Philip Luke Johnson
@phillegitimate.bsky.social
Studying how gangs and govts do things with words. Teaching students to do things with words. Very occasionally doing things with words. Lecturer @ Flinders Uni
Updates: https://philipljohnson.com/
🐈⬛🐈⬛🐈⬛
Updates: https://philipljohnson.com/
🐈⬛🐈⬛🐈⬛
The Cartel of the Suns is a fiction circulated by the US govt to justify actions against Venezuela. Insight Crime keeps repeating the fiction.
🇻🇪 | For years, Venezuela's Cartel of the Suns has been erroneously perceived as a vertically integrated drug trafficking organization. But what is it really, and how has it been impacted by Maduro's arrest? Find out at our exclusive event in English here: https://bit.ly/45Q26dA
February 6, 2026 at 9:46 PM
The Cartel of the Suns is a fiction circulated by the US govt to justify actions against Venezuela. Insight Crime keeps repeating the fiction.
I don't think we can understand US government policy on the Americas without centering the pardon of Juan Orlando Hernández, ex-pres of Honduras.
@jeanguerre.bsky.social makes sense of what would otherwise be this baffling (and quickly forgotten) pardon.
www.nytimes.com/2026/01/29/o...
@jeanguerre.bsky.social makes sense of what would otherwise be this baffling (and quickly forgotten) pardon.
www.nytimes.com/2026/01/29/o...
Opinion | Trump Is Not a Nationalist. He’s Something Worse.
www.nytimes.com
February 1, 2026 at 11:11 PM
I don't think we can understand US government policy on the Americas without centering the pardon of Juan Orlando Hernández, ex-pres of Honduras.
@jeanguerre.bsky.social makes sense of what would otherwise be this baffling (and quickly forgotten) pardon.
www.nytimes.com/2026/01/29/o...
@jeanguerre.bsky.social makes sense of what would otherwise be this baffling (and quickly forgotten) pardon.
www.nytimes.com/2026/01/29/o...
Stumbled upon a bunch of PDFs in their natural habitat.
January 30, 2026 at 9:26 AM
Stumbled upon a bunch of PDFs in their natural habitat.
Reposted by Philip Luke Johnson
Would that be the same “social cohesion” that led to Adelaide Writers’ Week falling apart?
“We are making this call together, as elders from the Labor and Liberal parties, wishing for the bipartisanship that was once our experience and is increasingly rare.”
John Hewson and Barry Jones on the need for a minister for social cohesion:
satpa.pe/BjOh6oO
John Hewson and Barry Jones on the need for a minister for social cohesion:
satpa.pe/BjOh6oO
A minister for social cohesion
satpa.pe
January 24, 2026 at 1:04 AM
Would that be the same “social cohesion” that led to Adelaide Writers’ Week falling apart?
I wrote about the “gunboat isolationism” practiced by the US government in the 19th century, and how it’s coming back today.👇
In the one-sided Mexican-American War, the US seized over 55% of Mexico’s land – including what today is California, New Mexico, Utah, Nevada and parts of other states.
Trump wants to send troops into Mexico. The land grab of the Mexican-American War makes this ‘politically untenable’
theconversation.com
January 22, 2026 at 12:54 PM
I wrote about the “gunboat isolationism” practiced by the US government in the 19th century, and how it’s coming back today.👇
He’s published a bunch of books but doesn’t covet the Nobel Prize in Lit.
fwiw i think his obsession with the nobel prize is entirely about obama getting it (setting aside whether or not obama ought to have received it)
"Donald Trump now genuinely lives in a different reality, one in which neither grammar nor history nor the normal rules of human interaction now affect him. Also, he really is maniacally, unhealthily obsessive about the Nobel Prize."
www.theatlantic.com/ideas/2026/0...
www.theatlantic.com/ideas/2026/0...
January 19, 2026 at 4:56 PM
He’s published a bunch of books but doesn’t covet the Nobel Prize in Lit.
Reposted by Philip Luke Johnson
Why the new food guidelines look like Cards Against Humanity
January 9, 2026 at 2:57 PM
Why the new food guidelines look like Cards Against Humanity
As Gregor Samsa awoke one morning from uneasy dreams he found himself transformed in his bed into
not a bug but a feature. not a coincidence but a tactic
January 9, 2026 at 12:45 AM
As Gregor Samsa awoke one morning from uneasy dreams he found himself transformed in his bed into
Reposted by Philip Luke Johnson
This is also the outcome many in Venezuela fear most: they capture Maduro, wash their hands of any real regime-change plan, and unfurl a “Mission Accomplished” banner. Meanwhile, the same players keep running Venezuela, nothing materially changes, and conditions on the ground could actually worsen
January 3, 2026 at 2:59 PM
This is also the outcome many in Venezuela fear most: they capture Maduro, wash their hands of any real regime-change plan, and unfurl a “Mission Accomplished” banner. Meanwhile, the same players keep running Venezuela, nothing materially changes, and conditions on the ground could actually worsen
Reposted by Philip Luke Johnson
I always tell students if you ask a good question the article will write itself
December 30, 2025 at 4:12 AM
I always tell students if you ask a good question the article will write itself
Reposted by Philip Luke Johnson
Reposted by Philip Luke Johnson
He estado preguntando y hasta ahora nadie tiene una respuesta inmediata y satisfactoria: si les pido que recomienden una novela latinoamericana reciente (digamos, los últimos diez años), que sea divertida, en el sentido de graciosa, y que no sea sobre violencia ¿cuál recomendarían?
December 12, 2025 at 4:02 PM
He estado preguntando y hasta ahora nadie tiene una respuesta inmediata y satisfactoria: si les pido que recomienden una novela latinoamericana reciente (digamos, los últimos diez años), que sea divertida, en el sentido de graciosa, y que no sea sobre violencia ¿cuál recomendarían?
Just read this passage in “We Are Green and Trembling” by Gabriela Cabezón Camara…
“Here it is. The lightning-thunder.”
“It is a hummingbird.”
“A lightning-thunder.”
“What does the lightning-thunder do?”
“Fire. It makes fire when it is angry.”
“Here it is. The lightning-thunder.”
“It is a hummingbird.”
“A lightning-thunder.”
“What does the lightning-thunder do?”
“Fire. It makes fire when it is angry.”
you ever think about how buck wild it must have been to be the first European colonizer to see a hummingbird?
“i saw a tiny bug that was also a bird, and it had hatred in its heart.”
“i saw a tiny bug that was also a bird, and it had hatred in its heart.”
December 11, 2025 at 11:17 PM
Just read this passage in “We Are Green and Trembling” by Gabriela Cabezón Camara…
“Here it is. The lightning-thunder.”
“It is a hummingbird.”
“A lightning-thunder.”
“What does the lightning-thunder do?”
“Fire. It makes fire when it is angry.”
“Here it is. The lightning-thunder.”
“It is a hummingbird.”
“A lightning-thunder.”
“What does the lightning-thunder do?”
“Fire. It makes fire when it is angry.”
NYT copies Tiny Desk concerts, but makes employees work through the whole set.
November 12, 2025 at 4:56 PM
NYT copies Tiny Desk concerts, but makes employees work through the whole set.
Editor: You get that frontispiece for Leviathan?
Etcher: Sure did boss, real fucking sexy just like you asked.
Etcher: Sure did boss, real fucking sexy just like you asked.
Hobbes must’ve felt like a fucking god telling the illustrator about this insane cover concept
November 10, 2025 at 12:09 AM
Editor: You get that frontispiece for Leviathan?
Etcher: Sure did boss, real fucking sexy just like you asked.
Etcher: Sure did boss, real fucking sexy just like you asked.
Reposted by Philip Luke Johnson
I'm excited to share my piece in Los Angeles Review of Books @lareviewofbooks.bsky.social, which examines OpenAI's claims about ChatGPT's creative writing skills, Big Tech's weaponisation of grief and nostalgia, and the collapse of the academic humanities. lareviewofbooks.org/article/lite...
Literature Is Not a Vibe: On ChatGPT and the Humanities | Los Angeles Review of Books
Rachele Dini discusses OpenAI’s “A Machine-Shaped Hand” and an academic sector in crisis.
lareviewofbooks.org
October 31, 2025 at 5:11 PM
I'm excited to share my piece in Los Angeles Review of Books @lareviewofbooks.bsky.social, which examines OpenAI's claims about ChatGPT's creative writing skills, Big Tech's weaponisation of grief and nostalgia, and the collapse of the academic humanities. lareviewofbooks.org/article/lite...
Bora Chung asking the big questions in “The Midnight Timetable.”
(Many thanks for the translation to @antonhur.com)
(Many thanks for the translation to @antonhur.com)
October 28, 2025 at 10:14 AM
Bora Chung asking the big questions in “The Midnight Timetable.”
(Many thanks for the translation to @antonhur.com)
(Many thanks for the translation to @antonhur.com)
What if the problem is not reading but the way we expect students to read? Couldn’t be that, not at all.
Here is what hasn’t been a problem: My students. I worried they would be resistant. They haven’t been. They have been game since day one, all in on the project. If I had to guess, I think they like how serious it feels. Like they are being taken seriously as scholars
October 26, 2025 at 12:37 AM
What if the problem is not reading but the way we expect students to read? Couldn’t be that, not at all.
Reposted by Philip Luke Johnson
Yep - using the USA as an excuse to gut environmental approvals.
Text of Aust/US critical mineral deal.
www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-st...
No 3 looks like an attack on requisite permits (probably environment)...the old red/green tape reduction trick.
www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-st...
No 3 looks like an attack on requisite permits (probably environment)...the old red/green tape reduction trick.
October 20, 2025 at 10:06 PM
Yep - using the USA as an excuse to gut environmental approvals.
I taught a little module on Ned Kelly for three years, but never read one of the most famous tellings of his story. Finally doing so and it’s an adjectival delight.
October 15, 2025 at 11:10 AM
I taught a little module on Ned Kelly for three years, but never read one of the most famous tellings of his story. Finally doing so and it’s an adjectival delight.
🎶 You bring me closer to guard! 🎶
why does Stanley Milgram look like he's about to release the best industrial noise 7" of 1981
October 8, 2025 at 2:36 AM
🎶 You bring me closer to guard! 🎶
Love this read on dark academia.
We need a name for the vast majority of academic institutions, which are extremely dark but look nothing like dark academia.
I’d have said dank academia, but now that sounds too cool.
We need a name for the vast majority of academic institutions, which are extremely dark but look nothing like dark academia.
I’d have said dank academia, but now that sounds too cool.
October 4, 2025 at 1:31 PM
Love this read on dark academia.
We need a name for the vast majority of academic institutions, which are extremely dark but look nothing like dark academia.
I’d have said dank academia, but now that sounds too cool.
We need a name for the vast majority of academic institutions, which are extremely dark but look nothing like dark academia.
I’d have said dank academia, but now that sounds too cool.
This is pretty poor from @insightcrime.org, opening with the misleading assumption that the drone strike is reliable evidence of drug trafficking. The strike prevents gathering any proof at all, it does the opposite of what this article suggests.
🇻🇪 | In September, a boat that set sail from Sucre, Venezuela, was attacked by a US missile, highlighting its strategic role in drug trafficking. Read our article to learn about the implications of the attack and the dynamics of local drug trafficking. http://bit.ly/4nxaYvC
October 3, 2025 at 5:43 AM
This is pretty poor from @insightcrime.org, opening with the misleading assumption that the drone strike is reliable evidence of drug trafficking. The strike prevents gathering any proof at all, it does the opposite of what this article suggests.
Have to give it to @themonthly.com.au for nailing 3/3 #Auspol cover story titles. All three covers going straight to the pool room.
October 1, 2025 at 6:42 AM
Have to give it to @themonthly.com.au for nailing 3/3 #Auspol cover story titles. All three covers going straight to the pool room.