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Wool-Encased Tea Addict @passeriform.bsky.social · 5h

"That Klein is stuck on these examples shows how deeply he is lodged inside the framing that the Republicans have put forward.

When you’re scared you get tunnel vision. If everything’s malleable, potential or imaginary future harms start to seem equivalent to concrete harm, even violence,

LOLGOP ❌👑❌ @thefarce.org · 5h

"You can make a principled stand for what you believe while welcoming in alienated voters looking for hope and community."

Notably, Anat points to a similar place Andrea Pitzer did in her dissection of the conversation between Klein and Coates:

Expert in framing 🤝 Expert in authoritarianism

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Seth Cotlar @sethcotlar.bsky.social · 1h

It's notable that one of the people who was invited to the White House for their "antifa round table" was Nick Sortor, a guy who has literally worked for "InfoWars." The feds are approaching the media aspects of this situation like an unabashed authoritarian state would. bsky.app/profile/opb....

OPB @opb.org · 1d

Right-wing media influencers are now being welcomed into the federal government to promote its messages. This kind of media access shows a deepening alliance between the Trump administration and an online world willing to misrepresent facts if it means furthering political goals.

Right-wing influencers shape nation and Trump’s understanding of Portland protests

Social media personalities, conservative media outlets and the Trump administration itself are blending online content to serve the administration’s policies.

www.opb.org

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Jacob T. Levy @jacobtlevy.bsky.social · 4h

The deportation order derives from the crime of which he has now been exonerated.

www.miamiherald.com/news/local/i...

He was wrongfully imprisoned for 43 years. Moments after being released, ICE took him

Subramanyam “Subu” Vedam now faces deportation.

www.miamiherald.com

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LOLGOP ❌👑❌ @thefarce.org · 3h

Either Peter Thiel knows nothing about branding or he wants us to associate him almost exclusively with the Antichrist.

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LOLGOP ❌👑❌ @thefarce.org · 3h

Strike down Media Matters and it will become the Pope

Bill Kristol @billkristolbulwark.bsky.social · 3h

Pope Leo quotes Hannah Arendt:

“The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the convinced Communist, but people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction and the distinction between true and false no longer exist."

www.cbsnews.com/chicago/news...

Pope Leo calls for news agencies to stand as bulwark against "post-truths," lies and manipulation

Pope Leo XIV has encouraged international news agencies to stand firm as a bulwark against the "ancient art of lying" and manipulation.

www.cbsnews.com

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LOLGOP ❌👑❌ @thefarce.org · 14h

“We are seeing a return to power of a past that never went away in the world.”

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Hamilton Nolan @hamiltonnolan.bsky.social · 13h

Has lived in the US since he was NINE MONTHS OLD.

Lynn Becker @cmgiulini.bsky.social · 14h

After spending 43 years in prison for a crime he didn't commit, evidence hidden by the prosecution reversed his conviction. Rather than finally enjoying freedom, ICE abducted him for deportation

Depraved.

www.miamiherald.com/news/local/i...

He was wrongfully imprisoned for 43 years. Moments after being released, ICE took him

Subramanyam “Subu” Vedam now faces deportation.

www.miamiherald.com

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Lynn Becker @cmgiulini.bsky.social · 14h

After spending 43 years in prison for a crime he didn't commit, evidence hidden by the prosecution reversed his conviction. Rather than finally enjoying freedom, ICE abducted him for deportation

Depraved.

www.miamiherald.com/news/local/i...

He was wrongfully imprisoned for 43 years. Moments after being released, ICE took him

Subramanyam “Subu” Vedam now faces deportation.

www.miamiherald.com

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Preorder Read This When Things Fall Apart @mskellymhayes.bsky.social · 1d

My publisher’s been very patient. I’m not doing everything I said I’d do to promote this book (out in a few weeks) because I’m an organizer in a city under federal attack. My days are full and emotionally exhausting. Any help getting the word out means a lot. It's a book people need right now.

Read This When Things Fall Apart by Kelly Hayes | Pilsen Community Books

A bundle of letters to activists and organizers on the frontlines in catastrophic times from Let This Radicalize You co-author Kelly Hayes In social movements, some heartbreaks are all but inevitable.

www.pilsencommunitybooks.com

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Carl T. Bergstrom @carlbergstrom.com · 12h

Thankfully, some of yesterday's CDC firings have been rescinded.

But this should be a major scandal, not business as usual in this shitshow of an administration. It's either spectacular incompetence or an effort to make even politically untouchable positions feel precarious to those in them.

Helen Branswell 🇨🇦 @helenbranswell.bsky.social · 13h

100s of #CDC employees were notified Friday they were being fired — RIF'd. The firings cross multiple parts of the agency, endangering its core mission of keeping Americans safe.
Saturday, some were informed they were RIF'd in error.
Hard to imagine how this happens www.statnews.com/2025/10/11/c...

CDC battered by government shutdown firings, while some are rescinded

The White House’s mass firing of CDC staff on Friday has decimated offices related to injury prevention, respiratory disease surveillance, and chronic disease, according to four people familiar with t...

www.statnews.com

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HerRoyalBOO👻bies @ourflagmeansbeth.bsky.social · 4h

I am taking credit for the spiritual attacks.

Nathan Kalman-Lamb @nkalamb.bsky.social · 17h

Jordan Peterson, explained

ca.news.yahoo.com/jordan-peter...

She explained how her 62-year-old dad had been dealing with a “host of neurological issues this summer that we believe stem from CIRS, which is chronic inflammatory response syndrome, due to decades of mould exposure.”

Fuller added that he had been suffering from symptoms of neuropathy and weakness for the last few years and his condition worsened after Peterson cleaned out his late father’s basement earlier this year.

“We don’t have a better explanation for his neurological symptoms at the moment other than spiritual attacks,” she said.

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LOLGOP ❌👑❌ @thefarce.org · 4h

I hate it when we start by circulating Republicans' lies first, operating in their frame.

So I edited this to help Bernie make his point first.

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emptywheel @emptywheel.bsky.social · 4h

How Trump plays you:
He posts a claim undermining the facts about January 6.

YOU ALL DISSEMINATE IT!!!

You don't mock that he's complaining that the FBI responded to a terrorist attack. You instead "fact check" re his claim that Joe Biden was in charge of the FBI--which is abt tribalism, not truth

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Nicholas Grossman @nicholasgrossman.bsky.social · 4h

Hannah Arendt distinguished totalitarianism “from other forms of political oppression known to us such as despotism, tyranny and dictatorship” in that totalitarianism seeks to subjugate civil society and private lives, not just political opponents, using psychological, not just physical, repression.

The Editorial Board @editorialboard.bsky.social · 5h

I saw the new George Orwell documentary last night. It’s called 2+2=5. I have been a little bit squeamish about applying the word totalitarian to Trump and the Republicans. Not anymore. We are experiencing a totalitarian movement. There’s no question.

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LOLGOP ❌👑❌ @thefarce.org · 4h

Maintaining our right to public protest is essential for defeating dictatorship.

A few reminders for this Saturday's monumental 'No Kings' event.

Trump Determined to Remind Us Why We Say 'No Kings'

We have frogs everywhere—a few reminders for this Saturday's monumental event.

www.thefarce.org

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LOLGOP ❌👑❌ @thefarce.org · 5h

"You can make a principled stand for what you believe while welcoming in alienated voters looking for hope and community."

Notably, Anat points to a similar place Andrea Pitzer did in her dissection of the conversation between Klein and Coates:

Expert in framing 🤝 Expert in authoritarianism

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LOLGOP ❌👑❌ @thefarce.org · 6h

Sorry and thanks if you read this!

It's a way to make sure I got as much out of this essential piece as I could.

And if it just helped one other person, frankly, that's not enough.

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LOLGOP ❌👑❌ @thefarce.org · 6h

Yes, we need a BIG TENT.

"But for a big tent to stand, it requires a central rod — otherwise it’s a tarp that smothers you. To win this battle, we must run on — not from — the broadly-held values most Americans cherish and make clear we are in a battle against fascism, not just inflation."

Conclusion
So here we are, with many Democrats responding to each new horror unleashed with a social media post attempting to drive conversation back to what surveys say voters care most about. Instead of speaking about what’s actually occurring, these Democrats have wedged themselves into an impossible corner where what they say barely gets heard and what gets heard can barely be credited. You cannot occasionally tell Americans the truth that this regime is veering into dictatorship while also promising to meet and negotiate in good faith with it. You cannot convey the full extent of the threat before us, let alone marshall public will into needed resistance, when your actions (or lack thereof) routinely undermine your utterances.

We often hear of the need for a “big tent” to combat authoritarianism, a term that seems to mean welcoming in more people but not immigrants and their allies, not LGBTQ people and their loved ones, not women who’d like some reproductive autonomy and their champions. And, yes, it will take a mass movement to bring down this regime. But for a big tent to stand, it requires a central rod — otherwise it’s a tarp that smothers you. To win this battle, we must run on — not from — the broadly-held values most Americans cherish and make clear we are in a battle against fascism, not just inflation.

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LOLGOP ❌👑❌ @thefarce.org · 6h

So why are Democrats overperforming in 2025 then, tough guy?

1. Special election voters are way more tuned in.

2. Trump's horribleness is closing the chasm.

Democrats have been overperforming in 2025 elections. And, yes, off-year voters are higher information than their presidential-only counterparts. But we are also seeing much higher turnout — in other words, bringing non-habitual voters into the electorate — than is common. What has changed? It’s certainly not Democratic approval ratings. Instead, the credulity chasm is closing and many voters can now see that MAGA is indeed doing as promised to destroy our freedoms and hand the wealth our work creates to their billionaire backers.

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LOLGOP ❌👑❌ @thefarce.org · 6h

Democrats have to leap the "Credulity Chasm." The belief that Republicans won't do the bad stuff they promise. Talking about "democracy" (as I have too much) moves us, but not swing voters.
Trump won because he won voters who did not believe the "Project 2025 agenda would actually come to fruition."

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LOLGOP ❌👑❌ @thefarce.org · 6h

This is why Democrats tend to only win "when reality breaks through."

Republicans create the conversations that work to their advantage; Democrats respond to whatever Republicans put forward — or what the survey questions they formulate say voters prioritize. Democrats win when reality breaks through — after the 2008 crash, or in 2020 when the Covid horrors of Trump were fresh — but they don’t do a good job of foregrounding the topics that benefit them.

Indeed, the Pollingism they default to often has them structure their queries so narrowly, they fail to consider the full range of topics, let alone articulations of them, it could be possible to make salient.

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LOLGOP ❌👑❌ @thefarce.org · 6h

What works isn't "what is poll-tested as 'popular' but rather making popular what needs to be said."

Like Chris Van Hollen going to El Salvador, for instance.

Instead, "Democrats often help amplify the opposition’s storyline."

Indeed, Democrats often help amplify the opposition’s storyline. Back in the day, for example, they did this by pledging to “end welfare as we know it,” thus crediting a slash-the-government approach associated with the right and demonizing fellow Democrats who had the audacity to support people in need. And, more recently, they tried to out-tough Republicans in ads that repeated “the border” over and again while hammering home the notion of immigrants as villains. Candidates ought to run against their opposition, not the people the opposition scapegoats and reviles.

Democrats are especially likely to get caught off-guard when Republicans repeat the unflattering stories Democrats also tell about themselves. From WelcomeFest to Third Way to Searchlight, Democrats who claim to be concerned that voters reject their party for being too “woke” keep publicizing these accusations, seemingly to ensure voters hear them. Repeating Republican attacks against the party they purport to want to help makes the charges seem more credible

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LOLGOP ❌👑❌ @thefarce.org · 6h

"While Democrats are brandishing thermometers, Republicans power up flamethrowers."

Democrats poll to shape themselves. Republicans poll to find out how to shape the electorate.

Taking the Temperature Versus Changing It
The mistake Pollingism demands that we make is to take the temperature of the electorate and calibrate what to say on this basis. But taking the temperature today doesn’t help us to know, much less control, where it will be set tomorrow. It puts us behind in both electoral and movement strategy — failing to dominate daily conversation, and neglecting to steer longer-term public opinion.

While Democrats are brandishing thermometers, Republicans power up flamethrowers. They figure out not merely “where people are,” but rather where they could be capable of going, if they hear some refrain repeated over and again.

MAGA’s stories are potent and memorable, not about the issues people register as most important but rather those that MAGA wants brought to the fore. This is Magnetism 101: make sure you’re fighting on the terrain that benefits you most. This means setting the terms of debate by every possible means by engaging in activities that bring your preferred conversation into people’s ears.

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LOLGOP ❌👑❌ @thefarce.org · 6h

"While Democrats are brandishing thermometers, Republicans power up flamethrowers."

Democrats poll to shape themselves. Democrats poll to find out how to shape the electorate.

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LOLGOP ❌👑❌ @thefarce.org · 6h

YOU HAVE TO PREACH TO YOUR CHOIR

They are the only ads that really matter. And you can’t buy them, you have to attract them by elevating them in magnetic ways.

This is what Trump is better at than any politician in American history, sadly. (Obama was pretty good, too, but only in election years.)

Trump took this basic formula and injected it with steroids. He throws “eating the dogs and cats” at the wall, or promises Mexico will build one at the border, and sees what sticks. Trump won over “persuadable” voters in 2016 and 2024 not by discerning their issue preferences and moderating his message to suit them but by motivating and equipping his base to carry his tune. When you are a low-info voter, seeing people you’ve known forever wearing the MAGA hat tells you that this is what people like you believe. And so you do. Trump’s campaigns have been driven by unleashing, not admonishing, his base and recruiting trusted messengers rather than trying to persuade people principally with ads.

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