Harry

Don Moynihan on "Purge, Merge, and Surge" "Instead of surging in Iraq, it’s happening here in American cities."

“More and more cabinet members — Rubio, Miller, Noem — live on military bases now, & it's another parallel to Iraq, where the administration lived in the Green Zone. There’s something deeply unhealthy about a society where leaders are literally shut off from the communities that they govern.”

This is the top headline on CNN. A good warning sign that your country may be becoming a dictatorship is when your plain-jane straight news networks start saying “Our country is becoming a dictatorship”

Pence: "State ownership of business is very common in China & Russia. Taking a percentage of sales of Nvidia, taking a percentage of stock of Intel is inconsistent w/ free market principles, and I think it's taken our country to a very perilous place and I think we need to resist that very strongly"

This is the playbook, folks.

If you're not paying attention now and doing something about it, then you're going to have to sit down the rest of your life because democracy is being taken away.

Do not be quiet in this moment.

Andy is a terrific reporter who has covered all sides of this story. Don’t get mad at him because he’s following all the leads even when they include the Clintons.

“I don’t know why they’re attacking Zohran. I think it’s stupid.”

@gallego.senate.gov says Dems can disagree with certain policies but attacking Mamdani when he’s bringing in new ideas and exciting people and “shrinking the tent” is shortsighted.

(H/T @atrupar.com )

There is no moral equivalence between bullies and the bullied, between tyranny and democracy, or between brutality and decency. No individual can be free in a society devoid of justice. There can be no liberty where brutality reigns.

I think it’s high time we take back the national narrative. For centuries Americans of all races, genders, religions, and abilities have worked to create a more perfect union, and we should shout from the rooftops that WE are America. Not these idiot white supremacist authoritarians.

THE BIG TEN: we would like to propose a 16-team playoff with 4 automatic bids for the Big Ten

(Crowd boos, jeers, throws tomatoes, chases Big Ten off stage)

THREE WEEKS LATER

THE BIG TEN: we have listened and learned and have a new proposal: a 28-team playoff with 7 automatic bids for the Big Ten

Remember: If we allow ourselves to fall into fatalism, or wallow in disappointment, or become resigned to what is rather than what should be, we will lose the long game.

The greatest enemy of positive social change is cynicism about what can be changed.

Every Democratic member of Congress should be in the streets of DC saying this dangerous authoritarian escalation must stop. Do they not grasp what’s going on here?

We’re not distracted and it’s not going away.

If you’re under any illusions about what an authoritarian personality cult the GOP has become, they’re not hiding it:

On D.C.’s Busiest Streets, Trump’s Provocateurs Provoke Today on TAP: ICE agents and federalized cops are now deliberately stationed where they can incite the most backlash.

In a move designed to provoke a public backlash, the Trump administration is deploying law enforcement to the busiest, most pedestrian-friendly areas of D.C. From Harold Meyerson:

The 18-Year-Old Vigilante ICE Agent Is Coming The trouble with getting rid of age limits for new ICE hires.

The possibility of untrained, unqualified people swarming restaurants, shops, factories, churches, and homes looking for immigrants, all with the imprimatur—not to mention the qualified immunity—of federal law enforcement, has never been so real.

Teenagers in Washington D.C. say the federal police takeover makes them feel unsafe When President Trump announced his crackdown on crime in Washington, D.C., the local U.S. Attorney said she wanted to focus on juveniles. But experts say harsher punishments don't deter criminals.

When President Trump announced his crackdown on crime in Washington, D.C., the local U.S. attorney said she wanted to focus on juveniles. But experts say harsher punishments don't deter criminals.

How pediatricians are quietly preparing immigrant families for the unthinkable: leaving their children behind | CNN On a warm June day in Nashville, Briana cradled her one-year-old son in the pediatrician’s waiting room. She was there for his routine checkup, expecting to talk about vaccines and growth charts.

Long trusted by parents to safeguard children and trained to navigate sensitive topics, pediatricians are quietly initiating some of the hardest conversations of their careers: If you’re detained, who will care for your child?

ICE Agent Caught on Camera Disguised as a Construction Worker The Intercept confirmed that a federal agent caught on camera wearing a hard hat and safety vest works for ICE.

theintercept.com/2025/08/11/i...

There is so much to say, and at the same time, nothing to add.

The reaction to Alaska by the Ukrainian artist.

How a Nazi-obsessed amateur historian went from obscurity to the top of Substack Tucker Carlson has called Darryl Cooper the “most important popular historian working in the United States today.” His background is more extreme than previously reported.

“Cooper wrote “Guten morgen” to a user on X last August, along with a picture of himself holding a coffee mug. It might take a moment to realize the user is a self-identified Nazi, and the mug Cooper holds is sold on a website” that features pro-Nazi merch.
www.motherjones.com/politics/202...

So far
West Virginia
South Carolina
And Ohio have decided to

Suck up to the convicted Felon and adjudicated RAPIST by sending their National Guard on an unnecessary STUNT to DC

This is how much they want ppl to forget about Epstein

#EpsteinFiles

anyway this entire thing screams stephen miller and like everything he does, it does not seem as if he's thought past the initial provocation.

the message from the white house is that you live in a city run by people the president doesn't like, you will be occupied like you are an enemy of the state.

3 Republican-Led States to Send National Guard Troops to D.C.

hundreds of national guard troops stationed around union station, the white house and the capital to do...what exactly? www.nytimes.com/2025/08/16/u...

Media is scared to say what’s happening so they’re pretending flooding DC with troops is just a crime-fighting policy, even though the people doing it are obviously quite clear it’s an authoritarian coup d’etat

Twenty-five years ago, and before, @billkristolbulwark.bsky.social and I would not have agreed on much.

He is entirely on the right side here.

These governors of SC and OH, whose urban crime problems are *worse* than DC's, should mind their own business.

U.S. Pauses Visitor Visas for Gazans After Right-Wing Outcry

More here

www.nytimes.com/2025/08/16/u...

According to Loomer via the NYT, Rubio took this call from her last night — right after he accompanied Trump to the summit with Putin.

It’s not just Trump. Rubio is taking phone calls from Loomer. We are fucked as a country.

It gets worse

Trump just fully capitulated to Putin-dropping his demand for a ceasefire and telling Ukraine to give up the Donbas

America never looked weaker-welcoming a war criminal, letting him dictate terms and then having the president do his bidding

Zelensky is walking into a trap on Monday