Wonky
LightNews LightNews
banner
wonkysq.bsky.social
Wonky
@wonkysq.bsky.social
120 followers 130 following 390 posts
Policy wonk specializing in climate change and urbanism, pessimistic optimist, 🔵😈
Posts Replies Media Videos
wonkysq.bsky.social
Good suggestions here that I hope someone in Europe pays attention to. I particularly like the one I pasted below. It baffles me that no one has taken advantage of how scornful this regime is about basic info security.
Trump’s administration has the worst information security in history—conducting extremely sensitive communications through totally unvetted third-party apps on their personal phones—and is also shot through with drunks and sex pests. Task European spies with finding and publishing all the most embarrassing private communications from all these disgusting freaks—in particular, who is screwing whose spouse.
January 21, 2026 at 4:06 PM
wonkysq.bsky.social
What does your daddy do? What does your mommy do? Please say it clearly so Fascist Busytown’s Palantir predictive policing AI platform can understand. Everyone worked very hard today. Tomorrow, there will be more to do, more rules to follow, and more opportunities to explain why you deserve to live here if you don’t look like everyone else.
January 18, 2026 at 3:11 PM
wonkysq.bsky.social
The world is full of threats to life and liberty, before you even start thinking about the pursuit of happiness. If you want to have life, that means you want to be able to buy a sandwich, take a bite out of it, and not die. You want your children to drink milk and not die. If a big storm is coming, you want to know about it so you can evacuate if you need to. Where there is nuclear waste, you want it put away properly. You want to increase your sum total of knowledge about the human body and the world, so that you can prevent disease, or cure it. And, ideally, you want passionate citizens to handle the specialized stuff—people who love flies, or dew points, or the price of eggs, or making sure airplanes don’t hit each other. If there were a big button that said, “Hey, push this button and somebody else will handle all the hard, technical stuff, and in exchange you will pay a percentage of your annual income, but don’t worry: We will have a team of people to make sure that you pay the right amount; also, there will be large, beautiful places where you can go for walks and learn about nature and history. And all the time you save will be your own!,” I would absolutely push that button.
January 13, 2026 at 4:47 PM
wonkysq.bsky.social
It seems beyond belief that a federal agency would say it won't allow itself to change regulations based on new research, but here we are. It's not enough for them to destroy EPA and the regulations that are meant to protect us—they also want to make sure it can't be rebuilt for decades.
Chemical companies and their trade organizations have argued that the EPA cannot reevaluate hazardous air pollution rules to account for newly discovered harms if it has revised them once already. It doesn’t matter if decades have passed or new information has emerged. If the EPA agrees, environmentalists fear that the decision could have wide implications, significantly curbing the EPA’s ability to limit nearly 200 pollutants from thousands of industrial plants. The next time new science reveals that a chemical is much more toxic, or that the amount of pollution released from a factory had been underestimated and would cause legally unacceptable health risks, the agency would not be able to react.
January 7, 2026 at 4:22 PM
wonkysq.bsky.social
Ah, yes, definitely his staff's idea for him to spend two weeks golfing. Otherwise he would have worked right through the holidays! Doing his customary, definitely-not-made-up working in an upstairs office.
Such wise staff, counseling him to try to keep his eyes open during meetings!
Trump’s staff have encouraged him to slow his pace. They urged him to spend roughly two weeks in South Florida around Christmas and New Year’s Eve, according to aides, a recommendation he acted on. Trump said he often begins his day early at an office in the White House residence before coming downstairs around 10 a.m. and working in the Oval Office until 7 p.m. or 8 p.m. Trump’s staff have also counseled him to try to keep his eyes open during public events, fearing the optics of his appearing to fall asleep, a person familiar with the matter said.
January 1, 2026 at 2:54 PM
wonkysq.bsky.social
The only way I'm getting through this time is by thinking about what comes next, and I love imagining the visceral joy of demolishing the tacky shit he loves so much.
newrepublic.com/article/2046...
Detrumpification must have a visual and physical record. It must be an event and a celebration. It must be an enduring memory and a warning to anyone who hopes to venerate authoritarian figures on American soil in the future. It must represent not just a political defeat but a societal rejection of Trumpism itself.
December 24, 2025 at 6:32 PM
wonkysq.bsky.social
The spirit of meat tree lives on (available at Costco)
Kit to build a Charcuterie Chalet (aka Savory Holiday House) and Charcuterie Tree (aka The CharcuTree). The house kit includes "savory cracker walls, salami shingles, parmesan snow, brie cheese spread, fruit and nut ornaments, pretzel windows, dehydrated orange decor, and piping" and while it actually looks better than you might think, all I can think of is how horrifying it must smell. The tree kit includes "sliced salami, cheddar cheese, pepper jack cheese, green olives, sparkly tree star topper, toothpicks, and tree cone base" and is a spiral of lines of salami, cheddar cubes, olives, and pepper jack cubes going around a cone. It looks much worse than the house but actually seems designed to be eaten.
December 18, 2025 at 3:44 PM
wonkysq.bsky.social
I reeeeeally hope this is not just rhetoric from Jeffries.
Jeffries concluded, “Accountability is coming. The statute of limitations is five years. Every single corrupt sycophant, including Bill Pulte, who continues to disgrace the law will have to answer for their actions.”
November 16, 2025 at 5:41 PM
wonkysq.bsky.social
Insightful piece. Personally, I think getting rid of this admin. is necessary but not sufficient to keep this country together. Too many people happily live in the grift bubble even though they don't profit from it. We need accountability and some basic level of shared, accepted truth & values.
Trump and Vance imagine, because it has worked thus far, that they can grift endlessly. They do not understand that their grift depends upon what I will unashamedly call the honest labor and decent convictions of millions of Americans. Were there not Americans who actually worked and cared and tried to live right, there would be nothing and no one to grift. The president and vice-president do not know the history of people like themselves, or that of other republics that were needlessly brought down by men of their particular sort. They think that the magic of words will always save them, that there will always be a next grift, that no crisis is so great that it cannot be turned to personal profit. This is true right up until the moment when it is not.
November 16, 2025 at 5:39 PM
wonkysq.bsky.social
Because I haven't seen him in any of the photos yet, I need to call out the Porco Rosso guy. Perfect message and outfit, and a clever reference for movie nerds.
A man standing on a sidewalk, between two other people who are cut off. He is wearing an old-timey aviator cap, brown leather with straps hanging down and goggles pushed up onto the forehead. He has a pig nose and a beard. The rest of his outfit is mostly covered by his sign, but it includes a worn leather bomber jacket over a white shirt, tan pants, and brown lace-up boots. His sign is hand-written and hand-drawn. It reads: "Better a pig than a fascist." In the middle of the sign is a drawing of a pig in the cockpit of an old plane. The pig is dressed just like the man is. There is a small American flag below the drawing. It refers to the Studio Ghibli film "Porco Rosso."
October 19, 2025 at 3:17 PM
wonkysq.bsky.social
Mallory Archer on a stairwell with Ron, saying, "Oh, and what fresh hell is this?"
October 10, 2025 at 2:55 AM
wonkysq.bsky.social
Trump admin takes down Congressionally mandated inspector general websites, including whistleblower hotlines to report possible waste, fraud, and abuse.
But, but... I thought they swore to cut waste, fraud, and abuse! Were they... lying?
www.govexec.com/oversight/20...
It also runs Oversight.gov, which houses over 34,000 reports from most of the 70-plus OIGs, and operates 28 OIG websites that house legally required hotlines for whistleblowers to report suspected cases of government waste, fraud and abuse. That site is also down. CIGIE warned lawmakers in a letter Saturday that OMB had made a “policy decision” to not apportion funding for fiscal year 2026 for CIGIE, which is primarily funded in a no-year revolving account that member OIGs contribute to, so CIGIE isn't affected by government shutdowns like the one that began at midnight.
October 2, 2025 at 3:12 PM
wonkysq.bsky.social
So this is what you see if you go to hud.gov -- an official website of the federal government -- right now.
The Radical Left are going to shut down the government and inflict massive pain on the American people unless they get their $1.5 trillion wish list of demands. The Trump administration wants to keep the government open for the American people.
September 30, 2025 at 2:00 PM
wonkysq.bsky.social
After Helene, instead of trackable aid delivered through an accountable federal agency, the Trump admin. promoted donations to evangelical groups that don't have to abide by federal civil rights laws or report on what they did with the money.
grist.org/accountabili...
Without external checks and requirements, though, “they may misjudge local needs, duplicate efforts, or overlook or short-hop services,” Grem added. “The very same shortcomings often get criticized in bureaucracies like FEMA.” Long-term planning doesn’t really factor in, Grem added. Unlike the Federal Emergency Management Agency, religious charities’ work focuses on immediate needs and rebuilding houses, not long-term disaster risk and mitigation. Though FEMA can be picky in disbursing aid, it must abide by federal civil rights law; private charities do not. Samaritan’s Purse and other religious charities have publicly opposed gay marriage and abortion. So have members of the Cathy family, who sit on the boards of many similar charities. It’s led some Helene victims to worry they might face differential treatment or judgment, or avoid seeking aid from such groups. Renters and undocumented immigrants are chronically overlooked by both public and private relief efforts.
September 25, 2025 at 3:42 PM
wonkysq.bsky.social
Little babies might be fine there, but apparently big babies aren't.
Quote from the article: "Every year, millions of people visit Washington and have no problem with the parks. Little babies are fine there. People wear watches."
September 1, 2025 at 6:59 PM
wonkysq.bsky.social
Love that place! All kinds of cryptozoology, including... TMNT?
A roughly 4- to 5-foot-tall statue of a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle wearing a blue eye mask, brown elbow and knee pads, and white wristbands and, uh... socks, maybe? He has a brown strap around his waist as well, attached to another strap that goes across his chest and over his shoulder. The card taped to his chest says, "Did you know... Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles were based on traditional, ancient Japanese cryptids called kappas?" Next to him is a display case that has several UFO-related items.
August 1, 2025 at 11:17 PM
wonkysq.bsky.social
My fave thing is museums about a very specific thing that sell that specific thing with the name of the museum on it. For instance, I have a pair of salt and pepper shakers from the Salt and Pepper Shaker Museum.
Two ceramic cylinders, pretty much identical. They are medium brown with a lighter brown top fading to a cream color at the very top. They say, in fancy script that is at about a 20 degree angle, "The Salt & Pepper Shaker Museum," and in smaller, sans serif font underneath, "Gatlinburg, TN Estd. 2002."
August 1, 2025 at 3:43 PM
wonkysq.bsky.social
The Hand Fan Museum in Healdsburg, CA. It's just one small room, but it's surprisingly interesting. The woman who runs it is passionate about hand fans. I can't find it now, but I bought a hand fan that said, "Healdsburg is hot! Use a hand fan!"
A wall with about 20 hand fans in custom-made cases that fit them exactly. Most fans are fairly large, but there are a few small ones interspersed. On a shelf below are books with titles like "FANS" and "Novelty Hand Fans." A hand fan in a hand fan-shaped gold-edged case. The fan is spread out. It has a black background and brown wood slats. On the fan, white dogs, all standing on their hind legs, are playing pool. Three dogs are at the pool table -- one is lining up his shot while the other two watch. To the left, two dogs face each other while chalking their pool cues. To the right of the pool table, another dog is chalking its cue while the last dog sits on a stool with a piece of paper, maybe keeping score. A hand fan in a rectangular, gold-edged case. The fan is a semi-translucent fabric, sort of a light black or brown background. Painted on the fan, mostly in white, is a pair of dogs pulling a chariot full of kittens. The dogs look a bit like poodles. The one in the foreground is white, and the other is black. They are wearing a fancy gold harness. The chariot is painted with thin gold lines. One brownish-gray kitten sits in the chariot facing forward, holding the reins. A second brownish-gray kitten faces us, and a third one faces behind the chariot. A white kitten faces away from us; we see only the back of its head. On one side of the glass, you can see the reflection of a wall of hand fans in display cases. Three rectangular cases with gold edges, in portrait orientation. Each has a fan shaped like a ping-pong paddle. Each fan has a cat in a hat, but not like Dr. Seuss. These cats look Victorian. The first is a gentleman. He is wearing a small black top hat between his ears and a black top with a white collar and a white front. His head is brown except for the area between his eyes and around his mouth, which is white. The second cat has been through it. His hat is floppy and askew. His ears are ragged. He has little bandages on his nose and cheeks, and his whiskers are twirled into a long, wonky mustache. He wears a red-and-green plaid jacket buttoned up to his neck with a plaid scarf underneath. The third cat seems to be a soldier. He wears a flat blue cap with red trim and a blue jacket with gold epaulets and a red sash. It's hard to see much detail because the light is reflecting off the glass.
August 1, 2025 at 3:43 PM
wonkysq.bsky.social
The closing quote, below, could sum up this administration's entire approach: not just lying outrageously and unashamedly, but also trying to hide actual rigorous research funded with our tax dollars.
“This report had five authors and was rushed over four months, and would not pass muster in any traditional scientific peer-review process,” says Hausfather. “The fact that this has been released at the same time that the government has hidden the actual congressionally mandated national climate assessments that accurately reflect the science only further shows how much of a farce this is.”
July 31, 2025 at 3:05 PM
wonkysq.bsky.social
@kentremendous.bsky.social ought to sue them for stealing Chainsaw Bear's shirt
Small, relatable bear with glowing red eyes and mouth open to display very small teeth, wearing a white t-shirt that says in red ink "Epic Bacon Much?" in between two vertical slices of bacon. His arms are a blur because he is wildly waving the chainsaws attached to both arms. This is Chainsaw Bear in his more-relatable form on The Good Place.
July 23, 2025 at 3:44 PM
wonkysq.bsky.social
I will not stand for this squirrel defamation. The squirrels are peaceable and wish us no harm. Look at this little guy! He's not rising up against anyone. As long as we keep giving them the agreed-upon nuts and assorted other snacks, we have nothing to fear from them.
A grey squirrel lying flat on a tan railing with a post behind him and out-of-focus greenery around him. The railing has been chewed on in places, but not by this squirrel. He's a respectful squirrel who is just looking for a cool place to sploot on a hot day. His front left and right rear paws dangle off the railing, as does about half of his fluffy tail. His head rests flat on the railing with his eyes half-closed, although his little ears stay on alert. He is altogether peaceful and uninclined to rise up against humans, especially if they continue to give him walnuts.
July 11, 2025 at 4:46 PM
wonkysq.bsky.social
I contributed in a small way to some IRA-funded programs, and I was so proud to be part of such important work that would bring so many benefits. It's gutting to see all that potential progress getting torched. The GOP is sabotaging the US and condemning the world to more harm from climate change.
So while the whole world turns away from fossil fuels and toward clean energy, China is going to be the one supplying that transition, which increases both its wealth and its influence around the globe — at a time when America has shut down the US Agency for International Development and ceased our foreign aid operations, abandoning one of the main tools of soft power. In sum, with this bill we get fewer jobs, higher energy prices, a weakened economy, a less reliable grid, and higher carbon emissions.
July 8, 2025 at 2:46 PM
wonkysq.bsky.social
Glad someone put a number to this. $1.6 trillion in additional climate change-related damage over the next 5 years. That's on top of the damage projected to be caused if we'd continued to reduce emissions.
Based on the most recent central estimate of the “social cost of carbon” in 2030 from the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), published under the Biden administration, those 7 billion tonnes of extra emissions would cause global climate damages worth more than 1.6 trillion dollars.
July 7, 2025 at 4:25 PM
wonkysq.bsky.social
Not to defend WaPo, but this is the top of the homepage at 5 pm-ish. (They still have the "let it all burn" headline below the main headline, but it kind of makes that woman seem like an outlier now.)
Washingtonpost.com homepage showing the headline "Tens of thousands rally in DC as Trump protests erupt across the US," followed by "In Washington and cities nationwide, demonstrators rallied in opposition to President Donald Trump's agenda." Below that is a photo of a man holding an American flag with many other demonstrators around him. Below that is the headline of a separate article, "She marched against Trump in 2017. Now, she says, 'just let it all burn.'"
April 5, 2025 at 9:36 PM
wonkysq.bsky.social
The dick teacher from The Breakfast Club saying, "That's 200% right there! You want another 50%?"
March 13, 2025 at 3:10 PM