curated news excerpts & citations
Nate Silver: What is Schumer’s shutdown endgame?
Democrats are in what chess players call zugzwang, where there aren’t necessarily any winning moves. But focusing on tariffs and inflation would be a better approach than Schumer’s plan.
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In the Times story, I argue that Democrats should tie their support for any government funding bill to tariffs — more specifically, to passage of the Trade Review Act, which would allow Congress to reassert its constitutional role in levying tariffs. I see several advantages here: it highlights an issue where Trump is behaving abnormally and violating the separation of powers, but which is still highly legible to voters and indeed perhaps the only thing that has proven to dent his popularity so far. And it could drive a wedge between the various factions of the GOP.
(Nate Silver more…)
NBC: Trump cancels meeting with top Democrats on how to prevent a government shutdown
Jason Easley: Trump Shows Why He’s History’s Most Incompetent Authoritarian
CBS: Trump criticizes European allies in U.N. speech: “Your countries are going to hell”
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ABC: Jimmy Kimmel to return to air on Tuesday
Heather Cox Richardson: Letters from an American – September 22, 2025
Conservative writer Bill Kristol took to social media today to say: “So many coverups. Release the Epstein files. Release the Homan tapes. Release the Venezuelan fishing boats evidence.”
Kristol was referring to three stories about which members of the administration seem to be hiding things that don’t fit their narrative.
…There is another sign today that Trump and his loyalists have outkicked their coverage as they try to consolidate power.
In Strength in Numbers, G. Elliott Morris noted that as measured by internet searches for “Cancel Disney+,” the boycott against Disney, the parent company of ABC, is now four times as large as any similar search of a boycott over the past five years. …
Morris observes that “a lot of powerful people just don’t realize how unpopular Trump is.” He explains that while polls show Trump is deeply unpopular, many people confuse voters with consumers. That is, while polls frequently measure how voters feel about the president, only about 64.1% of American adults eligible to vote went to the polls in 2024. Figuring that number into Trump’s popularity shows that only about 32% of American adults voted for Trump in 2024, while 53% of adults currently disapprove of his performance in the White House, with 48% strongly opposed. So businesses that decide to try to appease Trump voters are making poor business decisions.
(Heather Cox Richardson more…)TNR: Mike Johnson’s Epstein Delay Tactic Is About to Blow Up in His Face
Arizona voters are set to skew the numbers in the House of Representatives in a special election.
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Kareem Abdul-Jabbar: Kareem’s Daily Quote
In America Negroes do not have to be told what fascism is. We know.
Poet and activist Langston Hughes (1901-1967) speaking to an audience in the 1930s.
(Kareem Abdul-Jabbar more…)Joyce Vance: Ignore The Distractions
Sarah Jones: Sinclair’s Refusal To Air Jimmy Kimmel Shows Why The Fight For Freedom Must Rage On
One of the largest owners of TV stations in this country is the pro-Trump, Sinclair Broadcasting Group. They’re throwing a fit and refusing to air Jimmy Kimmel, but they’re on a short leash.
Jennifer Rubin: ‘Liberal Hollywood’? More like ‘Craven Entertainment Corporations’
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Steward Beckham: From NATO to Nature (50 Facts #1)
Where America Truly Lost Its Grip
(Steward Beckham more…)
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Jack Hopkins: The Power of “Good Trouble”: How to Light a Fire Under Yourself, Hit the Street, and Change What Everyone Else Thinks Is Unchangeable
The No-Excuses Playbook for Lawful…Relentless Pressure
(Jack Hopkins more…)
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TNR: The Latest Casualty of Trump’s War on Data Is a Critical Hunger Report
The USDA abruptly decided to terminate an annual survey that policymakers and organizations use to help Americans struggling with food insecurity.
(TNR more…)
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Dispatch: Tearing Down China’s ‘Great Firewall’
Leaked documents expose the global spread of China’s cyber repression.
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This month, the Great Firewall produced another unintended consequence, but this one embarrassed the entire CCP, not just the technology’s creator. A consortium of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) received leaked documents exposing the presence of Chinese internet censorship and surveillance technology in Pakistan, Myanmar, Kazakhstan, and Ethiopia. It is unclear how this information leaked or who was behind its exposure. But for a brief moment, the world caught a glimpse at the insidious spread of China’s repressive cyber regime.The company behind the export of the Great Firewall is Geedge Networks. …
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Beijing is leveraging censorship and surveillance technology to control speech globally. That cancer, if left unaddressed, will spread beyond Beijing’s authoritarian partners and infect the free world. Indeed, it is already happening. Look no further than TikTok, which the CCP controls and leverages to advance its own interests within the United States as the Trump administration’s proposed deal hangs in limbo.The success of Beijing’s gambit is predicated in large part on secrecy. The Geedge leaks expose the advance of the CCP’s global censorship regime, which cuts against the party’s preferences. But it also relies on American fatalism. As long as officials assume the party’s efforts are untouchable, the CCP will continue to advance. It is past time to start dismantling the Great Firewall, brick by brick.
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Gregg Nunziata: Trump’s War on Law Firms is a War on You
Why he won’t stop at destroying the legal profession.
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This moment calls for a robust, unapologetic, sustained defense of the rule of law in America. The legal profession will forever bear the black mark and scandal of this moment in which many of our leading law firms—those best positioned to resist government pressure—chose instead to cut a deal or keep their heads down and hope for the best. The rest of us must not follow their ignominious lead.We must defend our inheritance of liberty under law against all who threaten it. We must defend lawyers against attacks from the government, even the lawyers who won’t defend us. We do it not for them. We do it for ourselves and the country we love. Each one of us who sets that example makes it that much easier for others to join. A corrupt president can buy off a law firm or nine, but he cannot win against a united people who truly value their liberties and the laws that protect them.
(Gregg Nunziata more…)
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Lisa Needham: Trump posts his Watergate tapes
It ended Nixon’s presidency. For Trump, it’s just another Saturday.
NY Times: Trump’s Efforts to Punish His Enemies Are Ramping Up
NY Times: Trump’s Handpicked Prosecutor Takes Over Comey and James Cases
NY Times: Trump’s Pick to Replace Ousted U.S. Attorney Lacks Prosecutorial Experience
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Ken Klippenstein: Trump Declares War on Left With “Domestic Terrorist” Designation
Without ever defining what Antifa (short for Anti-Fascist) is as an organization, Trump’s executive order directs the federal government to “investigative, disrupt, and dismantle any and all illegal operations” conducted by the group. Trump’s previous FBI Director, Christopher Wray, said once that Antifa is “more of an ideology or a movement than an organization.”
(Ken Klippenstein more…)
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NPR: Trump blames Tylenol for autism. Science doesn’t back him up
Bulwark: Autism, MAHA, and the Face of God
One part junk science, two parts incompetent government, and with a dash of blasphemy, for seasoning.
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“Autism” is not a disease. It is not a sickness. It’s category of neurodivergence that’s so broad there’s a running joke about it in the community: If you’ve met one autistic person, you’ve met one autistic person.But the MAGA/MAHA alliance does not like autistic people; it finds them unsettling. “Hard to watch.” It would like to stamp out autism. So it has now officially—from the White House podium—blamed mothers for bearing autistic children and offered the possibility that they can cure these defective people.
This is wrong.
Wrong on the science. Wrong on the reality. And wrong on the humanity.
…Now as Jesus passed by, He saw a man who was blind from birth. And His disciples asked Him, saying, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?”
Jesus answered, “Neither this man nor his parents sinned, but that the works of God should be revealed in him.”
NY Times: What the Government Autism Announcement Got So Wrong
NewsNation: Trump urges pregnant women to avoid Tylenol, OB-GYN group disagrees
Dan Pfeiffer: Trump’s Anti-Vax Turn Is His Most Unpopular Move Yet
Only 4% of Americans Want Government Health Agencies to Restrict Access to Vaccines
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AP: West Point is violating the First Amendment with a crackdown on professors, lawsuit says
(AP more…)
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Ted Gioia: Is Mid-20th Century American Culture Getting Erased?
They call it the “Greatest Generation”—so why is its art disappearing?
[we have Casablanca on DVD]
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Above the Law: So, My Trump-Supporting Friends, Did You Believe … ?
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Dan Boguslaw: ICE Can’t Stop Lying About Its Accomplishments
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It is a statistical analysis, from macro analysis and public opinion polls, not actual government data. A warning affixed to the study in fine print suggests that despite ICE’s advertising blitz, the agency is not throwing illegals out of the country at this lightning rate.The study’s authors also concede that the figure may just be a result of “reluctance by immigrants to participate in the survey or to identify as foreign-born.” …
But who knows what the real numbers are? Since February, the Department of Homeland Security has stopped providing raw numbers on immigration arrests and deportations, choosing instead to tweet out questionable statistics. The Office of Homeland Security Statistics (OHSS) has not updated its monthly enforcement count since before Trump was elected.
(Dan Boguslaw more…)
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Borowitz: Study Links Trump Being President to Increased Use of Tylenol
Timeline: Tracking the Trump Justice Department’s Anti-Voting Shift
Tracking the Lawsuits Against Trump’s Agenda
Trump Pardons Database
Project 2025 Tracker
DOGE Tracker
ProPublica: Elon Musk’s Demolition Crew
Wired: 6 Tools for Tracking the Trump Administration’s Attacks on Civil Liberties
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