Lazy Sunday Morning Tabs
Steven L. Taylor
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Sunday, September 21, 2025
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3 comments
- From Nicolas Grossman writing at Arc Digital: Ezra Klein Accidentally Shows How the Media Brought Us Trump. This covers some points that have been made here on the site, but I think he does so in a way worth reiterating.
- Via Ars Technica: Oklahoma’s big “TV nudes” scandal was… a Jackie Chan movie on a Samsung streaming service.
- Via the NYT: Is ‘The Pitt’ Really an ‘ER’ Spinoff? Michael Crichton’s Estate Says It Is. I get it, they originally wanted to do a spinoff, were told no, and made their own show about an emergency room. But, ultimately, how can you say you own the rights to medical dramas set in ERs? And Noah Wiley can never play a Doctor again?
- By Julia Azari at Good Politics/Bad Politics: Our obsession with narrative is obscuring our understanding of political violence.
- Via the NYT: How Elon Musk Is Remaking Grok in His Image.
- Via the FT: US sliding towards 1930s-style autocracy, warns Ray Dalio. And that was three weeks ago.
- Via Politico: Trump says ‘we have to beat the hell’ out of ‘radical left lunatics’ after Kirk killing. A reminder, from immediately after the killing, of where heated, violent rhetoric has been coming from.
- Via Axios: Rubio says U.S. is deporting visa holders who celebrated Kirk’s killing. And he’ll be the judge of that–more principled news from the party and presidency that brought free speech back.
- Via the NYT: Draft Bill Would Authorize Trump to Kill People He Deems Narco-Terrorists. While it is not wise to get too worked up over proposals, this is insight into how an important part of the GOP thinks these days. I would also note the ongoing attempt to elevate a vague war on terrorism that merges the worst impulses of the post-9/11 era and the current authoritarian goals of this administration.
About Steven L. Taylor
Steven L. Taylor is a Professor Emeritus of Political Science and former College of Arts and Sciences Dean. His main areas of expertise include parties, elections, and the institutional design of democracies. His most recent book is the co-authored
A Different Democracy: American Government in a 31-Country Perspective. He earned his Ph.D. from the University of Texas and his BA from the University of California, Irvine. He has been blogging since 2003 (originally at the now defunct Poliblog).
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You know, I feel like there is no such thing as “politically neutral” I have had this take all of my adult life. My college roommate was a journalism major, and he harangued me that there’s no such thing as “unbiased” reporting. But there was “fair” reporting.
I ran into many tech types with the same notion, even going so far as to describe a workplace we shared as “non-political”. *cough* it was highly political, just of a particular sort that he didn’t notice.
So Musk making Grok “non-political” could represent Musk being the rube and easy mark that he always has been. After all, Trump played him for a couple of hundred million or so.
Not that that doesn’t make it dangerous, and it reinforces my main issue with AI: It is enormously expensive to train, and as such, will surely support the desires of the people spending the money to train it.
Not mine. Not yours.
Subheading from the piece on Ezra Klein:
I think AI has progressed to the point where we can make a better fake Charlie Kirk to praise. A pro-LGBT, pro-immigrant, pro-helping-the-needy Charlie Kirk. A Charlie Kirk that has absolutely nothing to do with the man.
Similar to the fake quotes from the founding fathers that are passed around Right Wing spaces with a picture of Thomas Jefferson and a quote from Starship Troopers.
Everyone wants to praise Kirk for his free speech, but no one wants to repeat what he was saying.
Lay a challenge. A deep fake Charlie Kirk, talking about the value of human kindness, serving the less fortunate, embracing the other, and our god given role as a global superpower to end hunger and reverse climate change. He sidled up to Trump and MAGA because that’s where the souls were that needed saving. The souls giving into the temptations of hate.
Maybe tie his fondness for guns to a need to protect the oppressed — the blacks, the browns, the queers — from the overreach of large governments.
Let the right wing correct the narrative with his actual, awful words.
@Jay L. Gischer:
Is it usually a “he” who doesn’t notice…