Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

LightNews

Jack Crosbie

@jscros.bsky.social

3.6K followers 150 following 110 posts

contributing writer at rolling stone

Posts Media Videos Starter Packs

Jack Crosbie @jscros.bsky.social · 2d

For Slate, I spent two days in New York's bizarre, dystopian immigration courts, getting a first hand look at the processes of Donald Trump's brutal new immigration system, and trying to focus on the human experience of being caught in it. slate.com/news-and-pol...

It’s the Place for Immigrants Who Do Things “the Right Way.” ICE Has Turned It Into Hell.

Immigrants come to court-mandated appointments in search of citizenship. They find masked, armed agents instead.

Jack Crosbie @jscros.bsky.social · Aug 14

Me before putting on a plate carrier for the first time: wow i hope i get to wear the cool bulletproof vest!!!
me after 10 minutes wearing plates in the summer: if i ever have to do this again i will just shoot myself and get it over with

Jack Crosbie @jscros.bsky.social · May 8

wow i'd forgotten about this too but it holds up, i think, thanks for remembering

Jack Crosbie @jscros.bsky.social · Apr 28

probably a good thing, folks are very upset with the headline. but really appreciate your insight!

Jack Crosbie @jscros.bsky.social · Apr 27

Back in January, I did leg day with Hasan Piker for the NYT, hoping to figure out what it means to be a left-wing man in a red-pilled world. www.nytimes.com/2025/04/27/s...

Hasan Piker: A Progressive Mind in a MAGA Body (Gift Article)

Hasan Piker pumps iron, likes weapons and wears pearls. His brand of masculinity has won him many fans online — and has been a useful vehicle for his politics.

www.nytimes.com

Jack Crosbie @jscros.bsky.social · Apr 21

For the Times, I wrote about the consultant class's quest to make Democratic politics cool again -- and whether or not it's too little too late. www.nytimes.com/2025/04/21/s...

What Is ‘Dark Woke’: How Some Democrats Push Back Against Trump

Democrats are trying out a new attitude. It’s provocative, edgy and perilously toeing the line of not being too offensive.

www.nytimes.com

Jack Crosbie @jscros.bsky.social · Apr 14

one of the biggest life changes that i've made in 2025 is that i have one of those little tech deck finger boards on my desk and after a lot of practice i can actually ollie over my cellphone about half the time

Jack Crosbie @jscros.bsky.social · Mar 21

Activists told me directly that these tactics were already in play during campus protests last year. Now it's clear they're going federal -- and they're going to pop up wherever the Trump administration sees dissent. newrepublic.com/article/1908...

Jack Crosbie @jscros.bsky.social · Mar 21

The charges often aren't meant to stick -- just sit in the system, going through the endless wheels of bureaucracy. Meanwhile, the defendants are out on bail, but their ability to organize is crippled. Others are deterred from participation by the possibility of catching a felony charge

Jack Crosbie @jscros.bsky.social · Mar 21

The playbook was simple: Hit a protest, snatch up everyone you can. Book them all into jail on felony domestic terrorism charges, even if they were simply walking in the street with a sign. When they get bailed out, slap them with conditions that mean their entire social life is destroyed

Jack Crosbie @jscros.bsky.social · Mar 21

One thing that I saw often in Atlanta was the use of specific and extremely harsh bail conditions for defendants who were released from custody. Activists were barred, sometimes, from any communication or association with other members of a movement -- oftentimes people who were even their roommates

Jack Crosbie @jscros.bsky.social · Mar 21

What we saw in Atlanta and can expect to see going forward: heavy use of the "domestic terrorism" charge, which varies widely state by state and federally. For non-citizens, we're seeing this coupled with visa or green card revocations. For citizens it's a bit different: (cont)

Jack Crosbie @jscros.bsky.social · Mar 21

There are already clear parallels to what the Trump administration is doing to protesters like Mahmoud Khalil and what they did to activists in the stop cop city movement: indefinite pretrial detentions, overlapping sets of charges that aren't meant to stick, confused jurisdiction issues.

Jack Crosbie @jscros.bsky.social · Mar 21

Last month, for @newrepublic.com, I wrote about the Trump administration's coming war on the First Amendment -- a prediction based on the experiences of protesters in Georgia's Stop Cop City movement, which is looking more and more like a dire sign of things to come: newrepublic.com/article/1908...

The Coming War on Dissent

As critics focus on Trump’s attacks on the media, his administration is preparing a larger assault on the First Amendment.

newrepublic.com

Jack Crosbie @jscros.bsky.social · Mar 19

blogged about my alma mater and the price of an education www.discourseblog.com/p/columbia-u...

Columbia University Sold its Soul for $400 Million

The integrity of one of the country's most famous institutions has a clear price tag.

www.discourseblog.com

Jack Crosbie @jscros.bsky.social · Mar 17

Conor McGregor at the White House is kind of an odd choice, as he's been heavily out of favor both w/ the UFC and w/ UFC fans for years now. Dumbest possible denominator probably still thinks he's cool but general consensus about him is that he's a washed-up clown who likes coke more than fighting

Reposted by Jack Crosbie

Matt Werner @werner1.bsky.social · Mar 14

What a paragraph by @jscros.bsky.social .
“Empire of Blood” in @rollingstone.com

Jack Crosbie @jscros.bsky.social · Mar 14

For @rollingstone.com, some scenes from the protest movement inside Columbia's campus this week, as the university administration sides wholeheartedly with both the Trump administration and Zionist groups on campus. www.rollingstone.com/politics/pol...

At Columbia University, Protesters Risk Everything as Free Speech is Shut Down

After Trump’s arrest of Mahmoud Khalil, fear and defiance mix at Columbia University in New York

www.rollingstone.com

Reposted by Jack Crosbie

Evan Hill @evanhill.bsky.social · Mar 9

Schlock and Awe returns with a new ep as @jscros.bsky.social and I are joined by @inthesedeserts.bsky.social to discuss Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk, Ang Lee's weird and uncanny 2016 film about an Army unit sent back from Iraq for a propaganda tour schlockandawe.substack.com/p/billy-lynn...

Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk (3/8/25)

Podcaster, writer and veteran Nate Bethea joins the lads to discuss Ang Lee's weird, uncanny film about an Army unit sent back from Iraq to America for a propaganda tour.

schlockandawe.substack.com

Jack Crosbie @jscros.bsky.social · Mar 7

Had a lot of fun trying to convince my buddy Max Fisher
that getting hit in the face recreationally was good and also solve the masculinity crisis in America on Offline with
@jonfavs.bsky.social. I'm in the second half but the first half is good too :) podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/e...

Elon Musk v. Dollar Store Jon Favreau and How the UFC Conquered America

Podcast Episode · Offline with Jon Favreau · 03/06/2025 · 1h 38m

podcasts.apple.com

Reposted by Jack Crosbie

Jordan Uhl @jordanuhl.com · Feb 28

Washington Post rushed to cancel subscriptions after Jeff Bezos' directive for the opinion section to focus on "personal liberties and free markets."

@jscros.bsky.social joins me to discuss what this means for the WaPo newsroom:

www.insurgentspod.com/p/ep-353-the...

Ep 353: The Oligarch Post ft. Jack Crosbie

Jeff Bezos instructed the Washington Post's opinion section to only write about "personal liberties and free markets."

www.insurgentspod.com

Jack Crosbie @jscros.bsky.social · Feb 26

one thing that's refreshing about the second trump regime is that everything going on is pretty simple once you realize the general direction that things are going www.discourseblog.com/p/the-oligar...

The Oligarchs Aren't Being Particularly Subtle Anymore

Jeff Bezos's move to reshape the Washington Post's opinion pages makes his intentions clear.

www.discourseblog.com

Jack Crosbie @jscros.bsky.social · Feb 20

had a weird and crazy day today and decided to get in my feelings about the fact that google keeps making me sign up for linkedin against my will www.discourseblog.com/p/the-tyrann...

The Tyranny of LinkedIn Must Be Stopped

I cannot get this website to leave me alone.

www.discourseblog.com

Jack Crosbie @jscros.bsky.social · Feb 17

i think i will step up my rhetoric against Big Calculator this week

Jack Crosbie @jscros.bsky.social · Feb 17

this isn't true

Mark Cuban @mcuban.bsky.social · Feb 17

If you have zero education, but learn how to ask AI models the right questions , in many jobs you will be able to outperform someone with an advanced degree, but who is unwilling to use Large Language Models.

Just takes a smartphone, curiosity to experiment and a mindset to learn.