Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Reposted by Micah Coffee

BeijingPalmer @beijingpalmer.bsky.social · 6h

let me note that one of the actual tests here is going to be 'what do people pushing these ideas want for their own children' and I will bet you a lot of money that the answer is 'the elite university model of Harvard et al' not 'learning through AI slop'

Vlad 🐸 Țepeș @porcupunk.bsky.social · 20h

Wow. Just wow.

"Students pay premium prices for information that AI now delivers instantly and for free. A business student can ask ChatGPT to explain supply chain optimization or generate market analysis in seconds. The traditional lecture-and-test model faces its Blockbuster moment."

When Knowledge is Free, What are Professors For?

Higher Education Must Stop Competing with AI on Information and Start Teaching What Machines Can’t Do

www.forbes.com

30 220 1K

Reposted by Micah Coffee

Mark Jacob @markjacob.bsky.social · 7h

A terrific AFP fact check uses reverse image searches to expose how a White House video took scenes from Florida, Texas, South Carolina and Nebraska and lied that they showed "Chicago is in chaos."
factcheck.afp.com/doc.afp.com....

Post from WH about Chicago "in chaos," showing scene from another state.

300 4.8K 9.4K

Reposted by Micah Coffee

Andy Craig @andycraig.bsky.social · 7h

The state of our Union is... uh, let's call it "frayed."

Dr. Lucky Tran @luckytran.com · 16h

15 US states and territories have formed a new Public Health Alliance, which will counter the absence of federal leadership by tracking outbreaks, issuing guidance, buying vaccines and more.

Members of the new alliance include CA, CO, CT, DE, GU, HI, IL, MD, MA, NJ, NY, NC, OR, RI, WA.

Map: Governors Public Health Alliance
* Guam is also a member of the alliance
Updated October 15, 2025
Map: @luckytran • Created with Datawrapper

4 36 180

Reposted by Micah Coffee

No true bill @bill-of-lefts.bsky.social · 21h

This has been bothering me all day because the obvious point of No Kings is to show we have the power to do a color revolution if they don‘t honor the results of future elections.

The other point is to radicalize fence-sitters by having people who are *clearly doing nothing wrong* be tear gassed

Hemry, Local Bartender @bartenderhemry.bsky.social · 1d

This is exactly backwards, the no kings protests are a mass movement of regular people that have every republican politician in the country raging about "hate America rallies," and the online protest industry weirdos who say shit like "radlib" to each other are the ones skimming off the top of them

it is no wonder that 50501, a movement of radlibs who are very upset but don’t want to get in trouble, would be boosting superficial activism.

superficial activism has its place, but if that place is front and center, it kills whatever movement it is skimming off the top of.

21 190 1.1K

Reposted by Micah Coffee

Yashar Ali 🐘 @yasharali.bsky.social · 21h

BREAKING via WSJ

The Trump administration is planning sweeping changes in criminal division at the IRS.

Full Story: on.wsj.com/3LbVFtK

The Trump administration is preparing sweeping changes at the Internal Revenue Service that would allow the agency to pursue criminal inquiries of left-leaning groups more easily, according to people familiar with the matter.
A senior IRS official involved in the effort has drawn up a list of potential targets that includes major Democratic donors, some of the people said.
The undertaking aims to install allies of President Trump at the IRS criminal-investigative division, or IRS-CI, to exert firmer control over the unit and weaken the involvement of IRS lawyers in criminal investigations, officials said. The proposed changes could open the door to politically motivated probes and are being driven by Gary Shapley, an adviser to Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent.

70 470 980

Reposted by Micah Coffee

Evan Bernick, a finite mode with a smol hooman and a lorg floof @evanbernick.bsky.social · 22h

Lincoln on Dred Scott and (not) relinquishing all constitutional authority to a narrow majority that messes a lot of important things up

msa.maryland.gov/megafile/msa...

If this important decision had been made by the unanimous concurrence of the judges, and without any apparent partisan bias, and in accordance with legal public expectation, and with the steady practice of the departments throughout our history, and had been in no part, based on assumed historical facts which are not really true; or, if wanting in some of these, it had been before the court more than once, and had there been affirmed and re-affirmed through a course of years, it then might be, perhaps would be, factious, nay, even revolutionary,
to not acquiesce in it as a precedent. But when, as it is true we find it wanting in all these claims to the public confidence, it is not resistance, it is not factious, it is not even disrespectful, to treat it as not having yet quite
established a settled doctrine for the country

2 37 150

Reposted by Micah Coffee

Andy Craig @andycraig.bsky.social · 21h

"a memorandum expanding his administration’s authority"

The phrasing you're looking for is that he's suspending parts of the Constitution by decree.

The New York Times @nytimes.com · 21h

President Trump on Wednesday signed a memorandum expanding his administration’s authority to repurpose unspent federal funds to pay members of the military during the government shutdown, escalating his challenge to the authority of Congress on spending matters.

Trump Signs Memo Expanding His Authority to Spend Federal Money

The president gave Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth wide authority to repurpose funds to pay members of the military without approval from Congress, which has the sole constitutional authority to decide federal spending.

nyti.ms

28 560 1.6K

Reposted by Micah Coffee

Aaron Rupar @atrupar.com · 1d

Mamdani: "I just want to speak directly to the president. I will not be a mayor like Mayor Adams who will call you to stay out of jail. I won't be a disgraced governor like Andrew Cuomo who will call you to ask how to win this election. I can do those things on my own."

550 5.8K 26K

Reposted by Micah Coffee

Adam Serwer @adamserwer.bsky.social · 1d

The "anti-woke" backlash was always about white collar labor competition from nonwhites, not hr bullshit. bsky.app/profile/phil...

Phil Lewis @phillewis.bsky.social · 1d

NBC News has reportedly eliminated its NBC BLK, NBC Asian America, NBC Latino and NBC OUT teams

NBC News’ 150 Layoffs Gut Black, Latino, Asian American and LGBTQ+ Diversity Teams

The cuts affected teams across the NBC News operation and came as the network no longer needed to support two different news operations. MSNBC has begun growing its own newsroom, hiring swaths of tale...

www.thewrap.com

77 1.3K 4.7K

Reposted by Micah Coffee

Holly Anderson 🍇 @hollyanderson.bsky.social · 1d

you fucked around and now the Episcopalians are doing memes. are you happy now. are you

Screenshot of a Facebook post featuring three of the Portland protesters wearing inflatable frog costumes with the following text:

Episcopalians on Facebook
Elizabeth Rose Elrod • 22h •
Exodus 8:2-6
"But if you refuse to let them go, I will plague your whole country with frogs...
The frogs shall come up on you and on your people and on all your officials."

41 9.6K 34K

Reposted by Micah Coffee

TRT 🇺🇦🇵🇸 @trt.bsky.social · 1d

In 2018 the Democrats achieved a National Margin of 8.6%. Trump had a 46% approval rating on Election Day.

Emily Badger @emmbadger.bsky.social · 1d

If Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act falls, Democrats might need to win the national popular vote by 5 to 6 points to take control of the House, via Nate Cohn
www.nytimes.com/2025/10/15/u...

5 23 79

Reposted by Micah Coffee

jamelle @jamellebouie.net · 1d

white reactionaries disenfranchising black voters to secure political power? that’s a jim crow. www.nytimes.com/2025/10/15/u...

The Supreme Court Case That Could Hand the House to Republicans

www.nytimes.com

120 1.8K 6.1K

Micah Coffee @jewcoffee.bsky.social · 1d

We are far enough away from the 19th century that there can be a flavor of Conservatism that seeks to conserve the spirit of liberty of Lincoln-era Republicanism (laudatory).

5

Reposted by Micah Coffee

ryan cooper @ryanlcooper.com · 1d

two big things happened imo: Trump winning in 2016 apparently proved they could utterly wallow in all their worst instincts and still win, and Elon buying Twitter and turning it into a) the default conservative comms platform b) an openly Nazi sewer

13 54 680

Reposted by Micah Coffee

jamelle @jamellebouie.net · 1d

a real question for the roberts majority is what in their view distinguishes jim crow disenfranchisement from majority-minority districts? a related question is what in their view made the typical jim crow law — which was facially neutral — unconstitutional?

jamelle @jamellebouie.net · 1d

white reactionaries disenfranchising black voters to secure political power? that’s a jim crow. www.nytimes.com/2025/10/15/u...

The Supreme Court Case That Could Hand the House to Republicans

www.nytimes.com

30 280 1.3K

Micah Coffee @jewcoffee.bsky.social · 1d

David Taylor (R, OH-2)

1 7 43

Reposted by Micah Coffee

Acyn @acyn.bsky.social · 1d

Trump: I want to thank Stephen Miller I would love to have him come up and explain his true feelings. Maybe not his truest feelings. That might be going a little too far

350 610 2K

Reposted by Micah Coffee

Paul Waldman @paulwaldman.bsky.social · 1d

So Nazis. They want to give refugee status to Nazis.

OK, maybe not JUST Nazis. Also certain other white people who hate non-white immigration. But Nazis can definitely come.

www.nytimes.com/2025/10/15/u...

The proposals also advise Mr. Trump to prioritize Europeans who have been “targeted for peaceful expression of views online such as opposition to mass migration or support for ‘populist’ political parties.”

That appeared to be a reference to the European far-right political party Alternative for Germany, whose leaders have trivialized the Holocaust, revived Nazi slogans and denigrated foreigners. Vice President JD Vance has criticized Germany for trying to suppress the views of the group, which is known as the AfD.

29 300 690

Reposted by Micah Coffee

ghost malone ergo propter malone @proptermalone.bsky.social · 1d

to temper that a hair, i think people generally need to start wrapping their head around what prosecutions into a likely field of pocket pardons look like, because it's not going to be anywhere near as satisfying as you want it to be

21 13 300

Reposted by Micah Coffee

Ned Resnikoff @resnikoff.bsky.social · 1d

The reason why the lower levels of the GOP are infested with outright Nazis is because the highest echelons are as well.

jamelle @jamellebouie.net · 1d

asylum but only for racists apparently www.nytimes.com/2025/10/15/u...

Trump Considers Overhaul of Refugee System That Would Favor White People

www.nytimes.com

1 21 110

Reposted by Micah Coffee

Don Moynihan @donmoyn.bsky.social · 1d

Feels like this will be a useful meme for the next few years

Peacemaker looks at a mural embedding Hitler into American symbols

24 1.2K 4.6K

Reposted by Micah Coffee

Joshua Holland @joshuaholland.bsky.social · 1d

“The content of that image [which my staffer placed on a wall behind him where nobody found it objectionable until this story came out] does not reflect the values or standards of this office, my staff, or myself, and I condemn it in the strongest terms.”

Gonna be quite an investigation, I'm sure.

Capitol Police called to investigate swastika in GOP congressional office

An American flag altered to include an image of a swastika was found in Rep. Dave Taylor’s office.

www.yahoo.com

7 11 47

Reposted by Micah Coffee

Justin Hendrix @justinhendrix.bsky.social · 1d

Quite a day.

33 580 1.4K

Reposted by Micah Coffee

Matt Binder @mattbinder.bsky.social · 1d

CNN is covering prediction market odds from an online casino as if it’s actual polling data

190 420 2.3K

Reposted by Micah Coffee

Jeff Yang @originalsp.in · 1d

ICE arrested comedian Robby Roadsteamer for singing a parody of Rod Stewart’s “Do Ya Think I’m Sexy” in a Jeffrey Epstein the Giraffe costume outside their facility.

He sings “If you hate brown people / and you are a Nazi” and ICE thugs grab him and drag him into detention. No violence—just speech.

140 1.7K 3.2K