Vaccines were once so uncontroversial that McDonald’s restaurants put the childhood immunization schedule on their tray liners. Now, as the U.S. government sows doubt, preventable diseases could come roaring back. (Published March)

How Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s Vaccine Agenda Risks a Resurgence of Deadly Childhood Plagues

The health secretary is spreading doubts about vaccine safety and considering changes that could prompt manufacturers to flee the U.S. market. History has shown how plagues from the past can roar back...

propublica.org

How Trump Is Dismantling America’s Scientific Research Machine. Gift link: nyti.ms/4ig8qll

How Trump Is Dismantling America’s Scientific Research Machine (Gift Article)

The system that has driven life-altering discoveries and helped make the United States a superpower is now under intense strain.

nyti.ms

Trump’s presidency is a wealth transfer from the bottom to the top

For the fabulously wealthy, paying taxes is pretty much optional. They can borrow against their vast wealth, which is mostly an untaxed capital gain, without paying taxes. When they die, the capital gain goes to zero. And loopholes exist to bypass the estate tax too.

Jen Taub@jentaub.bsky.social · last wk.

“Billionaires who popularized stock-based lending include Larry Ellison and Elon Musk. Both borrow to avoid having to sell shares—which could trigger a taxes and dilute their voting rights—in companies they founded.” www.wsj.com/finance/the-...

“Before July 2025, one of the food bank’s locations served between 20 and 40 families per day, he said. Now, more than 260 families come in daily for help…”

Katie Bergh@katiebergh.bsky.social · 2w ago

About 2 million kids have lost SNAP since deep cuts were enacted last year. The ripple effects: Kids losing SNAP also lose automatic enrollment for free meals at school. And as more kids lose SNAP, their schools may be forced to drop Community Eligibility.

If you have an iPhone w/ the current OS, go into Settings, scroll to the bottom to click on Apps, scroll down to M & go into the Messages app, and flick this switch “screen unknown senders”. This dumps 99% political text messages into a folder you can separately check.

Vladimir Putin is a war criminal. He's responsible for killing over 150,000 Ukrainians — including more than 15,000 civilians — and the murder of political opponents & dissidents.   Witkoff & Trump's bootlicking is an embarrassment to our country.

Witkoff calls Putin a 'humanitarian' at Russia peace talks without Ukraine

Speaking in Oslo on Tuesday, Zelenskyy said Washington had reaffirmed its commitment to providing Ukraine with security guarantees.

cnbc.com

Meta gave $1M to Trump's inauguration fund — and Mark Zuckerberg himsef has helped bankroll Trump's ballroom. Now Trump's DOJ has halted a years-long criminal investigation into allegedly enabling and profiting from illegal drug sales on its platforms. Funny how that works, huh?

'What Meta's Money Is Buying': DOJ Halts Probe of Facebook Owner That Has Given Trump Millions | Common Dreams

Billionaire Mark Zuckerberg's company was facing a criminal investigation for allegedly enabling and profiting from the

commondreams.org

“If I don’t win I won’t pay veterans poisoned by contaminated water on their base” is a hell of a closing strategy 😳

Aaron Rupar@atrupar.com · 2w ago

Trump on Camp Lejeune water contamination claims: "If we win the House and Senate, I am directing the Department of Justice to settle all remaining legitimate claims as soon as possible ... if we don't win, there's no money."

Really don’t think we can call ourselves a society if this guy is still walking around with billions of dollars in a couple years

Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie@audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 2w ago

The background: Elon Musk's company is powering its enormous data center with dozens of illegal, hazardous turbines in Black neighborhoods The NAACP sued xAI under the Clean Air Act, but then Trump tried to take over as plaintiff and dismiss *their* lawsuit ballsandstrikes.org/law-politics...

The legacy of Lindsey Graham: Trump effectively vetoes the bill Graham spent his last year pushing for, sides with Russia before midterms. www.nytimes.com/2026/10/16/u...

Trump Signs Order Exempting Russia From Sanctions Legislation

The sanctions were part of legislation that was named after Senator Lindsey Graham, the South Carolina Republican who died in July.

nytimes.com

Elon Musk proposed to Trump cut Ukraine’s use Starshield satellite network. But when Putin attacked Kyiv, causing an untold carnage, Musk blamed Trump bc he didn’t want to anger his consumers in Europe. “He tweeted out that he was innocent & that it was [Trump] that did it, the source said”

Exclusive: Musk approached Trump to slow down Starlink in Ukraine

SpaceX founder had publicly blamed president for chaos over restrictions, but sources say he initiated them

telegraph.co.uk

Some Pizzagate-level shit right here. An armed fucknut is gonna burst into a school, looking for the mutilzation room.

Aaron Rupar@atrupar.com · 3w ago

Trump: "They want to cut your children. It's unbelievable what they do. Your son leaves as Jimmy and comes home in three days as Janet, and they don't even ask you. They can take your child out of school and do whatever the hell they want. Minnesota is one of those states."

X is the platform of choice for these smears. Musk himself pushed this conspiracy from his own account three times. Democrats need to go to war against Musk because he's already attacking them. He's deeply unpopular. And, as we saw in Wisconsin, voters recoil when he becomes an issue in a race.

Solomon@solomonrmissouri.com · 4w ago

www.thebulwark.com/p/maga-james...

People forget that J6 was successful. Everyone who participated was let out of jail and the guy who perpetrated it is President again. There were no consequences. They have plenty of incentive to do a much bigger and worse version.

this is honestly one of the worst and most irresponsible things he has ever posted, and that's really saying something

Aaron Rupar@atrupar.com · 4w ago

Trump tries to start a race war: "The once Great State of Minnesota is being taken over by Somali Immigrants ... The Somalians should not be allowed to get away with what they are doing. They view you as weak and stupid people. Fight back Minnesota, fight back!"

> @cnn.com $SPCX www.cnn.com/2026/10/08/i...

Trump tries to start a race war: "The once Great State of Minnesota is being taken over by Somali Immigrants ... The Somalians should not be allowed to get away with what they are doing. They view you as weak and stupid people. Fight back Minnesota, fight back!"

Stephen "Miller did not want the facilities that were comfortable. He did not want facilities that were humane. We were told point-blank that that was not what the administration wanted." www.npr.org/2026/10/08/n...

ICE has quietly used this warehouse as a detention facility all summer, neighbors say

Throughout the summer, rumors have been bubbling in North New Jersey that ICE has quietly been using a warehouse as a detention center. NPR investigated.

npr.org

remember after citizens united when everyone pretended super pacs wouldn't coordinate with politicians and would be truly independent entities? that was a fun five minutes

Norm Eisen@normeisen.bsky.social · last mo.

Trump ran $10M+ in TV ads promoting himself, paid for w/ your tax dollars Facing backlash, he now says his super PAC will cover it Small problem: presidents can't direct super PAC spending either I'll get into it w/ @ms.now at 11AM ET👇 -TN

If you have $100 million to spend on ads saying you shouldn’t be taxed you’re not being taxed enough Google cofounder Sergey Brin has spent $102 million to fight California’s proposed billionaire tax—he could owe $13 billion if he loses fortune.com/article/how-...

Google co-founder Sergey Brin has now spent $100 million to fight California’s proposed billionaire tax—he could owe $13 billion if he loses | Fortune

The state’s ultrawealthy, including Larry Page and Peter Thiel, have similarly donated to efforts opposing the wealth tax.

fortune.com

I’ve been obsessed with this possible trendline for a decade. If you cut the things that keep people who remain in state healthy and increase access to guns guess what happens

The Economist@economist.com · last mo.

Deaths now outnumber births in reliably Republican counties for the first time since at least 1982. We explain how this may already be affecting voting patterns in America bit.ly/471apDL

Please know that this is one of my few legitimate areas of actual, high-level professional expertise: Kicking the healthiest people off of a health insurance program will bankrupt it. Not 'could;' not 'might,' not 'probably," but absolutely will, with mathematical certainty.

Aaron Rupar@atrupar.com · last mo.

Dr Oz says the Trump administration will kick more than a million people off health insurance because some of them have "never filed a claim"

The Oligarch who funded Don Jr.'s wedding is deeply linked to Russia's mass kidnapping of Ukrainian children.

Aaron Rupar@atrupar.com · last mo.

Trump credits Melania Trump with "securing the return" of Russian children (?) who have been displaced by the war Russia is waging inside Ukraine

Meta's new AI agent wanted my passport info. Not to help me. To train on me. Actually, it wanted everything: bank accounts, email inboxes, ID info. No surprise coming from Meta. But always worth reminding readers that AI automations come with major privacy risks. www.wired.com/story/metas-...

Meta's Muse Is Better at Surveilling Than Helping Me

The Muse app continues Meta’s trend of opting users into data collection for AI training. It also nudges you to share your bank account, email, and passport information.

wired.com

I graduated med school in 2014. I was taught-and saw-how hard melanoma was to treat, like a death sentence Since then, new treatments have made it possible for people w/ the most advanced melanoma, like Jimmy Carter, to live to 100! We are killing ourselves by letting them destroy American science

The Washington Post@washingtonpost.com · 2mo ago

A cancer vaccine succeeded in a clinical trial in preventing the recurrence of melanoma, a result experts say is a breakthrough for mRNA-based treatments. Trials for lung cancer, pancreatic cancer and other diseases' vaccines are also underway.

My grandfather, who is 102 and a medical doctor, has told me about the times before polio was cured. Most years, upon returning to school after summer’s break, there would be some children would didn’t make it back to school because of polio.

Kathleen Bachynski@bachynski.bsky.social · 2mo ago

“On Thursday, Mr. Gorton said that “the success of the polio vaccine was a massive medical fraud” and that widespread vaccination was a “public health disaster.” He received a standing ovation… Mr. Kennedy spoke next, linking arms with the group even as measles cases continue to rise”

If you're wondering why Trump is all of a sudden pushing AI and dismissing concerns about its safety as a "hoax," just look at his stock trades.

This “game” on the White House website, a version of Snake where you play as a white man in a suit and you run around picking up identifiably black, Asian, and Latino men and putting them in orange jumpsuits, might be the most openly white supremacist thing I’ve ever seen the US government produce

There are endless studies showing this and also the financial and societal benefits of universal basic income and or housing-first policies but the U.S. never goes for any of it because it would require allowing the poor to receive benefits that the rich consider “undeserved”

Jen Taub@jentaub.bsky.social · 3mo ago

“A single-payer universal health care system could cover every American, save more than 100,000 lives a year, and still cost $1 trillion less than the system it would replace, according to a new preprint study led by researchers at the Yale School of Public Health.” ysph.yale.edu/news-article...