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ivebenthinking.co
Ben Testani
@ivebenthinking.co
510 followers 490 following 470 posts
Putting words on screen: ivebenthinking.substack.com | 1L @law.ucla.edu | Bad at chess | Proud member @nwu.org
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ivebenthinking.co
Why is the NY Times giving Seneca Scott of all people space to talk about Oakland?? His framing as a mayoral candidate is incredibly generous.
Seneca Scott, a political organizer who ran for Oakland mayor in 2022, said that he was less concerned about the potential health harms from the coal project than about the financial fallout from litigation. He lives in West Oakland, a low-income neighborhood where the terminal sits and where any coal pollution would likely be concentrated.
November 27, 2025 at 1:57 AM
ivebenthinking.co
"No purchase necessary to win" is an eye-catching phrase with a storied history. But, as we approach the first month in 86 years in which federal food benefits will not be distributed, contests like McDonald's Monopoly have taken on a more sinister tone.
Corporate giveaways are, in the end, advertising gimmicks designed to drive purchasing. Earning Monopoly tickets for something you already have to do, like buying groceries, is a simple way to make a mundane errand fun. And if, like me, you find yourself with too much free time on your hands, the feeling of pulling a fast one on a corporation that comes from entering the contest via the free method required by law is eminently satisfying.
October 31, 2025 at 6:51 PM
ivebenthinking.co
I've been thinking about @rakesofmallow.bsky.social calling Christian Gray "ever the main character" all season and it's so true ☘️🏈
3) A tough debut for Chris Ash at defensive coordinator, as he spent the first three quarters pushing all the wrong buttons on third down and having his squad generally moving a half-step slow. Maybe there’s more to it that will be explained in time but I can’t think of a more baffling personnel decision than having the Christian Gray injury timeout and putting Karson Hobbs (playing his first real action) out there instead of DeVonta Smith on a third and long. Baffling! Leonard Moore solid and Gray the main character again forever and always, the pair combining to play every snap but one.
October 19, 2025 at 2:17 AM
ivebenthinking.co
Yes. It is, by a pretty solid margin, the most liberal of the Big Four sports fandoms.
A survey from Spotico of USA sports leagues fandom political ideologies. The NBA comes in at 51% conservative. The NHL is 54%, the NFL is 56%, and the MLB is 57%.
June 23, 2025 at 12:58 AM
ivebenthinking.co
I mean, c'mon. This is pathetic. Yeah, Blumenthal. Voters barely knew Kamala Harris was the candidate by October 2024, but I'm sure people will remember the Republicans' maneuvering with the Senate Parliamentarian.
Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) argued that the elaborate floor moves won’t change voters’ minds that the Senate ignored the parliamentarian to help the fossil fuel industry. Blumenthal said Republicans wanted to avoid a vote on directly overruling the parliamentarian, but he declared “it fails to give them anything more than a false fig leaf.”
May 22, 2025 at 4:48 PM
ivebenthinking.co
The email from @bart.gov announcing the debut of @alerts.bart.gov feels especially pointed in light of today's Social Security Administration news
BART offers automated service alerts on Bluesky social media platform BART has made service alert information even more accessible to the public by adding an automated BART Service Alerts channel to its Bluesky account (@bart.gov). As of Friday, April 11, there is now a dedicated feed for real-time BART Service Alerts (@alerts.bart.gov) to inform riders when multiple trains are off schedule by ten or more minutes. Unlike other social media platforms, Bluesky does not require a login to view BART’s timeline. BART has been providing informational content on Bluesky since November 2024. “Service alerts offer critical and timely information for our riders to help them make decisions about their ride,” said Alicia Trost, Chief Communications Officer. “We want this information to be easy to find and on the platforms people use. The Bluesky social media platform is growing in popularity, and our followers have been asking for our automated service alerts to be posted there.”
April 11, 2025 at 9:12 PM
ivebenthinking.co
Snagged last-minute tickets to the two #MarchMadness games in San Francisco today. Two Sweet 16 games cost me less than one Warriors game!
A photo of the court at the Chase Center as seen from the upper deck
March 28, 2025 at 1:14 AM
ivebenthinking.co
My mood after having picked St. John's to make the Final Four #cbb
The St. John's red Thunderbird mascot sitting alone in the bleachers. The chyron announces "Big East cancels conference tournament." The image is from March 2020.
March 22, 2025 at 9:28 PM
ivebenthinking.co
This response from Alameda County Superintendent of Schools Alysse Castro is how all Democrats should be talking about Republicans' illegal actions.
When Castro was asked about the potential presence of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents appearing at schools in Alameda County, she suggested the response would be akin to a school shooter on campus. “The reality—and I respect as a law enforcement officer, my friend Yesenia, can’t interfere with a law enforcement activity—but in schools unfortunately, or fortunately, we know how to deal with arm intruders on campus, and we know how to lock it down, and we know how to call for backup,” Castro said. “Real fascists are really trying to come for our kids,” Castro added. However, she believes county and state law will provide a bulwark against any adverse federal actions. “In the legal hierarchy, an executive order does not come close to trumping the law in California,” Castro said.
March 6, 2025 at 7:24 PM
ivebenthinking.co
I mean, what is wrong with the Democratic leadership? They are so cowardly. You are MEMBER OF CONGRESS. The story will be WHATEVER YOU WANT IT TO BE! If you used "props" to MAKE A POINT about the people harmed by Trump, that's what the story will be!!! Their comms teams should be fired into the sun.
Minority Whip Katherine Clark, D-Mass., specifically asked members not to use “props” to protest the speech, while House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., encouraged members to stay on message and keep the spotlight focused on the people affected by Trump’s policies — not make the story about themselves.
March 5, 2025 at 6:32 AM
ivebenthinking.co
🚨 URGENT call to action 🚨

Please join @norcalresist.bsky.social in demanding ICE release Damaris, Edgar, and their daughter from detention. Despite having an active U visa application, the family faces imminent deportation. We need community outreach to urge ICE to stop deportation proceedings.
Emergency Call to Action Call ICE And demand release of Damaris & Edgar and their 7 year old daughter! The family is pursuing a U-visa application and has an attorney, but ICE has detained them and is threatening to deport them to Guatemala. Phone: 415 365 8800 Email: SanFrancisco.Outreach@ice.dhs.gov
February 26, 2025 at 7:35 PM
ivebenthinking.co
And sometimes, the conflict of interest edits are more commercial in nature, even if the editor's intentions were likely good.
In laying out his case that Mfuzia violated Wikipedia’s COI policy, Nstrauss came within an inch of committing a policy violation themselves. They claimed to have found “through publicly available offsite information, that Mfuzia is an employee of FDU and is specifically tasked with working with its public relations department to maintain the FDU's Wikipedia article [sic].” Nstrauss categorized Mfuzia’s edits “quite well-written” but also as giving articles a “promotional, ‘puff-piece’ feeling overall.”
February 19, 2025 at 5:52 PM
ivebenthinking.co
Since at least 2013, employees of the Fairleigh Dickinson University Public Relations Department have attempted to edit their own school's Wikipedia.

In the best case scenario, these edits are of questionable motivation but ultimately beneficial to the site, as seen in 2021.
In October of 2021, the user Rebecca Maxon at Fairleigh Dickinson University submitted a significant number of suggested edits to the then-protected article on the university. The article on FDU hadn’t been updated to match the restructuring the school implemented in 2019, and Maxon was happy to clarify. Normally, these types of edits would be welcomed by the Wikipedia community. There was just one problem: Maxon was at the time the Associate Director of Communications for Fairleigh Dickinson.
February 19, 2025 at 5:52 PM
ivebenthinking.co
It's elephant seal breeding season at Point Reyes National Seashore 🐘🦭
February 19, 2025 at 5:27 PM
ivebenthinking.co
A major goal for me this year is to spend less time experiencing the world with my earbuds in. I wrote about how and why I'm seeking more silence in an essay for Notre Dame Magazine: magazine.nd.edu/stories/the-...
The results of my efforts have been mixed. There are no shortcuts to tranquility, and confronting my problems and stress is not the same as solving them. On days when it feels as though anxiety is about to crest and drown me, I fish my earbuds out of my pockets and instead allow my music to crescendo, postponing my mind’s duel with reality until another day when I feel more prepared to contemplate. But on calmer days, I leave my ears open, attuned to my surroundings. I can now differentiate the rattle of the recycling truck chock full of glass bottles and aluminum cans from the rumble of the garbage truck stuffed with the rest of my city’s refuse. On warm days when everyone in my building leaves their windows open, I follow my upstairs neighbor as he makes progress on a new steel drum composition. His rehearsals transport me to tropical paradise no matter how stressed I feel.
January 9, 2025 at 6:01 PM
ivebenthinking.co
I also love when languages have words without an English counterpart, so I wrote about saudade — using movies like La La Land and Before Sunset as a framing device — in my latest blog post.
Of course, the fantasy ends when the film returns to reality, one where Seb is seemingly more successful professionally but far less so romantically. It is impossible to fault Seb or Mia for the choices they made, as their love failed due to the largely mutual understanding that the demands of their separate careers meant it was impossible for either person to behave differently while still reaching the same levels of success. This no-fault romantic failure is saudade.
January 6, 2025 at 9:01 PM
ivebenthinking.co
C'mon, TSA. Can't even print your Arabic correctly #ORD
The contact us sign from TSA at ORD with the Arabic printed incorrectly
December 30, 2024 at 3:10 PM
ivebenthinking.co
Four siblings, four fandoms, four degrees outside.
Me and my siblings tailgating at the Bills game
December 23, 2024 at 4:46 AM
ivebenthinking.co
It's always made me laugh that on Android, "Italian" brings up 🤌🏻, 🍕, and 🍝
A screenshot of Gboard showing an emoji search for "Italian" brings up 🤌🏻
December 16, 2024 at 7:12 PM
ivebenthinking.co
Rode my first Capitol Corridor train from Oakland to Sacramento today and it was a really nice experience. Amtrak is so underappreciated.
A foggy morning view out of a Capitol Corridor train passing the Benicia Bridge
December 8, 2024 at 5:45 PM
ivebenthinking.co
Major props to the California state government's MyShake app, which alerted me to the earthquake ~3 minutes before the standard emergency phone alerts went off.
An alert from MyShake about the earthquake in Humboldt County telling me shaking is expected and I should drop, cover, and hold on
December 5, 2024 at 7:21 PM
ivebenthinking.co
In my latest Substack, I examine our collective ability to bolster the accuracy of our recollections through the lens of a single playlist I've kept going for eight years now simply titled 🌠
open.substack.com/pub/ivebenth...
The endurance of 🌠 means the playlist is now a memory artifact in the same vein of the songs that comprise its existence. I turn to 🌠 when I am overwhelmed, alone, nostalgic, melancholic, or simply awake late at night and trying to fade into my nocturnal background. Some of the songs on 🌠 are also among my all-time favorites, while others would never have been downloaded if it were not for their inclusion on 🌠.
November 25, 2024 at 5:33 PM
ivebenthinking.co
I am fascinated by the ways in which digital platforms have empowered us to improve the accuracy and precision of our memories.
open.substack.com/pub/ivebenth...
For people like me for whom a music library doubles as a diary, the advent of streaming services has expanded not just our audio discovery capabilities, but the level of detail contained within our digital journals. With or without Spotify, the Dreamville collaboration “Costa Rica” would have always been associated with playing beer die in the backyard of my house as a college senior. But thanks to Spotify’s database functionality, I know precisely which date — September 3, 2019 — I was introduced to the song. By cross-referencing my other digital archives, like my photos and calendar, I can create a more accurate memory of my introduction to the track.
November 25, 2024 at 5:33 PM
ivebenthinking.co
Elon Musk is determined to ruin everything I hold dear #cbb
Elon 80 Notre Dame 75
November 23, 2024 at 2:24 AM
ivebenthinking.co
Extremely excited to discover that the ESPN app now allows custom multifeeds across sports so I can watch the Holy War and Auburn Houston #cbb #cfb
A photo of the Utah BYU and Auburn Houston broadcasts on the Apple TV ESPN app
November 10, 2024 at 4:22 AM