Paddle Pressure

A big part of analysis of the mass public (academic or journalistic) is remembering that, as an expert, your intuition about persuadable voters is garbage. The more experience you have with politics, the more unlike the people you study you are.

Persuadable voters really care about Jeff Epstein.

Trump pulling out all the stops to welcome Saudi crown prince for first White House visit since Khashoggi killing | CNN Politics President Donald Trump is planning to receive Saudi Arabia’s powerful Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman at the White House this week with all the trappings of a state visit, sources familiar with the m...

No mention of the Saudi personal deal with Trump letting family pocket millions?
www.cnn.com/2025/11/16/p...

They should

We're ten years into these embarassing lies and I think this is the first time we've seen a Sunday morning show ready?

"I’m not a financial expert, but if I had disposable cash I’d avoid the hyperinflated AI bubble and invest in a company that manufactures pitchforks." What @willbunch.bsky.social said. bsky.app/profile/will...

credibility just drips off of trump's chief economist.

Union believes Israel is a greater threat to regional stability than Iran – The Oxford Student On Thursday, 13th November, the Oxford Union debated the motion “Israel is a greater threat to regional stability than Iranm” voting 265-113 in favour.  Evaluating the threats emanating from both coun...

There are plenty of serious scholars who believe this, perhaps a majority. But in any event no one doubts that Israel and Iran are the two major forces for instability in the region and that both are state-sponsors of terrorism. www.oxfordstudent.com/2025/11/16/u...

The vulnerability of the U.S. government to criminal exploitation is just staggering. I mean, I can't wrap my head around how we can prevent the "sue federal government, friends and allies in the Department of Justice settle" racket.

Gotta love how Jon Karl and ABC News had this graphic ready to go *the very moment* that Hassett rolled out his Walmart anecdote.

In case you were asleep, Benjamin Netanyahu reaffirms that there will be no Palestinian state on the territory of the current Israel/Palestine. Instead there will be ethnic cleansing, forced deportations, mass arrests and genocide.

Massie: "The president has been saying this is a hoax. Well, he's just now decided to investigate a hoax, if it's a hoax. And I have another concern about these investigations he's announced. If they have ongoing investigations, those documents can't be released. So this might be a big smokescreen."

"Immigration officials have deported a father living in Alabama to Laos despite a federal court order blocking his removal from the US on the grounds he has a claim to citizenship, the man’s attorneys said on Tuesday."
www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...

Can Donald Trump deploy the National Guard whenever he likes? The Supreme Court seems likely to say no

Tomorrow, all briefs will be in hand for SCOTUS to rule on Trump's emergency plea to deploy National Guard troops. The law does not seem to be on his side. My @economist.com analysis www.economist.com/united-state...

Convicted (and then pardoned) seditious conspirator Enrique Tarrio of Proud Boys (and FBI informant) fame joined the very large MAGA media influencer contingent at Portland’s ICE facility last night.

Corey Lewandowski, described here as Noem's "senior advisor," is in fact her adulterous lover, as he proudly and routinely trumpets to people off camera.

Texas Turns Its Sprawling State Police Force Into Immigration Agents for Trump The notorious 287(g) task force program has finally reached DPS, raising fears of widespread racial profiling.

New from @francescadnunz.bsky.social: Texas Department of Public Safety and ICE signed a pair of agreements that will authorize state police within DPS’s Criminal Investigations and Highway Patrol divisions to effectively operate as ICE agents, on a statewide basis.

Remember the recent middle-of-the-night apartment building raid where children were dragged outside naked & zip-tied in the street while black & Latino residents were _sorted by race_ and piled into separate vans while their apartments were ransacked & robbed? That raid? So it resulted in 0 arrests.

I do not want to “Do my own research.” I want to pay trained accredited experts to do the research, trained accredited experts to report on findings, and trained accredited experts to make policy based on them.

I am busy af with my own job, I don’t need to do eight zillion more.

Jack Schlossberg talks Kennedy legacy and the fact that Trump’s trying to dismantle it… damn🔥

“He’s so obsessed with the…Kennedy name…that he caged one and put… a rabid dog in his cabinet. put a collar on my cousin RFK Junior and has him there, barking, spreading lies and spreading misinformation.”

Above all things, Marjorie Taylor Greene is an opportunist. Being younger, she’s concerned about a future after Trump. Tea Pain will give her credit, she sees the writing on the wall for Republicans. The question is, how many other Republicans will come to this epiphany as well?

Watching the Rupert Murdoch media empire's latest propaganda barrage for Trump across multiple platforms with coordinated messaging. There's a real air of desperation about it, but the key is reporting narratives that Fox does not report as "smears" by other media outlets. It's a case of projection.

Hey Megyn Kelly,

14-year-old Eloise would like a word:

“If my voice makes you uncomfortable, good…
because the minute adults start defending predators by defending the age of a child, you’re not protecting the truth, you’re protecting the predator.”

Sound up! 🔥🔊

1/2

'Glittering generality' statements is extremely common behavior in dementia patients: i.e., "I don't know what this 6 inch scar on my abdomen is from, but I know 'they' did some kind of surgery", "I know I was in the hospital for a couple weeks, but I can't remember what was wrong", etc.

Trump must be annoyed that he can’t issue pardons covering future crimes the way John Roberts and the maga court provided him with a blanket pardon covering all presidential crimes past and future.

Bondi in July: “there’s no Epstein client list”

Bondi now: “the department will pursue (Democrats) with urgency”

Imagine thinking this DOJ is anything but a tool of the aspiring dictator in the Oval Office

The memo purporting to offer a legal rationale for Caribbean boat strikes is awfully close to “assuming Trump’s lies are true, here’s a law that applies.”

But as @gregsargent.bsky.social notes, by trying to immunize officers who follow the orders, it’s practically a confession that they’re illegal.

EU Foreign Policy Chief Kaja Kallas
@kajakallas.bsky.social:

Right now, Russia does not want to negotiate at all. Every time the world reaches out, Russia responds with missiles. Russia's latest attacks make abundantly clear that Russia is pressing with war. And this pattern keeps repeating.

It’s wild that you can just openly bribe the President of the United States with chunks of gold to get
whatever you want, it’s fine, you don’t have to hide it, just say “I am bribing the President with gold,” zero consequences.