Recovering lawyer, minor public official, (very) former sf/fantasy editor, occasional painter. This is the account I admit to in public.
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anil isn't kidding. this level of transparency and detail — talking to voters like adults — is remarkable. i would imagine it also helps people feel like they are part of something bigger. and, christ, mamdani is insanely charismatic and good on screen. like, you just want to watch him talk!
My God, they've reinvented the Deadly Joke. And somehow possibly developed immunity to it. We're all doomed. www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ed_o...
This. Greenblatt and the travesty he's made of the ADL shouldn't be allowed to claim they're the one true arbiter of "Jewish concerns." They're not; they don't speak for anything like all of us; and they don't get to claim to do so over our objections.
Yes. I just wanted to clarify, since people will read terms of art as if they were natural language, and be confused, and this is important. I can already see the posts yelling, "They're denaturalizing Zohran, it's a civil case so he can't have a lawyer!" And then you have to explain 10,000 times.
Of course it's a barrier to access, but there's still a huge difference between "you're going to need to find a public interest org who want to litigate this" and "we don't care if Danielle Sassoon is willing to represent you pro bono, you're not allowed to have a lawyer."
Ah, thanks. I'm reading that to mean that unlike in criminal cases, you're not entitled to have a lawyer appointed for you if you can't afford one, but NOT to mean that you can't have a lawyer at all. Is that great? No. But it's a far cry from not being allowed counsel, period.
Where are you getting that? Just on the face of it, these appear to be normal civil or criminal cases, where a defendant would normally be entitled to counsel.
ICE *already* can't meet their detainment numbers without rounding up children, veterans, people born in the U.S., people with no criminal records, people at immigration hearings, plus academics and visitors with valid visas. So who do they plan to detain with >10x the budget? The answer is: you.
This is likely a waste of both our time, but I'm genuinely curious: Do you really think somebody who's weaker on policy is a better choice for president because they have a few less dollars? You're pushing Gavin Newsom, not some poor person.
So what? Sometimes you can use a good class traitor, and he's never suggested the party's gone too far supporting trans people.
The Great Khan of the Steppes is right there. We don't have to nominate fucking Newsom. We can go for Pritzker instead, and have someone who doesn't try to throw any of our people under buses.
And Bove, who Trump nominated to the Third Circuit, is arguably even worse. I think he was scheduled for a Senate confirmation hearing today. Under any normal conditions the nomination would have been pulled. But these days, who knows? Shamefully, there still might be 51 party-linevotes for him.
And it comes on top of Bove's firing Danielle Sassoon, and attempt to fire Hagan Scotten (who resigned first) over their refusal to follow orders to disregard professional ethical standards in the Eric Adams case. It's a pattern: the Senate has evidence-based reason to assume he'll lie under oath.
This whole thread. Please. A grateful nation will thank you. DON'T RANK CUOMO.
Do the right thing: rank me #1, Zohran #2, and DON'T RANK ANDREW CUOMO.
I don’t see this mentioned at all about Andrew Cuomo. He’s on Netanyahu’s legal defence team for his ICC claims. nypost.com/2024/11/25/u...
I'm trying "Brad Lander is a Jewish Zionist, and he knows both Mamdani and Cuomo better than most of us do, and he's ranking Mamdani #2 and not ranking Cuomo. I think we can probably trust his judgment on this one." It has the merit of all being true. We'll see whether it works.
Why I will never give another penny to the @nytimes.com , number approximately three hundred thousand. I know excellent journalists still try to make it a good paper. I only wish they could quit en masse and create the paper they deserve to work for, free of their clueless management.
We have entered the "The police is saying that if the police is at your door you are not safe call the police immediately" stage of making America great again
With the tragic assassination of a Minnesota Democratic leader, I’m going to underline this point again.
Another moment where I wish a vid or podcast had been an article. I recently tried to watch Exodus, which I'd heard was hugely influential when it came out. It's a shockingly awful movie, for itself and not just its politics, and I bet this is really interesting - if you can do video/audio.
Every Dem Senator: "What happened to Senator Padilla today was an unprecedented breach of constitutional government and demonstrates the scale of the threat to our republic." Also Every Dem Senator: [Goes back to business as usual] 18 Dem Senators: [Vote for Trump's crypto bill]
In all seriousness: do we think he understands what Social Security even is?
"It's really hard to fathom that the guy making my pizza for 25 years is a gangster and a terrorist, and the person who shows up in an unmarked car wearing a mask and body armor comes to take him away is somehow the good guy” www.wnep.com/article/news...
Bondi DOJ has a problem. On left: DOJ Indictment and Detention Memo allege Abrego Garcia lied to officer by not revealing he was coming from Texas On right: DHS Referral Report: "Subject stated he was driving 'three days ago' (11/27/2022) from Houston, TX to Temple Hills, MD (via St Louis, MO)"
This doesn’t even include one of his most egregious decisions: Teaming up with RFK Jr. to shut down the Indian point nuclear reactor, which was replaced with fossil fuels, driving up electricity bills
I never thought I would say I FUCKING LOVE THIS CAMPAIGN AD
every single paragraph more disqualifying than the last.
He'd better be. We need alternatives to goddamned Newsom and Emanuel and Shapiro and god-help-us Cuomo and Slotkin and the rest of them.
But seriously: What is the use case? I'm trying to imagine the buyer who wants this thing, and I hate admitting to failure; but I'm coming up mostly blank. (An assistive device for early-onset Alzheimer's, maybe? But other than that . . .)
My hypothesis: the AI has hallucinated that Omelas exists, the child's name is Dorian, and that instead of aging like the Portrait, he instead receives all the injuries that customers would otherwise suffer. Dorian enables a perfect, harm-free society, so long as we don't have to insure Dorian.
Your regular reminder that if it weren't for Cuomo and NY redistricting, which Cuomo and his allies designed to create extra Republican districts, the House would not have been able to pass this bill. Don't rank Cuomo. Just don't.
I wonder. I don't think it's an exotic argument: my sense had been that it was fairly well known to well-managed companies (not that all well-known companies, or all of them with political influence, are well-managed). MAGA hates it, but that doesn't make it untrue.
I knew, but it didn't really sink in until I started seeing images from the committees. I've had people yell at me for repeating Trumpist propaganda for using its official name over the past few days, and I can't blame them.
It would be so much more persuasive if they even tried to give any reason why it's a bad comparison, besides "it makes us feel bad in our tummies."
“well, my neighbor got thrown in a gulag, my kid has measles and the ps6 costs as much as a ford bronco, but i just can’t get past dems refusing to say joe biden was old in 2025” - a voter who definitely exists
In what might be the logical endpoint of American Zionism, the Heritage Foundation has declared that pro-Palestinian activism is not just antisemitic, but is in fact a shadowy global conspiracy … led by Jews. www.nytimes.com/2025/05/18/u...
The person you're taking it away from is anyone who uses or might use a community hospital, since those rely on medicaid reimbursements. Including rich people, surprise!!! Inter alia. You'd think no matter how stupid he is, he'd have someone on his staff who could tell him.
Beside the important points, but this is an illustration of why Trump never got the old-money-NYC approval he craved. Fly around on an old plane, humiliating?? Please. It flies; your predecessors used it; you wouldn't even think of replacing it with some tacky flashy new thing unless you had to.
This! It’s profoundly anti-Palestinian AND anti-Jewish, antisemitism is living large at NYU.
So that's why pictures of Giraffe were so surprisingly accurate: Florence had a live model! (I love the Countdown threads so much. And am looking forward to my own copy of the book so much, too.)
In part that's because the implication is that if you're not The Winner, you don't get citizenship and can be deported to Libya or something. If we were actually providing paths to citizenship for everyone who wanted to come here, it would feel less like a Hunger Games thing. Plus, of course: Noem.
"[S]tudents paid to capitalize on the name" is everything wrong with attitudes toward education today in a nutshell. It's an interesting dilemma for a school, though: if it withholds a degree from a particularly accomplished graduate for Not Following Orders, what's that precious name worth?.
The federal government is attempting a radical, massive expansion of what constitutes "wiretapping" that threatens everyone working in media/as a journalist today and I hope you'll read this and share it with everyone you know. I'm not just fighting this for me. I'm fighting it for everyone.
It’s very strange that this article on the staffing issues at Newark Airport doesn’t mention the fact that DOGE fired 400 FAA employees a few months ago, and union officials warned about exactly these kinds of shortages.
"The Campaign Finance Board just confirmed what we've known all along: Andrew Cuomo is for sale ... While Donald Trump works to dismantle democracy on the national stage, Cuomo and his billionaire backers are trying to buy City Hall."
OK, this is wild. In September 2023, geophysicists across the world started monitoring a very odd signal coming from the ground under them. It was picked up in the Arctic. And Antarctica. It was detected everywhere, every 90 seconds, as regular as a metronome, for *nine days*. What the HELL? 1/
Yeah, I’m not a New Yorker but his massive personal faults are only matched by his staggering professional incompetence so I’m not really seeing the appeal? “We need an asshole to fight Trump”? Yeah, I visit NYC often and I think you have more than one option there.
Oh, this is glorious.
The corruption here isn’t even my biggest concern. The security risk!?! The security risk is astronomical and totally unfixable. Listening devices? Tracking devices!? Software backdoors!? Intentional AND unintentional!? Unmeasurable risk.
As Democrats slowly mount a resistance against Trump’s second administration, there is no worse person to elevate than a shameless self-promoter with an inflated sense of his political gifts and accomplishments. newrepublic.com/article/1949...
📌
I believe you. I'd be psyched for the full version some day, but meanwhile? You win all the internets, and thank you.
“One former aide to Cuomo told me that the two seem to understand each other. ‘When he talks to Trump, he calls him ‘boss,’ the former Cuomo aide said. ‘I’ve never heard him call anyone else ‘boss..I think he and Trump get along very well—he kind of admires him.”
A zillion-alarm fire and something that must be stopped, obviously; we're in deeper trouble than ever if it isn't. But also, an answer to all the people wailing that the courts are powerless against the Trump regime now. If that were true, the regime's supporters wouldn't need to try this.
A report from the scene of a horrifying kidnapping on the streets of Worcester, MA today by @billshaner.bsky.social www.welcometohellworld.com/they-dont-ne...
On one hand, ha ha; on the other hand, this sort of thing might make a Chief Justice think twice about whether they really wanted to overturn Humphrey's Executor. www.yahoo.com/news/trump-a...
This happened a lot less before our Secretary of Defense and his pals might have made it possible for foreign adversaries to hack the Pentagon. I'm sure it's just a coincidence, and not any malware or anything like that.
When asked if the United States should have a military parade to show off its might, President Eisenhower responded: “Absolutely not. We are the pre-eminent power on Earth. For us to try and imitate what the Soviets are doing in Red Square would make us look weak.”
Have I said, "Don't rank Cuomo" recently? Well, don't. Here's a new reason not to: as certain people used to say, He's not even really a Democrat.
Tomorrow, a new tool to create mixed income affordable housing called “green social housing” is going before Council. It’s not going too far, I think, to say this is one of the most consequential things Council could do to support affordable housing—all over the city.
I remember the days when reporters didn't need to add that parenthesis telling you who appointed a given Federal judge. It was a better world then. Not that I don't appreciate them doing it now, when we do need to know.
Lmao
What, ask him a question, and expect him to answer it? That's lèse-majesté, you rebellious peasant. . . . also, thank you. God, the New York Dems as an institution. I'm surprised people don't come for them with torches and pitchforks.
And you can make facts tell a lot of different stories without lying about them. But when you get to the point where your story is the same no matter what new facts come in, you've got a problem. Or, if your experiment keeps failing, you need to at least consider that your hypothesis is wrong.
Are you a lawyer who is barred in DC? Do you know a lawyer who is barred in DC? Send them this. NOW. The election for the DC Bar president is underway, and MAGA AG Pam Bondi's brother is running and nazi praising interim DC US Atty Ed Martin's deputy is running, too. We need to defeat them both.
The thing is, I suspect you've been exposed to more ideas that aren't what the national party's been hearing from its go-to pundits and consultants for the past few decades. These are guys you go to when you want a soothing bedtime story telling you exactly what your leadership wants to hear.
More worth hearing from, too.
Because of course. Rules? Apply to Andrew el magnifico? Surely not! . . . NYC, don't rank this guy. Please. I'm begging you here.
We need side and back views.
I get the sentiment, but this is extraordinarily fast for discovery. We're talking about the need to review potentially thousands of documents, prepare and conduct multiple 3-4 hour depositions, write legal briefs, prepare motions, and do a lot more in a VERY short period. bsky.app/profile/rmcg...
A modest request: In reports about Trump's endless, lawless exec orders, maybe point out that he *does not have* legal power to do these things. Trump did not "make it official" or "make good" on this bullying, as @semafor.com contends. He has ZERO official power to do this. King Canute dept.
🧵 NY-17 Rep. Mike Lawler had a local social worker physically dragged out of his town hall Sunday night. Emily Feiner was singled out by private security, lifted out of her seat, as the crowd chanted “let her stay” and “shame, shame.” She’s a constituent. Not a threat. Fascism again.
Impeach, remove, and ban from all future office.
The Constitution forbids bribery *3 separate times*. So important to the Founders they included two emoluments clauses, and made it the only named impeachable offense besides treason. The Constitution is clear on banning bribery. It's just that Congress and the courts decided to pretend otherwise.
Good heavens, it's Mordred. Centuries out of his proper time, yes; but what's that to principal players in the Matter of Britain?
What an embarrassment. It’s wild that the official position of the US Government is now pro-Nazi.
They're overreacting to a lot lately. I don't think it's a sign of strength or confidence.
Reposting so I can find this again, amid the torrent of horrifying news. I know it's from days ago.
It's a high bar, but this from @radleybalko.bsky.social might be one of the most fucked up things I've read in the new Trump era. For context, this TX lawyer had just had an informal conversation with a family caught up in ICE raids. Seriously. Read this. radleybalko.substack.com/p/the-courag...
Fffft. A lot of men are superheroes, once you get to know them. If your kids won't think you're a superhero if they have a chance to know who you are, you're likely not much of a superhero. Or much of a man, either, come to that.
I will lead the breach! To preserve manly Pete Hegseth's masculine freedom to bring his wife to important military meetings abroad and to expose national secrets to adversaries over insecure comms while manfully chatting with his wife. Warfighter first culture! . . . my God, these people.
I'd totally buy that. It's the form that's off, not the substance.
Call me cynical, but this is not the post of Donald J. Trump in his ordinary form. The cadences and the random capitalizations are all wrong. It's too calm and quasi-rational for him (or for Stephen Miller, either). Somebody else drafted it for him, or got access to his account.
Cuomo is a coward who will only appear at forums when he is standing alone by himself and other candidates are unable to question his incredibly bad record and lack of ethics or competence. He literally got planners to change the forum for him. www.politico.com/newsletters/...
Yeah, I just went and looked. Eight candidates on the ballot, and he won with 22.something percent. Also, ChatGPT. Hard no from me, which is annoying because I'd love not to have to work on a senate campaign next year.
I'm guessing it will if the alternative is Auchincloss. Yeah, the guy's 80, but he's not another rich entitled moderate in the Auch mold. If I'm not misremembering who Auch is; isn't he the one who won his seat because there were like a thousand people to his left on the primary ballot?
Call me a fool, but I don't know that I'd say this to or about somebody who'd be in a position to determine whether the government had met its burden of rebutting the presumption of immunity from criminal charges in any future case, however hypothetical now.
When people mean “some random Dem operative who spoke on condition of anonymity” I’m going to need them to say that rather than “Dem leadership”
Man, Boasberg is a hero. It's like, "Help me, Obi-Wan Kenobi, you're our only hope," and when he hears it he gets back on the metaphorical horse and tries.
I have been hesitant to say that municipal voters in MA should pay attention to partisan affiliation this year, and not vote for any Republican for any office. Not like the Dems are perfect; but wow, my hesitation is evaporating faster and faster.
Highly-paid centrist pundits & consultants: this is a clever trap which Dems should avoid by ignoring it or, better, supporting it
Your question assumes it wasn't obvious in the first instance. Which it is, to me. Our culture cares deeply about gender. It can't be fun to be trapped in what you know on a gut level is the wrong one. Let people be who they are; it's not harming me. Or you, so cut it out with the discrimination.
Everything you needed to know about goddamned AIPAC. If you didn't know it already.
So say we all.
Actual headlines of David Brooks columns, 2020-2025
I'm grateful to Mr. Sargent for doing the response to this garbage from Vance. I'd just add this: Vance admitted during the campaign that he's lied to the public about key facts, and intends to go on lying whenever he finds it convenient. He has, or should have, zero credibility on anything.