Kyle, can you please make a quick run up to Wolcott and unbrainwash my parents? Signed, good journalism-loving Washingtonian.
Northwest lawyer, husband of …better northwest lawyer. “A great many people think they are thinking when they are really rearranging their prejudices”-Edward R. Murrow
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Kyle, can you please make a quick run up to Wolcott and unbrainwash my parents? Signed, good journalism-loving Washingtonian.
A federal appeals judge defends the legal rule of New York Times v. Sullivan on defamation, actual malice and public figures
Resistance against harmful policies can often yield effective results. We must continue to hold our values close and push back when necessary. @wsna.bsky.social
I am at the mall and people have worked very hard to show their tattoos, while trying to cover up so it looks like they are accidentally showing their tattoos.
Here's this week's Better Offline monologue, where I consider what would happen if I'm right about the AI bubble bursting - and the consequences of both three years of myth-peddling journalism and markets addicted to growth at all costs. podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/b... Linktr.ee/betteroffline
"Her patient had signs of what could be a cancer or could be an unusual infection — diagnoses that would require completely different treatment. Ordinarily, she would confirm an infection after sending a sample to the CDC for testing ...the CDC no longer has the capacity to do that"
On the moon?
AP Livestream - CDC coming out in force to support our ousted leaders.
Gift link www.nytimes.com/2025/08/28/h...
Washington fire crews - already operating with fewer resources after the State Legislature cut $60m from its Wildfire Response Account this year - are now suffering border patrol raids. We all lose when local austerity echoes authoritarianism. www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news...
🚨Border Patrol arrested two firefighters who were actively fighting a wildfire at the time. When the other members of the crew asked for a chance to say goodbye, a Border Patrol agent told the crew member “you need to get the f*ck out of here. I’m going to make you leave.”
“Areas with high costs have high homelessness rates, and areas with low housing costs have low homelessness rates. When rents rise quickly, homelessness does, too. When rent growth is contained, homelessness drops. Increasing the housing supply helps…” www.pew.org/en/research-...
The daughters of Hermann Göring's aide - who refused for years to talk with art-theft investigators - put their home in Argentina up for sale, and GUESS WHAT.
We are very far off the cliff here folks. 🇺🇸
Oh look, it's the thing every fascist government says about the opposition party before they dissolve them and turn the country into a one party state.
The FBI just scrapped its decades-old bachelor’s degree requirement for recruits—and slashed academy training from 18 weeks to 8. What could go wrong? www.msnbc.com/msnbc/amp/sh...
@douglewin.bsky.social: "One acre of corn for ethanol = 25,000 miles in a Ford F-150. One acre of solar = 700,000 miles in an F-150 Lightning. That’s the scale of possibility Bill McKibben laid out on the Energy Capital Podcast." #alwaysbecharging www.douglewin.com/p/here-comes...
Confirming: Katherine Wells, head of Lubbock Public Health, told me the CDC was under the gag order when measles was first confirmed, so she had to turn to publicly available literature to make a cross-county containment plan: www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...
U.S. Special Operations Command, recently implicated in a covert anti-vax campaign targeting Asian countries, is seeking machine learning tools to automate digital propaganda and “suppress dissenting arguments" online, according to a procurement document I obtained theintercept.com/2025/08/25/p...
The "individualization of risk" approach to health reminds me a lot of how industries deflect their responsibility to address climate change and pollution by directing energy and attention toward consumers -- ditch plastic straws, recycle your plastic soda bottles theconversation.com/how-federal-...
The watercolor pics make this happen.
In the new issue of #ScientificAmerican: Remarkable new treatments can free millions of kids and adults from the deadly threat of peanut allergy, tackling one of our fastest-growing medical problems. www.scientificamerican.com/article/new-...
By deputizing CBP officers, Burgum is effectively expanding their powers so they can legally enforce laws and operate as police inside national parks, monuments, and other federal lands.
RFK Jr should resign because his lies — which enrich him personally because he profits from lawsuits against vaccine companies — will kill many Americans. This shooting is just the tip of the iceberg. What Congressmembers will have the courage to call for RFK’s removal from office?
A federal court ruled that ANTHROPIC illegally copied MILLIONS of books to train its AI. All authors and publishers whose books were downloaded by Anthropic from pirate websites are subject to receiving compensation. This could involve your work. For more info: authorsguild.org/news/anthrop...
"How bad slavery was" is worse. Much worse. Much worse than you think, much worse than you're taught, much worse than museums depict. Worse.
The fact that the thing we're calling artificial intelligence *can't do math* and yet we're jamming it into programs that successfully *have done math* for decades, then warning people against using the AI to do math, seems like an excellent summary of where we are.
The people dominating our political landscape, culture, and economy are just so stupid and full of shit it's almost impossible to describe
Last week, Boston received a letter from AG Bondi threatening to prosecute officials and withhold funds unless we cooperate with carrying out mass deportations. The US Attorney General asked for a response by today, so here it is: stop attacking our cities to hide your administration’s failures.
I think it's just important now and again to recognize that taking great pictures from a nuclear-powered robot car on another planet is, objectively, amazing
doing "fascism is the practice of colonialism redirected inwards" hyper literally
"Crime was *such* a pressing issue in DC that Donald Trump found it necessary to first figure out how to put up a flagpole on the White House grounds, lay the plans for a $200 million ballroom, host a bunch of crypto dinners, release a cell phone plan and a crypto coin."
We will stand up for the dignity and right to privacy of all Washingtonians. This is an important win, especially for our immigrant communities and mixed-status families, who are already being targeted by the Trump administration.
We haven’t expanded the size of the House since before the baby boom. 42 senators represent states with a combined population smaller than that of California’s. www.pbump.net/o/the-declin...
So painful to read Federalist 76, which is about the president's appointment power, in 2025. Hamilton's like, no president would be so degenerate as to appoint only those "personally allied to him," esp since Senate confirmation would 'silently operate' as an "excellent check" on such attempts
NEW VIDEO: The Supreme Court will hear several election cases this fall including a high-stakes Louisiana redistricting case that could undermine the Voting Rights Act and an anti-voting lawsuit challenging Illinois’ ballot receipt deadlines. www.youtube.com/watch?v=_bAj...
'It is a tragedy beyond recount, however, that this faint echo is all his children will retain of their father, a memory of a candle’s warmth in the gaping abyss of international inaction.'
The good news is, now that we've gotten rid of "data" the analytical value of vibes has skyrocketed
DHS is recruiting using a not-so-subtle reference to a 1978 book from white nationalist William Gayley Simpson, Which Way Western Man? Simpson's book was released under an imprint associated with the National Alliance, founded by Turner Diaries author William Luther Pierce.
Supreme Court Fast-Tracks Potential Demolition of Section 2 of Voting Rights Act by Setting Argument October 15 in Louisiana Case, Possibly in Time to Affect 2026 Midterm Elections electionlawblog.org?p=151533
18 million children will lose free school meals because of the Republican cuts to food assistance. time.com/7308619/trum...
Wow, that was mad fabulous.
The Director of the White House Office of Personnel Management just said that all government workers should be “at will” employees. This comment comes as the Trump administration attacks federal unions and tries to erode workers' rights. news.bloomberglaw.com/daily-labor-...
lol Matt Braynard.
if they start threatening wind energy executives with jail time over bird deaths, just remember that oil pits kill three times as many birds per year, according to the federal government’s own data
In the ongoing Posse Comitatus Act trial, Major General Scott Sherman — who's spent 33 years in the military — testifies that a (civilian) Trump official questioned his loyalty to the USA after he objected to a request for assistance for the MacArthur Park operation. DOJ objects. Overruled.
I am starting to believe that the AI craze actually has, for once, created a genuinely useful way to test someone's intelligence: are they unquestionably on board with using corporate AI tools for everything, or are they going "whoa, hey, wait a second"?
How many of DCs homeless are just people Jared evicted from his properties? The Beleaguered Tenants of ‘Kushnerville’ www.propublica.org/article/the-...
PREDICTION: After Trump is gone, $NVDA and $AMD will sue the US government to recover its illegally obtained export tax.
Wow…
🚨DHS asks the Supreme Court to halt an injunction restricting the ability of ICE and Border Patrol to stop and question people based on factors such as speaking Spanish, being Latino, doing day labor, or being in certain areas. Hard not to read this as a request for a license to racially profile.
Constitutionalism in a nutshell
The VA’s unilateral termination of union contracts for ~360k workers represents a loss of 2.5% OF ALL UNION MEMBERS IN AMERICA. I’m not sure what it will take for the labor movement to get into crisis mode, but the crisis is here.
Documents TPM obtained suggest that NIH is using a Palantir-built tool to push toward a program that sounds a lot like the one Congress is worried about. Full story here from @joshkovensky.bsky.social:
Today we celebrate the Voting Rights Act's 60th birthday! While the VRA has been dramatically weakened in the past 15 years, it remains among the crown jewels of the Civil Rights Movement. Understanding why it's so vital requires understanding its history and context. Time for a birthday thread...
Washington Post: “Is fascism bad? The answer may surprise you” Teen Vogue: “Here are three fun tips you can use this summer to disable an armored personnel carrier”
Alright, that was pretty funny, nice work.
Been around since the 60s. The Long History of mRNA Vaccines | Johns Hopkins | Bloomberg School of Public Health share.google/9qWlltyOwmVZ...
Important—and still timely, I may add—read
Decimated FOIA offices. Fee waiver denials. Accidental or arbitrary closures of FOIA requests. Technical failures to submit requests. These are some of the threats to FOIA. Read our deep-dive into threats to transparency for @justsecurity.org. www.justsecurity.org/118371/foia-...
Dr. Masao Tomonaga was 2 years old when the United States dropped a nuclear bomb on his home city of Nagasaki, 80 years ago today. He joins us to reflect on his life’s work studying the effects of radiation and treating fellow survivors.
🔴 THREAD: RFK Jr. just canceled 22 mRNA vaccine projects. TL;DR: mRNA vaccines saved millions of lives. Ending these projects puts us at risk and leaves us unprepared for the next big outbreak. Here’s what RFK Jr. did — and why everyone should care. 🧵 (1/12)
Journalist. Boko Haram survivor. Award-winning restaurant manager. ICE detainee.
We will all be sicker and poorer and worse off because they are turning biomedical research into a bonfire, lit with the torch of their lies about the COVID vaccines. These people hate us so much they'd rather die of cancer than allow us to live without fear. www.patreon.com/posts/135821...
Earlier last week, Mark Zuckerberg posted a new online mini-manifesto, titled “Personal Superintelligence,” setting the direction for Meta’s AI program. The one strong prediction we can make right now is that the future of AI will be a gigantic mess, with huge social costs, writes Dave Karpf.
@mawaldman.bsky.social on @morningjoe-msnbc.bsky.social: "For the first time, we see a concerted drive by the Trump administration to undermine the 2026 election. A lot of this is illegal, and it is emphatically not normal." Read our latest report: bit.ly/4l1lUPP
I went through all 106 potential amendments to the Seattle Comp Plan and wrote about the ones you definitely want to know about. www.theurbanist.org/2025/08/05/s...
“.. Within about three minutes of the crash, the Model S uploaded a “collision snapshot”—video, CAN‑bus streams, EDR data, etc.—to Tesla’s servers .. The vehicle then deleted its local copy, resulting in Tesla being the only entity having access.” @electrek.co $TSLA electrek.co/2025/08/04/t...
"The detaining of hundreds of people on immigration charges earns the jail more than $24,000 a day or $720,000 a month in fees paid by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) – on top of $36 an hour in transportation fees the jail charges Ice."
🚨The Pentagon will stop sharing vital hurricane-tracking satellite data with NOAA and NASA after July 31. Without this microwave imagery, forecasts could become less accurate during peak storm season, increasing risk to lives and coastal communities. open.substack.com/pub/theintel...
39th & 40th Congress: we are writing these constitutional amendments to give the federal government the power to address racial inequities and enforce a set of national civil rights Roberts Court: but what if you didn't
They said they intend to repeal the 20th century and they meant the 19th too
NSF and NIH cut off almost 300 grants to UCLA. Story by @dangaristo.bsky.social www.science.org/content/arti...
Trump has attempted to gut the IMLS. It’s a small agency, but public libraries across the country rely on its funding. Growing demand for digital materials and a rise in book bans have also put a strain on public libraries www.marketplace.org/episode/2025...
A vicious exam, with vicious procedures with a vicious origin story behind its very existence. The entire enterprise should be stopped. Here’s this July’s first horror story. abovethelaw.com/2025/07/bar-...
It should be a standard mainstream plank of any opposition party that it does not recognize the authority of the 6 fascist and insurrectionist members of the court and will treat all of their votes as null and void retroactive to their confirmation.
"WASHINGTON, D.C. (August 1, 2025) – The Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) announced today that it will begin an orderly wind-down of its operations" cpb.org/pressroom/Co...
My latest essay, "The Supreme Court Pretends to Think of the Children," offers a short analysis of Free Speech Coalition v. Paxton, the Texas porn site age verification case. You can read it here in George Washington Law Review's On the Docket www.gwlr.org/fsc-v-paxton...
This is an amazing blow to democracy and an illustration of how Trump and the GOP are trying to impose minority rule. Great work from @ariberman.bsky.social
The IRS's free tax filing tool is now reportedly "gone," according to Trump's IRS chief. This comes after Intuit, the maker of TurboTax, lobbied the government for years to block IRS free file. Intuit donated $1 million to Trump’s inauguration. See how this works?
The built environment, a pre arch course.
Steve illustrates the value of patiently eviscerating nonsense in lieu of ignoring it.
The Justice Department's focus on rooting out rare instances of fraud in elections "is troubling in part because it means taking away focus from actually enforcing the legal protections for voting rights," @seanmorales-doyle.bsky.social told @theguardian.com
If someone wants to shoot a lot of people and doesn't care about getting caught there isn't much you can do about it besides a decades long gun control project
Unexpectedly good politics from Thomas Kinkade's family! www.kinkadefamilyfoundation.org
Love to use the word "may" twice in a single sentence, in the guise of newswriting
This is a really terrific piece that reads like an American tragedy: a smart and curious young man interested in history and technology bought into the online far-right ideas about govt and used his talents to eviscerate it. Some thoughts 🧵
Really this is an act of war on the American people, perpetrated at the behest of one sector of the economy. It is beyond insane.
🚨On June 26, 2025, U.S. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. announced the U.S. will halt funding to Gavi, citing lost public trust and disputed science. Gavi, credited with saving 18.8 million lives, now faces a major funding gap. theintellectualistofficial.substack.com/p/us-pulls-s...
A very brief timeline from @kieraevebutler.bsky.social and I, outlining some of the actions RFK Jr. has taken in his disastrous war on vaccines. It's hard to keep up with this stuff, and that's what they're counting on. Get up to speed here: www.motherjones.com/politics/202...
Plus, why has RFK Jr. signed off on a bogus rec from his new vaccine advisory committee and what does this mean for CDC scientists? I did my best to break it down and explain what’s at stake this fall in the latest edition of Inside Medicine on Substack… 4/
The key to good legal writing is clarity. Exceptional clarity persuades. Unclarity sows doubt. Not key? Originality. Humor. Cleverness. A distinctive voice. Torrents of peripheral legal authority. Demonstrations of opposing counsel’s stupidity and bad faith. Edit for clarity.
We are seven months in, and the speed with which vital civic institutions are capitulating to authoritarian demands we once would have regarded as inconceivable in an established liberal democracy is jawdropping. I hadn't thought I was polyannaish about America, but it's really stunning.
CRITICALLY, agencies SHOULD NOT be proceeding as if a rescission package will pass. Obligate all the funds until the minute a rescission package passes. Stop only then.
jessica.substack.com/p/exotic-dan... [shocked face emoji]
This is genuinely appalling. Thinking of David Halberstam's 'Powers That Be,' with sections on mightiness of (a) CBS; (b) Wash Post; (c) Time mag; (d) LA Times. The pillars of US journalism as civic forces (with huge flaws), and as businesses. It is like Ozymandias now. Shame on CBS.
Incredible collaboration.
People talk about Seattle as though its a progressive city and yet it has effectively barred some people charged with drug crimes – *charged* not convicted – from entire areas of the city. If Trump did that there would be 1000 Bluesky posts decrying it. boltsmag.org/city-attorne...
Nicholas Slayton 