Emmett O'Connell
@emmettoconnell.bsky.social
Blogger, podcaster, local government communicator, rec soccer defender
OlympiaTime.com
theolympiastandard.com
OlympiaTime.com
theolympiastandard.com
The complete year in transgender politics in Tumwater WA that ended in mixed results.
www.thestranger.com/news/2025/12...
www.thestranger.com/news/2025/12...
Conservatives Zeroed In on Tumwater in Washington State’s Fight Over Trans Athletes
“When a school board tells students they don’t deserve inclusion, it’s heartbreaking.”
www.thestranger.com
December 4, 2025 at 3:46 PM
The complete year in transgender politics in Tumwater WA that ended in mixed results.
www.thestranger.com/news/2025/12...
www.thestranger.com/news/2025/12...
Zillow pulled climate-risk scores from listings after agents and homeowners said they hurt sales. Buyers will be flying blind as climate-driven disasters, rising insurance costs, and a stressed housing market collide.
grist.org/housing/zill...
grist.org/housing/zill...
Zillow deletes climate risk data from listings after complaints it harms sales
The site removed the feature after real estate agents and some homeowners alleged that the scores appear arbitrary and hurt sales.
grist.org
December 4, 2025 at 1:42 PM
Zillow pulled climate-risk scores from listings after agents and homeowners said they hurt sales. Buyers will be flying blind as climate-driven disasters, rising insurance costs, and a stressed housing market collide.
grist.org/housing/zill...
grist.org/housing/zill...
I was reminded of how Walsh keeps defending lawmakers accused of serious misconduct (from “domestic terrorism” to harassment) framing accountability as a “circular firing squad” and praising the very behavior that got them sanctioned in the first place.
www.investigatewest.org/wa-gop-chair...
www.investigatewest.org/wa-gop-chair...
WA GOP chairman says party ‘lost a lot of talent’ to sanctions and infighting
Jim Walsh decries actions against lawmakers accused of “domestic terrorism,” sexual harassment and other misbehavior
www.investigatewest.org
December 2, 2025 at 2:11 PM
I was reminded of how Walsh keeps defending lawmakers accused of serious misconduct (from “domestic terrorism” to harassment) framing accountability as a “circular firing squad” and praising the very behavior that got them sanctioned in the first place.
www.investigatewest.org/wa-gop-chair...
www.investigatewest.org/wa-gop-chair...
Known bad boss and end-of-times-Matt-Shea supporter tried to buy his way into small-time elected office and face planted.
Letter to the Editor | The people have spoken
www.gigharbornow.org/opinion/lett...
Letter to the Editor | The people have spoken
www.gigharbornow.org/opinion/lett...
Letter to the Editor | The people have spoken - Gig Harbor Now
Letter to the editor by George Young of Gig Harbor.
www.gigharbornow.org
December 2, 2025 at 2:08 PM
Known bad boss and end-of-times-Matt-Shea supporter tried to buy his way into small-time elected office and face planted.
Letter to the Editor | The people have spoken
www.gigharbornow.org/opinion/lett...
Letter to the Editor | The people have spoken
www.gigharbornow.org/opinion/lett...
Dusk Olympia WA
December 1, 2025 at 12:28 AM
Dusk Olympia WA
Explore Olympia’s 130-year loop from bike paths to highways, updates on the Olympia Standard podcast, and why locally hosted social spaces could shape our info future.
Dive into history, community, and what’s next in this edition of the Olympia Time newsletter
buttondown.com/OlympiaTime/...
Dive into history, community, and what’s next in this edition of the Olympia Time newsletter
buttondown.com/OlympiaTime/...
From bike paths to highways (and notes on the future)
Thanks to everyone who took me up on my request for you to just email me about how you feel this project is going. Sometimes, because I don’t post these...
buttondown.com
November 30, 2025 at 5:09 PM
Explore Olympia’s 130-year loop from bike paths to highways, updates on the Olympia Standard podcast, and why locally hosted social spaces could shape our info future.
Dive into history, community, and what’s next in this edition of the Olympia Time newsletter
buttondown.com/OlympiaTime/...
Dive into history, community, and what’s next in this edition of the Olympia Time newsletter
buttondown.com/OlympiaTime/...
I'm inordinately excited about this:
Roundabout is a community-built local digital space now in closed beta across five diverse towns. Designed for real relationships, trusted info, and local stewardship, an antidote to enshittified social media.
newpublic.substack.com/p/introducin...
Roundabout is a community-built local digital space now in closed beta across five diverse towns. Designed for real relationships, trusted info, and local stewardship, an antidote to enshittified social media.
newpublic.substack.com/p/introducin...
👋 Introducing Roundabout: built for neighbors, with neighbors
New_ Public’s app for local communities enters closed beta in five pilot communities
newpublic.substack.com
November 30, 2025 at 3:37 PM
I'm inordinately excited about this:
Roundabout is a community-built local digital space now in closed beta across five diverse towns. Designed for real relationships, trusted info, and local stewardship, an antidote to enshittified social media.
newpublic.substack.com/p/introducin...
Roundabout is a community-built local digital space now in closed beta across five diverse towns. Designed for real relationships, trusted info, and local stewardship, an antidote to enshittified social media.
newpublic.substack.com/p/introducin...
Reposted by Emmett O'Connell
Funny how when a person is killed in traffic, according to the Post it’s the “car” that did it but when anyone comes along to make streets safer it’s an attack on “drivers.”
November 30, 2025 at 2:25 PM
Funny how when a person is killed in traffic, according to the Post it’s the “car” that did it but when anyone comes along to make streets safer it’s an attack on “drivers.”
Olympia’s roads were once so muddy Tacoma cyclists turned back, spurring locals to build 1890s bike paths. The craze faded, but its leaders later helped create WA’s early highways, paving over the bike era. Today, we return to bikes, rebuilding what cars replaced
olympiatime.com/2025/11/29/f...
olympiatime.com/2025/11/29/f...
From Wheelmen to Highways to Bike Lanes: Olympia’s 130-Year Loop – Olympia Time
olympiatime.com
November 29, 2025 at 5:48 PM
Olympia’s roads were once so muddy Tacoma cyclists turned back, spurring locals to build 1890s bike paths. The craze faded, but its leaders later helped create WA’s early highways, paving over the bike era. Today, we return to bikes, rebuilding what cars replaced
olympiatime.com/2025/11/29/f...
olympiatime.com/2025/11/29/f...
A public official claiming First Amendment protection while attacking a newspaper is ironic because the First Amendment was created to protect the newspaper from the government official, not the government official from the newspaper.
www.thecentersquare.com/washington/a...
www.thecentersquare.com/washington/a...
Dozens of Spokane Valley residents call for elected official's resignation
(The Center Square) – Dozens of people condemned Spokane Valley Councilmember Jessica Yaeger on Tuesday after she posted to social media that she is a “proud Islamaphobe,” calling for her
www.thecentersquare.com
November 26, 2025 at 8:31 PM
A public official claiming First Amendment protection while attacking a newspaper is ironic because the First Amendment was created to protect the newspaper from the government official, not the government official from the newspaper.
www.thecentersquare.com/washington/a...
www.thecentersquare.com/washington/a...
Portland’s inclusionary zoning finally works as intended after the city fully funded it in 2024. With larger tax abatements, developers stopped skirting the 20-unit threshold, more mixed-income projects entered the pipeline
www.sightline.org/2025/11/25/p...
www.sightline.org/2025/11/25/p...
Portland’s Inclusionary Zoning Program Is Finally Performing, New Data Suggests | Sightline Institute
Because for the first time, the city fully funded it.
www.sightline.org
November 26, 2025 at 2:38 PM
Portland’s inclusionary zoning finally works as intended after the city fully funded it in 2024. With larger tax abatements, developers stopped skirting the 20-unit threshold, more mixed-income projects entered the pipeline
www.sightline.org/2025/11/25/p...
www.sightline.org/2025/11/25/p...
Army veteran and longtime U.S. resident Zahid Chaudhry has been detained by ICE since August, worsening an eye disease that could leave him blind. A court may order his release before Thanksgiving, but conditions and lack of care have already caused severe harm
www.thestranger.com/news/2025/11...
www.thestranger.com/news/2025/11...
This Army veteran and husband of a former Congressional candidate has been detained by ICE since August. If he's detained much longer, he could lose his eyesight.
As time creeps by in the Northwest Detention Center, pressure builds in the muscles behind Muhammad Zahid Chaudhry’s eyes. The swelling tissue puts pressure on his optic nerve. For Zahid, as he’s call...
www.thestranger.com
November 26, 2025 at 2:03 PM
Army veteran and longtime U.S. resident Zahid Chaudhry has been detained by ICE since August, worsening an eye disease that could leave him blind. A court may order his release before Thanksgiving, but conditions and lack of care have already caused severe harm
www.thestranger.com/news/2025/11...
www.thestranger.com/news/2025/11...
Spokane’s Flock cameras were queried 2.3M times in early 2025, over 95% by out-of-state agencies, including states targeting abortion and aiding immigration enforcement. A new investigation shows how this always-on ALPR network enables broad, unregulated surveillance
rangemedia.co/flock-spokan...
rangemedia.co/flock-spokan...
Watching the watchmen – RANGE Media
Editor's note: A deeply-reported series on the Flock cameras tracking your movements.
rangemedia.co
November 26, 2025 at 1:58 PM
Spokane’s Flock cameras were queried 2.3M times in early 2025, over 95% by out-of-state agencies, including states targeting abortion and aiding immigration enforcement. A new investigation shows how this always-on ALPR network enables broad, unregulated surveillance
rangemedia.co/flock-spokan...
rangemedia.co/flock-spokan...
When a political movement is built on conspiracy theories, it's ironic to worry that no one believes you when you're trying to do a thing.
Comer Worries No One Will Believe His Epstein Report
politicalwire.com/2025/11/26/c...
Comer Worries No One Will Believe His Epstein Report
politicalwire.com/2025/11/26/c...
Comer Worries No One Will Believe His Epstein Report
House Oversight Chair James Comer (R-KY) said he worries his committee’s probe into the Jeffrey Epstein files could be drowned out by conspiracy theories, Politico reports. Said Comer: “I fear the rep...
politicalwire.com
November 26, 2025 at 1:44 PM
When a political movement is built on conspiracy theories, it's ironic to worry that no one believes you when you're trying to do a thing.
Comer Worries No One Will Believe His Epstein Report
politicalwire.com/2025/11/26/c...
Comer Worries No One Will Believe His Epstein Report
politicalwire.com/2025/11/26/c...
Meta internal docs say it may earn ~10% of its revenue from scam and banned-goods ads, showing users 15B scam ads daily. Meta often flags scammers but still lets them run ads, sometimes charging them more instead of banning them, despite global regulatory pressure.
www.reuters.com/investigatio...
www.reuters.com/investigatio...
Meta is earning a fortune on a deluge of fraudulent ads, documents show
Meta projected 10% of its 2024 revenue would come from ads for scams and banned goods, and it internally estimates that its platforms show users 15 billion scam ads a day, company documents show.
www.reuters.com
November 25, 2025 at 1:43 PM
Meta internal docs say it may earn ~10% of its revenue from scam and banned-goods ads, showing users 15B scam ads daily. Meta often flags scammers but still lets them run ads, sometimes charging them more instead of banning them, despite global regulatory pressure.
www.reuters.com/investigatio...
www.reuters.com/investigatio...
Substack is boosting and profiting from both Nazi/extremist content and dangerous health disinfo. Algorithms, categories, and leaderboards push anti-science creators
mediaanddemocracyproject.substack.com/p/substack-h...
mediaanddemocracyproject.substack.com/p/substack-h...
Substack has a Nazi problem AND a health disinformation problem
Substack creators and Substack audiences are supporting a platform that profits off of promoting dangerous antiscience content – at the expense of public health.
mediaanddemocracyproject.substack.com
November 25, 2025 at 1:38 PM
Substack is boosting and profiting from both Nazi/extremist content and dangerous health disinfo. Algorithms, categories, and leaderboards push anti-science creators
mediaanddemocracyproject.substack.com/p/substack-h...
mediaanddemocracyproject.substack.com/p/substack-h...
About 100 people protested ICE arrests in Longview WA, decrying detentions as cruel and unconstitutional. Demonstrators shared fears of profiling and family separation, while one counter-protester argued for “legal” immigration.
andrestepankowsky.substack.com/p/longview-d...
andrestepankowsky.substack.com/p/longview-d...
Longview demonstrators protest recent uptick in ICE detentions in Southwest Washington
About 100 gather near Walgreen's to object to 'inhumane' Trump deportation policies
andrestepankowsky.substack.com
November 24, 2025 at 1:43 PM
About 100 people protested ICE arrests in Longview WA, decrying detentions as cruel and unconstitutional. Demonstrators shared fears of profiling and family separation, while one counter-protester argued for “legal” immigration.
andrestepankowsky.substack.com/p/longview-d...
andrestepankowsky.substack.com/p/longview-d...
Local elections aren’t failing, our information ecosystem is.
This week’s Olympia Time digs into how confusion beats big ideas when local media is thin, plus updates on The Olympia Standard’s new direction and what to read next.
Subscribe for clarity.
buttondown.com/OlympiaTime/...
This week’s Olympia Time digs into how confusion beats big ideas when local media is thin, plus updates on The Olympia Standard’s new direction and what to read next.
Subscribe for clarity.
buttondown.com/OlympiaTime/...
Confusion wins
I left the election season and didn’t send this newsletter for a few weeks. Mostly because I was fiddling with the tool to send it with, was traveling and...
buttondown.com
November 23, 2025 at 3:23 PM
Local elections aren’t failing, our information ecosystem is.
This week’s Olympia Time digs into how confusion beats big ideas when local media is thin, plus updates on The Olympia Standard’s new direction and what to read next.
Subscribe for clarity.
buttondown.com/OlympiaTime/...
This week’s Olympia Time digs into how confusion beats big ideas when local media is thin, plus updates on The Olympia Standard’s new direction and what to read next.
Subscribe for clarity.
buttondown.com/OlympiaTime/...
X’s new tool exposed that many top MAGA influencers were actually foreign-based, a classic step one of the War on Pineapple playbook: fake “locals” stoking division.
The reveal shows how overseas operators fuel U.S. political polarization.
www.thedailybeast.com/top-maga-inf...
/1
The reveal shows how overseas operators fuel U.S. political polarization.
www.thedailybeast.com/top-maga-inf...
/1
Top MAGA Influencers Accidentally Unmasked as Foreign Actors
A new feature on Elon Musk’s X has given deeper insight into the online “America First” movement.
www.thedailybeast.com
November 23, 2025 at 2:34 PM
X’s new tool exposed that many top MAGA influencers were actually foreign-based, a classic step one of the War on Pineapple playbook: fake “locals” stoking division.
The reveal shows how overseas operators fuel U.S. political polarization.
www.thedailybeast.com/top-maga-inf...
/1
The reveal shows how overseas operators fuel U.S. political polarization.
www.thedailybeast.com/top-maga-inf...
/1
Reposted by Emmett O'Connell
Grand opening, grand closing.
X quietly disabled a new feature that showed which country an account was posting from when it revealed that lots of popular right wing MAGA accounts were being run from foreign countries like India and Nigeria.
X quietly disabled a new feature that showed which country an account was posting from when it revealed that lots of popular right wing MAGA accounts were being run from foreign countries like India and Nigeria.
November 22, 2025 at 9:05 PM
Grand opening, grand closing.
X quietly disabled a new feature that showed which country an account was posting from when it revealed that lots of popular right wing MAGA accounts were being run from foreign countries like India and Nigeria.
X quietly disabled a new feature that showed which country an account was posting from when it revealed that lots of popular right wing MAGA accounts were being run from foreign countries like India and Nigeria.
Reposted by Emmett O'Connell
Some incredible details in this piece
*one DOGE faction was planning the future of the US government at a venture capital firm
*illegally communicating on Signal to avoid transparency laws was deeply embedded into organizational culture to be taken for granted
*one DOGE faction was planning the future of the US government at a venture capital firm
*illegally communicating on Signal to avoid transparency laws was deeply embedded into organizational culture to be taken for granted
November 22, 2025 at 8:15 PM
Some incredible details in this piece
*one DOGE faction was planning the future of the US government at a venture capital firm
*illegally communicating on Signal to avoid transparency laws was deeply embedded into organizational culture to be taken for granted
*one DOGE faction was planning the future of the US government at a venture capital firm
*illegally communicating on Signal to avoid transparency laws was deeply embedded into organizational culture to be taken for granted
WSU approved anti-trans CME courses through a detached accreditation process that relied on outside standards and ignored months of student and faculty warnings.
The courses were only suspended after major backlash from LGBTQ+ groups
rangemedia.co/after-pushba...
The courses were only suspended after major backlash from LGBTQ+ groups
rangemedia.co/after-pushba...
WSU suspends transphobic CMEs – RANGE Media
Students and faculty had pressured the university to revoke its accreditation of courses designed by a anti-transgender hate group, but it didn’t act until it came under external scrutiny.
rangemedia.co
November 22, 2025 at 12:53 PM
WSU approved anti-trans CME courses through a detached accreditation process that relied on outside standards and ignored months of student and faculty warnings.
The courses were only suspended after major backlash from LGBTQ+ groups
rangemedia.co/after-pushba...
The courses were only suspended after major backlash from LGBTQ+ groups
rangemedia.co/after-pushba...
The section at the bottom of the post about how to achieve "no jerks" seems to be the most salient thing I've taken from watching Seattle politics from afar. I've seen a lot of decisions made that can most easily been explained as products of strife and drama.
publicola.com/2025/11/21/h...
publicola.com/2025/11/21/h...
Homeless Authority Praises Religious Program, Katie Wilson Plans to Jerk-Proof the Mayor's Office, and Who Will Be the City Council's Next President? - PubliCola
1. The King County Regional Homelessness Authority has signed a contract with Barb Oliver, the head of tiny house builder…
publicola.com
November 22, 2025 at 12:46 PM
The section at the bottom of the post about how to achieve "no jerks" seems to be the most salient thing I've taken from watching Seattle politics from afar. I've seen a lot of decisions made that can most easily been explained as products of strife and drama.
publicola.com/2025/11/21/h...
publicola.com/2025/11/21/h...