Benjamin Rahn

@brahn.bsky.social

471 Followers 601 Following

Dad. Product engineer. Ex-Stripe. Co-founded ActBlue. Erstwhile physicist.

Screenshot highlighting “Mariannette Miller-Meeks”
Quote: Wyle makes eye contact for his next point, delivering it with a Robby-esque matter-of-factness. "Fourth point: The election went the other way," he says with a shrug. "We could have been a really good show with a lot of nice things to say in a perfectly normal Kamala Harris universe. And instead we became almost a beacon of hope and humanity in an alternative universe. But in the midst of that, fifth point-this is essentially competence porn. You're watching really smart, dedicated people do what only they know how to do at a level that you don't know how to do it, and you're so fucking glad that they're there doing it, and compartmentalizing their own stuff to put your broken pieces back together. You're so reassured by knowing that there are people out there that laugh and joke and have the ability to lock in like that."
Image and product description for a "Nobel Peace Chocolate Medal". Text in Norwegian, English translation via google translate: Nobel Peace Prize Chocolate Medal 21.00 kr About the chocolate medals The chocolate medals are produced in Gouda, the Netherlands – one of the world’s largest chocolate factories, exporting to over 60 countries. The factory holds several quality certificates, including the British Retail Consortium’s Procheck certificate. Ethical and sustainable The cocoa used in the medals is UTZ certified , ensuring responsible production with respect to both the environment and people. Product details Diameter: 55 mm Weight per medal: 11 grams
From the linked piece by Jamelle Bouie: "If they win next year, Democrats will need to treat the next Congress not as a return to the status quo ante but as the beginning of a new era in which the principal task is to roll back the president's effort to create and consolidate a personalist dictatorship. They'll need to fortify the American political system against future attempts to play dictator and lay out a project of genuine democratic renewal. None of this is possible without a willingness to use power rather than just hold it."
Zohran for NYC stylized sign that reads “How to Cook for Forty Humans
Daft Punk (electronic music duo who dress like robots for their performances)
If we take a step back for a second, the idea that if a political movement garners mass support, it can't possibly be extremism, incompatible with democratic self-government, or beyond the pale in a broader cultural and societal sense is utterly implausible and historically illiterate. History is full of authoritarian movements that had mass appeal (the Nazis, to mention the obvious
If we take a step back for a second, the idea that if a political movement garners mass support, it can't possibly be extremism, incompatible with democratic self-government, or beyond the pale in a broader cultural and societal sense is utterly implausible and historically illiterate. History is full of authoritarian movements that had mass appeal (the Nazis, to mention the obvious
Sen John Thune, Republicans Majority Leader
Headline: Oswald Mosley's grandson is the boss of Palantir in the UK.
Much better results for building a diagram of the US presidents since Herbert Hoover. (On my spot-checking all the information and images are correct.)
Very bad results of asking GPT-5 to build a diagram of US presidents since Herbert Hoover. Lots of bad mispellings, wrong dates, and distorted pictures that have only the most passing resemblance to the intended president. Source https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/last-16-us-presidents-chatgpt5-simon-kent-pm09e/
Excerpt from linked review: Firstly, these are sprightly novels. Though Brust is spinning a genuinely epic tale of civilization-spanning intrigue, informed by profound insight into politics and power, these are, at core, caper novels about a wisecracking assassin who is also a witch, and whose familiars, a pair of flying venomous lizards called "jhereg," are even funnier than Vlad, the series narrator. Brust is a great political thinker (he may be the person the wags had in mind when they observed that Marxists are the only fantasy writers who get the ratio of lords to vassals right), but he never allows the politics shot through these volumes to get in the way of their astonishing narrative energy. What I'm trying to say is: these are fun to read. But they're not just fun. They're also daring. Each volume does something that Brust has never done before. One book takes the form of annotations to a dry-cleaning bill (seriously!), another is framed around gathering ingredients for a recipe (likewise); another is a trio of multi-POV novellas that interlock in surprising, head-spinning ways. There are whodunnits, war novels, romances, heists, quests… And, with Vallista, now there is a haunted house novel to rival Gormenghast, The Fall of the House of Usher, or Lovecraft's He. I've followed other long-running series, like Pratchett's Discworld books. Unlike Pratchett, Brust keeps the focus on a single character, Vlad Taltos, and follows his development through book after book, as he quests to…well, that's an interesting question. A more obvious comparison is King's Black Tower books, which I followed for decades (only to be disappointed when the series finished with a wet fizzle of a cop-out), but whereas the Black Tower concerned itself with Roland, the eternal and unchanging hero, Vlad Taltos changes…a lot. He learns things, and then learns that those things were wrong. He changes for the better, and for the worse. [...] these books are unlike anything I've read.
Garak from Star Trek: Deep Space 9, wearing a vest and striped shirt, making a jazz hands gesture
Screencap from "O Brother Where Art Thou" with Pappy O'Daniel and son sitting on a porch. The text reads "Say I got an idea...we could hire us a little fella even smaller than Stokes's".
US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth at a press conference, scrunching up his face in a comical manner (which he would probably describe as fierce and manly)
Screen capture of https://x.com/brahn/status/1930749217817149580
Politico headline: "New think tank 'Seachlight' pushes Democrats toward more popular positions"
Collection of four sock barnyard animal sock puppets (a sheep, a cow, a pig and a horse)
Screencap from "O Brother, Where Art Thou": Tim Blake Nelson saying "...and turned him into a horny toad"
Excerpt from the linked Brooks column: What is happening now is not normal politics. We're seeing an assault on the fundamental institutions of our civic life, things we should all swear loyalty to - Democrat, independent or Republican. **It's time for a comprehensive national civic uprising.** It's time for Americans in universities, law, business, nonprofits and the scientific community, and civil servants and beyond to form one coordinated mass movement. Trump is about power. The only way he's going to be stopped is if he's confronted by some movement that possesses rival power.
Video screen cap with the words "weaponized intertextuality" on top of an out-of-focus shot from Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens
A billboard that reads “Manage your stormy data. No hush money required”
Screencap of https://bsky.app/profile/governor.ca.gov/post/3lnycxlgh2c2u with Gov. Newsom, grinning, saying "GenAI has come to traffic management"
NYTimes headline: "Trump Officials Blame Mistake for Setting Off Confrontation with Harvard" ... "An official on the administration's antisemitism task force told the university that a letter of demands had been sent without authorization"
Picture from meme https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heartbreaking:_The_Worst_Person_You_Know_Just_Made_A_Great_Point
Excerpt from the Simple Sabotage Field Manual: "When possible, refer all matters to committees, for 'further study and consideration.' Attempt to make the committees as large as possible -- never less than five."
Simpsons meme with Homer talking to Bart; text reads "Not donating money to either candidate...so far"
“And the condemnations were joined by a particularly unexpected voice — the far-right pundit Ann Coulter. “There’s almost no one I don’t want to deport, but, unless they’ve committed a crime, isn’t this a violation of the first amendment?” she wrote.”
NYTimes headline: How South Korea's President Planned a Military Takeover, Then Blew It
a text message that reads “Hi Arthur, I really like the red wine you gave me last time. Can you tell me where you bought it from? Thank you” and an accompanying photo of a Kirkland brand wine bottle
Tuesday: Alice falling down the rabbit hole (from Disney's Alice in Wonderland) Wednesday: a woman crying on a bed Thursday: a woman at. bar, smoking and drinking Friday: Furiosa from "Mad Max: Fury Road"
From Star Trek: Deep Space 9 -- Gul Dukat regards the baseball that Sisko left in his office as a symbol of his intent to return.
They want you to feel powerless and to surrender and to let them trample everything and you are not going to let them. You are not giving up, and neither am I. The fact that we cannot save everything does not mean we cannot save anything and everything we can save is worth saving. You may need to grieve or scream or take time off, but you have a role no matter what, and right now good friends and good principles are worth gathering in. Remember what you love. Remember what loves you. Remember in this tide of hate what love is. The pain you feel is because of what you love.
Calvin (from “Calvin and Hobbes”) reading a book and getting an evil grin on his face.
The videos succeeded because they were professionally made, because they included shocking details — the hookah lounge and hockey rink inside Putin’s vulgar Black Sea residence, as well as the vineyard, the helicopter pad and the oyster farm — and because they linked these stories to the poverty of Russian teachers, doctors and civil servants. You have bad roads and bad healthcare, Navalny told Russians, because they have vineyards, helicopter pads and oyster farms. This was investigative journalism but packaged and designed to move people — to explain to them the connection between the palaces built by distant rulers and their own damaged lives — and it worked. Some of the videos received hundreds of millions of views.
Hardcover copy of _The Phantom Tollbooth_ by Norton Juster, Illustrations by Jules Feiffer
Mr Burns (from the Simpsons) saying "It's called playing the percentages. It's what smart managers do to win ball games."
Screencap of a post by NBC reporter Sahil Kapur, which reads as follows -- The debate around a "national abortion ban" needs to include a key nuance. There's zero chance Congress fully outlaws abortion. The open question is federal restrictions that override states - like 20 or 15 weeks - which Republicans routinely attempt when they have majorities.
Chasing goose meme. The first panel shows the NYT headline "How some states are making it harder to register voters" and the goose asks "which states?" In the second panel, the goose yells "which states, montherfucker?"
Andrew Scott as Moriarity from the TV series “Sherlock”, with an expression of mock surprise
Mr Burns (from the Simpsons) looking horrified
Title and subtitle of linked article: "Trump's Abortion Announcement: It doesn't mean shit"
Cover images of Sviatoslav Richter's recordings of The Well-Tempered Clavier, Books I and II, by JS Bach. The two images are nearly identical except for the difference in expressions on Richter's face, which look (to me!) similar to the facial expressions in the Kombucha Girl meme
Nelson Muntz (character from the Simpsons) saying "Ha Ha!"
Screencap from the Simpsons: Monty Burns with evil expression on his face saying "Let the fools have their tartar sauce."
Pixelated screen that reads "hello world"