Dirty dozen: "The Times editorial board has compiled a list of 12 markers of democratic erosion, with help from scholars who have studied this phenomenon. The sobering reality is that the United States has regressed, to different degrees, on all 12."

Trump says there are obstacles to releasing $ to feed the poor. This is a guy who sees no obstacle to bombing boats in the Caribbean, eliminating whole fed'l agencies, and snatching innocent people off the streets to deport to places they've never lived. I think we know who's the obstacle.

It's not just rising health insurance costs that Trump is bringing to America, but the dismantling of public health protections.

Cost to fund SNAP and keep 42 million people from starving: $100 billion Cost of lost revenue due to tax cuts for the richest Americans in the top 1%: $100 billion One is decried as "welfare." One is not. Why?

We’re sharing this because everyone claimed Project 2025 wasn’t real, yet here we are. Trump has also been talking more openly about a third term, and Steve Bannon said there’s a group actively working on it turns out, there might be one.

I know it’s too much to expect them to know their history, but if the American Revolution had a motto, it definitely would not have been “immigrants go home.” It would have been “get your fucking soldiers out of our cities.”

David A. Graham writes in The Atlantic about the various ways Trump could rig the midterms. He notes that modern autocrats don’t cancel elections. They hold unfair elections to fool people into thinking they’re not living in a dictatorship. It’s called “competitive authoritarianism.” (Gift link)

Today, Mike Johnson will keep the House adjourned for the 81st day out of the last 93. 12 days of work in over 3 months. With full pay and benefits. The senate has been working, so this is not about the shutdown. It is about avoiding a vote to release the Epstein files.

Grifter and Son, a new docudrama about America's most corrupt family.

After officers set off two stun grenades, an officer blasted a riot control agent, likely a pepper-spray round, into the crowd, hitting Jorge Bautista, a pastor with the United Church of Christ in San Mateo, wearing all black at right, in the face. Credit: Jerome Parmer

Pay attention to this one

Today, Mike Johnson will keep the House adjourned for the 80th day out of the last 92. The senate has been working, so this is not about the shutdown. It is about avoiding a vote to release the Epstein files.

When you erase history as blatently as Trump and his minions, it implies you wouldn't mind repeating the uglier bits.

the big, beautiful grift goes on...and on....and on....

Now that Trump has illegally bombed a seventh boat in the Caribbean, please note this: Rep Adam Smith, ranking Dem on Armed Services, tells me that *at no point* have officials given lawmakers even the most basic information about these extrajudicial murders: newrepublic.com/article/2019...

My god....

So rainbow crosswalks are being painted over in MAGA land because they could be a "distraction" to drivers, but Trump and Vance say it's just fine to fire live ammo over a busy urban highway in Calif? So safe that a CHP car was damaged by shrapnel.

Great #NoKings rally at UC Berkeley today

When one isn't enough for a princess

George Wallace on the 1963 civil rights March on Washington: It’s all a bunch of communists trying to destroy America. Mike Johnson on the 2025 No Kings rally: It’s all a bunch of marxists/socialists/Antifa trying to destroy America. The GOP playbook: Same as it ever was

Alameda County Food Bank is an awesome organization that just got more awesome in my eyes

Republicans complain about immigrants changing the character of America, but they’ve welcomed the most dangerous foreign influence: former South Africans such as Musk and Thiel bringing an apartheid mentality to America.

A terrific AFP fact check uses reverse image searches to expose how a White House video took scenes from Florida, Texas, South Carolina and Nebraska and lied that they showed "Chicago is in chaos." factcheck.afp.com/doc.afp.com....

Trump wants to cut FEMA aid, and Republicans in Congress don't want to talk about it (besides, they're on a shutdown vacation). Because billionaires need their tax break.

Morally corrupt. And no Republican is willing to call out these illegal actions.

@mbenioff.bsky.social calls for troops in low-crime SF, letter writers push back. Susie and Mark Buell ask, "While one can appreciate that Benioff must look after the best interests of his shareholders, did he really have to say, 'I fully support the President, I think he is doing a great job'?"

Our local #indivisible chapter hosted a public roundtable on attacks on free speech last month--here's the video link:

Cruelty is so clearly the point

STEPHANOPOULOS: I didn't insinuate anything. I asked you whether Tom Homan accepted $50k as was heard on an audio tape recorded by the FBI in September 2024. You did not answer the question. Thank you for your time. VANCE: No, George, I sai-- STEPHANOPOULOS: We'll be right back

The following is REAL footage from Portland, 2025. Viewer discretion is advised.

So the people causing the shutdown are getting paid. The people keeping the country running don’t. And Speaker Mike Johnson won’t let the House come back to work. So basically they’re on a paid vacation while Americans miss paychecks. Did I get that right?

A smaller population and slower-growing workforce will reduce the size of the US economy. Debts will be harder to pay off; a large military, more difficult to maintain. Zero Migration America will make its residents poorer by pulling down productivity growth and thus GDP per person.

Nasty. @washingtonpost.com "Federal workers not entitled to back pay after shutdown, budget office claims The top lawyer at the White House Office of Management and Budget argued that the law guaranteeing back pay to furloughed workers does no such thing"

The nativist right keeps talking about “heritage Americans.” It's a buzzword engineered to move the goalposts on immigration even further, argues @alibreland.bsky.social.

There it is

What happens when we allow unfettered hate speech? "MAGA's backlash to the civil rights groups comes as the number of hate crimes in the past few years hit record levels. Analysts say antisemitic crimes rose again last year."

One thing that comes through awfully clearly in these ICE videos is how many of these goons gravitated toward the job because being able to assault people with impunity is a big thrill for them.

Alaska newspapers hit with censorship. A Republican state representative complained to the papers' owners, who pulled the story and edited it. "Gone from the article was a line stating that Mr. Kirk had perpetuated conspiracy theories, including Covid-19 and climate misinformation..."

The president just gathered the highest ranking officers in the military to tell them that he may order them to kill American citizens -- and that they better follow his orders. All in response to a series of crises that have no basis in reality. I don't know how to yell any louder.

THIS

Govt shutdown looms but there's $ for this. Says retired Army Maj. General Paul D. Eaton, “Pete Hegseth spent millions to fly in all of our generals and admirals to rant about facial hair and brag about how many pull-ups he can do, and have Donald Trump sleepwalk through a list of partisan gripes.”

This is how you autocrat

Costly destruction of the federal workforce coming tomorrow. "The total resignation program is set to cost $14.8bn, with 200,000 workers paid their full salary and benefits while on administrative leave for up to eight months, according to a Senate Democrats’ report in July."

"The Trump administration can treat this government of the people as his own mob enforcers, but the people need not acquiesce. When Trump abuses his power to settle political scores, the people can choose to nullify."

So much for "ending wars"...Our military blowing up boats in the Caribbean with the aim of destabilizing Maduro is a terrible escalation of a conflict that Trump made. As the piece notes, this is not about fentanyl (that's not where it comes from), it's about "regime change." A dangerous game.

Portland is "war ravaged" in the same sense that Pete Hegseth embodies a "warrior ethos"