I think the Blue Dog Democrats have much to say to the Democratic Party and to American politics more generally. www.nytimes.com/2026/01/12/o...

Shapiro: J.D. Vance is profoundly and pathetically a weak human being, and he does whatever he thinks his boss wants him to do. What we need right now is not idiotic gaslighting from the sitting VP He should be ashamed of himself—and he’s not. I think that speaks to the weakness of his character.

A powerful, important take by the Jesuit magazine America on Vance's lies and the ICE killing of Renee Good. www.americamagazine.org/short-take/2...

Why is that Catholics like JD Vance, Caroline Leavitt, and Tricia McLaughlin are, apart from the president, the leading liars of the Trump Administration? All of them play on their Catholicism. All of them have forgotten/rationalized/dismissed/plunged in headlong anyhow into the sin of lying.

It's time for Catholicism to re-iterate to those in power its ancient teaching that lies are wrong (thinking of you Vance and Leavitt, habitual Catholic liars). As Pope Leo says here: “We need words once again to express distinct and clear realities unequivocally." www.nytimes.com/2026/01/09/w...

COMMENTARY: It seems an increasing number of Americans, including elected leaders and journalists, are afraid to tell the truth about what happened on January 6. That's dangerous.

Between Hegseth's persecution of Sen Kelly for saying what is true - one should not obey unlawful orders - and Miller saying that our world is "governed by strength, ...is governed by force, ...is governed by power,” we see rule by violence and the death of morality. Yes: the death of morality.

Reformed January 6th participant (who refused a pardon): “You can't gaslight me. I was there. I saw the officers being pepper sprayed. I watched one of them fall down and hit his head and his back. So don't be telling me it wasn't violent.”

In celebration of Mamdani's first day in office, the map from our 2016 NYC atlas celebrating Queens as the most linguistically diverse place on earth. (800 languages spoken in NYC, according to NY's Endangered Language Institute, which collaborated with us on this map.

I need you to listen to and share this story - of how Trump is preparing to abandon Ukraine in exchange for Russian money for his billionaire friends. It could be the greatest corruption of American foreign policy in our history. Russia gets Ukraine. Trump's friends get rich.

Trump is terrified of America's non-White population. When he warns Europe that it faces “civilizational erasure” he is offering support to Europe's ethnonationalist right, trying hard to stop Europe from following America’s multiethnic path. eduardoelreportero.substack.com/p/trump-is-e...

Powerful piece by @philklay.bsky.social on the intention and spectacle of cruelty behind the boat strikes and much else in the Trump era: www.nytimes.com/2025/12/05/o...

Is it possible that whole “free speech” and “ending censorship” thing was all just a setup by election deniers and useful idiots to work platform referees into serving their objectives? 🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔 Maybe there was no “censorship industrial complex” and these ppl never gave a shit ab free speech. 🙊

@davidfrenchjag.bsky.social with an excellent piece on the consequences for soldiers and sailors of Trump's authoritarian directives to the US military: www.nytimes.com/2025/11/23/o...

What cuts in foreign aid are doing to real human beings and to our souls: A report from Jesuit Bill O'Neill, who has worked for years in refugee camps in east Africa. www.americamagazine.org/last-take/20...

The USCCB is in a hole and, with Coakley's election, decided to keep digging. No objection here if Pope Leo makes a forceful intervention, voids the election, and gets the bishops back on track with the faith confirmed by the judgment of the whole church. www.ncronline.org/opinion/depr...

This kind of wealth is the epitome of obscenity.

Excellent piece by Elizabeth Bruenig that lays out clearly the present and growing tension between the affirmation of universal dignity and the demand to welcome the stranger at the heart of Catholic faith and MAGA's ICE-drenched-nationalism. www.theatlantic.com/ideas/2025/1...

Justice Gorsuch keeps saying to use the "plain language" and the "plain language" of the relevant statue doesn't use the word "tariff." Not a good look to try to find a way around the plain language, your Honor.

Justice Alito sounds like a lawyer for the Trump Administration - raising stuff not in the Solicitor General's argument and trying every angle to justify these tariffs. www.nytimes.com/live/2025/11...

One year ago tonight, I couldn’t sleep. Tonight, I can. Mamdani, Spanberger, Sherrill, and more: Good folks stepping up to take back this country. We celebrate tonight. Back to work tomorrow.

Mamdani: "Yes, aunties."

Also of broader note: Leo says "many people who have lived for years and years not causing problems have been deeply affected by what's going on right now." That appears to be a reference to the large number of immigrants detained in the U.S. who have no criminal record.

Very important to note: Catholicism does NOT require baptism to be saved, as this article incorrectly states and as operates as a background framework for Vance's comments. Understanding this undermines the "be baptized or bust" approach of the Christian right. www.nytimes.com/2025/10/31/u...

Two Illinois Guardsmen claim to have sworn an oath over orders, stating that they will not turn on their city

Ian McKellen at the Cambridge Union reading from Shakespeare's play "Sir Thomas More" on welcoming strangers...a text for our times: youtu.be/ffCl8jPTgmQ?...

Thank you, Bishop Bullock of South Dakota and the De Smet Jesuit Community... www.americamagazine.org/news/2025/10...

The dialogue is a whole other thing but the bit about "fuck you shoot me I'll die for this shit" and the reaction is the crux here, from Gandhi's time on down, no authoritarian in history ever knows how to respond to this and it's why it beats them whenever deployed

It seems incorrect in this WashPost story to call these people to be repatriated "alleged drug runners" since there is 0 evidence to support such claims. More accurate to say "the persons to be repatriated survived the US military attack on a vessel." www.washingtonpost.com/national-sec...

Pope Leo's reflection on God's presence in the poor is one more moment for the Catholic Church in the US to engage the theological depth of his argument and let go of the reflex to first and only consider these matters in terms of arguments about capitalism. www.vatican.va/content/leo-...

This is disturbing stuff: Reform of the Insurrection Act is clearly needed but, for now, is it too late? www.nytimes.com/2025/10/18/o...

While I respect the new Pope as I do all Popes I am a little confused why he is talking about new religious ideas about helping the poor and welcoming migrants and not traditional religious ideas like becoming rich

A great piece that offers an economic vision for a winning coalition in US politics. newrepublic.com/article/2011... via @newrepublic.com

Amen for this beautiful Paul Baumann remembrance of a great soul and good friend, Pat Jordan. Deo gratias for your beautiful life, Pat, and every consolation to your family. @commonweal.bsky.social www.commonwealmagazine.org/paul-baumann...

Love this doc from Pope Leo on love for the poor: "Lives can actually be turned around by the realization that the poor have much to teach us about the Gospel and its demands. By their silent witness, they make us confront the precariousness of our existence." www.vatican.va/content/leo-...

Amen

Thiel's anti-Christ is really just anti-libertarian: A vast government that limits the lonely freedom of the uber-wealthy. But the anti-Christ of the Gospels is the one who denies that Christ became a fully human being: poor, bound to all, loving beyond death. www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2...

"Authoritarian regimes need civil society — the realm of people and organizations outside government control — to acquiesce to their rule." www.nytimes.com/2025/10/08/o...

@davidfrenchjag.bsky.social on hope and "Lord of the Rings": "'For like a shaft, clear and cold, the thought pierced him that in the end the Shadow was only a small and passing thing: there was light and high beauty forever beyond its reach.'” www.nytimes.com/2025/10/05/o...

This guy is very good. Very well said, Mr. Mamdani

War ravaged Portland.

Liberalism has atomized & Balkanized the national community & robbed us of a common national project, no one trusts anyone anymore. We’ll fix this this by forcing your coworker Raul to carry his papers everywhere for random questioning, closing your closest hospital, & bankrupting the local college

An aching, beautiful interview with Erika Kirk, Charlie Kirk's wife. May she and her children be consoled today and forever. I invite everyone to read this to get to know Mrs. Kirk and her loving life with her husband. www.nytimes.com/2025/09/21/u...

Excellent and important piece, Dominic. Thank you

They cry “free speech” when it’s hate, violence, and lies. But the second we tell the truth or call them out, suddenly we’ve gone too far. That, my friends, is what you call selective outrage.

The amount of shit I got for this segment at the time was astronomical, and it was all from people who now stalk CVS employees to get them fired for insufficient online sadness. Cheering on political violence is both evil and not new, an outgrowth of an internet intentionally dismantled years ago.

korean reporting is nightmarish on the conditions Korean workers were contained in

“Unguarded Eyes”: The Doorway to a Politics of Conscience - Markkula Center for Applied Ethics www.scu.edu/ethics/all-a... @daviddecosse.bsky.social

In the spirit of seeking peace, here's an essay of mine calling for the development in the United States of a shared politics of #conscience. I welcome further conversation on this topic and honor all of those courageous people already engaged in the work of peace. www.scu.edu/ethics/all-a...