Tuesday’s Forum
Steven L. Taylor
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Tuesday, March 10, 2026
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22 comments
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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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Apparently Iran is targeting data centers.
Is this really a bad thing?
Draining the swamp into their pockets while making fond memories of high times. It’s the corruption, stupid! It’s the stupidity! It’s the hypocrisy! It’s corrupt, stupid, hypocrisy!
Pentagon Spent $93 Billion In One Month ‘Use-It-Or-Lose-It’ Spending Spree
—- Numerous articles over the past several months have highlighted insider deals for contractors to DoD/DoW and other Trump managed government agencies. We can all now dismiss the MAGA claims of being focused on efficiency, cutting waste and fraud. At some point the numbers will be tallied up, and Trump’s administration is shaping up to be the most wasteful and fraudulent in the history of the United States, ever, biggly. Duplicitous sloganeering being their strong suit — along with deliberate cruelty.
This says it all about Trump:
REPORTER: Mr. President you just suggested that Iran somehow got its hands on a tomahawk and bombed its own elementary school on the first day of the war. But you’re the only person in your government saying this. Even your defense secretary wouldn’t say that when he was asked, standing over your shoulder on your plane on Saturday. Why are you the only person saying this?
TRUMP: Because I just don’t know enough about it. I think it’s something that I was told is under investigation. But Tomahawks are used by others, as you know. Numerous other nations have Tomahawks. They buy them from us, but I will certainly, whatever the report shows, I’m willing to live with that report.
Rex Tillerson was right, he’s a fucking moron.
@Kathy: from the article:
An “Iranian suicide drone”? It’s not alive, and we don’t refer to American cruise missiles as suicide rockets, or guided munitions as suicide shells, so this is really just to bring up the notion of suicide bombers and terrorism and tie it to Iran striking back. Just a little bit of bigotry to spice up the story.
I would expect this from WaPo or the NY Times, but I expect better from the Guardian.
Maybe I’m too woke, and maybe it was just an unfortunate turn of phrase with no intent behind it, but I think some people should probably have their fingers broken so they can’t write. Maybe not on the first offense, but the prospect should be there.
Old pianos would have that hinged cover that could slam down and shatter your fingers if you were either in a Bugs Bunny cartoon or if your piano teacher had just finally had enough of your awful playing and broke. It was a specter of harm and danger hanging over the entire affair to remind you to be careful. I think perhaps computer keyboards should have something similar.
On a more down to earth note, we just bought a 3.5 lbs pot roast for $42. Is beef too dear for a typical family? I looked at the on line site for my nearest grocery store, and they listed the price per ounce which is new to me. Chicken and pork prices are better.
@Lucys Football:
Aside from the US, the only countries that own and operate the Tomahawk are the UK, Australia, Japan, and the Netherlands. Which of these countries would sell them to Iran?
@Gustopher:
The now infamous Tomahawk is essentially a suicide drone, made before drones became popular.
Yesterday I was asked to put a bunch of files from the cloud on a thumb drive. Ok, so I found them, copied them to a folder so I’d know later what I’d sent, and copied them to the USB thumb drive.
Or I tried to.
After copying 10-15%, it stopped and wouldn’t budge, Cancelling caused the little system window to display “cancelling” for a very long time. Forcing that closed to extract the drive crashed the files explorer.
But it gets better. An attempt from another PC also failed. Copying them to the local hard drive didn’t help. Sending them through an online file server also didn’t help. We could download the zipped files ok, but not copy them to the thumb drive.
Today IT showed up to look it over, just as I was leaving for an errand. When I got back, they had got all the files in the thumb drive, but I’ve no idea how that happened.
I’m beginning to hate thumb drives. Not just for this, but for how many we use up. They’ve become the thing to transfer files, no matter how small. For some proposals, we send one or tow containing the technical and economic proposals. These files tend to be under 1MB, and up to a couple of MB at most. It’s like using a big rig truck capable of hauling tons to haul a can of soda.
Another REPUBLICAN politician goes to prison.
It’s remarkable that video has emerged showing a Tomahawk missile hitting near the school on the first day of the war. But that evidence is in no way needed, because the Pentagon knows the location of each target. The only question should be whether the intelligence that made it a target was faulty, or I suppose that possibly a munition malfunctioned. The answer does not get easier with the passage of time; in fact, the delay begs the question of why it took so long.
As for the term suicide drone, I’ve commented before that we should stop using it. For all the reasons discussed, it’s just not appropriate.
Anyone else notice a rather large uptick in the amount of articles talking about the “dangers” of antidepressants?
It’s “fun” to watch the anti-trans playbook being used against antidepressants. One tell that it’s pure fuckery is that the specific complaints are being leveled against SSRIs, but all antidepressants are imputed with being bad.
For what it’s worth, I’m on an NDRI (Wellbutrin) and will likely be for the rest of my life. Getting the NHS to prescribe it for me was like pulling teeth. Partly because Wellbutrin is only prescribed for smoking cessation in the UK, and partly because the NHS seems to think that no one should be on antidepressants ever.
@Beth: Obviously, you should take up smoking so you can be quitting it, thus justifying your Wellbutrin.
(You could just claim to be trying to quit smoking, and either never smoke or smoke all you want — are they really going to run tests to check to make sure you are smoking?)
I had seen the SSRI stuff circulating a few months ago, specifically tied to gun violence starting with trans people on SSRIs with guns using the tools as they were clearly designed for –um– going on shooting sprees.
I actually haven’t heard about it for a few months, but I guess the next major shooting will spark a spirited debate as to whether we can stop gun violence in our schools by –sigh– restricting access to mental health care for minors.
Sleepytown GasBuddy Update
I’m sure there has to be something apocalyptic in this link.
So, first someone makes a message board site for AI agents. Then Fakebook buys it.
Seriously, the bubble can’t pop fast enough (but we’ve been waiting over a year for it).
@Beth: @Gustopher:
Can’t speak for a recent uptick. Other than this Vox piece, served by the Apple News algo, I have not seen much.
This interview is good. I have a suspicion or two or three as to why, but 20th-21st century psychiatry produced some strident, vocal professionals.* Often, they got the most attention. So this discussion stands out to me.
I have more to say about the older criticisms referenced above, the anti-anti-depressant crowd, and how the latter intersects with some subcultures that advocate lifestyles and beliefs that stand in contradiction to their stated reasons for opposing medication for psychiatric issues.
Maybe another time.
The one big reason El Taco and his GQP minions will try to steal the midterms and the 2028 general election, is that most likely the next Democratic president won’t try to return things to normal as Biden did.
I got some blowback here in 2020 when I suggested Biden should instruct his AG to go all out to prosecute and jail El Taco as quickly as possible. Yes, I knew then the importance of an independent DOJ, as well as why it’s a terrible idea to politicize law enforcement. I thought letting a budding dictator go free after attempting to steal an election, and attempting an actual insurrection to remain in power, among other things, was even worse.
Well, the US no longer has an independent DOJ, and it’s more politicized than the legislative branch. In effect, it’s largely the fixer of the executive branch. It’s held back from causing major damage only by the courts, which still require actual evidence from prosecutors (and Biden’s pardons of many subjects of EL Taco’s ire).
Given all the grift and corruption, not to mention other blatantly illegal actions, and the pending matter of the Jan 6 2021 insurrection, and the obstruction of justice found but not pursued by the Mueller team, I can’t see a Democratic president in 2029 not instructing their AG to relentlessly and swiftly put the orange ass’ ass in jail*, should he still be alive.
And El Taco and Klaus Barbie and Fixer Barbie and Whiskey pete and Kash and Marco and all the others have to know they’ll go along to keep El Taco company.
So, no way they will meekly accept being thrown out of office by something as abstract as the will of the people, or the rule of law, or fair elections.
What may give them pause, if anything does, is the prospect that some or most blue states won’t quietly accept the blatant theft, and do something a bit more kinetic than legal action.
*But I’ve been wrong before.
@Gregory Lawrence Brown:
Home heating oil prices are even more volatile. We pay market price for residential heating oil, which is set at some number of cents per gallon above the daily regional port price. The residential price was…
$2.74 in early Dec 2025
$4.65 yesterday
I pity anyone who got a market-priced heating oil delivery yesterday, because today it had dropped to $4.22.
And it was already relatively high last month — in mid-Feb 2026 we got a delivery for $3.65 after a long period of very cold weather. Such is supply and demand. That was the highest price we’d paid since Feb 2023, when it was about $3.60.
@Gustopher:
Oddly enough I’ve never smoked or vaped (anything), ever. It’s just gross. Plus watching my grandma teathered to a ventilator for the last years of her life helped.
@Kurtz:
I couldn’t get past the Captcha on that. Was it the “SSRIs killed my penis” I saw a couple days ago?
I might be a little more sensitive to it since I’m watching both the U.S. and UK work overtime to take away various medications that make it possible for me to exist and get out of bed in the morning.
The anti-antidepressants push seems to have picked up in the last couple weeks. Just wait, the Atlantic will be pushing “antidepressants killed my penis AND my kids” any day now.
@Beth:
https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/481854/ssri-antidepressant-withdrawal-dependence-tapering
No, it isn’t that at all. But it does acknowledge gaps in research and understanding, and areas doctors and therapists should be more mindful of patient concerns.
Keep in mind, I take antidepressants. And, I can say with near certainty that I would be in a much worse situation if I do not take them. Or, not be, at all.
I am on your side.
I also share your frustration that people can be persuaded by people like RFK, Jr., Oz, or Mercola, and that politicians, journalists, and even medical professionals exploit those fears or buy into it themselves.
It makes life much more difficult for you and I. And ends up harming those in need of care, and in some cases, those around individuals who experience a preventable crisis.
—
On cynical exercise of power:
There are legitimate reasons for concern. Throughout history, ‘insanity’ has been used to justify imprisonment, torture, and execution. Moreover, that label would often be applied to those critical of the contemporary status quo.
Many of the anti-antidepressant crowd display authoritarian tendencies, but use the language of resistance. It is a bait-and-switch. Others are expressing genuine beliefs, but are mere useful idiots.
@Kurtz: “Most psychiatrists aren’t trained to explore the meaning and emotions patients assign to their medications.”
I don’t know, man, that really doesn’t align with what I know about psychiatrists. And in spite of not using one personally, I know quite a bit about them. Exploring how the drugs are working in the context of the entire patient’s sense of well-being is what they do in their appointments.
@Jay L. Gischer:
I can’t speak to that claim one way or another. But he is involved in educating and training psychiatrists.
But your skepticism makes sense.
@Kurtz: I followed the link. I read the piece carefully. The words I quoted are not the words of any expert, but the words of the person who wrote the piece, as best I can tell. This person uses female pronouns and shows no sign of any technical background in her bio.
@Jay L. Gischer:
It didn’t occur to me that the author would play that fast and loose with the doctor’s responses.
I probably should have considered that.
Now I am more curious.
The NYT piece linked in the intro only mentioned the lack of high quality studies related to tapering and withdrawal without commenting on education and training.