James Del
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jdel.bsky.social
James Del
@jdel.bsky.social
6.6K followers 320 following 180 posts
Occasionally blogging (downthepipes.co), often scheming, always producing.
Specialist in assorted dark arts & life sciences.
Previously: Passionfruit, Futurism, GMG
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jdel.bsky.social
This is a great course taught by the original blogger-turned-columnist, highly recommended for anyone (writers and non-writers) looking to get their expertise out in the world.
November 10, 2025 at 4:40 PM
jdel.bsky.social
Actually curious to see how this plays out. The far left is expecting another Obama, high on the hope and change rhetoric, fairly moderate in governance, still very much tethered to the capitalist order and ultimately a disappointment to card carrying socialists. He stands to disappoint someone here
kattenbarge.bsky.social Kat Tenbarge @kattenbarge.bsky.social · 4d
People who hate Zohran and everything he stands for: Now that Zohran has won, the most effective thing he can do is betray all of his principles
November 6, 2025 at 2:54 PM
Reposted by James Del
haydihidiho.bsky.social
We should never talk about billionaires without mentioning that they are dangerous money hoarders ever again.
qasimrashid.com Qasim Rashid, Esq. @qasimrashid.com · 9d
Bloomberg just doubled down on his support for Cuomo.

Bloomberg—who has hoarded $109.4B—has spent $8M to get Cuomo elected. That's like the average American household spending $4.38.

Billionaires got us into this affordability crisis. They will not get us out. Abolish billionaires. Vote Mamdani.
November 1, 2025 at 1:54 PM
Reposted by James Del
espiers.bsky.social
Anyway, here’s what’s wrong with the stupid ballroom: www.elizabethspiers.com/donald-trump...
Donald Trump's $300 Million Playpen
Trump can find money for a vanity project, but not for SNAP recipients [Note: I actually filed this for the NYT ten days ago but it sort of lingered in the workflow and by the end of the week, they d...
www.elizabethspiers.com
November 1, 2025 at 2:40 PM
jdel.bsky.social
If Toronto wins the World Series the rule is America becomes Canada, nobody knows this because the last time it happened Canada beat Philadelphia, and Clinton was like "double or nothing" which they wisely agreed to, but now we're here (like most Clinton era policies, it felt prudent at the time).
October 30, 2025 at 2:25 AM
Reposted by James Del
johnmoe.bsky.social
First thing, Tulane’s a very competitive school so congrats to the monkeys for getting in there in the first place.
October 28, 2025 at 8:34 PM
Reposted by James Del
oliviamesser.bsky.social
I wrote the first version of this draft almost exactly a year ago, but I wasn’t ready.

I am now.

thebarbedwire.com/2025/10/27/t...
Texas Is a Lot More Queer Than You Think. I Am Too.
There are 1.8 million of us, and we’re not going anywhere.
thebarbedwire.com
October 28, 2025 at 1:58 PM
Reposted by James Del
gregggonsalves.bsky.social
At the end of her column @espiers.bsky.social says she looking for work. I have to say she is one of the people I most look forward to reading these days. When so many mediocre writers rise upwards like hot air, it was shocking to hear this.
October 28, 2025 at 11:25 AM
Reposted by James Del
davidjroth.bsky.social
You have to be willing to walk away from these guys if they let you down, just as a matter of basic self respect. It's not a fandom. You're hiring them to do a job or not.
tbone.malware-virus.biz timothy faust @tbone.malware-virus.biz · 20d
I liked the Platner ads too but I think there's a difference between "guy who had some bad reddit posts a decade ago" and "ex-Blackwater merc who still has a Nazi tattoo." Sucks bigtime that he's the only one taking positions and talking policy I like, but them's the breaks!
October 21, 2025 at 3:50 PM
Reposted by James Del
gilduran.com
Someone went there:

"It Kind of Seems Like Peter Thiel is Losing It"

via @futurism.com

futurism.com/future-socie...
It Kind of Seems Like Peter Thiel Is Losing It
He's spent the past month delivering four high-octane lectures in San Francisco's downtown waterfront on the antichrist.
futurism.com
October 20, 2025 at 4:22 PM
Reposted by James Del
jeffsharlet.bsky.social
This, FWIW, is my current teaching policy on AI, always subject to revision. It is, I recognize, easier applied to creative writing, which draws students who *want* to take the course rather than have to.
This is a course for those interested in writing not as means to an end but as an end in itself. Recently a friend and I read a cover story in New York magazine titled, “Everyone is Cheating Their Way Through College,” by James D. Walsh. My friend has also taught writing. He likes to tell his students, “If you want to be a writer, put on a cool hat and go sit in a bar with cheap beer. If you want to write, write.” I didn’t think AI would be a temptation for creative writing students. “Everyone is Cheating Their Way Through College” persuaded me that for many it’s not a temptation but a condition. You sleep in a bed, you wear clothes, you don’t scream at teachers. Just the way it is. Maybe AI is becoming that, too, part of “just the way it is.” Maybe it is that already. My mind raced through ideas about how to “beat” AI. The article dismantled them. Then I thought, “That’s not my job.” I’m a writer and a teacher, not a cop. If you want to work with me on writing, we can do that. If you want to cheat, you can do that, too, and I probably can’t stop you. I’m interested in working with students for whom writing feels… good. Who seek that feeling. A feeling of being, of alertness. Of purpose; of intention. This is a course for those who are interested in using writing to experience some variation of this feeling. Sometimes this feeling comes in a moment of clarity, sometimes in the making of a lyrical juxtaposition. There are so many more emotional, intellectual, and spiritual possibilities that arise from the act of shaping language. I live off the aftermath of that act—the recognitions, financial and otherwise, I earn from the results—but there is no paycheck, or even a finished book held in hand for the first time, that has ever brought me as much complicated pleasure as the arrangement of words. Maybe you’re like this, too. Or maybe you want to be. If so, I designed this course with someone like you in mind.
October 20, 2025 at 12:11 PM
Reposted by James Del
jessicacalarco.com
We need to talk about how social media algorithms push moms down a slippery slope of distrust.

From "Are my kids getting enough support in school?" To "Maybe I should homeschool." To "Maybe modern medicine is bad."

I've seen this first-hand in research I'm doing on parenting apps. 1/🧵
October 15, 2025 at 12:25 PM
jdel.bsky.social
This timeline is cursed with a whole host of ghoulish reality but I think having to explain Bari Weiss to my 99 year old grandmother is up there with the worst of it
October 12, 2025 at 3:59 PM
Reposted by James Del
pixelatedboat.bsky.social
Nice try, “Paul A. Thompson”
A Pitchfork review for One Battle After Another that call it a “nerve-wracking masterpiece”, written by one Paul A. Thompson
October 10, 2025 at 5:32 AM
jdel.bsky.social
Went to see this on the big screen tonight, can confirm it is indeed lol
bencollins.bsky.social Tim Onion @bencollins.bsky.social · Oct 9
Welp, here it is: maybe the funniest thing we've ever done, in its entirety.
The Onion Investigates: Jeffrey Epstein
YouTube video by The Onion
www.youtube.com
October 10, 2025 at 1:09 AM
Reposted by James Del
carnegro.bsky.social
Pope Leo is spitting.

www.npr.org/2025/10/09/n...
Leo questioned a world where the wealth of the elite grows "exponentially" while many "millions of people die of hunger or survive in conditions unfit for human beings." He also criticized "ideologies that defend the absolute autonomy of the marketplace and financial speculation," with false promises "that a free-market economy will automatically solve the problem of poverty." Leo described a "new tyranny," which shuns any kind of oversight and where the economy is structured "in such a way that sacrifices are demanded of the masses in order to serve the needs of the powerful." The poor, he wrote, are only allowed "drops that trickle down." The pope openly challenged "prosperity theology" and called Christians to the practice of giving charity. "It will not solve the problem of world poverty, yet it must still be carried out, with intelligence, diligence and social responsibility," he wrote. Popular movements that challenge "the empire of money," invite people to take on the cause to combat poverty alongside the poor, instead of on their behalf, and "make history," the pope said. It our duty, Leo said, to "make their voices heard, albeit in different ways, in order to point out and denounce such structural issues, even at the cost of appearing foolish or naïve."
October 9, 2025 at 1:25 PM
jdel.bsky.social
This, by the way, is what "testing the Supremacy clause" looks like in practice. Kudos to Portland cops for upholding their oath to serve and protect their community, but a sad state of affairs when the state sanction enforcement branches are arguing. Back the blue, I guess??
October 9, 2025 at 2:35 PM
Reposted by James Del
annamerlan.bsky.social
"A practice that would have been unthinkable under past administrations is becoming normalized: sending ICE detainees, without due process, to far-flung prisons in countries with notorious human rights records."

www.motherjones.com/politics/202...
ICE is sending people to a prison in Africa’s only absolute monarchy
Inside the “legal black hole” in Eswatini, where Trump is sending detainees.
www.motherjones.com
October 9, 2025 at 12:14 PM
jdel.bsky.social
Somebody tell Trump about Jubilees (the historic monarchy tradition not the SFW gangbang videos). If we're gonna have a king we might as well get the good shit
October 8, 2025 at 2:19 PM
jdel.bsky.social
Only vibe code that matters to me is "thou shalt not attempt to finish the interrupted story a third time unless expressly invited"
October 8, 2025 at 12:38 AM
Reposted by James Del
joolia.bsky.social
this is very good

— lol, lmao —
October 7, 2025 at 4:15 PM
Reposted by James Del
webvixen.bsky.social
Frank Zappa 🎤
October 5, 2025 at 10:34 PM
jdel.bsky.social
My AIM screen name in 7th grade was SimmerDownNowDC because this skit aired a week before a busload of LI middle school honor society kids went to Washington DC and spent 3 whole days telling vast numbers of federal employees to "simmer down now."
October 3, 2025 at 11:19 PM
Reposted by James Del
jimswift.bsky.social
Donald Trump wanted to give King Charles one of Dwight Eisenhower's swords. The director of the library said no.

He was told to resign or be fired. WTF.

No swords for Kings.
October 3, 2025 at 9:41 PM
jdel.bsky.social
Bless this source for providing such a vivid and potentially enduring image of the Veep-like clusterfuck this all stands to be
justinbaragona.bsky.social Justin Baragona @justinbaragona.bsky.social · Oct 3
NEW from me:

Several CBS News staffers and insiders told me that the network "is not a good place now" amid the imminent arrival of Bari Weiss as editor-in-chief, who one source likened to Michael Scott of The Office based on her lack of qualifications.

www.the-independent.com/news/world/a...
CBS News staffers are ‘literally freaking out’ about Bari Weiss taking over newsroom
EXCLUSIVE: ‘People are using words like depressing and doomsday – feels like some sort of doomsday,’ one source told The Independent about the mood inside CBS News right now.
www.the-independent.com
October 3, 2025 at 9:25 PM