Denis McLaughlin

The state’s job isn’t to moralize the market. It’s to govern and regulate it.

Anything less is wishful thinking dressed up as civic virtue.

/10

Obama's framing isn’t just soft, it’s a symptom.

It treats corporate retreat as a moral failure, not a structural inevitability.

Until we fix THAT, we’ll keep mistaking market PR for principle.

9/

The fix isn’t better corporate virtue.

The fix is stronger public institutions. Build laws that make it impossible to betray the public good without consequence. Stop begging corporations to be moral and make government capable again.

8/

Obama’s right that people have a capacity to stand up. But companies aren’t people—despite what SCOTUS would have you believe.

They’re machines built to convert capital into more capital. (^ this also goes to why Citizens United was wrongly decided)

They don’t “stand up.” They pivot.

7/

A democracy that relies on CEOs for courage has already surrendered the plot.

Public purpose belongs in public hands—law, regulation, enforcement—not corporate press releases about “values.”

6/

The deeper issue isn’t that these places folded. It’s that they were ever in a position to matter this much in the first place.

We’ve outsourced moral authority to entities whose only mandate is quarterly profit.

5/

When companies roll back DEI policies or cozy up to a hostile administration, that’s not “cowardice.”

That’s the market doing what the market does: chasing favor, contracts, and survival.

4/

This is the same neoliberal reflex that got us here: pretending private actors can fill the void left by a hollowed-out public sector.

Government retreats, corporations step in, and suddenly we act shocked when they act in their own interest.

3/

Corporations aren’t moral actors. Their job isn’t justice, it’s profit. Their constituencies are shareholders and their respective communities, not the public.

Expecting them to “take a stand” on principle is like expecting a shark to go vegan.

2/

Obama takes aim at companies cutting deals with Trump: ‘We have capacity to take a stand’ Universities, law firms and businesses that have changed course should have stood by convictions, says ex-president

The Guardian piece about Obama scolding corporations for “cutting deals” with Trump completely misses the point.

The problem isn’t that companies lacked courage. It’s that we EVER expected them to have any.

🧵1/10

(bear with me on the threads bc I'm delayed in an airport)

Christofascists melting down over Pope Leo is 🌟divine🌟

The Real Reason They Pulled Jimmy Kimmel Off Late-Night This censorship isn’t about jokes — it’s about serving corporate interests.

TIMELINE:

- Kimmel makes late-night joke

- FCC chair threatens companies running Kimmel

- Nexstar throws Kimmel off its stations as it begs FCC chair for merger approval

- Disney suspends Kimmel as it begs Trump DOJ to approve Fubo deal

FOLLOW THE MONEY👇

www.levernews.com/the-real-rea...

TERRORISM EXPERT HERE:
He cannot designate an idea as a terrorist group.

There is no org called ANTIFA. There is no leadership or funding path or no membership. Also there is no terrorism law in America. Ask Luigi.

He wants to call anyone a terrorist. That’s Fascism.

#ReleaseTheEpsteinFiles

For anyone needing a timeline cleanse, yesterday I had the privilege of adopting my wife’s 5 y/o son to whom I’ve been a stepfather to since he was 11 months old.

Feeling on top of the world today!

More pro-death shit from the self proclaimed “pro-life party.”

I have not gotten as many texts asking if I saw "the news" since Joe Biden dropped out

Teachers Try to Beat the Heat As extreme heat rises in Orlando, Fla., teachers turn to collective bargaining to ensure comfortable, air-conditioned classrooms.

Last year, broken air conditioning systems in Orlando schools led to students being hospitalized with heat-related illness.

This year, teachers say: Never again.

They’re using their union power to demand safe, cool classrooms.

The only thing I can say about this paragraph is read it. Sit with it. Read it again. @michaelharriot.bsky.social

Sometimes really serious people follow me on here and I really wonder what led them to this abyss

100% this. Dems lose policy debates because they’re always fighting from a defensive posture.

It validates the attack lines, and the attack lines are what sticks in the public’s minds.

The media is far more likely to frame liberal-left politicians, like Mamdani, as extremist than they are the President, who has made no attempt to conceal his authoritarian inclinations.

Like most of the things this administration does, fwiw.

It can be both a distraction and a dangerous moment for democracy

@washlegalclinic.bsky.social would be a good place to start!

With Trump set to use crime as a fake justification to threaten DC today, media coverage should make one thing clear: At this point his pattern of manufacturing pretexts for militarizing domestic law enforcement has become undeniable. Some thoughts on that here:

newrepublic.com/article/1987...

This whole thing screams “chocolate city is too black” to me

Apparently omw in to an active war zone!

(taking the metro in to DC, like I have done without issue for the last 3 years)

I have no idea how it happened! I was totally prepared to accept a mess of an itinerary that got me in after midnight but the GA said “I can get you on a direct that leaves in 30 minutes”

I could not accept fast enough lmfao

Just accepted a voluntary bump from a flight with a connection to a direct flight that gets me in 2 hours earlier AND a $700 flight credit.

I fear I will be chasing this high forever.

A new rule threatens home care providers and their clients A rule change proposed by the Labor Department threatens home care providers.

As the Department of Labor considers a rule change that would prevent home care providers from earning minimum wage or overtime, we need to make our voices heard. Learn more. www.afscme.org/blog/a-new-r...