Michael Lee, Ph.D he/him/his

It actually doesn't matter whether this war is unpopular or not if you have a party that clearly has no intention of getting re-elected through democratic means.

"The things that will DESTROY US are:

POLITICS WITHOUT PRINCIPLES;

PLEASURE WITHOUT CONSCIENCE;

WEALTH WITHOUT WORK;

knowledge without character;

BUSINESS WITHOUT MORALITY;

SCIENCE WITHOUT HUMANITY;

and worship without sacrifice."

~ Mahatma Gandhi

See, the thing is we haven’t been—not because past presidents were perfect angels or thrilled with Iran, but because they didn’t want to close the Strait of Hormuz, evacuate American civilians from the whole region, and set the world economy on fire.

Cartoon labelled "Foreign Policy Refresher". The panels read: The US sold arms to Iran... Generating big profits... That were sent to the contras... Who are fighting the Nicaraguan government... Which the US wants to overthrow... On the grounds it's tied to anti-American states... Like Iran. Any questions?

A cartoon on the Iran-Contra scandal, in which the US sold arms to Iran, despite an embargo, to use the proceeds to fund the right-wing Contras' attempt to overthrow the Nicaraguan government.

From Ireland, the international magazine of the Workers' Party, 1987.

Nearly eight years ago, when I began reporting on the "working homeless," it was treated as an edge case, a tragedy at the margins.

That fiction has collapsed.

Housing insecurity is now an ever-widening sinkhole, swallowing not only the poor and working class but entire swaths of the middle class.

Kansas invalidated a trans woman's license even though she never changed her gender marker.

It's not about the gender marker. It's about targeting trans people and making their lives unlivable.

Dishonesty is at the center of the anti-trans hate campaign. Though much bigotry is blatant, an astonishing amount is laundered by the nyt, which routinely manipulates and falsifies information to foist on unsuspecting readers

Take its small but important role in legitimizing this extremist group🧵

Just paid these two and I’m adopting one more MN immigrant family’s rent for tonight, if I can pull it off.

This next family needs $2400 to stay out of eviction court. Can you help them stay housed?

V: @Ian-Coldwater
CA: $iancoldwater
PP: @coldwater

Please share and help if you can! Thank you! 🌻

Police Mass Arrest Protesters Again After Whipple Protest, Ending Week of Action - UNICORN RIOT Dozens of people were arrested by state police and Hennepin County sheriff's deputies after a march against ICE to the Whipple Federal Building on Sunday, March 1, during the last planned protest of t...

NEW: Dozens of people were violently arrested by state police and Hennepin County sheriff's deputies after a march against ICE to the Whipple Federal Building on Sunday, March 1, during the last planned protest of the 'Bring the Heat Melt The Ice!' week of action in Minnesota. [Video]

U.S. Troops Were Told Iran War Is for “Armageddon,” Return of Jesus Advocacy group reports commanders giving similar messages at more than 30 installations in every branch of the military

Deeply, deeply disturbing:

"U.S. Troops Were Told Iran War Is for “Armageddon,” Return of Jesus. Advocacy group reports commanders giving similar messages at more than 30 installations in every branch of the military."

substack.com/home/post/p-...

Tomorrow we’re taking up Pause Evictions Save Lives, a policy that will temporarily extend pre-eviction notice from 30 to 60 days until August 31st. This will give residents more time to get resources and support so that families can stay together and we can keep people in their homes.

U.S. Troops Were Told Iran War Is for “Armageddon,” Return of Jesus Advocacy group reports commanders giving similar messages at more than 30 installations in every branch of the military

EXCLUSIVE: At more than 30 installations, U.S. commanders told troops the war on Iran is a Christian war.

The Military Religious Freedom Foundation has been “inundated” with more than 110 complaints.

One NCO said they were told the U.S. war is to bring about Armageddon and the return of Jesus…

Media Matters analyzed a year of NYT coverage of anti-trans bills and found that 66% of the time the paper didn't quote a trans person. Further, it found that the paper often quoted right wing sources without mentioning their histories of anti-trans rhetoric.
So "right-wing rag" is pretty accurate.

Another contrast—this time, between this case and United States v. Skrmetti, 605 U. S. 495 (2025)—is also striking. In Skrmetti, several parents challenged Tennessee’s ban on gender-affirming care for minors. The suit raised claims grounded in both equal protection and substantive due process. As to the latter, the parents in Skrmetti, similarly to the parents here, asserted a right “to make decisions concerning medical care for their minor children.” Pet. for Cert., O. T. 2023, No. 23–466, p. 34; see id., at 18 (invoking a “right of parents with respect to the care, custody, and control of their children, including in decisions about medical care”). And in support of that right, the Skrmetti parents relied on the same precedents the Court does today: Parham, 442 U. S. 584, and Pierce, 268 U. S. 510. See Pet. for Cert., No. 23–466, at 34–36; ante, at 5–6. But the Court, when deciding to grant certiorari in Skrmetti, limited its review to the equal protection issue: It would not even hear the parents out on their substantive due process claim.

This footnote in the Kagan dissent specifically calls out the double standard of quickly jumping to defend the rights of transphobic parents while ignoring the parental rights of trans youth seeking access to gender affirming care in Skrmetti.

DO this now

Deeply disappointing to see the Court tossing this complex issue with an emergency order.

Justice Kagan is not mincing words here:

"The Court is impatient: It already knows what it thinks, and insists on getting everything over quickly."

States Move to Limit Access to H.I.V. Treatment

This is infuriating. Even if you're someone who believes we need capitalism in our medicine (why?), modern HIV drugs prevent transmission. Taking access away from 16,000 in Florida (and many more to come elsewhere) means we're making a lot more people sick. Which is very bad capitalism, actually.

Conservative Supreme Court justices curb California’s effort to shield transgender students from forced outing The High Court's ruling came down in an early-evening unsigned order.

The justices are endangering trans kids.

www.advocate.com/news/educati...

States Move to Limit Access to H.I.V. Treatment

www.nytimes.com/2026/03/02/h...

I don't want to put too much emphasis on the political antics of an AG who is launching a salvo at trans youth conveniently a day before Texans vote in a close primary.

That timing is far from coincidental.

And while troubling, this opinion is just that - an opinion - it is not enforceable law. 🧵

Greg Bovino, other federal agents investigated for actions during Operation Metro Surge Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty said her office is already investigating 17 incidents involving potential unlawful conduct by federal agents.

The use of a chemical irritant by Greg Bovino is among 17 instances of “potential unlawful behavior” by federal agents in Minnesota currently being investigated for criminal charges, Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty said.

A scanned image of the first page of a legal document on letterhead from Ken Paxton, Attorney General of Texas, dated February 27, 2026. It is labeled "Opinion No. KP-0518" and addressed to Mr. Darrel D. Spinks, Executive Director of the Texas Behavioral Health Executive Council. A portion of the first paragraph is highlighted in yellow, reading: "mental health care providers" licensed by the Texas Behavioral Health Executive Council."

A scanned image of the second page of the Attorney General Opinion document. A section in the first full paragraph is highlighted in yellow, which reads: "[f]or the purpose of transitioning a child’s biological sex as determined by the sex organs, chromosomes, and endogenous profiles of the child or affirming the child’s perception of the child’s sex if that perception is inconsistent with the child’s biological sex."

A scanned image of the third page of the Attorney General Opinion document. The text discusses various statutory and dictionary definitions of the terms "health care provider" and "health care". There are no highlighted sections on this page.

A scanned image of the seventh and final page of the Attorney General Opinion document, showing the "SUMMARY" section and the signature block for Ken Paxton. The entire summary paragraph is highlighted in yellow, reading: "The definition of a “health care provider” in subsection 161.701(2) of the Health and Safety Code unambiguously encompasses the professions regulated by the Texas Behavioral Health Executive Council. Any licensee that facilitates the provision of unlawful procedures or treatments that aim to transition a child’s sex are thus forbidden from receiving public money in support of those efforts and, separately, risk revocation of their licenses to practice."

Texas AG Ken Paxton has declared that it is illegal for mental health providers and therapists to treat trans youth. It means that trans youth will be denied access to any mental healthcare that isn't conversion therapy. Paxton also threatens parents of trans youth with child abuse investigations.

I don't think people's problem with, for example, the paper's decade-long crusade putting a big ol' target on trans people's backs can be accurately described as NYT doing "reporting that doesn't always 100% accord with what advocacy groups want."

An Inside View of Why NYT’s Trans Coverage Has Been So Bad A former New York Times editor affirms that the paper's fearmongering, pseudo-scientific, anti-trans coverage is a response to directives from the top.

fair.org/home/an-insi...

An entire generation of AIDS survivors is now struggling with a hidden epidemic - LGBTQ Nation Tez Anderson didn't understand why he was experiencing extreme stress, isolation, and nightmares until he realized he has AIDS Survivor Syndrome.

An entire generation of AIDS survivors is now struggling with a hidden epidemic www.lgbtqnation.com/2026/02/an-e...

In a democracy, the war on Iran would not be possible.

They Are Not Protecting Elections. They Are Controlling Them. Voter ID lies, manufactured fear, and a coordinated campaign to shrink democracy

Republicans aren’t arguing about voter ID.
They’re arguing about who gets to vote.
I just published a deep dive on how trump and the GOP are quietly sabotaging the 2026 midterms with paperwork, red tape, and lies.
Read. Share. Don’t look away.
brooklyndaddefiant.substack.com/p/how-trump-...

It's hard to explain the neighborhoods in Minneapolis to people outside & how hard each have been hit, but this is another one in critical need.

Please share outside Minnesota Bluesky in your broader circles, religious congregations, etc.

If you happen to know any multi millionaires, chat 'em up?

Bureau of Prisons: February 19, 2026 PURPOSE AND SCOPE To establish professional guidelines for the mental health evaluation and treatment of inmates meeting the diagnostic criteria for Gender Dysphoria (GD) to assist their progress toward recovery, while reducing or eliminating the frequency and severity of symptoms and associated negative outcomes.

This week it was uncovered that the Trump regime is trying to "cure" trans prisoners of being transgender, while doing everything they can - from labeling our mere existence as explicit to stripping us of our legal documents - to ensure we *all* end up imprisoned in their ever-growing camps.

We were literally watching our community provide a ceremony at the Whipple building.

Hennepin County Sheriff’s then began to escalate tensions. This was disrespectful to our community, our culture, and our ancestors.

This created fear and was an attack on our right to peacefully assemble.