Ian Litwin's Avatar

Ian Litwin

@impossible-now.bsky.social

English PhD. Abolition, C19, William Wells Brown, print culture, 1848.

484 Followers  |  2,373 Following  |  74 Posts  |  Joined: 13.11.2024  |  1.7911

Latest posts by impossible-now.bsky.social on Bluesky

HAPPENING NOW: Portland Police Commander Franz Schoening testifies that federal officers on Oct. 18 barraged protesters with crowd control munitions β€” not because of any violence but because another federal officer accidentally shot tear gas onto the roof of the ICE facility.

29.10.2025 18:05 β€” πŸ‘ 16472    πŸ” 6462    πŸ’¬ 378    πŸ“Œ 384

Their response seems to be at odds with recent history. Biden moved to his left in the general election to court progressive voters, and he won.

Harris moved to Biden's right to court anti-Trump conservatives and centrists, and she lost.

Who are these people kidding?

29.10.2025 14:51 β€” πŸ‘ 3    πŸ” 1    πŸ’¬ 1    πŸ“Œ 0
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How New Trump Multiyear Policy Makes NIH Grants Even Harder To Get The new Trump administration multiyear funding policy for NIH grants has dropped National Cancer Institute grant funding rates from one in 10 applicants to one in 25.

How New Trump Multiyear Policy Makes NIH Grants Even Harder To Get

Here’s my coverage in @forbes.com of this

πŸ›Ÿ πŸ§ͺ 😷 #AcademicSky #MedSky #episky🩺 #HiSciSky Public Health #science

www.forbes.com/sites/brucel...

28.10.2025 17:53 β€” πŸ‘ 15    πŸ” 12    πŸ’¬ 0    πŸ“Œ 0

A primary responsibility of a political party is the political education of the electorate. When neoliberal Democratic Party leaders blame the electorate for their own failures by saying voters are too craven or stupid to vote for them, the deficiencies to which they point are of their own making.

27.10.2025 02:16 β€” πŸ‘ 33    πŸ” 8    πŸ’¬ 3    πŸ“Œ 0

When Anthonhy Burns was kidnapped in Boston in 1854 under the auspices of the Fugitive Slave Act, thousands of ordinary white and Black Bostonians responded with outrage like this and stormed the jail in an unsuccessful attempt to free him.

25.10.2025 21:56 β€” πŸ‘ 953    πŸ” 307    πŸ’¬ 14    πŸ“Œ 12

People all over the country need to understand that federal agents are not in Chicago to prevent violence – they're in Chicago to cause violence.

25.10.2025 17:50 β€” πŸ‘ 861    πŸ” 419    πŸ’¬ 26    πŸ“Œ 11
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Despite Illinois Sanctuary Laws, At Least 17 County Sheriffs Have Contracts to Hold People in ICE Custody To ascertain if county jails are complying with the state’s TRUST Act, WTTW News sent Freedom of Information Act requests to each of the 90 county jails in Illinois to obtain copies of intergovernment...

NEW: I found 17 sheriffs in Illinois that have contracts to detain people for ICE through U.S. Marshals Service contracts. IL law explicitly prohibits these types of intergovernmental service agreements. news.wttw.com/2025/10/22/d...

22.10.2025 15:15 β€” πŸ‘ 1717    πŸ” 1058    πŸ’¬ 71    πŸ“Œ 83
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Rubio promised to betray U.S. informants to get Trump’s El Salvador prison deal To secure U.S. access to President Nayib Bukele’s notorious CECOT prison, Rubio agreed to turn over several MS-13 leaders central to a long-running Justice Department investigation.

This story is extraordinary even by 2025 standards. Marco Rubio, the nation's top diplomat, made a deal with Bukele and agreed to renege on informant agreements in a years-long DOJ investigation into MS-13, totally undercutting credibility of such agreements.

www.washingtonpost.com/national-sec...

19.10.2025 14:05 β€” πŸ‘ 4675    πŸ” 2134    πŸ’¬ 110    πŸ“Œ 225
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β€œBrown Sugar Makes the World Go β€˜Round”: A Conversation with Kim F. Hall on The Sweet Taste of Empire | Barnard Center for Research on Women Tomisin Fasosi interviews Kim F. Hall on her new book, The Sweet Taste of Empire

Want a taste of *Sweet Taste of Empire*? See this pre-launch discussion w/ a former student about the book, my relationship to writing and to food -- and why it's not just about the early modern. #booksky #RaceB4Race #ShakeRace #writing #foodhistory #history
bcrw.barnard.edu/brown-sugar-...

06.10.2025 20:50 β€” πŸ‘ 67    πŸ” 32    πŸ’¬ 2    πŸ“Œ 3

conscience is the wound, and there’s naught to staunch it

13.10.2025 18:47 β€” πŸ‘ 158    πŸ” 43    πŸ’¬ 2    πŸ“Œ 3

PLEASE SPREAD THE WORD!!

The University of Texas-Austin is beginning a process to eliminate the Black Studies, Latino Studies, and Gender Studies departments in the College of Liberal Arts. This is a grave threat to the educational liberty of students, faculty, staff, and the people of Texas. 1/

13.10.2025 16:37 β€” πŸ‘ 1368    πŸ” 1055    πŸ’¬ 25    πŸ“Œ 61

Police officers who publicly declare that they’ll quit if a mayoral candidate they dislike wins the election are (1) usually bluffingβ€”sure buddy, toss away that paycheck and pensionβ€”and (2) exactly the sort of cops cities would be better off without, ones who don’t see themselves as public servants.

13.10.2025 12:23 β€” πŸ‘ 10864    πŸ” 2449    πŸ’¬ 228    πŸ“Œ 112

This is exactly what I'm worried about for future elections.

08.10.2025 20:54 β€” πŸ‘ 0    πŸ” 0    πŸ’¬ 0    πŸ“Œ 0
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This South Side Weekly report on the Chicago building raid is well worth reading. Most striking to me are the indications of collusion between federal authorities and the building owner and management to effect a mass eviction at the blighted property. southsideweekly.com/federal-agen...

08.10.2025 12:54 β€” πŸ‘ 1573    πŸ” 848    πŸ’¬ 58    πŸ“Œ 66

ICE is lying. Go figure

07.10.2025 00:13 β€” πŸ‘ 2256    πŸ” 498    πŸ’¬ 72    πŸ“Œ 13
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ICE says I cause assaults on ICE by reciting facts about ICE’s recent shooting but refuses to link to the thread. Only posting a picture. ICE lies and ICE hides. You can read the facts for yourselves

04.10.2025 00:00 β€” πŸ‘ 7062    πŸ” 1862    πŸ’¬ 234    πŸ“Œ 161
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Took about 20 years. And I never thought a book about enslavers using deputization to give themselves policing power would be relevant to our times. But we are where we are.

My book, White Power: Policing American Slavery, is now available for preorder.

a.co/d/29c7EIP

29.09.2025 21:01 β€” πŸ‘ 1118    πŸ” 384    πŸ’¬ 49    πŸ“Œ 14

NYC Mayoral Primary was 95 days ago & the general is in 37 days. And Schumer & Jeffriesβ€”the two Democratic leaders who should be leading by exampleβ€”have still REFUSED to endorse the democratic nominee.

I don’t wanna hear them or any of their supporters utter β€œvote blue no matter who,” ever again.

27.09.2025 17:07 β€” πŸ‘ 804    πŸ” 175    πŸ’¬ 29    πŸ“Œ 10

He's a transphobe and perennially out of his depth. My favorite was when he claimed pediatric gender care was a bad field of medicine because it was "grounded in metaphysics." Then he had to quote Wikipedia to explain metaphysics. Just absolute clown shit.

26.09.2025 02:37 β€” πŸ‘ 3    πŸ” 0    πŸ’¬ 0    πŸ“Œ 0
The Supreme Court devalues democracy. Thirty-seven state
constitutions block public funds from supporting religious
entities. Richard Schragger, Micah Schwartzman & Nelson Tebbe,
Reestablishing Religion, 92 U. Chi. L. Rev. 199, 211 (2025) .
The Court aims to federally-repeal these state constitutional
provisions.
The Court's beliefs meddle with local and state
governments. Forcing states to send public funds to religious
entities federalizes public policy. By unprincipled fiat. See
also New York State Rifle & Pistol Ass'n, Inc. v. Bruen, 597
U.S. 1 (2022) (zero to superpower).
Taxpayer funds now flow to religious institutions. So, the
government collects money from nonbelievers (under the threat of
jail), and uses some of it to support religion. And since not
all religions will receive public funds, the government forces
minority faiths to support other faiths, or else.
The Court twists text, history, purpose, precedent, and
public meaning to offend the First Amendment's character-of-
government structure and the Constitution's separate sovereignty
structure.
As it steamrolls both, the Court says nothing about church-
state separation and federalism principles. The Court's
nevermind stance to the structural features of the Constitution
"has unfolded with little engagement with, and occasional

The Supreme Court devalues democracy. Thirty-seven state constitutions block public funds from supporting religious entities. Richard Schragger, Micah Schwartzman & Nelson Tebbe, Reestablishing Religion, 92 U. Chi. L. Rev. 199, 211 (2025) . The Court aims to federally-repeal these state constitutional provisions. The Court's beliefs meddle with local and state governments. Forcing states to send public funds to religious entities federalizes public policy. By unprincipled fiat. See also New York State Rifle & Pistol Ass'n, Inc. v. Bruen, 597 U.S. 1 (2022) (zero to superpower). Taxpayer funds now flow to religious institutions. So, the government collects money from nonbelievers (under the threat of jail), and uses some of it to support religion. And since not all religions will receive public funds, the government forces minority faiths to support other faiths, or else. The Court twists text, history, purpose, precedent, and public meaning to offend the First Amendment's character-of- government structure and the Constitution's separate sovereignty structure. As it steamrolls both, the Court says nothing about church- state separation and federalism principles. The Court's nevermind stance to the structural features of the Constitution "has unfolded with little engagement with, and occasional

Check out Justice Eddins’ complete repudiation of the Roberts Court here. It’s worth reading in full. It’s quite braveβ€”and exceedingly rareβ€”for a sitting judge to speak so candidly and scathingly about SCOTUS’ partisan contortions of law, history, and fact.
www.courts.state.hi.us/wp-content/u...

20.09.2025 15:35 β€” πŸ‘ 1953    πŸ” 703    πŸ’¬ 41    πŸ“Œ 67

How is this not a joke? The quote sounds like it was written by a "The Atlantic" pitchbot account.

22.09.2025 15:22 β€” πŸ‘ 1    πŸ” 0    πŸ’¬ 0    πŸ“Œ 0
The new TOC from academia dot edu. 

By creating an Account with Academia.edu, you grant us a worldwide, irrevocable, non-exclusive, transferable license, permission, and consent for Academia.edu to use your Member Content and your personal information (including, but not limited to, your name, voice, signature, photograph, likeness, city, institutional affiliations, citations, mentions, publications, and areas of interest) in any manner, including for the purpose of advertising, selling, or soliciting the use or purchase of Academia.edu's Services.

The new TOC from academia dot edu. By creating an Account with Academia.edu, you grant us a worldwide, irrevocable, non-exclusive, transferable license, permission, and consent for Academia.edu to use your Member Content and your personal information (including, but not limited to, your name, voice, signature, photograph, likeness, city, institutional affiliations, citations, mentions, publications, and areas of interest) in any manner, including for the purpose of advertising, selling, or soliciting the use or purchase of Academia.edu's Services.

If you’re on academia dot edu, let me suggest that you strongly consider deleting your account.

17.09.2025 19:09 β€” πŸ‘ 2143    πŸ” 1297    πŸ’¬ 82    πŸ“Œ 204
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DOJ Deletes Study Showing Domestic Terrorists Are Most Often Right Wing Following Charlie Kirk’s assassination and the Trump administration’s promise to go after the β€œradical left” a study showing most domestic terrosim is far-right was disappeared.

The Department of Justice has removed a study showing that white supremacist and far-right violence β€œcontinues to outpace all other types of terrorism and domestic violent extremism” in the United States.

πŸ”— www.404media.co/doj-deletes-...

16.09.2025 16:40 β€” πŸ‘ 10952    πŸ” 6270    πŸ’¬ 349    πŸ“Œ 627

This is a firing offense. Bill Pulte must go.

13.09.2025 00:23 β€” πŸ‘ 2310    πŸ” 669    πŸ’¬ 57    πŸ“Œ 13
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β€˜Radicalized’ Evergreen High School shooter appeared to hold antisemitic, violent views in online accounts Armed with a revolver, the 16-year-old shooter systematically reloaded and fired as he wandered the school, trying to find new targets, police say.

We don't yet have any idea what the ideology of the Kirk shooter was.

But we do know that the Denver school shooter was a far-right white supremacist.

www.denverpost.com/2025/09/11/e...

12.09.2025 01:34 β€” πŸ‘ 8972    πŸ” 3594    πŸ’¬ 132    πŸ“Œ 118
Charlie Kirk Was Not Practicing Politics the Right Way The mainstream media seems entirely uninterested in explaining Charlie Kirk's work.

Charlie Kirk Was Not Practicing Politics the Right Way

πŸ”— www.404media.co/charlie-kirk...

11.09.2025 18:01 β€” πŸ‘ 1512    πŸ” 300    πŸ’¬ 62    πŸ“Œ 16

He joked multiple times about Paul Pelosi getting smashed in the skull with a hammer.

11.09.2025 02:44 β€” πŸ‘ 13528    πŸ” 2931    πŸ’¬ 253    πŸ“Œ 58

@impossible-now is following 20 prominent accounts