LMAO so the college president who received $2 million in total compensation from WVU last year thinks ‘Universities Have Become Isolated and Arrogant’ Oh really? Have we? LOL give me a break and get back on your yacht www.chronicle.com/article/univ...

This goes for all those defending the NYT's handling of Epstein, as well.

His closing lines are 🔥: "What I do know is that I was accused more than once by some Board members and the Governor’s office of being stubborn. Perhaps I am. But stubborn and principled often look the same, especially to those who are unprincipled."

this is obviously a very UVA-specific letter, but it absolutely reflects the bad faith of a weaponized federal government & outside supporters against higher ed. as such, it's a must-read for anyone wanting a feel for what universities/faculty/students are up against.

Former UVA president Jim Ryan, who resigned over the summer due to pressure from the Trump Administration, just shared this 12-page letter with the Faculty Senate, detailing his experience with the Board of Visitors and DOJ. It's a surreal--and troubling--read. drive.google.com/file/d/1Is6x...

Literally yes this.

can’t wait to tell my students in the middle of class, “hold on—gotta email the chancellor before I can answer your question“

Let me fix that for you: Texas A&M is limiting how instructors may discuss gender identity and race in classrooms in an assault on academic freedom unseen in America since the Red Scare.

After Moneyball (the book) made Teahen moderately famous, I met him at a Hy-Vee grocery store in Columbia, Mo., as part of the Royals winter caravan. He was there signing photos with Brian McRae, John Mayberry, and Andy Sisco.

An interesting tidbit in the joint status report filed in the Broadview ICE facility case today: ICE says video from inside the facility "between October 19, 2025, and October 31, 2025, has been irretrievably destroyed" and can't be produced in discovery. www.courtlistener.com/docket/71832...

This is real news. Reporters, please report on it. ELEVEN former top FCC officials, Republican and Democratic, came together to condemn FCC Chairman Carr's abuses of power and efforts to suppress legal speech. It's not just Jimmy Kimmel. The FCC's jawboning and chill on legal speech is ongoing.

Sometimes you run across an old quote that stops you cold. From a Jayson Stark article in January 2000:

Apples-to-apples, the Clinton email server dump had so much boring, banal email compared to this. But that didn't stop Trump and the GOP from running around in 2016 like it was Watergate. Other lesson: the news media has/had no discernible methodology for document dumps and proportional coverage.

The thing about my Daily Beast tenure I'm proudest of? How we stayed on the Epstein story for years, when all of the uptown elites were rolling their eyes and telling us to go away.

i only ever knew one thing about larry summers & it was that he said that girls are bad at math so now i know two things about larry summers not looking good as legacies go, lar

if you can’t see the aurora borealis tonight, here is a sewer tunnel which is a wonder in itself.

So if someone teaches NYT v. Sullivan as a civil rights case, would that require a prior approval? Because it's pretty difficult to teach a law course without examining structural power imbalances. I am *so* thankful to have escaped these Texas shenanigans.

Texas A&M panel: Firing violated professor’s academic freedom - @texastribune.org share.google/Q5UVRMb2CCd5...

Breaking: Marion County agrees to pay out $3M for newspaper raid, express regret kansasreflector.com/2025/11/11/m...

This is what A&M, UT Austin and other universities need to be made to see. cc: @texasaaup.bsky.social @aaup.org @utaustinaaup.bsky.social

Nico Harrison is now free to take over as lead strategist for Senate Democrats

A fair point. When I was at CNN, for instance, we had to pass legal AND something called The Row (fact-checking and journalistic standards), which invariably improved our stories, AND Standards & Practices, which I gradually realized meant corporate standards and was largely about butt-covering…

You only live thrice

Over the last 10 months, the federal government has cracked down on political expression with a persistence and viciousness reminiscent of some of the darkest periods of U.S. history. Welcome to the Third Red Scare.

On Thursday, a wave of horror stories about ChatGPT hit California courts.

one time I pointed out that elon musk followed no women on twitter and he immediately followed caity weaver

OSCAR ISAAC, on whether he'd return to "Star Wars": ".. Yeah. I mean, I’d be open to it, although right now I’m not so open to working with Disney. But if they can kinda figure it out and, you know, not succumb to fascism, that would be great." @variety.com $DIS variety.com/2025/film/ne...

Hey, happy opening day fellow llamas! #learnedleague #LL107

Happy There Is A Circulatory System Walking Through The Kitchen Day to all who celebrate.

My college intramural team was the Yaksmen and you’d better believe this news blew up the groupchat this morning

I am once again saying that we saw what wall to wall, panic coverage of a crisis looked like after the Biden debate and there’s no reason Trump isn’t getting that kind of coverage except for class solidarity.

In case you were wondering how long I would be free from high school band drama after putting the last piece of equipment away from the last performance from marching season at 8:30 p.m. yesterday, the answer is less than 12 hours

I’m at a drumline contest, sitting in the shade of a hot parking lot because it’s 80 degrees with glaring sun and not a cloud in the sky at the moment

One of my buddies’ kids just won a bronze medal at worlds in trampoline, and you’ve never seen a college bro groupchat blow up like we have over the past few days. Streaming tumbling worlds at 8 a.m. and cheering. Anyhow dudes rock.

I am once again reminding you that “general” is the adjective in “attorney general” (and deputy attorney general). If you need help remembering that, just think of Ted Cruz begging his wife to call him “general” when he was Texas solicitor general. www.politico.com/news/2025/11...

sometimes an Oxford comma can make all the difference

I am reminded of Thunder Beef

Federal authorities said public prayer is only allowed after high school football games.

Me and some other senior band dads with left speaker, aka my speaker since 2019 when my middle kid was a freshman marimba player

My last Friday night lights as a Paschal high school band parent, after 10 years with kids here. It’s going about as well as the past decade of games.

Rumesa Ozturk was grabbed off the street and detained for six weeks and threatened with deportation over an op-ed

The AP tracked down details of some of the people killed in President Trump's military strikes on drug smugglers he describes as narco-terrorists. They were, with one exception, not high-level criminals. One was a fisherman. One was a bus driver; another a taxi driver. apnews.com/article/trum...

When in Houston, have to make a stop at Campesino Coffee for tamales & cafe de olla

This is it. It’s on that dotted line where it could be either, and that’s that. That’s the way it works. The jury reached its decision.

VICTORY: Federal court dismisses class action lawsuit against pollster J. Ann Selzer, filed by the “Center for American Rights” www.thefire.org/news/victory...

making Jacob the stereotypical Bluesky user is the rudest and truest attack anyone has ever made on us

On a brief visit to Houston - guest lectured in a course at Rice yesterday, seeing my kid in Little Shop of Horrors tonight. At happy hour at Loro Asian smokehouse on Kirby now and it’s incredible.

in light of sandwich guy I am contractually obligated to remind you that jurors can always prevent a conviction by choosing to say "not guilty" 🙂 the power to refuse to convict is espech important rn given the Trump admin's rampant criminalization and repression of dissent (and other freedoms, too)