Every month for the last 77 years, the Bureau of Labor Statistics has estimated Americans' unemployment rate This streak dies tomorrow Govt staff could not survey Americans about whether they're working or looking for work in Oct, the 1st time in 934 months This blind spot will remain forever

A new collection of CTU stickers. Which one do you think is my favorite?

What Ken Griffin has in common with the avg NYC voter is limited to fundamental biology and doesn't even include a zip code. Who cares what Ken Griffin thinks? Ken Griffin Hopes Mamdani's Policies Differ From His Talking Points search.app/aeCbE

The shutdown narrative shift from GOP vs "Dems who want healthcare for illegals" to WH vs Senate GOP illuminates what a dumb trap Trump has built for himself. If this weren't so dangerous I'd be enjoying it. apnews.com/article/trum...

For so long the Church has coded right-partisan, largely because it has chosen narrow culture war public engagement. Signs are abounding the Catholic Church is escaping that extreme position and returning to a mainstream, consistent ethic engagement. I am here for this.

This really hasn’t gotten enough attention this week. @wired.com #ICE www.wired.com/story/fbi-wa...

But ask yourself how generously patient he'd be if Biden or Obama kept the sacraments from people. Detainees' access to sacraments is 'under careful review' share.google/ww8fPG5Y042Q...

Listening to Democrats on @stephruhle.bsky.social talking abt Pope Leo and making Catholic arguments agnst MAGA. We're in a different place.

Shithole country stuff. www.msn.com/en-us/politi...

In days after his election many of us reflected on how he had become the most powerful American in the world. I am surprised he is leaning into it. And, I am grateful. www.bbc.com/news/article...

To those troubled by Zohran Mamdani, E.V. Debs, and democratic socialism— I give you Thomas Aquinas, John Paul II, and the Catechism on the universal destination of goods. share.google/Nq9ihzvvFONa... share.google/2woKlSA37OOh... share.google/ClSp8oJLdkC3...

If they think 'Democratic Socialism' is radical, wait 'til they hear about authentic Catholicism! 😇

This is the Cheney obituary to read. www.thenation.com/article/poli...

Too early to say this was because of ATC staffing and the shutdown. But it remains always true that governing is serious. Too serious for memes and AI-generated nonsense, too serious for partisan gridlock. When we fail to be serious abt governing, people die. www.livenowfox.com/news/plane-c...

You'll want to remember Dick Cheney for Afghanistan and Iraq, waterboarding and Guantánamo. History will remember him (and David Addington) most for Bush Admin signing statements that quietly created a legal argument for a unitary executive, and so DOGE, withholding SNAP, etc., etc.

Around Chicago ICE/Border Patrol are mostly just driving around looking for landscaping crews. It’s not targeted by threat or criminal background. It’s just Kavanaugh sweeps of brown men in work clothes operating landscaping equipment to hit quotas. They’re not investigating, they’re hunting

Friends in the DC Metro area, The Bernardin Center is coming to you on Nov 14. Please join us for Mass and a reception as we remember Cardinal Bernardin on his 29th memorial. Mass at 12p at Monastery of the Holy Land in America. Reception to follow. bernardincenter.substack.com/p/cardinal-b...

This is such incredibly welcome news. @heidischlumpf.bsky.social is one of the most experienced Catholic journalists in the US with a deep perspective. Commonweal is the oldest and most thoughtful lay Catholic journal we have. Great things are coming. Ad multos annos.

Rubin's got the analysis right, except she doesn't see it's a horrible calamity. All the stuff abt voting for candidates not issues is a smarter sounding way to say we vote for celebrities despite our interests, and that's what got us Trump. It's not politics. open.substack.com/pub/contrari...

A distinction could be helpful. Politics is the opposite of violence. "Political violence" is an oxymoron. The result here shouldn't arouse 'O tempora O mores' pearlclutching abt the youngs. It should tell you we have allowed politics to fail, and so politic's alternative is here to take root.

I'm a big fan @govpritzker.illinois.gov. But did dropping that F bomb move the needle in some way I'm not seeing? Shock and performance got us here. If we want something different, more of the same is a bad strategy.

Hot take. Donald Trump is not news. Nothing he can do can be newsworthy because the story is the same corruption and authoritarianism over and over. The next newsworthy thing about him will be when, one way or another, he is not in power. There is no news in the White House. I learn nothing new.

Up and down the Rio Grande A thousand footprints in the sand Reveal a secret no one can define The river flows on like a breath In between our life and death Tell me who's the next to cross the borderline

I am genuinely proud that this is the way my entire city seems to be approaching this invasion by masked kidnappers. Document the crimes, document the harms, document the bad actors. Share information. Make it as hard as possible for them to commit these atrocities.

Most of the US is spared the ugliness of a paramilitary presence, being surveilled by facial recognition and StingRays, seeing neighbors thrown to the ground and taken away to inhumane conditions. But when you are able to see it, it's hard to call it America. And there's nothing "Great" about it.

My good friend Father Michael Place has begun writing on Substack. You'll recognize the person his younger self is there with. Father Mike was the steady theological mind supporting the Bernardin years in Chicago. I urge you to follow him and hear from him today. open.substack.com/pub/inthispl...

Once again the Church showed up. A Mass for All Saints at Broadview where again access was refused to bring Eucharist to detainees though all of DHS's protocols were observed. I would guess >1000 souls there to bear witness. All you holy men and women, pray for us. share.google/s6pfmCwdxafc...

A partial list of what Bovino does not have to tell a federal judge happened today: *An agent pushed a City Council member in Albany Park *Agents deployed pepper spray in Albany Park & Evanston *Agents were involved in a car crash in Evanston *An agent pointed a gun at a woman in Evanston

"They were careless people, Tom and Daisy—they smashed up things and then retreated back into their money and let other people clean up the mess they had made."

'Let them eat art deco green tile style, which is totally inappropriate for the Lincoln era.'

15 million Americans are going to lose their health care.

The urgency of a 3d term is much like urgency of disrupting midterm voting— If there ever is an investigation reckoning with ICE, misuse of funds, God knows what else, the exposure a lot of ppl will have to jail time will be substantial. Keeping pwr isn't as much abt pwr as avoiding consequences.

End stage capitalism update. Now I can't buy a drink at Walgreens on way to work without being pressured to apply for a Walgreens Mastercard. The poor employees have to, I get that. It's all part of the same inhumanity. But debt harvesting at my convenience store is near the bottom of the barrel.

I can’t stress this enough: you cannot understand politics without reading this paragraph about why there’s no such thing as a 1/3rd pound hamburger

NEW: @govpritzker.illinois.gov says abuses committed by federal agents carrying out President Donald Trump's mass deportation efforts have become "wider and more intense." Pritzker calls the agents "thugs" who are intimidating law-abiding Chicagoans. @wttw.bsky.social

Weird things to say. Dems voted for HR 1968 in March. Did GOP come to table in 6mos abt healthcare premiums? I missed it. So why would this time be diff? In Sept Senate GOP suspended filibuster for 48 noms. Why not do it again to fund govt? And I'm no progressive so go blow smoke someplace else.

Not quite on schedule, but not far off either.

The GOP theory of govt is reality TV. It's important to recognize this. Govt under this theory is not for the common good or public safety or making life better. Their constituents expect none of that. Under this new theory govt's only true purpose is one or another version of—

Fun fact. Trump destruction of soybean exports (rightfully) gets lots of attention. But you know what we sell even more of to China? Education. 2024 soybean exports to China: $13B. Higher Ed: $14B. Yes, all those internat’l students count as *exports.* Trump is STILL actively destroying that market.

For those wondering what the new White House ballroom will look like, I recommend a visit to Alsip, IL.

Whenever people complain about the number of folks relying on food stamps, it is worth reminding them that SNAP is, by too large of a degree, a subsidy for corporations that refuse to pay a living wage and their political allies who reject public policy prescriptions to reduce income inequality.

Your occasional reminder that the greatest threat to constitutional govt isn't tearing down the East Wing or even ICE raids. Its happening in plain sight, and nearly no one sees it. But the POTUS is absorbing congressional power that will be hard to get back. www.reuters.com/world/us/us-...

🧵This is an important story. Chicago is at the forefront of the resistance to our nation’s fall into authoritarianism. Every city should be joining in and showing consistent support for them. We’re in one of the most pivotal moments in the nation’s history.

Now when it drops on your dirty little head Where you gonna go? It's you, you, you When it drop on, you're gonna feel it

Those who wish to make a report can call the Secretary of State’s Plate Watch Hotline at 312-814-1730 or email [email protected]. Illinois Secretary of State issues warning after Border Patrol caught on video in Round Lake admitting to license plate swapping share.google/4FslTbsAWNg4...

The ad gets a lot of eyeballs during baseball games. Trump has gotten it even more eyeballs.

Art has no use-value. It defies utility and acquisitiveness. Art gives the best inocculation agnst the sterile, inhuman world being built by wealthy tech ppl. Without art, we have no true politics. John Adams: ‘Wealthy tech people have no interest in culture’ share.google/8LB33DsAbpDW...