watching the CECOT 60 Minutes segment that CBS suppressed, it’s striking that Weiss specifically called out as unnecessary some of the most rigorous investigative work in the segment, including an explanation of how it was done (by human rights researchers)

Odds that we're in the "Trump is dying and trying to slap his name on EVERYTHING -- battleships, the Kennedy Center, Greenland -- before he goes" phase of the administration?

the anti-semitic Charlie Kirk conspiracy theories spreading like wildfire seems to have sparked a genuine panic among MAGA conservatives that the brand has turned so rancid, combined with, by and large, a complete inability to acknowledge that this was an inevitable result of the movement.

🧵🙄 "And despite the critiques of some current European governments, the new strategy makes it emphatically clear that the United States wants Europe to be strong"

Farewell The Hayseed Scholar podcast has come to a close. In this farewell episode, Brent's brother Kyle hosts it and they chat about the podcast and why Brent is closing it down. Two friends of the pod, Matt McDonald and Jelena Subotic, also join to mention what they liked and what they…

“A strict constitutionalist might indeed say that the constitution died in 1861...” Albert Jay Knock, Our Enemy, the State (1935). Disregarding the “Second Founding” as outside the bounds of the organic constitutional order has a long history.

we aren't powerless! never forget that outrage and pushing back works, even if it just buys time until we have more power. this is a marathon, not a sprint

This is a dumbfounding guideline. Absolutely a destructive and incompetent recommendation that was clearly made by people not qualified to judge such decisions.

An underappreciated dimension of our media and politics environment is that every policy principal is now terminally online, arguing basic policy matters in public In no sane world, prior to 2016, would anyone want the DNI (or any admin official) to set or defend U.S. policy or objectives this way

Stefanik is an opportunistic carpet bagger and she deserves every bit of this. She’s spent almost her whole Congressional career kissing Trump’s ass at the expense of her constituents. If anything this article is too nice.

And make sure to read @lkatfield.bsky.social's great new book, I highly recommend it! www.amazon.com/s?k=furious+...

This is just gutter white nationalist agitprop from Stephen Miller. A good time to read our deep dive into Miller's ideological fanaticism (see below)

There are many horrible things about the USAID cuts, but what sticks with me is how little providing this aid required of us as Americans.

Japan is going to speed run getting nukes at this rate.

It's late and I'm not gonna bother looking up a full quote, but one concerning sign with the US approach to Asia is that they aren't using the standard jargon much anymore.

Moyn in 2017: Trump isn't a threat to constitutional democracy. The courts will stop him. Liberals, and their "Tyrannophobia," are the real problem. Moyn in 2025: The Court is illegitimate and must be destroyed. Liberals, and their unwillingness to see this, are the real problem.

“they” is a person here and should face whatever law we can bring to bear, civil or criminal.

As a certified “alarmist” I think it’s a little odd this doesn’t really tackle the obvious rebuttal I heard most: That the first Trump term was quite bad, but it was not the relentless assault on the foundations of liberal democracy we’re witnessing now, until Jan 6.

It's a shell game. Trump is taking money from soldiers' housing subsidies to "give" them $1,776 "warrior dividend" checks.

Listened to @mjsdc.bsky.social describe the "Trump has the prerogatives of the Stewart King's of England" oral arguments last night. There is simply no path forward in which the United States becomes a Constitutional Republic in the absence of unpacking the Court. None. Zilch. Zero.

Well, this doesn't look remotely corrupt. Nope. Not at all. politicalwire.com/2025/12/18/t...

Today, class, we will once again discuss “revealed preferences”

"I will show those doctors who say I'm killing children now by killing more children in the future"

At the same that tech was created a new gilded class, its leaders convinced themselves that the most altruistic thing they could do with their money was keep it. www.bloomberg.com/opinion/arti...

I keep thinking—as a historian—that it’s rare when doing research to find a politician who reveals his nasty innards so blatantly—with no sense of self or shame. Future historians who didn’t live through this will be absolutely open-mouthed.

thinking about how few people know about the false electors scheme is genuinely depressing thinking about how nobody in the democratic party has signaled a willingness to reopen that question is also depressing i'm just really depressed, i think

If you’re hoping to retire, or maybe save up a down payment, well, it’s going to be a rocky few years until (if?) the regulatory state is restored ( @schumer.senate.gov try anyway!) For those who don’t know, McBride is not some bomb throwing catastrophist. If anything, the reverse.

If you read enough history, you will encounter some well-meaning person say "Well, maybe we should consider if democracy is outdated. Look at what Mr. Mussolini/General Pinochet is doing." And you think, wow, thank God we have more perspective today. And then you realize that we don't.

It's a slippery slope from "illegal aliens" to legal immigrants to naturalized citizens to people whose parents were born somewhere else to anybody who learns a forbidden concept or searches for the wrong phrase on the internet. www.brennancenter.org/our-work/ana...

“All we got in return was a country that offered millions of people a better life than what they left behind” is some really fine reasoning from the guy who’s biggest regret is that he was born too late to serve as a kapo during World War II.

Another excellent @jamellebouie.net column: We do not have a president, we have a junta (my word), unelected extremists empowered by the Supreme Court and the so-called unitary executive. Gift link. The Man Who Rules the Country Presides Over Nothing www.nytimes.com/2025/12/17/o...

OK folks, I reran the analysis cited by JD Vance predicting coldness toward Jews with 2024 ANES data. Shocker: the "foreign-born" result is pretty modest and inconsistent, other factors -- notably age and gender -- are much stronger predictors. Found a couple other interesting nuggets as well

Maybe this is why I'm not a Beltway journalist, but I think the fact the United States is about to invade Venezuela to take their oil is an 100X bigger story than Trump's chief of staff going on the record with Captain Obvious characterizations of their dysfunctional regime

Just say women. This is taking forever.

New Data shows at least 3,800 children, including infants, have been put in detention since Trump took office. Many were held for long stretches. “There is no other way to describe it; it’s a jail for children," one parent said. www.themarshallproject.org/2025/12/17/c...

This Miller deep dive scared the shit out of me. He's evil.

Stephen Miller and JD Vance say their opposition to immigration is not just gutter racism but concern about the cultures supposedly incompatible with the US. Then they ban the adoption of non white children. bsky.app/profile/reic...

On that last post: I genuinely cannot think of any good-faith reason to bar international adoptions from those 39 countries. Under this new ban, consulates will refuse adoption visas for any baby from Cuba, Haiti, Venezuela, Nigeria, or any of the 39 other countries.

NEW: President Trump is expanding the previous 19-country travel ban to a whopping 39 countries (plus the Palestinian Authority), and appears to expand a block on legal immigration to now include spouses, children, and parents of U.S. citizens, who were previously exempted.

Hundreds of underage girls married off and hundreds more children kidnapped as U.S. foreign aid cuts contribute to surge in violations against persecuted Rohingya children.

Wiping out Oracle's IP--all of it--with a quick Congressional bill at the start of a new admin--would more than suffice to make everyone realize that liberals, when sufficiently angry, are scarier than reactionaries. And it would destroy a parasitic copyright troll of negative economic value.

Hearing this is payback for Colorado not honoring Trump/Peters ‘pardon’

This is extinction-level resilience targeting. See: digitalcommons.usf.edu/jss/vol13/is...

Agree on the politics, but important to realize Rubio et al believe Venezuela regime change is the key to transforming the whole region, not least Cuba. Very much like neocons and Iraq, very parallel. This is a major geopolitical aim for them, much deeper than wag the dog

Yes. Yes. Yes.

when you read this it is very clear that Wiles thinks she is flexing the administration's muscle. relatedly, it is also very clear that the White House is completely delusional about its standing with the public. they are high on their own supply.

Really great piece. It's pretty revealing that the strongest defense of the term "interim docket" to describe the shadow docket is basically: Yeah, we know it's not descriptively accurate in a lot of cases, but we're annoyed by people who say "shadow docket." That's not even an argument!

This is extremely important

here is what the head of mi6 said btw www.bloomberg.com/news/article...