I know there's a difference between the right answer and what is politically advantageous to say. But on the merits, God doesn't reproduce or have DNA, so God doesn't have a sex or gender. Does Paxton reject monotheism and believe in pagan gods who were said to reproduce with each other?

Impeachments have no detectable effect on public opinion or election results. So politicians should simply follow their conscience and their oath of office. You can just do the right thing.

The consensus among housing policymakers now recognizes the importance of supply and demand. People setting higher education policy should appreciate it as well. Provide more supply of elite and mass-market public university student seats and market pressure will push down private school prices too.

You’re telling me there’s a painting of a sainted historical figure thar doesn’t depict him 100% accurately?

"Good thing we've still got politics in Texas -- finest form of free entertainment ever invented" - the late, great Molly Ivins

It pains me to say it, but Wemby’s just got nothing on offense tonight.

okc's free-throw rate is 50.0. san antonio's free-throw rate is 38.6. pretty please let these guys play basketball

Exactly what I wanted to see, Tony Brothers deciding Game 5 of one of the most intense series in recent years

The consensus among housing policymakers now recognizes the importance of supply and demand. People setting higher education policy should appreciate it as well. Provide more supply of elite and mass-market public university student seats and market pressure will push down private school prices too.

Impeachments have no detectable effect on public opinion or election results. So politicians should simply follow their conscience and their oath of office. You can just do the right thing.

“So you try to help people then? Like people in your community?” “Haha, no. I only care about people I’ve imagined centuries in the future.”

For better or worse, the Humpty Dumpty approach taken by the current Supreme Court and some Trumpist law professors, in which words mean whatever they wish them to mean at that moment, is doing a good bit to discredit the idea that major constitutional controversies should be settled by judges.

I prefer people who take the text, history, and original intent of our Constitution seriously, rather than those who begin with their "normative, political, moral predispositions" and try to invent a tortured rationale for them. Why have a written constitution at all if you are doing that?

I prefer people who take the text, history, and original intent of our Constitution seriously, rather than those who begin with their "normative, political, moral predispositions" and try to invent a tortured rationale for them. Why have a written constitution at all if you are doing that?

It's going to be hilarious (in the soul-crushing way) to see how fast Alabama goes to #SCOTUS for a stay of this ruling under Purcell, after obtaining relief from the Court from a similar injunction <checks notes> 15 days ago on the ground that it *wasn't* too close to the election.

Man this Bouie video and Sumner quote go incredibly fucking hard.

People really struggle with this concept but: How will you prove YOU deserve due process if you aren’t afforded due process?

i was just saying to folks on my stream that the true measure of a writer who doesn’t actually know anything is that everything they write is about online discourse

Famous for being perpetually somewhat disheveled, his 1970s State House rep campaign used this poster, with the line "Neatness isn't Everything."

Here's some classic Barney Frank chairing the House in 2007. This one might be my favorite. www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Msz...

“Yeah I’m into altruism, but ONLY if it’s, you know, effective, otherwise it sucks”. - weirdos

Don't you just hate it when you're trying to do a quick war in the Middle East for the content and then it just won't end like it keeps going and going forever

omg this is insane

Implicit (but rarely stated directly) in the tributes to Colbert is that he is pretty obviously being taken off the air because Trump's FCC loyalists engaged in viewpoint discrimination in violation of the First Amendment by conditioning anti-trust approval of a corporate merger on his being fired.

This is incredibly dumb: cross-national collaborations are part of what makes science great. No country has a monopoly on good ideas.

Not my actual denomination, but I get it. My aesthetic is confusing to a lot of people.

LOL

The Spurs should play Kornet more. I like them with that double big lineup. Wemby can’t be the only one fighting for position inside when he is in the game.

The argument here is basically: The murderer didn't commit a crime because the person he killed already had chronic hypertension.

If Netflix rebooted this during peak TV and threw money at this cast until they agreed to do it, I would have totally watched this show. www.youtube.com/watch?v=UIcb...

Had totally forgotten about this until @ryanlcooper.com reminded me. But here's one of the first things I wrote for the Mischiefs of Faction blog back in 2014, arguing that Stephen Colbert's political perspective was much healthier than Jon Stewart's during his original Daily Show run.

Great for polisci phds looking for alt-academic opportunity.

Implicit (but rarely stated directly) in the tributes to Colbert is that he is pretty obviously being taken off the air because Trump's FCC loyalists engaged in viewpoint discrimination in violation of the First Amendment by conditioning anti-trust approval of a corporate merger on his being fired.

I'm unclear why we are supposed to care about official party autopsies at this point. They are not high-quality, causally identified research, so we don't learn about reality. And they don't predict future candidate or party behavior, so we don't get insight into that either. Big nothingburgers.

No call on this one. Amazing.

Today would be a great day to know how primary upsets happen, and what they mean for the future of a major political party. Have I got data for you!

Interesting stuff. But from a polling methods perspective, it is much better to use liberal/moderate/conservative than left/right because many more people know what elites mean by those terms. And while better, even understandings of liberal/moderate/conservative are not universal!

Thomas' view here is heavily contested if not outright discredited by extensive historical evidence that he simply ignores yalelawjournal.org/note/a-reass...

The delta between how much you can touch Wendy without getting a foul called versus how much you can touch SGA is astonishingly large.

The delta between how much you can touch Wendy without getting a foul called versus how much you can touch SGA is astonishingly large.

One great thing about Barney Frank is that he didn't go out of his way to be mean (you might even call him a happy warrior), yet he also didn't develop a civility fetish despite all his time in Congress. www.youtube.com/watch?v=q9AX...

I've said many times before. The main weakness of political scientists' attitudinal model of Supreme Court justices' behavior is that it is probably not cynical enough.

One great thing about Barney Frank is that he didn't go out of his way to be mean (you might even call him a happy warrior), yet he also didn't develop a civility fetish despite all his time in Congress. www.youtube.com/watch?v=q9AX...

An egregious violation of the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. The Constitution needs to be enforced as written, not only in ways that are convenient for the powerful.

The status quo matters in the U.S. system because it has lots of veto points. The idea that the president can do anything militarily unless a new law is passed is contrary to our constitutional text. And thus, the 1973 War Powers Act without a legislative veto violates the Constitution.

The podcast bros said they were supporting Trump for two reasons: He wouldn’t start any wars, and he’d release the Epstein files. Massie lost tonight for two reasons: (a) forcing the release of the Epstein files, and (b) trying to restrain Trump’s war in Iran.

Thinking about last night's game. And, big picture, it is still astonishing that, in my living memory, the Spurs won the draft lotteries to select David Robinson, Tim Duncan, and Victor Wembanyama. An amazing amount of good fortune.

This is extremely corrupt and lawless. Every administration should enforce the law impartially. But absent Trump issuing a formal pardon, I think this policy could just be disavowed by any new administration.

Openly supportive of an attempted coup against the American republic and its constitution.