Nicole M. Baran, Ph.D.

Someone has sure already made this observation but the fact they can convert all those empty warehouses into prison camps means they could have converted them into housing, community centers, job training centers or, hell, libraries or schools all along. It’s always a matter of will not resources.

Gender studies courses are shutting down across the US. The Epstein files reveal why | Joan Wallach Scott Texas A&M University is the latest school to end women’s and gender studies programs and teaching race. We know why

Eliminating gender studies courses helps to ensure that universities and other institutions will continue to protect men who benefit from the abuse of women and girls, either directly or through their connections to those who exploit girls and women for profit.

www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

There is No Scientific Justification to Revoke the Endangerment Finding The U.S. EPA's decision to repeal the Endangerment Finding will limit the government's ability to regulate emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act.

As I say here, there is no scientific justification to revoke the engagement finding. In fact, over the last 15+ yrs, the evidence of how climate change affects our health has only grown. Higher risk of allergies, dementia, fertility, heart disease, and death: that’s what’s on the line. @nature.org

James Heckman - Wikipedia

James Heckman, a Nobel Prize winning economist who studied the sources and impact of inequality and segregation on the labor market and is most famous for demonstrating the impact of early childhood education. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_H...

Minnesota still needs your attention

Forbes 250: America’s Greatest Innovators The Forbes Innovator 250: America's Greatest Innovators showcases the visionaries shaping our future. Find the full list of great minds and the mark they are leaving on our history.

Idk I just feel like releasing this on Women and Girls in Science day with the top people being in the Epstein files and only THREE (3) women being in the top FIFTY...is on the nose.

www.forbes.com/sites/alexkn...

Should You Buy a Newspaper or a Yacht? Advice for Jeff Bezos

Devastated to see what’s happening at a place that I loved because it was the writing home of so many people I loved. what a gutting week

Welp, this one made me cry

Anne Frank died of typhus at Bergen-Belsen

ACADEMICS:
If some other academic's ability to think through ethics, morals, or consequences was so poor as to admit association with any old wealthy person, especially when they've already been convicted of heinous crimes

You gotta admit their work may ALSO reflect this lack of intellectual rigor

Epstein’s economic power among academics was made possible by a capitalist system that makes higher education dependent on the charity economy rather than a public good supported by taxing the rich

the things is that evolutionary psychologists et al who promote a biologically essentialist (ie sexist and racist) view of humanity would be wrong and bad on their own terms without them spending all their private time hanging out chatting about torture with their rape daddy billionaire, and yet…

Academics vying for a spot in Epstein‘s world. There are so many. I feel the need to make a thread, so I don’t keep confusing them. 1/

An extraordinary document. Read it.

“Attached to this order is an appendix that identifies 96 court orders that ICE has violated in 74 cases. … ICE has likely violated more court orders in January 2026 than some federal agencies have violated in their entire existence.”

U.S. government has lost more than 10,000 STEM Ph.D.s since Trump took office A Science analysis reveals how many were fired, retired, or quit across 14 agencies

This quantification of loss is staggering. And knowing some of the excellent people that make up these numbers… is heartbreaking
www.science.org/content/arti...

Every social theory undergirding Trumpism has been broken on the steel of Minnesotan resolve. The multiracial community in Minneapolis was supposed to shatter. It did not. It held until Bovino was forced out of the Twin Cities with his long coat between his legs. The secret fear of the morally depraved is that virtue is actually common, and that they’re the ones who are alone. In Minnesota, all of the ideological cornerstones of MAGA have been proved false at once. Minnesotans, not the armed thugs of ICE and the Border Patrol, are brave. Minnesotans have shown that their community is socially cohesive—because of its diversity and not in spite of it. Minnesotans have found and loved one another in a world atomized by social media, where empty men have tried to fill their lonely soul with lies about their own inherent superiority. Minnesotans have preserved everything worthwhile about “Western civilization,” while armed brutes try to tear it down by force.

Last week in Minnesota, I watched ordinary people risk their lives to protect their neighbors. In the process, they not only won a significant—though not final—victory against authoritarianism, they proved virtually every MAGA social theory wrong. (gift link) www.theatlantic.com/ideas/2026/0...

Following the killing of AFGE Member Alex Pretti and the subsequent slanderous rhetoric that followed from top Trump administration officials, AFGE National President Everett Kelley issued the following statement: “Yesterday, AFGE brought together labor and faith leaders from Minneapolis and across the nation to mourn our fallen brother from Local 3669, Alex Pretti. We honored his life and legacy and lifted up his family, his friends, his union, Minneapolis, and our nation in prayer. “Today, we demand accountability. “In the immediate aftermath of Alex’s killing, DHS Secretary Kristi Noem betrayed the public trust by slandering the good name of our union brother and calling him a “domestic terrorist.” Alex Pretti was a patriotic ICU nurse at a VA hospital who devoted his life to serving America’s veterans. That claim was reckless, defamatory, and unsupported by the facts. Noem was preceded in this false statement by Stephen Miller, Deputy White House Chief of Staff, who is also the architect of the chaotic and failed immigration policy in Minnesota. “Our demand is clear: Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, who was responsible for carrying out the policy that led to Alex’s needless killing, and Deputy White House Chief of Staff Stephen Miller, the architect of that policy, must resign immediately. If they refuse, President Trump must dismiss them.

The American Federation of Government Employees, which represents border patrol officers at the National Border Patrol Council, calls on Kristi Noem and Stephen Miller to resign or be fired

if bovino is out and conservatives are turning on noem then there is a real opportunity to demand that miller resign too.

The more I think about it, the more I’m convinced the Democrats have to push their hand immediately. The parallels with the delays and subsequent failures after January 6th are blaring warning signs about what will happen if they don’t go after the issues with ICE and CBP at the root RIGHT NOW.

The people of Minnesota have also:

- Created a visual record of ICE crimes to counter false narratives and aid future prosecutors
- Engaged in well organized mutual aid to meet immediate needs of those most affected

A model for the rest of us.

The people of Minnesota have executed one of the most impressive civil resistance campaigns I can remember:

- Organized a city wide general strike
- Maintained nonviolent discipline amidst violence
- Mobilized 10,000s in subzero temps to protest and watch ICE
- Flipped public opinion against ICE

If you are a scientist funded by NIH and agree that if the HHS/NIH bill is held hostage by linkage for funding to DHS/ICE, we need to shutdown both and save lives, its time to speak up. Right now, with a few exceptions, the silence is deafening

On the weakness of state terror: once ppl internalize the regime's lawless brutality, that they are no safer in their homes than in the streets (& vice versa), and that their unwavering defiance is what confounds & disempowers the regime, they also realize they have nothing to lose but their fear.

Really hard to look at this and all the other examples of bravery and kindness from ordinary people in this moment not think also of the tremendous cowardice exhibited over the past year by some of the richest, most well-protected people in business, media and politics

Opinion | State Terror Has Arrived

The Trump administration “seeks to reduce us all to a state of constant fear — a fear of violence from which some people may at a given moment be spared, but from which no one will ever be truly safe. That is our new national reality. State terror has arrived.” - @mashagessen.bsky.social

www.nytimes.com/2026/01/24/o...

Alex Pretti "used to tell people off when they made sexist comments to female physicians. He bought me coffee when I had a really bad day as an intern...I laughed alongside him daily. He made a point to teach medical residents without judgement, but with a smile on his face and a joke."

One thing that irks me: people keep calling the folks on the streets in Minneapolis protestors. They are not generally there to protest, they are there to observe and document. This is the product of organizing and mutual aid. It is telling that these acts of citizenship are seen as protest!

they're executing moms and nurses in the street. they're using preschoolers as bait. they're stealing people's dads and grandmas and children. they're tear gassing babies. they're staking out schools. there is no remedy but abolition. any proposal that doesn't start there is an act of violence.

Something you almost certainly won’t see in the national news is how many tiny protests are all over the Twin Cities today.

They’re at stoplights. Parks. Bridges. Just everywhere. And people walking by are joining in. The solidarity is so deep.

It’s beautiful and brave. I love this city.