Michael O'Bryan
@michaelobryan.bsky.social
Senior Lecturer in Writing and English at Washington University in St. Louis - I guess this is a chance to wipe the slate clean of my overly earnest political opinions and bad basketball takes, but who are we kidding
Reposted by Michael O'Bryan
have you considered that your strategy of "try to kill enough brown people that a race scientist who goes by Trannyporno will let you into his groupchats" failed worse than any dem candidate since Dukakis
July 12, 2025 at 6:36 PM
have you considered that your strategy of "try to kill enough brown people that a race scientist who goes by Trannyporno will let you into his groupchats" failed worse than any dem candidate since Dukakis
Reposted by Michael O'Bryan
why did we let anyone other than the engineers of the noble honda civic even attempt building for space flight www.theverge.com/news/689183/...
Honda successfully launched and landed its own reusable rocket
Will SpaceX have more competition?
www.theverge.com
June 18, 2025 at 3:16 PM
why did we let anyone other than the engineers of the noble honda civic even attempt building for space flight www.theverge.com/news/689183/...
I hate when recipes call for 1/2 tsp kosher salt, please be serious
June 18, 2025 at 3:52 PM
I hate when recipes call for 1/2 tsp kosher salt, please be serious
Reposted by Michael O'Bryan
Everyone I knew who covered disinformation got laid off, their bosses got bullied into firing them, or they changed their beats from actual Nazi harassment campaigns. It cannot be stressed the damage the paid-for Substack “free speech” guys did in the service of fascism and against real free speech.
i've been trying to see what the right wing platforms (even outside of X) are showing people regarding the protests in LA and i am not sure it can be overstated just how much the AI slop is being used to reinforce the idea that downtown is a post-apocalyptic war zone
June 12, 2025 at 2:56 AM
Everyone I knew who covered disinformation got laid off, their bosses got bullied into firing them, or they changed their beats from actual Nazi harassment campaigns. It cannot be stressed the damage the paid-for Substack “free speech” guys did in the service of fascism and against real free speech.
Reposted by Michael O'Bryan
I would love to see orders of magnitude more discussion about what "swing voters" should figure out, deal with, suck up, get a clue about, etc and orders of magnitude less discussion about how protestors should coddle random third party's hallucinations about this section of the electorate
June 10, 2025 at 6:15 PM
I would love to see orders of magnitude more discussion about what "swing voters" should figure out, deal with, suck up, get a clue about, etc and orders of magnitude less discussion about how protestors should coddle random third party's hallucinations about this section of the electorate
Reposted by Michael O'Bryan
"i bet you feel bad for saying that guy was insanely old, now that something that happens to really old guys is happening to him" no i dont actually
May 19, 2025 at 4:42 AM
"i bet you feel bad for saying that guy was insanely old, now that something that happens to really old guys is happening to him" no i dont actually
This is probably nothing right?
April 22, 2025 at 5:18 AM
This is probably nothing right?
No Schnucks, I don’t want to test out your computerized grocery cart that lets me scan and bag my items as I go so you can lay off all your checkers and baggers. Actually.
April 5, 2025 at 8:28 PM
No Schnucks, I don’t want to test out your computerized grocery cart that lets me scan and bag my items as I go so you can lay off all your checkers and baggers. Actually.
Reposted by Michael O'Bryan
You can totally see how this mf bankrupted a casino.
April 3, 2025 at 1:45 AM
You can totally see how this mf bankrupted a casino.
Reposted by Michael O'Bryan
it can't be overstated what a profound and shameful journalistic failure it was to not properly communicate the fact Trump genuinely has absolute no fucking idea what he's doing
I have to be honest. I think the people in power are so stupid, sheltered and insane that there's no real overriding goal or strategy to any of this.
April 2, 2025 at 10:40 PM
it can't be overstated what a profound and shameful journalistic failure it was to not properly communicate the fact Trump genuinely has absolute no fucking idea what he's doing
It’s always been this, all the way back to 2015, and it’s a real disservice to try to convince people it’s 5D chess or Putin’s orders or whatever. Those fictions are more comforting than a world run by morons whose opponents can’t stop them and who half of voters love. Fictions, nonetheless.
I have to be honest. I think the people in power are so stupid, sheltered and insane that there's no real overriding goal or strategy to any of this.
April 2, 2025 at 11:55 PM
It’s always been this, all the way back to 2015, and it’s a real disservice to try to convince people it’s 5D chess or Putin’s orders or whatever. Those fictions are more comforting than a world run by morons whose opponents can’t stop them and who half of voters love. Fictions, nonetheless.
Okay, point taken and agreed in spirit and all, but people say this “dumbest ruler ever” thing all the time, and like, there have got to be some inbred teenagers were overlooking in that assessment.
It’s still hard to believe the simple fact that this is all self-imposed. Everything that’s happening right now wasn’t the result of some foreign adversary destroying the country. We did this all to ourselves by electing the dumbest motherfucker to ever rule a nation.
April 2, 2025 at 11:45 PM
Okay, point taken and agreed in spirit and all, but people say this “dumbest ruler ever” thing all the time, and like, there have got to be some inbred teenagers were overlooking in that assessment.
Reposted by Michael O'Bryan
The thing about watching a JD Vance speech is that everyone knows he’s a little pig man. Everyone knows he exists to squeal for Trump‘s amusement. No one respects him and he clearly doesn’t respect himself.
March 28, 2025 at 6:56 PM
The thing about watching a JD Vance speech is that everyone knows he’s a little pig man. Everyone knows he exists to squeal for Trump‘s amusement. No one respects him and he clearly doesn’t respect himself.
I’ve kept receipts for months about Matt Yglesias vaguely implying Dems need to embrace racial explanations for crime. Yesterday, his pal David Shor was outed for posting race science. Today he says Dems should work with an overt Nazi. Time to consider that Matty himself buys race science, I’d say.
Speaking of Hanania and the abundance bros, here’s their associate Matt Yglesias triumphantly returning to this thread by saying Dems need to ally with an unreconstructed Nazi if they want to win. Sort of hits different after learning one of his major influences is himself a white supremacist, huh?
March 24, 2025 at 6:51 PM
I’ve kept receipts for months about Matt Yglesias vaguely implying Dems need to embrace racial explanations for crime. Yesterday, his pal David Shor was outed for posting race science. Today he says Dems should work with an overt Nazi. Time to consider that Matty himself buys race science, I’d say.
is this good?
www.theatlantic.com/politics/arc...
www.theatlantic.com/politics/arc...
The Trump Administration Accidentally Texted Me Its War Plans
U.S. national-security leaders included me in a group chat about upcoming military strikes in Yemen. I didn’t think it could be real. Then the bombs started falling.
www.theatlantic.com
March 24, 2025 at 6:07 PM
is this good?
www.theatlantic.com/politics/arc...
www.theatlantic.com/politics/arc...
Since the election, I’ve been keeping a thread of influential centrists breaking rightward. Yglesias and his ilk are here several times implying that Dems should stop shunning people who explain crime with race science so it shouldn’t be a surprise that David Shor is a closet white supremacist.
March 23, 2025 at 9:03 PM
Since the election, I’ve been keeping a thread of influential centrists breaking rightward. Yglesias and his ilk are here several times implying that Dems should stop shunning people who explain crime with race science so it shouldn’t be a surprise that David Shor is a closet white supremacist.
The one premise that most robustly explains the entire landscape of 21st century American politics sounds too vulgarly reductive to be true, and yet nonetheless: well-heeled centrists find more affinity with fascists than with socialists.
anyway, if you were wondering why David Shor keeps arguing that Republicans will never pay an electoral penalty for racism under any circumstances, this is why
March 23, 2025 at 8:32 PM
The one premise that most robustly explains the entire landscape of 21st century American politics sounds too vulgarly reductive to be true, and yet nonetheless: well-heeled centrists find more affinity with fascists than with socialists.
Reposted by Michael O'Bryan
oh i think this is exactly right. people care about your views but they ALSO care about whether you seem real and authentic
"I'm not embarrassed of my own beliefs" is exactly why AOC has crossover appeal to lots of moderate Dems who don't share her ideology
March 22, 2025 at 11:19 PM
oh i think this is exactly right. people care about your views but they ALSO care about whether you seem real and authentic
I came of age during Web 1.0, back when you’d encounter beheading videos and whatnot with little warning, and I still remember the day I read a summary of the movie he posted as one as one of my most appalling moments on the internet.
Dom Lucre, who posted infamously horrific and wildly illegal child sexual abuse material to Twitter - and then had his account personally reinstated by Elon Musk - allegedly was recently invited to the White House.
March 22, 2025 at 11:43 PM
I came of age during Web 1.0, back when you’d encounter beheading videos and whatnot with little warning, and I still remember the day I read a summary of the movie he posted as one as one of my most appalling moments on the internet.
So like, am I supposed to know what Cold Harbor is now because I definitely don’t lol.
March 22, 2025 at 4:34 AM
So like, am I supposed to know what Cold Harbor is now because I definitely don’t lol.
Reposted by Michael O'Bryan
Remember that time Megan McArdle was mad that people thought Citizen Kane was about capitalism?
Imagine watching The White Lotus and not understanding that every guest is an ignorant fool. Why you’d have to be an…
March 19, 2025 at 4:16 AM
Remember that time Megan McArdle was mad that people thought Citizen Kane was about capitalism?
Imagine watching The White Lotus and not understanding that every guest is an ignorant fool. Why you’d have to be an…
March 19, 2025 at 2:28 AM
Imagine watching The White Lotus and not understanding that every guest is an ignorant fool. Why you’d have to be an…