Another Steel City win

Friday Night's Mother Nature Fireworks in Chicago.

Taking a hit for the team: Watching Caligula at Mt. Rushmore. The "idea" part of the speech, read from script, is extended, Joe McCarthy-toned denunciation of Communism as the era's greatest threat. Recall that his three closest chums internationally are: -Putin -Xi Jinping -Kim Jong Un

Omg I just discovered there are four scissor-tailed flycatcher fledglings learning to fly in a nearby tree. Look at these fluffy little cuddle buddies! 😭 #Photography #Birds

“The one thing the framers of the Constitution did not want was a federal government in Washington telling people what they had to believe. That has been unconstitutional since the framing of the Bill of Rights.” - Professor, University of Oregon, School of Law www.impactivize.org/impactivizer...

would love to see a hostile audit of Freedom 250. hell, would love to see hostile audits of everything even tangentially related to trump. this will produce endless material. you could conceivably bring the administration to an effective halt!

#ELB: “The Many Ways Trump Is Trying to Tip the Scales for the Midterms” https://electionlawblog.org/?p=157048

Democrats are preparing a hostile audit of Trump and his inner circle, intent on exposing — and ultimately ending — the most lucrative presidency in American history. Dems see the presidential gold rush as corruption personified — and plan to bury Trump's orbit in subpoenas if they win the House.

Not described in here: How you force Trump to comply with subpoenas. They couldn't get him to comply in the first term. What has changed?

Listen to Britain’s dawn chorus of 1976: the dramatic loss of birdsong in 50 years

The difference in birdsong between now and 1976 is HUGE. I am baffled how little is left. They have a clip that perfectly illustrates the change every 10 years.

Directing President Trump’s “Storytime” interview with Usha Vance.

The entire city is on edge right now. It’s 96 degrees, we’re interrupted every 5 min by the sound of low-flying fighter jets, and the president has managed to ruin July 4th. Quietly muttering to myself: “just wait until IT happens. Everyone will be so happy when IT happens. It’ll be incredible…”

Most of these National Mall things are considered a birthright among people in Washington, DC. To have it all stripped away from us in service of a pedophile is one of the basest humiliations and one that will not be forgotten.

2/2 And while I'm at it: Reminder that DC has more residents than two entire states w total of 3 Reps and 4 US Senators (WY and VT, closing in on ND). We pay *more* federal tax per capita than any other jurisdiction—really, top even NY and CA. And have zero vote in Congress. Statehood for DC.

I don't think any American--regardless of party, despite fondness for aviation (which I share)--would enjoy being under the nonstop low-altitude, high-speed, incredible-volume of the Caligula overflights of our nation's capital right now. It feels and sounds like being under aerial attack.

Democrats Describe the Wire Fraud behind the Single Ferris Wheel and the Empty Fields of Glyphosate emptywheel.net/2026/07/03/d...

How did Pakistan end up mediating US-Iran diplomacy? Part of the answer is Pakistan was an early supporter of Trump’s crypto currency ventures. One executive is Zach Witkoff, son of Trump envoy Steve. Zach Witkoff signed an MOU re: the company’s coin with Pakistan’s finance minister in Islamabad.

This is someone who previously used private financial information to target the presidents enemies with legal charges. So good chance he is now trying to do the same with intelligence information.

I know why it's the case, but it's jokerfying that the complete co-mingling of the White House and the Trump family's private portfolio isn't getting the full court press scandal treatment from even a single media outlet.

This has been my philosophy for all of my most recent seven books (and the one I've written since then that's coming out later this year). It wasn't for the eight before that, because I was too polite, too obedient, still learning. But it has been ever since... www.tom-cox.com/a-brief-guid...

New at Can We Still Govern: The One Big Beautiful Bill Act was signed on July 4, 2025. It is the blueprint for Trump's second term. A year on, Gabriel Scheffler explains three major lies at the heart of the law's Medicaid provisions. donmoynihan.substack.com/p/one-year-o...

The obvious points here: *there is no problem that the cops are solving. Some staff are negotiating fan access to players. No need for a govt official to jump in *their natural instinct is to escalate rather than defuse the tension, to demand obedience rather than manage the situation

On our 250th anniversary, I refuse to cede the idea of patriotism to the white supremacist fascists. That mythic patriotism has always been part of our identity--but we can tell a very different story through the legacies of American critical patriotism. My new @pghreviewofbooks.bsky.social essay! 🗃️

The right-wing attack on birthright citizenship is not just about birthright citizenship itself. As MAGA’s reaction to the Supreme Court ruling proves, it is part of their opposition to a broader ideal, that “All men are created equal.” www.theatlantic.com/ideas/2026/0...

One of the most successful pedestrian streets in the world, the Strøget in Copenhagen, was filled with cars until a 2 year pedestrianization pilot project in 1962. The opposition argued “no cars means no business,” but the street has been a massive retail success, the city’s busiest shopping street.

Cambridge just posted the first ten pages of my manuscript, In Congress We Trust? Enforcing Voting Rights from the Founding to the Jim Crow Era. Check it out here: assets.cambridge.org/97810097/816...

Why fireworks can be a death sentence for wildlife - National Geographic apple.news/AZWI_GiJxTUu...

OTD in 1964, President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act. Here is a photo of LBJ handing a pen to Martin Luther King, Jr, at the signing ceremony. As the caption says, this was "the strongest civil rights legislation since Reconstruction Days."

Great thread. 🧵 Without LBJ to capitalize on grassroots advocacy, who knows how much longer it would have taken to see another civil rights law. And talk about an incredible transformation from an anti-civil rights figure to the greatest pro-civil rights president in American history.

“It dates back to the early 1870s and Reconstruction, when white terrorists were attempting to oust democratically elected Black officials as well as white politicians who did not support their violent anti-Black agenda.”

Your reminder that Joshua Chamberlain thought it was a moral imperative to fight the Confederacy but he didn't have any background as an Army officer, so he was like, "Hmm, I should study Casey's Infantry Tactics and Duparcq's Elements of Military Art and History", and that's how he beat Longstreet.

PUBLICATION DAY! Signed ones available Blackwell's, who also do FREE international delivery: blackwells.co.uk/bookshop/pro... Extract here: www.tom-cox.com/one-week/ You might like it if you like the sea, walking, knitting, old records, community, crows, dogs, silliness, folklore or the sea.

We need a word like "impeachable" but in the imperative, to the effect of "impeachment-necessitating" except, y'know, catchy "Disqualifying" has the sense except a) he's already in power & b) he's *also* already constitutionally disqualified from the office he claims to occupy. Need something else

A nation of immigrants. This interactive map lets you zoom in by census track on which countries of origin are most prominent where. Super cool. Happy 4th. Gift link 🎁 www.nytimes.com/interactive/...

We uncovered how he hijacked America 250 – watch to see how. youtu.be/-ydXJ3HhXy0?...

Stephen Miller's suit here shows one of the biggest problems with men's tailoring today. 🧵

HYDRATION ADVICE from an archaeologist who works in intense heat: 1) Water isn't enough. You need electrolytes. Use liquid IV/ gatorade, premake a jug. 2) Set up phone reminders every 2-3 hours to drink 8oz, more if outside 3) Wake up and DRINK and have a glass before bed. You'll sleep better

Kavanaugh really, really wants people to think that trans sports bans and his decision upholding them are strictly about sports None of that is true! ballsandstrikes.org/scotus/west-...

NEW @crisesnotes.bsky.social PIECE: It finally happened, Unitary Executive Theory minus the Federal Reserve is the law of the land. In today's piece I explain what it all means. www.crisesnotes.com/agency-indep...

I wrote about the Supreme Court's latest disgusting anti-trans ruling. I wrote about it because I refuse to act like taking away constitutional rights and allowing legal discrimination is okay just because it's happening to people who don't poll well in a diner in Ohio. In @thenation.com

In almost exactly one month, Missourians will be voting on a GOP-backed referendum that, if it passes, would effectively end citizen-led ballot initiatives in the state. Here's all you need to know: boltsmag.org/missouri-ame...

The other day I noted the only way Trump would keep paying Event Strategies to put together humiliating public events is if it were a vehicle for corruption. Today, Natural Resource Dems released a report substantiating that corruption. emptywheel.net/2026/06/29/t...

Longtime citizen flagged, voter registration revoked in proof-of-citizenship ordeal indianacapitalchronicle.com/2026/07/02/l...

Yesterday, a felony indictment brought by a special grand jury charging local activist Tanesha Hudson with voter registration fraud was quickly thrown out. But not before it caused Hudson to lose her job. “The process was the punishment,” says Hudson. www.charlottesvilledtm.com/p/special-gr...

The image here borrows its title from Grant's 1868 presidential campaign slogan, "Let us have peace." Here's what Frederick Douglass had to say about that sentiment.

This is the email US ambassador Bill White sent to an American who lives in Belgium (shared by Samuel Dempsey, one of the journalists removed from the Freedom 250 party in Brussels):

The Great American State Fair isn't like a county fair and it isn't like the World's Fair. It also isn't like the Smithsonian, despite the proximity. What it's most like is a digital Potemkin village. It's a content generator. That's all they do anymore. davekarpf.beehiiv.com/p/what-is-th...?