J. D.

J. D.

@jdetc.bsky.social

Chicago/ish. Civil/ish litigator. Left-center/ish. Elder Millennial. He/him. Interests/etc.: 1A/defamation, lolsuits, half of true crime, food, Cubs, Chi teams other than the Sox, EPL/soccer, art/architecture, film, indie music, enviro issues, tech

2.1K followers985 following11.1K posts

Isn't this exhausting? Like it's a normal Monday night in October and on top of life's other obligations you have to put on your divorced dad at the zoo get-up and take the Tesla to a cheesecake factory to do numbers on expiring discourse. Don't you have other shit going on?

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This got slapped with an intolerance label but as a member of the alleged victimized protected group it seems like a totally clean hit? What are we doing here?

lastpositivist.bsky.social@lastpositivist.bsky.social

Brazil going the way of South Korea. Basically around the world women are desperately trying to keep power out of the hands of incredibly stupid fascistic grifters while men keep trying to hand it over. Men are an embarrassing cringe gender.

If I didn't already think so-called prediction markets were somewhere between a scam and day-trading, comparing them to insurance underwriting would boot my ass right over the finish line. You can tell it's asinine because no one in their right mind would set insurance premiums Polymarket style.

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The idea would be laughable that randos in Sheboygan and Albany and Tuscon pooling their billions together have group insight into the odds of a hurricane destroying Joe's car next year, at least compared to Allstate or Traveler's. And yet make it about an election and people lose their damn minds.

(Elections are a much harder question than whether Joe's car will get destroyed by a hurricane next year by at least an order of magnitude if not two)

If I didn't already think so-called prediction markets were somewhere between a scam and day-trading, comparing them to insurance underwriting would boot my ass right over the finish line. You can tell it's asinine because no one in their right mind would set insurance premiums Polymarket style.

It's rare the skeet that's so bad that I unfollow and mute the person, but the comparison here unintentionally gives away the game. Insurance is about predicting whether someone will die or get in an accident or what have you. Yet no one's filling the void with so-called "prediction markets."

Why not? If the vox populi is reasonably precise at predicting events, why not harness that crowd wisdom to estimate the odds of certain large property damage and offer competitive premiums? If "prediction markets" represent real odds, that's easy money for anyone with sufficient start-up capital.

Here's a real-life application of economic policy. The Cheesecake Factory exists almost entirely in solid blue counties with infrastructure and leadership that support the gaudy but industrial production of cheesecake. What's wrong with Arkansas or Montana that they can't lure cheesecake jobs?

Marisa Kabas@marisakabas.bsky.social

THE FACTORY

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I don't understand how an adult could organically arrive at the opinion that not only is The Cheesecake Factory high class but that 99.9% of Americans feel similarly while accusing someone else of being an out of touch elitist. Steve's either never been to a Cheesecake Factory or he's dumb as hell.

Like if you take a first date to the Cheesecake Factory by Water Tower Place you are either going to be eating that cheesecake alone or you have bit off more cheesecake than you can chew, son. At least take her to Gibson's so she can see how bleak the middle-aged divorcee market is.

Here's a real-life application of economic policy. The Cheesecake Factory exists almost entirely in solid blue counties with infrastructure and leadership that support the gaudy but industrial production of cheesecake. What's wrong with Arkansas or Montana that they can't lure cheesecake jobs?

Marisa Kabas@marisakabas.bsky.social

THE FACTORY

It says quite a bit about soft-as-cream-cheese Steve that he thinks 99.9% of Americans perceive of the Cheesecake Factory as something that not even the Cheesecake Factory's C-suite believes (you can see in their annual report how they themselves describe the business).

This is ghoulish and uneforced. The second part goes against what should be objectively bedrock party principles and will net somewhere around 0 votes. Moderate Democrats learn that no one buys Bigotry Lite challenge: impossible.

Erin Reed@erininthemorning.com

Josh Turek of Iowa, Democrat, comes out with one of the worst anti-trans ads yet. Not only is it an anti-sports ad, it proposes a ban on federal funding for gender affirming care. That would hit all medicaid and medicare patients, and any ACA federally-subsidized plans as well. Horrific.

Shocking to learn women his age aren't interested in a man who publishes this in a magazine.

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My culture* is not your cynical capitalist costume. *white people who like the type of Chinese food where you get a fortune cookie.

Jared Holt@jaredlholt.bsky.social

For fuck’s sake

Why do none of these freaks have normally shaped heads? He looks like Bert just got back from a Caribbean vacation.

MeidasTouch@meidastouch.com

NEW: Vivek Ramaswamy says Amy Acton being a victim of childhood sexual abuse makes her “flawed” while defending his ad featuring her estranged mother. “In politics sometimes it's a tough sport.”

Not letting your wife read is a whole new tier of medieval male insecurity. My brother in Christ, have you been to a bookstore? If she's managed to find and purchase something that's truly against your precious values, your facade has already crumbled. Otherwise, it's... a book.

Jamison Foser@jamisonfoser.bsky.social

guy has more issues than Sports Illustrated www.scarymommy.com/parenting/pa...

Like we thought Mike Pence was bad and this guy's out in the US here policing outside literature like it's an AA meeting. What's she gonna do, Chet, find out about cunnilingus? Learn that there medications for depression? Discover Australia is a real place?

Yup. Important to remember that any of the Founders would piss themselves with wonder walking into a Costco. We really don't really have to consider what they'd think about mail voting or AR-15s.

Micah@rincewind.run

how all of these conversations would actually go

This is one of those things that's so ignorant it's not even the best argument she could make, which is that his full name, not really used, is Abdulrahman, which could theoretically be a problem if anyone honest gave a single solitary shit about given name etymologies other than... you know.

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I've never been to In-N-Out or Dave's Hot Chicken (why that and not Bojangles?) but it's straight up anti upper Midwest discrimination to make this list and not include Culver's. 1000 stores, people! Leave the ignorance of your mid fast food cave and embrace the warm yellow glow of Curdis.

Smithaniel@ohsoaddictive.blacksky.app

What’s your score?

This is a cousin of the beliefs that Greek statues were all pristine white marble and that writers like Dickens or Dostoevsky didn't and couldn't have had trashy taste. Civil rights activists would've been all over the socials including livestreams and selfies. And Nextdoor would've been way worse.

Joel S.@joelhs.bsky.social

"The Jews who went to Mississippi didn't take selfies and post tweets." Okay, but honestly, if tweets had been a thing in 1961, many of them probably would have done.

A flip side to this truth is that ubiqitous social media probably protects activists in hostile venues in 2026 as much as no one wants to believe that.

It has to be a kink for this guy, right? The odds of being this big of a sitcom-y doofus organically are way too remote. This is the Vice President of the damn United States making eye contact with a 40-year old journeyman QB on the practice squad. Warm smile, approach, and... no, Mr. Quayle.

Razzball@razzball.bsky.social

JD Vance greeting Bengals players and most are ignoring him lol

The most epic case of FAFO possible. If you elect me President, we're splitting all his stuff and he's moving to a prison with no internet access.

Walker Bragman@walkerbragman.bsky.social

Elon Musk threatens Congress.

I would argue we have a better working knowledge of culture from 1-2 generations ago than people in the 70s. I grew up with a VCR and DVDs and now have streaming. My parents had 4 channels and the whims of distributors.

Toss@stevenspoints.bsky.social

Setting aside that Gone With the Wind was not just “a 40 year old film” but literally the inflation-adjusted highest grossing film ever, I don’t think it’s rare to see people riffing on old movies? Like, “hey isn’t this thing from (insert 80s or 90s movie) kinda weird” is a pretty common TikTok post

They're going to steer this poor man straight into the ground.

FactPost@factpostnews.bsky.social

Trump snarls at reporter: Quiet. Quiet! What's wrong with you? Are you a sick person?

My opinion of Ramaswamy was already on the floor but sweet Georgia Brown what a dumpster person. I hope his wife leaves his stupid ass and gets everything.

The only way this happens is if you're already chest-deep in the K-K-K-Hole.

Polymarket@polymarket.extwitter.link

JUST IN: Elon Musk warns superintelligent AI will be so persuasive that many people could get “one-shotted” into believing whatever it tells them.

I'm obviously against changing the name because I'm a grown-up and not a completely useless dipshit, but any of the following would make me smile and want to buy property there: 1. Nu Mexico 2. Gnu Mexico 3. Nuevo México 4. Whatever a representative congress of the state's tribal leaders wants

omg

The government not employing anyone is big if true.

Most billionaire wealth isn't in yachts or jewelry — that's just a few percent of it. Most is productive business capital: companies that employ people, build things, and fund research. Tax that wealth and you're taxing the businesses that employ us all. Cato's Adam Michel explains.

Lina is trying to out-edgelord Elon Musk from China. I'm confident this is the best use of a "148 IQ"

Lordbeef@lordbeef.bsky.social

and I can do my banking on this app???

What does "unbelievably turbo gay" even mean? I live in a large free city, there's no amount of turbo anything I find beyond belief.

This is sort of like when they gave Dylan the Nobel Prize in literature only it seems worse somehow. Like... no, Dylan did not develop anything in this field, please read a book.

Waffle 🧇@wafflecut.bsky.social

I love Bob Dylan but Bob Dylan fans gotta stop saying this. Rap has its own actual history and it’s not singers doing a bunch of rhyming words really fast.

Notable that "Silocon Valley is a lot of poker fraud" is such a self-evident truth that a tech journalist is saying it to an interviewee who specializes in postmodern satire as if it's as obvious as gravity. And yet we still have leaders across the country who do not get it because line go up-up.

WIRED@wired.com

Would you lie to this man? EXCLUSIVE: Nathan Fielder, codirector of the Elizabeth Holmes documentary ‘You Can See Everything,’ sat down with WIRED for an extended interview—the first he’s given to discuss the film. 🔗 www.wired.com/story/nathan...

Just one question, Mr. Candidate, do you disavow Jason Alexander's non-Seinfeld filmography? ...the whole thing, Sir, North, Dunston Checks In, Bob Patterson, there's stuff in there so toxic you'd deny ever seeing it. ...No, sir, I don't think Thomas Jefferson believed in THAT freedom of speech, no.

"Hakeem cannot move" implies that Hakeem Jeffries would successfully bargain with a coalition to win the speakership but fail at any attempts to pass legislation with the same coalition and that's just wishcasting by someone who needs a factory reset.

Keith Edwards@keithedwards.bsky.social

"I would rather have the Republicans keep the house." - James Carville

El Sayed was rebuking a gutter racist who had just insulted him via negative stereotyping in a public place. "Angry, overly defensive jerk" is about as nice as Tommy could have expected. These are the same weirdos who have been fluffers to an angry, overly defensive jerk for the last decade.

Trevon Logan@trevondlogan.bsky.social

Since the video is self explanatory they are moving to a discussion of tone. They do this while refusing to admit that Tommy is a conservative operative, and in no way an “innocuous person at the town hall.” These are deeply and fundamentally unserious people.

University of Chicago once again inflicting its best and brightest upon the world.

Justin Baragona@justinbaragona.bsky.social

UPDATE: Jan Crawford has deleted the tweet. bsky.app/profile/just...

It's always the ones you most suspect.

Marisa Kabas@marisakabas.bsky.social

SCOOP: 'Tommy' from the now-viral exchange with Abdul El-Sayed is Thomas Teepell, a former staffer for Republican Senator Josh Hawley with close ties to Christian Nationalist Sean Feucht. He's the son of a former Bobby Jindal staffer whose consultant work was instrumental in getting Hawley elected.

This should be instantly impeachable. What are we doing here.

The New York Times@nytimes.com

Breaking News: President Trump signed an executive order to exempt Russia from new sanctions legislation that Congress passed last month. www.nytimes.com/2026/10/16/u...

It's very curious that when a female employee makes a big mess he just kicks her out of the palace and plucks a new one from the showroom, but the greasy clown shoe weirdos who allegedly are men get to stay in the admin no matter how many goats they sex pest, and by very curious I mean not at all.

CNN@cnn.com

President Donald Trump has fired Katie Zacharia as press secretary, advisers to the president said, ending her turbulent week-long stint as the White House’s top spokesperson. https://cnn.it/4zzMpUj

Pete Hegseth is a daydrinking serial killer and he is somehow still running the defense department. Seemingly the only thing that could make Trump see that he hired a daydrinking serial killer is if he gets the Fox News makeover. Then Trump would never have heard of the person.

I was told at some point during law school about the lawyer / attorney "distinction" but it seems rather obvious that making that technical distinction when American English otherwise treats them as synonyms is an invitation for frauds and quacks to exploit the difference.

I really don't care if a law school grad wants to flippantly call themselves a lawyer among their friends and family, but we're a self-regulating profession and any time it veers into the professional ambit we need to nuke it from orbit.

There is a perfectly good word for the work she did in China and it's "consultant." It doesn't magically become "lawyer" because you went to law school.

1. Parlor trick <---you are here 2. "3-5 years away from mass commercial adoption" 3. Lots of time in a K-hole 4. You're still at step one 5. Tesla / SpaceX line go up 6. Mars is still uninhabitable and the USAID cuts killed real people

Yahoo Finance@yahoofinance.com

"Flying cars are real!" 🚀 Elon Musk and Tesla showcase the new Roadster.

"I'm going to say something few Democrats are willing to say" always seems to be followed by something that 95% of Democrats would sign onto. Screw that. If anything I wish more Democrats had the courage to argue that we should be blowing way more government money on fun stuff.

Team Talarico@teamtalaricohq.bsky.social

James Talarico: Let me just say something that a lot of Democrats aren't willing to say. We should be looking for efficiency in our government. I believe in stewardship. This is a value in my faith tradition. We should be good stewards of taxpayer funds.