Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

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Anna Megill @annamegill.com · 7h

Pupdate from DC: sleepy potato

A pudgy white French bulldog sleeps all curled up on a brown leather couch with his head resting on a pillow. He's sleeping pretty hard.

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BeijingPalmer @beijingpalmer.bsky.social · 7h

Dune is a badly written novel but it’s very exciting if you read it at the right age for the ideas to captivate you enough that your brain can compensate for the prose.

Rachel Feder @rachelfeder.bsky.social · 20h

Tell me your most unhinged literary opinion, as a little treat

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Jesse Mermell @jessemermell.bsky.social · 1d

He is 13. A 7th grader w/ a pending asylum case. Being held more than 500 miles from home & housed w/ adults. He called his mom crying, & reported that he’s sleeping on concrete w/ an aluminum blanket.

How is this anything other than sick & shameful? www.bostonglobe.com/2025/10/12/m...

Everett 13-year-old arrested by ICE and sent to Virginia detention facility - The Boston Globe

The boy’s mother, Josiele Berto, was called to pick her son up from the Everett Police Department on Thursday, the day he was arrested.

www.bostonglobe.com

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Victor Ray @victorerikray.bsky.social · 15h

Between this, the resegregation of the military, and the retooling of the Department of Justice to focus on (fake) discrimination against white Christians, and eviscerating Civil Rights Act enforcement, they have nearly erased the structural legacy of the Civil Rights Movement.

Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.bsky.social · 15h

Wednesday is gonna be a rough day:

The Supreme Court will be hearing oral argument in a pair of cases that threaten what little remains of the federal government’s ability to protect voters from racial gerrymandering under the Voting Rights Act

ballsandstrikes.org/scotus/louis...

Louisiana v Callais: The Republicans Justices Are Getting Ready to Finish Off the Voting Rights Act

In Louisiana v Callais, John Roberts will have the chance to finish his decades-long war on. voting rights.

ballsandstrikes.org

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Wiseowl374 @wiseowl374.bsky.social · 9h

Mariners just dogwalking the Jays rn

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Gregory Pratt @royalpratt.bsky.social · 14h

Here’s the story a Latina US citizen told me about being surrounded by masked agents who demanded her papers and, when they got them, told her she “doesn’t look like” a Greeley. www.chicagotribune.com/2025/10/13/i...

ICE tickets Chicago man with legal residency $130 for not having his papers on him: ‘It’s not fair…I’m a resident’

Under federal law, registered foreign nationals must carry proof of registration with them at all times. But prior to a second Trump administration, it was rarely enforced.

www.chicagotribune.com

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Reconstructionist @unavaleable.bsky.social · 10h

of those three, the one that was most likely pivotal for the 230,000 votes that decided the EC is RFK, which is a nightmare

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Reconstructionist @unavaleable.bsky.social · 10h

the failure to speedily prosecute trump, the failure to pass more norms codification bills other than ECRA, the decision to keep the WTO dead, the skin-deep internationalism all major failures even if they were the product of forces partially outside the control of the admin (wrt congress)

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Senator Chris Van Hollen @vanhollen.senate.gov · 11h

These are the same kind of weasels who would’ve called George Washington & America’s revolutionaries “terrorists.” They spend their days sucking up to King Trump & demonizing peaceful protest just as some in America sought to appease King George III.

Looking forward to No Kings Day.

Johnson describes planned No Kings rally as ‘hate America,’ ‘pro-Hamas’ gathering

Organizers largely blew off the rhetoric, but some Democrats online criticized the tone.

www.politico.com

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"Online Rent-a-Sage" Bret Devereaux @bretdevereaux.bsky.social · 1d

But when it comes to it, if it comes to it, in that awful moment of decision, yes, you will want the old grandmas and grandpas at the front, as many of them as you can get, so those terribly young fellows with the rifles understand what a wicked, awful thing is being asked of them.

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"Online Rent-a-Sage" Bret Devereaux @bretdevereaux.bsky.social · 1d

And if that happens, the fate of the republic may well end up resting on the decisions in the moment of some second lieutenant and his gaggle of tired, somewhat confused young - most of them will be terribly young - soldiers.

Do they attack, do they beat down or shoot that grandma?

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"Online Rent-a-Sage" Bret Devereaux @bretdevereaux.bsky.social · 1d

This is correct, in part - as the grim, military historian in me feels the need to note - it is psychologically much harder to get soldiers to open fire on people they view as 'respectable.'

And I dread, with grim increasingly certainty, that we are headed to a point where that matters.

WhatSaraSaid @whatsarasaid.bsky.social · 1d

protests against this government should include white Boomer grandmothers who meet for pilates class, get a pitcher of mimosas & walk together to the public space

we need people in the street who think everyone can talk their way out of a speeding ticket, they're key to winning

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WhatSaraSaid @whatsarasaid.bsky.social · 1d

protests against this government should include white Boomer grandmothers who meet for pilates class, get a pitcher of mimosas & walk together to the public space

we need people in the street who think everyone can talk their way out of a speeding ticket, they're key to winning

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Asawin Suebsaeng @swin24.bsky.social · 12h

I get the sense that a staggeringly high percentage of guys who earnestly say with some regularity “fuck around and find out” simply do not understand that the real life versions of the street or bar fight they are picturing typically last a few seconds, don’t have defined winners, and look stupid

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Adam Serwer @adamserwer.bsky.social · 1d

?????

Orange creamsicle kitty Eggsy and tortie kitten jimmi pickles making eye contact

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Rachel Maddow @maddow.msnbc.com · 14h

"After the warning, neighbors showed up and formed a human chain outside the church to guide parishioners home. NBC Chicago found more organizers doing the same for the beginning of the 6 p.m. mass..."

www.nbcchicago.com/news/local/c...

Chicago priest urges parishioners to leave mass with caution after ICE agents reported nearby

Chicago's Rogers Park community remained vigilant after reports of federal agents near a Catholic church during Sunday mass.

www.nbcchicago.com

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Nicholas Grossman @nicholasgrossman.bsky.social · 14h

When Mike Johnson or another national leader repeatedly claims they haven’t seen relevant things in the news, an appropriate reporter reaction would be “Holy cow, how do you not know?!? How can you do your job without knowing what’s happening? What are you doing to fix your ‘not knowing’ problem?”

BeijingPalmer @beijingpalmer.bsky.social · 16h

I don't understand why U.S. reporters so regularly seem to let politicians get away with 'I haven't seen that' about stuff a) they obviously know and b) is directly relevant to their job. Did they sign some kind of agreement never to ask a follow-up question?

Aaron Rupar @atrupar.com · 18h

REPORTER: We know the president moved forward with mass layoffs. We're also learning there were significant cuts to staff at special education services. Are you comfortable with those cuts?

MIKE JOHNSON: I haven't seen the specifics of that and I don't know

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Rachel Maddow @maddow.msnbc.com · 16h

oh. right.

www.washingtonpost.com/investigatio...

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Wiseowl374 @wiseowl374.bsky.social · 12h

As I told my R father who was whining about simply seeing anti-trump people in FL. “WE want protestors instead of pitchforks.”

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GHOULLIKEHELLMACHINE @golikehellmachine.com · 12h

every asshole on this website loudly braying that elections either won’t happen or won’t be fair in 2026 had better be buying an inflatable costume and sturdy walking shoes for this saturday, because if truly believe that, you’re not gonna like what the next step is

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Aaron Reichlin-Melnick @reichlinmelnick.bsky.social · 13h

I posted about this on X, and Tricia McLaughlin, the DHS spokesperson, QTed me to say the kid was actually a hardened criminal arrested with a knife and a gun.

So far she has provided no evidence of this. I share this to give DHS's response, and for the possibility she is telling the truth.

My original post on X: "This makes NO SENSE. A 13-year-old was arrested by local police for unknown reasons, and then turned over to ICE, which is detaining him far away from his mother — who is going through immigration court, has an asylum application on file, and is legally authorized to work." Underneath that I posted a link to the opening paragraphs of the article and the headline.

In response, DHS Spokeswoman Tricia McLaughlin, @TriciaOhio, wrote: "Here are the facts: he posed a public safety threat with an extensive rap sheet including violent assault with a dangerous weapon, battery, breaking and entering, destruction of property. He was in possession of a firearm and 5-7 inch knife when arrested."

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Wiseowl374 @wiseowl374.bsky.social · 12h

Finally took one of those GenAI programs for a spin and while I can see why the easily-amused cheapskate might prefer endlessly tweaking keywords and burning up data centers, I’ll stick to commissioning real artists, you can tell the intent & spark of true art is absent in the AI slop.

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George Gantsoudes @pedsortho.bsky.social · 20h

Please remember that the disgust people have over Christopher Columbus is not based on some modern, 21st century “woke” ideology, but rather on contemporaneous accounts of atrocities that make many modern genocides appear quaint in comparison.

Below, are the accounts of Bartlomé de las Casas.

But too many of the slaves died in captivity. And so Columbus, desperate to pay back dividends to those who had in-vested, had to make good his promise to fill the ships with gold. In the province of Cicao on Haiti, where he and his men imagined huge gold fields to exist, they ordered all persons fourteen years or older to collect a certain quantity of gold every three months. When they brought it, they were given copper tokens to hang around their necks. Indians found without a copper token had their hands cut off and bled to death.
The Indians had been given an impossible task. The only gold around was bits of dust garnered from the streams. So they fled, were hunted down with dogs, and were killed.

After each six or eight months' work in the mines, which was the time required of each crew to dig enough gold for melting, up to a third of the men died.
While the men were sent many miles away to the mines, the wives remained to work the soil, forced into the excruciating job of digging and making thousands of hills for cassava plants.
Thus husbands and wives were together only once every eight or ten months and when they met they were so exhausted and depressed on both sides... they ceased to pro-create. As for the newly born, they died early because their mothers, overworked and fam-ished, had no milk to nurse them, and for this reason, while I was in Cuba, 7000 children died in three months. Some mothers even drowned their babies from sheer desper-ation.... In this way, husbands died in the mines, wives died at work, and children died from lack of milk ... and in a short time this land which was so great, so powerful and fer-tile... was depopulated... My eyes have seen these acts so foreign to human nature, and now I tremble as I write....

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Jules Sherred (he/him) @geekyjules.julessherred.com · 16h

Boo hoo. Poor American businesses are being hurt exactly as intended. Instead of crying at Canadians and describing our feelings as "bruised," maybe talk to your politicians who caused this. Boo hoo

www.cnn.com/2025/10/13/b...

CNN headline: Canada's boycott America movement is hurting innocent bystanders

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Peter @notalawyer.bsky.social · 1d

the actual story here, which the media never talks about, is that police in this country have become a discrete right-wing political operation. the story isn't about cops leaving (they're lying about that), it's about the police trying to exert influence over elections.

Mark Misoshnik 🏴 @misoshnik.bsky.social · 2d

Lmao is this supposed to be a bad thing?

A tweet from Bari Weiss that says “"It's shaken me to my core," a lieutenant said of Mamdani's unexpected victory in June. "The absolute dread I feel is palpable.
"
Today in @TheFP our @Olivia_Reingold talks to the cops who say they will walk if Zohran Mamdani is elected in November:”

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