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Aaron Greenspan

@aarongreenspan.com

2.5K followers 200 following 4.5K posts

"Fueled by a litany of largely unintelligible and random grievances" —Elon Musk's Lawyers "Écrasez l'infâme" —Voltaire http://www.aarongreenspan.com

www.aarongreenspan.com

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Aaron Greenspan @aarongreenspan.com · Feb 25

Everyone should watch this. Thanks to our friends in France for putting it in plain English in a way that seemingly no American broadcaster can. www.youtube.com/watch?v=k35P...

Operation Trump: Russian Spies Conquer America

YouTube video by Best Documentary

www.youtube.com

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Jacob Bogage @jacobbogage.bsky.social · 1h

👀 Scoop: IRS Direct File, the free government-backed program that let you file your taxes for free, is dead.

IRS wrote to state tax agencies saying it would not be operational this coming tax season, per records I've obtained.

IRS Direct File: 2023-2025.

(Story from when the pilot launched.)

IRS tests free e-filing system that could compete with tax-prep giants

The tax agency has quietly built its own prototype system for filing tax returns digitally and free of charge, according to current and former officials.

www.washingtonpost.com

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🏳️‍⚧️ Josephine Riesman @josie.zone · 3h

Hoo boy does this Cheney obit hit hard

defector.com/dick-cheney-...

At its heart, American conservatism is a fantasy. It's a vision of a world too evil to be saved or cared about, and fearsome enough to justify any and every impulse toward cruelty and violence that a person might have. A world resolutely unworthy of knowing, except as a danger. A world in which you will always need a gun, and to shoot somebody with it, instead of just lusting for both.

Because the world isn't actually like that—because, in general, people are just people, and mostly want to live peaceably and get along with each other—most American conservatives must mainline Fox News (or Newsmax, or whatever) directly to their brains at all hours in order to remain within the fantasy that both sustains and degrades them. In this respect, Dick Cheney got luckier than most American right-wingers could ever dream. Fanatics with brown skin crashed commercial jet airliners into the World Trade Center and Pentagon, at a time when, as vice president under the harebrained and banally evil George W. Bush, Cheney for all practical purposes ran the most lethal death-dealing apparatus in the history of the world. He got to spend seven years deciding who the bad guys were and how to kill them. He got to scrawl the simplest possible moral calculus across the world in blood. He lived the dream.

This is the Mega Millions jackpot for the American conservative. This is the golden ticket to Willy Wonka's Chocolate Factory. No one has ever welcomed their firstborn child to the world with greater joy than that with which the American reactionary greets a Pearl Harbor, a 9/11, a dead cop, an assassinated YouTube bigot. Dick Cheney's celebration lasted more than 20 years; by the time it ended—to the extent it ever did—a crucial portion of American civil liberties had gone with it. More than half a million Iraqis were dead.

Against the sheer scale of that mountain of corpses, it seems almost ghoulish to mention that Cheney, more than any other person, brought us today's political reality. He did, though; the American conservative project, the old dream of making the world into a place awful enough to justify American conservatism, never had a better champion. He was a shamelessly self-dealing con man, for one thing: Chosen as a trusted associate of the elder George H. W. Bush to lead the search for the right running-mate for George W., Cheney picked himself, and then ran the Iraq War as a monumental graft machine for his Halliburton oil company and as many cronies as could be dealt in. The nature of Cheney's con—aided by its contrast against Donald Rumsfeld's burlesque vamping, John Ashcroft's spiral-eyed eschatological lunacy, and the president's plain brainlessness—was a thin performance of steely, flinty-eyed competence laid over arrogance, ignorance, and ineptitude. He wrecked everything he touched, and was wrong in all of his predictions and analyses, and as a result completely discredited America's respectable establishment. Along the way, he played white America's (and mainstream media's) Islamophobia and bloodlust like arcade joysticks, to rearguard each next extension of authoritarianism and paint the administration's critics as traitors. His vileness and cynicism were corrosive, and have by now more or less fully eaten through every surface and instituti…

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Adam Kinzinger @adamkinzinger.substack.com · 4h

Reminder: At the height of COVID
When hospitals were desperate for COVID tests, Trump sent thousands to Putin for his personal use

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James Fallows @jfallows.bsky.social · 7h

People of California:

Don't take anything for granted. If you haven't voted early, be sure to vote today, YES on Prop 50.

(Conveniently, the only item on the usually clogged Calif ballot.)

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Aaron Greenspan @aarongreenspan.com · 7h

Um, "Chicagoans *say*?"

What exactly would it take for "the immigration blitz" to be "out of control" without a qualifier?

Gregory Pratt @royalpratt.bsky.social · 1d

NEWS: Federal agents crashed with woman’s car, pointed guns at her, dragged her out by legs, tossed her in a minivan, held her and (eventually) let her go without charges. This as Chicagoans say the immigration blitz is out of control. (DHS blames her.)
www.chicagotribune.com/2025/11/03/c...

Chicago woman dragged out of her car after colliding with ICE demands accountability

The arrest of Dayanne Figueroa highlights growing concerns about the use of force against U.S. citizens and due process. She was released after a few hours without charges.

www.chicagotribune.com

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Cristian Farias @cristianfarias.com · 18h

Left: The statutes Aileen Cannon analyzed when declaring unconstitutional Jack Smith's appointment as special counsel: www.politico.com/f/?id=000001...

Right: The statutes Pam Bondi cited when retroactively reappointing Lindsey Halligan as special attorney: storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...

Screenshot of ruling by Aileen Cannon:

"The Court now proceeds to evaluate the four statutes cited by the Special Counsel as purported authorization for his appointment—28 U.S.C. §§ 509, 510, 515, 533. The Court concludes that none vests the Attorney General with authority to appoint a Special Counsel like
Smith, who does not assist a United States Attorney but who replaces the role of United States Attorney within his jurisdiction."

Screenshot of Pam Bondi appointing order:

On September 22, 2025, I exercised the authority vested in the Attorney General by 28 U.S.C. § 546 to designate and appoint Lindsey Halligan as the United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia. See Att'y Gen. Order No. 6402-2025. For the avoidance of doubt as to the validity of that appointment, and by virtue of the authority vested in the Attorney General by law, including 28 U.S.C. § 509, 510, and 515, I hereby appoint Ms. Halligan to the additional position of Special Attorney, as of September 22, 2025, and thereby ratify her employment as an attorney of the Department of Justice from that date going forward.

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Aaron Greenspan @aarongreenspan.com · 17h

Yeah, suffice it to say, I didn't buy the print copy. There are far better uses of $4.00 or whatever it costs these days.

Aaron Greenspan @aarongreenspan.com · 17h

Obviously! Where did I go wrong?

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Aaron Greenspan @aarongreenspan.com · 17h

(So much to love about that photo. The fact that it suggests I'm literally two-faced. The fact that my eyes are closed. The fact that it makes my nose look extra-big because part of it is actually not my nose, but my ear from the other side. The overexposure. The fact that it just sucks.)

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Aaron Greenspan @aarongreenspan.com · 17h

Huh. Just a few days ago, the NYT went with this for me. If only I'd been born a Nazi.

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The New Republic @newrepublic.com · 1d

Agents forcibly opened the woman's car door and pulled her out by her legs, dragging her through the street. They did not identify themselves or tell her that she was under arrest.

The citizen was held for hours before being released without charge. trib.al/tYMBPec

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Aaron Rupar @atrupar.com · 1d

it's time for journos to start asking Johnson meta questions

"Speaker, on 5 occasions last week you said 'I haven't seen it' when asked about news events w/big implications for public policy. Do you ever read the news, and do you agree it's problematic for the Speaker to be so woefully uninformed?"

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Aaron Greenspan @aarongreenspan.com · 19h

"Dear PlainSite Legal or Compliance Team,

I am writing on behalf of my client, [Client Name], ..."

lol

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Molly White @molly.wiki · 22h

I want to see Mamdani win in NYC tomorrow for a lot of reasons, but one of them is absolutely to watch Bill Ackman crash out

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Chance the Lawyer @chancethelawyer.bsky.social · 23h

evergreen advice 🌲

Greg Pak @gregpak.net · 2d

musk did another unspeakable, inexcusable racism that i'm not gonna spread around

but delete your twitter

no money for musk

no money for nazis

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John Rogers @johnrogers.bsky.social · 1d

It's not in this article but the government asserts that the sandwich was thrown at "point blank range", which implies subway sandwiches have defined effective weapon ranges of varying lethality, and I would like to see the government's chart of these ranges.

Josh Mankiewicz @joshmankiewicz.bsky.social · 1d

Trial Begins for Man Accused of Lobbing a Sandwich at a Federal Agent www.nytimes.com/2025/11/03/u...

Trial Begins for Man Accused of Lobbing a Sandwich at a Federal Agent

www.nytimes.com

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Max Berger @maxberger.bsky.social · 1d

In a way, I find the authoritarian takeover of our media system even more disturbing than the authoritarian takeover of our political system.

Our political system has been failing basically my entire adult life. But, the media system provided accountability and sort of worked. Now it’s collapsing.

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News Eye @newseye.bsky.social · 1d

NEW: Footage of a US citizen in Chicago being rammed then dragged from her car on her way to work.

Abducted, with no warrant, her family couldn’t find her for hours.

She was later released with NO CHARGE.

A DHS statement said she “violently resisted arrest, injuring two officers”.

You decide…

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southpaw @nycsouthpaw.bsky.social · 1d

You don’t get to name your kid X Æ A-12 and then say “or whatever his name is” about anyone else.

Matt Novak @paleofuture.bsky.social · 1d

Elon Musk endorses Cuomo for mayor of New York and makes sure to add some racism in there: “…Mumdumi or whatever his name is.”

Elon Musk: Remember to vote tomorrow in New York!
Bear in mind that a vote for Curtis is really a vote for Mumdumi or whatever his name is.
VOTE CUOMO!
11:45 AM • 11/3/25 • 1.2M Views

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David Sirota @davidsirota.com · 1d

This was considered peak Savvy Punditry And Strategy™ one year ago.

Lessons for Dems & liberals: 1) stop thinking political pundits who've never worked on campaigns have any useful advice on how to win elections 2) just because something is published by an elite media outlet doesnt mean it's smart

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Aaron Greenspan @aarongreenspan.com · 1d

R-U-S-S-I-A

Tech Policy Press @techpolicypress.bsky.social · 1d

Elon Musk’s Grokipedia is one of many experiments designed to replace human-generated writing with LLMs. But Ryan McGrady says its defining feature is its use of technological power to re-exert top-down authority over information and knowledge. Who is Grokipedia for, he asks, other than its owner?

With Grokipedia, Top-Down Control of Knowledge Is New Again | TechPolicy.Press

Ryan McGrady asks, who is Grokipedia for, other than its owner?

www.techpolicy.press

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Max Kennerly @maxkennerly.bsky.social · 1d

Taxing commercial flight to reflect its true environmental costs presents genuine policy & economic tradeoffs, but taxing private air travel does not, and the latter should be taxed at ludicrously punitive rates to address the deficit created by the former.

Richard Allan @rpallanuk.bsky.social · 1d

Impact of flights on global warming severely underestimated by many carbon calculators & offset schemes that don’t properly account for taxiing, sub-optimal routing or non-CO2 climate effects which are larger component:
www.newscientist.com/article/2502...

Research paper:
doi.org/10.1038/s432...

Your flight emissions are way higher than carbon calculators suggest

Existing tools that work out the carbon footprint of flights greatly underestimate their warming impact, say the makers of a new calculator

www.newscientist.com

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alec karakatsanis @equalityalec.bsky.social · 1d

As even some people on the inside have admitted, this is about regime-change, natural resources, profit, politics, etc... The government itself has said virtually no fentanyl comes from Venezuela. It's just lawless murder in service of predatory domination. All whitewashed.

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alec karakatsanis @equalityalec.bsky.social · 1d

All of this normalizes some of the most dangerous, depraved, shocking, and fraudulent conduct that people in power can perpetrate. It's just normalizing the lies, and the very concept that routine drug interdiction could somehow morph into automatic process-free assassination.

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alec karakatsanis @equalityalec.bsky.social · 1d

Deja vu. bsky.app/profile/equa...

alec karakatsanis @equalityalec.bsky.social · 12d

This is driving me crazy. The New York Times calling this madness an “anti-drug operation” is one of the worst forms of propaganda: accepting stated motivations of powerful people as the truth.

NYT headline: U.S. strikes second boat in pacific as anti drug operation expands.

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