weird how so many democrats from competitive seats feel compelled to vote against the party line (and national interest), but republicans don't. makes you wonder if they are taking bad advice that has little to do with electoral performance, and GOP pols know this

This is a huge deal. After years of leading in fundraising, Dem small donors are (rightly) pissed off at the spam texts and emails, as well as at congressional leadership. Meanwhile, GOP billionaire money is hitting record levels. Perfect storm. www.nytimes.com/2026/02/10/u...

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I have been a little surprised that this shoe hadn't dropped already. The more that businesses become seen as extensions of a particular government's interests, the less that many other governments will want to have any relationship to them. See also the CapGemini brouhaha.

"This isn’t some fringe effort. From the tradwife explosion to MAHA disinformation about birth control, conservatives are pouring hundreds of millions of dollars into convincing the next generation that the rapid erosion of their rights isn’t a political and moral crisis—but a lifestyle upgrade."

wrote a bit this week about how my take on backlash presidential politics intersects with @adambonica.bsky.social and @jakemgrumbach.bsky.social's "How Not to Defeat Authoritarianism" open.substack.com/pub/goodpoli...

This is gender.

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1/ ProPublica collected handwritten letters in mid-January from children held at the Dilley Immigration Processing Center, the same facility where 5-year-old Liam Conejo Ramos was taken. Hundreds of kids are still detained. We’ll let the children’s words speak for themselves. 🧵

Pour one out for every professional political pundit, writer, consultant whatever that has spent the last decade trying to pretend that the Trump phenomenon was about trade or opiates and not a big chunk of white america losing its mind over having a black president bsky.app/profile/kyle...

Somebody should write a letter to Harper's

This is an important point. Empathy—in and of itself—is anti-fascist. The arts—and the project of higher education as a whole—teach empathy, enabling you to put yourself in other people’s shoes. So to a fascist, they must be destroyed.

Ian McKellen performs “The Strangers’ Case” speech from “Sir Thomas More” on Colbert.

ICE at the polls! Bannon is basically yelling “fire” in a crowded theater here. His objective is to cause chaos (and suppress votes on the left). And it’s already working. This threat works on multiple levels and doesn’t have to be “real” to serve its purpose. Let me explain & offer some advice.

In case you want to hear me rant about this to a different person!

The popularism argument would have had us counting these people out. What it misses is that people want to DO something. And if Dems are too busy reading polls to lead, people will be brave on their own and lead each other.

Number of times in past two months that Washpost Opinion has published house editorials on the Kennedy Center in Washington, DC: Zero Number of times in past two months that Washpost Opinion has published house editorials on NYC Mayor Mamdani: Six www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/the...

Trump is now demanding One Billion Dollars from Harvard, threatening criminal punishment, and insinuating Harvard’s president was chosen because of his religion (?)

I never, ever want to hear again from certain quarters about a free speech crisis on campus. I would accept apologies for being useful idiots.

the arrest of journalists in minneapolis, including don lemon, is more evidence that the only move the administration knows how to make is to use force, and does not know how to respond when that force is met with defiance and indifference.

I know we’re so far past even considering the possibility that Republicans ever actually believed in the Constitution, but it’s a useful thought experiment to read this article as if it was about Biden using technology developed by a billionaire donor to surveil anti-abortion and 2A activists.

The Trump Adm is arresting Don Lemon and overcharging disruptive protesters at Cities Church to posture as if it’s protecting Christians. It’s not. DHS is staging disruptive ops at other churches, at least one of which has had to go online. ... 1/4

This isn’t about convicting Don Lemon. It’s unlikely that will happen. It’s about intimidating journalists & making them censure themselves out of fear of consequences. It’s about eroding the free press because the administration can’t afford the criticism.

It’s so heavy when you are going to get groceries and you find a car sitting with its windows broken out and it’s empty but still running and someone’s stuffed animals or pictures or papers are just laying all over the road. I have personally seen at least five of these in the last three days alone

We need to talk about the rise of "smol bean fascism" where you have all the guns and the immunity but the really scary people are the ones with whistles and phone cameras and they're giving you generational trauma and ptsd by filming you killing people for no reason

Levitsky and Ziblatt write abt how “strong“ conservative parties are a key ingredient for democratic stability but a key caveat always gets missed: it’s the responsibility of CONSERVATIVE elites to gatekeep their looney-bin, not liberals “helping (them) by elevating certain figures

I can’t believe their plan of shooting people in the face and bombing their homes hasn’t proven more popular

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Why is Dem leadership not on the ground in MN? If the answer is “polls show Trump’s disapproval is only -15 on deportations, but -25 on prices,” thats a Bad Use Of Polling and a complete failure in their capacity as leaders to lead public opinion and fight for democracy and the rule of law

Here’s a starter pack of @startribune.com journalists on Bluesky

Reminder: All it would take to end the murder of American citizens by an untrained government goon squad is 16 Republicans in Congress voting with Dems to defund ICE (or 23 to impeach and remove Trump — 3 in House & 20 in Senate). That’s it. 23 Americans can vote for the public and end all of this.

We are dealing with a Western Christian supremacist movement willing to see millions die in the name of racial purity. This is William Wolfe. A year ago he was invited with fourteen other faith leaders to the WH. Today he is praising ICE for killing peaceful observers. This is Christian fascism.

Your reminder that MAGA is an unpopular minority movement buttressed by lies and enforced by violence and threats of violence.

In case it wasn't already clear: Rubio, Noem, & Trump want to punish these students for their free speech. They're all for free speech until someone disagrees with their views. But that's not how our 1st Amendment works. The courts must stand up to this miscarriage of justice.

Encouraging the military and paramilitary forces of authoritarian regime to quit or at least abandon their posts has long been an important goal of nonviolent, pro-democracy resistance movements, and should be adopted in the US as well

So great to see @mariajstephan.bsky.social on @colbertlateshow.bsky.social. First half below, second half here. www.youtube.com/watch?v=96Wv...

MAHA doctors elevated themselves, and RFK & Trump to power, by claiming that COVID mitigations would lead troops in the street. Now, they are part of an administration putting troops in the street. Remember those who enabled on the way. My latest for SBM.

As a democracy movement scholar, the Minneapolis ICE resistance is one of the most inspiring things I've witnessed in US politics. These people are the very best of us, and the vision of American community that they embody is far more powerful and enduring than anything the nativists could offer.

ICE wants to terrify people into submission and compliance so that they can operate with impunity, unimpeded, in semi-secrecy. It is not working. In every urban center these masked goons descend upon, the local community is rallying in solidarity.

This is the most astonishing graph of what the Trump regime has done to US science. They have destroyed the federal science workforce across the board. The negative impacts on Americans will be felt for generations, and the US might never be the same again. www.nature.com/immersive/d4...

Remember when business spent billions of dollars over decades to undermine Democrats because they threatened to impose the most minor regulations?

15 months ago

Morning

White supremacy explains many apparent contradictions. Conservative calls for free speech were always about freedom to use slurs without sanction. Calls for small government were always about denying Black folks rights and state protections. This is conservatives achieving their goals.

Being right about trump was boring, tedious, partisan, ideological. Being wrong about trump? Heterodox, contrarian, free thinking.

ICE recruitment is going well.