They’re laughing so hard they made a whole Lego diss track just about Leavitt where they call her “Baghdad Barbie” and portray her as a puppet working in an office that’s engulfed in flames. Less creative than some of the other ones, but her sycophancy has definitely made it into their propaganda.
University of Alabama (Tuscaloosa campus) this Thursday (evening screening of Andor episodes 2.8 & 2.9 intro'ed by me, Q&A and discussion to follow) and Friday (paper presentations) & it will apparently be livestreamed. Can send you the info. PTJ is the Friday morning keynote.
"...even if Alderaan’s royal family was deeply involved in funding rebellion, the planet's destruction still violates the principle of distinction...& constitutes collective punishment & genocide under contemporary understandings of international law."
Politics of Star Wars conference is gonna be 🔥
I got at this dynamic a bit in an interview with BBC Arabic, where I note both the lack of experienced US diplomats at the table with Iran & the absolute trashing of any standing the US had as a mediator in the region.
"The Trump administration is stripping diplomacy of its meaning."
Notice the overarching trend of the personalization of politics (& straight graft). These people aren't negotiating anything on behalf of populations whom they ostensibly represent; those populations don't even factor to them. It's all a system of favors b/t businessmen who see financial opportunity
Solidère/Hariri model sanitized tourist playground for Damascus, cruise ship terminal & golf for millionaires on the coast, and no mention of anything that will benefit ordinary Syrians. Just a bunch of billionaire families redefining the bounds of disaster capitalism.
Attempt at an artistically staged photo of a small white bag of coffee beans where “World Aeropress Championship” is printed in a large circle with an official silver seal in the middle. Bag sits inside an open box with the deep orange box lid arranged on top of it. Orange lid reads “2025 World Aeropress Championship, Seoul Korea.
If I’m super hype for the next few weeks, it’s because my PhD student is doing brilliant work on global coffee markets & brought me *the* Aeropress World Championship official coffee beans from his fieldwork in Seoul. I’m gonna crush grading this year.
Signal already has a setting that blocks message content from displaying in push notifications; the case highlights why such a feature might be important for some users to turn on. www.404media.co/fbi-extracts...
"How dare you make me confront my active participation in and profit from the dehumanization of an entire group of people who just want to be left alone to live their lives?"
One of the the villages the IDF demolished is my friend's ancestral home, Taybeh. Not a house, not a commercial building, not a gas station, the whole ancient village that survived the Ottomans, colonialism, and every other Israeli occupation. Just obliterated in the name of collective punishment.
HRW: Israeli attacks on four oil depots around Tehran on March 7 may cause long-term health and environmental harm for civilians. Strikes on primarily civilian infrastructure causing foreseeable civilian harm are violations of IHL and likely war crimes www.hrw.org/news/2026/04...
But the white phosphorus? The targeting of civilian infrastructure? Weaponization of forced displacement? Not new. The 1st page of my book ends w/ a description of a hospital being targeted in 1982, from a nurse who survived.
It just wasn't live streamed, which is the second big distinction. 4/4
Big distinction now is the use of AI for automated/largely automated targeting. That's based on decades of surveillance that used to feed into human systems. There are massive implications for the speed of Israeli attacks (100+ bombs/10 min), proportionality (lack thereof), & accountability. 3/4
That's not to downplay the horrors of Gaza, 2006, or this week's massacre in Lebanon. It's to put them in context of a long history of Israel building surveillance systems (human & digital), obtaining weaponry, workshopping narrative justifications, & testing the int'l community's permissiveness 2/4
I understand why people are using the the term "Gazafication of Lebanon," but there is a long history to Israel's current tactics that long predates 2023. It used to be the "Dahiyeh Doctrine," a term that references the 2006 July War. That said, Israel's 1982 Lebanon invasion is a key precedent 1/4
God I hate this genre. These kids who protested Gaza got arrested, expelled, beaten up, doxxed, lives ruined by outside agitators and were utterly betrayed by the administrations that should have protected them at any cost. Shut the fuck up.
This honestly sounds like something that a drunk nerd would come up with for a Model UN conference crisis simulation.
I remember vans dropping protesters in party swag in Barbour, w/ its well-trod route into the city center. Aramoun's trees decorated w/ fairy lights, Dec 2026.
160 bombs in 10 mins. Hundreds of lives lost as Israel dropped ordinance on densely-populated residential neighborhoods without warning.
Before GPS, people navigated Lebanese cities w/ landmarks; there weren't always street signs. For people from that era, each bombing prompts a uniquely embodied, spatial memory. The gym a block from the Ramada, a jilted mistress's passion project. The nut shop at the entry to Burj al-Barajneh.
400 dead so far, over 1000 injured, dozens and dozens missing. This is one hour into the massacre. I have no idea what the death toll will be in the end. Also, they have announced “another wave” of attacks coming
Diplomaxxing
I honestly don’t think many people outside of Lebanon get how real the “except every so often their house is almost blown up” part. Just because they live in Lebanon. It’s like the injustice is so stark people just cannot comprehend it, and most certainly do not want to confront it.
Huge quantities of fertilizers/components come through the Strait (~1/3 of world supply). Ukraine has been targeting Russian fertilizer plants b/c they can be used to make weapons. But I don't expect this guy to understand what increased fertilizer prices & shortages mean for farmers & food supply.
Video calls w/ Lebanese friends now feature fuzzy stripes on the screen b/c of the omnipresent Israeli drones. Today, my friend's face suddenly whipped towards the windows as she covered her head; background noise cancellation meant that I didn't even hear the explosion that shook her whole house.
Pam Bondi isn’t as sympathetic of a character.
The TikTok girlies (gender neutral) are hatching a plan to all buy copies of communion by hooks on Vance's release date. I will be participating.
If men do not stop manspreading on the DC Metro, I am going to start publicly dressing them down like children.
I just had to try three times to sit down because these grown ass supposed professionals won’t move their legs.
Never go in against a Sicilian when death is on the line, a riff.
the information environment in Israel is unbelievably fucked. it wasn't great before Oct 7 and it's been catastrophic since.
Thank you so much for your engagement & generosity, Raul; this all means a lot, especially coming from you.
It's horrifying to see so many of the historical politics & dynamics I wrote a/b replayed in Gaza & again in Lebanon, w/ the added factors of AI & a completely unrestrained Israeli gov't.