YESSSS!!!!

I understand that he’s not under any obligation to do more, but Obama joking around with celebrities & parroting right-wing talking points about academia & Democrats using Funny Words feels wildly inadequate to the authoritarian moment that we find ourselves in as a country bsky.app/profile/mcop...

🧵 Obama repeating James Carville BS about Democrats & faculty lounges/college seminars/funny words fits exactly this description. bsky.app/profile/mcop...

Always good to chat with @perrybaconjr.bsky.social and @jakemgrumbach.bsky.social, even if it’s often about difficult subjects, like the Court’s continued assault on the VRA. Check out our conversation: Trump and the Supreme Court Are Crushing Black Political Power newrepublic.com/article/2101...

I'll be discussing how the numerous Dem 2028 candidates are positioning themselves in the very early stages of the race with two experts on the primary process, @smotus.bsky.social and @mschmitt9.bsky.social. Tune in if you can. open.substack.com/live-stream/...

Great conversation. David suggests it's Hilton v. Becerra or Steyer. We discuss if it's ever progressive to vote for a billionaire.

I continue to think that "backlash politics" is the wrong frame. There has been a counter-revolution against the Black freedom movement for generations. It is a FRONTLASH and I think that not thinking of it this way has done a real disservice. It's been PERMANENT WAR.

it doesn't matter how you talk to people if the supreme court guts the vra and disenfranchises your voters en masse, is the thing. It would be great if party leaders would focus on expanding the court rather than on irrelevant critiques of messaging. 1

Or, you know, you could give people something to vote for through actual social policy. Just throwing out some ideas! (Then again it’s fair for Obama to think this is because people did ignore much of his bad policy due to his charisma)

The Democratic Party is defining itself around affordability. But Jon Ossoff is emphasizing another idea too: corruption. My look at this reelection campaign and why it's resonating both in Georgia and nationally. newrepublic.com/article/2099...

I see some people online who seem to really want Obama "to speak up more" etc... but my point is and has been that he's deeply OUT OF TOUCH. Which Democratic electeds are "talking to people like a college seminar?" Name names. His comments are just another complaint about "the groups." Sad!

Very well said.

Prof. Derek Peterson, U of Michigan historian & MacArthur Genius Grant recipient, thanked “pro-Palestinian student activists” during a grad speech today, for “opening our hearts to the injustices and inhumanity of Israel’s war in Gaza.” His words, and the cheers that followed made my heart sing.

Schatz talks a good game but is strategic about avoiding specific commitments and shifting responsibility to movements to push him and his peers. The only things these guys will respond to are primary challenges, donor strikes and mass protests.

"The real swing voters in Maine are not white working class men, but educated middle-age and older women who might be registered Democrats or independents but voted for Collins in the past because they find her reasonable," @aseitzwald.bsky.social. newrepublic.com/article/2098...

"The question for Platner: Does his aggressive maleness, his macho-ness, the anger, does that push some women into Collins' camp? And are there enough men, progressives, or women who feel differently to make up for it on the other end?" says @aseitzwald.bsky.social. newrepublic.com/article/2098...

Black folk will call you out, but here's the part that doesn't get said as much: we will also call you in. With intention. With grace and (tough) genuine love.

Random observation: The Black collective keeps the Black professional class humble and our feet firmly planted on the ground. And as a daughter of that collective, yes, they should. Being accountable to other Black folk isn't a burden. It's a blessing.

"The entire Democratic Party should be rooting for this young mayor who inspired people across the country. Obama gets that. I am not sure why Hochul and Menin don’t." Wise words from @perrybaconjr.bsky.social.

New York Gov. Kathy Hochul and NYC City Council Speaker Julie Menin shouldn't become the Manchin and Sinema of NYC politics. newrepublic.com/article/2095...

"Politics in New York and America are full of uninspiring, establishment figures like Menin and Hochul. That’s why Mamdani won. New Yorkers voted for someone and something new. Hochul and Menin should at least try it his way." newrepublic.com/article/2095...

LOL! Iglesias literally lives off creating outrage of academics and liberals — that is his whole business model. And still, for reasons that are beyond my comprehension, many academics and liberals describe him like this and keep funding his grift by engaging with him. 🤷‍♂️

"The current Democratic party is as close to a party for working people as the US has ever had. That is inextricable from the fact that the Democrats are as close to a multi-racial coalition as the US has ever had," says @nberlat.bsky.social. www.everythingishorrible.net/p/this-democ...

Oh dang, look what popped up. Excited to dive into this chapter of the Citations Needed expanded universe.

@ahjohnson.bsky.social's book "How to Sell a Genocide: The Media's Complicity in the Destruction of Gaza" is out this week. Highly recommended. We had a great conversation about the book, other media failings, and also a bit of discussion about AOC 2028. newrepublic.com/article/2092...

How ridiculous the democrats are, using terms i made up

It’s not the case that Trump “got pulled into” attacking Iran any more than Netanyahu “tricked” or “played” Biden. To put it this way denies that most of our Beltway foreign policy actors, both parties, have deeply internalized Israel’s perspective and interests. That’s an American pathology, on us.

Excellent book.

"Young people are turning away from Turning Points. Here's why that spells doom for Democrats." Did I do it right (badum bum) @nytpitchbot.bsky.social?

Sasse should enjoy his remaining time & be free of pain. But he was a bad Senator who enabled authoritarianism & an awful, incredibly corrupt university president under a far right Governor. He doesn’t need a feature in the NYT op-ed page now any more than Hasan Piker needs a glow-up from Ezra.

In my conversation with @ibramxk.bsky.social, he discusses the last six years of first a "racial reckoning" and then a counter-mobilization against it that didn't just come from the right. newrepublic.com/article/2089...

"Authoritarianism and the erosion of democracy is being justified via great replacement theory. It's allowing an economic and political class to continue their hoarding of power, getting the people they're taking rights from to believe they're actually protecting them," says @ibramxk.bsky.social.

"When you can make a group of people believe their lives are under attack, their jobs are being stolen, their electoral power taken away, their culture eroded, it allows you to claim you're going to be their savior and their protector. That's happened around the world," says @ibramxk.bsky.social.

"Abundance" was the big concept in Democratic/liberal circles a year ago. @lindsayowens.bsky.social of @groundwork.bsky.social explains why that's not as much the case a year later. Video (newrepublic.com/article/2088...) and transcript (newrepublic.com/article/2088...)

"When you ask Americans why government isn't working, they will tell you the biggest impediment is the government is working for the wealthy and corporations. Most Americans don't think it's just red tape and bureaucratic inefficiency," says @lindsayowens.bsky.social. newrepublic.com/article/2088...

"The abundance agenda, when stacked up against alternatives, is an inferior choice politically. Can it appeal to the working class? It does particularly poorly. It faded from the political conversation because it couldn't compete as a political project on the merits," says @lindsayowens.bsky.social.

"This line of inquiry fundamentally misunderstands the role of political access journalism, publishing, and, perhaps most critically of all, some pretty sweet jacket design."

Terrific piece. This is what actual partisan capture of campus speech looks like

From @anatosaurus.bsky.social: "If you were in the room where it happened and you didn't stop it, you made it happen. War Criminal Cabinet."

I’m on a plane for a panel on structural racism tomorrow at the University of Michigan. One of the questions is how do we communicate with people who might be hostile to social science on race? My answer is some folks are hopeless, and we write them off while convincing those we can.

"The right-wing media is so large it's creating characters and soap operas that legacy media covers as news. I don't think that there's any real way out of that, outside of building a broad and big left media ecosystem to balance that out," says @ajbauer.bsky.social. newrepublic.com/article/2086...

"The anti-woke backlash is a Red Scare, basically. It's the same logic. The goal is to, again, pull leftists and liberals apart, to create a wedge" between them," says @ajbauer.bsky.social. newrepublic.com/article/2086...

This @sarayasin.bsky.social essay launching "The Key" is excellent. This line captures so much. "It just takes far too much effort to make these stories happen." She means the necessary, moral, honest stories, like calling a genocide a genocide. Must-read. www.thekeymagazine.com/p/western-jo...

"Journalism is unique but it mirrors the other institutions that have failed to meet this moment, whether it is academia or the arts — all too willing to torpedo their credibility and principles to silence any speech or sentiment perceived as pro-Palestinian." www.thekeymagazine.com/p/western-jo...

"Wittingly or unwittingly, Swan, Haberman, and the Times provided a massive platform for Rubio, Vance, and others to point the finger solely at Trump for a misguided war." newrepublic.com/article/2087...

I hoped that the Times and other outlets realized from 2017-20 the folly of stories without named sources in which Trump aides distance themselves from his decisions. Alas. This week the NYT allowed Trump's advisers to claim they privately doubted the war. newrepublic.com/article/2087...

"Sanders leading the anti-AI charge is a critical mission. The Democratic Party and the country desperately need a leader who isn’t afraid of being portrayed as a Luddite or anti-business and will therefore forcefully air concerns about the proliferation of AI." newrepublic.com/article/2086...

Excellent piece.

Bondi's "dismissal is the latest sign of Trump’s growing weakness and the successful resistance to his authoritarian aims." Sharp piece as usual from @perrybaconjr.bsky.social ↘️