10 Sunday Morning Reads – FBI: Epstein Was Vladimir Putin’s Wealth Manager –An embittered Brit decimated Washington Post –US Brain Drain Threatens Scientific Leadership –How Substack makes money from hosting Nazi newsletters –What I Saw at the Battle of Minneapolis ritholtz.com/2026/02/10-s...

You're saying that Trump's tariffs not only (1) increased costs on Americans (2) crippled industries that lost export customers, but now also (3) did not work at all and only INCREASED the trade deficit (probably because of 2)?!? It's almost like Trump is a moron. www.nytimes.com/2026/02/19/b...

No WAY.

10 Thursday AM Reads: -The Grift Economy Is Going Mainstream -Bitcoin's Plunge Should End the Hype That It Is Digital Gold -Why Voters Hate Trump's (Pretty Decent) Economy -The Disappointment of Young Trump Voters -Why AI Writing Is So Generic, Boring, and Dangerous ritholtz.com/2026/02/10-t...

I wasn't sure this off-Broadway play was believable until real life overtook it www.nytimes.com/2026/02/16/o...

10 Weekend Reads: -Something Big Is Happening -Inside the Booming Business of Monster Porn (GQ!) -26 Rules to Be a Better Thinker in 2026 -Is inherited wealth bad? -Are We Tripping? -The 'Harvard of Umpire Schools' Closes as Changing Times Favor Tech Over Tradition ritholtz.com/2026/02/10-w...

The Project 2025 author is using millions of dollars in USAID money for his own security detail. It is estimated that 762,000 people have *already died* as a result of Elon Musk and Russell Vought’s obscene murder of USAID, including more than 500,000 children. Vought is a mass murderer.

A key moment that shows the police-state nature of the Trump regime.

Time for Democratic officials to petition the state bar of each DOJ lawyer who works on these BS cases to be disbarred. These prosecutors know the case is "not supported by probable cause." That is grounds for disbarment. Time to take the fight to the corrupt DOJ!

NEW: Ever feel like everything takes longer, costs more, and leaves you more frustrated than it should? That’s not a coincidence. We call it the Annoyance Economy, and it costs American families $165 billion a year in wasted time and money. 👇

Just learned that AIPAC has now jumped into a fourth open seat House race in Illinois, backing Melissa Conyears Ervin with what has been described as a $2.8 million buy (around $500k a week). This is straight up AIPAC, not a shell PAC, through United Democracy Project.

No Kings includes Draft Kings

Bitcoin crashing, down to 66,000. Let's hope it doesn't take down the whole system. I guess they too did not realize that everything Trump touches turns to shit.

happening this morning in Minneapolis -- ICE agents drawing guns on observers. I reiterate again that it is only a matter of time before DHS kills more innocent people in Minnesota. Congress needs to shut this shit down right now.

A UAE investor secretly gave Trump $187 million and his top Middle East envoy $31 million. And then Trump gave that investor access to sensitive defense technology that broke decades of national security precedent. Brazen, open corruption. And we shouldn't pretend it's normal.

If many people hold a left-wing opinion they are a mob and should be ignored; if few people hold a left wing opinion they are fringe and should be ignored. The substance or correctness of the opinion is irrelevant. This is the reactionary centrist credo bsky.app/profile/eliv...

10 Monday AM Reads: -Kevin Warsh Is Trump’s Man—and His Own. How He Will Reshape the Fed -What happens after the Age of the Dollar ends? -Why public expectations of inflation matter -How high can prices in the Hamptons go? -When Bruce Springsteen Met Michael Stipe ritholtz.com/2026/02/10-m...

10 Sunday Morning Reads -Trump’s Year of Anarchy -Crypto CEO Became Enemy #1 on Wall St -Injury to Buildings and Vegetables -Trapped in the hell of social comparison -On the architecture of unreality -The commenters won -Police Losing Faith in Its Tactics ritholtz.com/2026/02/10-s...

Donald Trump is mad. And I don’t mean angry. For a president to boost this is alarming. As in 25th Amendment alarming.

Job losses and bioterrorism yes, but the other pressing threat in Amodei's essay is the threat AI poses to democracy. @nschneidman.bsky.social and I draw out the threat posed of "authoritarian lock-in" in response: www.ifyoucankeepit.org/p/the-autocr...

🚨🚨🚨They’re making their move against our election system

“Imagine how they lie when there’s no evidence to contradict them.” Watch this powerful message from Jon Stewart.

We are letting another massive opportunity slip by. The Pretti shooting remarks prove how willing they are to go with bald faced lies. Make that a crucial point! They lie to you ALL THE TIME!

Lowest consumer confidence since 2014:

Wild to for a jewish organization to be like "well if mamdani wasn't such a fucking rootless cosompolitan" bsky.app/profile/joel...

Another great piece from @elienyc.bsky.social “Trump will lose this case because he’s trying to mess with something the Supreme Court thinks is important. I wish we all could be so lucky as to appear valuable to John Roberts and the Supreme Court.”

It seems to me Congress should hold off on funding elaborate conspiracies to violate the Constitution.

The British 🇬🇧 today👇

Does ICE know a Hispanic is playing football tonight, qb for Indiana. How cool would that he if those goons charged onto the field and grabbed him. 😉

MLK Jr. said America suffers not just from "the vitriolic words and actions of the bad people but for the appalling silence of the good people." Remember this.

Walz: "What's happening in MN defies belief. News reports simply don't do justice to the level of chaos & disruption & trauma the federal govt is raining down... This long ago stopped being a matter of immigration enforcement. Instead, it's a campaign of organized brutality against the people of MN"

Harsh, but fair: Decades of Tax Cuts and Oligopoly rule have undone all of the post-World War Two Middle-class economic gains. U.S workers just took home their smallest share of capital since 1947, at least fortune.com/2026/01/13/u...

NEW and WOW: Germany, Netherlands, Sweden, and Canada are sending troops to Greenland amid continued threats from U.S. President Donald Trump to annex the territory, multiple outlets reported. www.newsweek.com/greenland-ge...

🚨🚨wake up the pope 🚨🚨

A woman recording an ICE agent tells him "Shame on you." The agent responds, "Have you all not learned from the past couple of days?" "Learned what?" she asks Then he knocks her phone out of her hand

We got “liberated”, alright. 🤡 @wsj.com www.wsj.com/livecoverage...

FTW.

Stephen Miller on CNN yesterday defending taking Greenland by force: “We live in a world, in the real world that is governed by strength, that is governed by force, that is governed by power. These are the iron laws of the world since the beginning of time.” This is the fascist manifesto.

amazing how the entire machine can pivot within 24 hours. no need to slowly upsell the argument; just issue new marching orders

The US just joined the axis of evil. We are so screwed.

Note to Venezuelans celebrating this action: everything Trump touches turns to shit. Everything.

And Trump has already ruined 2026.

👇👇

Hopefully more Americans now understand that we have a very dangerous, delusional dickwad at the controls.

Happy New Year with real fascist stuff about expelling a third of the nation. Wonder who’ll be targeted.

Trump has done so much damage to democratic institutions not via clever, well executed strategy, but by acting on authoritarian/bigoted/corrupt impulse, then stubbornly barging ahead if he meets pushback. Manufacturing charges against Abrego Garcia only after deportation failed is a good microcosm.