DrLostCauses
@acpacek.bsky.social
Academic studying political causes/consequences of well-being. Fan of the interesting and important. Despairing Boston sports and happy Liverpool fan.
Views and opinions are my own, not my employer’s or my state’s. I speak as a private citizen.
Views and opinions are my own, not my employer’s or my state’s. I speak as a private citizen.
Pinned
DrLostCauses
@acpacek.bsky.social
· Oct 28
I’ll echo what many others have said here: if you can, please please please donate to your local food bank. We’ve all seen the headlines. Things are about to get brutal…real bad for a lot of people. Yes in your community. Please save “They voted for this” for later.
Here’s to good luck in 2026. A lot of us could sure use it.
January 1, 2026 at 11:30 PM
Here’s to good luck in 2026. A lot of us could sure use it.
I measure the years in deaths. In 2024, 12 people in my life. In 2025, 1.
Strange metric I know but it is what it is.
Strange metric I know but it is what it is.
January 1, 2026 at 12:25 AM
I measure the years in deaths. In 2024, 12 people in my life. In 2025, 1.
Strange metric I know but it is what it is.
Strange metric I know but it is what it is.
Reposted by DrLostCauses
🚨 We’re hiring an Assistant Professor in Political Science
⏰ Deadline 4th January 2026
🙋♀️ Any questions, please reach out
👇
⏰ Deadline 4th January 2026
🙋♀️ Any questions, please reach out
👇
🚨 LSE Assistant Professor in Political Science 🚨
We’re hiring a tenure-track assistant professor - any area of empirical political science - to join our wonderful Government Dept @lsegovernment.bsky.social
Any questions, please reach out to me
📣 Please share! 📣
jobs.lse.ac.uk/Vacancies/W/...
We’re hiring a tenure-track assistant professor - any area of empirical political science - to join our wonderful Government Dept @lsegovernment.bsky.social
Any questions, please reach out to me
📣 Please share! 📣
jobs.lse.ac.uk/Vacancies/W/...
December 30, 2025 at 8:16 AM
🚨 We’re hiring an Assistant Professor in Political Science
⏰ Deadline 4th January 2026
🙋♀️ Any questions, please reach out
👇
⏰ Deadline 4th January 2026
🙋♀️ Any questions, please reach out
👇
Reposted by DrLostCauses
A cross-national analysis finds that as governments become more populist, academic freedom declines
doi.org/10.1017/S153...
doi.org/10.1017/S153...
December 30, 2025 at 2:02 AM
A cross-national analysis finds that as governments become more populist, academic freedom declines
doi.org/10.1017/S153...
doi.org/10.1017/S153...
Reposted by DrLostCauses
Post-doc positions:
"Academic freedom is under pressure today. This requires rescue havens of free research. ... [we] invite early career researchers, whose work is restricted due to political pressure in the USA..."
uni-freiburg.de/frias/call-f...
"Academic freedom is under pressure today. This requires rescue havens of free research. ... [we] invite early career researchers, whose work is restricted due to political pressure in the USA..."
uni-freiburg.de/frias/call-f...
Call for Applications: Early Career Rescue Fellowship – Freiburg Institute for Advanced Studies
uni-freiburg.de
December 19, 2025 at 5:14 PM
Post-doc positions:
"Academic freedom is under pressure today. This requires rescue havens of free research. ... [we] invite early career researchers, whose work is restricted due to political pressure in the USA..."
uni-freiburg.de/frias/call-f...
"Academic freedom is under pressure today. This requires rescue havens of free research. ... [we] invite early career researchers, whose work is restricted due to political pressure in the USA..."
uni-freiburg.de/frias/call-f...
I have spent my share of Christmases alone, most recently 2024, 2023. It’s a very mixed, roller coaster time, highs and lows. It’s just…different.
Happy holidays to everyone who's in solitude today. You get to decide what this post-solstice 24 hours is like! You could mourn or reflect, give gratitude or binge-watch, join your chosen family or cozy up with your animals. You may not be surrounded by people, but a lot of us are in the same place.
December 25, 2025 at 5:56 PM
I have spent my share of Christmases alone, most recently 2024, 2023. It’s a very mixed, roller coaster time, highs and lows. It’s just…different.
Reposted by DrLostCauses
Happy holidays to everyone who's in solitude today. You get to decide what this post-solstice 24 hours is like! You could mourn or reflect, give gratitude or binge-watch, join your chosen family or cozy up with your animals. You may not be surrounded by people, but a lot of us are in the same place.
December 25, 2025 at 1:17 PM
Happy holidays to everyone who's in solitude today. You get to decide what this post-solstice 24 hours is like! You could mourn or reflect, give gratitude or binge-watch, join your chosen family or cozy up with your animals. You may not be surrounded by people, but a lot of us are in the same place.
Pouring one out for anyone who’s read any military history and understands why countries stopped building battleships after WW2.
December 22, 2025 at 10:27 PM
Pouring one out for anyone who’s read any military history and understands why countries stopped building battleships after WW2.
Apropo of nothing that might have happened in mainstream media, please support independent media. It really is the last best hope for now, as mainstream media continues to voluntarily implode and self-destruct.
December 22, 2025 at 3:26 AM
Apropo of nothing that might have happened in mainstream media, please support independent media. It really is the last best hope for now, as mainstream media continues to voluntarily implode and self-destruct.
The great Thomas Downey’s oyster pan roast. Hope I’m doing it right.
December 21, 2025 at 11:46 PM
The great Thomas Downey’s oyster pan roast. Hope I’m doing it right.
R.I.P. James Ransone. For many folks this is very much not the happiest time of the year. Check on your people and stay safe.
December 21, 2025 at 10:40 PM
R.I.P. James Ransone. For many folks this is very much not the happiest time of the year. Check on your people and stay safe.
I’ve reached a point in my long time on this rock that very few things surprise me. But encountering people who’ve never experienced death remains near or at the top of the list. What a world to inhabit.
December 21, 2025 at 3:43 AM
I’ve reached a point in my long time on this rock that very few things surprise me. But encountering people who’ve never experienced death remains near or at the top of the list. What a world to inhabit.
Doing a potato pancake thing of sorts with the ever present and ubiquitous East European seasoning blend. Almost very happy with the results but not quite.
December 20, 2025 at 4:13 AM
Doing a potato pancake thing of sorts with the ever present and ubiquitous East European seasoning blend. Almost very happy with the results but not quite.
Reposted by DrLostCauses
Out of 102 episodes globally in which a trend toward autocracy was reversed over the past century, the vast majority led to restored or even increased levels of democracy.
doi.org/10.1080/1351...
doi.org/10.1080/1351...
December 18, 2025 at 8:28 PM
Out of 102 episodes globally in which a trend toward autocracy was reversed over the past century, the vast majority led to restored or even increased levels of democracy.
doi.org/10.1080/1351...
doi.org/10.1080/1351...
For the surviving children, workshops, mines etc. The New 1820s are gonna be lit af
BREAKING: RFKJr directs that the US instantly stop recommending all vaccinations for children. www.washingtonpost.com/health/2025/...
Under RFK Jr., U.S. plans to stop recommending most vaccines, defer to doctors
The plan, which is not finalized, suggests children get fewer shots and shifts to a model telling parents to consult doctors to make their own vaccine choices.
www.washingtonpost.com
December 20, 2025 at 12:51 AM
For the surviving children, workshops, mines etc. The New 1820s are gonna be lit af
Gutted to learn of a former PhD student’s sudden passing. Taught at U WI-Milwaukee.
Keep the good ones close.
Keep the good ones close.
December 20, 2025 at 12:33 AM
Gutted to learn of a former PhD student’s sudden passing. Taught at U WI-Milwaukee.
Keep the good ones close.
Keep the good ones close.
Finally getting to Fallout S2 and forgot how much I loved Leslie Uggams.
December 19, 2025 at 3:05 AM
Finally getting to Fallout S2 and forgot how much I loved Leslie Uggams.
New Gilded Age-ish.
Trump has announced his ballroom will now cost $400 million.
This comes as Americans' health care premiums are set to skyrocket in the coming weeks.
This comes as Americans' health care premiums are set to skyrocket in the coming weeks.
December 17, 2025 at 5:49 PM
New Gilded Age-ish.
We are in so much late Brezhnev territory right now that it’s grotesque how close the analogies hit despite all the wildly different contexts.
December 17, 2025 at 2:36 AM
We are in so much late Brezhnev territory right now that it’s grotesque how close the analogies hit despite all the wildly different contexts.
For virtually all my career I had a co-author who also happened to be my closest friend. A year after his passing got the first R&R on a paper without his name on it. All sorts of mixed emotions here.
Keep the good ones in your life close and never take them for granted.
Keep the good ones in your life close and never take them for granted.
December 17, 2025 at 1:13 AM
For virtually all my career I had a co-author who also happened to be my closest friend. A year after his passing got the first R&R on a paper without his name on it. All sorts of mixed emotions here.
Keep the good ones in your life close and never take them for granted.
Keep the good ones in your life close and never take them for granted.
Twilight Zone’s “Night of the Meek” is still very above average holiday viewing. It’s hokey of course. But Art Carney’s dept store speech…
December 16, 2025 at 4:37 AM
Twilight Zone’s “Night of the Meek” is still very above average holiday viewing. It’s hokey of course. But Art Carney’s dept store speech…
R.I.P. Joe Ely. Texas’s musicians are the mirror opposite of its politicians: gifts to the world instead of…something else.
December 16, 2025 at 2:43 AM
R.I.P. Joe Ely. Texas’s musicians are the mirror opposite of its politicians: gifts to the world instead of…something else.
The comments in this thread are interesting. I’m reminded of the demonstrations against Milosevic in Serbia. Yes many of the demonstrators were from various segments of the “Right.”
Opposition coalitions can be strange and sadly unstable and conflictual.
Opposition coalitions can be strange and sadly unstable and conflictual.
Hungary: “Resign! Resign!”, citizens crowds chant outside Viktor Orbán’s and president’s offices in Budapest. 🇪🇺🇭🇺
December 16, 2025 at 12:41 AM
The comments in this thread are interesting. I’m reminded of the demonstrations against Milosevic in Serbia. Yes many of the demonstrators were from various segments of the “Right.”
Opposition coalitions can be strange and sadly unstable and conflictual.
Opposition coalitions can be strange and sadly unstable and conflictual.
More and more people are questioning the president's troubling cognitive state. This isn't likely to change.
Two prominent Republicans on Capitol Hill called out the president for his sick post about the murder of a beloved director.
Even MAGA Can't Stomach Trump's Vile Rob Reiner Post
Two prominent Republicans on Capitol Hill called out the president for his sick post about the murder of a beloved director.
www.huffpost.com
December 15, 2025 at 5:30 PM
More and more people are questioning the president's troubling cognitive state. This isn't likely to change.