Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

ohmpills.bsky.social @ohmpills.bsky.social · 1d

Plenary authority refers to a single government official having absolute power on a particular matter.

www.independent.co.uk/news/world/a...

Plenary authority, the dictator phrase that caused Stephen Miller to stop talking

Miller suggests Trump wields absolute power over decisions to send in the National Guard, before suddenly stopping speaking in an awkward interview moment

www.independent.co.uk

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ohmpills.bsky.social @ohmpills.bsky.social · 1d

tRump is doing everything he can to goad his opponents & will have an increasingly authoritarian response if any of them respond w/ violence.

www.alternet.org/trump-nation...

How Trump is setting a deadly trap by goading opponents

Tensions in Chicago and Portland, Oregon are high as President Donald Trump moves forward with his federal crackdown on those heavily Democratic cities. In his column for The Bulwark, Never Trump cons...

www.alternet.org

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ohmpills.bsky.social @ohmpills.bsky.social · 1d

Air traffic controllers warn of escalating delays & stress as the tRump shutdown enters its 2nd week.

www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...

Shutdown deepens US airport chaos as staffing shortages worsen

Air traffic controllers warn of escalating delays and stress as the government shutdown enters its second week

www.theguardian.com

ohmpills.bsky.social @ohmpills.bsky.social · 2d

What is being carried out against Venezuela is not an operation against drug trafficking but rather a regime change operation.

www.counterpunch.org/2025/10/07/w...

“We Will Blow You Out of Existence:” Trump’s Caribbean Spectacle

On 23 September 2025, US President Donald Trump delivered a dramatic address, explicitly threatening those allegedly involved in drug trafficking to the United States with being blown “out of existenc...

www.counterpunch.org

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ohmpills.bsky.social @ohmpills.bsky.social · 2d

Put forward a prototype for a new type of American government, for a post-tRump country, that carries forward part of the existing institutional framework that is worth preserving, alongside radical change in response to tRump.

www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Blue states should come together to declare an emergency. Here’s how | Thomas Geoghegan

States opposed to Trump can create a compact – a new prototype for American government – even if it’s perceived as political theater

www.theguardian.com

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ohmpills.bsky.social @ohmpills.bsky.social · 2d

Nearly 28,000 people relied on Glenn Medical center for its services, but now they will have to travel more than 30 miles for care.

www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...

Rural US town outraged as only hospital forced to shut: ‘I would have died without it’

Nearly 28,000 people relied on Glenn Medical center for its services, but now they will have to travel more than 30 miles for care

www.theguardian.com

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ohmpills.bsky.social @ohmpills.bsky.social · 3d

Hyper extraction describes how the wealthy have come to touch nearly every single part of American’s. everyday life largely through private equity, which allows wealthy individuals to invest in private companies & look to parts of the economy to squeeze more.
www.theguardian.com/news/2025/oc...

Boom time for US billionaires: why the system perpetuates wealth inequality

As the super rich grow even richer, inequality expert Chuck Collins says the system is broken – but it can be fixed

www.theguardian.com

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ohmpills.bsky.social @ohmpills.bsky.social · 3d

The tRump administration abruptly cut $500 million in deliveries from a program that sends U.S.-produced meat, dairy, eggs & produce to food banks & other organizations across the country.

projects.propublica.org/trump-food-c...

Trump Canceled 94 Million Pounds of Food Aid. Here’s What Never Arrived.

ProPublica obtained records from the Department of Agriculture that detail the millions of pounds of food, down to the number of eggs, that never reached food banks because of the administration’s cut...

projects.propublica.org

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ohmpills.bsky.social @ohmpills.bsky.social · 3d

Equality & those rights must be essential parts of a constitutional democracy. In the law & in our moral realm, no one must be disadvantaged by reason of religion or creed, ethnicity, race, national origin, sex or other characteristics.

www.alternet.org/anthony-kenn...

Ex-justice reveals 'warning to judges' as Supreme Court docket threatens equal protections

After Justice Lewis F. Powell Jr., a Richard Nixon appointee, announced his retirement from the U.S. Supreme Court in 1987, President Ronald Reagan struggled to get a nominee confirmed. Reagan's first...

www.alternet.org

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ohmpills.bsky.social @ohmpills.bsky.social · 4d

They're eating cats & dogs!

"If I have to create stories so that the American media actually pays attention to the suffering of the American people, then that’s what I’m going to do."

- JD Vance 09.2024

www.counterpunch.org/2025/10/03/h...

He Tells the Truth When He Lies: a JD Vance Primer on Building Conspiracies

As of this writing, all the information the public has about the alleged killer of Kirk is that he acted alone, drove his own car, used his grandfather’s rifle, and was turned in to law enforcement by...

www.counterpunch.org

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ohmpills.bsky.social @ohmpills.bsky.social · 4d

What happens when a leader of a democratic country believes he has a license to kill & proceeds to use it?

It appears we're finding out.
www.alternet.org/trump-scotus...

The Supreme Court gave Trump a 'license to kill' — and he's using it: analysis

When the U.S. Supreme Court handed down its controversial 6-3 immunity ruling in Trump v. the United States in 2024, some scathing dissent came from one of the Barack Obama appointees: Justice Sonia S...

www.alternet.org

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ohmpills.bsky.social @ohmpills.bsky.social · 4d

By citing Ernst Fraenkel’s work, "The Dual State", Ketanji Brown Jackson is drawing a parallel between the drift in jurisprudence that's taking place under the combined actions of tRump & the supreme court & the legal structure of Nazi Germany.

www.theguardian.com/us-news/ng-i...

Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson is trying to warn us about something. Are we listening?

Jackson enters her fourth year on the supreme court on Monday. As its fiercest liberal voice wary of Trump’s growing power, she faces an intense battle ahead

www.theguardian.com

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ohmpills.bsky.social @ohmpills.bsky.social · 4d

A senior WH official accidentally leaked details of plans to send an elite army unit to Portland, in the latest intelligence leak by the tRump administration.
www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...

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ohmpills.bsky.social @ohmpills.bsky.social · 6d

The combo of cheap humour & rage bait is the province of the shitpost, low-effort social media content designed to amuse insiders & annoy outsiders.

Like so much of internet culture, shitposting was pioneered on the message board 4chan & tRump is a natural.

www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Do you know about shitposting? It’s cheap humour, rage bait – and now, it seems, US government policy | Robert Topinka

Donald Trump’s White House reveals a new ‘portrait’ of Joe Biden – and in his world, if you don’t laugh, the joke’s on you, says Robert Topinka of Birkbeck, University of London

www.theguardian.com

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ohmpills.bsky.social @ohmpills.bsky.social · 7d

As bad as Hegseth was, tRump was far worse.

He rambled somewhat incoherently & listlessly for more than an hour, airing his usual political gripes & addressing military matters only occasionally.

As is typical, he sounded both deranged & dangerous.

www.seattletimes.com/opinion/trum...

Trump, Hegseth military grandstanding an embarrassment

The president and the secretary of defense disgrace themselves scolding military commanders.

www.seattletimes.com

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ohmpills.bsky.social @ohmpills.bsky.social · 7d

Kegsbreth talked about the previous commander in chief, president Biden & then talked about the ‘enemy within’. That is a dangerous slippery slope to be referring to that to the leaders of the US military. Very dangerous.
www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...

Veterans react to Hegseth’s ‘insulting’ address to generals and admirals

Defense secretary’s speech touching on physical fitness and doctrine of lethality was seen as ‘egotistical’ and ‘dangerous’

www.theguardian.com

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ohmpills.bsky.social @ohmpills.bsky.social · 8d

Can we be confident that tRump & Hegseth won’t succeed in turning the U.S. military into something more like ICE?

The thought seems incredible.

But that ICE would be doing what it is now doing on our streets would have been shocking just a year ago.
www.thebulwark.com/p/the-silenc...

The Silence of the Generals

And the searing words of a veteran on the bench.

www.thebulwark.com

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ohmpills.bsky.social @ohmpills.bsky.social · 9d

The idea of the internal enemy was intrinsically connected to a notion about the inferiority, impurity & treasonous nature of those who were considered different from the majority. Fascists disputed the idea that citizenship defined the community.

www.alternet.org/the-right-wi...

'Fascism as a playbook': Trump says US 'under invasion from within'

President Donald Trump warned all 800 of America’s top military leaders that there is a “war from within” and that the nation is “under invasion” — not by armies in uniform, he said.“America is under ...

www.alternet.org

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ohmpills.bsky.social @ohmpills.bsky.social · 9d

The suspected shooter in the killing of at least 4 people in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Michigan, Marine veteran Thomas Jacob Sanford, bore a virulent hatred of the Mormon religion which he referred to as the antichrist.

www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...

Michigan church shooting suspect bore a hatred of Mormon religion, locals say

Michigan suspect was a Marine veteran, as was suspect in another recent shooting in North Carolina, who has been charged with murder

www.theguardian.com

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ohmpills.bsky.social @ohmpills.bsky.social · 9d

These are rules that’ll cause an enormous amount of hardship for millions of people in communities across the country.

It’s going to cause people to become homeless, kids to be pulled out of their schools, people to lose their jobs.

www.propublica.org/article/trum...

Millions Could Lose Housing Aid Under Trump Plan

Drafts of unpublished rules obtained by ProPublica detail plans that would open the door to full-time work requirements, two-year limits on living in federally supported housing and stripping aid from...

www.propublica.org

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ohmpills.bsky.social @ohmpills.bsky.social · 9d

Noem’s actions suggest the injection of political favoritism into an agency tasked w/ saving lives & rebuilding communities wiped out by disaster.

It heightens concerns about the discretion Noem has by personally handling all 6 figure expenses at the agency.

www.propublica.org/article/kris...

Kristi Noem Fast-Tracked Millions in Disaster Aid to Florida Tourist Attraction After Campaign Donor Intervened

The DHS chief has been widely criticized for slowing down FEMA’s response after natural disasters. Texts and emails obtained by ProPublica point to an effective way to get help faster: have one of Noe...

www.propublica.org

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ohmpills.bsky.social @ohmpills.bsky.social · 9d

The speech that’s being pushed by the political MAGA/tRump white supremacist agenda is intended to cause harm & to inflict mental anguish.

The words they use, the ideas disguised as simple free speech is metastasizing as a cancer & infecting the country.

www.counterpunch.org/2025/09/29/t...

The First Amendment as a Racist Weapon

The debates over the protection of free speech have been raging since before the killing of Charles Kirk. The killing of Charles Kirk has taken this discussion into another realm. Jimmy Kimmel was a h...

www.counterpunch.org

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ohmpills.bsky.social @ohmpills.bsky.social · 9d

tRump has made clear his disagreement w/& even his contempt for some of the core teachings of Jesus & acknowledged that he’s a man driven by vengeance.

It’s not simply that those qualities are part of who he is; it is that he draws strength from the dark passions.

www.alternet.org/trump-jesus-...

Trump is 'an almost perfect inversion of the moral teachings of Jesus': GOP speechwriter

The former speechwriter for three Republican presidents and a senior fellow at the non-profit Christian organization The Trinity Forum explains what he calls "fully MAGA-fied Christianity" in his late...

www.alternet.org

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ohmpills.bsky.social @ohmpills.bsky.social · 10d

Until Democrats work out how to bridge that divide between “they/them” & “you”, between oat milk latte & whiskey, they risk fighting the next election w/ the same flaws that doomed them last time.

www.thetimes.com/us/opinion/a...

As Kamala Harris settles scores, Democrats face an identity crisis

No corner of the party is spared from blame in the defeated candidate’s memoir. So can they make their public perception a little less ‘oat milk’?

www.thetimes.com

ohmpills.bsky.social @ohmpills.bsky.social · 10d

This unapologetic trawl through a doomed campaign reveals a celebrity-obsessed party high on its own supply. It would be hilarious if it wasn’t so tragic.

www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Kamala Harris’s election memoir shows just how deluded the Democrats still are | Nesrine Malik

This unapologetic trawl through a doomed campaign reveals a celebrity-obsessed party high on its own supply. It would be hilarious if it wasn’t so tragic, says Guardian columnist Nesrine Malik

www.theguardian.com

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