Writer, Nashville-based, Philly-born https://teapaw.org/t.co/Qtl2AphCDR https://teapaw.org/t.co/Gtc9zAvZt8
Nashville, TN
Joined November 2008
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"Go take a hike!": Art professor absolutely unloads on the pronoun police with a rant for the ages notthebee.com/article/an-art…
this is not a bad idea
Everyone who is being sucked dry to pay for freeloading masses is starting to give socialism a second look. This is by design.
Rs need to do an end run around it. Give us a taste of all this AI money, the supposed tariff money, the money clawed back from fraudsters. Reward the hardworkign citizens who need a break!
Trump accounts are nice but may I suggest: an annual Christmas bonus to all adults 21 and up who are citizens, no crime record, and who pay taxes, and who make under X amount a year.
People need SOME tangible benefit from their years of sacrifices as conservatives. Maybe this is the only way.
Michelle Pollino retweeted
Wait for the last 10 seconds, because that’s where this one gets dangerous. A political faction rose faster than anyone predicted, and he admits it blindsided him. He was at the protests back in the day and never bought into them, so why does he say THIS movement is different? Big money is behind it, the other side can’t rein in its own people, and the media is about to get called out. Promises were made, a lot of them never happened, and voters are fed up. Then he drops one “what if” about the Iran war that rewrites the entire midterm story. Watch to the end, then watch it again.
FULL EPISODE BELOW!!!
youtube.com/watch?v=nRCTb_VL…
🎯🎯🎯🎯🎯
We're in a new era of communication, and only one side seems to be living in it. The old guard consultant class is about to be relegated to the dustbin of history.
If you think that high prices lost the election for the right, you don't understand marketing. Humans have no problem paying a premium for a good quality brand. Notice the word "brand", not "product". Are Nikes better than New Balance? Nope. But the brand is better. And notice what happened when they tinkered with the brand and screwed their core narrative? Nike stock fell through the basement. Did the product change? Nope. The brand did.
It's not the product, it's the brand. Results don't sell the product, the storytelling does. Will these newly-elected commies lower prices? Of course not. Are they gonna get you free healthcare? No, your insurance is gonna get even worse, just like it did the last time they tried socialized medicine. They're not going to do anything they've sold you, but...like Saul Goodman said: if you're committed enough, you can make any story work.
The committed storytelling of a couple insane podcasters was enough to fracture an entire political coalition from their own side in less than 2 years...they have zero power, zero credibility, they've never actually governed anything nor produced any results, but...they're good storytellers, and that's all that matters. Are they telling a good story? No, it's atrocious, but they're telling their atrocious story effectively and compellingly.
It is 100% true that everything's too damn expensive, and we all know that inflated prices are always sticky. Does anyone know that it's entirely the result of shutting down the global economy over the flu and (both naive republicans and democrats) printing infinity dollars for several years? Nope...because nobody has effectively told that story, and it's an unsexy story to tell. "Free stuff!" is a VERY easy story to tell, and when everyone's gotta take out a second mortgage just to pay their insurance premiums, "free healthcare" is an unbeatable story. It doesn't matter that "free healthcare" doesn't exist and socialized medicine is a terrible product...it's not the product, it's the brand. And "FREE!" is a great brand.
You can't get mad at people for having the financial literacy of a 9 year old. I mean, you can, but they outnumber you a million to one, so it's not going to be productive. You need to figure out how to make an unsexy story sexy, or else the "free stuff!" crowd is going to eat your lunch every time. If you give people a choice between earning a six pack on a treadmill or taking Ozempic, they're gonna choose Ozempic...they don't care about the side effects. If you give people a choice between fiscal discipline or free stuff...guess what they'll pick? They don't care about the side effects.
With projected growth of 5%, the economy right now is stronger than it's been in generations. Is that the story you hear? Nope. Is that the vibe you feel? Absolutely not, especially when every time you fill up your gas tank, it feels like a diesel enema.
It's not the product, it's the brand. A great product can fall into oblivion with bad messaging...a single bad review from one effective storyteller can tank a restaurant. The "influencer economy" is lucrative for a reason; everybody inherently understands the importance of effective storytelling...except the right. Zohran Mamdani gets it...he has an army of influencers on staff. In a perfect metaphor of this transitional phase of old guard vs new wave political messaging, Zohran nuked the Vice President into oblivion with maybe the biggest ratio in the history of the internet. By simply posting the subway assistant meme, Mamdani got 2 MILLION likes, quoting a post from the VP that had only 10K likes. If you're reading that sentence thinking "this is fucking ridiculous, you're talking about social media likes as political analysis now?"...you are the problem.
Yes, this stuff matters. Rizz matters. The President did a masterful job of this kind of retail politics in his historic 2024 campaign...you can be angry that this is what politics has been reduced to, but you can either adapt or die.
"No the problem is, you didn't deliver enough for the American people!" Are you a moron? Since when does anybody care about that? What have democrats delivered for Californians in the last 20 years? Unmitigated wildfires, homeless drug zombies everywhere, roads that look like Fallujah in 2004...people don't care about results. They think they care about results. That want you to believe they care about results, just as Nike wants you to believe their shoes are better than New Balance...but at the end of the day, all people really care about is the swoosh.
Adapt or die.
Michelle Pollino retweeted
Let me explain something to you before I go shopping for new things. Oh, hi there. @Lightning33v 😘
Losing Congress makes President Trump's job harder. He can't pass new laws without Democrats now and they get subpoena power to drag people into retarded hearings again.
What he keeps is a lot, though.
He still has the veto, so nothing they pass becomes law without his signature.
He also still runs the whole executive branch: the military, the border, DOJ and the FBI.
Executive orders and foreign policy. He's still the one holding the pen and they can't get anything done without going through him.
Thank you for your attention to this matter.
Michelle Pollino retweeted
The presidential veto limits damage nationally - other than huge spending because who cares about the debt lol - but the states were hit hard. TX of course but also AZ, IA, GA, etc – just lots of bad policy coming. The silver lining is that 2028 will be a correction the other way—as long as the GOP nominates anyone other than Vance. But the Senate is lost until 2032, so I hope Thomas and Alito got on their treadmills this morning.
this is true...but also say goodbye to borders Texas
Tim Dillon: “This is a vote against the system.”
“It’s a vote against the corruption.”
“It’s a vote against the cost of living.”
“If people can’t own a house, get married, have children … ”
“They’re going to become radicalized.”
“The same people that elected Trump because they wanted cheaper gas, cheaper groceries, they didn’t want to go to war with Iran.”
“Nobody wanted that.”
“We have an economic war that’s disguised as a culture war.”
“The people that voted for Mamdani were four-year college graduates who took out a lot of student loans.”
“White-collar college graduates are voting for the DSA candidates because they’re mired in debt.”
“They don’t own anything.”
“And they don’t feel like they ever will.”
“Trump was supposed to address those concerns.”
“And if he doesn’t, somebody else will.”
@TimJDillon @chamath @Jason @friedberg @theallinpod
Michelle Pollino retweeted
Ten Random Election Night Thoughts:
1. Democrats in power is good business for conservative media and podcasters. Take that for what it is worth.
2. Half of Americans have an IQ of 100 or less.
3. Why is a midterm loss for the Presidential incumbent’s party so common? Are people really that shortsighted and devoid of animating principles? And I mean this in a non-partisan way. Who votes for Obama in 2008 and then helps the GOP win in 2010? Who votes for Trump in 2024 and then helps the Dems win in 2026? Are Americans really that stupidly fickle?
4. Why can’t every state count its votes in a few hours like Florida?
5. Democrat voters are like locusts. They ravage one state, escape that state to a good and decent state, and then turn their new state into the same hellhole they just left. Don’t believe me? Ask Colorado. Now, Texas, apparently.
6. Thune is happy right now.
7. The silver lining is that the Dems are going to accomplish nothing in the next two years other than to run endless, silly investigations and impeachments, which will make them look impotent and weak headed into 2028.
8. Trump is about to be unleashed. He has no midterms to worry about and he probably could care less about the campaign of the 2028 GOP nominee, JD or otherwise. “Unitary executive” is about to take on a new meaning.
9. If I was whomever is in charge of Iran at the moment, I’d be looking at properties in the Cayman Islands.
10. The legacy media still has more power than most conservatives are willing to acknowledge.
Michelle Pollino retweeted
Understand the implications of what happened in Texas last night.
Gina Hinojosa has called on Gov. Abbott to end state & local cooperation with ICE & she can order that on day one.
Hinojosa voted against the 2017 SB 4 as a TX state rep. The bill was essentially a sanctuary cities ban and required TX law enforcement to cooperate with ICE detainers. She then voted against another SB 4 in 2023, which made it a state crime to cross illegally into Texas.
Should there be another border crisis in coming years, there will likely be no resistance from Texas at the border. No Texas DPS, no TX National Guard, no razor wire or water buoys, and no Operation Lone Star, which Hinojosa called a “dog and pony show” and “political theater”.
Remember when 15,000 Haitians surged illegally into Del Rio, TX in 2021 under the international bridge? That was only stopped because Texas DPS responded on Abbott’s orders and physically blocked further crossings by lining up their cruisers to form a wall. The Biden Border Patrol was caught off guard and offered almost no resistance, except for some horseback agents who were falsely slandered for “whipping”.
Additionally, because Republicans failed to pass any legislation codifying President Trump’s border security measures, if Dems take the White House in 2028, that Dem president could, if he/she wants to, reverse every single Trump border security policy immediately upon taking office because they were all done at the executive level, and they can order Border Patrol to go back to a passive catch & release policy like we saw under Biden.
Michelle Pollino retweeted
The US has no idea the world of hurt that it has ushered. It is truly soul-crushing to see some of the outcomes. My reaction is not based on partisan politics but rather a deep love and reverence for the US. Regrettably, American Exceptionalism is increasingly disappearing. I will continue fighting in the battle of ideas but I fear that this might be a fatal inflection point. May the America of the Founding Fathers eventually prevail.
Michelle Pollino retweeted
We're in a new era of communication, and only one side seems to be living in it. The old guard consultant class is about to be relegated to the dustbin of history.
If you think that high prices lost the election for the right, you don't understand marketing. Humans have no problem paying a premium for a good quality brand. Notice the word "brand", not "product". Are Nikes better than New Balance? Nope. But the brand is better. And notice what happened when they tinkered with the brand and screwed their core narrative? Nike stock fell through the basement. Did the product change? Nope. The brand did.
It's not the product, it's the brand. Results don't sell the product, the storytelling does. Will these newly-elected commies lower prices? Of course not. Are they gonna get you free healthcare? No, your insurance is gonna get even worse, just like it did the last time they tried socialized medicine. They're not going to do anything they've sold you, but...like Saul Goodman said: if you're committed enough, you can make any story work.
The committed storytelling of a couple insane podcasters was enough to fracture an entire political coalition from their own side in less than 2 years...they have zero power, zero credibility, they've never actually governed anything nor produced any results, but...they're good storytellers, and that's all that matters. Are they telling a good story? No, it's atrocious, but they're telling their atrocious story effectively and compellingly.
It is 100% true that everything's too damn expensive, and we all know that inflated prices are always sticky. Does anyone know that it's entirely the result of shutting down the global economy over the flu and (both naive republicans and democrats) printing infinity dollars for several years? Nope...because nobody has effectively told that story, and it's an unsexy story to tell. "Free stuff!" is a VERY easy story to tell, and when everyone's gotta take out a second mortgage just to pay their insurance premiums, "free healthcare" is an unbeatable story. It doesn't matter that "free healthcare" doesn't exist and socialized medicine is a terrible product...it's not the product, it's the brand. And "FREE!" is a great brand.
You can't get mad at people for having the financial literacy of a 9 year old. I mean, you can, but they outnumber you a million to one, so it's not going to be productive. You need to figure out how to make an unsexy story sexy, or else the "free stuff!" crowd is going to eat your lunch every time. If you give people a choice between earning a six pack on a treadmill or taking Ozempic, they're gonna choose Ozempic...they don't care about the side effects. If you give people a choice between fiscal discipline or free stuff...guess what they'll pick? They don't care about the side effects.
With projected growth of 5%, the economy right now is stronger than it's been in generations. Is that the story you hear? Nope. Is that the vibe you feel? Absolutely not, especially when every time you fill up your gas tank, it feels like a diesel enema.
It's not the product, it's the brand. A great product can fall into oblivion with bad messaging...a single bad review from one effective storyteller can tank a restaurant. The "influencer economy" is lucrative for a reason; everybody inherently understands the importance of effective storytelling...except the right. Zohran Mamdani gets it...he has an army of influencers on staff. In a perfect metaphor of this transitional phase of old guard vs new wave political messaging, Zohran nuked the Vice President into oblivion with maybe the biggest ratio in the history of the internet. By simply posting the subway assistant meme, Mamdani got 2 MILLION likes, quoting a post from the VP that had only 10K likes. If you're reading that sentence thinking "this is fucking ridiculous, you're talking about social media likes as political analysis now?"...you are the problem.
Yes, this stuff matters. Rizz matters. The President did a masterful job of this kind of retail politics in his historic 2024 campaign...you can be angry that this is what politics has been reduced to, but you can either adapt or die.
"No the problem is, you didn't deliver enough for the American people!" Are you a moron? Since when does anybody care about that? What have democrats delivered for Californians in the last 20 years? Unmitigated wildfires, homeless drug zombies everywhere, roads that look like Fallujah in 2004...people don't care about results. They think they care about results. That want you to believe they care about results, just as Nike wants you to believe their shoes are better than New Balance...but at the end of the day, all people really care about is the swoosh.
Adapt or die.
Guys, I hate to break it to you, but most political advisors are so bafflingly incompetent, it would make your head spin. All the talented communicators go work in Hollywood or at Saatchi and Saatchi, and these political bros never tap these agencies for help...I've connected several campaigns with literally the best marketing geniuses in the game, got them discounted rates, even...and they just never even bothered calling. It truly feels like a lot of consultants and candidates just want to lose.
You ever wonder how my ads went so massively viral, but there's not been a single candidate who's come close to it? It's their dumbass advisors. I didn't go with any political advisors, and they were SO mad about it. I partnered with a filmmaker and marketing wizard, instead of political grifters. Why? Because I wanted our messaging to be effective. Political ads suck. Nobody watches them. I wanted people to want to watch my ads. The fact that nobody else understands this is...I honestly don't know how to explain it, other than they want to lose.
There are a bunch of candidates who love it when their party loses power. It takes all the heat off them, because then they can't be expected to pass legislation when they're in the minority, plus they can fundraise way better off of the rage when the opposition is running roughshod over the country. Baffling to watch.
Michelle Pollino retweeted
Commie regime on the way if 2028 falls
Peace in the Middle East is a good thing. Every American should pray for it. This war was a rare and major misstep, and the obvious outcome was already well known in the Pentagon since the 2002 “Millennium Challenge” war games that perfectly predicted what would happen in 2026. Blowing up Iran is not worth blowing up the world economy and thereby ushering in a bloody communist regime in the United States. Give peace a chance!
Michelle Pollino retweeted
In its own way, Iran nuked us after all
It's actually poetic, if you think about it.
Michelle Pollino retweeted
I'm can't even be that mad because almost everyone losing tonight deserved to lose, in a vacuum. Obviously I would have held my nose and voted for all of them but most people aren't me.
$116 today to fill up my tank and no end in sight
I mean, this is the most obvious outcome!