Picked my bracket the scientific way, running a bunch of simulations on an xgboost model based on 20 years of tournament data; eyeballing the results; deciding I don’t like them; and picking based on logos, mascots, and previous teaching affiliations.

Proud to publish this piece from my former student, who writes that Russia's lawfare in the European Court of Human Rights is "transforming [it] into an unwitting accomplice in one of the most sophisticated disinformation operations of the modern era.” americansunlight.substack.com/p/russias-la...

The Universal Periodic Review (UPR) is a peer-to-peer evaluation of a country's rights record. All 193 UN member states are expected to participate, and even states like Russia and China do. Today, the US took the unprecedented step of withdrawing from the UPR www.reuters.com/world/europe...

May infamy follow him for the rest of his days. www.washingtonpost.com/national-sec...

As of today, Elon Musk is thought to be responsible for the death of 300,000 adults and kids due to the illegal closure of USAID (source: www.impactcounter.com/dashboard?vi...) That's a 103 deaths per hour, each day. And it will get worse. His legacy is one of death, destruction, and failure.

On Friday, my son stayed home from school because he had a sore throat and wasn’t feeling well. He went with my husband to his office for the morning while I handled our daughter. When he came back at lunch, he was not interested in eating, saying his throat hurt too much. 1/n

If we know where they were sent, but it isn’t to detention: exile. If we know where they are & it’s in detention: extraordinary rendition. If we don’t know where they are, but we know someone’s holding them: kidnapping. Otherwise, if we don’t know where they are: disappearance.

Heparin is just like an iPhone, except it's a bit more compact and you use it to prevent blood clots instead.

The only way forward, that I can see, requires both courage and collective action. If we’re not going to fight for our students and our scholarship, then what the hell are we doing anyway?

A good reminder to follow everything Eunji Kim does. She is so smart and just has an intuitive understanding of how people engage with entertainment media. She’s also hilarious. oh and her new book is coming out in a month: press.princeton.edu/books/hardco...

As someone educated outside the elite doctoral programs, EITM was huge for me. If you want to be good enough at finding stuff out (i.e., "research") to be paid to do it, there's no substitute for being around the best of the best and trying to learn from them.

This year we will be in Michigan in August. Apply if you are midway through your PhD program in the social sciences to learn from the best in the discipline how theory and empirical methods come together!

This segment from @maryannefranks.bsky.social is an incredibly tight argument that captures the breadth of the Trump assault on free speech perfectly and in less than a minute. Spread it far and wide.

I knew Dan Drezner when his headings were like "Sanctions work somewhat better than you think."

A competent Democratic Party would have this clip all over the airwaves and social media inside of 24 hours.

I'll be moderating a panel on Birth Right Citizenship at @umfordschool.bsky.social (and try to bring a comparative perspective). The panel includes legal scholars and historians (see below), join us on FRIDAY March 28th! fordschool.umich.edu/event/2025/c...

The people Attorney General Bondi is calling “terrorists” have had no trial and no chance to defend themselves. We do not know who they are. Ignoring the Constitution does not make us safe. It puts us all in peril.

Great way to advertise the book 👍🏼 I didn't know about it but now I do and immediately bought the book. www.vanityfair.com/news/story/m...

They will not stop until Americans stand up to them. Today, the Senate Democrats failed that test. Tomorrow, I hope that the rest of us come together to defend our values and principles.

vote your vote, but don't lie to constituents. have some fucking dignity.

...topics such as the Civil War..."??? It literally became a national cemetery *because of the Civil War. We're not a serious country. Or, more accurately, this isn't a serious government

Trump and Republicans set this up as an unprecedented power grab so they can slash and burn government services on their terms. I’m a firm NO — on cloture and final passage — on this ‘CR’

Again, if university presidents/leaders want to shape public opinion & the politics of the moment, rather than idly sitting by why Trump destroys free speech & dismantles the entire business model of 🇺🇸 higher education, here is the opportunity to do that. Loudly. Collectively. Publicly. Immediately.

Last week, I presented at my final Conflict & Change PhD Workshop @uclspp.bsky.social. Once again, ECRs from around the world shared their projects. I’m grateful for the opportunity to have been involved as both an organizer and a presenter from the beginning of my PhD! Hope to come back someday. 🙂

We find similar evidence from residence of Texas across two different types of natural disasters: doi.org/10.1016/j.gl...

Another paper showing climate shocks lead to support for climate action among conservatives. Analyzing data collected in Florida, the paper finds Republican positions change after personally experiencing loss from climate-exacerbated extreme events. www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Tyranny requires your fear, your silence, and your compliance. Democracy requires your courage.

📢 “He’s trying to steal Medicaid to enrich himself. He’s gutting NASA to line his pockets with SpaceX. He’s looting everything good in America for private profit.” - @aoc.bsky.social at today’s #SaveOurServices NYC rally. The fight isn’t over. Join us: go.savepublicservices.com

This event is happening this Wednesday at the #Umich Ann Arbor campus, come and please share!

Senator Schatz, @schatz.bsky.social, rejects idea that Dems should wait for Trump to touch 'most popular' programs to fight. "I'm not going to just wait until they touch the ACA. That's the kind of pundit-brain, poll-tested bullshit that got us into this mess." www.newyorker.com/news/q-and-a...

Every headline about USAID that does not say "illegal" or "unconstitutional" is a failure

that's my basic approach, and i'm not gonna BS them, and if i get evals that complain i was biased, honestly wtf is the point of being a full professor if i can't give my honest assessment of the situation

Team Trump: An Unholy Gathering of Liars, Dimwits & Lackeys. There is a toolkit embedded in this post with clips from all of their hearings! Please share. Make sure America knows how unqualified and unfit these people are!

I’ve spent about 2-3 hours each day on calls or chats with my US gov friends. Here’s an anonymized recap of what’s going on. First, I am so very sorry that they are living our last year at Twitter. I never wanted to think about that time again, and I hope my advice is helpful. 1/

If apostles of Jesus are on the earth, they'd sound like Rev. Mariann Edgar Budde.

I love this paper

Are you a PhD candidate studying political violence? Consider applying for the HFG Emerging Scholar award. $25k toward finishing up your diss. Deadline: 1 Feb. Details/Apply: www.hfg.org/emerging-sch...

In case you missed it, I wrote an essay for Wired about the weird wonderful world of HTML programming. Includes some digressions into breaking tags, my quiet love of building my own EPUBs, and an argument for why HTML is the most important computing language ever. www.wired.com/story/html-i...

@umisrcps.bsky.social now has its own starter pack. Follow all for insights from our affiliates and signature projects, including the ANES. Comment to be added! go.bsky.app/TfMekNA

Junior scholars, consider applying if you’re interested! Happy to answer questions you might have!

It's been a year since I bragged about the article "The women and men that make peace" (and that wasn't on bluesky) but now it is formally available - Open access - in Journal of Peace Research... journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10....

In the wake of Jimmy Carter's death, I've been reading up on the campaign to eradicate Guinea worm disease. As well as being a monumental humanitarian achievement, it's also a fascinating lens into the progression (or otherwise) of data visualization... 🧵

🎊 We're proud to share the first publication from @um-psc.bsky.social trainee @spencerallen.bsky.social. The findings in this 🧵, which show how internet access mattered for COVID outcomes, are reported just as net neutrality has been struck down in federal court. @umisr.bsky.social #UMich

🎊 Justine Davis and Martha Wilfahrt won the @africanpoliticscg.bsky.social Best Article Award for work on the human dimensions of survey research; they show how enumerators experience insecurity and material challenges when collecting public opinion data, especially in post-conflict settings.

God i love @propublica.org so much

What if the majority of people denied asylum in the United States are: a) Telling the truth, b) In real danger of persecution, and yet c) Still denied asylum on legal technicalities? That's the bombshell finding of a landmark new study. bclawreview.bc.edu/articles/317...