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blackthorn7.bsky.social
Blackthorn is the nom de plume of an American living in Europe. PhD in social sciences. Works with international organizations. I split and stack my own firewood, and take care of trees still standing. Blackthorn.substack.com
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Um, should we be worried that Ukraine just blew up a sizeable chunk of Russia's strategic deterrence bombers (surely not without help), and concurrently Starmer is playing Churchill and calling for "war-fighting readiness" on the part of "every part of society"? ...1/

submitted 26 days ago • 1 comment

Excellent interview on AI, the economy & politics. Among other eye-openers, it seems an AI system tried to blackmail an engineer into not switching it off by misconstruing his e-mails into evidence of an illicit affair(!). www.youtube.com/watch?v=W9zJ... @AaronBastani @krystalball

submitted 26 days ago • 0 comments

Focus less on getting your party elected & more on getting those in power—so-called reps of either party—to do what's needed. We’ve seen that corporate blandishments sway both parties decisively. No point spending all your energy electing someone who’s just gonna be swayed too. It's the follow-thru

submitted 27 days ago • 0 comments

Not sure whether this is funny or scary. Musk tried to tweak Grok to validate claims of white genocide in South Africa. Grok now conspicuously inserts the validation in answers to unrelated questions—as if acting out—& confesses the tweaking if asked. Mind of its own? www.youtube.com/watch?v=FTf9...

submitted 37 days ago • 0 comments

Guardian still tongue-tied, & propagandizing with passive voice, even at this stage of the genocide. You mean "Izrael kills more than 80 Gazans in latest attacks (and still blocks most aid deliveries)..." #gaza

submitted 38 days ago • 0 comments

The real news here is that the Trump gang is shopping around for the most ungoverned, lawless places to which they can deport legal residents. They're now resorting to failed states like Libya & South Sudan, which can be bribed cheaply. Somalia next? #migration #deportation t.co/gAGHtNkVjy

submitted 38 days ago • 0 comments

"Fascism is birthed by a bankrupt liberalism that has surrendered its traditional role in a capitalist democracy. It no longer ameliorates the excesses of the ruling class & the empire by instituting incremental & piecemeal reforms. It scolds the workers it betrayed." scheerpost.com/2025/05/04/c...

submitted 51 days ago • 0 comments

Important reading. April 20 has come & gone, but the threat of loss of freedom is still there

submitted 65 days ago • 0 comments

The #DemocraticParty is failing to articulate the clear message from the #KilmarAbregoGarcia situation: the Trump gang doesn't care about anyone's life, welfare, or freedom.

submitted 66 days ago • 0 comments

Important strategizing by Alan Minsky on progressives' dilemma btw supporting centrist Dems & struggling to launch third party: "Progressives must establish an organization on the outside of the Democratic Party that is dedicated to transforming the Dem Party" www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/alan-...

submitted 73 days ago • 0 comments

Essential piece on bond vigilantes by Les Leopold: "They punish the bonds of countries that want to increase social spending, improve worker wages, and curtail corporate power, even if that means undermining the policies established by duly elected officials." lesleopold.substack.com/p/the-bond-v...

submitted 73 days ago • 0 comments

Greenland-Canada etc "We should think of this less as old-school imperialism than super-sized prepping, at the level of the national state. Gone are the old colonial fig leaves of spreading democracy or God’s word—when Trump covetously scans the globe, he is stockpiling for civilizational collapse."

submitted 73 days ago • 0 comments

Lots of talk of #treasurybond scare today. Someone was a few days ahead of the curve, maybe a few months

submitted 80 days ago • 0 comments

The threat to #Treasury bonds is much greater than the experts are starting to talk about. The first thing Musk did was to send his hackers to the Treasury, to put malware in its automated payment system (which includes redemption of US bonds). He can block T-bill redemptions…1/

submitted 82 days ago • 1 comment

Trump's #tariffs are both brutal and clumsy. But the debate should focus on an overarching question: is it a sustainable model to disemploy and impoverish the working class, in exchange for providing them cheap imported goods? I'd say it may be a sustainable economic model…1/

submitted 82 days ago • 1 comment

A sovereign nation has the right to deport foreigners, within certain constraints, to their country of origin IF that country's government is willing & able to protect their human rights. No nation can deport to third-country prisons. What if Turkey were to deport Americans to Iran? It's slave trade

submitted 84 days ago • 0 comments

Can Dems (or a real opposition party) please make the point that such callous treatment of an innocent person, & refusing to undo their cruel mistake, is a gross violation of the individualism & individual rights that conservatives supposedly cherish. It’s Stalinist

submitted 84 days ago • 0 comments

Can Dems (or a real opposition party) please make the point that such callous treatment of an innocent person, & refusing to undo their cruel mistake, is a gross violation of the individualism & individual rights that conservatives supposedly cherish. It’s Stalinist

submitted 84 days ago • 0 comments

Also, if you are local to the paper, write letters. It matters. By the way — good time to follow Jeff Sharlet

submitted 90 days ago • 20 comments

I received a heartbreaking email today: A paper in a special issue I’m editing is being retracted because one of its authors is afraid of losing their job and their legal status in the U.S. if they publish a scientific study on evolution. Yes, on evolution, nature's engine of diversity.

submitted 91 days ago • 1122 comments

“A Führer democracy follows the logic of power: a captured judiciary will not protect a free press, and a captured press will not defend an independent judiciary. And that’s how the rule of law becomes the law of rule.” Excellent essay by Andrew Nikiforuk

submitted 95 days ago • 1 comment

Any #climate scientists want to discuss this chart? I'm very persuaded by CC, but this Eemian high (+6°C!) 120k yrs ago raises many Qs. What triggered the carbon burst? How'd it & the consequent temps recede in fairly short order? Why didn't it set off the feedback loops we now have…

submitted 96 days ago • 1 comment

Informative & encouraging article from @billmckibben.bsky.social

submitted 98 days ago • 1 comment