Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Jonathan Ladd @jonmladd.bsky.social · 1h

He’ll figure it out just fine when a Democrat is president.

Dan Immergluck @danimmergluck.bsky.social · 14h

Me, a very smart federal judge, “but should we really have any right to put a check on the fascism of Dear Leader?”

digitaledition.chicagotribune.com/shortcode/CH...

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Asawin Suebsaeng @swin24.bsky.social · 8h

For my piece today at @zeteo.com i wanted to truly underscore how punishingly stupid american fascism is now. Like, my original proposed headline for this was:

Our Democracy Is Imperiled Because One Old Man Won’t Stop ‘Yelling’ At His TV. zeteo.com/p/trump-addi...

Trump’s Addiction to Watching Fox Is Killing American Democracy

Our country is falling apart because one old man, Trump advisers and former administration officials say, won’t stop ‘yelling’ at his TV.

zeteo.com

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Jay Rosen @jayrosen.bsky.social · 8h

A thing I have learned from being online since 1995:

If you're a writer, editor, journalist, academic, you have to be ready to go contrarian when you feel it. And if you're feeling it all the time, such that it's become your idenitity, that's a signal. You broke your mind.

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Jonathan Ladd @jonmladd.bsky.social · 8h

Yes, this is not a biased hit piece. Yet the nature of this guy's behavior is right there in the article for anyone willing to see it.

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Jonathan Ladd @jonmladd.bsky.social · 9h

Again, the way to make sense of Supreme Court behavior as a day-to-day shorthand is just to imagine them as having the same level of knowledge, fairness, sophistication and information as the median senator from their party.

Aaron Rupar @atrupar.com · 11h

Amy Coney Barrett defends heavy use of the shadow docket: "If we wrote a long opinion, it might give the impression that we have finally resolved the issue, and in none of these cases have we finally resolved the issue."

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Rich Raho @richraho.bsky.social · 1d

Chicago priest Fr. Larry Dowling describes procession to ICE facility: “No one had the courage to speak directly to us. No one from Homeland Security could stand in the presence of the Monstrance holding the Blessed Sacrament. No wonder. Evil is repelled, recoils in the presence of Christ.”

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Khashoggi's Ghost @urocklive1.bsky.social · 1d

Just a reminder that Wikipedia is the only remaining reliable source of information that right wing billionaires can't control. (Although they'll never stop trying.)

Please donate to them whenever you can. Even a little bit helps.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page

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Jonathan Ladd @jonmladd.bsky.social · 1d

“If you have to say that a second coup attempt probably won’t work, you are implicitly granting that (a) a second coup attempt is possible and that (b) it could conceivably succeed.” www.thebulwark.com/p/legal-orde...

“Legal Orders” and Trump’s Military

Authoritarians don’t take power by openly flouting the law. They look for pretexts and legal theories.

www.thebulwark.com

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Joshua Reed Eakle 🗽 @joshuaeakle.com · 1d

In Chicago, four vehicles descended and eight ICE agents moved in to kidnap a child.

She screams, “I’m 15,” as ICE yanks her from the car and kneels on her neck.

This is not about immigration enforcement.

It's about terrorizing Americans.

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unraveled @unraveledpress.com · 1d

Father Larry attempts to walk toward the detention center.

ISP prevent people from moving forward. Lieutenant Col Bradley says he's making a call and dialing the ICE facility, but also says people may be waiting a while.

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Jonathan Ladd @jonmladd.bsky.social · 1d

TikTok is controlled by an authoritarian government. One of their goals is the weakening of democracies around the world.

Prem Thakker ツ @premthakker.bsky.social · 2d

Huh: TikTok took down my 8-second video featuring this image of Debbie Brockman — the news producer just detained by Trump’s CBP agents — saying it violates the “joy of TikTok”

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Tom Clark @tomsclark.bsky.social · 1d

The biggest story you should read today is that dozens of federal judges are willing to talk about how alarmed they are by SCOTUS’ willingness to step in on an emergency basis and allow the Trump Administration to do things that seem illegal. Their candor is unprecedented.

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NPR @npr.org · 1d

Pope Leo XIV weighed in on U.S. politics, saying that Catholic politicians must be judged on the full range of their policy positions and suggesting that the country's immigration policy is "inhuman."

Pope Leo XIV says 'inhuman treatment of immigrants' in the U.S. isn't 'pro-life'

Pope Leo XIV weighed in on U.S. politics, saying that Catholic politicians must be judged on the full range of their policy positions and suggesting that the country's immigration policy is "inhuman."

n.pr

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Olivier Simard-Casanova @o.simardcasanova.net · 1d

The data is from April but holy moly

Prof Peter Hotez MD PhD DSc(hon) @peterhotezmdphd.bsky.social · May 30

No words

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Jonathan Ladd @jonmladd.bsky.social · 2d

bsky.app/profile/jonm...

Jonathan Ladd @jonmladd.bsky.social · 2d

It is a strange situation that now the best liberal news and commentary podcast featuring a NY Times columnist as a host is not an in-house NY Times podcast. And it doesn't seem like it could be brought in-house under their aforementioned somewhat opaque podcast norms. /2

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Jonathan Ladd @jonmladd.bsky.social · Nov 11

I'm on team Theda Skocpol/Hahrie Han on this. www.thenation.com/article/poli...

The US Is a Civic Desert. To Survive, the Democratic Party Needs to Transform Itself.

The party should jettison its consultant class and move toward a local-membership model that would help to rejuvenate civic life across the country.

www.thenation.com

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The Bulwark @thebulwark.com · 2d

"They put me on suicide watch and they put me in the cell, I'm naked, in like a hospital dress and just a concrete bed with like a mattress, like a thin mattress and, they leave the light on 24/7."

@timmiller.bsky.social talked to a veteran who ICE wrongly detained and brutalized

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CAHSR's Strongest Soldier @emoscientist.bsky.social · 20d

A really striking thing about the US is how it feels like everyone is constantly trying to rip you off. You have to hold constant vigilance against scam. Absolutely corrosive to social trust and a core part of our current political problems.

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unraveled @unraveledpress.com · 2d

Some clergy are begging to be allowed closer to the detention center to perform communion.

"You are preventing our religious freedom," someone in the crowd shouts.

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The Upshot @upshot.nytimes.com · 6d

The decline is occurring as the Trump administration has delayed visa processing, instituted travel bans or restrictions for 19 countries, threatened to deport international students for pro-Palestinian speech, and heightened the vetting of student visa applicants.

www.nytimes.com/interactive/...

Nearly 20 Percent Fewer International Students Traveled to the U.S. in August

The data shows the steepest decline in August international student arrivals since the pandemic.

www.nytimes.com

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Mrs. Betty Bowers @mrsbettybowers.bsky.social · 5d

Thanks, New Yorker

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Jonathan Ladd @jonmladd.bsky.social · 2d

It is a strange situation that now the best liberal news and commentary podcast featuring a NY Times columnist as a host is not an in-house NY Times podcast. And it doesn't seem like it could be brought in-house under their aforementioned somewhat opaque podcast norms. /2

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Jonathan Ladd @jonmladd.bsky.social · 2d

Overall, the NY Times is an outstanding journalistic institution. I'm a daily print and digital subscriber. That does not mean I never have criticisms. One thing I do find strange is their implicit quotas and rules around the ideologies of the podcasts they run under their banner. /1

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Kevin Collins @kwcollins.bsky.social · 2d

Cint and other marketplaces like it are also the underlying infrastructure for the political message testing industry, which should give some people a lot of pause.

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