Trump repeatedly expressed his concern about autism yesterday when he told pregnant women not to take Tylenol. The research on Tylenol is mixed, some studies show an association, some don't. It's worth noting how his administration has undermined autism science www.propublica.org/article/rfk-...

-cutting 10s of millions of $s for more than 50 autism-related studies -rolling back protections from air pollution, which studies link to autism -reversing bans on chemicals, including TCE, also linked to autism -Ending her autism research & gov career 👇 www.propublica.org/article/rfk-...

Please stop supporting the single use plastics industry. Just carry a water bottle around it’s not that hard. www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

I know it's hard to do but you have to tune out the constant & I mean constant torrent of criticisms on social media re: activism & organizing. If you don't, it can stop you from trying to do any activism or organizing. Most of the critics aren't doing any organizing themselves so keep trying things

Just back from the pediatrician and they expressed a very direct concern that within the next few years “we are going to lose all vaccines.”

This is sad and gross.

Supposedly, the world is divided into good, noble “lions” and evil, grasping “scavengers.” Guess which one Ben thinks he is? www.currentaffairs.org/news/ben-sha...

Trump’s plan for a “midterm convention” is actually very smart. As I wrote for @currentaffairs.bsky.social , unlike Biden, Trump grasps the importance of ensuring that people recognize, concretely, what the federal government is doing for them: www.currentaffairs.org/news/make-bu...

...the Joe Biden playbook: build renewables while also building fossil fuel infrastructure at the same time, ensuring that we make no meaningful climate progress. Better than Trump’s atavistic death drive of an environmental policy, but that doesn’t make it any less daft. jacobin.com/2025/09/hoch...

Many right wing Silicon Valley billionaires are sick freaks who welcome human extinction because they want AI to take over. Their influence explains why Trump 2.0 is such a terrible time to be alive: newrepublic.com/article/2003...

A lot of wisdom in @lizafeatherstone.bsky.social 's latest piece on NY governor Kathy Hochul - someone who's hardly been a leader, but who has repeatedly been willing to tack left when that's what the prevailing winds seems to favor. jacobin.com/2025/09/hoch...

The free speech activist who built a list of professors he worked to get fired for their speech must be celebrated for his support of free speech, and anyone who quotes his speech accurately in context will be fired and/or face state punishment by the champions of free speech, do I have that right?

As I wrote for @currentaffairs.bsky.social , “Biden believed that if he poured money into [Republican-led states], the story of his policies’ benefits would simply tell itself. It was a terrible assumption.” www.currentaffairs.org/news/make-bu...

The federal government is killing federal transportation grants nationwide because the projects they would have funded are designed to help pedestrians, cyclists, and transit riders—rather than drivers.

This piece is very good, and an excellent response of sorts to @ezraklein.bsky.social www.vanityfair.com/news/story/c...

There’s a huge opportunity here for green social housing. Even with these zoning changes, new construction faces headwinds, especially for lower-income residents. But the state is now opening space—literally—for the subsidized construction of beautiful, climate-friendly, mixed-income homes.

The USDOT is systematically killing transportation projects that were funded, but that don't prioritize driving. Other projects that are being targeted for defunding are apparently pedestrian & bike improvements in Auburn, San Diego, NYC, Chicago, Philadelphia, San Francisco, Portland, and more...

Boston's fed grant to improve safety at key intersections has been cancelled by USDOT because, according to the agency: "DOT's priorities presently include... preserving or increasing roadway capacity for motor vehicles... [the] project includes several elements that impede vehicle capacity & speed"

I’m legitimately confused about which forms of violence are political and which are not.

Political violence is bad unless you're committing it against your most vulnerable constituents for a photo op, I guess.

What if bureaucrats were hot influencers?

Maybe don’t kill NEPA? www.nytimes.com/2025/08/21/u...

Yes, we need critical analyses of climate and capitalism. No, we don’t need Fox News headlines in the Nation or exhausting, one-sided takes on green political economy.

I'm going to be a bit more precise. The problem w the headline is that it reproduces Fox News memes that renewable energy is itself fraudulent—ie, not green, no better for enviro, etc. That's just not true. Worse: that's not even what the piece or the underlying book is about! 1/

I dare you to go to Annunciation School and tell our grieving community, in effect, guns don’t kill kids, antidepressants do. Just shut up. Stop peddling bullshit. You should be fired.

“The main thing is that [Vienna] just kept the policy commitment: housing is a human right, we’re going to keep building it.” @aldasky.bsky.social @cplusc.bsky.social

What’s not a feature of democracy is pitting citizens against experts. It is, however, a classic feature of fascism.

This is the make or break moment for Powell's @federalreserve.gov. If they do not defend Lisa Cook and treat her as still on the Board, the fight over the Fed as an independent agency will officially be over. see my Friday piece. www.crisesnotes.com/trump-vs-pow...

We need a politics that “reasserts the public sphere as a brandable, defensible alternative” to privatization and corruption. My latest, on why we need a robust federal workforce: @currentaffairs.bsky.social @fedworkersunited.bsky.social www.currentaffairs.org/news/make-bu...

This isn’t education, it’s indoctrination. The Trump administration gutted PBS and NPR not to save money, but to control the narrative. In their place, PragerU is moving into more classrooms. Already in Florida, Oklahoma, South Carolina, and Idaho schools.

The rise of fascism in the U.S. has been fueled by a deeply broken citizen-expert relationship. I wrote for @currentaffairs.bsky.social about the roots of this crisis, and what we can do about it: www.currentaffairs.org/news/make-bu...

I wrote a bit in this new piece for @currentaffairs.bsky.social about how 1970s-era @pbs.org , which was really special, was my first experience of a tangible public good—and about a manual laborer I recently met with a PBS tattoo on his arm who felt the same. www.currentaffairs.org/news/make-bu...

All this does is allow this regime to further pull us into stupid meme wars - a distraction from the grueling work of rebuilding democracy. It’s discouraging to see people falling, again, for this nonsense, which will have the same transformative effect as “brat summer” and coconut memes.

In the past, the administrative state was a powerful force for good in Americans’ lives. To defeat Trumpism, it needs to become one again. www.currentaffairs.org/news/make-bu...

MBGA—which stands for “Make Bureaucracy Great Again”—doesn’t exactly roll off the tongue the way MAGA or MAHA do. But embracing the idea, if not the acronym, is necessary to fighting Trumpism effectively. www.currentaffairs.org/news/make-bu...

The word “bureaucracy” often has strong negative connotations. But a bureaucracy is simply a system of experts who make important decisions. Throughout our history, bureaucracy has been key to making this country great for most Americans. www.currentaffairs.org/news/make-bu...

While many Americans now appear to disapprove of DOGE itself, many nevertheless continue to believe that “government is inefficient” and that “DOGE is a good idea.” This raises the question: What has gone wrong in American society that has given us DOGE? www.currentaffairs.org/news/make-bu...

DOGE is the product of a crisis in the relationship between American citizens and government experts. The federal government is failing to communicate effectively with the public about the things that it is doing to improve their lives. www.currentaffairs.org/news/make-bu...

We need knowledgeable, public-spirited bureaucrats who, like their New Deal predecessors, are empowered to deliver things people need, and who are committed to democratically building public support for the administrative state. www.currentaffairs.org/news/make-bu...

By dismissing “populism” as universally “bad,” today’s liberal anti-populist crusaders obfuscate the reality that it was populist demands and mass movements that prompted the development of the regulatory state that Trumpists seek to dismantle. www.currentaffairs.org/news/make-bu...

DOGE did not have “the right idea,” and any serious opposition would reject its entire premise. We need federal workers empowered to manage much greater levels of public investment than we’ve recently had, and we should say so. For @currentaffairs.bsky.social www.currentaffairs.org/news/make-bu...

Thanks to author @ear2thepavement.bsky.social for her latest @currentaffairs.bsky.social piece, which spotlights FUN and co-executive director Chris Dols. #MakeBureaucracyGreatAgain #supportfederalworkers #savefederaljobs Read more: www.currentaffairs.org/news/make-bu...

This piece by @ear2thepavement.bsky.social is so, so good. It lays out exactly what we need- use the federal government to make people's lives better directly- not through a private entity. Love this quote from @aldasky.bsky.social ‘We’re from the government and we’re here to help—and it’s great!’

Excellent piece by @ear2thepavement.bsky.social on relations between government, citizens and expertise in the US. Brings to mind Theodore Porter's book, 'Trust in Numbers: the Pursuit of Objectivity in Science & Public Life'. Porter makes a case that... 1/2

Everybody needs to read this new piece by @ear2thepavement.bsky.social about how government can actually make our lives better! DOGE is a scam; we need bureaucrats! www.currentaffairs.org/news/make-bu...

To hold off fascism, we need to do more than resist. We need to learn from history, and build a *charismatic* state, with civil servants working hand-in-hand with working class communities to make lives better. @ear2thepavement.bsky.social nails it! www.currentaffairs.org/news/make-bu...