"This was the voice of moderation until 13 Sept, 2025"
by liberal japonicus Knock yerselves out.
by liberal japonicus
We had an election here in Japan, I had hoped to post something on Friday before the polls but unfortunately, my wife's father passed away and Japanese funerals being what they are, I couldn't write anything. Rest below the fold
by liberal japonicus An open thread-y post to talk about this NYT daily An explosive whistleblower report claims that the Justice Department is asking government lawyers to lie to the courts and that that has forced career officials to choose between upholding the Constitution or pledging loyalty to the president. Today, I speak to that … Read more
by liberal japonicus A topic that everyone might have thoughts on https://www.theguardian.com/education/2025/jul/06/1960s-schools-experiment-created-new-alphabet-thousands-children-unable-to-spell The Initial Teaching Alphabet was a radical, little-known educational experiment trialled in British schools (and in other English-speaking countries) during the 1960s and 70s. Billed as a way to help children learn to read faster by making spelling more phonetically intuitive, it radically … Read more
by liberal japonicus As I mentioned, I'm having trouble determining the amount of Schadenfreude to take when things happen lately. This one is a conundrum https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/jul/15/trump-epstein-files-maga An open thread for all your Schadenfreude needs.
by liberal japonicus I often see videos with titles like 'Why young people can't communicate', which I usually find to be someone from my generation making pronouncements about younger people and explaining why everything has gone to shit. I normally don't click on the titles but when this Ezra Klein interview titled How The Attention … Read more
by liberal japonicus This has been reported in several places. In a new discovery about this mysterious yet often familiar species, researchers have found ancient evidence of a Neanderthal "fat factory" in what is now Germany. Operational around 125,000 years ago, the factory would've been a place where Neanderthals broke and crushed the bones of … Read more
by liberal japonicus The comments on the previous post are closed (because we are obviously a Communist collective that can't tolerate a diversity of opinion) so here is an open thread. Have at it.
by liberal japonicus Re: BigBadBird McK had been banned basically for being deeply rude, has apparently tried coming back under a different handle, so this new version is likewise banned. There is some other evidence, but given his last comment, it seems pretty clear that BigBadBird is a sockpuppet. さよなら。
by liberal japonicus I like this substack newsletter, ChinaTalk by Jordan Schneider and I thought this piece was quite fascinating.There are a lot of competing points and it would be impossible to summarize them, but the introduction gives an idea I recently hosted a 2-session reading club for Abundance, bringing together paid subscribers of my … Read more