Trevor Holder

y’all do realize we’re two years out from the primaries right

It's kind of funny how Hayek's (mostly correct) argument against central planning because concentrating that much economic power in one place inevitably lead to totalitarian behavior is also a pretty strong argument against like, extreme concentrations of wealth and market power

By this logic the desire from Republicans to keep ICE anonymous but to force citizens to jump through multiple hoops to vote is also intellectually inconsistent. Which is true. Dems should hammer them on that. (You can use the constitution to do this!)

i try not to indulge in generation-based resentments and i know all the gen-x ppl here are good and pure and definitely should not get mad at me but i have to admit i have way more of an axe to grind with gen-x than i do with the boomers

Epstein victim Virginia Giuffre: “I was trafficked to a lot of types of different men — billionaires, royalty… he used me as a form of blackmail so these people would owe him favors.”

President’s Day is a good reminder that the best thing we could do with the office is abolish it.

I had the great fortune of being remarkably, demonstratively wrong about substantial geopolitical things at an early point in my education (undergraduate) where my opinion did not matter.

I recommend the experience to everyone.

Have you ever once seen the New York Times quote Trump like this?

This is a nice move in an interview www.nytimes.com/2026/02/16/u...

This is really obvious when you see all of them get very upset when liberals stop associating with them. They thought they would make "the hard decisions" and be welcomed as saviors. Now its obvious they've fucked everything up and no one likes 'em.

Counterpoint: if the Prince of Darkness rises from a fiery portal at the Iowa Caucus and declares his opposition to Donald Trump, I will ride to battle with the host of Hell

some past “multicultural economic zones” you may recall include the Roman Empire, the Holy Roman Empire, the Ottoman Empire, and the British Empire.

while all of these had significant problems “no one will die to defend them” was memorably not among them

the AuDHD urge to put additional context in parentheses in texts so others know there’s more than one thought happening at the same time

Him getting a Norse tattoo to cover up the Nazi tattoo was absolutely fucking wild and I have no idea how it didn't get more play in social and traditional media.

Nazi obsession with Norse mythology isn't exactly obscure.

In 1863, Sgt. Cyrus Boyd of Iowa encountered a black child, put on the auction block by her master, who was also her father. "By G-d," Boyd exclaimed, "I'll fight till hell freezes over and then I'll cut the ice and fight on."

More of this energy in 2026, please.

www.baltimoresun.com/2007/04/15/w...

The story of our current political moment will be written in retrospect as one of elites creating alternative information environments for themselves and then freaking out because of them. It’s like telling exaggerated ghost stories at a sleepover and then everyone not sleeping.

We are a nation in which thousands of Black people were "legally" kidnapped with the assistance of the federal government & sent back into slavery.

We are also a nation in which thousands of white & Black people organized in their local communities to try to stop those kidnappings.

"We" are both.

search of the fugitives. 13 Giltner sent his grandson Francis Troutman in search of the Crosswhites, and by January 1847 Troutman had located the family and gone in pursuit with a handful of slave catchers and a local sheriff named Harvey Dickson. The language of the subsequent court records produces a kind of civility in the ensuing encounter that obscures tension and fear yet also conveys the Marshall community's political and legal consciousness. On the morning of January 27, 1847, the slave catchers approached the Cross-white home. Crosswhite saw them coming, and he and his eldest son tried to flee, but some of Troutman's men caught them and brought them back to the house. Troutman declared his intent to arrest the family as fugitives, prompting Crosswhite to take steps to ensure a fair hearing in court. The fugitive convinced the slave catchers to allow him to leave the house "to consult counsel," which he did, accompanied by Sheriff Dickson. In their absence dozens of black and white townspeople materialized in and around the house. When Crosswhite returned, a number of these townspeople threatened and attempted to fight off the slave catchers. James Smith, a black man "with a club raised, approached within five or six feet" of Troutman and "threatened to smash out his brains," but Dickson held him back.

The crowd outside the house grew to more than a hundred, keen on preventing the arrest. William Parker, a black neighbor, proclaimed that he was willing to risk his life to prevent the Crosswhites being taken to court. Alongside these threats the crowd took on some of the more genteel forms of antebellum politics, offering resolutions of their intent to resist the capture. White abolitionists were among the most vocal of those present, including Charles Gorham, who resolved "that these Kenruckians shall not take the Crosswhite family by virtue of physical, moral, or legal force." That call met with "general acclamation (and] much noise." Ultimately the activists prevented the arrest simply by expressing their willingness and exhibiting their capacity to break the law. Sheriff Dickson felt unable to control the crowd; Troutman gave him a signed warrant to arrest the fugitives, bur Dickson refused to execute it. Convinced that a few slave catchers were no match for the antislavery mob, the sheriff persuaded Troutman that attempting an arrest would be dangerous and fruitless. The following day Gorham encountered Troutman in a Marshall courthouse and informed him simply, "Your negroes are gone." Overnight, abolitionists had ushered the Crosswhites east toward the Detroit River, where they crossed into a more secure freedom in Canada.

Bonner also tells this moving story from Marshall, MI in 1847 in which an inter-racial crowd of neighbors helps a local family of fugitive slaves (the Crosswhites) escape from the clutches of "legal" kidnappers who have come to return them to their "owners."

Reactionary centrist advice to Democrats boils down to one thing: avoid making the argument, about anything. Don't defend what was known as "the a-word" (abortion), promise to also "get tough on crime" aka don't speak out on injustice, hop on board xenophobic policies & rhetoric (Laken Riley).

Yesterday morning kids were sent running from their bus stop in panic because ICE showed up. This guy at today’s ICE Out of Lindenwold protest is a must watch 😭. @maddow.bsky.social

notice that in the video quoted here the person who said he is engaging in protest for the first time in his life says, with emotion, “that’s not who we are,” in reference to ICE terrorizing grade schoolers.

think about this person every time you see someone scolding someone else for saying that

Here's the thing: This was true in 2024. In the very same surveys where media shouted from rooftops that majorities supported "mass deportation" MORE people supported having people stay. But the latter didn't merit airtime. Chart credit: @mikepod.bsky.social

IT'S CALLED STRATEGIC AMBIGUITY ERIC, AND IT'S THE OFFICIAL USG POLICY

“Why didn’t Democrats codify xyz before I didn’t vote for them to keep full control of Congress & then gave Republicans a trifecta?”

Well they codified same sex marriage & interracial marriage at the end of 2022 before Republicans took over the House at the start of 2023 & you mostly shittalked it.

so cool we have pre-emptive 2028 discourse for a like a year before anyone even announces

Not really sure how you can see Evelyn Normielib (D, Texas) setting fire to a facility that might have the possibility of becoming an ICE concentration camp and despair about how Dem primary voters are gonna pick Gavin "We are Charlie Kirk" Newsom as the nominee

The thing about all the Newsom posting is that people are giving themselves negative feelings about the party as a whole based on something at best hypothetical (more likely imaginary) and after the thing doesn’t come to pass, those negative feelings will remain, searching for justification.

One of the things MAGA is somewhat right about is Europe's complete unwillingness to secure itself. The US (many times now) has asked Europe to increase its military capabilities so that we can focus elsewhere. The Euros keep saying no.

Alleged someone allegedly burning a concentration camp in Kansas City.

Suburban wine moms will really be like "you believe in voting? that pales in effectiveness to my strategy, firebombing a concentration camp" and then very effectively firebomb a concentration camp