Gift article: www.nytimes.com/2025/11/17/s...

Weird how our AI-boosting government is killing the IRS's free tax filing tool, only for the company who spent $3,720,000 on lobbying last year to sign a big AI integration deal for their tax software. Probably a coincidence.

Some of the responsibilities the administration aims to move were explicitly assigned to the U.S. Education Department by Congress, raising questions about the legality of these changes. n.pr/47KSHp6

It is genuinely incredible to me how much evidence there is to support investing in the public good and how much animus there is to do this simple, effective thing.

The U.S. stock market is falling again following a sell-off that swept Europe and Asia.

Gift article: “Those in large, central metropolitan areas are disproportionately vulnerable, according to the analysis. Hospitals in such places make up just 18 percent of all hospitals in the country, but they represent half of the most at-risk ones.” www.nytimes.com/2025/11/18/u...

The top concern we heard about the Fed's embrace of lighter-touch bank oversight is that it could lead to more blindspots that may mean a bigger crisis "People don’t know what problems were stopped before they had a chance to hurt them," said Peggy Twohig, who led the CFPB's supervision dept

Medicaid insurers have incentives to maintain "ghost networks," lists of providers that are unavailable. The WSJ analysis found more than a third of the doctors listed in the networks didn’t treat the insurers’ Medicaid patients. (gift link) www.wsj.com/health/healt...

Feeling the pinch @yahoofinance.com finance.yahoo.com/news/medicar...

Imagine escaping the literal Nazis, making it to America, living three quarters of a century there making your life, and then this:

NEW: The Trump administration's brutal removal of so many workers is projected to shrink the nation’s GDP by as much as 6.8% — a deeper hit than the one sustained during the Great Recession. A.J. Schumann:

Again, this is an existential crisis for the entire financial & academic model of 🇺🇸 public universities, but the public doesn’t understand this, in part because our leaders have been <totally absent from the public square> on this issue. It’s maddening: bsky.app/profile/mcop...

What can happen now that the FTC's 'click-to-cancel' subscription policy is canceled. (gift link) wapo.st/3LJCt79

A new study finds the people who need SNAP and Medicaid the most often struggle to access them. Administrative hurdles and uncertainty make enrollment hard.

An important pragmatic point as Trump, Dr. Oz, and others claim to want to reform the subsidy scheme for 2026: It's too late for that. Insurers modeled premiums with and without enhanced subsidies; they *didn't* estimate rates accounting for some quarter-baked scheme to issue some subsidy as cash.

You know you’re in good shape when you have your people out there going “isn’t unemployment relaxing?”

Paul Krugman only reads blogs and that is why he, unlike everyone else who has been in punditry for decades, has never lost his mind

These short-term health plans, also called junk plans, may be cheaper than ACA insurance, but the coverage is so full of holes that five states have banned their sale. (gift link) wapo.st/4oRpNtt

“Older adults and people with disabilities will pay almost $203 per month in 2026 for their Medicare Part B premium, the Trump administration said late Friday. That’s about 10% higher than the $185 per month that Medicare beneficiaries pay this year. Rising health care costs are a major concern”

Jamelle was cooking. Gift link: www.nytimes.com/2025/11/12/o...

No. No. No. Waking up to the devastating news that Alice Wong has passed. I have no words yet, except to say that Alice was a powerful force for good in the world & I loved her. I posted the below just before her passing.

The DOT also reportedly plans to rescind requirements that airlines disclose junk fees. It's also planning to redefine what flight cancellations would require refunds for passengers. Both Delta and United gave $1 million to the Trump inauguration fund. Everything is for sale.

For more on Rev. Woolf, who appears to have been arrested today: he published an editorial with @rns.org literally this week titled “Why clergy should risk assault to protest ICE” —> religionnews.com/2025/11/13/w...

Faith leaders and ordinary residents have shown more courage than all of elite society has in standing up for their neighbors, and America.

New from me: Global Entry revocations are surging in the last ~2 years, well outpacing enrollment, according to data from a FOIA. People often don't know why their membership was revoked. www.bloomberg.com/news/article...

what's wild is we're not even really seeing the impact of the complete and total evisceration of corporate oversight, consumer protection, and the social safety net yet our regulators genuinely no longer function and the press, politicians, and even policy people also haven't noticed yet

Funding retirement plans with AI data-center debt? What could possibly go wrong? (gift link) www.wsj.com/finance/inve...

Are they really?

The WiseR plan will bring prior authorization, using AI, to traditional Medicare. The project is scheduled to launch in six states starting in January. A few Democrats have introduced a bill opposing it. @wendellpotter.bsky.social open.substack.com/pub/healthca...

If this number were true, it would amount to about ~0.4% of 42 million recipients.

How is AI *really* impacting jobs? Henley Chiu, the CTO of Revealera, a jobs data analysis firm, analyzed 180 million jobs listings in 2024 and 2025, in an effort to find out. Chiu found an: -8% drop in all jobs postings -~30% drop in art, photography, writing jobs -22% drop in journalism jobs

NEW: @propublica.org investigated the Chicago apartment raid where kids were zip-tied and citizens detained for hours. They find: - NONE of the arrested were criminally charged - NO evidence the building was "filled with TdA terrorists." - ZERO legitimate reason for DHS to rappel from a Blackhawk.

The SNAP fight at the Supreme Court is officially over. Trump's Department of Justice acknowledges that SNAP is now fully funded through the end of the fiscal year and thus withdraws its request for an additional stay. The end of the shutdown mooted the case before SCOTUS could touch the merits.

🧵👇

We started Indivisible in 2016 because a future Trump appointee was talking about the WWII Japanese internment camps as a model for immigrants at the same time that Schumer was talking about finding common ground with Trump.

What a change from one year ago.

Fret about AI bubbles all you want, this may be the biggest source of financial stability risk out there: What happens when you can't get the insurance your mortgage requires you to have? They'll be a breaking point, as Trump admin doing all it can to exacerbate climate risks with fossil fuel push.

👀 "In some of the more striking cases, Trump’s pardons erased not only criminal convictions for defendants tied to large-scale corruption and financial crimes but the restitution judges had ordered or that defendants had agreed to pay." per @propublica.org www.propublica.org/article/trum...

This new piece from @shannonmattern.bsky.social about the role of libraries in public life is extraordinary. There's so much I want to quote from it, but I'd encourage you to take the time to read it yourself instead... placesjournal.org/article/extr...

Ahead of Veterans Day, I was honored to welcome a flight of veterans and their families as they arrived in DC.

THE SOCK IS TWO HUNDRED AND THIRTY DOLLARS. 😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂

These kinds of things happened two decades ago under the last Republican president. A lot of people made a lot of short term money. Then it all came crashing down and his successor had to clean up a huge mess. Here we go again.

This point absolutely correct and I will add that Mamdani demonstrates that an insurgency, even one with real moral clarity and anger at the status quo, can still be cheerful and inviting.

I wonder if any of them realize that sculptor Anish Kapoor is an immigrant as well.

aaaaand we are back to private sector job losses in ADP, 4-wk avg loss of 11k in the week ending Oct 25 implying a sharp deterioration at the end of the month given the 42k monthly gain for October. This new data series is basically averaging zero net private sector job creation since August

Then they came for the coffee shops (gift link) wapo.st/445ikyu

The CFPB was created. The Trump administration is seeking to eliminate it, despite the fact that Congress has passed no law enabling it to do so.

It is incredible — the blind spots you develop when you’ve never, ever been poor.

Even as the Social Security Administration falsely claims that phone wait times are down to single-digit minutes, callers are recording dance routines to the hold music as they wait over two hours . . . equal parts adorable and horrifying! parade.com/news/80s-sta...