NEW: This weekend in Trump's effort to make fascism happen. The Trump administration tried to illegally send children to Guatemala as troops walked aimlessly around Dupont Circle. This evening, at Law Dork:
NEW: This weekend in Trump's effort to make fascism happen. The Trump administration tried to illegally send children to Guatemala as troops walked aimlessly around Dupont Circle. This evening, at Law Dork:
Any and all Trump regime claims that they’re trying to save money were proven to be ridiculous lies when they passed the budget bill Trump demanded that adds several trillion more to the debt.
Thank you. I can rest now.
Same. What is that? This will haunt me.
Pritzker on Trump sending troops into cities: "He has other aims other than fighting crime... he would like to stop the elections in 2026 or frankly take control of those elections. He'll just claim there's some problem with an election and then he's got troops on the ground that can take control."
Seems like a place that some folks would enjoy visiting once, but if you actually lived there it would get really old really fast.
Of course in these discussions someone inevitably says, “but science isn’t always right!”. Sure, but fortunately the process is self-correcting. And while no one and nothing is perfect, it’s also far better than the other options.
Thought this was well put. You’re going to have to trust someone’s information on most topics. Whose will it be? bsky.app/profile/sean...
Little kids with brain cancer. That’s who Donald Trump and RFK Jr. are screwing over by cutting health care.
Late is the hour in which both William Broad and the New York Times (www.nytimes.com/2025/08/31/s...) express concern over the Trump administration's promotion of antiscience: 🧵
*Court rules that Trump's policies are illegal but allows them to stand anyway* is the best summary of America in 2025 I know.
This enables the Trump regime’s approach of moving far faster than the courts do, so even when they lose in court, the damage is done.
But if the court believes a law to be illegal, they shouldn’t leave it in place while appeals play out. It’s illegal. Block it. If the govt wins the appeal, it can be enforced. What they are doing allows illegal laws to stay in place for months to years longer. That’s ridiculous.
It’s 2025 and I still hear people who aren’t rich say things like, “a rising tide lifts all boats”. Oh how I laugh and think “you moron”. Sigh. Increased wealth can be shared when government helps that happen. When they do less and less of that, the result isn’t hard to predict, and here we are.
I vaguely remember tweeting something like the country that effectively captures this free energy source at scale will rule the 21st century. whelp.
To me the hand looks like it could have bruising from an IV. That’s not unusual, especially for someone is age. Of course in that case, why did he need an IV?
Yeah, him and the entire Republican Party. They could have stood against Trump. They could still do their damn jobs in Congress and take action to rein him in. Instead they fully back his authoritarian regime.
Trump regime operatives exposed in plot to undermine Denmark and overthrow the government in Greenland. Regime operatives attempted to disrupt democracy through misinformation and disruption operations aimed at recruiting traitors and collaborators to help sway public consensus towards the US.
Republican Party leaders could have made a difference. Still could. But they betrayed our country, surrendered to Trump, and went all in on his authoritarian regime instead.
This led directly to Trump being able to lie constantly and with impunity. Right wing media doesn’t call out the lies, and a big swath of the electorate refuses to trust any other sources.
I keep landing on right wing propaganda as a primary cause of where we are today.They spent decades convincing tens of millions of Americans that “mainstream media” was biased against people like them and no other news sources could be trusted and it WORKED.
Right wing media sure won’t tell people the truth. All credit will go to Trump. I keep landing on right wing propaganda as a primary cause of where we are today.They spent decades convincing tens of millions of Americans that no other news sources could be trusted and it WORKED.
Sadly if these factories actually happen many people will only notice and give credit to whoever is president at the time, oblivious to when and by whom the actions were taken that made it happen.
Pay attention. Your family’s safety is on the line.
And independent agency or not, USIP was created by Congress and thus the president should not be able to unilaterally dismantle it. But our courts, especially the Supreme Court, are just letting Trump do it to USIP, USAID, and others. Our courts are broken enablers of Trump.
Of what use are courts that move too slowly to uphold the law? The Trump regime knows that they can simply move faster than courts that might stop them. By the time a ruling is made, it’s too late.
That the Trump regime still controls the remnants of USIP is a damning indictment of our government and our courts. What happened at USIP was plainly illegal, yet it stands. Our courts were no help and the damage is done. Little remains of the USIP.
I think it depends with the WSJ. I’d argue their news side is decent journalism. Is it even right wing? But the opinion side is full of right wing hacks and has been for a long time.
By any conventional measure, we have crossed a threshold in this country where democratic institutions are being intentionally attacked on a daily basis. Of course these attacks are not always successful. But a few failed campaigns does not (should not) disguise the fact that one is at war (3/3).
My lab's been attacked by an anti-wind group and their lawyers. They threatened the science funding of my whole university, to shut me and my undergraduate research assistants up. NYT just covered it. 1/n www.nytimes.com/2025/08/25/c...
One more time, shout out to the very serious people who suggested that RFK had some really good points about public health. No way to have predicted how things would turn out, except to look at his past record and everything he said about vaccines.
Full resignation letter from Demetre C. Daskalakis, a CDC leader, does not hold back. "The recent shooting at CDC is not why I am resigning. My grandfather, who I am named after, stood up to fascist forces in Greece and lost his life doing so. I am resigning to make him and his legacy proud."
The cruelty is the point.
Agree with this. Make them fight for every inch. Worth reading this thread.
Especially Epstein files.
A devastating end to sixty years of bipartisan success that saw more children live to see their fifth birthday than through any other U.S. agency.
Yep. The NYT reported that 75% of the Guard deployed to Los Angeles whose enlistments were up said they won’t re-enlist. davisvanguard.org/2025/07/trum... (Article quotes and links to paywalled NYT article)
Yeah, it continually depresses and enrages me that “protect democracy” was not that effective at getting people to show up and vote against Trump (nor was don’t elect a felon or a sexual predator, but anyway). Thought most everyone cared about that and many just don’t. Not really.
“Our shared commitment to our country, our oaths of office, & our mission of helping people before, during & after disasters compel us to warn Congress & the American people of the cascading effects of decisions made by the current administration” FEMA employees wrote www.nytimes.com/2025/08/25/c...
Tim Walz: "I always get in trouble for it and I'll continue to say it, I don't think we do any favors when we don't name it -- these are fascist policies."
Obviously it’s not silly to them. They see it as respectful to those who may identify different than they appear at first glance. At any rate, in my experience people who get upset about “pronouns in bio” are seldom worth engaging. X is full of such people and often they’re raging bigots.
Right wing media use anything to label Democrats “woke”. Take that ridiculous Cracker Barrel thing. What on earth is “woke” it? They took a guy in a chair by a barrel off their sign and just have text. Ummm… okay. So? That’s woke? How? The phony outrage is even dumber than usual.
Then maybe this supposed “large percentage of people” need to grow up. Ignoring people because they have pronouns listed? That’s stupid. No one’s making you post your pronouns. If someone else wants to, so what? Seems to me it’s people so needlessly bothered by it who have a problem.
I hate it. I wanted people to care about democracy enough to get out and vote against the authoritarian who’d love to end it, but many people just… didn’t . They weren’t paying attention or it was too abstract or they bought into the propaganda or whatever. “Protect democracy” didn’t move people.
Many people have correctly stated that the Oct 7th attack by Hamas was horrific and wrong, but that it doesn’t justify the slaughter in Gaza. It never stops the “you support Hamas!” attacks used to deflect all criticism of the Israeli government’s actions.
You’re not going to get a straight answer as he has zero interest in providing one. We’re also seeing the support for Palestinians equals support for Hamas lie repeated over and over.
People who know the definition of the word “extortion” call it extortion.
Yes, and while Trump deserves a heaping portion of the blame, it doesn’t happen without the Republican Party and especially congressional Republicans supporting him. The GOP is an authoritarian party that cares nothing for democracy. People need to accept that fact.
"'The difference between Trump 1 and Trump 2 is that he now has no guardrails … Now Trump is surrounded by people who want to be like him. He learned his lesson of not having people around him who would say no to him,' said George Conway, a lawyer and board president of [@chkbal.bsky.social] …."
Dictator chic.
The president also has zero authority to do so. All states should ignore any executive order he issues trying to take away this vital right.
I’m kind of speechless with this one. I can’t imagine the kind of person who continues to make the argument that it doesn’t count as real starvation if the kids were already sick.
Masked men jumped a San Bernardino family in unmarked cars, opened fire, and shattered their truck windows—all while the family was just coming home from work. The feds later admitted it was CBP, but the family says the agents never showed warrants or IDs.
So glad there were fifteen of them. What if they’d only had thirteen federal agents on the scene?! 🙄
I want to live in a well-educated society. Please, use my tax money to educate people. I don’t care if they want to study something not directly related to their career. They’ll be more knowledgeable, well-rounded people who’ve hopefully become better critical thinkers. Great!
“America began to conceive of education as a private, personal good, to be measured solely in terms of increase in lifetime earnings.” This all too common view drives me nuts. How do we get more people to understand the value of higher education independent of what job opportunities it leads to?
I think that a sizable chunk of humanity is deeply uncomfortable with uncertainty.
Refusing to "trust the experts" is meant to be a brave, responsible position. But (as Carl explains in the thread) there is too much knowledge in the world. You have to trust *somebody*, much of the time. If you have no trust in experts, you end up trusting the idiots.
SAY GOODBYE TO YOUR MEMORIES, THEY'RE KILLING THE EARTH, ALSO WE'RE BUILDING NEW AI CENTERS feels absurdly farcical and dystopian while perfectly illustrating Stage 4 End-Stage Capitalism in all its dipshit horror.
Points for the username. I’m reminded of famed commenter QueefBurglar69 from Bojack Horseman.
Step 1: Smithsonian quietly removes info about Trump impeachments Step 2: Smithsonian insists this is routine updating and not political interference Step 3: White House: "Nah, it's political interference, to be very clear." www.wsj.com/politics/pol...
First it was sending the Guard and active duty to LA to “protect federal agents”. Then it was sending the Guard into DC to do law enforcement. Trump is talking about doing so in other cities. Now there’s this plan to use the military against protests. The escalation to outright fascism continues.
This is dark. The far-right whitewashing of history and indoctrination of kids is well underway. www.vox.com/today-explai...
What a banal way of describing the march toward fascism.
The stuff that, 15 years ago, would have been a screaming 72-point all-caps headline — and now appears in the sixth paragraph, almost as an aside www.wsj.com/world/russia...
"why are institutions continuing to fold at the same time that trump's approval numbers are going down and some methods of oppositions are proving effective" is The Question right now imo
Harvard hasn’t completely caved, but they’ve been revamping programs, taking down websites, and rebranding offices to purge all mention of DEI. Even Harvard won’t defend DEI programs. Better to give in to the racist, bigoted trash who run the country now. www.thecrimson.com/article/2025...
“But growing evidence suggests that the electricity bills of some Americans are rising to subsidize the massive energy needs of Big Tech…”
Roasting helps but they identified the compounds that caused them to bitter and bred them to have much less of those things. I’m sure that helped a lot. I roast them with garlic, olive oil, and parmesan cheese. Delicious.
🧵 Dear Republican lawmakers, Canada has the largest intact boreal forest on the planet. An increasingly hotter world due to #ClimateChange makes longer dry seasons, far larger wildfires & yes, more smoke. No amount of "raking" fixes it. The scientists warned of exactly this for a very long time /1
Per the WSJ, Bondi told Trump he was in the Epstein files. Now Trump says it’s all a hoax. Funny how that works.
Why didn’t Stanford University file that lawsuit? Cowards. They left it for the student newspaper to do?
The student newspaper. This fell. To the student. Newspaper.
Government efficiency at its best www.huffpost.com/entry/nation...
I read about Mercola a very long time ago on quackwatch.org. It’s a great resource that’s been around since 1996 (pretty early web days!).
We write things down so people don’t forget, yet somehow people with no education in relevant fields decide that they know better than people who study the topic for a living and try to tell them, “Look! Here’s the evidence!”
Yep. He’s been one of the country’s biggest alternative health grifters for decades. He claims actual evidence based medicine is bogus so he can sell overpriced snake oil.
Does Musk ever tell the truth? He claimed “Big Balls” valiantly rushed to save a woman from being assaulted in her car. The police report says the woman was Coristine’s SO, it was his car, they assaulted him, and it appears to have been an attempted carjacking. What a stupid thing to lie about.
Folks look at you like you're crazy when you say we're in the midst of the worst, most unprecedented Article I constitutional crisis in American history, & then, well:
The entire business model of R1 public universities rests on 4 revenue sources: 1. Federal grants 2. Private gifts/endowments 3. Tuition (esp. from foreign students) 4. State $ For decades, 📈 in 1-3 offset a secular 📉 in 4. Now, 1 & 3 are being decimated & 4 ain't coming back. The math is clear.
“Both of them.”
We're in the Orbanization of our media system now. It's happening. CNN's Brian Stelter drew this assessment from Gábor Scheiring, "who experienced Viktor Orbán's autocratic power plays in Hungary firsthand as a member of the Hungarian parliament." view.newsletters.cnn.com/messages/175...
It’s sad to see the Washington Post continue to circle the drain, their top talent bailing as Bezos and the leadership he’s installed focus on staying on the right side of an authoritarian regime.
The Corporation for Public Broadcasting is shutting down operations after loss of federal funding:
Now there’s an oxymoron.
Explain? lol… nah. “Here’s why this is bad news for Democrats…”
MORE from Virginia Giuffre's family: "The government and the President should never consider giving Ghislaine Maxwell any leniency." “Ghislaine Maxwell is a monster who deserves to rot in prison for the … violence and abuse she put not just our sister Virginia through, but many other survivors."
Apologies against that we elected a goddamn fascist idiot. We have no excuse.
More of a branch insect, am I right?
Reminds me that one of my best profs was both acclaimed for writing a couple books and lecturing widely at other schools and an excellent teacher, so the school and the students could be happy. Well, some students. His aggressive questioning style made students uncomfortable. But he was good!
Students eventually got this crazy idea that profs teaching classes should care about and be competent at teaching. I hope they still get pissed when that’s not the case. That’s the schools’ fault for having the wrong incentives.
“Funding for scientific research should not be controlled by a small group of highly paid and unaccountable insiders at the NIH, many of whom stay in power for decades. The NIH monopoly on directing research should be broken”. Project 2025, page 462. Today, Russell Vought did just that.
Stupid? Probably, but he’s also lying, and Fox News is facilitating that. This is state propaganda.
HAPPENING NOW: a group of New York rabbis are being arrested at a protest outside the Israeli consulate calling for bringing food into Gaza, an end to the war, and return of all hostages @newjewishnarrative.bsky.social
Holy shit. This guy saved a PNG to a bird. (he drew a bird into a spectrogram, played that sound to a starling, and the starling reproduced it back to him with enough accuracy he got his bird drawing back in their call's spectrogram) www.youtube.com/watch?v=hCQC...
Obligatory: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IP_over...