Joshua Blanchard retweeted
Democrats understand what Zohran Mamdani believes, so they get why he'd be doing press conferences with Trump. They never understood what Kamala Harris wanted to do, so her association with Liz Cheney was damning.
Believing in things has value.
NHJ's school decisions: weird
NHJ's piece self-critiquing these decisions: weird
People writing about their minor children in this public way period: weird
Everyone on Twitter talking about NHJ as a parent in personal ways: weird
This tweet by me: weird
Joshua Blanchard retweeted
IMO the way Mamdani has transformed himself from a pretty broadly unpopular figure nationally before the election into one of the rare net popular political figures in America *through his governance* might be even more impressive than his actual win in 2025.
Joshua Blanchard retweeted
Ezra Klein is usually wrong on major public policy, going back to his veneration of Obama and his praise of Obamacare. Now he is relying on METR as 'investigators' when they are a weird cult. Klein is also EA-adjacent. Our whole social order trusts people like this.
I agree with Ezra Klein on the urgency of stopping recursive self-improving AI at the frontier. This is humanity’s last chance. But The Question Is: How do we enforce a ban on RSI — even if (a big “if”) China and the U.S. agree on the terms of such a ban?
nytimes.com/2026/09/20/opini…
A company with a business model that caters to people who make bad decisions? This is the first I'm hearing of such a thing. What's next? Loans and credit with high interest?
If one thing is important right now it is all of the talking about AI. Especially online. And ESPECIALLY on this website. Historians will one day write about the turning point - posts and Substack essays.
Sometimes I vibe with this point but here I don't. I'm pretty sure I also have the 2017 reaction right now in 2026.
Ugh. This will complicate one lesson in my bioethics classes per semester.
NEW: Jehovah’s Witnesses have just officially changed their position on accepting blood products in medical care.
It’s now a matter of individual conscience. It’s also a bit confusing as they say that:
“the decision to accept red cells, white cells, plasma or platelets from another person’s blood is a matter of personal conscience”
But they still reject whole blood transfusions.
These are becoming like SNL's "whoah - they're actually good!" parody of America's Got Talent. It cannot actually be shocking or amazing to these professional fighters and MMA commentators that sometimes humans get knocked out by *checks notes* a punch to the face.
"KO/TKO accounts for 32.78%"
fightomic.com/ufc-finish-rat…
Then again, a lot of these people have brain injuries themselves, so maybe they really are surprised every time!
"Zionism is the Jewish right to self-determination."
Because many people define "Zionism" this way, they therefore think it's obvious that "anti-Zionism" means "Jews do not have the right to self-determination."
Yet very few if any anti-Zionist thinkers defend the latter thesis.
American Jews are debating whether to stop calling themselves "Zionists" for fear of public disapproval. I think that would be a mistake, and I lay out five rules for how to approach self-identification for Jews who are wavering on this: commentary.org/seth-mandel/t…
The answer to this is pretty simple. Some people learn about a topic in a polemical manner; they just want to know whatever factoids they can cobble together to support something else. This leads to many mistakes, but they're not actually interested in the topic.
Imagine turning ISIS, who hate Shias, into a Shia group in your movie.
Hi @benshapiro why are you so ignorant and dumb about a topic - Islam - you talk so much about? Could you not hire a factchecker for your shitty, racist movie?
This happens in many areas. For example, the "Christian apologetics" industry fosters it: someone may have no interest in physics, but they know the "fine-tuning" facts. They have no interest in Roman history, but they can quote where Tacitus mentions Jesus.
Plagiarism smdh. @HeerJeet just because you added a period doesn't mean that you didn't steal the core of my original idea.
One of my favorite moments in Battlestar Galactica is when Al from Quantum Leap complains about his finitude.
youtu.be/qcD6hXAT-CI
