they predict significant economic impacts by 2050:

• Annualized GDP growth of 3.5% (compared to 2.4% in 2025)
• A labor force participation rate of 55% (roughly 10 million fewer jobs)
• 80% of wealth held by the top 10% (highest since 1939)

🧵 Here's what we found:

[James Standish @imperialpint]

Discussion of The exploding deficit & total failure of the tariffs will, of course, be preempted by the ‘bombing Iran’ episodes of the Trump Show

[James Standish @imperialpint]

https://t.co/v6yBPGVIaa

[Josh Barro @jbarro]

And not in, like, the fetishist way

[James Standish @imperialpint]

https://t.co/6flRyz9S58

[James Standish @imperialpint]

Maybe, Spotify has finally fixed the shuffle!!! All fresh songs from my playlist & no repeats from the last few days! An astonishing technological leap from the crack programmers at Spotify!!!
WOOT!!!!

[Gad Saad @GadSaad]

Dear @realDonaldTrump, thoughts?

[James Standish @imperialpint]

Just heard that the Venmo-PayPal service merger is supposed to be good for me. They probably won't stop sending the digital gibberish I get now like “PAYMENT ID:172090” when it should be "dinner with D". only the AI overlord will know what I've done with my money. #Venmo #PayPal

[James Standish @imperialpint]

Probably another antifa false flag operation! https://t.co/9dVmai3dpt

[James Standish @imperialpint]

Who invented cancel culture? Who could have possibly come up with that awful idea? Shouldn’t We hold individuals and organizations accountable for their harmful words or actions, especially those related to politics?
https://t.co/xzB98rtAiT

[James Standish @imperialpint]

According to a NY superior court judge, Luigi Mangione is not a terrorist. Perhaps he’s garden variety psychopath. Not a passionate advocate for social justice but a cold blooded murderous nutcase. https://t.co/6e5Rydeimm

[James Standish @imperialpint]

“Trump Family Amasses $5 Billion Fortune After Crypto Launch”. WSJ
That’s about $625 million a month. Truly, the biggest, most beautiful deal he’s ever made.

[James Standish @imperialpint]

@BigPopz72 @RBReich How many forms of sewer shit are there? Maybe Republicans are a slightly higher form of sewer shit. Are independents a form of sewer shit as well?