DC friends! Come see @wkamaubell.bsky.social perform standup tomorrow night!

A long-overdue conversation with @lukethomas.bsky.social about how MMA — the sport he's loved and covered for decades — has become one of the foremost vectors of right-wing politics in America. While Dana White (like so many UFC fans) remains in denial about that very fact: youtu.be/bUIaL-zE2b4?...

There are so many chuds (or worse) at UFC events these days that if you’re a celebrity dapping up whoever, there’s a good chance that person will have been charged or convicted of sex crimes.

UFC is feeling the heat about their gross politicization of their product and comically over the top Trump boosterism, so now they’re pivoting to striving centrist Dems to launder their deserved reputation as a right-wing company.

Swollen RFK Jr. Warns Americans Not Eating Enough Bees https://theonion.com/swollen-rfk-jr-warns-americans-not-eating-enough-bees/

I had an opportunity to talk to @lebatardshow.bsky.social about the UFC going all-in on Donald Trump. What I want everyone to understand is the specific role UFC played for Trump: they were critical in rehabbing his image following Jan 6. That plus more: www.youtube.com/watch?v=FXCN...

One of the first places Trump appeared post Jan 6 or during legal proceedings from the Jack Smith case were UFC events. The timing of his UFC appearances matches his legal troubles. If he's making the rounds now, he’s grasping for an image boost.

How it feels being on this app today

New shot of Earth from behind the Moon 🌎 📷 Artemis II

Check out our interview exclusive with @lukethomas.bsky.social where he and @heynottheface.bsky.social discussed everything from the threat TKO/Zuffa Boxing poses to boxing all the way to the journey the UFC has taken into the right wing, and more. heynottheface.substack.com/p/exclusive-...

On today’s episode of Hey Not The Face! we have as a guest @lukethomas.bsky.social to discuss the UFC’s relationship to the Trump administration, why boxing may be underestimating the threat posed by Zuffa, and his foray into political coverage. open.substack.com/pub/heynotth...

Can’t help but connect this to the UFC on the WH lawn, the ICE and DoD propaganda videos on X. The president, Hegseth, all these regime sycophants, want war and death and untold human suffering as spectacle. They want us glued to our TVs at 8pm like it’s fucking 90s pay-per-view.

That headline hasn't aged very well. Never heard anyone discuss this before

I had the opportunity to guest lecture at the University of Maryland on the relationship between MMA and the political right. We start from social sorting and psychology influences and then get to fascism in 1930s Brazil to the modern UFC-MAGA alliance and more. open.substack.com/pub/lthomas/...

I had the honor of talking with MMA legend @juliekedzie.bsky.social about combat sport culture and the hypocrisy of UFC fighters clamoring to fight at the White House. Thanks to @tsingleton.bsky.social for having me as a co-host.* podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/i... *art courtesy of Claudia Fung

You cannot imagine how much differently this post/lecture was received at The Other Site.

Lawton, Oklahoma

I had the opportunity to guest lecture at the University of Maryland on the relationship between MMA and the political right. We start from social sorting and psychology influences and then get to fascism in 1930s Brazil to the modern UFC-MAGA alliance and more. open.substack.com/pub/lthomas/...

New — I wrote about how journalists proudly using AI to help them write their stories obscures the deeply human process that makes journalism a societal necessity, and one that feeds the soul of those who create it. Hope you’ll give it a read. I promise I wrote the whole thing.

Had the opportunity to join progressive stalwarts @krystalball.bsky.social and @kylekulinskishow.bsky.social on their podcast to talk the UFC White House event plus the Iran War, Trump's health, our misanthropic tech oligarchs and much, much more. krystalkyleandfriends.substack.com/p/stumbling-...

BBC News - I turned down MMA fighter on a night out - so he punched me www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Man, I can’t believe the company that grossly underpays its talent would also have executives who don’t take human capability or need seriously.

Hey @lukethomas.bsky.social.. Love seein' you evolve brother! Great to see you on @krystalball.bsky.social, @kylekulinskishow.bsky.social and friends! youtube.com/watch?v=6Cp-...

UFC wasn't selling enough PPVs for ESPN by 2025 for ESPN to make money off the buys alone, per @wonf4w.bsky.social Paramount paying all this money for what appears to be a hope of adding 6-7 million to the service seems like a huge stretch on their end

I interviewed UFC antitrust plaintiff Jon Fitch about his class action, the 3 current cases, the Ali Act (which he has been trying to expand to MMA) and the new bill supported by TKO, and how hard it is to get fighters involved. heynottheface.substack.com/p/exclusive-...

New in PN: How MMA defines the Trump administration "Everywhere you look in the Republican Party today, you see insecure men trying to show how manly they are. And the performance of manhood to which they are most attracted is violence."

According to documents filed this morning by the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of NY, ICE has been lying for a year — not only to the public, but to the courts and to prosecutors — about being authorized to make arrests at 26 Federal Plaza and other immigration courts. (1/2)

A really great interview of @superwuster.bsky.social by @lukethomas.bsky.social one quote I enjoyed was "I don't know if being fed yourself is really that great for your character" substack.com/@lukethomasn...

Illiteracymaxxing as education seems like a bad idea.

Actors are juicing but they're doing it under the supervision of doctors who are at least theoretically invested in their wellbeing, unlike the enormous numbers of guys blasting testosterone sourced from the depths of a dirty lab

NEW: It’s not just tech platforms. Businesses everywhere are growing larger, taking more from customers and yet somehow only getting worse. Tim Wu explores the "platformization" of the economy in his new book, so I sat down to talk to him about it. NO PAYWALL: lthomas.substack.com/p/tim-wu-age...

NEW: It’s not just tech platforms. Businesses everywhere are growing larger, taking more from customers and yet somehow only getting worse. Tim Wu explores the "platformization" of the economy in his new book, so I sat down to talk to him about it. NO PAYWALL: lthomas.substack.com/p/tim-wu-age...

It was obvious as hell when Paramount offered for UFC what was well in excess of a combo offer from ESPN and Netflix that Paramount were massively overpaying to make a splash. Their WBD deal might still go through, but they are massively over leveraged.

The “Temu” Regime: How Incompetence and Fragility are Dismantling American Power From Failed MMA Fighters to “Crusader” Cosplay, the New Guard Prioritizes Posturing Over Policy While the Economy and Global Stability Burn thelefthook.substack.com/p/the-temu-r...

Search Party just published a video on Bellingcat and the Irish Times's investigation into the biggest drug cartel you've never heard of, and it's ties to everything from MMA to Hezbollah. www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kj0G...

Bellingcat and @thetimes.com revealed that two of the world’s most wanted men were visible at a live-streamed MMA event in Dubai. Now, Search Party digs into the Kinahan cartel and their US-sanctioned leaders. www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kj0G...

I covered MMA professionally for more than five years and I can speak to his MMA credentials in context, though not any of his statements about his background. He fought in an promotion that features up-and-coming fighters in their first career bouts, usually against what we call tomato cans.

We wanted to understand the complexities of a special forces mission to retrieve Iran's stores of uranium. So we talked to three unvaccinated UFC fans at a Wendy's in Toms River.

The Cesar Chavez story discussed yesterday is out, in the New York Times. Two women say that he sexually assaulted them as children, beginning when they were 12 and 13. And Dolores Huerta says he raped her in 1966.

If there is one "good" thing about the UFC White House card, it's that the event has brought back into focus the UFC's exploitative labor practices. This MSNow report cites the video I did with @moreperfectunion.bsky.social, for example, as part of a wider focus: www.ms.now/opinion/ufcs...

DC statehood now.

"Joe Kent, one of the United States’ top counterterrorism officials, announced his resignation on Tuesday, citing his opposition to the Iran war and what he said was Israel’s influence over the Trump administration’s policies." doesn't bode well www.nytimes.com/2026/03/17/w...

Peasant mentality.

Tomorrow is the one-year anniversary of my Substack. I didn't do everything I wanted this past year, but I made a compendium of the myriad stuff we did. For those who've supported my efforts, thank you. I hope to make it worth your while again in the year ahead: lthomas.substack.com/p/one-year-o...

You think MMA is a sideshow when you work inside of it, but the older I get, the more I realize it’s deadly serious.

Oh this is one of those observations that’s going to stick with me for a long time

@lukethomas.bsky.social + @moreperfectunion.bsky.social with a great video. Especially if you are or have been (like myself) a fan of MMA.

Last night’s UFC 326 was the first card in years I watched from start to finish, and it really hammered home to me how far the product has fallen. The UFC has long been in wealth-extraction mode, but those chickens are now so obviously coming home to roost with how it presents to the consumer.

Among a variety of other problems, it’s hard to overstate the level of disrepair the UFC product has fallen into. UFC is enshittifying right in front of us and I genuinely think there’s no coming back from this.

A federal judge in DC rules that Kari Lake was not lawfully appointed and that actions she took as the claimed head of USAGM "shall have no force or effect," including last August's RIFs at the Voice of America.