JB Holston
@jholston.bsky.social
1.4K followers 1.3K following 27K posts
CEO, Sr. Advisor, former Engineering and Comp Sci Dean, F100 exec, entrepreneur. Sustainable, Inclusive Growth https://jbholston.substack.com/ . Colorado, Maine, London. @jbholston on Threads.
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Under-discussed implication of the upcoming Red Regime ; America just hit peak population, and the population mix will be way older, way faster. Why, and what are the implications? 🧵 1/
"This sentiment is, arguably, cringe. But it is also, on the most basic level, the work of politics. And precisely for that reason, it is an attempt to countermand the senses of loneliness and unmooring from reality that Arendt identified as ingredients of tyranny." 3/3
David Black, a Presbyterian pastor whom ICE agents shot with pepper balls, described protests outside Illinois ICE facilities as not “resistance” but “world building”: “We are making ourselves into the world we want to give to the next seven generations.” 2/3
“The most effective resistance might be investing in things that Trump’s rhetoric tries to delegitimize: community solidarity, mutual aid, and bottom-up organizing,” 1/3 www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archiv...
Resistance Is Cringe
But it’s also effective.
www.theatlantic.com
Reposted by JB Holston
When the Supreme Court recently allowed immigration agents to consider race during sweeps, Justice Brett Kavanaugh said that citizens shouldn’t be concerned because agents will “promptly let the individual go.”

For these Americans, that wasn’t true: https://propub.li/47aawMD
Meanwhile
Just arrived on the scene at Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) facility in South Portland. Here less than 10 minutes when agents charged out of the facility and used a pale yellow gas that caused tears and coughing in crowd members. Also shot munitions at those retreating.
Unfathomable corruption.
Coast Guard Buys Two Private Jets for Kristi Noem, Costing $172 Million

Public documents show the Department of Homeland Security has contracted to purchase a pair of top-of-the-line Gulfstream jets for the secretary

www.nytimes.com/2025/10/18/u...
Coast Guard Buys Two Private Jets for Noem, Costing $172 Million
www.nytimes.com
Reposted by JB Holston
I know something about aircraft pricing, and when you "need" to get updated avionics, safety equipment etc.

This is grotesquely wasteful, unnecessary, and self-aggrandizing.

No Kings. Also, no cosplay Marie Antoinettes.

www.nytimes.com/2025/10/18/u...
Coast Guard Buys Two Private Jets for Noem, Costing $172 Million
www.nytimes.com
Awesome.
Student media rules. They are lapping a lot of the spineless media orgs this year and showing how solidarity is the way.
Reposted by JB Holston
They don't think they're public servants.

They think they're kings, princes, dukes, and barons. They control the government, and that makes them royalty, and that means our money should be used to buy them planes and gold-plated toys and gilded ballrooms
Reposted by JB Holston
Today, I convened a group of former military generals and veterans to hear perspectives on deploying troops in American cities.

Their commitment is to our nation. That’s why they’re speaking out against what the President's doing as uncalled-for, unprecedented, and un-American.
Reposted by JB Holston
Reposted by JB Holston
I have a Canadian friend. She used to spend a lot of time in US, actually went to school & lived here for a while. She said w/i last couple of days she fears she may never return to the U.S. What they are doing to this country is a travesty.
We must fight them with all the resistance we can muster!
Regime info source: untrustworthy.
Reposted by JB Holston
Given the Trumpist assault on the patriotism of all who plan to attend No Kings rallies, I urge every Democratic elected official to attend one. They shouldn’t speak—if there are speakers, better to br less partisan civic leaders and citizens—but they should stand in solidarity with the rest of us.
Reposted by JB Holston
Taken together with impoundments, this would break everything. The president is claiming the power to not spend money he doesn't want to and now also to spend money where it's not allowed. And SCOTUS might say no one has standing to stop him. That would make him an appropriations king.
Reposted by JB Holston
So just how bad is this? I got a text from an appropriator friend saying "The Republic has fallen. Pack it in."
Thread :
Trump's mechanism to pay the troops during the shutdown is by far the most illegal budgetary action he's taken as POTUS, potentially setting the stage to break everything.

It's also needless because Congress would easily pass a troop pay bill if Johnson were willing to gavel in.

Long thread.
Reposted by JB Holston
🧑‍🌾 SOYBEAN FARMERS: “MAGA now stands for ‘Make Argentina Great Again’ — a bailout is like putting a band-aid on a bullet hole.”

Trump’s Tariffs are ☠️ them. Are you guys listening? @rustygrills @RepChrisTodd @RepFaison @MarshaBlackburn @RepTimBurchett @GovBillLee
Reposted by JB Holston
In the first half of 2025, AI-related investment accounted for 31% of GDP growth. Growth excluding this investment was only 1.1%.

My @morningjoe-msnbc.bsky.social Chart
"If there’s a sudden run on a stablecoin for some reason, then there could be “fire sales” of Treasuries, the report said.

And things “could spill over into bank deposits and government bond and repo markets,” the IMF cautioned." Not so stablecoins. www.bloomberg.com/news/newslet...
Spread of Stablecoins Rings Alarms for Financial-Stability Risks
I’m Chris Anstey, an economics editor in Boston. Today we’re looking at Mark Schroers and Laura Noonan’s reporting on concern about stablecoins as the IMF-World Bank meetings progress. Send us feedbac...
www.bloomberg.com
Incompetent courtier capitalism. Kakistocratic.
New: Trump officials unveiled a tool intended to help millions of Medicare patients pick their plans, as open enrollment begins today.

But the tool — a directory that was intended to match providers with their plans — was rife with errors, The Post found.

More here w/Akilah Johnson
Medicare doctor directory, a Trump team priority, launches with errors
The directory, intended to help older Americans navigate Medicare Advantage open enrollment, produces conflicting responses about which providers are covered by health plans.
www.washingtonpost.com
Great and a tragedy that this talent pipeline
Is being choked off financially by the current regime.
BREAKING: Morgan State University has received the largest donation in its 158-year history: $63 million from philanthropist MacKenzie Scott. The gift is unrestricted, meaning the HBCU can spend the money however it wants. Here's what you should know:
www.thebanner.com/education/hi...
MacKenzie Scott gives Morgan State its largest donation ever
Philanthropist MacKenzie Scott has now given Morgan State University a total of $103 million.
www.thebanner.com