To win, you need: (1) Charisma (2) “fight” (3) popular policy positions El-Sayed is a guy who has all three. So, while he is certainly going to be carpet-bombed by negative ads, I think his overall chances are pretty good. No left-right-center analysis was needed or helpful for this assessment.

It is a GENIUS messaging strategy to link AI and data centers to dick swinging toxic masculinity and I want more of it.

Aaron Rupar@atrupar.com · 1h ago

El-Sayed: "Mike Rogers is a guy who wants to put a data center in your backyard so he can make himself feel a little more manly by making an AI video ... he's a guy who went back to Florida so he could lick every single boot Donald Trump owns to bet for his endorsement."

For this blatantly antisemitic depiction of Phil Weiser to get some attention, what needs to happen is, instead of being put on a slick campaign ad/mailer sent out by his Republican opponent, it needs to appear on a sign held up by a 19-year-old left-wing college student at a campus protest.

Kyle Clark@kylec.bsky.social · 24h ago

Depicting Jewish people with horns is a centuries-old, dehumanizing, antisemitic trope. Democratic Gov nominee Phil Weiser is outspoken about his mother’s birth in a Nazi concentration camp, his family members killed in the Holocaust, and the threat posed by antisemitism today.

DSA-aligned Democrats are now the most pro-free-trade voting bloc in the United States, in an incredible turn of events www.theargumentmag.com/p/who-suppor...

When we don't adequately fund public universities, and instead force students to take out loans, what we as a society are really doing is borrowing money from the younger generation—their hard-earned future income—to fund a necessary project that benefits us all: building an educated society.

Mark Copelovitch@mcopelov.bsky.social · 2d ago

1. This is bullsh*t & an epically stupid policy completely detached from any empirical evidence: bsky.app/profile/mcop... 2. We could simply avoid this entire issue by <all together now> Funding. The. Damn. Public. Universities. Like. We. Used. To: bsky.app/profile/mcop...

There's literally no end of university presidents who are surprisingly uneducated about what competitive authoritarianism is and how it relates to their job. It's so consistent a pattern that it brings to mind the question of who these people talk to all day—& the classic line from Upton Sinclair.

Jonathan Feingold@jpygold.bsky.social · 2d ago

My lord at this point it’s either incompetence or collusion. any university president who thinks they can “work” with the Trump regime lacks fitness for the job.

John Cornyn and Thom Tillis: the new Susans Collins!

Corey Rayburn Yung@coreyryung.bsky.social · 2d ago

They are Charlie Brown, except they know Lucy is going to pull the football away but they need to pretend they don't (and will act shocked at Lucy's inevitable betrayal).

Abby was the one that broke open the Max Miller story (and shame on NYT for not acknowledging that). Here is her original story: www.motherjones.com/politics/202...

Assault, misogyny, verbal threats: Records detail new allegations against Rep. Max Miller

Police reports and filings in a bitter custody dispute raise new questions about the conduct of an Ohio Republican as he campaigns for a third term.

motherjones.com

Abby Vesoulis@abbyvesoulis.bsky.social · 3d ago

I first got 1000+ pages of court documents from Miller & Moreno's custody case. Anybody can request these from Cuyahoga County. I reviewed those by myself, one by one—no AI involved!—and the filings pointed to police reports. I then sought those out separately and spent days combing through them.

This is an interesting indicator of where we are. Harris is not the leader of the Democratic party by any means, but she is a reliable barometer of what a large central slice of Democratic leaders are saying at the moment. Hearing court "expansion" not just "reform" from her is interesting.

Acyn@acyn.bsky.social · 5d ago

Kamala Harris: I know this is going to be controversial coming from me in particular, we need to revisit the electoral college. We need to revisit the point of expanding the court. We need to revisit, if they so want, statehood for Puerto Rico and D.C.

"guys bob wants to study the venom of the gila monster, what a stupid idea" -- industry, 1990s

Eugene Vinitsky 🍒@eugenevinitsky.bsky.social · 5d ago

Love this idea that industry should subsidize basic research. Industry famously is great at prioritizing timelines longer than a year or two

This piece by @bedoyausa.bsky.social is excellent. Much of Los Angeles understands that our city's most iconic industry has been in crisis for some time. To understand that crisis you need to understand mergers and consolidation. I think it remains possible to stop the Paramount merger in court.

Alvaro M. Bedoya@bedoyausa.bsky.social · last wk.

People think "Hollywood" is rich and famous. The reality? Film and TV is a national industry. It's a blue collar industry. And it is an industry free fall. My latest for @newrepublic.com on how the Paramount merger would crush blue collar workers who can not afford it newrepublic.com/article/2136...

The easiest possible layup for a President at war with another country would be to explain that they are attacking us. Trump won't do that because he views Minnesota as a bigger enemy than Iran.

Aaron Rupar@atrupar.com · 5d ago

Trump: "We heard in Minnesota there was a cyberattack and they blame it on Iran. I don't think so. I blame it on Minnesota because they're grossly incompetent. Iran's got bigger problems than worrying about Minnesota."

SHOOT IT INTO MY VEINS

Henry Farrell@himself.bsky.social · 5d ago

I remember seeing someone (very reasonably) complaining here a few days ago that there seems to be next to no visible thinking on left and center about how to join the dots on administration and democracy. This is the beginnings of an answer to that complaint donmoynihan.substack.com/p/rebuilding...

It is certainly true that the tech sector enjoys increasing returns. But it is *not* true that this is a difference from "traditional production industries" - increasing returns are ubiquitous in manufacturing. giftarticle.ft.com/giftarticle/...

Yep, "you can't just fire people, keep their passports, do brutality, not even a little bit" was in some anti-slavery reforms to the H2A program in 2024. Farmers were outraged at the "gov't overreach & red tape." They went hard for Trump in '24, & he repealed those farm worker regs in June 2025.

Gaius Cassius Longinus@cassius1213.bsky.social · 6d ago

I'm also guessing that the farmers in question didn't want their workers to be able to quit and that they wanted the right to "discipline" them for "poor performance" however they saw fit?

Most rural areas have a ruling class. And they want cheap unfree workers & to pass their fiefdoms on tax-free forever. It ain't rocket science. The fact that we're scared to talk about THAT, ime, is what's costing us a lot of rural voters!

Mamdani's supposed fault was calling the Prime Minister of Israel a war criminal, when he is, in fact, facing war crimes charges at the ICC. Trump claimed with no evidence that George Soros was funding Central American migrant caravans, which the Pittsburgh synagogue shooter explicitly believed.

Shot...

Mayor Zohran Kwame Mamdani@mayor.nyc.gov · 2w ago

NYC’s small business owners have said it over and over: endless paperwork and uncertainty has made getting their stores up and running too difficult. So we’re cutting red tape, eliminating redundant permits (did you know you need a permit just to serve some ice cream?), and speeding up inspections.

It may seem bureaucratic, but there's an important point here about the limits of presidential power. Trump can order the National Park Service to put up these "warning" signs because it's part of the executive branch. The Smithsonian isn't. He can't order it around in the same way.

Stephen West@stephenwest.bsky.social · 2w ago

offs

This is exactly what I run into with conspiracy theorists — a stray, unverified claim gets treated as if it debunks the real story, and it almost always falls apart under scrutiny. Wild to hear that pattern showing up at 60 Minutes as Cecilia Vega describes it.

Dear lord, what are they trying to AVOID discovery of? Cancelling grants solely because the state where the grantee happens to be located did not vote for Trump is the less damaging thing they will admit in writing?

tony romm@tonyromm.bsky.social · 2w ago

It's part of a major federal court case over those cancelations. Here's what the government admitted as part of a process meant to avoid discovery (and perhaps spare it from sharing more damaging records):

Insane new research. Scientists gave asthma patients free electric stoves to replace their gas stoves, then checked to see if symptoms improved. Not only did symptoms improve, ditching gas was *better than medicine.* Details in today's newsletter: www.climatecoloredgoggles.com/p/electric-s...

Researchers used electric stoves to treat asthma. It worked.

The latest evidence that gas is bad for your health.

climatecoloredgoggles.com

The most important number not mentioned in this story: the statute of limitations for insider trading. It's, at a minimum, 5 years, and for some cases 10. Even a Merrick Garland speed prosecution would have plenty of time to catch anybody who had any inside information about, say, Vulcan Elements.

Donald Trump Jr.’s Investment Firm Posts Staggering Returns of 200%

The fledgling firm, run by the president’s oldest son and his partner Omeed Malik, has made investments in A.I. and defense technology that have tripled in value in just months.

nytimes.com

Folks with any connection to UT-Austin might want to take a look at the following petition. I would certainly not get involved in an ordinary tenure denial (especially at a school where I no longer teach)... but this seems different and that is the problem. actionnetwork.org/petitions/op...

Open Letter Concerning the Tenure Denial of Dr. Iván Chaar López

The denial of tenure to Dr. Chaar López has become a national concern because it raises questions that extend far beyond one faculty member or one institution. Scholars across disciplines depend upon ...

actionnetwork.org

Corporations are people, my friend www.bloomberg.com/news/feature...

Trump Extends Pardons to Companies, Echoing a 17th Century King

The president is the first in modern US history to issue clemency to businesses, with nine so far in his second term.

bloomberg.com

How can courts help protect universities from executive branch attacks? In a new essay, @fishkin.bsky.social argues that courts can play a crucial role, but Congress, states, and universities must give them stronger tools to constrain unlawful attacks on higher education.

What Courts Can Do and How to Help Them Do It

knightcolumbia.org

Here's something I post from time to time. My answer to a reader who asked me: what could journalists do NOW to break with some of their more corrosive habits.

Local plumbers two steps ahead of every university administrator in america 👏

Metin Seven (Moon Child's dad 🌝)@seven.eurosky.social · 2w ago

Scam for-profit higher Ed programs definitely exist, but these people are finding an approach to going after scam colleges that is aimed at normalizing a broad line of attack on the whole liberal arts. It’s like tenure: there are problems, but the solutions this crowd offers are much worse…

Seth Cotlar@sethcotlar.bsky.social · 2w ago

Government-promoted anti-intellectualism is a common feature of fascist states, with “intellectualism” coded as feminine and/or Jewish/leftist.