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astrobride.bsky.social
Astro🪐
@astrobride.bsky.social
130 followers 130 following 870 posts
✨lover of cats, yeller at clouds✨
she/they | mean bisexual 💗💜💙 | minors DNI pls im allergic
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astrobride.bsky.social
AFGE blames Dems for shutdown and don't really give a shit about fellow working class peoples' healthcare lmao.

in fact, here's the union president Everett Kelley saying exactly that!
interviewer asked: Do you think it was worth it for congressional Democrats to fight for ACA subsidies? American Federation of Government Employees union President Everett Kelley's response: Listen, I am not trying to say that ACA is not important. I think it’s vitally important, okay? I just don’t think that it should be done holding federal employees hostage. And I do need to back up and say that I brought, I’ve had some Democratic representatives, senators, congressmen visit the airports to carry food to the employees and show that appreciation.
November 10, 2025 at 1:59 AM
astrobride.bsky.social
oh how quaint. look at this stupid fucking graph Sen. Bill Cassidy of Louisiana trotted out
Senator Bill Cassidy of Louisiana speaking during the United States Senate session on November 9th, 2025, session began at 6pm EST. he gestures at a graph that says: "WHERE DOES YOUR HEALTHCARE DOLLAR GO?" at the top. left-hand side of Sen. Cassidy's graph is communicating that despite us pouring taxpayer dollars onto individuals, 80% of those dollars are gobbled up by insurance companies to pay for care and the other 20% of them go to admin costs and insurance company profit. this is the "bad" system (bad according to Republicans, good according to the rest of us who need them!) of the Enhanced Premium Tax Credits in the Affordable Care Act that were added during COVID. the right-hand side of Cassidy's graph shows 100% of taxpayer money going directly to the patient into a prefunded flexible spending account (an HSA, aka health savings account) to spend as they wish on their healthcare. this "cuts out the middle man" of the insurance company. AN ADDENDUM BY ME, BLUESKY USER ASTROBRIDE: to be clear, if someone with a taxpayer funded flex HSA has to pay out-of-pocket for their care then this is a bad deal! the money in one of those accounts would be gone in like a month if you have chronic conditions.
November 9, 2025 at 11:27 PM
astrobride.bsky.social
....nevermind i think i see what you mean

this is both "take on the military industrial complex!" and pro-military, which are WEIRD positions to have simultaneously
Take on waste and corruption at the Pentagon; rebuild American shipbuilding Massive, massive waste in procurement. A revolving door between the Pentagon and massive “defense” contractors. Widespread consolidation, encouraged by deliberate government policy, to the point where competition has virtually disappeared in many vital areas. This is the legacy of several decades of disastrous mismanagement and profiteering at the highest level of the American military. We need to take the funds currently paying for mansions in Virginia and Maryland for defense contractors, and reinvest them into closing the massive shipbuilding gap. I’ve seen under the hood. I know exactly how much money is wasted, and where. Send me to Washington and I will work tirelessly to rebuild the American military.
October 21, 2025 at 6:46 PM
astrobride.bsky.social
amazing radical language. we NEED more of this

one small problem tho. people need income to live, which is why unions have strike funds to support members. now that he's put that out there, Chicagoans can lobby him for support. eviction freezes and such. idk stranger things have happened
While Taft-Hartley’s restrictions make it all but impossible for labor unions to orchestrate anything akin to a national general strike, it does not dictate how grassroots activists and coalitions could organize, as long as those efforts do not include the help of legally-recognized labor unions.
October 20, 2025 at 5:32 AM
astrobride.bsky.social
wow, that's chilling

wow that's. no it's not chilling, that's TERRIFYING ACTUALLY
screenshot of the US State Department's new bluesky account @state-department.bsky.social skeet: "Give us a follow so we can update you on how the Democrats' partisan shutdown is harming America's national security. (we also heard this is a great place to research visa revocations 👀)" the last line about visa revocations was underlined by me, Bluesky User Astrobride, in red for emphasis
October 18, 2025 at 9:46 AM
astrobride.bsky.social
me but with this stuff

i put it on everything that doesn't get Lao Gan Ma
a jar of Herdez Guacamole Salsa medium spicy level
October 16, 2025 at 2:35 AM
astrobride.bsky.social
suggests that he did indeed grow disillusioned with our endless for-profit wars

⬇️ from his Reddit AMA where someone asked him about going from protesting the war to being part of it. just reads like a painfully honest Dude who has yet to reflect deeply enough on his part in the War on Terror
Thank you so much for asking this -- it truly is a great question. It's the kind of thing that does make sense to me but can completely understand why it might not to other people. Look, I was against the war in Iraq and did everything I could to try to stop it before it started. That's why I protested George W. Bush. But when the war started, a sense of service drew me to enlist. I also just felt that I would be able to get through it -- and I felt in my bones that I should go and not make someone else go in my stead. I also felt that there was value in trying to be a voice of reason and decency in a deeply unreasonable and indecent place. And finally, if I'm being honest, I wanted to be a soldier since I was two years old. I was drawn to military history. I personally had that urge. At 19, I was also a young man drawn to an adventure -- and serving overseas was the ultimate adventure. I have different feelings on that now than I did then, but at the time, that was one of my reasons.
October 13, 2025 at 9:22 PM
astrobride.bsky.social
good CHRIST we're fucking cooked
reaction meme png of a sad girl sitting at a table drinking wine and smoking a cigarette while looking at her phone. there are three additional bottles of wine on the table as well as two packs of cigarettes. she has another glass of wine already poured up in addition to the glass in her hand.
October 7, 2025 at 7:35 PM
astrobride.bsky.social
son, I think it's time we had.......

"The Talk"
CNN Weather headline that reads "Here's what can happen when two hurricanes get too close together"
September 29, 2025 at 9:52 AM
astrobride.bsky.social
ok which fucking one of you was gonna tell me that eels have TWO jaws???

TWO JAWS!!!!!!!

jesus
scientific diagram of a moray eel showing its internal jaw structure including a second, smaller set of jaws inside of its throat. both jaws are complete with a set of sharp teeth. the second set of jaws comes out when the eel opens its mouth wide and its smaller teeth join together with the main jaw's teeth
September 27, 2025 at 10:32 AM
astrobride.bsky.social
thank you thank you

this poor ship dawg

may our mother country follow the same path as this ship one day: sunk to become a new home for new creatures, new life growing around it. bc right now our country is a damn neglected rust bucket
ocean liner SS United States being tugged out of the Philadelphia harbor, on her way to her final resting place off Destin-Fort Walton beach. her hull, once a gleaming black, is now very rusty. her once red funnels are so rusted that they're light pink now ocean liner SS United States being tugged out of the Philadelphia harbor, on her way to her final resting place off Destin-Fort Walton beach. her hull, once a gleaming black, is now very rusty. her once red funnels are so rusted that they're light pink now
September 12, 2025 at 9:15 PM
astrobride.bsky.social
you really can't come up with a better metaphor for the Current Times We're In than that of the United States being sunk by none other than... the United States

please join me in saluting our fallen comrade. rest in peace old girl, you deserved better
the rusting ocean liner SS United States behind a barbed wire fence. on the fence are tacked signs which read "Goodbye SS United States" and "Rest In Peace"
September 12, 2025 at 10:40 AM
astrobride.bsky.social
........for the great SS United States, the fastest ocean liner ever built.
a black and white photo of the passenger ship SS United States
September 12, 2025 at 10:40 AM
astrobride.bsky.social
both mindblowing and heartbreaking
more from Clive Wearing's wikipedia entry: In a documentary broadcast in 2005, Wearing was interviewed about the experience of his condition: Wearing: You're the first human beings I've seen, the three of you. Two men and one lady. The first ... people I've seen since I've been ill. No difference between day and night. No thoughts at all. No dreams. Day and night, the same – blank. Precisely like death. Interviewer: Is it very hard? Wearing: No. It's exactly the same as being dead, which is not difficult, is it? To be dead is easy. You don't do anything at all. You can't do anything, when you are dead. It's been the same. Exactly. Interviewer: Do you miss your old life? Wearing: Yes. But I've never been conscious to think that. So I've never been bored or upset. I've never been anything at all, it's exactly the same as death. No dreams even. Day and night, the same. Interviewer: When you miss your old life, you say, 'Yes, I miss my old life', what do you miss? Wearing: The fact that I was a musician. And in love.
September 7, 2025 at 3:17 AM
astrobride.bsky.social
ever heard of Clive Wearing? after a bout of encephalitis, he developed severe amnesia and can't form new memories
screenshot of the wikipedia entry on Clive Wearing which reads: In a diary provided by his carers, Wearing was encouraged to record his thoughts. Page after page was filled with entries similar to the following: (context note from i, bluesky user Astrobride, to anyone using a screen reader: the following lines are crossed out in the wikipedia entry) 8:31 AM: Now I am really, completely awake. (1st Time) 9:06 AM: Now I am perfectly, overwhelmingly awake. (1st Time) 9:34 AM: Now I am superlatively, actually awake. (1st Time) (context note: that's end of crossed out lines, the rest of the text is normal) Earlier entries were usually partially crossed out, since he forgot having made an entry within minutes and dismissed the writings. He did not know how the entries were made or by whom, although he did recognise his own handwriting. Wishing to record 'waking up for the first time', he still wrote diary entries in 2007, more than 20 years after he started them.
September 7, 2025 at 3:17 AM
astrobride.bsky.social
Project 2025 baybeeee
The Endangered Species Act. The Endangered Species Act was intended to bring endangered and threatened species back from the brink of extinction and, when appropriate, to restore real habitat critical to the survival of the species. The act’s success rate, however, is dismal. Its greatest deficiency, according to one renowned expert, is “conflict of interest.”82 Specifically, the work of the Fish and Wildlife Service is the product of “species cartels” afflicted with groupthink, confirmation bias, and a common desire to preserve the prestige, power, and appropriations of the agency that pays or employs them. For example, in one highly influential sage-grouse monograph, 41 percent of the authors were federal workers. The editor, a federal bureaucrat, had authored one-third of the paper.83 Meaningful reform of the Endangered Species Act requires that Congress take action to restore its original purpose and end its use to seize private property, prevent economic development, and interfere with the rights of states over their wildlife populations.
September 6, 2025 at 12:24 AM
astrobride.bsky.social
fossil fuel and mineral extraction on native land is very much a tribal sovereignty issue, ofc -- not just because of land conservation for environmental justice reasons, but because those leases can generate essential revenue for tribes

kinda ironic, innit
The Native American lands of the United States are home to large coal reserves, coal mining, and coal plants. According to the Division of Energy and Minerals Development (DEMD), twenty Native American reservations have coal reserves. Navajo, Hopi, and Crow lands have produced coal for decades. Coal revenues have been a major contributor to these Tribes’ economic health, generally accounting for a significant proportion of their total income and creating hundreds of direct, high paying jobs.
September 6, 2025 at 12:24 AM
astrobride.bsky.social
ah, this may be our answer.

even if this isn't why the Pentagon's up late tonight it's still. very fucked
Al Jazeera: UN warns Israel of ‘horrific impact’ of planned Gaza City attack LIVE25 minutes ago
August 30, 2025 at 5:58 AM
astrobride.bsky.social
i mean.

high pizza traffic + Trump MiA + US warships en route to Venezuela... Papa's Shaq-a-Ronis™ aren't the only thing cookin
The cold war origins of pizza intelligence The Pizza Meter isn’t a modern invention. During the Cold War, Soviet intelligence operatives coined the term “Pizzint” (Pizza Intelligence) to monitor sudden surges in food deliveries to U.S. government buildings as early warning signals for American military actions. Historical precedents validate this unconventional approach. The CIA famously ordered 21 pizzas in a single night before Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait in 1990. Similar spikes occurred before U.S. military interventions in Grenada (1983) and Panama (1989).
August 30, 2025 at 5:42 AM
astrobride.bsky.social
oh, and they're not even being shy about the fact that they intend to set up a Supreme Court showdown about all this. (9/9)
(c) To the maximum extent permitted by the Constitution, the Attorney General shall vigorously prosecute those who violate our laws in ways that involve desecrating the American Flag, and may pursue litigation to clarify the scope of the First Amendment exceptions in this area.
August 26, 2025 at 12:21 AM
astrobride.bsky.social
they've been kinda throwing spaghetti at the wall for 8 months because that's what you do when you're a bigot. there's not really a reason to hate immigrants, of course, as we all well know. so you make one up. if that accusation doesn't get you the results you seek, make up another. on and on (8/9)
Burning this representation of America may incite violence and riot. American Flag burning is also used by groups of foreign nationals as a calculated act to intimidate and threaten violence against Americans because of their nationality and place of birth.
August 26, 2025 at 12:21 AM
astrobride.bsky.social
...but this is what it's really about, i think: manufacturing instances of "anti-American sentiment" (aka anti-WHITE American sentiment) committed by immigrants in order to satisfy Trump/Stephen Miller's massive anti-immigration operation (7/9)
(d) The Secretary of State, the Attorney General, and the Secretary of Homeland Security, acting within their respective authorities, shall deny, prohibit, terminate, or revoke visas, residence permits, naturalization proceedings, and other immigration benefits, or seek removal from the United States, pursuant to Federal law, including 8 U.S.C. 1182(a), 8 U.S.C. 1424, 8 U.S.C. 1427, 8 U.S.C. 1451(c), and 8 U.S.C. 1227(a), whenever there has been an appropriate determination that foreign nationals have engaged in American Flag-desecration activity under circumstances that permit the exercise of such remedies pursuant to Federal law.
August 26, 2025 at 12:21 AM
astrobride.bsky.social
many states already have National Guard units deployed rn, ostensibly to help ICE do clerical work at detention centers or sth in order to free up more ICE goons for Trump's violent immigration crackdown.

which means they've got additional boots on the ground to enforce the flag EO, possibly (6/9)
This Court's holding does not forbid a State to prevent "imminent lawless action" and, in fact, Texas has a law specifically prohibiting breaches of the peace. Texas' interest in preserving the flag as a symbol of nationhood and national unity is related to expression in this case and, thus, falls outside the O'Brien test. Pp. 491 U. S. 406-410.
August 26, 2025 at 12:21 AM
astrobride.bsky.social
the court determined Johnson's flag-burning was fine because he wasn't trying to ""incite a riot"" with that action. (3/9)
Texas v. Johnson, 491 U.S. 397 (1989) (b) Texas has not asserted an interest in support of Johnson's conviction that is unrelated to the suppression of expression and would therefore permit application of the test set forth in United States v. O'Brien, 391 U. S. 367, whereby an important governmental interest in regulating nonspeech can justify incidental limitations on First Amendment freedoms when speech and nonspeech elements are combined in the same course of conduct. An interest in preventing breaches of the peace is not implicated on this record. Expression may not be prohibited on the basis that an audience that takes serious offense to the expression may disturb the peace, since the Government cannot assume that every expression of a provocative idea will incite a riot, but must look to the actual circumstances surrounding the expression. Johnson's expression of dissatisfaction with the Federal Government's policies also does not fall within the class of "fighting words" likely to be seen as a direct personal insult or an invitation to exchange fisticuffs. This Court's holding does not forbid a State to prevent "imminent lawless action" and, in fact, Texas has a law specifically prohibiting breaches of the peace. Texas' interest in preserving the flag as a symbol of nationhood and national unity is related to expression in this case and, thus, falls outside the O'Brien test. Pp. 491 U. S. 406-410.
August 26, 2025 at 12:21 AM
astrobride.bsky.social
this is correct, bc Texas v. Johnson wasn't solely about "is it protected First Amendment speech to burn the American flag" but rather "is it protected speech if it's VERY OBVIOUS that the flag burner is engaging in expressive, political speech and NOT violent crime", basically (2/9)
Notwithstanding the Supreme Court’s rulings on First Amendment protections, the Court has never held that American Flag desecration conducted in a manner that is likely to incite imminent lawless action or that is an action amounting to “fighting words” is constitutionally protected. See Texas v. Johnson, 491 U.S. 397, 408-10 (1989).
August 26, 2025 at 12:21 AM