I'm not going to stop saying this. We need to stop calling it "deporting." It may not always be fair or humane, but deportation has a process. And it means you're sent back to where you came from. These people are being trafficked and sold to slave prisons. Not deported.

I’m currently employed in manufacturing. Tool and diemaker simply do not have the capacity to actually make the amount of tooling that would be necessary to reshore even like 5% of currently overseas manufacturing. We’re already at like 16 week lead times.

It's critical for everyone to remember what an Executive Order is. It is the President communicating orders to members of the executive branch. Policies to pursue, actions to take, etc. They are not laws. They are not close to being laws. They are formalized memos to employees. That's all.

The will, and that’s entirely the point.

Trump threatens to put American citizens on deportation flights to a slave prison in El Salvador

Interesting piece from a smart @theverge.com editor reckoning with the question of how news stories should characterize official acts that seem overtly illegal but which the Trump admin argues are legal and courts have not yet ruled on.

Roses are red Violets are blue

If the constitution is still in operation, Trump's executive order abolishing the Department of Education is just a suggestion. If Trump can abolish the Department of Education with an executive order, then the constitution is just a suggestion.

One way to understand what’s happening is that Republicans want to do to academia - colleges, universities, science, medical research - what they did to labor.

Imagine calling yourself the master race and have to resort to erasing the achievements of minorities to make yourself feel better.

NEW! Sworn declarations filed last night confirm the Trump admin sent INNOCENT people to rot in prison El Salvador, including a professional soccer player jailed and tortured by the Maduro regime, who entered this country LEGALLY to seek asylum, and who has NO CRIMINAL RECORD in either country.

Foreign nationals here legally getting thrown in prison without due process. Illegally firing govt agency commissioners. An unelected billionaire defunding vital services. The Republicans who cried about "the left" violating checks and balances are now awfully quiet, huh?

Completely unsurprising turn of events.

The abundance debate has quickly reached a level of abstraction that borders on incoherence. “Is deregulation good or bad” is a nonsense question absent any specifics. “Whose fault is all of this” is a useless question in the absence of historical analysis or an examination of coalition politics.

“Democrats stop capitulating on values to sway a moderate republican voter base that no longer exists, instead of being a working class opposition party” Challenge: Impossible. These people will never go to bat for us because they are disgustingly out of touch with everyday Americans.

If the Supreme Court ultimately agrees with what the gov't is arguing today, that the President has broad Article II powers that would permit it to deport people & there can be no judicial review, then literally no one is safe.

For all those people who think “the left got more radical,” this is what the evolution of the GOP has looked like over the past few years.

Every American skipping over this violation of the law, and assuming this happens to 'people who deserve it/are dodgy somehow,' should realize that there is jack-all stopping them from doing the same thing to you next, if you shrug off the rule of law for people on visas.

From 1850-1950 we saw robber barons and various titans of industry construct these massive, political fortresses to consolidate their power and safeguard their wealth and control, from then on we have dealt with their heirs who believe those fortresses were natural geological formations.

"dei medal" you might as well just put "n*gger medal" because that's what they mean to say

Among the material devastation to everyday people, Senate Dems have now blown a hole in their ability to work with the House. We had an agreed upon plan, House took immense risk, then Senate turned around midway and destroyed it w/ a fear-based, inexplicable abdication. They own what happens next.

This ended up being timely (and will be timely many more times before this is all over, I'm afraid) stancilculture.substack.com/p/crisis-is-...

The Trump regime will arrest you in the middle of the night because you spoke your mind. And federal agents in plain clothes who refuse to identify themselves will be the ones to do it. If you think I'm being hyperbolic, watch this clip.

one thing i keep thinking about is how there is simply no way to design a constitutional system that can resist authoritarian incursion if participants in that system do not actually care that much

the thing about chasing what you think is public opinion is that if and when things turn you will have made a bunch of statements and taken a bunch of stances that you’ll have to disavow. probably a better strategy just to say what you actually believe and stand by it. anyway, this guy sucks.

yep. and this is the basic problem with trump being psychologically incapable of perceiving a positive sum relationship. everything is a dominance game for him.

Sorry but I’m with @samsteindc.bsky.social. This isn’t “in response” to the Oval meeting. They had all of this pre-planned and ready to roll out. Trump and Vance instigated the Oval confrontation to justify it.

The fact that the USA has banned visas for trans people but welcomed rapist Andrew Tate shows how all this "defending women" stuff is total bullshit

I received, and continue to receive, many extremely vicious attacks for standing with the people of Syria and Ukraine against prominent UK and US leftists who recited Putin and Assad's propaganda. Humanitarian principles must always transcend partisan loyalties. I won't be bullied into submission.

To me, a Nazi salute means, "I want to murder your family." There can be no irony about it: It puts deep anger and hatred in my heart to see it done and I will never forgive anyone who justifies or minimizes it.

The Google AI results at the top of searches are so pointless. We have a resource (the internet!) that knows everything, and instead of going to the source, it's like you asked your stupid cousin who is trying to recall the information from a podcast he heard last week.

There's a common path in the development of authoritarian or totalitarian regimes, regardless of whether they are overseen by Catholic Inquisitors, Protestant enforcers, monarchists, fascists, Nazis, Stalinists, Maoists .... First they eliminate words. Then they eliminate people.

An impactful read from @georgemonbiot.bsky.social; the first book I’ve picked up in quite some time that I couldn’t put down. I’d put this high on the list of required reading for 2025 if we’re to cultivate a strong understanding of how we got here, and how we move forward. Some excerpts:

it's really saying something that this is how an apparent friend explains Elon's goals www.vanityfair.com/news/story/e...

Filing under: Posts You Can Hear

Big ups and I hope to see other publications follow the example and not cave to the fascists immediately. Now if only AP could stop canning regional journalists in a time where it’s hard enough for the local press to get reliable info at the federal level.

If you are at an event where someone on stage gives a Hitler salute and that person is not dragged off by security and kicked out, you are at a Nazi rally.

I've read most of the analyses of the DOGE 2025 "receipts" site. This, from NPR, is the best I've read so far. Some of what they claim to have cut haven't been cut, other "cuts" will incur costs down the road. NPR says DOGE has made $2B of cuts, not $55B. www.npr.org/2025/02/19/n...

Ta-Nehisi Coates: If Democrats can’t draw the Line at Genocide, they can’t Draw the Line at Democracy

I’m one half of a small indie car podcast that has about 100 listeners and that’s just fine. We’ve built a fun little discord community with 20-30 people from that. It makes no money, but gives us all a little place to hang out. We don’t charge for anything and I’m not looking to quit my day job

Men (usually spineless) like O’Brien are endemic to Blue Collar Culture. Especially in Union construction. Sure, the current regime will be the final blow to workers rights — but fecklessness and masculinity for the sake of identity within private unions has quite literally been of their own doing.

If this reporting stands up (and it appears confirmed by multiple sources): devastating. The EIS is the front-line SWAT team of disease detection in the US and globally, and also the training ground for new generations of public health workers. No EIS, no boots on the ground for outbreaks. ->

This is probably the most accurate take.

Why would you make your narrator unreliable. I trusted you and purchased this book and this is how you repay me

I'm sad to share that the trans vet that took her life outside the VA last week was apparently Elisa Rae Shupe. She's someone many of us know - she was responsible for the mass email leak that let us know how the ADF, Heritage, etc planned to enact trans eradication we see today. RIP Elisa.

What if history just didn't repeat itself, for once?

a good part of me thinks that in addition to everything else, the reason they are scrubbing these stories is they do not want disadvantaged kids to believe they can aspire to anything other than their designated “black” or “hispanic” or “woman” job

the OTHER thing about the white house’s anti-diversity push is that like old fashioned segregation it is explicitly an effort to undermine unions! like c’mon! don’t be stupid!