Will we protect Iranians who take to the streets or not? This is the only one of these questions to which the answer seems clear. And the answer is that, as with a few months ago, we will not.
28.02.2026 21:25 — 👍 2 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0Will we protect Iranians who take to the streets or not? This is the only one of these questions to which the answer seems clear. And the answer is that, as with a few months ago, we will not.
28.02.2026 21:25 — 👍 2 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
Trump and Netanyahu call on the Iranian people to revolt, while sources quietly pass the word that the new effective leader is someone with whom we hope to make a nuclear deal.
Are we seeking regime change or not?
Would we now accept the Obama deal by another name or not? 1/2
The tech bro’s stood by when Trump and his cabinet goons came for international relief aid, public broadcasting, great universities, law firms, political opponents, peaceful protesters, late night comedy, broadcast news and public health.
Now they are starting to figure out that no one is safe.
Thanks so much to Tom Davidson for this excellent piece and very kind shout out
www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/life...
Only thing really new I see in this piece is an old fashioned blind gossip item that someone on the White House staff is currently involved in adultery.
That seems pretty gratuitous, and also off-putting: if newsworthy, tell us the facts; if not, why publish?
www.theatlantic.com/politics/202...
I am sure you aren’t. But don’t the responses trouble you, even so?
26.02.2026 14:02 — 👍 0 🔁 0 💬 1 📌 0
Why support for a free press may be less than we think— and what to do about it. This week’s Second Rough Draft newsletter
open.substack.com/pub/dicktofe...
Marilyn Thompson is a former leader of the WaPo investigative team, a Pulitzer-winning editor, former newspaper editor in Lexington, KY, once So. Carolina journalist of the year and a vet of the NYT, LAT and ProPublica.
Has she found the Epstein smoking gun?
www.postandcourier.com/news/hilton-...
The point on Mandelson is more obtuse, but still repugnant.
Leaking secret, market-moving info to a market player who keeps giving you money in various forms seems a pretty serious crime. In any rule of law country.
UK is actually setting an example here that one day the US might again emulate.
If you’ve wondered why so many WSJ alums were sorry the author of this piece ever ran the paper, just read this.
Andrew’s sin: that he’s boring and dumb. And the assertion is that there is no evidence that he committed a sex crime, when there is ample such evidence. 1/
www.wsj.com/opinion/even...
Friday-Trump announces 10% tariffs
Saturday- increases them to 15%, with sources noting that 10% level undermines deals already reached. Tuesday- tariffs go into effect, but only at 10%. Work on 15% still underway; White House says they will take effect soon.
Resulting uncertainty wreaks havoc.
Not a positive sign for anything when the median consumer ages 10 years over a period of just 11 years.
www.semafor.com/article/02/2...
Delaying $100 billion plus in refunds of taxes Trump illegally levied will also create uncertainty for those importers, while immediately increasing federal deficit projections, and thus interest rates.
21.02.2026 19:51 — 👍 2 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
Of all the nonsense Trump spewed yesterday about tariffs, the biggest was that we now have certainty.
In fact, his now 15% temporary levy will freeze all imports that can be postponed.
And that his latest statutory vehicles don’t permit constant adjustment will trigger enormous uncertainty.
The Court clearly ruled that the emergency tariffs were illegally imposed. Hard to imagine even what the argument is for not eventually refunding all the money illegally collected.
The Court’s silence today on remedies wouldn’t seem to affect that.
We now know why the tariff decision was delayed: the Trump appointees were fighting among themselves on their shiny, new “major questions” doctrine:
Gorsuch takes it seriously.
Barrett is having serious second thoughts.
Kavanaugh would discard it when politically inconvenient.
Epstein accountability:
UK royalty
UK government
Norwegian government
Goldman Sachs
Paul Weiss
Hyatt Hotels
No accountability:
Trump
Trump cabinet (Lutnick lies to Congress)
Trump Justice Department
another banger @dicktofel.bsky.social newsletter on the hardest journalism problem to solve: money. open.substack.com/pub/dicktofe...
19.02.2026 14:44 — 👍 6 🔁 3 💬 1 📌 0
With the revelations that @theatlantic.com measles piece was first posted with no editor’s note and that it a PR rep initially said the story was true, the editors there need to acknowledge that this was mishandled.
The failure was not with the writer, but with editors.
We shouldn’t look away from the difficulty of bringing local news to places with less money. This week’s Second Rough Draft newsletter
open.substack.com/pub/dicktofe...
When Kristi Noem’s heated blankie was found to have been left behind, her “aide” told the Coast Guard pilot to turn the plane around and fetch it. When the pilot refused, the “aide” said the pilot was fired. NBC has three witnesses.
www.nbcnews.com/politics/imm...
One of Warren Buffett’s last big bets at Berskshire was to buy about 3% of the shares of $NYT. A huge vote of confidence, but the model seems to remain essentially unique.
17.02.2026 23:48 — 👍 2 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0Leon Botstein, president of @bardcollege.bsky.social, has repeatedly made public statements about his relationship with the pedophile sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein that have turned out to be misleading, incomplete, or untrue. I'm going to make a thread to compile them all here.
15.02.2026 18:27 — 👍 1037 🔁 284 💬 21 📌 1
Was pleased to again join TVP World Press Talks, this time to discuss the global implications of the Epstein files
youtube.com/watch?v=82GG...
When they screw up, Trump officials reflexively blame enemies— “domestic terrorists”, now “cartel drones.” But facts— from bystander videos to leaked emails— reveal their lies, and their dangerous ineptitude.
www.nytimes.com/2026/02/14/u...
Words of wisdom for journalists: "We shouldn’t help people lie anonymously" @dicktofel.bsky.social
13.02.2026 17:45 — 👍 29 🔁 3 💬 1 📌 0
Amazing WSJ story on Kristi Noem’s egotistical mismanagement of Homeland Security, including blowing $70 million of taxpayer money on a plane apparently used as an airborne love nest.
www.wsj.com/politics/pol...
Critical press coverage of institutional foundations is rare. Here’s a very tough piece on the Mellon Foundation.
www.theatlantic.com/magazine/202...
"One president spewing racism about another isn’t a game. It’s a cancer on our society, metastasizing from the top down. And...focusing on an “insider” view of the making of a gaffe rather than the societal effect, is deeply cynical & highly corrosive of how journalism is supposed to work."
12.02.2026 17:16 — 👍 2 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 0
“people who lie when granted anonymity shouldn’t be granted it again”— @dicktofel.bsky.social
dicktofel.substack.com/p/cynicism-i...
But I expect @cnn.com @politico.com @washingtonpost.com @nytimes.com @axios.com will keep doing it every day, until they have new editorial leadership.