Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

🎃🦇👻 Michael Scare-anicolas 👻🦇🎃 @karanicolas.bsky.social · 20h

This is just sparkling content moderation. It's only jawboning if it comes from the J'Aubonne parish of Louisiana.

Renee DiResta @noupside.bsky.social · 20h

I'm sorry, is the Trump Administration talking to a tech platform?

Is it...requesting content moderation?

Today following outreach from @thejusticedept, Facebook removed a large group page that was being used to dox and target @ICEgov agents in Chicago.
The wave of violence against ICE has been driven by online apps and social media campaigns designed to put ICE officers at risk just for doing their jobs. The Department of Justice will continue engaging tech companies to eliminate platforms where radicals can incite imminent violence against federal law enforcement.

🎃🦇👻 Michael Scare-anicolas 👻🦇🎃 @karanicolas.bsky.social · 23h

Democrats should make clear that any school which signs on should expect to be jerked *hard* in the opposite direction once they regain control of the executive branch.

Mandatory aggressive DEI and pro-trans programming, academic receivership: a total realignment with every change of government.

Robert Kelchen @robertkelchen.com · 1d

After getting zero firm commitments to this point from the first nine invitees, the Trump administration is extending its proposed compact to all colleges. Expect some red-state publics to say yes.

Trump Offers All Colleges Preferential Funding Plan Rejected by MIT

The Trump administration is inviting all US colleges to participate in a compact — initially rejected by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology — that would grant preferential federal funding in re...

www.bloomberg.com

Reposted by 🎃🦇👻 Michael Scare-anicolas 👻🦇🎃

Steven W. Thrasher is finishing The Overseer Class @thrasherxy.bsky.social · 1d

What an offensive statement from so-called historians. There have been others who have been chased out of the country. Mohamed Abdou was deported for his teaching about Gaza…and he was a prof AT COLUMBIA! But he was queer, Muslim, brown & untenured. Do only white straight tenured profs get sympathy?

Karl Jacoby @karl-jacoby.bsky.social · 1d

History faculty at Columbia & Barnard decrying the harassment of @mark-bray.bsky.social: "This is the first case in recent memory of a historian who has fled the country after receiving death threats on account of the history that they teach."

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🎃🦇👻 Michael Scare-anicolas 👻🦇🎃 @karanicolas.bsky.social · 1d

It is striking, for all the countries out there that aggressively try and export their specific model of governance, that the US isn’t really one of them.

It’s also the case that constitutions have evolved and advanced over the past 250 years, and the US uses a horribly outdated model.

wishda @wishda.bsky.social · 1d

The U.S. Constitutional system, when adopted abroad, has always collapsed into dictatorship.

It’s why the State Department nation building efforts have always modeled parliamentary systems.

We may be at the “Admit it is broken at the core” stage.

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🎃🦇👻 Michael Scare-anicolas 👻🦇🎃 @karanicolas.bsky.social · 1d

I am also struck by the lack of attention paid to how Israel fired tear gas and rubber bullets *today* at Palestinians waiting for the release of their loved ones.

This kind of brutality is just priced in, and therefore deemed unimportant to report on.

Jonathan Cohn @jonathancohn.bsky.social · 1d

Very jarring how the media treats some lives as inherently and others not.

I am happy for hostages and their families to be reunited, but it’s shocking how little media attention is given to “how do Gazans grapple with the utter destruction of their homes, vast loss of lives, and ongoing famine.”

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Rianamator 🦇🎃👻 @riana.bsky.social · 1d

"device operating systems and app stores require users to enter their age or DOB when setting up a new phone or computer. The new rules are slated to take effect on 1/1/27, and for devices set up prior to that date, ... must come up with a way for users to enter their ages by July 1st that year."

The Verge @theverge.com · 1d

California enacts its own internet age-gating law

This one has Google on board.

buff.ly

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Don Moynihan @donmoyn.bsky.social · 1d

And Shapiro absolutely does not support free speech of the type that the op-ed advocates. He supports government censorship of speech he dislikes, and punishment of anyone who would abridge his speech. It is so funny the Times keeps presenting him as a free speech hero.
bsky.app/profile/donm...

Don Moynihan @donmoyn.bsky.social · Mar 20

Maybe saying "GOP are hypocrites on speech" is effective as framing exercise but
a) who is the audience that still thought they cared about this stuff?
b) the Times is still treating giant hypocrites on speech as good faith experts, e.g. Shapiro has pushed an Orban-style suppression of campus speech

Some conservatives said this kind of action is overdue and unsurprising.

“When you take federal funds, you agree to abide by all kinds of rules,” said Ilya Shapiro, director of constitutional studies at the conservative Manhattan Institute. Universities agree, for instance, to abide by certain accounting standards and anti-discrimination policies.

Those rules are not always enforced consistently, Mr. Shapiro said. Nor is the Trump administration “exactly being legally precise” in a lot of what it has done, he added.

picture of Ilya Shapiro with the guy who enforces Viktor Orban's supression of higher ed.

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🎃🦇👻 Michael Scare-anicolas 👻🦇🎃 @karanicolas.bsky.social · 3d

If you consider the historical context, it makes total sense that tech bros and boomers responded to getting ratioed on Twitter by driving the country into nihilistic fascism.

🎃🦇👻 Michael Scare-anicolas 👻🦇🎃 @karanicolas.bsky.social · 3d

The American revolution was literally started because wealthy colonists didn’t want to pay their taxes and felt looked down on by the British aristocracy. It’s petulance all the way down, and kind of hilarious how it was recast as a yearning for freedom over the years.

Peter @notalawyer.bsky.social · 3d

the idea that freedom is in our DNA is just a misinterpretation of the fact that we’re a nation of finicky whiners who don’t like to be personally inconvenienced

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🎃🦇👻 Michael Scare-anicolas 👻🦇🎃 @karanicolas.bsky.social · 3d

The American revolution was literally started because wealthy colonists didn’t want to pay their taxes and felt looked down on by the British aristocracy. It’s petulance all the way down, and kind of hilarious how it was recast as a yearning for freedom over the years.

Peter @notalawyer.bsky.social · 3d

the idea that freedom is in our DNA is just a misinterpretation of the fact that we’re a nation of finicky whiners who don’t like to be personally inconvenienced

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William Lafi Youmans @willyou.bsky.social · 3d

I wrote this essay for the anniversary of Alex Odeh’s still unsolved murder. I tried to focus more on Alex the person and his legacy for the community than the frustrating story of a failed investigation, which I will write about elsewhere. mondoweiss.net/2025/10/40-y...

40 years after Jewish extremists murdered a Palestinian activist in California, no one has been held accountable

On October 11, 1985, Palestinian-American Alex Odeh was killed when a bomb destroyed his office. Despite suspicions that Jewish Defense League members carried out the attack, no charges have ever been...

mondoweiss.net

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🎃🦇👻 Michael Scare-anicolas 👻🦇🎃 @karanicolas.bsky.social · 5d

The ironic thing about this is that at the end of the day China and Russia will probably have more complete records about this administration’s activities than the National Archives.

George Conway 🇺🇸🚫👑🐸 @gtconway.bsky.social · 6d

Apart from helping Comey's selective prosecution defense, this also means the president of the United States uses direct messages on Truth Social to communicate with cabinet officials.

I didn't know that, but we can be sure intelligence agencies all over the planet already did.

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🎃🦇👻 Michael Scare-anicolas 👻🦇🎃 @karanicolas.bsky.social · 4d

Next month @schulichlaw.bsky.social is hosting the inaugural Canadian Technology Law Conference, with a keynote from Justice Minister Sean Fraser, and more great speakers.

Register at www.eventbrite.ca/e/canadian-technology-law-conference-democracy-and-the-information-society-tickets-1748859769649

Poster for the Canadian Technology Law Conference on Democracy and the Information Society, featuring photos of Sean Fraser, Bram Abramson, and Suresh Venkatasubramanian.

🎃🦇👻 Michael Scare-anicolas 👻🦇🎃 @karanicolas.bsky.social · 4d

Funny, I would have thought Canada is a much more natural place to land than, say, Switzerland or France, given the common language and cultural similarities, plus the large immigrant population.

Maybe they're dissuaded by the 51st state talk. I think more likely what's missing is the money though.

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🎃🦇👻 Michael Scare-anicolas 👻🦇🎃 @karanicolas.bsky.social · 4d

Imagine if Canada was out there trying to recruit brilliant American researchers the way E.U. universities are. This is a once-in-a-generation moment to capitalize on an outflow of talent from the U.S., and we're sitting on our hands.

Florian Scheuer @florianscheuer.bsky.social · 5d

I am delighted to share that Nobel laureates Esther Duflo and Abhijit Banerjee will join our Department of Economics @econ.uzh.ch at the University of Zurich on July 1, 2026, as Lemann Foundation Professors of Economics.

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Mike Stabile @mikestabile.bsky.social · 5d

Buried in Michigan's antiporn bill is a provision to effectively outlaw "circumvention tools," such as VPNs.

Mark my words: legislators will increasingly leverage porn panic to restrict or ban VPNs, and to limit internet privacy far beyond adult sites.

Experts raise privacy concerns over Michigan bill targeting pornography and VPNs

Rep. Josh Schriver, the bill’s sponsor, says the law is designed to target only producers and distributors of pornography, not everyday internet users.

www.wilx.com

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🎃🦇👻 Michael Scare-anicolas 👻🦇🎃 @karanicolas.bsky.social · 5d

This is classic elite mindset - they're worried about the tables being turned on them, personally. They're not thinking about whether accountability for criminal conduct is in the best interests of the country, or American democracy. Exactly the kind of insular thinking that led us here.

Ryan J. Reilly “paints a vivid and urgent portrait of… disarray” @ryanjreilly.com · 5d

“What we don’t want to become the norm is where people think, ‘OK, there’s a new administration, now everyone in the old administration gets prosecuted. That’s an incredibly dangerous cycle where nobody wins.”

www.nbcnews.com/politics/jus...

Experts fear impact of deepening polarization and perceived political prosecutions

Reforms enacted after Watergate to bolster public confidence in the impartiality of prosecutions are proving dated and ineffective, legal experts warn.

www.nbcnews.com

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🎃🦇👻 Michael Scare-anicolas 👻🦇🎃 @karanicolas.bsky.social · 5d

The ironic thing about this is that at the end of the day China and Russia will probably have more complete records about this administration’s activities than the National Archives.

George Conway 🇺🇸🚫👑🐸 @gtconway.bsky.social · 6d

Apart from helping Comey's selective prosecution defense, this also means the president of the United States uses direct messages on Truth Social to communicate with cabinet officials.

I didn't know that, but we can be sure intelligence agencies all over the planet already did.

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🎃🦇👻 Michael Scare-anicolas 👻🦇🎃 @karanicolas.bsky.social · 6d

Man, what were those Antifa lunatics in Weimar Germany so stirred up about anyway?

Matt Novak @paleofuture.bsky.social · 6d

"Antifa has been around in various iterations for almost 100 years in some instances, going back to the Weimar Republic in Germany."

- Jack Posobiec at Trump's roundtable on antifa

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🎃🦇👻 Michael Scare-anicolas 👻🦇🎃 @karanicolas.bsky.social · 6d

This is what happened at UCLA. They couldn't allege discrimination based on race, due to the pesky fact that large numbers of the encampment protesters were Jewish, so they created "pro-Zionist" as its own protected class.

To me, that sounds like it's based on political belief, but what do I know.

Joseph Howley @illdottore.bsky.social · 6d

My read on this is that as schools found themselves pressured to investigate Jewish students for antisemitism, there was a scramble to come up with other forms of discrimination charges, incl “Veteran status” and adumbrating “pro-occupation American Jews” under “Israeli” as a nationality group.

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🎃🦇👻 Michael Scare-anicolas 👻🦇🎃 @karanicolas.bsky.social · 6d

Really wild how these concepts are being reframed across the board: they strip protections from religious and racial minorities while creating new rules to protect ICE agents and IDF soldiers. They crush DEI for historically disadvantaged groups while demanding it for Republicans.

Joseph Howley @illdottore.bsky.social · 6d

An underreported part of US campus repression post-2023 was the pivot to making “[IDF] military veteran” a protected class coterminous with “[pro-occupation Israeli/Jew]”. Students protesting the Gaza war were charged with *discrimination based on veteran status*. migrantinsider.com/p/scoop-appl...

SCOOP: Apple Quietly Made ICE Agents a Protected Class

Internal emails show tech giant used anti-hate-speech rules meant for minorities to block an app documenting immigration enforcement.

migrantinsider.com

Reposted by 🎃🦇👻 Michael Scare-anicolas 👻🦇🎃

kedeveaux.bsky.social @kedeveaux.bsky.social · 7d

#Denmark PM announces in #Parliament that the government will push to ban social media for those under 15 years of age. www.theguardian.com/world/2025/o...

Denmark plans social media ban for under-15s as PM warns phones ‘stealing childhood’

Mette Frederiksen links social media use to anxiety, depression and lack of concentration

www.theguardian.com

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🎃🦇👻 Michael Scare-anicolas 👻🦇🎃 @karanicolas.bsky.social · 7d

Tell Trump to knock off the 51st state talk and we’ll summon them back home. Ball’s in your court.

Rick Weinmeyer @rickweinmeyer.bsky.social · 7d

The only immigration problems the city of Chicago and state of Illinois are facing is the dangerous crisis of Canadian Geese along the running and biking trails.

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🎃🦇👻 Michael Scare-anicolas 👻🦇🎃 @karanicolas.bsky.social · 7d

Wtf. I came back to Canada explicitly because I wanted a Supreme Court with fancy santa robes. Why even be a law professor?

Pwnallthethings @pwnallthethings.bsky.social · 8d

Tragic news from Canada where the Canadian Supreme Court has gone from the official dress on the left to the one on the right

Canadian Supreme court. Everyone is dressed in bright red wooly gowns, with a beige trim. It looks sort of like a Santa robe

The Canadian Supreme court. Everyone is dressed in black gowns with a bright white kravat, and two thin red vertical lines on the side of the robe

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Robert Diab @robertdiab.bsky.social · 8d

Thank you to @karanicolas.bsky.social for alerting me to this: Liberals backtracking on C-2, tabling a revised bill this week... www.cbc.ca/news/politic...

Government to table new border bill amid privacy concerns over C-2: sources | CBC News

The federal Liberals are set to introduce a new bill expected to mirror much of what's in their already tabled border legislation — but with some clauses that sparked concerns from opposition parties ...

www.cbc.ca

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🎃🦇👻 Michael Scare-anicolas 👻🦇🎃 @karanicolas.bsky.social · 8d

All of the chaos that we've seen in the U.S. this year has happened in the context of a relatively stable economy. When this bubble inevitably pops things are going to go absolutely off the rails.

Justin Hendrix @justinhendrix.bsky.social · 9d

"The hundreds of billions of dollars companies are investing in AI now account for an astonishing 40 per cent share of US GDP growth this year... In a way, then, America has become one big bet on AI."

America is now one big bet on AI

It’s seen as the magic fix for every threat to the US economy

www.ft.com

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