Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Brad Simpson @bradleyrsimpson.bsky.social · 18h

This is an incomplete "archive" of my book, which relied on huge amounts of materials drawn from digital, as opposed to physical archives. But hopefully it gives a sense of the sources I used for the book, and models a practive of open access to some of my research that others may be able to use.

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Brad Simpson @bradleyrsimpson.bsky.social · 18h

I am mostly done with the archival material I used for my book The First Right: Self-Determination and the Transfomation of International Order, and so I am putting as much of these materials as I can online, where they can be used by other scholars: www.bradleyrsimpson.com/self-determi...

Self-determination Documents — Bradley R. Simpson

www.bradleyrsimpson.com

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Reposted by Brad Simpson

frankbongiorno.bsky.social @frankbongiorno.bsky.social · 1d

Past/Present is an Australian Historical Association initiative, in partnership with the Guardian, looking at current events in historical context. Here's an excellent piece by Roland Burke on early international efforts to deal with misinformation/disinformation.
www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

The fledgling UN tried to rein in mass-scale misinformation. The world turned its back and is now paying the price | Roland Burke

The ruinous result of the US approach to freedom of information and media has made anti-democratic contagion impossible to ignore

www.theguardian.com

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Brad Simpson @bradleyrsimpson.bsky.social · 1d

Woody Guthrie wrote a song about the Salvation Army called The Preacher and the Slave. The Wobbly and Catholic Worker folk singer Utah Phillips covered it. open.spotify.com/track/0UVEYu...

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Brad Simpson @bradleyrsimpson.bsky.social · 1d

Hey @govpritzker.illinois.gov wtf what are you doing cooperating with and sending state police to support the fascist racist thugs who are kidnapping people off of Illinois streets? You can’t claim to resist to Trump and use state police to support his shock troops at the same time. Pick a side.

unraveled @unraveledpress.com · 1d

Note: it's not even curfew yet.

State police just started pushing people off the business park corner. Here in the road, a brave group of demonstrators are attempting to hold their line.

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Brad Simpson @bradleyrsimpson.bsky.social · 1d

The Trump administrations attempt to destroy US solar and renewable energy capacity is one of the great geopolitical own goals in world history. Like abandoning computers and the internet in favor of typewriters in the 1980s-1990s.

Will Bunch @willbunch.bsky.social · 1d

America's collapse in one swath of the NYT homepage

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Brad Simpson @bradleyrsimpson.bsky.social · 1d

At this point, I think it’s appropriate to make comparisons with Ferdinand Marcos in the Philippines, Indonesia’s Suharto, and maybe one or two others as among the most corrupt national leaders in modern history.

Scott Horton @robertscotthorton.bsky.social · 2d

Trump said he deserved a cut for brokering the TikTok deal, and at once there was agreement that his son Baron would have a top executive slot... though he hasn't asked for it, and has no apparent qualifications to hold it. This is how Trump 2.0 works. www.telegraph.co.uk/us/news/2025...

Barron Trump tipped for top TikTok job

US president’s 19-year-old son could be appointed to the app’s board

www.telegraph.co.uk

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Brad Simpson @bradleyrsimpson.bsky.social · 1d

Thiessen’s role at the Post has long been to launder in the most unimaginative and boring way possible the absolute dumbest ideas and Trump world. He has never had an original thought. Just a human centipede of a megaphone for mega.

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Brad Simpson @bradleyrsimpson.bsky.social · 1d

I would imagine people in jail could give a shit less about such things if Kardashian coming led to even a temporary improvement in anything going on around them, even if it was only for the cameras.

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Brad Simpson @bradleyrsimpson.bsky.social · 1d

I played a minor role in helping to organize the 2003 global day of action against the Iraq war and I will never forget the New York Times the next day calling the anti-war movement a third superpower. If the media were actually honest about the scope and scale of these protests, it would matter.

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Reposted by Brad Simpson

Sara Silverstein @sarasilverstein.bsky.social · 1d

Trump govt further gutted the CDC last night, while continuing the govt shutdown instead of protecting healthcare for Americans. Areas affected last night include policy, comms, intelligence, infrastructure, global health & more. This is an attack on national security
www.nytimes.com/2025/10/11/u...

Trump Administration Lays Off Dozens of C.D.C. Officials

www.nytimes.com

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Brad Simpson @bradleyrsimpson.bsky.social · 1d

Trump’s demented and demonstrably false descriptions of Portland are the rantings of an authoritarian lunatic. Why would @nbcnews.com merely say that this fascist propaganda “is disputed by local officials.” @nbcnews.com use words that convey what Trump is actually doing and their actual intent.l!

Ryan J. Reilly “paints a vivid and urgent portrait of… disarray” @ryanjreilly.com · 1d

PORTLAND, Ore. — A small group of federal agents in camouflage and face masks watched from atop the immigration processing center Thursday night as a unicorn, peacock, dinosaur and raccoon danced to Cher’s “If I Could Turn Back Time.” www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news...

Costumed protesters in Portland defy description of the city as a 'war zone'

Dancing frogs, peacocks and unicorns outside the federal immigration building present a joyful contrast to the Trump administration's portrait of the Oregon city, they say.

www.nbcnews.com

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Brad Simpson @bradleyrsimpson.bsky.social · 1d

All of this is of course completely illegal. At some point people who can afford to spend the day in jail on bullshit charges up that will immediately get dismissed before ever reaching a judge need to just gum up the works and fill the jails, leaving fewer ICE folks to torment immigrants.

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Reposted by Brad Simpson

jj skolnik @modernistwitch.myatproto.social · 1d

every single dem should be taking notes. this is how you message around trans issues

(of note: i believe he is the only cis candidate for office to have trans people consult on his lgtbq+ policy platform)

Zohran Kwame Mamdani @zohrankmamdani.bsky.social · 1d

UNTIL IT’S DONE, Ep. 4: Sylvia Rivera

In the 1970s, queer New Yorkers had been pushed to the margins of NYC. Our trans neighbors faced immense cruelty. But in Sylvia Rivera, they found a champion.

As we combat Trump’s politics of darkness, her legacy can light the path forward.

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Brad Simpson @bradleyrsimpson.bsky.social · 1d

Trump Admin torn between racism, growing and eating food. wapo.st/48Iuil5

Trump administration says immigration enforcement threatens higher food prices

U.S. farmers face labor shortages and potential food price hikes due to Trump’s immigration policy, the administration acknowledged in a Federal Registry document.

wapo.st

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Brad Simpson @bradleyrsimpson.bsky.social · 1d

If and when this is ever over, the evidence will be overwhelming that Stephen Miller was personally directing a huge range of crimes which Trump may have supported but was only dimly aware of. But Miller has no immunity. He is a racist gangster and should spend many years in prison for this.

CNN @cnn.com · 1d

In the hours after a chaotic confrontation in Chicago last week that culminated with a federal agent shooting a local woman, top White House aide Stephen Miller delivered an urgent order to Department of Defense personnel: Prepare to send in the troops.

Stephen Miller emerges as key architect of Trump’s offensive on Democratic cities | CNN Politics

In the hours after a chaotic confrontation in Chicago last week that culminated with a federal agent shooting a local woman, top White House aide Stephen Miller delivered an urgent order to Department...

cnn.it

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Brad Simpson @bradleyrsimpson.bsky.social · 1d

The one consistent through line among most Maga supporters is their racism, whether directed at Muslims or Latinos, or Palestinians. Everything else is flexible.

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Brad Simpson @bradleyrsimpson.bsky.social · 1d

The Trump Admin is really engaged in an epistemological war, a war on knowledge and data that states need to perform basic functions and plan for a democratic society, rather than a personalist dictatorship.

NPR @npr.org · 1d

The federal government has long surveyed high schoolers to help track how their academic choices may have influenced the course of their lives. The Trump administration put an end to that effort.

The government has long researched high school experiences. Then DOGE cut the effort

The federal government has long surveyed high schoolers to help track how their academic choices may have influenced the course of their lives. The Trump administration put an end to that effort.

n.pr

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Brad Simpson @bradleyrsimpson.bsky.social · 1d

A random neighbor the other day was door knocking handing these out to everyone in the area. This day of protest is going to be huge, and Trump and Co. publicly denouncing everyone protesting as terrorists and Soros plants is just going to make it bigger.

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Brad Simpson @bradleyrsimpson.bsky.social · 2d

Yes, but more you make the harder it gets.

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Brad Simpson @bradleyrsimpson.bsky.social · 2d

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Brad Simpson @bradleyrsimpson.bsky.social · 2d

These immigrant development economists who won the Nobel Prize in 2019 and are now leaving the US founded the Abdul Latif Poverty Action Lab at MIT to research global poverty elimination strategies. The Trump Admin is a bunch of racist arsonists. www.povertyactionlab.org

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Brad Simpson @bradleyrsimpson.bsky.social · 3d

Biden could have forced Netanyahu to accept a much better deal for everyone on Gaza at a moment when genocide could have been prevented, and he did not, and it is to his, Blinken’s, and many other Democrat’s eternal disgrace that they never viewed Palestinians as worthy of saving from annihilation.

Andrew Exum @exum.bsky.social · 3d

This week has confirmed my suspicion that Biden’s Middle East policies will look worse, and will be even more embarrassing for Democrats, with the passage of time.

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Reposted by Brad Simpson

Maggie Blackhawk @maggieblackhawk.bsky.social · 3d

New essay in the Atlantic today: How Native Nations Shaped the Revolution by Ned Blackhawk (with many lessons on how we ended up where we are as a nation, and a gift link) www.theatlantic.com/magazine/arc...

How Native Nations Shaped the Revolution

The Founders were inspired—and threatened—by the independence and self-governance of nations like the Iroquois Confederacy.

www.theatlantic.com

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Brad Simpson @bradleyrsimpson.bsky.social · 3d

The NYT journalists who wrote this - Samuel Granados, Genevieve Glatsky and Annie Correal - devote not a single word to the blatant criminality of the Trump Administration extrajudically murdering people.

Why Blowing Up Venezuelan Boats Won’t Stop the Flow of Drugs www.nytimes.com/interactive/...

Why Blowing Up Venezuelan Boats Won’t Stop the Flow of Drugs

President Trump says striking drug traffickers from Venezuela will prevent deadly drugs from reaching the United States. But the major smuggling routes are elsewhere.

www.nytimes.com

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