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Jason Kuznicki

@jkuznicki.bsky.social

5K followers 1K following 8.1K posts

A gay dad cultivating his garden in Puna, Hawaii. Now working on some big projects for the future.🍍🌴🌱📖🌐☸️ Newsletter: https://pacification.beehiiv.com/ Book: https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/3319839950/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?ie=UTF8&qid=&sr=

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Jason Kuznicki @jkuznicki.bsky.social · 7d

The remedy for a president who believes he can levy taxes and spend the revenue without congressional authorization is removal from office.

Jason Kuznicki @jkuznicki.bsky.social · 11d

The remedy for a president who even attempts to invent new crimes by decree is removal from office.

Jason Kuznicki @jkuznicki.bsky.social · 13d

The remedy for a president who both lies to your face and also expects you to make a deal with him is removal from office.

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Jason Kuznicki @jkuznicki.bsky.social · 2m

What does “cognitively available” mean? I can understand what my mom meant. I could even play along with it.

What set us apart is that I would expect a massive, years-long fraud to leave evidence.

Jason Kuznicki @jkuznicki.bsky.social · 6m

So a lot of people (and a lot of libertarians in particular) end up against democracy because it delivers nothing like what they want, namely their own policy preferences.

Jason Kuznicki @jkuznicki.bsky.social · 6m

I also think we more often expect too much from democracy—and then hate it for not delivering on our preferences in particular. But preference aggregation by voting is mathematically impossible; outside of a few very simple cases, groups don’t have coherent preferences.

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Kevin Elliott @kjephd.bsky.social · 25m

I'm gonna try to articulate something I've been thinking about for a while, regarding *why* disillusionment, distrust, & dissatisfaction with democracy are rising.

Almost everything I read takes this phenomenon as an exogenous shock, assuming no one chose to make it so. I suspect that's incomplete.

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Jason Kuznicki @jkuznicki.bsky.social · 16m

I was very much with you until this point. When I think of distrust in democracy, I think of my late mother, who sincerely believed that every local election had always been rigged.

I don’t think of it as the more plausible view. I think of it as wish fulfillment.

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Kevin Elliott @kjephd.bsky.social · 25m

A truly dispiriting thing is that even advocating reform to SAVE democracy could perversely strengthen its enemies because its friends can lose confidence in its current form. Though of course you shouldn't ignore the defects of the status quo, accepting them confirms at some level the populist line

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Kevin Elliott @kjephd.bsky.social · 25m

Here's the key thing about distrust: it can be motivated both by a populist diagnosis leading to reactionary authoritarianism AS WELL AS an emancipatory, left-coded reformism or radical critique.

Everyone can distrust democracy for their own ENTIRELY DISTINCT & FUNDAMENTALLY INCOMPATIBLE reasons.

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Jason Kuznicki @jkuznicki.bsky.social · 28m

The seemingly infinite appetite for “Hey, did that guy just do a racism?” versus the nonexistent appetite for “This policy choice lessens social friction.”

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economymedicine.bsky.social @economymedicine.bsky.social · 32m

We have lost the idea that power comes with obligations to others. Power allows you to do things that others cannot but it must also come with burdens that others do not bear.

mtsw @mtsw.bsky.social · 48m

I think one of the biggest cleavages in our society that no one talks about is the division between those that think powerful people must be held to a higher standard than non-powerful people and those who think powerful people should be flattered and sucked up to.

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Jason Kuznicki @jkuznicki.bsky.social · 33m

The folks in costume, who are dangerously blurring the line between human and animal.

Once again making us sound way more badass than we are.

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Jack Jenkins @jackjenkins.me · 35m

Observation: It's curious that Republicans are making this a thing.

They barely acknowledged past protests, including No Kings, assuming they acknowledged them at all.

So why focus so much rhetorical energy on this protest, and why now?

Aaron Rupar @atrupar.com · 40m

Lisa McClain refers to No Kings as "the I Hate America rally"

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Jason Kuznicki @jkuznicki.bsky.social · 38m

Scale, scale, scale. The way to stop being a Substacker and start running a big media company seems only open to certain people, doesn’t it?

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Rob Tracinski @tracinski.bsky.social · 41m

"Trump is abusing power, so let's not give him more of it" is an excellent argument. Trump's whole administration (both of them, actually) is a cautionary tale about constantly scheming to expand presidential power without considering that someone you hate might get elected to the office.

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Rob Tracinski @tracinski.bsky.social · 1h

LOL, I think we’re already proving that one wrong.

Robin Berjon @robin.berjon.com · 8h

Kicking off the Future of Democracy event with Barry talking about corporations more dangerous to freedom than the state.

The Future of Democracy colourful slide, with Barry talking.

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Jason Kuznicki @jkuznicki.bsky.social · 44m

There are a few. @liberalcurrents.com is the best of them. But they have so few peers and so little reach next to the big media that they most directly oppose ideologically.

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Jason Kuznicki @jkuznicki.bsky.social · 48m

What if there were an outlet that believed in liberalism with the same fervor that the big media conglomerates have for reactionary centrism?

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Jason Kuznicki @jkuznicki.bsky.social · 54m

The typical reader is confused and a bit put off by a page full of truly original, nuanced, and divergent opinions. But they’ll know exactly what to do with a page full of fascism: boo, or cheer, and either way—click and link.

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Jason Kuznicki @jkuznicki.bsky.social · 54m

“Viewpoint diversity” doesn’t really mean finding people who all have a bunch of different and original perspectives.

In practice it just about always means “move the Overton Window towards fascism.”

I wish it weren’t so.

Matthew Kirschenbaum @mkirschenbaum.bsky.social · 1h

I’m guessing that a reasonable person might say a good faith effort to foster “viewpoint diversity” on campuses could or should include elevating the local chapter of Young Republicans . . . right? Right? www.politico.com/news/2025/10...

‘I love Hitler’: Leaked messages expose Young Republicans’ racist chat

Thousands of private messages reveal young GOP leaders joking about gas chambers, slavery and rape.

www.politico.com

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Governor JB Pritzker @govpritzker.illinois.gov · 14h

Greg Bovino, Kristi Noem, and DHS need to answer for their unchecked attacks on Chicago residents.

ICE is an out-of-control danger to our peaceful communities.

The images from the Sun-Times today speak for themselves.

An ICE agent throws a tear gas canister at protesters at East 105th Street and South Avenue N in East Side.

Photo Credit: Anthony Vazquez/Sun-Times

Federal immigration enforcement agents detain a protester during a skirmish at East 105th Street and South Avenue N in East Side.

Photo Credit: Anthony Vazquez/Sun-Times

A U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent points a crowd control weapon at a protester Tuesday at East 105th Street and South Avenue N in the East Side neighborhood.

Photo Credit: Anthony Vazquez/Sun-Times

A Chicago Police Department officer washes his face after being exposed to tear gas during a protest at East 105th Street and South Avenue N in East Side.

Photo Credit: Anthony Vazquez/Sun-Times

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Sean Casten @seancasten.bsky.social · 1h

These charts are shocking, frightening and entirely predictable on account of Trump's tariff policies, slow growth / high unemployment fiscal policies and assault on the rule of law that has always been the bedrock reason to invest in the US.

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Liberal Currents @liberalcurrents.com · 1h

Catch up with the first three episodes of @sjshancoxli.liberalcurrents.com's new "Liberalism 101" podcast series: www.liberalcurrents.com/neonliberali...

Neon Liberalism #47: Liberalism 101: Liberalism and Limited Government
If you remember anything from high school civics, it's the phrases "separation of powers" and "checks and balances." That separation and those checks are under the greatest attack we've seen in our lifetimes. But why does that matter? How does it affect
By Samantha Hancox-Li, Robert Black 11 Oct 2025

Neon Liberalism #46: Liberalism 101: Liberalism and Toleration
Samantha and Lucian Staiano-Daniels, author of "The War People," discuss the connection between liberalism and toleration and the dark history of religious civil war. How did the European Wars of Religion give birth to our concept of toleration? And is this history enough reason today to embrace toleration?
By Samantha Hancox-Li, Lucian Staiano-Daniels 05 Oct 2025

Neon Liberalism #45: Liberalism 101: Liberalism and Prosperity
Samantha and fellow Liberal Currents editor Jason Briggeman discuss the economics of liberal democracy, starting from the basic question "why are all the rich countries liberal democracies?" Did liberal democracy cause the Industrial Revolution? What is the role of imperialism in the modern economy? And perhaps most importantly:
By Samantha Hancox-Li, Jason Briggeman 27 Sep 2025

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David Bier @davidjbier.bsky.social · 2h

Cato filed an amicus brief in RAICES v. Noem, the case challenging Trump's Border Dictator order that purports to suspend all immigration law because it is "ineffective." Our brief describes how the government's arguments are baseless www.cato.org/legal-briefs...

RAICES v. Noem

The government’s assertions are based on either misinterpretations or tortured readings of the data, attempting to find justification for a spurious legal argument in facts that simply are not there.

www.cato.org

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Kelly² @anarchakelly.bsky.social · 2h

In ~2017 I blew the whistle on open Nazis and white supremacists in the student libertarian group ecosystem and in return I was fired from my job lmao. The student GOP group chat leak is not even a little surprising.

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Rob Tracinski @tracinski.bsky.social · 12h

Can we all just get together and promise not to buy or talk about this book so that being massively embarrassing is not rewarded.

Oliver Darcy @oliverdarcy.bsky.social · 13h

Scoop: Olivia Nuzzi has written a book during her year in exile, in which she is set to in part address her relationship with RFK Jr. Details in @status.news: www.status.news/p/olivia-nuz...

Have I Got Nuzzi For You

Olivia Nuzzi is set to address her relationship with Robert F. Kennedy Jr. in a forthcoming book, galleys of which are circulating among a select group of readers, Status has learned.

www.status.news

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Mark Thompson @sonofathomp.bsky.social · 17h

We’ve just received two months straight of ‘violent rhetoric playing a role in the Kirk assassination’ lectures from the right, only to have Congressional Republicans come out and preemptively label the upcoming No Kings protests as an Antifa offensive full of disloyal subversives. Rhetoric indeed.

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