Jon Rauch

“Information Looking for People” A review of Emily Baker-White, “Every Screen on the Planet: The War Over TikTok” (Norton, 2025).

In case you're still using TikTok, here's a reminder that it's a dishonest company with even more dishonest backers. www.lawfaremedia.org/article/info...

What Do Liberalism and Religion Owe Each Other? When religion becomes an identity it can't play the vital role of cultivating the virtue and morality necessary for a self-governing people

One of the frustrations of being an editor/organizer is that I don't get to do my own thinking and work. One of the joys is that I get to platform absolutely first rate conversations by brilliant minds such as this one at LibCon2025. Moderator @jonrauch.bsky.social open.substack.com/pub/theunpop...

Explains a lot! Thank you, Sarah.

"Which is why when these text messages come out, and you see people answering with, 'Oh, just put them in the gas chamber.' [For] all these staffers on the Republican side, that vice signaling has become a cultural touchstone of who people are on the right now."

"That vice signaling is both antidote to virtue signaling, which they see as a hallmark of the left, but it's also like a code that they talk to each other in...

“Something that is happening culturally on the right is what I would categorize as 'vice signalling.' This starts out as ironic detachment and then grows. There's this line, 'We all wear masks and in time our faces grow to fit them.'...

Sam Harris | #458 - The Bulwark Against MAGA Sam Harris speaks with Sarah Longwell and Tim Miller about Trump and the future of American politics.

Important new concept from @sarahlongwell25.bsky.social: "vice signaling." From her 2/11/2016 interview with Sam Harris... www.samharris.org/podcasts/mak...

Detailed analysis by Rob Shapiro finds MAGA is the same type of authoritarian, violence-prone mass movement that brought dictators to power in other countries. www.sonecon.com/hannah-arend...

Moore to the Point 2-11-2026 v.2 - Christianity Today Moore to the Point 2-11-2026 v.2 newsletter. Get the most recent headlines and stories from Christianity Today delivered to your inbox daily.

Whatever else you do today, do not miss this column by Russell Moore about the real meaning of the Epstein debacle. www.christianitytoday.com/newsletter/a...

Sam Harris | #456 - American Fascism Sam Harris speaks with Jonathan Rauch about the emergence of fascism in American politics.

Sam Harris and I dissect the Trump phenomenon and sadly conclude...yes, it's fascism. www.samharris.org/podcasts/mak...

The Myth of the Police State — The Dial No one, not even the supposed beneficiaries, is protected.

Want to know why Trump is granting asylum to supposedly persecuted white South Africans? Read this insightful essay by Eve Fairbanks about the false (and racist) claim that whites were better off under apartheid. www.thedial.world/articles/new...

This is, quite frankly, complete bullshit. I’ve received more criticism, harassment, and — at one point — calls for my death in the past six months of criticizing this administration than I did in an entire FBI career of investigations, operations, and arrests. And I never wore a goddamn mask.

OMB Confirms Congressional Punt on PAYGO | Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget This week the Office of Management and Budget (OMB)

How about those fiscally conservative Republicans? "OMB estimates that the lawmakers in 2025 added $2.6 trillion to the deficit through 2030 and $4.4 trillion through 2035."
www.crfb.org/press-releas...

"Recent events have brought Trump’s governing style into sharper focus," Jonathan Rauch argues. "'Fascist' best describes it, and reluctance to use the term has now become perverse." theatln.tc/wVq7MFaa

Europe needs a Project 2026 English original of article published this morning in Italian by La Stampa

Wake up, Europe! open.substack.com/pub/billemmo...

Steve Chapman: The lawless president launches a lawless war What sets Donald Trump’s second presidency apart is his refusal to let any laws, domestic or international, stand in his way.

www.chicagotribune.com/2026/01/07/c...

Trump’s Betrayal of Venezuela’s Democracy Movement Is Hard to Overstate If he continues to snub María Corina Machado, the heroine of the opposition, America will bear responsiblity for the country’s next tragic chapter

Must-read from Larry Diamond: "We are left with the worst of all possible worlds. Maduro is gone but his predatory dictatorship lives on. There is no sign of a plan to induce this awful regime to negotiate a transfer of power to the democratic coalition." www.theunpopulist.net/p/trumps-bet...

Why what's been achieved in Gaza is a ceasefire, not a peace deal. There is only one genocidal party to the conflict, and it's Hamas. www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/202...

Trump Is Going For Regime Change in Venezuela Sadly, it's unlikely to end well.

Frank Fukuyama's incisive analysis of Venezuela. Explains why legality is a side issue (and a dead end for Dems) open.substack.com/pub/persuasi...

YouTube video by University of Miami School of Law “Life During a Constitutional Crisis” - Professor Bernard Harcourt

Here's a brilliant and also moving analysis of the U.S. shift toward authoritarianism...and the importance of individual acts of resistance. www.youtube.com/watch?v=2FeO...

We need deterrence against America too English original of article published in Italian this morning by La Stampa. The footnote has been added [and is meant to be whimsical...]

"Next year Europe will have to change its approach and start copying China. It needs to punch back to deter an increasingly hostile America." open.substack.com/pub/billemmo...

An important counter to the Putin-Trump narrative English original of article on the EU's big loan to Ukraine published in Italian this morning by La Stampa

"As for Trump, the only things that can be predicted with confidence is that he will continue to call for peace and continue to collude with Putin." open.substack.com/pub/billemmo...

German Views of the U.S.-Germany Relationship Turn Sharply Negative Nearly three-quarters of German adults say relations with the United States are bad, while only 24% of U.S adults say the same of relations with Germany.

Trump's gift to Putin. 73 percent of Germans say relations with the US are "bad." www.pewresearch.org/global/2025/...

Trump’s hatred demonstrates Europe’s importance From now on, we must act as if the transatlantic alliance does not exist, because under Trump-Vance it doesn’t. English original of column published in Italian today by La Stampa [with minor updates]

Bill Emmott: "Europe offends Trump in much the same way as Democratic Ukraine offends Putin." billemmott.substack.com/p/trumps-hat...

At RDI's conference in DC, I just heard a retired federal judge, Mark Wolf, say Trump might declare martial law to impede the 2026 elections. He's not predicting, but no one thinks he's crazy to raise it. rdi.org/2025-frontli...

Trump's strategy for diminished America The White House just put out a National Security Strategy, laying out its principle of “flexible realism”: a dwindling and darker role for America in the world.

Tim Mak has it about right. www.counteroffensive.news/p/trumps-str...

Grand jury refuses to reindict Letitia James in mortgage fraud case Before a Virginia grand jury’s ruling Thursday, a judge had dismissed an earlier indictment after finding that the prosecutor had been unlawfully appointed.

This is a stunning indictment...not of Letitia James but of DOJ and the Trump administration. Serious prosecutors and lawyers would be hanging their heads in shame. www.washingtonpost.com/national-sec...

Rob Shapiro: Trump has made the affordability crisis worse, and opened the door wide for Democrats to mount a populist campaign from the left. washingtonmonthly.com/2025/12/02/a...

Pete Hegseth Needs to Go—Now A man with such contempt for the military should not run the Pentagon.

Tom Nichols states the obvious...but let's please not forget that the first boat strike, which targeted civilians posing no imminent threat or hostility to the US, was probably as illegal as the second. www.theatlantic.com/ideas/2025/1...

YouTube video by The Bulwark Why Populism Is Winning (w/ Francis Fukuyama)

"Conspiracy theories define what it means to be a conservative in America today. It used to be the Reaganite agenda of low taxes, deregulation, individual freedom. But it really is whether you believe in these weird theories that partake of a different reality." www.youtube.com/watch?v=-GDA...