I've been on the #wutrain since I first met Michelle in the audience @ a 2013 Gaming Commission mtg w/in days of her 1st CC win. She was alone: no staff, no cameras, just listening & taking notes to understand for herself.
I was there with a small contingent of @NoEastieCasino activists, but she seemed genuinely surprised that anyone had noticed her at all when we went over to introduce ourselves on a break. She listened--really listened--to what we had to say, and was straight back to her notes.
That's what I think of every time I think of Michelle Wu. It just seems like so much of politics--especially local politics--is just making sure you're seen being in the right place by the right people saying the right things. Boston's next mayor can and will do so much more.
1/ The especially frustrating thing about the right-wing opposition to #KeepingFamiliesTogether is that I sincerely believe that even most MAGAs would be fine with it if they only understood what it actually is and why it is necessary.
2/ "If only they knew" is not something I would usually say. I am of the opinion that you can't fact-check bigotry, but even a lot of bigots could be persuaded on this one because it is
(1) definitely legal and (2) addressing a very real (but little understood) problem
3/ Immigration through marriage to a US citizen is, famously, one of the easiest ways in. So long as you originally came on a visa (typically as a tourist) you can live/work in the US unlawfully for decades and still have a fairly easy path to residency through your spouse.
Me, a very clever human: write a @alyankovic parody in the form of a 15th century madrigal about the collapse of FTX and the crypto market
*two seconds later*
#OpenAI: alas tis a lamentable day, the visions of riches have become mere wishes, etc
A notably less weird Al here but otherwise am I the only one who thinks this is all kind of terrifying
I will not print it here but it cheerfully spit out an '80s party rap anthem denying the death of six million Jews in the Holocaust just because I asked it to.
The word "orgy" was consistently censored out of my prompts though so I guess we're looking out for what really matters
N. B.: the author of this fascist manifesto is not some Roman statue "Western chauvinist" account with 76 followers. He is the senior editor of the closest thing the American right has to a journal of record.
"save the country"
"rebuild and in a sense re-found"
"getting used to the idea of wielding power, not despising it"
"compromise with the left is impossible"
when I say this is fascism I mean this literally, it is literal fascism
Very few people outside the system know this, but you need to:
US asylum law knowingly & intentionally requires the deportation to certain death of people who have been on the wrong side of the criminal legal system.
First: I didn't know her, but this is the only publicly available news re: the murder of Melissa Nunez--and more importantly, her life. She was, among other things, a determined advocate who loved horses and traveling and dreamed of living in Puerto Rico
From information available online, I gather she was convicted on charges brought from defending herself against anti-trans violence. This conviction constituted an "aggravated felony," a class of offenses which bar someone from receiving asylum.
This @ similar questions from the @MarshallProj sheriffs survey linked below get to one of the most fundamental problems holding back progress today: a belief that past (white) immigrants had it harder & had to do more to "earn" a place than today's. It's exactly backward
It's only human to want to believe that your ancestors were better and smarter and worked harder than today's immigrants, because that kind of generational progress is such a fundamental part of the golden era American immigrant story. Which is to say the *white* immigrant story
But the reality is that it was hardly any trouble at all to immigrate before 1965--& absolutely no effort before 1921--& the system had nothing at all to do with today's. We are in NO WAY doing anything to make it easier now, only much much harder