At the stage of GOP "governance" when promising to limit your corrupt plans is a sign of merit.
@chicaattack.bsky.social
An obvious and entirely predictable consequence of the SC's terrible Slaughter decision is turning the federal government into a vehicle for pay to play (or pay to not be regulated) governance. open.substack.com/pub/danieldr...
The Corruption Is the Point
An awful lot of folks are okay with bribing Donald Trump, his family, and his administration. What will the reckoning look like -- or will it happen at all?
open.substack.com
Rich texts can support many adaptations, and the very best understand and use some or more elements of a text and expand on them to speak to contemporary audiences.
This is almost certainly illegal, yet the Times' headlines or short write-up doesn't mention this. www.nytimes.com/live/2026/07...
Trump Administration Live Updates: White House Withholds Medicaid Funds for California and Minnesota
nytimes.com
Straight of Mackinac. THE bridge off in the distance. Thank goodness there is a decaying oil pipeline under all of this.
So many things are terrible. One thing that is not is a paddle and refreshing open water swim in Lake Michigan near Charlevoix on a hot day. Sublime. Use dive fins and snorkel and mask for maximum effect.
Hunter Biden has a few regrets. He says had he known how things would have turned out, he would have done things differently.
Trump Cut a Billion-Dollar Mining Deal. His Sons Stand to Profit.
nytimes.com
This is excellent and one of the clearest nonacademic explanation/applications of Baudrillard I have seen. It's also a reminder that authenticity cannot be simulated at scale. www.youtube.com/watch?v=mniO...
The Dystopian Reality of Online Advertising
YouTube video by Venus Theory
youtube.com
I am not optimistic about the upcoming Odyssey movie, especially after I heard Matt Damon was going to play the lead role. Big budget, movie star films have one overriding goal: to make money by appealing to as many as possible.
Why the Odyssey Keeps Defeating Filmmakers
Full of violence, desire, monsters, and magic, Homer’s epic has tempted directors for decades. Can Christopher Nolan’s new adaptation survive the voyage?
newyorker.com
I know people on this site love to criticize Klein --and for the record his infamous take on Charlie Kirk was naive and professionally self-serving--but he also platforms interesting thinkers and ideas, and that has value for me. Here is his conversation with author Gary Shteyngart.
I Keep Telling People We’re Living in This Dystopian Novel
The Ezra Klein Show · Episode
open.spotify.com
Really like the framing of this piece: this is what distrust of institutional expertise looks like. www.propublica.org/article/mark...
He Profits Off Raw Milk That’s Making People Sick. The Government Isn’t Stopping Him.
With Raw Farm, the largest raw-milk dairy in the country, Mark McAfee has capitalized on a once-fringe product that’s been thrust into the mainstream in recent years and backed by Health Secretary Rob...
propublica.org
I have had my fair share of criticisms of the Times, but sometimes the paper publishes incredibly informative pieces supplemented with top shelf explanatory graphics. www.nytimes.com/interactive/...
Opinion | America Needs to Build More Housing
Basic economic principles point to the solution for the housing affordability crisis.
nytimes.com
I paid my weather tax all year and now it's high season in northern Michigan.
It's so maddening to watch politicians actively attack experts who can make things better. govintegrity.substack.com/p/the-123-to...
The $123-to-One Investment House Republicans Want to Cut
The Government Accountability Office's work is vital in the fight against fraud, waste and abuse
govintegrity.substack.com
I fear that if or when Dems regain power, they will be complacent and not meet the enormous challenge of repairing democracy, rebuilding state capacity, regulating corporate power, and checking the pernicious influence of enormous wealth.
How we can save the constitutional republic with a king --by Ross Douthat
My approach to conspiracy theories --even the ones that confirm my biases --is to wait for actual evidence to emerge. I don't think motivation or incentive to do something is sufficient evidence that something occurred (e.g., Trump WOULD cheat in an election, therefore it is likely he did.)
Douthat fails to even mention that Elon essentially paid to implement DOGE with no oversight and that the cuts made under it were most likely illegal! One of his criticisms is that the cuts achieved so little. Laws be damned.
Opinion | The Political Malpractice of Elon Musk
nytimes.com
Spending billions to make prices higher!
Iran War Live Updates: U.S. Blockade Will Last ‘As Long as It Takes,’ Hegseth Says
nytimes.com
It really is remarkable how much the GOP is forfeiting their ability to credibly complain about a range of issues in the future: the debt, executive overreach, pay to play and self-dealing corruption, picking winners and losers in the economy. The blind hope is no one will remember any of this.
You know what would crush it in ratings? New reality TV show in which Secretary of DOD and some underlings brave the Strait of Hormuz in a Boston whaler. I would watch it.
The reason no one talks about the debt or annual deficits anymore is that they no longer exist! He fixed it on Day One!
A lot of folks in this country need to admit that at least implicitly they think the ends can justify the means, and so unilateral, unchecked power over federal spending, law enforcement, the regulatory state, and the war power is basically okay as long as the goals are something they support.
What undergirds almost all of these terrible takes (which are nicely dismantled in the podcast) is a willful amnesia over the Iraq war and blindness to the administration's counterproductive incompetence. open.spotify.com/episode/0Nck...
The Worst Iran Takes
open.spotify.com
Best overview of how both sides can lose the war. This is truly excellent. acoup.blog/2026/03/25/m...
Miscellanea: The War in Iran
This post is a set of my observations on the current war in Iran and my thoughts on the broader strategic implications. I am not, of course, an expert on the region nor do I have access to any spec…
acoup.blog
"Why this emergency exposes the inherent weaknesses of liberalism and requires a King" --by Ross Douthat
And what's wrong with letting one guy do whatever he wants without checks and balances. Is there REALLY a downside here?