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Reposted by Steve Saidemonster

Alexandra 🇨🇦 @alexandra-gee.bsky.social · 1h

Here’s another great quote. “The good news is that trade threats between Ottawa and Washington have eased a bit in recent months.” The U.S. started the threats and the trade war. Also, I don’t see any easing.

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Jacob T. Levy @jacobtlevy.bsky.social · 1h

Good Place:

Fun fact: Columbus is in the Bad Place
because of all the raping, slave trade, and genocide.

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NY Times Pitchbot @nytpitchbot.bsky.social · 2h

Trump's insistence that Joe Biden was president on January 6 raises new questions about Joe Biden's memory.

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Steve Saidemonster @smsaideman.bsky.social · 1h

The idea that a party or candidate would prefer for the US to do worse if it means that their competitor is denied a win goes way back and has been a GOP strategy my entire lifetime.

What do we call this but betrayal and maybe even treason?

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Steve Saidemonster @smsaideman.bsky.social · 1h

Someone pointed out that this is at least the third time a Republican presidential candidate has messed with an international negotation to deny his competitor a win:
Nixon (and Kissinger!) in 1968 re Vietnam
Reagan and Iran Hostage Crisis in 1980 and now Trump.

1/2

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Charles Ghoul-ba ✡️ @charlesgaba.com · 2h

So basically this is Iranian Hostage Crisis 2.0, just with a 9-month delay in the payoff for no particular reason.

Il Pomodoro @dabenner.bsky.social · 3h

This seems like confirmation

Then Mr. Trump won the presidency back, and the Biden administration was determined to get a cease-fire in place by January, before it left office. It drafted a peace plan, much of which was quite similar to the “20 point plan” Mr. Trump recently issued. There was slow progress: More than 130 hostages had been released by the time the January cease-fire took place.

“We handed over a cease-fire that silenced the guns, had hostages coming out and aid going in, along with a day-after plan to make it permanent,” Mr. Blinken said. But when the new administration took over, “the moment was squandered,” he added. “Israel and Hamas went back to war for eight months.”

Israeli officials tell a different story. Mr. Biden was a lame duck, they noted, and disengaged. Mr. Trump was a known entity, less likely to lecture Mr. Netanyahu in private or public. They put their money on a new president, and a new negotiating team

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Nicholas Grossman @nicholasgrossman.bsky.social · 1h

One of Trump’s few consistent positions is pro-corruption.

Adam Schwarz @adamjschwarz.bsky.social · 2h

Trump calls on the Israeli President to pardon Benjamin Netanyahu:

"Cigars and champagne - who the hell cares about it?"

Netanyahu is currently on trial for bribery, fraud, and breach of trust, including allegedly accepting 700,000 shekels (approx. $210,000) worth of luxury goods in bribes.

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Bryan Based International Order 🇨🇦 @bryanpeeler.bsky.social · 1h

👇👇👇

Paul Guinnessy @paulguinnessy.bsky.social · 1h

Remember that one reason the war lasted two years is so Bibi can stay out of jail for corruption

Aaron Rupar @atrupar.com · 2h

Trump to Israeli Knesset: "I have an idea -- Mr President, why don't give him a pardon? Give him a pardon. Whether we like it or not, this has been one of the greatest wartime presidents. And cigars and champagne -- who the hell cares about that?"

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jamelle @jamellebouie.net · 2h

obviously john roberts and the trump majority aren't going a little thing like "history" or "the written text of the constitution" get in the way of their ideological drive to remake the (republican) presidency as an elected dictatorship.

Originalist ‘Bombshell’ Complicates Case on Trump’s Power to Fire Officials

www.nytimes.com

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Steve Saidemonster @smsaideman.bsky.social · 2h

I am shocked that American whisky manufacturers have not read some basic IR theory about reciprocity.

Seriously, where are all the firms that depend on exports? Where is Helen Milner? It was always going to be thus--you raise tariffs, other countries will retaliate.

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Hilde Eliassen Restad @herestad.bsky.social · 2h

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Steve Saidemonster @smsaideman.bsky.social · 2h

Wow, has any journalist lost her credibility faster than @sallyjenx.bsky.social ??

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Breen Ouellette (he/him) @breeno.bsky.social · 2h

Sentence a youth to prison, destroy a life forever.

Stop platforming #copaganda.

Do better @theglobeandmail.com.

The Globe and Mail @theglobeandmail.com · 4h

Toronto Police Association pushes tougher sentences for young offenders

Union president says more offenders who are 16 or 17 should be treated as adults

www.theglobeandmail.com

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thinkingbayonet.bsky.social @thinkingbayonet.bsky.social · 2h

I now realize that for my entire adult life, I've had a very narrow conception of what "supporting and defending the Constitution" means. Standing on business when armed agents of the State are knocking on your door is way more important, by a country mile, than anything I did overseas

Matt Novak @paleofuture.bsky.social · 10h

Border Patrol “attempted to arrest a plumber working inside a Logan Heights home but left empty-handed after the homeowner refused them entry.

The homeowner told agents she would not allow them inside because the warrant they presented did not include her address and lacked a judge's signature.”

Federal immigration operations target San Diego neighborhoods, sparking community resistance

Federal immigration agents conducted operations in Logan Heights and Southeast San Diego on Friday, with community members capturing footage of the enforcement actions.

www.10news.com

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djchocolatemlk.bsky.social @djchocolatemlk.bsky.social · 2h

They want our markets but they choose to treat us with such disrespect? They better get involved in politics then because that's what's screwing them. Until then they can all get bent.

Breen Ouellette (he/him) @breeno.bsky.social · 3h

"This was all about some ugliness that we’re not part of. We’re not in politics. We’re just some guys in Virginia making good whisky. But unfortunately, we’re the victims."

Everyone is "in politics" in a democracy.

Tell these American whisky guys to vote harder or cope harder.

Canada’s boycott America movement is hurting innocent bystanders | CNN Business

Virginia Distillery CEO Gareth Moore was bullish on his company’s American single malt whisky sales north of the border when 2025 kicked off.

www.cnn.com

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Steve Saidemonster @smsaideman.bsky.social · 2h

I forgot to add my handy illustration of this

Illustrating the basic reality of American politics. The Dem positions on issues is squarely in the middle. Being in between the Dems and GOP is not centrist or middle but an always moving further right extremist stance.

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Steve Saidemonster @smsaideman.bsky.social · 2h

The Dems are consistently in the middle of the electorate. Which is why polarization sounds wrong since only one party is flinging itself to the extreme.

Demands that they be in between where they are now and where the GOP is bad math--Dems need to be at median voter, not avg of Dem/GOP position

Lee Drutman @leedrutman.bsky.social · 2h

New study finds Democrats represent public opinion better than Republicans: "the quality of statehouse democracy, here meaning the dynamic relationship between opinion and policy, is substantially weakened by Republican Party control of state government."

www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/epdf/10....

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Steve Saidemonster @smsaideman.bsky.social · 2h

Yesterday, I wrote about fake civ-mil crises in Canada when we have had plenty of real ones saideman.blogspot.com/2025/10/when... the military is not ahead of the civs on either Golden Dome or F-35s

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Sara Mitchell @sbmitche.bsky.social · 3h

Exactly. The media needs to recall all the international pressure and prior negotiations that preceded this moment before declaring T the “winner” of this peace process.

Lord Businessman II @lordbusinessman.bsky.social · 3h

I've already seen people, smart people, giving too much credit to the president 'wanting peace' and way too little credit to 'another nine months of grueling war with a Srebenica level civilian death toll'

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Andrew D Thaler @drandrewthaler.bsky.social · 3h

You don't have to judge Columbus by the standards of today. His tenure as governor of Hispaniola was so horrific that he was dragged back to Spain in chains to answer for his many crimes.

Plus he never set foot on any land that would ever be a part of the United States of America.

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Hobby Drifter in Tokyo @hobbydrifter.bsky.social · 7d

White people who have spent decades thinking “Born in the USA” is patriotic and “Every Breath You Take” is a great wedding song are suddenly very concerned about not being able to understand lyrics to some songs at the Super Bowl halftime show.

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Peter @notalawyer.bsky.social · 13h

the actual story here, which the media never talks about, is that police in this country have become a discrete right-wing political operation. the story isn't about cops leaving (they're lying about that), it's about the police trying to exert influence over elections.

Mark Misoshnik 🏴 @misoshnik.bsky.social · 1d

Lmao is this supposed to be a bad thing?

A tweet from Bari Weiss that says “"It's shaken me to my core," a lieutenant said of Mamdani's unexpected victory in June. "The absolute dread I feel is palpable.
"
Today in @TheFP our @Olivia_Reingold talks to the cops who say they will walk if Zohran Mamdani is elected in November:”

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Bluesky Fanatic @blueskyfanatic.bsky.social · 11h

The Trump Economy
Our wine sales to Canada are down 96%!!!!!!!!!
===============

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Erica Ifill @wickdchiq.bsky.social · 11h

Do y’all know how violent police usually are to normal ppl? Great thread 🪡

alec karakatsanis @equalityalec.bsky.social · 21h

THREAD. Did you know that at about 1/3 of all stranger homicides in the U.S. are perpetrated by police? But there's something hidden here that is important to understand in this authoritarian moment.

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Erica Ifill @wickdchiq.bsky.social · 11h

THIS

alec karakatsanis @equalityalec.bsky.social · 21h

And this leads to one thing, among many, that scares me a lot now: Things were already very bad on this front, but the unhinged gestapo tactics of ICE grant enormous power to predators across society in positions of power to prey upon vulnerable people: employers, abusers, etc.

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