Annie Heffernan

Counterpoint: while the language of the ad is pretty damn clear (surprise! it’s eugenics), it’s also occurring alongside the broader normalization of white nationalist and eugenics-adjacent beliefs (consider the popularization of phrases like high/low-iq individual and the return of the r word).

Yep. this also happened with cochlear implants in India, where they put implants in impoverished children without adequate follow-up, long-term support, or access to software updates:

journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...

To be clear: I don’t think we have to teach them ai (at all). I also embed it within a lesson about what ChatGPT is and isn’t (a search engine or reliable source of information). But mostly: I miss being able to assign reading responses. This is more a response to UMs partnership than anything else

The most common evaluation notes the empty blandness of the writing, so it’s not just about fact checking. But they seem to be most convinced to refuse AI by informing them of its environmental impact .

I’ve done this with reading responses in an UG writing class and asked students to grade the output and explain their reasoning. Yes, it’s more work, but given that UM has already partnered with Microsoft and OpenAI with 0 faculty input, it’s all I can do to convince them it’s actually a crap tool

The Mothership Vortex: An Investigation Into the Firm at the Heart of the Democratic Spam Machine How a single consulting firm extracted $282 million from a network of spam PACs while delivering just $11 million to actual campaigns.

The annoying spam texts destroying the Democratic brand:

$678M raised through those spam tactics

$282M to one consulting firm: Mothership Strategies.

$11M to actual campaigns (1.6%)

The party isn’t just treating donors like marks—it’s being fleeced itself yet continues to back Mothership.

cactuscloudsart Today I discovered a woman called "Angie the ICE Chaser" on TikTok and she literally just follows ICE vehicles in her car. They become increasingly erratic in their attempts to lose her (breaking sooo many laws on camera) and they never do. She is single handedly striking terror into ICE agents across LA. She also follows them through neighborhoods honking her horn and shouting "THEY ARE ICE!" out her window. There is a GFM for gas money and the legal fees she is fully expecting to come around.

Hero

This cop gentle parenting Allen Dershowitz is the highlight of my week.

"Come over here for a second, we'll talk"
"We've already covered this"
"step off to the parking lot by that woodshed"

(he's about 2 seconds away from resorting to "ooo, big feelings!")

Virginia Guiffre statement to Maxwell read on the day of her sentencing.

Virginia Guiffre statement to Maxwell read on the day of her sentencing.

This is Virginia Guiffre's statement to Ghislane Maxwell, read by Guiffre's attorney in court the day Maxwell was sentenced.

I had to divide it into 2 parts. Please read each & share.

These are the words of a child rape victim, a victim of the monster Trump now protecting & arranging her freedom.

Cornell University Discriminated Against Me I was excluded from a candidate search on the basis of my race and have filed an EEOC complaint. I’m filing a complaint against Cornell University for racial discrimination. This isn’t a political stu...

(A different version of the WSJ oped)

1. Wright works for the Manhattan Institute. He's not a liberal. Or if he is, it's in the same way that Bari Weiss is a "liberal"
2. Not getting a job is not a "gross injustice." And not getting this particular job did not destroy Wright's career.

Thank you! I’ll post the link when it’s up on first view! (Also: David was an *excellent* guide to the APSR/publishing process, and IMO was crucial to getting this thing published).

aww thank you! That means a lot. This was the first chapter I wrote of the dissertation, and it's become distressingly more relevant as the years pass.

Screen capture of the first bage of an article in American Political Science Review, reading as follows: Title: "They Attend Strictly to Their Own Business": Disability and the Construction of the Worker-Citizen Ann K. Heffernan, University of Michigan, United States Contributing to a growing interest in disability in political science, this article makes the case for the central role of disability in upholding the belief in work as requisite for full citizenship. Turning to the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, it shows how disability and the figure of the disabled worker were used to fortify emergent understandings of work against the changes wrought by industrial capitalism. Focusing on three sites of disabled labor—the school-based workshop, custodial institution, and industrial factory—it reveals the crucial ideological work performed by disability in sustaining the myth of the independent worker-citizen. Where existing scholarship has focused on disability either as an identity category or as a target of rights and policy, this article models an alternative approach, arguing for the relevance of disability as a concept that is integral to, and productive of, the ways we understand citizenship and political belonging.

Coming soon to an open access APSR near you:

(all kidding aside, I'm so happy to see this piece out in the world)

There is absolutely no excuse for any Democrat asked about trans athletes to ever respond with anything but “why are you wasting my time asking about FEWER THAN FIFTEEN CHILDREN AND YOUNG ADULTS IN THE ENTIRE COUNTRY WHO WANT TO PLAY GAMES WITH THEIR FRIENDS. What is wrong with you?”

Late to this, but still have lots of thoughts so let’s go: one like = one point on the political economy of disability and chronic illness. Consider this my belated ADA anniversary offering :)

Illustration of a person curled up and sleeping on overlapping pink and red hands. The Center for Racial & Disability Justice logo is in the top left. Bold headline at top right reads: “FROM CARE TO CONFINEMENT: What ‘Crime & Disorder’ Really Means.” Bottom text: “Trump’s new Executive Order threatens disabled, unhoused, and marginalized communities. Here’s why.”

🚨 Trump’s EO expands civil commitment, guts housing & harm reduction, and ties funding to policing unhoused people. It targets disabled, unsheltered, Black & Brown, LGBTQ+, and multiply marginalized folks. We need housing & support—not punishment & institutionalization. More: crdjustice.org (1/8)

[pterodactyl screech]

I would feel a lot less doom about this if Newsom and others weren’t also trying to do this but using more polite language

(Now is also a great time to revisit Sue Schweik’s The Ugly Laws: Disability in Public)

Close up on an ancient plate featuring a light pink octopus with bright eyes and a smile. The octopus has two arms waving above its head in a friendly manner.

hi

The Democratic party needs fresh faces and fresh voices.

by Rahm Emanuel, James Carville, and David Axelrod

This is phenomenal. “None of the witnesses we deposed disclosed her cookie staycation.”

Thank you. I needed this today

I had the profound privilege of commending Alice Wong, a visionary leader, cultural organizer, and one of the most powerful voices in the disability justice movement.

Through her leadership, writing, & activism she has empowered the voices of individuals with disabilities throughout the nation.

yup. I’d love it if there was some magical thing that trump could do that would cost him his base (or their republican electeds), but I’m 99% sure they’re just going to revise their priors so that pedophilia and sex trafficking is either 1) false, or 2) unimportant.

Yep. I think a lot of people who believe this don’t realize how much federal funding their states receive (and that those buckets of money won’t just “go to the states” once you get rid of FEMA/DoE/etc.)

darth vader: (arm extended dramatically) join the dark side

way too many people, way too willingly: ok

darth vader: (quickly withdrawing arm) jesus christ

Please, i am begging you (“you” being CNN): talk to ONE person from Chicago. Anyone will do, really.

McMahon didn’t—and likely still doesn’t—know what IDEA stands for, and many of the people crowing about returning choice to the states are clueless about education funding works. The Heritage Foundation may have some grand plan, but its enactment depends on a ton of uninformed folks on the ground.

I do think monetary gain and the need for a uneducated workforce plays some role here (I’m as cynical as the next person), but a huge part of it is a profound lack of understanding of what the DoE does and how it works (we’re returning it to the states/giving parents more say/enabling “choice”)

The majority may think: "We're not ruling on the legality of Trump's actions; it's just a stay." Bullshit. With the injunction stayed, Trump and McMahon will be able to effectuate their evisceration of the Department of Education and it will be impossible to put Humpty Dumpty back together.

Oh my GAWD (laudatory). You are an artiste (I knew this, but still).