Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

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Taniel @taniel.bsky.social · 9h

There’s 1,000 times more chatter about the Maine senate race in a year than about Maine’s ballot measure in 3 weeks that’d bring voter ID and crack down on mail voting… maybe let’s start there??? boltsmag.org/maine-questi...

A Ballot Measure Targets Mail Voting in Maine - Bolts

Question 1, on the November ballot, would set up a barrage of new restrictions on absentee ballots that would considerably affect older voters and people with disabilities.

boltsmag.org

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riffle @riffle.bsky.social · 2m

And have several backups that are drawn differently but also maximally reduce GOP seats. If the first is nixed, introduce the second.

Eventually, like in Ohio a few years ago, just use one that's ruled out but it's "too late to redraw."

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Joshua Holland @joshuaholland.bsky.social · 13m

“It's just a vehicle. So it's ironic that it would even become a political statement, but nonetheless it is. [Editor’s note: Taylor was arrested and convicted of conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding in the January 6 attack on the Capitol. He was later pardoned by President Trump.]”

Zoë Schiffer @zoeschiffer.bsky.social · 31m

What's it like to own a Cybertruck in the year 2025? We talked to owners about their most controversial purchase and why they (still) love it: www.wired.com/story/owning...

Spit On, Sworn At, and Undeterred: What It’s Like to Own a Cybertruck

“We were the targets.” WIRED spoke to seven Tesla Cybertruck owners about their most controversial purchase and why they're proud to drive it.

www.wired.com

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Alan Elrod @aselrod.bsky.social · 49m

Churches showing an AI Charlie Kirk telling congregants, through an artificial voice, not to let evil win is a new level of instrumentalizing the dead.

When Trump goes, I think we’re going to see the same thing. Visions and AI slop will abound. Prophecies and messages from beyond the grave.

Alan Elrod @aselrod.bsky.social · 1h

I wrote about how MAGA is being shaped by a politics of immortality, how Charlie Kirk’s martyrdom reflects this, and what it could mean for the future of Trumpism. Read at @liberalcurrents.com

www.liberalcurrents.com/the-last-ene...

The Last Enemy Is Death: Prophetic Visions, AI Slop, and How the Politics of Immortality Could Shape Our Future

How mystics and transhumanists force the dead to speak on behalf of their politics.

www.liberalcurrents.com

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riffle @riffle.bsky.social · 42m

I just saw this and had to add it to this conversation.

You and the Pope have something in common (though Papa is a White Sox fan).

bsky.app/profile/razz...

Razzball @razzball.bsky.social · 21h

Someone in the crowd: “Go Cubs!”

Pope Leo XIV: “Han perdido! They lost!”

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riffle @riffle.bsky.social · 8h

Yes no relievers is the key for them.

As for the spite, i get you. I don't have fandom really: i just know who I want to be humiliated.

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Adam Keiper @adamkeiper.com · 11h

Booting the press from the Pentagon—and yes, Hegseth's media policy was so clearly unacceptable that it was likely proposed as a way to force journalists to "self-deport" from the Pentagon—is very bad news for American democracy.

Read @markhertling.bsky.social:

www.thebulwark.com/p/locking-do...

Locking Down the Pentagon Press Is Dangerous

Pete Hegseth’s proposed restrictions would harm the people whom both the military and the press are meant to serve.

www.thebulwark.com

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riffle @riffle.bsky.social · 8h

Yeah that's been the Dodgers recently. I was pulling for the Brewers (despite their dingy uniforms) but it'll have to be a miracle now.

I'll have to settle for the Yankees being eliminated.

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Gabriel Malor @gabrielmalor.bsky.social · 11h

Look at this shit.

The memorandum thus essentially seeks to
overturn mandates that Congress has put in place. Neither the OMB/OPM documents themselves,
nor defendants in their opposition papers, make any attempt to justify this position. At the hearing,
counsel for defendants refused to answer the question of whether or not defendants’ action are legal,
instead saying that defendants were “not prepared” to address the merits today.

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derek guy @dieworkwear.bsky.social · 8h

thinking about the time a cool Instagram fashion account asked me to name my favorite products and i didn't know i was supposed to name fashion products, so i said pigeon food because i like feeding pigeons and their followers were like "why the fuck do i need pigeon food for my outfit?"

The Instagram account Saint featured me. The first slide says: "Derek Guy - Dieworkwear. Derek Guy is a menswear writer who has written for The New York Times, Esquire, and Mr. Porter. He also runs a menswear blog called Die, Workwear"

One of the slides showing my favorite products. It's it's a big bag of Hagen pigeon food. The food is fortified with the vitamins and nutrients pigeons need.

Instagram user writes: "Why tf do i need pigeon food for my outfit." I replied: "this is what i can afford to eat after spending all my money on clothes ::sad face::"

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riffle @riffle.bsky.social · 8h

Yeah it seemed like a harbinger: instead of a single out and a certain score, two outs and no runs! Insane action!

That it didn't harbinge anything is, well, it's just like baseball.

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riffle @riffle.bsky.social · 8h

Yeah, same.

Pardon me for the insensitivity to anurans but it's been boiling the frog for years now. I just assumed so many were so cooked that nothing would shake loose a mass of users. Glad if I'm wrong.

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Chris Geidner @chrisgeidner.bsky.social · 10h

To catch you up, Indiana University’s student newspaper reported:
• It was told to print no news in its homecoming edition, set to come out Thursday.
• It refused.
• The director of student media was fired.
• Hours later, IU cut all print editions of the paper, including Thursday’s issue.

Chris Geidner @chrisgeidner.bsky.social · 10h

UPDATE: More at Indiana University, with all IDS print being cut.

The university chancellor claims “the campus is completing the shift from print to digital effective this week” — despite the fight earlier this week having been over a print Homecoming edition. www.idsnews.com/article/2025...

By Mia Hilkowitz and Andrew Miller
Oct 15, 2025 5:54 pm • Updated Oct 15, 2025 7:28 pm
f
Indiana University fully cut the Indiana Daily Student's print newspaper - including the special publications it had earlier indicated it wanted us to run - Tuesday evening, hours after firing its student media director. Our next edition, part of volume 158, in our 158th year of publication, was set to go out
Thursday.

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jamelle @jamellebouie.net · 15h

the extent to which media elites treat liberal americans as if they do not count in the body politic is a real problem

Perry Bacon @perrybaconjr.bsky.social · 17h

I read the piece. You shouldn't. He dismisses the "No Kings" protests as liberals in blue cities. He invokes Rosa Parks, as if rural white people in the 60s loved everything that the movement then was doing. "We need a movement but not this one" is a core centrist tact these days.

Ezra Levin ❌👑 @ezralevin.bsky.social · 17h

Is this a joke. www.theatlantic.com/magazine/arc...

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Perry Bacon @perrybaconjr.bsky.social · 2d

I didn't watch CBS News before Bari Weiss got there. I doubt you did either. But the mainstream media moving right really does matter, because of the mainstream media's collective powers of 1. agenda-setting and 2. framing. newrepublic.com/article/2016...

The Mainstream Media Is Moving Right. Here’s What We Can Do About It.

At The Washington Post, CBS, and maybe CNN, the trend line is terrible. But liberals do have the power to reverse these trends.

newrepublic.com

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Max Kennerly @maxkennerly.bsky.social · 14h

There was only one "mass movement" that David Brooks ever respected:

Pictures of the "Brooks Brothers riot," in which Republican staffers tried to disrupt election canvassers in Miami-Dade County, Florida, on November 22, 2000. Yes, this was a prelude to January 6, 2021; the Republican Party was always headed this way.

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riffle @riffle.bsky.social · 8h

Ahh so Twitter somehow got worse. Makes sense.

Thank you Dr. The Frog.

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riffle @riffle.bsky.social · 8h

Thinking about that insane double play by the Brewers the other day, there needs to be an Outfield Fly Rule to prevent that from happening once a century.

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Just some guy @rocinante.bsky.social · 11h

Taught book 3 of the Aeneid today. After reading about the harpies attacking Aeneas and his crew I am all done with stories about birds massacring mariners. Now time to put on the baseball game and oh god what the fuck this shit again

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riffle @riffle.bsky.social · 9h

That is so good.

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Sirius B @aowl.bsky.social · 9h

I want to write a law review article that the SCOTUS has stopped doing adjudication and now does rulemaking while forcing agencies to stop doing rulemaking and start doing adjudication

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Pwnallthethings @pwnallthethings.bsky.social · 10h

Like at a certain point it's not at all clear what the precedential effect even *is*. One of many reasons TvUS was a disaster is the idea you can create a "rule for the ages" about presidential misconduct in some abstract way divorced from the facts of that misconduct is obviously nonsense.

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riffle @riffle.bsky.social · 9h

So from context I see there has been a bsky influx. Any numbers?

What caused it?

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Don Zeko @donzeko.bsky.social · 13h

This is almost literally what the English Civil War was fought over.

The New York Times @nytimes.com · 14h

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

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riffle @riffle.bsky.social · 9h

I only know it via UK comedy. Specifically an early Mitchell and Webb bit where a druggie refers to heroin as "moreish."

Useful term.

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