The Power of Making Connection Musings from a routine day in a criminal courtroom

The Power of Making Connection
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Cameron Combs (@cameroncombs2) Stanley Hauerwas for no reason.

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Stephen Miller Implies He Intended for Trump's Nutjobs to Kill Democrats - emptywheel Stephen Miller just confessed on Fox News that when he uses dehumanizing language -- when he calls Democrats "fascists" or "Marxists" or "radical" -- he intends it as a message to "all the crazies and...

Stephen Miller Implies He Intended for Trump’s Nutjobs to Kill Democrats www.emptywheel.net/2025/10/02/s...

Mainstream Press Confesses They Missed the Other Politicized Prosecutions - emptywheel Watching the mainstream press, you'd think it was the first time that an investigation ordered up by Donald Trump resulted in a flimsy false statements charge just before the statute of limitations ex...

Mainstream Press Confesses They Missed the Other Politicized Prosecutions www.emptywheel.net/2025/09/26/m...

A deeply depraved portrait of hubris.

Ten Years Ago I Warned Republicans Had Few Means of Limiting the Damage Trump Would Do - emptywheel Ten years ago today, I observed that Republicans had "few means of controlling [Donald Trump] and even fewer to limit any damage he might do if provoked." In those ten years he set out to -- and made ...

Ten Years Ago I Warned Republicans Had Few Means of Limiting the Damage Trump Would Do www.emptywheel.net/2025/07/30/t...

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2) Three quarters of Republicans (77%) and white evangelicals (74%) favor installing deterrents such as walls, floating barriers in rivers, and razor wire to prevent immigrants from entering the country illegally, even if they endanger or kill some people.
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New PRRI Poll: Six in Ten Americans Oppose Exporting Undocumented Immigrants to Foreign Prisons Without Due Process Under the Trump administration, immigration enforcement has taken an unprecedented turn as immigrants, including asylum seekers and individuals with legal protections, are now being transferred to…

BREAKING @prri.org poll.
My disturbing take: It’s virtually impossible to write a survey question about the treatment of immigrants that is too brutal for Republicans to support.
1) 8 in 10 Republicans support renditions of immigrants to foreign prisons without due process.
prri.org/spotlight/ne...

The Spiritual Formation of Vance Boelter Not all spirits are good.

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Aaron Rupar @atrupar.com • 1h Trump to UAE president: "We have a term 'groceries.' It's an old term but it means basically what you're buying, food, it's a pretty accurate term but it's an old fashioned sound but groceries are down." ABU DHABI, UAE BREAKING NEWS HEWS ONAL: TRUMP SPEAKS AT BILATERAL MEETING W/UAE PRES That meansobeing gre most 48. 1 20 268

Hey Siri,
Show me cognitive impairment

Democracy at a Crossroads Trump's First 100 Days

It’s been a tumultuous first 100 days, to say the least. What do white evangelicals make of all this?
To no one’s surprise, 3 in 4 white evangelicals (76%) approve of the job Trump is doing as president.
This is exactly what they voted for.

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The Trump Administration’s War on Children The administration is quietly putting America’s children at risk by cutting funds and manpower for investigating child abuse, enforcing child support payments, providing child care and much more.

The staff of a program that helps millions of poor families keep the electricity on, in part so babies don’t die from extreme heat or cold, have all been fired.

The office overseeing the enforcement of child support payments nationally has been hollowed out.

Good Friday Now The cross of imperial violence

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Sweet Auburn: The Black Churches Reflections from a journey of pilgrimage

Sweet Auburn: The Black Churches
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Photo of Senator Chris Van Hollen with Kilmar Abrego Garcia.

I said my main goal of this trip was to meet with Kilmar. Tonight I had that chance. I have called his wife, Jennifer, to pass along his message of love. I look forward to providing a full update upon my return.

Undocumented immigrants paid an effective federal income tax rate of 5.27% in 2022.

That means they paid a higher effective tax rate than 5 of the richest Americans…and a higher effective tax rate than 55 mega corporations.

So let me ask you: who are the real freeloaders?

this exactly. there’s precedent! Republicans do this shit all the time and they get rewarded by their voters for it, even when it doesn’t produce results, because they’re fighting. We need fighters on our side.

This, this, this. More work like this. For higher ed, for journalism, for entertainment, every area. Documentation.

Today, thousands of openly-transgender service members will put on their uniform and do what needs to be done because they honor their oath to our country, while Pete Hegseth denigrates their service and violates his oath by brazenly sharing classified intel in text groups.

Just a reminder.

Seven Reasons Trump's Entire National Security Team Should Resign in Disgrace - emptywheel It's not just that Mike Waltz accidentally added the wrong person to a Signal chat, the cover story Trump has adopted. Trump's entire national security team was witness to an egregious breach that mig...

Seven Reasons Trump’s Entire National Security Team Should Resign in Disgrace www.emptywheel.net/2025/03/25/s...

Screenshot from Trump’s Truth Social post of a (AI generated?) picture of a towering golden statue of himself in the middle of a main street. It’s taller than the palm trees lining the street.

Me: Nothing can ever be so utterly terrifying & yet totally hilarious in its sheer clownish bafoonery.

DJT: Hold my M@G@ hat.

He’s really going full Nebuchadnezzar in the most spot on cartoonishly cringe way possible & these “Bible believing evangelicals” gladly bend the knee. Embarrassing.

Cable news keeps saying no German far right party hasn’t been this strong “since the Second World War.” Gosh, I wonder if there are any historians who could tell us who ran Germany then?

YouTube video by malacomg The Mississippi Mass Choir - Lord We Thank You

Have to rest my mind and spirit this morning. So I reached for home in the form of the Mississippi Mass Choir. m.youtube.com/watch?v=Jf7s...

NO KINGS is extremely effective because it’s simple, an extremely widely held belief, and gets right to the core of Trump’s assault without having to use words lots of people don’t understand

Crowd boos during singing of U.S. national anthem at Senators game Watch as fans begin to boo during the singing of the U.S. national anthem at a Senators game.

Annoying that it took these tariffs to generate boos, rather than you know… {gestures at all the beastly hegemonic crap the USA has been about for generations}

youtube.com/watch?v=OkV7... A beautiful lullaby from a Bach cantata written for the Feast of the Presentation (tomorrow)

they r also thereby condemning Moses, Nathan, Micah, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Uriah, Daniel, John the Immerser, etc. Any gov official who doesn't "plead the cause of the afflicted & needy” doesn't “know YHWH” & will be "cast down from their seat of power” (Jer 22:16; 9:24; Luke 1:52–53; Ps 72:1–4, 12–13).

You know someone has only ever read a handful of out-of-context scriptures is when they condemn Bishop Budde for confronting a governing official, as if “getting political” in that way is transparently inappropriate. If they actually read this Bible they claim is divinely inspired, they'd realize+

Pete Hegseth's America Welcome!

We’re all living in Pete Hegseth’s America now. Here’s what that looks like:
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