summer in the bubble My family and I are spending the summer in California, where my daughter works and lives. It’s gorgeous here—the ocean breeze, kale smoothies, solar panels sparkling like jewelry on every roof. But let’s not kid ourselves: this is a bubble of liberalism so
Audio0:00/260.945851× Trump’s return to office isn’t politics as usual—it’s something colder, faster, and far more dangerous. What we’re watching isn’t just policy change. It’s a controlled demolition of the American state, carried out with a grin and a bulldozer. The
This was a hard one. I poured hours into researching it and gathering citations, but writing it felt heavy and joyless, because it’s all so unbelievable. Thanks for being here. Joe Texas0:00/425.1125851× Cutting government “waste” sometimes means cutting the people who tell us when we’re
Funny thing about the deficit: it’s only a crisis when Democrats are in power. The moment a Democrat walks into the White House, Republicans clutch their pearls and warn we’re teetering on the brink of national ruin. Suddenly, every dollar spent is a mortal threat to our grandchildren.
by Barbara Finnicum (I haven't figured out how to change authors. I will. In the meanwhile, Barbara wrote this). Please help me get my readers back that Substack(assholes) stole. I don't normally curse, but there comes a time ... Sometimes I wonder what’s really going
the story of the site May 12, 2025 Writing is how I stitch meaning into a world unraveling at the seams. It grounds me—quieting the static, ordering the storm, giving shape to thought, sometimes just letting me shout into the void with a semicolon. This is where I turn
Enemy0:00/149.4185711× We have met the enemy, and it is us. Pogo said that in 1970. A cartoon possum nailed the dark heart of American life better than most politicians ever manage. But the idea wasn’t new. In 1838, Abraham Lincoln stood up in Springfield, Illinois, and
There was a time I felt proud of the United States. Not blindly, not without criticism, but with a sense that we were striving toward something better. Our history has always been contradictory—liberty proclaimed by slaveholders, equality promised but rarely delivered—but there was, for a time, a belief
Newsletter
until it worked
Newsletter
as a strategy
Newsletter
way too many
Newsletter
perhaps people are catching on