Blake Emerson

“Mussolini’s seizure of power echoes a fascist playbook.”

Amazing how hard it is to write “Trump is an authoritarian.” Despite headline, important analysis: www.nytimes.com/2025/08/03/u...

Behemoth or Leviathan? State and Unstate

Great Hegelian critique from John Ganz (contra Tooze) on endless fascism debate w/r/t the attack on universities.

Muting Sydney Sweeney, American Eagle, genes, and… Margaret Sanger just to be sure.

In better news, I am on the Long Island Railroad and it’s going as well as reasonably could be foreseen.

There are lies, there are damn lies, and then there are statistics, and after that there is fascist buffoonery.

Plus, we may be at an inflection with Trump’s room to maneuver given economic news and public souring on immigration enforcement. So it’s worth trying to force him into retreat on universities at this moment

Yes that’s all true. My thinking is it’s lose-lose, so might as well go with defense of basic constitutional and academic principles

I do think litigation could work and really must be pursued. This funding cut off is illegal in very straightforward procedural sense. A trial type hearing is required before funds can be cut off under Title VI.

And now UCLA -- the USG is marching through the top research universities one by one. And because of the overwhelming power of the USG, the best we can hope for is a not-bad deal. See my analysis here: contrarian.substack.com/p/trumps-reg...

*German-Jewish

My dad’s a Haverford alum, and I grew up playing on the campus. Very fond of the place.

Live footage of the Trump Administration combatting antisemitism.

Live footage of the Trump Administration combatting antisemitism.

“Let’s use the Jews to destroy the American university system” is some real varsity level Jew-hating stuff, for real.

Chancellor Julio Frenk is the child of German refugees who fled to Mexico from Nazi Germany. He has not been shy about addressing bias where it exists.

Meanwhile, using the pretext of antisemitism to take money away from my employer is the most antisemitic thing ever to have affected me personally.

It has been the honor of my life to serve as Commissioner of BLS alongside the many dedicated civil servants tasked with measuring a vast and dynamic economy. It is vital and important work and I thank them for their service to this nation.

Based CBA

An inherent weakness of arbitrary power is that it the discounts benefits of compliance (due to uncertainty) and thus decreases the opportunity costs of resistance.

Contra the unitary executive BS, the problem with the executive branch is too much presidential control, not too little. 29 USC sec. 3

Would be funny if it wasn’t so bleak. Get ready for no more reliable job reports, everyone!

The "Antisemitism" Pretext for the Assault on Political Protest and Academic Freedom Remarks to my administrative law course at UCLA Law, April 1, 2025

Now that Trump has cut off $200 million in UCLA funds, I’m reposting the remarks I gave to my administrative law class last spring. I stand by them.

How Trump’s “Big, Beautiful Bill” Will Make Law School Unaffordable For People Who Are Not Already Rich Sweeping changes to key student loan programs will make it harder for aspiring public interest attorneys to attend law school—and exacerbate this country's justice gap.

At @ballsandstrikes.org, @skennedy2504.bsky.social and Heather Atherton explain How Trump’s “Big, Beautiful Bill” Will Make Law School Unaffordable For People Who Are Not Already Rich.

POV: You did everything possible to ruin the United States’ economic strengths, administrative capacity, constitutional commitments, and global standing.

Scottish Enlightenment

Oh yes. I’m hopefully that Newsom’s adversary position will fortify UC. Will be vocally pissed if they don’t fight

Sure hope so. It’s also definitely unlawful if the rationale is antisemitism, for both procedural and substantive reasons.

Took 7 months of complete chaos and destruction to create any cracks in the economy the Biden Administration created.