Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Tom McGrath @tcmcg.bsky.social · 17m

The last face you see before the axe:

Willie the Wildcat, Northwestern, growling

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Reposted by Tom McGrath

Ella Brockway @ellabrockway.bsky.social · 28m

Penn State fired its coach after losing to

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Tom McGrath @tcmcg.bsky.social · 22m

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Tom McGrath @tcmcg.bsky.social · 24m

James Franklin seems to be a decent guy and coach, and yeah, the mood yesterday seemed pretty toxic, so it’s kind of a shame?

That said, I do take an admittedly perverse pleasure in Lost To Northwestern being the bell that tolls for thee.

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Tom McGrath @tcmcg.bsky.social · 1h

I should mention that I’m a tracking dilettante and there could be any number of reasons why the apps don’t know who these helicopters are or to whom they belong.

Tom McGrath @tcmcg.bsky.social · 1h

There is a legitimate case to be made that there has not been a more talented QB more comprehensively ruined by multiple teams.

DrawPlayDave @thedrawplay.com · 1h

I knew the Jets were punting the year at QB but holy moly

The Athletic @theathletic.com · 2h

The 0-6 Jets finished with -10 net passing yards 🤯

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Tom McGrath @tcmcg.bsky.social · 1h

[Sam Zell looks up from his present residence, and is, for a fleeting moment, satisfied]

Nora Flanagan @noraflanagan.bsky.social · 3h

It’s weird that the Chicago Tribune never ran a feature story on the South Shore apartment building raid…right? It’s mentioned in an article about warrantless arrests and that awful editorial about how we’re all overreacting. But no stories. Every other Chicago news outlet covered it. Why is this?

Tom McGrath @tcmcg.bsky.social · 1h

Troublingly, I think the Feds have started to turn off their ADS/B or something, because there’s more than a few N/A and Unknowns.

From Flightradar24, a Bell HH-1N Iroquois
with registration N/A

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Tom McGrath @tcmcg.bsky.social · 2h

*I* wasn’t fucking ready.

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Reposted by Tom McGrath

BUM CHILLUPS AKA SPENCER HALL @edsbs.bsky.social · 2h

ahahaaaha hit him with the GTFO

Aaron Rupar @atrupar.com · 3h

STEPHANOPOULOS: I didn't insinuate anything. I asked you whether Tom Homan accepted $50k as was heard on an audio tape recorded by the FBI in September 2024. You did not answer the question. Thank you for your time.

VANCE: No, George, I sai--

STEPHANOPOULOS: We'll be right back

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Tom McGrath @tcmcg.bsky.social · 2h

If the white Nike fits…

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Tom McGrath @tcmcg.bsky.social · 3h

Ah, yes. One of the Fitz “We don’t want to win this, but we will, just out of spite” specialties.

Tom McGrath @tcmcg.bsky.social · 3h

I might have genuinely memory-holed this as a trauma response, because I can’t immediately identify this.

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Reposted by Tom McGrath

Sharon @sharonk.bsky.social · 6h

thiel, man, what the fuck are you talking about

He describes the plot of Watchmen, a 1986 graphic novel involving superheroes grappling with moral questions about humanity against the backdrop of impending nuclear war:

The antihero Ozymandias, the antichrist-type figure, is sort of an early-modern person. He believes this will be a timeless and eternal solution – eternal world peace. Moore is sort of a late-modern. In early modernity, you have ideal solutions, ‘perfect’ solutions to calculus. In late modernity, things are sort of probabilistic. And at some point, he asks Dr Manhattan whether the world government is going to last. And he says that ‘nothing lasts forever.’ So you embrace the antichrist and it still doesn’t work.

Thiel later finds biblical meaning in the manga One Piece, discussing how he believes it represents a future where an antichrist-like one-world government has repressed science. He believes that the hero, Monkey D Luffy, represents a Christlike figure.

In One Piece, you are set in a fantasy world, again sort of an alternate earth, but it’s 800 years into the reign of this one-world state. Which, as the story unfolds, gradually gets darker and darker. You sort of realize, in my interpretation, who runs the world and it’s something like the antichrist. There’s Luffy, a pirate who wears a red straw hat, sort of like Christ’s crown of thorns. And then towards the end of the story, transforms into a figure who resembles Christ in Revelation.

Thiel, along with a researcher and writer at Thiel Capital, explored these ideas at greater length in an essay for the religious journal First Things earlier this month.

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Tom McGrath @tcmcg.bsky.social · 3h

[the wind whispers “Northwestern is sneakily decent”]

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Tom McGrath @tcmcg.bsky.social · 3h

I also open the latter riff to @rantmo.bsky.social - it was the first thing I could think of, though.

“It’s a devised piece” would’ve been a better opener.

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Tom McGrath @tcmcg.bsky.social · 3h

Alternatives to “charged-it” are too long:

“The dance/violence/intimacy scenes are lit in red”

“It’s moody and atmospheric,” which means “it’s dark, the shadows are murder, and there’s probably enough haze to animate Prop 65 and give it a stroke.”

Tom McGrath @tcmcg.bsky.social · 3h

And the other professions:

“I charged this, right?”

-and-

“I’m basically off-book”

(The latter is me, I’m the one lurching out of the shadows as a jump-scare.)

Tom McGrath @tcmcg.bsky.social · 4h

In honor of spooky month, share a 4 word horror story only someone in your profession would understand

“A developer acquired it”

Children of the Core @the-core.lol · 4h

In honor of spooky month, share a 4 word horror story only someone in your profession would understand

“I already did it” (with “it” being the thing you literally just specifically told a manager not to do)

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Tom McGrath @tcmcg.bsky.social · 3h

Because “we painted our brick” felt too obvious.

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Tom McGrath @tcmcg.bsky.social · 4h

In honor of spooky month, share a 4 word horror story only someone in your profession would understand

“A developer acquired it”

Children of the Core @the-core.lol · 4h

In honor of spooky month, share a 4 word horror story only someone in your profession would understand

“I already did it” (with “it” being the thing you literally just specifically told a manager not to do)

Mia Murphy 🏳️‍⚧️ @miamurphy.net · 4h

In honor of spooky month, share a 4 word horror story only someone in your profession would understand

"A member wrote this."

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Tom McGrath @tcmcg.bsky.social · 4h

“The news from the front is grim: another battalion has shattered under the withering assault of being called names and relentlessly being danced at in costume.”

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Tom McGrath @tcmcg.bsky.social · 15h

These refs are… not good, my friend

Tom McGrath @tcmcg.bsky.social · 15h

This has gone absolutely tits up in Auburn. Tremendous work everyone

Tom McGrath @tcmcg.bsky.social · 17h

Hang on - their blood is two parts blood to one part alcohol.

Sickos Committee @sickoscommittee.org · 18h

Hey @shutdownfullcast.bsky.social I think you should know about this.

UNIVERSITY
Q51)
18T6
POLICE
Texas A&M Police @TAMUPolice
Public Intoxication. Aggie Park. Contacted subject eating a sandwich with a water jug of whiskey. BAC was.337. Released to EMS. #BTHOflorida
7:14 PM • 10/11/25 • 22K Views

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Tom McGrath @tcmcg.bsky.social · 18h

Monstrance mention! Everybody drink [from the cup of the Covenant]!”

Dr Eleanor Janega @goingmedieval.bsky.social · 18h

Look, this is what Catholicism does so well. Yes girl, BRING OUT THE MONSTRANCE. MAKE THEM SAY IT IN FRONT OF THE BLESSED SACRAMENT. Martin Luther could *never*. He failed to predict the Trump Presidency and also is directly implecated. I am so serious.

Rich Raho @richraho.bsky.social · 21h

Chicago priest Fr. Larry Dowling describes procession to ICE facility: “No one had the courage to speak directly to us. No one from Homeland Security could stand in the presence of the Monstrance holding the Blessed Sacrament. No wonder. Evil is repelled, recoils in the presence of Christ.”

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