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Maria Bustillos

@mariabustillos.com

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Maria Bustillos @mariabustillos.com · Mar 10

I'm a founding member of FLAMING HYDRA, a cooperative of the best independent journalists and artists around, making a superfine newsletter for you each weekday.

Love press freedom? Support us for just $3 per month.

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Maria Bustillos @mariabustillos.com · 4h

Maria Bustillos @mariabustillos.com · 6h

TRUTH it drives me up a tree when this is overlooked or dismissed

Maria Bustillos @mariabustillos.com · 6h

Iambic pentameter makes for the most sublime poetry by far, and its finest practitioners are

1. Alexander Pope
2. Nabokov (as John Shade)
3. Shakespeare

(tell me of others as good if you know em)

Rachel Feder @rachelfeder.bsky.social · 19h

Tell me your most unhinged literary opinion, as a little treat

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💀 🎃 ThemBOO! 🎃 💀 @thembo.bsky.social · 14h

Conservatives love to pine away for picturesque "real America," and then without fail show pictures of some sleepy New England university town that's voted D+60 for 75 years

Twitter screenshot
"American conservati...
@acc_national

America isn't an idea. It's home."

Attached are four daytime photos of picturesque rural scenes in the fall.

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Rick Perlstein @rickperlstein.bsky.social · 8h

This is Israel's defense minister. Just to be clear: Israel interprets the deal allowing continueing the violence even after the freeing of the hostages.

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Maria Bustillos @mariabustillos.com · 10h

a kaleidoscope of possibilities

Maria Bustillos @mariabustillos.com · 10h

An old friend once told me he'd been reading Descartes and I saw him some weeks later and asked him so, how did you like it? and he goes: 'I read each word.'

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Maria Bustillos @mariabustillos.com · 10h

no!!! yoicks well just read the NYT review and you will see what I mean

Maria Bustillos @mariabustillos.com · 12h

idly recalling the 2008 NYer story about Grazer hiring someone to read books for him, and find him interesting people to talk with

even more sus than I thought it was back then

www.newyorker.com/magazine/200...

from the linked 2008 piece, the advertisement to be Brian Grazer's 'cultural attache'

This person would be responsible for keeping Brian abreast of everything that’s going on in the world; politically, culturally, musically. . . . They’re also responsible for finding an interesting person for Brian to meet with every week . . . an astronaut, a journalist, a philosopher, a buddhist monk. . . . There is LOTS of reading for this position! Grazer may ask you to read any book he’s interested in. You’ll probably get to read about 4 or 5 books a week and you may be required to travel with him on his private plane to Hawaii, New York, Europe—teaching him anything he asks you about along the way. . . . You will also be provided with an assistant. . . . Salary is around $150,000 a year. . . . You will be to Grazer what Karl Rove was to Bush.

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Maria Bustillos @mariabustillos.com · 12h

So like Julia Roberts in an 'anti-woke' film produced by Trump-voting Brian Grazer, in which she plays a Yale professor and she quotes Foucault, and the plot hinges on the questionable accusation of rape by a queer black student plagiarist against a white dude

is that what you're saying

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Jonathan M. Katz @katz.theracket.news · 16h

There were at least two ceasefires under Biden! In which more than five times as many living Israeli hostages were released in exchange for 240 Palestinians! Has everyone forgotten this?

Coffee Indiana @coffeeindiana.bsky.social · 16h

Also, ceasefires have happened under prior Presidents! The day he gets Palestine their own country he can be told he's the most special boy deserving of a shiny prize.

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Maria Bustillos @mariabustillos.com · 13h

guess I don't have to

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onion person @junlper.beer · 14h

watching the UKs green party elect an actual unafraid leftist into leadership and see party membership double in under a month is once again endless proof that if you stand up for leftist causes and treat the electorate like adults, you’ll win people over easily

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Maria Bustillos @mariabustillos.com · 15h

ARE you a @flaminghydra.com subscriber??!

IF yes please remember to vote in the HYDRANYM! There's some real good ones.

Voting is extended one extra day since we're observing the holiday:

flaminghydra.com/hydranym-no-...

HYDRANYM No. 20: Vote!

by The Editors Judges, reflect on the theme of: SWITCH and render your verdict below. HYDRANYM is the Creative Writing word game especially for Flaming Hydra subscribers (here’s the RULES). J...

flaminghydra.com

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Christopher Mathias @letsgomathias.bsky.social · 2d

many great parts to this @davidjroth.bsky.social reflection on One Battle — perhaps the quickest I've ever clicked on a link — but was struck by these lines i think because they get to core of liberal/centrist refusal to admit the severity/stakes of what's happening flaminghydra.com/issue-416/

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Radley Balko @radleybalko.bsky.social · 18h

The Treasury Secretary declares himself to be pro-monarchy, and promises to punish the entire country if the people exercise their First Amendment rights.

Aaron Rupar @atrupar.com · 19h

Bessent: "No Kings means no paychecks. No paychecks and no government."

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jen see @iamjensee.bsky.social · 1d

This @davidjroth.bsky.social joint @flaminghydra.com is the kind of culture writing I love. It’s about One Battle After Another and the film serves as a starting point for a bunch of interesting ideas.

If you like good writing on the internet, Flaming Hydra is pretty great, actually.

Struggle cinema

David Roth on 'One Battle After Another'

flaminghydra.com

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Maria Bustillos @mariabustillos.com · 18h

Can we assume that workwear suffered the same fate as every other challenger so far

Ghostin this Hell @hoovybaby.bsky.social · 1d

no quarter given lmao

Matt Stoller & @matthewstoller • 2h
UPS had seven months of warning about the de minimis change, but is still taking packages w/o getting required customs info & is making tariff charge errors.
Nice use of passive voice though!

derek guy
@dieworkwear • 2h
i apologize using a passive voice. i was not born in london to a wealthy bank executive, sent to an exclusive private prep school in new hampshire, and then studied at harvard before larping as a champion of the people. you have to work with my low upbringing.

Maria Bustillos @mariabustillos.com · 1d

Nope, not trying to do the right thing

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Maria Bustillos @mariabustillos.com · 1d

This guy makes George W. Bush sound like freaking Pericles

Aaron Rupar @atrupar.com · 1d

Trump: "I don't think there's anything that's gonna get me in heaven. I think I'm not maybe heaven bound. I may be in heaven right now as we fly on Air Force One. I'm not sure I'm gonna be able to make heaven."

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CajunBlueAZ ⚜️🇺🇸 🇺🇦 @cajunblue.bsky.social · 1d

🚨🚨🚨WA Governor Bob Ferguson responds to a letter he received from AG Pam Bondi in which she threatened to place him in jail. 🧯He is on fire! 1/2

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the Mountain Goats @themountaingoats.bsky.social · 1d

so, this weekend the great Dr. Demento did his final show. I could write a lot about the importance of his show to me & my friends when we were 12 and 13. there's more to it than "he played funny stuff" and "his show is where @alyankovic.bsky.social got his start." 1/3

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Maria Bustillos @mariabustillos.com · 1d

oh it's praise all right

Maria Bustillos @mariabustillos.com · 1d

Who are your favorite writers from @nytimes.com, the reason you may choose periodically to come back

Mine are @samthielman.com @polgreen.bsky.social @jamellebouie.net and Eric Kim, and also Spelling Bee

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Julie DiCaro @juliedicaro.bsky.social · 1d

So Kilmer Abrego-Garcia will not challenge a deportation to Costa Rica, who has agreed to for him residency, but DHS won’t agree to send him there because it’s not cruel enough.

www.nytimes.com/2025/10/10/u...

For weeks, Mr. Abrego Garcia, a Salvadoran national who is married to a U.S. citizen, has made clear that he would not challenge his deportation if he were sent to Costa Rica, which has promised him legal residency and guaranteed that he would not be sent back to El Salvador.

But the Trump administration has refused to deport him to Costa Rica, and in an earlier hearing this week, Judge Xinis pressed the administration to consider the option or clarify why it was unacceptable.

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